Friday, July 29, 2005

What Worldviews and Typing Have in Common

Yesterday I was typing an excerpt from a book to email to a friend. My fingers were flying while my eyes were fixed on the paragraph I was quoting. I was surprised when I looked up at the monitor and found the following: "zpg vpitdr. ,u dpi; ;pbrd yjod dysyr pg imvrtysom." Obviously, my fingers were not properly positioned on the home keys. Worldviews are a lot like typing. If we have the wrong starting point, we'll end up with incoherence. The trick is getting people to stop typing long enough to look at the screen.

9 comments:

Tony Byrne said...

Apparently you just needed someone with the gift of interpretation.

"zpg vpitdr. ,u dpi; ;pbrd yjod dysyr pg imvrtysom"

roughly translates to:

"The theological views of Tony are far superior to mine."

I didn't say it! I am merely the humble translator!

Good illustration in your post ;-)

Chris Meirose said...

I think you were just typing in tongues. You pentacostal you.

Big Chris
Because I said so

Sarah J. Flashing said...

Keith, you took the words right out of my fingers...and you managed to do it with the wrong row on the keyboard!

KP said...

Tony - I haven't yet received confirmation of your interpretation in my spirit but I'll let you know if I do.

David - What I was thinking of most was the incoherence of non-Christian worldviews but I'd also include the inconsistency you referred to. Francis Schaeffer, to whom Pearcey in indebted, frequently said that the more consistent unbelievers are in taking their unbiblical presuppositions to their logical ends, the more removed they will be from reality as they experience it. Pearcey does a very good job of illustrating this in Total Truth. I agree with you that this is a fruitful apologetic insight. By the way, you can find an audio interview I did with Nancy here.

Big Chris - Shhhhh! You'll blow my cover.

Sarah - Great minds think alike. ;-)

Myron - This is not a billboard. Thank you.

Anonymous said...

tohjy pm yjr ,pmru

KP said...

OK, if people insist on using language like that, I'm going to have to do away with anonymous comments. I apologize to those readers with the gift of interpretation (like Tony B.) who were offended.

Tony Byrne said...

One of the things that came to my mind was the issue of sin. Many times, it's not a case of mere mental confusion, but a stubborn refusal to look at the screen or adjust their fingers. I believe we would all acknowledge that there is a moral dimension involved that the analogy tends to miss.

Anonymous said...

G'day Tony and Keith,

not wanting to turn this into a discussion, but I dont think even we van tillian reformed theologians are not aware of he amount of reconstruction our minds effect in our process of theologising. We are not immune from that.

Davidponter

KP said...

Hey, David! Glad to have you on board. I agree. We're no doubt unaware of the extent and we're not immune.