All entries by this author

Roger Scruton on Donald Davidson *

Sep 19th, 2003 | Filed by

And ‘the sound made by a research programme when it hits’ – Cambridge.… Read the rest



In Defense of the Essay

Sep 19th, 2003 | By Christopher Orlet

It is an article of the most unshakable faith that the personal, familiar, Montaignian–call it what you will–essay is minor stuff, a second-rate employment undertaken by bankrupt novelists and other failures. In literary rankings its place lay well below the novella and scarcely above the book review. “Essays, reviews, imitations, caricatures are all minor stuff,” wrote the New York Times critic in a recent review of a Max Beerbohm biography. In this conviction he has more support than a sports bra. Indeed, the personal essay’s most esteemed and acclaimed practitioners have to a man voiced misgivings about their trade. E.B. White called the essay a second-rate form. Cynthia Ozick, certainly one of the best contemporary essayists, may not specifically refer … Read the rest



Outmoded Authoritative Structures? *

Sep 18th, 2003 | Filed by

Did the makers of ‘The Matrix’ get Baudrillard wrong? Or were they making a subtle point about – oh never mind.… Read the rest



Richard Sennett on Patriotism *

Sep 18th, 2003 | Filed by

Dissonance cannot be resolved by a cathartic destructive act.… Read the rest



Donald Davidson *

Sep 18th, 2003 | Filed by

The Telegraph obituary.… Read the rest



The Colorado Question

Sep 17th, 2003 7:57 pm | By

There’s a heated debate going on in Colorado right now, over something called the ‘Academic Bill of Rights,’ planned legislation that would enforce or promote or encourage universities to adhere to or comply with said Bill of Rights, David Horowitz, the imbalance between registered Democrats and registered Republicans in the political science departments of Colorado universities, and whether and how something should be done about said imbalance. The Academic Bill of Rights itself sounds pretty unexceptionable, declaring for instance that scholars should be hired on the basis of their competence and appropriate knowledge, not their political beliefs. That provision, for instance, is simply another version of B&W’s mission statement. So far so good. But it is difficult to help being … Read the rest



Fluid Nations and Patriot Studies *

Sep 17th, 2003 | Filed by

Now Heavy Former Ballerinas; People Who Daydream Obsessively of Rescuing Someone Famous; and many more. … Read the rest



A Slightly Guilty Formalist *

Sep 17th, 2003 | Filed by

Denis Donoghue speaks of beauty in his latest book.… Read the rest



Perhaps There Are More Than Two Sides? *

Sep 17th, 2003 | Filed by

How does one achieve ‘balance’ in a complicated subject that doesn’t always divide neatly along a left-right axis?… Read the rest



Hire a Conservative! *

Sep 16th, 2003 | Filed by

What kind? By whose definition as of what date? And what if she changes her mind?… Read the rest



What Are Children For? *

Sep 16th, 2003 | Filed by

Jobs, nappies, sleep, time, vomit, money, servants, shopping, sexism, age – it’s all a bit complicated.… Read the rest



Women On Top *

Sep 16th, 2003 | Filed by

Girls beat boys just about everywhere.… Read the rest



Proliferation

Sep 16th, 2003 12:32 am | By

It’s interesting how ideas can go off in unexpected directions. Sort of a six degrees of separation thing – it can seem as if any given idea can lead to any other in three or four steps, however remote they may seem at the beginning. I noticed it yesterday, for instance: I started writing my TPM essay thinking it was going to be about one thing, and after the first paragraph found myself talking about something quite different. I started out thinking the idea led into one subject (and it did) but in the writing found that it also led into another, so followed it there instead.

The core idea was that of competing goods. A familiar enough idea: that … Read the rest



Moral Racism *

Sep 15th, 2003 | Filed by

When Other Races kill each other, western pundits blame the scars of colonialism.… Read the rest



What is Lost by Abandonment of Principle *

Sep 15th, 2003 | Filed by

Alan Ryan on Richard Posner’s view of pragmatism and democracy.… Read the rest



Just a Bit More

Sep 14th, 2003 11:36 pm | By

Just a little more about the religion article. Because there really is a lot of nonsense in that piece. I only talked about some of it, and I find there’s another bit I just can’t leave alone, in the last paragraph.

It is often said that science answers “how” questions while religion asks “why”, but that is simplistic. The greater point lies in their scope. Religion, properly conceived, attempts to provide an account of all there is: the most complete narrative that human beings are capable of. Science, by contrast, is – as the British zoologist Sir Peter Medawar put the matter – “the art of the soluble”. It addresses only those questions that it occurs to scientists to ask,

Read the rest


Lies on the Front Page and the Back *

Sep 14th, 2003 | Filed by

Why do journalists and comedians think they’re better than politicians?… Read the rest



Another Stack of Jumpers

Sep 14th, 2003 1:39 am | By

Oh good, more fuzzy-headed nonsense about religion. There does seem to be an inexhaustible supply of it out there. This one is so full of odd, vague, fuzzy statements it’s hard to know where to begin.

One of the highlights of this week’s meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science was a discussion on why, although the existing religions do not capture all of what’s out there in the universe, some at least of their endeavours must be taken seriously.

Well what on earth does that mean? ‘Endeavours’? What do you mean endeavours? For that matter, what do you even mean by ‘capture all of what’s out there in the universe’? What do you mean by ‘capture’, … Read the rest



Not the Same Old Thing *

Sep 13th, 2003 | Filed by

The state of scientific research into paranormal phenomena.… Read the rest



Nonsense *

Sep 13th, 2003 | Filed by

‘Religion, properly conceived, attempts to provide an account of all there is.’ Well no doubt, but it fails!… Read the rest