The Guadalajara Reporter

Myths, dicey things, can unite a nation or lead to a self-delusion. Some are clearly fabricated and used to mislead

Soldiers — celebrated with soaring hosannas that foster myths once war is over — have been treated by their commanders for much of history as what in now known as “cannon fodder.” Military personnel, during most of the world’s great wars were issued no IDs, so identification of the dead, was chancy. Identification tags, weren’t issued until sometime in 1914.

Several days ago in The New York Times, Alex Rosenberg, professor and Philosophy Department chairman at Duke University, posed a sharply argued defense of “the philosophical theory that treats science as our most reliable source of knowledge and scientific method as the most effective route to knowledge” – superior to other theoretical endeavors, say, literary theory and most certainly myth. While his paean to rationality is provocative and instructive — and valuable at this moment in history — its exclusivity prompts an immediate common-knowledge refutation: The dramatically apparent reality that we are not rational animals — as a brief and candid survey by any person of his/her past shows. National and world history clearly illustrates this — including current political events in the United States and Mexico.

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