‘The success of scientific explanations of the natural world makes religious explanations redundant.’… Read the rest
Oral History Bumps into Regulation 
Nov 30th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
With colleges wary of potential lawsuits, oral historians find their work caught up in regulatory reviews.… Read the rest
Michael Walzer on the Utilitarianism of Extremity
Nov 30th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
When our deepest values are radically at risk, the constraints lose their grip.… Read the rest
Why Arendt Matters
Nov 30th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Arendt blurred categories; a philosopher who offered notes on the very latest world affairs.… Read the rest
Ronald Dworkin Reviews Peter Kramer’s Freud
Nov 30th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘Freudian analysis is not science; it is fashion, totally dependent on public acclaim.’… Read the rest
How to Train a Computer to Think Like a Person
Nov 30th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Intelligence Augmentation uses human beings as part of computer programs.… Read the rest
Scott McLemee on the Yale Book of Quotations
Nov 30th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Billie Holliday and Bob Dylan, worth the space, but ‘Plop plop fizz fizz’?… Read the rest
Nigel Warburton Interviews Stephen Law
Nov 30th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Consider the relationship between sentimentality and Christmas.… Read the rest
Are we rational self-interested choosers?
Nov 30th, 2006 | By H E Baber… Read the restThe fact is that most of the people engaged in political violence today—from the Basque country to the Philippines—are not fighting for individual rights, nor for that matter are they fighting to establish an Islamist caliphate. Most are fighting for a national homeland for the ethnic nation to which they belong. For most human beings other than deracinated north Atlantic elites, the question of the unit of government is more important than the form of government, which can be settled later, after a stateless nation has obtained its own state. And as the hostility towards Israel of democratically elected governments in Palestine, Iraq and Lebanon shows, democracy can express, even inflame, pre-existing national hatreds and rivalries; it is not a
Ken Livingstone on Multiculturalism
Nov 29th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘What is prohibited is one group or person imposing their will on others.’ Tell that to al Qaradawi.… Read the rest
Oxfam Report on Education in Afghanistan
Nov 29th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Seven million Afghan children are out of school while five million children attend school.… Read the rest
Oxfam Says Most Afghan Children Not in School
Nov 29th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Girls are particularly losing out: 1 in 5 girls in primary, 1 in 20 in secondary school.… Read the rest
Misery of Women in Afghanistan
Nov 29th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘We were very happy. Rawa came and talked about how they could help us. But that has stopped now.’… Read the rest
Taliban Tear Teacher to Pieces; He Taught Girls
Nov 29th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
He was part-disembowelled and then torn apart with his arms and legs tied to motorbikes.… Read the rest
Sharia Law Spreading in the UK
Nov 29th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘Some lawyers welcomed the advance of what has become known as “legal pluralism”.’… Read the rest
Where this ends and that begins
Nov 29th, 2006 2:04 am | By Ophelia BensonFrom Geoffrey Nunberg’s new book Talking Right page 134.
In the 1920s, the [Wall Street] Journal warned against the threats to freedom that were implicit in minimum wage laws [and] the child-labor amendment to the Constitution (“an assault upon the economic independence of the family…”)
I’ll get to my point, but first I’ll clear up a detail. I frowned in puzzlement when I read that, thinking ‘The – ? I didn’t know there was a child-labor amendment to the Constitution. Ignorant me.’ So I looked it up, and there isn’t; Nunberg apparently meant attempts to pass a child-labor amendment, which (no doubt with the help of the WSJ) failed.
But my point is that that is another example … Read the rest
Both sides
Nov 28th, 2006 11:51 pm | By Ophelia BensonAlan Boyle posted Allen Esterson’s reply to Troemel-Ploetz on ‘Cosmic Log’ today. I meant to say something else about the November 20 post (the one with Troemel-Ploetz’s reply) yesterday but I forgot. (I know, I know. But I can only hold one thought in my head at a time. Be patient with me.) But it’s interesting, and it’s always coming up. It’s something Boyle said this time:
We’ve gone back and forth over the role that Albert Einstein’s first wife, Mileva Maric, may have played in the development of the special theory of relativity…and now I’ve gotten the other side of the story from Senta Troemel-Ploetz…
The other side. Of the story. But it isn’t a story, and there isn’t … Read the rest
Chemistry Teacher Urges Teaching of ID
Nov 28th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘There’s little enough time with the school curriculum to deal with real science,’ says Phil Willis.… Read the rest
Christina Odone is Cross at Dawkins
Nov 28th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘Creationism and ID have long been part of our heritage and have failed to infect it.’ Oh?… Read the rest
Please Teach Holistic Science
Nov 28th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Reductionist scientific model keeps broader, more holistic science out. Tragic.… Read the rest
