[W]e enter a period in which Christianity slowly but surely loses its hegemonic position in intellectual discourse, while academic historians of philosophy abandon the currents and ideas associated with “Platonic Orientalism” as unworthy of serious…
Tag: meta
Wouter Hanegraaff on religionism & eclectism
Due to their utter incompatibility with the findings of modern historical criticism, these two traditional perspectives [apologetic and anti-apologetic currents] were unable to keep up with scholarly progress in the study of ancient religions, and…
Wouter Hanegraaff on the Enlightment paradigm as the beginning of the eclipse of ‘Western esotericism’
The “Enlightenment paradigm” announced so clearly in [Christoph August] Heumann’s Acta Philosophorum was the beginning of the eclipse of “Western esotericism” in modern intellectual discourse. So far, the “pagan” philosophies associated with Platonic Orientalism had…
Wouter Hanegraaff on Jacob Thomasius & Ehregott Daniel Colberg
As already noted, [Jacob] Thomasius was not just a critical historian of philosophy. First and foremost, he was a pious Lutheran who believed that the biblical revelation was the only reliable source of religious truth…
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Wouter Hanegraaff on the anti-apologetic foundations of the history of philosophy as a modern discipline
Like Savonarola, Gianfrancesco [Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s nephew & follower of Savonarola] points to sacred scripture as the sole, exclusive and absolutely infallible source of true knowledge: the certainty given by absolute…
Wouter Hanegraaff on the historiographical foundations of the Western esotericism
Before moving on to the anti-apologetic reaction, it is important to provide a brief evaluation of what the preceding discussion contributes to the leading problematics of this book as a whole. I have been arguing…
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Kiril Avramov, Vasily Gatov and Ilya Yablokov, pledging devotion
While the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign was the first where digital technology played a significant role (and contestants had dedicated teams for this purpose), it was the very first major political event in which digitally…
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Steven M. Smallpage, Hugo Drochon, Joseph E. Uscinski & Casey Klofstad on the demographics of conspiracy theorists
Conspiracy beliefs are individuals’ acceptance of specific conspiracy theories as likely true. […] Of course, polling leaves room for interpretaion. First, how a survey item is worded can affect if the idea being asked about…
Annika Rabo on witchcraft
Mass media have played, and continue to play, a large role in the ‘uncovering’ of evil forces. Not only newspapers, radio and television spread news of witchcraft, but in films produced for a mass audience…
Andrew McKenzie-McHarg on (a)temporality of conspiracy theories
Bratich’s [Bratich, J.Z. (2008) Conspiracy panics: political rationality and popular culture, Albany: State University of New York Press] line of argument, implies that conspiracy theories, if they exist at all, only do so from the…
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