Back in the spring, I posted two pieces in a series. In one, I argued that by a usual definition of “ordinary means,” widely (almost universally) recommended vaccines, including COVID vaccines, are ordinary means. In the second, I posted snippets […]
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Catholic Identity Conference Misses the Mark on All 3 Points
This week, several Catholics in Pittsburgh are going to declare their resistance to Pope Francis at the Catholic Identity Confernece. They claim three main issues where Pope Francis needs resisting but on all three they are wildly off-target. They interpret […]
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What to Do If the Seal of Confession Is Broken
Since issues regarding breaking the seal of confession from time to time online, I will write the “for dummies” version of how to respond if this happens. To begin, directly breaking the seal is latae sententiae (automatic) excommunication: they are cut off […]
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The Church Cannot Change Teaching on Homosexuality (Hollerich Errs)
Last week, another leader in the Church has suggested we should change our teaching on homosexuality. However, “should” implies there that the one doing the action is able. However, the Church has no power to change her teaching on homosexual […]
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Summarizing My Thought from Twitter
Mark Wilson over at Catholic Bard has searched through my Twitter pretty extensively to catalog / summarize my thought. He compiled a long piece that might be helpful for those wanting a summary of what I have posted on rather […]
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Suing Social Media for Addiction?
It is almost a joke that many have social media addiction today. Tons of people seem to have at least a low-level and manageable addiction. Now we need to raise questions about the ethical and legal responsibilities of social media […]
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What Is Medical Testing? (A Response to Dr. Paul Casey)
Dr. Paul Casey wrote a piece arguing that very few medicines had medical testing on fetal cell lines, specifically HEK-293. The main issue with his argument is that he uses non-standard definitions of terms like medical testing and lying, and […]
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Privacy & Social Media on the Ethics and Culture Cast
Back in November, I was at the de Nicola Center’s annual Fall Conference at Nore Dame. I presented on human dignity and privacy focusing on the social encyclicals, Alan Westin, and John Paul II. Ken Hallenius, one of the people working […]
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Catholic Anti-Vax Arguments & Reductio ad Absurdum (2/2)
Yesterday, I posted a piece explaining the structure and possible counterarguments to a reductio ad absurdum. If you haven’t read that, you might want to go and read it. Now we deal with a claim where a reductio ad absurdum […]
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Identifying and Arguing Against Reductio ad Absurdum (1/2)
A common mode of argument is formally called reductio ad absurdum. The point of this is to take your opponents’ arguments and show absurd conclusions that follow from those arguments. The point of the reductio is quite obviously to argue […]
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