Jeremy Taylor wrote:

Chomsky is an anarchist, specifically an anarcho--communist.

Maybe. I mentioned his name only to illustrate how skewed/broad Feser's brush is when painting liberalism.

Reading closer, Feser provides two direct identifiers to the liberalism he is talking about. One is Hillary Clinton  and the other is French Revolution. What would you say, what's the connection between these two? My point is that if these two have a connection, then Chomsky fits into the mix just fine.

Jeremy Taylor wrote:

I also don't see that pointing out the hypocrisy of the dominant form of left-liberalism necessitates advocating for conservatism. I'm a Platonic univeralist. I have the greatest respect for Islam and traditional Islamic civilisation. I consider it as divine and sacred as Christian civilisation or any other. But I still notice left-liberal hypocrisy surrounding it.
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It's correct that pointing out problems with a stance does not necessitate a particular different stance. However, when the problematic stance is poorly identified, it raises questions whether it's actually misidentified and whether perhaps the accuser's own stance is problematic.

Jeremy Taylor wrote:

Palestinians are considered the underdogs, the oppressed by left-liberals and much of the left. Therefore, they are treated as the generally in the right and Israelis in the wrong regardless of the facts.

Hmm. What would you say the facts are? Do for example Chomsky and Finkelstein present facts or narrow ideological talking points when they discuss the topic?

Jeremy Taylor wrote:

seigneur wrote:

 
So neocons are liberals. Who knew?

I thought it was common knowledge that many started out as liberals or leftists and blended their liberalism with conservatism.

 ​Personally, I wouldn't judge movements simply on their foreign policy.

 
Neither do I. On the political arena, the role of conservatives is (simply, if you like) to bicker with liberals.

Just like there are no permanent inherent core liberal values in politics (as Feser has demonstrated very convincingly in his analysis time and again), there are also no inherent core conservative values. The common element of conservative policies is either to thwart an alleged threat from liberals or to oppose the current liberal slogan for no particular reason. Pro-life versus pro-choice, pro-war versus anti-war, pro-hoarding versus pro-spending, etc. Nevermind the nature of the issue of life/choice, war/peace and hoarding/spending, nevermind the particular outcomes and effects of the agenda.

Conservatives in politics serve no other purpose than to be in virtual opposition to liberals. They are each others' mirror images, both equally fluid, essenceless.

Sustaining the actual core values and observing the continuity of the society would be traditionalism, something that normally doesn't exist in politics. It would take an actual statesman to do it. But there are no statesmen these days. We only have politicians.

In my own conversion, arguments for God have been irrelevant. However, admittedly, when explaining one's own theism to someone else, it goes by way of logical proof or philosophical argument. Some arguments are better than others (more coherent/compelling) or more aligned to one's own perspective.

It would be interesting to take a look at some of the arguments in the list. Thanks, AKG.

Alexander wrote:

I don't read Feser as trying to prove Christianity right and Islam wrong. Obviously, he does think Christianity is right, and Islam is wrong, but I don't think you would need to accept such a view to agree with much of what he says in the posts (I think it's perfectly compatible with a neutral position toward both).

His posts are neutral, if you ignore much (even most) what he writes. In several paragraphs, he writes "Christianity" or even "Catholicism" where "classical theism" would be more appropriate and more balanced.. And he writes "Islam" instead of "Wahhabi/fundamentalist Salafi". I must assume that he either means what he writes or he is occasionally overlooking important distinctions on a host of delicate and nuanced topics, so that he ends up presenting a pro-Catholic spin where it's inappropriate.

Christianity is definitely more than Catholicism and classical theism is emphatically not peculiar to Christian doctrines and violence/injustice is not somehow more inherent to Islam than to Christianity, yet several of his passages seem to be repeatedly asserting the contrary on all these points. For example he says that crusades were essentially a defensive affair. In reality, the fourth crusade sacked Constantinople and went no further (meaning, the slogan of defence of Holy Land was empty propaganda). Constantinople never properly recovered from the crusade, Muslims eventually conquered it and stood soon enough at Vienna. So there.

I am unwilling to read professor Feser by way of misrepresentation. I will assume he meant what he wrote. What he wrote weakens my trust for the way he sees politics. He writes about liberalism, Christianity, and Islam as political forces. While I agree with much that he writes about the nature of liberalism, as soon as he mentions some names of supposed liberals, I am at loss. In what way is Sam Harris, a very loud proponent of G. W. Bush's crusade (G. W. Bush's own term), a liberal? Probably Feser la

How does he formulate his rejection of intentionality? Do you have a quote or a reference?