Is boredom emotional recuperation, or is it just boredom?… Read the rest
All entries by this author
Wot’s an Intellectual? 
Apr 22nd, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
A bag of wind? A small-breasted man? A woman who doesn’t wash much? … Read the rest
Pre-emption
Apr 21st, 2006 8:00 pm | By Ophelia BensonThe thing about the cultural anthropoligical view is that, unless you are a cultural anthropologist, it’s not the place to stop. Because tolerance, acceptance, neutrality, non-judgmentalism never is the place to stop. That’s one of the advantages of being human, isn’t it – we are able to second-guess things, and ask for something better, so we should never permananently and thoroughly give up that ability and right.
We can suspend it at times, obviously. You don’t go to a friend’s house and tell her how to do things. (On the other hand, if you somehow discover that serious abuse is going on, you may want to intervene, with all the attendant difficulties and worries that possible duty raises.) But that … Read the rest
Expert in Postmodern Theory Helps Out
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Simply a theory that suggests there is more than one way of looking at the world. Ah.… Read the rest
Top Sydney School’s Boring Approach to Shxpr
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
You can read Othello in two of three ways: ‘Marxist, feminist, race’. Zzzzz.… Read the rest
Geoffrey Wheatcroft: Blair is Worse Than Bush
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The harder Blair’s arguments are looked at, the more curious they seem.… Read the rest
Sean Wilentz on Bush’s Historical Standing
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Unswerving adherence to a simplistic ideology that abjures deviation from dogma as heresy.… Read the rest
Peter Wilby on ‘Faith’ Schools
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Parents want them because they have better discipline.… Read the rest
Australian Creationist Begins Tour of Britain
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Will give a series of talks over three days at anonymous Lancashire secondary school. … Read the rest
Spiegel Samples Some Friday Prayers
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘If a woman, even a Muslim woman, is naked and you have no way of covering her up, it is legitimate to kill her.’… Read the rest
Muslim Students Complain of Fundamentalism
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Students training to be imams at London college cite doctrines which describe nonMuslims as ‘filth’.… Read the rest
Iran Cracks Down on Women’s Clothing
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Taxi drivers will be responsible for passengers dressed ‘inappropriately’.… Read the rest
Torture Doesn’t Work
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Military common sense has been abandoned in favour of the brutal, politically driven shortcut.… Read the rest
A Second-rate Utilitarian but a First-Rate Liberal
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Mill quoted Bentham’s opinion that pushpin was as good as poetry – as evidence of his short-sightedness. … Read the rest
Furthermore
Apr 19th, 2006 8:55 pm | By Ophelia BensonAnother point about this strawman argument we keep getting from rabbis and bishops, this ‘argument’ that boils down to claiming that non-theists have a ‘belief that the only things that are real or can be known are those that can be empirically observed and measured’ and then following that absurd claim with the equally absurd claim that love, morality, beauty and god are all ‘face[s] of human experience that [are] not subject to empirical verification.’
The other point (see above) is that that endlessly repeated pseudo-argument is a crap argument from two directions, not just one. It’s bad and stupid first, as I mentioned, because it dishonestly or woollily or confusedly makes a truth-claim about the existence of an … Read the rest
Adam Smith Would be New Labour, says Brown
Apr 19th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘The Chancellor has long attempted to claim the giant of the Scottish Enlightenment for Labour.’… Read the rest
On Some Criticisms of the Euston Manifesto
Apr 19th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Ha ha, wrong station, hee hee, they met at a pub, nyah nyah, Nick Cohen and Francis Wheen.… Read the rest
Hepatitis B May Play a Role in ‘Missing Women’
Apr 19th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Virus could account for 75% of China’s missing women, less than 20% of India’s.… Read the rest
Anthony Seldon on Teaching Happiness
Apr 19th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Draws on Epicurus, Seneca, Kant, Mill.… Read the rest
