More than half the marks could be awarded without students having to read any Shakespeare.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
Integrated, Redundant Approach 
Jan 24th, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
US National Academy of Sciences on best way to confine genetically engineered organisms.… Read the rest
Review of Philosophy of Science Today
Jan 24th, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Astronomers study stars, philosophers of science study astronomers.… Read the rest
What Was the Question Again?
Jan 23rd, 2004 9:19 pm | By Ophelia BensonI’ve been thinking a good deal about focus lately. About relevance, subject matter, connections. The competing merits of breadth and intensity, range and depth. About how to think about such things, and how to decide between them – metaquestions again. I seem to think about metaquestions a lot – but then that’s not surprising, is it; B&W is essentially about metaquestions. At least I think it is. That’s one of the metaquestions I’ve been thinking about – what is B&W about.
Not that I don’t know, or don’t think I know, or think I don’t know. I do think I know. Or at least I know I have an opinion. But there could be other opinions – and in fact … Read the rest
Nature is Nice – Until it Eats You
Jan 23rd, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
How thrilling to see a lion in the local park…… Read the rest
History is Difficult
Jan 23rd, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Who lied, which one vacillated, who shed crocodile tears over Vietnam?… Read the rest
History is Confusing
Jan 23rd, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Evidence conflicts, minds change, memory errs, wishes interfere.… Read the rest
Top Ten Books for Orwell-readers
Jan 23rd, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
D.J. Taylor’s choices include Gissing’s New Grub Street… Read the rest
Wonderfully Unsettles the Mind
Jan 22nd, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Hesperus Press publishes minor works by major authors.… Read the rest
Fundamental Epistemology
Jan 22nd, 2004 | By Cassandra L. Pinnick"A more fundamental project now confronts us. We must root out sexist distortions and perversions in epistemology, metaphysics, methodology and the philosophy of science-in the “hard core” of abstract reasoning thought most immune to infiltration by social values."
Discovering Reality, Sandra Harding and Merrill B. Hintikka (1983)
Until roughly the mid-twentieth century, liberal feminist politics had little apparent impact on American universities. But thereafter the transformation was swift. Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, student demographics shifted, women’s studies flourished, and remarkable reforms to the liberal arts curriculum became entrenched. There was no surprise when feminist theory moved into the humanities or the “soft” sciences. And, these days, the radical edge is worn off the idea of … Read the rest
Investment Tips
Jan 22nd, 2004 1:43 am | By Ophelia BensonI’ve been reading a volume of the letters of Dwight Macdonald lately. One bit I read this morning seemed particularly appropriate for B&W. It’s from a letter in December 1937, to Freda Kirchwey, the editor of the Nation, taking that magazine to task for a number of blind spots, such as being too ‘timid and stuffy-genteel’ in its editorial attitude to the New Deal’s recent swing to the right, and particularly for being hostile to the Commission that was investigating the Moscow Trials (he doesn’t mention John Dewey but I assume that’s the Commission usually known as the Dewey Commission).
… Read the restWhile I was at Fortune, the Nation was always to me the great symbol of honest, truthful, intelligent journalism
What Accounts for Cheating?
Jan 21st, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Rational choice? Emotions? Values? Winner-take-all economies?… Read the rest
‘Cowboy Cloners’ Should be Outlawed
Jan 21st, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Head of Royal Society and others appeal to media not to publicize claims.… Read the rest
Brief Constructed Response
Jan 21st, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Or paragraph, in the vernacular. Eduspeak jargon is Fun Happy Talk.… Read the rest
Before After Theory
Jan 20th, 2004 9:19 pm | By Ophelia BensonThis is an interesting review by Elaine Showalter of Terry Eagleton’s new book After Theory.
In the ’80s, theory ruled, and the subject formerly known as literature was banished or demoted in the interests of philosophy and aesthetic abstraction.
Hmm. But was it really philosophy? Or was it just little bits of philosophy here and there. That’s fine, it’s no crime to know only a little about something, that’s certainly my situation about almost everything – but one has to be clear about it. One has to be careful, it seems to me, not to confuse sampling philosophy with really studying it, and one has to be equally careful not to confuse Literary Theory with philosophy, because (this is … Read the rest
US v WHO on Sugar and Obesity
Jan 20th, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
US accused of diluting dietary advice to please sugar lobby.… Read the rest
Showalter on Eagleton
Jan 20th, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Theory and nontheory. Nontheory? You know, poems, stories, plays.… Read the rest
Fairy Tales Equate Beauty with Goodness
Jan 20th, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Not a news flash, but worth pointing out all the same.… Read the rest
National Book Critics Circle Nominations
Jan 20th, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Scott McLemee receives Citation for Excellence in Reviewing.… Read the rest
Not all Skepticism is Good Skepticism
Jan 19th, 2004 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Carl Zimmer on how extinction skeptics get it wrong.… Read the rest
