this confusing modern world

 To gain clarity in this confusing modern world I have no better solution that the medieval idea of synthesis between faith and reason but nowadays it would be a bit different than the Middle Ages. For one thing Reason would not mean just Plato and Aristotle, but would include Kant [and I would dare to add Leonard Nelson.] Also the Rishonim like the Rambam that had Physics being an integral part of learning Torah would include modern Physics. [Hegel might also be considered a powerful sequel to Kant but with the Friesian approach Nelson (and Kelley Ross) I found a lot more answers than i did in Hegel. ] 

As for faith, I realize there is a crisis in faith in itself. Rav Nahman of Breslov pointed out the problem of Torah scholars that are demons [in his book Le.M vol. I, ch. 12 and 28].These teachers make getting to authentic Torah problematic. The best thing I can see is to get through the Tenach and the Two Talmuds and Midrashim by fast learning, and to have at least one in depth session in "Iyun" in Tosphot, Maharsha. and the Avi Ezri of Rav Shach [or Reb Chaim of Brisk.] [This sort of learning in depth along the line of Reb Chaim was the way of the Mir in NY when I was there. But there is also a way of learning Tosphot in depth that is more difficult to decribe. ]  

  

People need more than knowledge. They need wisdom.

 People need more than knowledge. They need wisdom. And by that I mean an understanding of what life is all about. This is the role that the Bible used to play in the lives of people. But when the Bible became disenfranchised, people find other things to fill that gap in their lives. And the new myths are most often teaching lessons that are pernicious. Thus you find in the Bible the fact that sufferings has  a reason--sufferings are an unavoidable part of the  human condition. We all suffer and cause others to suffer. In the Bible, the reason is simple: What goes around, comes around. But when people lack that wisdom, they find other reasons for their  plights and dilemmas. For women, that is men. For the "woke" it is being born in the wrong body. The list goes on.  

professors of gender, race studies, psychology. ...

 STEM [Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics ] and labor [working people] make a coalition in liberal capitalistic societies. Who is left out?  The Intellectuals, the pseudo enlightened, the Humanities professors that can't compute, can't do the math, can't make anything that people want. So what do they do? They claim secret knowledge that supposedly everyone needs. That is the university professors of gender, race studies, psychology. philosophy. literature, etc., that no one needs  or wants, and can not make anything that people need. Theirs's is the politics of resentment.  Everyone wants people that can do stuff; can go to the moon, can make computers, that drive trucks. Who needs the pseudo intellectuals? 

 I was walking out side the other day and saw printed on the back of someone's sweater "שומר אחי" ("My brother's keeper").That is in reference to what Cain asked God, "Am I my brother's keeper?"(This was just  after murdering him.)  This reminds me of the attitude that everyone had toward my son, Izhak (also known as Nahman), when he was begging for help and everyone's answer was "Am I my brother's keeper?" Everyone's answer should have been just what was printed on that fellow's sweatshirt:  "שומר אחי" ("My brother's keeper")

 za6 midi file

The subject of string theory

The  subject of string theory came up recently so I thought to write down my thinking on this. Mainly it is appeal to authority. Feynman worked long and hard on gravity and saw that quantum gravity has no chance since it is not renormalizable. So if there is any way to reconcile QM with gravity, it has to be something else. Then there is the remarkable fact that String Theory has a two spin particle which arises  naturally in the equations; and for  along time that was thought to be a strike against it until someone realized that the graviton implied in General Relativity is  a two spin particle.

't Hooft has a synopsis of it, and also Siegel at Stony Brook in NY. 

I am nothing, but a layman, but this I how I see things. Maybe I am not qualified to offer an opinion but neither are most of the enemies of string theory. They are certainly not in the major league like 't Hooft or Siegel or Susskind at Stanford.

Musar approach of the Rishonim

I might have just gone with the Musar approach of the Rishonim except that their framework is faith {sinai} with reason {Aristotle}. That works for me to some degree except for the problem pointed out by Berkley that there is nothing of the heat of the fire or the sharpness of the sword that enters the mind to give an idea of heat or fire. To see that point clearly it helps to read Thomas Reid, the common sense philosopher. [There are also problems  in Aristotle's Metaphysics.] So the purely Aristotelian approach is not possible except with some sort of modification. Thus, the three critiques of Kant are a necessary development. That leaves me however with some problems in Kant which were noticed almost before the ink was dry. From that emanated a few schools. To me the one that makes the most sense is Jacob Fries and Leonard Nelson. ["Why not Hegel?" you might ask. For me, the reason is the dialectic method is a tool of reason, but not the only way reason progress. Empirical evidence is needed. There is the problem of pure reason alone that Kant pointed out.