All entries by this author

Raymond Tallis on Mary Midgley’s Owl of Minerva *

May 1st, 2006 | Filed by

The tendency to narrow philosophy to a technical exercise is one she has vigorously opposed. … Read the rest



Blasphemy Rocks

May 1st, 2006 1:30 am | By

Someone should have said this long ago.

Something terribly important has been missing from discussions orbiting around the Mohammed cartoons…What’s been missing has been an acknowledgment that blasphemy isn’t just something that must be tolerated. It’s something that possesses a special political value of its own. Blasphemy, in short, is a good thing. It’s something admirable, noble, and, yes, even respectable.

Actually…now you mention it…somebody ought to start a magazine called Blasphemy. And mean it.

It must be stated and stated unequivocally that it’s no more improper in healthy democratic discourse to ridicule religious figures and ideas (even core ideas) than it is to criticize and mock (other) politically important figures and ideas…Formally speaking, in democratic discourse there’s nothing

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One for the Dictionary

May 1st, 2006 1:14 am | By

Here’s something I’d like to know. Why do people keep calling Galbraith an ‘unapologetic’ liberal? Why is being a liberal something one is expected to apologize for?… Read the rest



Gustave et Marcel

May 1st, 2006 12:58 am | By

Those French – they’re witty bastards. Flaubert for instance. I picked a Penguin selection of his letters off a shelf this morning, for no particular reason, I just caught sight of it and felt like browsing in it – I opened it at random – at a letter to Louise Colet in which he talks about Musset, with whom Colet had just begun an affair. (Page 185)

I have been thinking a great deal about Musset. And I think that in the end it is all just Affectation…Men sentimentalize over everything, and most of the time the poor women are taken in by it. It was only to make a good impression on you that he said: ‘Try me. I

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When the Morning Stars Sang Together

May 1st, 2006 12:57 am | By

I like this item of Julian’s, too. He asks what is meant by ‘being religious’.

Yet logos and mythos do not exhaust the meanings of religiosity. There is a third sense, one which I believe is more important and more widely held. This is the idea of having a religious attitude. Attitudes are…deeply important to how we live, for they determine our entire orientation to the world around us. Among the primary religious attitudes are those of awe, reverence, gratitude and humility. What each have in common is that they capture a sense that there is something greater than us, which commands us, and which we cannot control. And it is the perceived absence of these attitudes in atheism

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Archive

May 1st, 2006 12:01 am | By

The Archive

Interrogations ArchiveRead the rest



Hitchens on the Euston Manifesto *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

Even the obvious has now become revolutionary.… Read the rest



The Righteousness of Blasphemy *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

Not just something that must be tolerated, blasphemy possesses a special political value of its own. … Read the rest



John Kenneth Galbraith *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

The Affluent Society one of those rare works that forces a nation to re-examine its values. … Read the rest



Pseudowisdom from Freud *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

‘We want a strong man’ – that’s deep.… Read the rest



Saudi Arabia Attempts Reform *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

If women start driving, it will lead to adultery and kidnap.… Read the rest



You Can’t Do Both *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

It’s a sin to shag a sheep and then eat it.… Read the rest



Preachers Ask God to Lower Gas Prices *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

Next week: prayers for a sale on SUVs.… Read the rest



Niall Stanage on the Euston Manifesto *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

It ‘may sound like a lengthy statement of the obvious. But, in a way, that’s the point.’… Read the rest



More Indy Drivel on Astrology *

Apr 30th, 2006 | Filed by

‘On certain levels, it is a science.’ Which would those be?… Read the rest



Stepping Sideways

Apr 29th, 2006 11:15 pm | By

Phrasemaker, Scruton, isn’t he.

Freud, who assumed the mask of the objective observer, who presented his results as the inescapable conclusions of arduous empirical study, who repeatedly claimed that his psychological discoveries would one day be grounded in biology, is now widely accepted at mask-value…Someone must have reminded him that not all children are boys; but he had an easy way with his critics, which was to throw the Greeks at them. Thus was born the Electra complex, conjured from a thigh-bone of Oedipus…At every point where scientific method might impose its logic on the argument, Freud stepped sideways into metaphor, asserting with dogmatic intransigence that this is how things are because this is how they must be.

Stepping … Read the rest



Roger Scruton on Sigmund the Fraud *

Apr 29th, 2006 | Filed by

At every point where scientific method might impose its logic on the argument, Freud stepped sideways into metaphor.… Read the rest



Andrew Brown Interviews Raymond Tallis *

Apr 29th, 2006 | Filed by

GP, research scientist, professor of gerontology, literary critic, poet and philosopher.… Read the rest



Jesus Christ! Cherie Blair in Wrong Frock Scandal *

Apr 29th, 2006 | Filed by

Wears white dress to meet pope, must think she is a queen.… Read the rest



Overselling Climate Change *

Apr 29th, 2006 | Filed by

Alarmism is bad strategy.… Read the rest