Is global warming now beyond debate? When does dissent become Untruth and lose the rights and respect due to "legitimate dissent"? Who decides

To summarise - what we are seeing is a revival of mythic thinking. Whilst this blog examines integral approaches we actually live in a time when the rational stage is being eroded by the mythic. Al Gore’s book is about the many ways that mythic thinking (ideology is a form of mythic thinking) has replaced reason in US politics.

Beliefs come in three flavors: true, false, and untested. Obviously we should want to have only true beliefs if we are to function as rational participants in a social and political world as complex as ours. One thing in our favor is that we cannot hold a false belief. If that sounds odd then just think of the many examples that occur daily. I believe I left the keys in the car, but when I go there to get them, they are not there. I can no longer hold that false belief. Or, I feel drops of water on my neck during a rain storm and believe the roof has sprung a leak (again). But, looking around I see that my grandson has just shot me from a fair distance with his new water pistol. I cannot hold that leaking roof false belief any longer.

As a believer myself, I can hardly be against belief per se. But I am against all kinds of beliefs, based on religion, politics or science, that spare no room for doubt. Belief gives us meaning and direction. But we need doubt to give us a sense of proportion. Without an appreciation of our own follies, belief turns into an instrument of domination. All of us, whatever our beliefs and incli nations, could do with a serious dose of doubt. We need, says my friend Stuart Sim in his latest book, Empires of Belief, to be far more sceptical towards all belief systems, science included. We need doubt in both our private and public lives: at home, in the market and in the political process.

Psst! Have you heard The Secret? If not, the first thing you need to know is that The Secret isn’t a secret, and this in itself should set your skeptical alarm bells ringing, since whenever the very name of a thing is a contradiction of the thing itself, it is easy to imagine that the bridge up ahead may be washed out.