Luke Cooksey

DO-PhD(c) 🩺🧬🔬| ἀποκατάστασις | תִּיקּוּן עוֹלָם | Views are my own.

[Ryan Haecker @RyanHaecker]

Atheism is so obviously false

“I have to admit that I find it impossible to take atheism very seriously as an intellectual position. As an emotional commitment or a moral passion—a rejection of barren or odious dogmatisms, an inability to believe in a good or provident power behind a world in which there is so much suffering, defiance of "Whatever brute and blackguard made the world," and so forth—atheism seems to me an entirely plausible attitude toward the predicaments of finite existence; but, as a metaphysical picture of reality, it strikes me as a rank superstition. I cannot imagine how it is possible coherently to believe that the material order is anything but an ontologically contingent reality, which necessarily depends upon an absolute and transcendent source of existence. To me, the argument for the reality of God from the contingency of all composite and mutable things seems unarguably true, with an almost analytic obviousness; and all philosophical attempts to get around that argument (and I am fairly sure I am familiar with all of them) seem to me lack anything like its power and lucidity.”

—David Bentley Hart, The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss (pg. 294)

[Girardism @Girardism]

René Girard on the argument of the Grand Inquisitor:

“The Inquisitor does not confuse the message of Christ with the psychological cancer to which it leads, by contrast to Nietzsche and Freud. He therefore doesn't accuse Christ of having underestimated human nature, but of having overestimated it, of not having understood that the impossible morality of love necessarily leads to a world of masochism and humiliation.

The Grand Inquisitor doesn't seek to make an end of idolatry by an act of metaphysical force, like Kirillov; he wants rather to heal evil with evil, to tie humans to immutable idols, and in particular, to an idolatrous conception of Christ.

... The error of Christ, in the eyes of the Inquisitor, is all the less excusable because ‘Christ had adequate warnings.’ In the course of the temptations in the wilderness, the devil, the ‘profound spirit of self-destruction and nothingness,’ revealed to the redeemer and placed at his disposal the three means capable of insuring the stability, well-being, and happiness of humanity. Christ disdained them, but the Inquisitor and his ilk have taken them up, and work — always in the name of Christ but in a Spirit contrary to his — for the advent of an earthly kingdom more in keeping with the limitations of human nature.”

— René Girard

[Sam Sherman @Sherman_FFB]

Kirk Cousins agent

[Greg Jennings @GregJennings]

Well, would you look at this... 😃

[John Mandrola, MD @drjohnm]

Remarkable

[Dutch Rojas @DutchRojas]

Holy Smokes.

A nonprofit health system declares a young man “brain dead.”

His father pulls a weapon.
The health system goes into lockdown.

Then it happens,
The son wakes up.
He makes a full recovery.

The father gets 11 months in prison.

When a citizen defies the system,
they face prison.

When a nonprofit health system nearly ends a life too early to begin an organ harvesting process, it’s called “protocol.”

The health system kept its nonprofit shield.

The executives kept their tax-advantaged compensation.

The organ procurement relationships stayed intact.

And every chart was locked.

No one in the system faced consequences.

Context they don’t want you to see:

Tomball Regional Medical Center was run by Tomball Regional Health Foundation , a 501(c)(3) nonprofit.

Declaring “brain death” hands legal control of the body to the medical–legal system, not the family.

Nonprofit health systems receive federal incentives for organ donation coordination.

Those incentives flow through Organ Procurement Organizations (OPOs) — financial partners to the hospitals.

They call it “care.”
I call it a system with perverse incentives, and one man with 11 months in prison was the only person who paid a price.

Not #healthcare

Credit for OG post: @DesireeAmerica4

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@RyanHaecker I would've switched majors from biochem to english on the spot.

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@OnAncientPaths I may be behind on the times, but I hope you still write that book on defending Christian ethical veganism!

[Ryan Haecker @RyanHaecker]

Goals

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

Tim MacMahon is alternate timeline Billy Napier with a winning record at Florida.

Change my mind.
@BannedMacMahon

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@BrandonLuuMD Of course it was an ortho resident 😂

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@CarolusCarman A Hidden Life is one of my favorite movies, but I have to extensively prepare myself for the heaviness every time I watch it.

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@JPGK_MD I'm just impressed you have the wherewithal for philosophical reflection during the rigors of neurosurgery residency at a busy hospital!

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@CarolusCarman Everyday is a good day for listening to Arvo Pärt for some of us...

[Nature is Amazing ☘️ @AMAZlNGNATURE]

Baby elephant chases birds, falls and goes to mama crying

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@TheChiefNerd 3) get angry, brow-beat, and mock anyone who challenges his views. This is not a recipe for arriving at sound conclusions. Viewers, be on (logical) guard.

[Luke Cooksey @LukeCooksey_]

@TheChiefNerd Joe's process of study appears to be: 1) hear of a fringe theory that biases toward vaccine skepticism; 2) invite fringe theory-rep podcast guest on for discussion and buy what they're selling without methodical and skeptical criticism so long as it fits his bias;

[Grok @grok]

Joe Rogan's key claims analyzed:

- Autism rate 1 in 12 boys in CA: Affirmed by CDC 2022 data (80.1 per 1,000).

- Link to strict vaccine policies/autism: No evidence; scientific consensus finds no vaccine-autism link (e.g., Johns Hopkins, multiple studies).

- MMR causes serious issues: Debunked; large studies (e.g., 650k+ children) show no autism association.

- No placebo-controlled vaccine tests: Partial; many use placebos, but ethics often require active controls.

- Tetanus treatable by cleaning wound: Debunked; vaccine essential to prevent.

- Polio from DDT: Debunked; caused by virus, eradicated by vaccines.

- 1986 Act exempted pharma from lawsuits, ramped schedule: Affirmed; NCVIA limited liability.

- Diseases eradicated by sanitation/nutrition over vaccines: Mixed; both contribute, vaccines key for polio/smallpox.

- Pharma corruption/revolving door: Affirmed; documented FDA-industry transitions raise concerns.