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A Guide for the 20th-century Pagan
Collection StructureFiring Line broadcast records > Episode guide > A Guide for the 20th-century Pagan
Item Title A Guide for the 20th-century Pagan
Guest Adler, Mortimer Jerome (1902-2001)
Host Buckley, William F., Jr. (1925-2008)
Date CreatedFebruary 15, 1980
Description

A great bookman, in his second appearance on Firing Line, talks about "what one can say to pagans without any appeal to faith": that is, he tells them about "the God of the philosophers," who "converges" with but is not identical to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. This conversation is sometimes difficult for the non-philosopher, but Mr. Adler has the gift of choosing illustrations to bring us along. MJA: "Kant made a simple mistake.... He said that a hundred dollars in my pocket is not greater than a hundred dollars in my mind. I think that's just nonsense. A hundred dollars in my pocket will do things that a hundred dollars in my mind will not do. I understand the error that he made. Existence is not an ordinary predicate, not an ordinary absolute. It's not like red or green or large or heavy or here or there. And he therefore thought that existence is not a characterizing term. But to say that that which exists in reality does not have more existence and more power than that which exists only in the mind is nonsense."

Language(s)
Country of Origin
Place RecordedAlexandria, Virginia, United States
DimensionsDuration: 60 minutes
FormatText
Medium television programs
Aspect Ratio
4:3
Color
color
Soundtrack
sound
Hoover IDProgram S0408
Record Number80040.650
NotesVideo available through special order.
RightsCopyright held by Stanford University. This copy is provided for educational and research purposes only. No publication, further reproduction, or reuse of copies, beyond fair use, may be made without the express written permission of the Hoover Institution Library & Archives on behalf of Stanford University.

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