What is the difference between science and pseudo-science? The criterion by which our current practices distinguish the two is falsifiability, but what is inherently valuable about falsifiable hypotheses? Presumably, the goal of science is the discovery of truth. If an unfalsifiable method predicted data more reliably than a falsifiable one, shouldn’t we adopt the unfalsifiable method? Leon Wieseltier, literary editor of The New Republic, is untroubled by this puzzle or myriad similar puzzles. Or perhaps he has solved them all. That would at least justify the oracular certainty with which he proclaims, in the first sentence of his choleric review of philosopher Daniel Dennett’s new book Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon (“The God Genome,” NYT, 2/19/06), … Read the rest
Valor Words
Jun 21st, 2006 5:18 pm | By Ophelia BensonSo here’s Matt Yglesias noting another valor-word issue. This time the word is ‘principle’. I’m good because I have principles. Well that’s nice, but what kind of principles? What principles? Which ones? Be specific. Give details. Include time place and brand.
Indeed, most Lieberman supporters seem to have abandoned making the case for their man on the merits. Instead, the keyword is principle. A DLC press release called Lieberman “a man of utmost integrity who speaks and governs by his values and principles.”
And there’s another one – integrity. Integrity, again, is only as good as it is. Lots of people can have integrity. The integrity of an axe-murderer isn’t all that desirable. The integrity of a selfish conceited bullying … Read the rest
Principles are Good Only if They are Good
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonJust saying you have some isn’t good enough.… Read the rest
What’s Up With Democrats Against Estate Tax?
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonNot a lot of clear thinking, anyway.… Read the rest
Ann Coulter is not a ‘National Treasure’ [link fixed]
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonSpinsanity has documented many distortions in Coulter’s earlier books.… Read the rest
On Ronald Aronson on Sartre and Camus
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonA provocative account of the contribution they made to modern literature and philosophy.… Read the rest
Review of Anthony Appiah’s Cosmopolitanism
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonConversation is one way of habituating people to appreciate differences in others.… Read the rest
Update on Reza Moradi
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonKeith Porteous Wood of the NSS found him a pro bono lawyer; they await the summons.… Read the rest
Bloom on Goldstein on Spinoza
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonAs in Epicurus and Lucretius, Spinoza’s God is scarcely distinguishable from Nature, and indifferent to us.… Read the rest
Nonsense from National Review (No, really?!)
Jun 21st, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonNaughty Richard Dawkins hurts people’s feelings by telling the truth. How howwid.… Read the rest
That Special Glow
Jun 20th, 2006 2:11 am | By Ophelia BensonI need a word to describe a category of word that (when used for rhetorical purposes) presumes to declare its own value in advance of judgment. Pre-emptive, or pseudo-hurrah, are the two I’ve come up with.
The one I have in mind at the moment is ‘family’. This is by no means the first time I’ve had hard thoughts about that word (there was the 2000 presidential campaign, for instance, when the Democrats completely dropped the word ‘people’ from their vocabularies in favour of ‘families’, so that working people became working families, as if they were all hired and paid in a bunch instead of one at a time), but they’re always being refreshed; at the moment it’s Faisal Bodi’s … Read the rest
Gurinder Osan on Erroneous ‘Merit’ Argument
Jun 19th, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonResponse to quotas for backward castes in education reveals unattractive features of Indian society.… Read the rest
Praful Bidawi on India’s Merit-obsessed Discourse
Jun 19th, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘To put it bluntly, these are the Babas and Babys of yesterday’s Baba Log – children of the middle class elite.’… Read the rest
Nick Cohen on Backroom Deals
Jun 19th, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonRevolting and typical that largely male employers and trade unionists struck deals which failed to give women their due. … Read the rest
Microscope on Medialens
Jun 19th, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonPeter Beaumont is expecting another Medialens-ing.… Read the rest
Peter Beaumont Reads Noam Chomsky
Jun 19th, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘Chomsky has allowed bile and rhetoric to replace intellectual rigour in his latest diatribe.’… Read the rest
Please Sir Can I Teach Nonsense?
Jun 18th, 2006 7:31 pm | By Ophelia BensonSo ‘faith schools’ want ‘exemption from new equality laws in order to carry on teaching that homosexuality is a sin’ do they. That’s interesting.
At the moment, many faith schools make children aware of different sexual practices, but underline that anything other than heterosexuality is a sin. In a submission to the unit, the CofE said that it would not wish to discriminate against pupils or parents on grounds of sexual orientation in the context of admissions or in disciplinary procedures. But it insisted that schools should be free to teach that homosexuality is at odds with the Bible.
Thus we see why the realm of education, if it is to be real education, has to be secular. It’s like … Read the rest
Gain and Loss
Jun 18th, 2006 7:00 pm | By Ophelia BensonJean Drèze notes an important fact that’s worth keeping in mind:
Sen is praised as a “feminist economist” but it is not very clear what “feminist” actually stands for (except for a general concern with gender issues) and why Sen qualifies. A notable exception is Martha Nussbaum’s bold assessment. Taking issue with the notion that freedom is always a desirable social goal, she points out that “gender justice cannot be successfully pursued without limiting male freedom”.
Fer sher. And that’s one reason there is so much Faisal Bodiesque blather about keeping families intact and dealing with problems within the community, cluttering up the place – because improvement of the lot of women (whether you call it justice, or freedom, or … Read the rest
Jean Drèze on Feminist Reading of Sen
Jun 18th, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonNussbaum points out that ‘gender justice cannot be successfully pursued without limiting male freedom.’… Read the rest
Pratap Bhanu Mehta on Book on Dalit Phobia
Jun 18th, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIn our discourse on caste, Dalits’ marginality and exclusion does not get the attention it deserves.… Read the rest