Liberal reformists cannot escape the fact that Orthodox Islam is incompatible with human rights.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
What is liberty of conscience?
Mar 9th, 2008 4:40 pm | By Ophelia BensonI have a question for you, basically about terminology. Here is a quoted passage, which I have never understood.
… Read the restShould religious organizations and their members be treated as unequal under the law for certain purposes connected with gender? US constitutional law has standardly granted special latitude to religion, by contrast with other forms of commitment and affiliation. Religious reasons for exemption from military service, or for refusing to work on a particular day, are granted a latitude that is not granted to other forms of conscientious commitment, such as the familial or the artistic or even the ethical. This remains controversial for the way it appears to privilege religion over nonreligion and thus, it might seem, to violate the Establishment
American Psychological Association and Torture
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonAPA ignored evidence that psychologists designed and provided training for ‘enhanced’ interrogation.… Read the rest
Fundamentalist State School ‘Worst in London’
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonFirst non-Anglican non-Catholic ‘faith’ school to get state funding is in meltdown.… Read the rest
The Placebo Effect: the Coolest Thing in Medicine
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonMany people with your kind of condition have been helped by ’sugar pills’; we feel a sugar pill may help you.… Read the rest
Ben Goldacre on Drug Companies and Truth
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonTo make sensible decisions, doctors need information. But drug companies have repeatedly been shown to bury unflattering data.… Read the rest
Kafka Fraud Revealed
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘The Metamorphosis’ wasn’t fiction at all. Literary critics turn pale with shame.… Read the rest
Autism Payout Reignites Vaccine Controversy
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonUS government decision to compensate case may undermine public confidence in vaccines.… Read the rest
Surveys Probably Undercount Atheists in US
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonSurveys of unpopular opinions offer dubious results.… Read the rest
Pope Pretends to be Liberal
Mar 9th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonConvinces no one.… Read the rest
The Life of Ivan Ilyich
Mar 9th, 2008 | By Allan NadelTolstoy’s grotesque caricature did a grave disservice to this fine and noble man. Tolstoy wrote: “Ivan Ilych’s life had been most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible.” On the contrary Ivan Ilych’s life was complex, if not extraordinary certainly exemplary, and therefore most wonderful.
What was so terrible in Tolstoy’s eyes? True, Ivan Ilych was “an intelligent, polished, lively and agreeable man…a capable cheerful, good-natured, and sociable man, though strict in the fulfillment of what he considered to be his duty.” However—and this appears to be his tragic flaw—“he considered his duty to be what was so considered by those in authority.” You see, Ivan Ilych led an unexamined life, and as we all know an unexamined life … Read the rest
Reverse epistemology
Mar 8th, 2008 3:34 pm | By Ophelia BensonAnthony Appiah notes in The Ethics of Identity p. 86:
Many accomodationists are also concerned that courts often fail to respect religious beliefs – fail to respect what [Stephen] Carter terms the ‘alternative epistemology’ of the church. What we haven’t understood, we’re told, is that religion demands an ‘epistemology of its own’ – that it is ‘really an alien way of knowing the world – alien, at least, in a political and legal culture in which reason supposedly rules.’
There is a note on page 301:
… Read the restIn this spirit, Carter advises that ‘[g]iven its starting point and its methodology, creationism is as rational an explanation as any other.’ It runs into trouble only because its starting point and methodology ‘reflect
York and O’Cathlain
Mar 8th, 2008 3:28 pm | By Ophelia BensonFrom the Lords debate on the abolition of the blasphemy law. The Archbishop of York.
It is more difficult to reach for an understanding that replaces the common law of blasphemy with a law that essentially provides for a protection not exclusively of the Christian faith but of the fabric of society, as the case in December decided.
So the idea here is that the fabric of society needs to be protected from blasphemy or something like blasphemy. So the idea is that blasphemy, or something like blasphemy, is dangerous or destructive to the fabric of society. Why? Because it pisses people off? But lots of things do that; it’s impractical and illiberal to make laws against all of … Read the rest
International Women’s Day Protests
Mar 8th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonItaly, Iraq, Colombia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Indonesia, China.… Read the rest
Normblog on Appiah on Moral Obligation
Mar 8th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe socialist idea is that we sign up to a code according to which people do not die unrescued.… Read the rest
Bush Vetoes Limits on Torture
Mar 8th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe bill would have limited all American interrogators to techniques allowed in the Army Field Manual.… Read the rest
Women’s Day in Afghanistan
Mar 8th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonWhen the Taliban took over, the public lives of women effectively came to an end.… Read the rest
Debate on Blasphemy Abolition: Column 1118
Mar 8th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonYork: ‘the protection of society is achieved by ensuring that the Christian religion is treated with respect.’… Read the rest
Lords Approve Abolition Of Blasphemy
Mar 8th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonAfter an acrimonious debate in which the bogeyman of secularism was repeatedly invoked.… Read the rest
3,000 UK Women a Year Forced Into Marriage
Mar 8th, 2008 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe study found at least 300 cases in Luton where victims had contacted community organisations.… Read the rest