Bush bill of goods may be dodgy but so is Chirac Double Standards Emporium, says David Aaronovitch.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
Philosophers – Shut Up Now!
Mar 17th, 2003 7:37 pm | By Ophelia BensonWhat is it about philosophers that they can’t resist pontificating about things they know nothing about? The examples are legion. Mary Midgley and David Stove wittering on about Darwinism and selfish genes. Simon Blackburn and Mary Warnock making a mess even of amateur political commentary. And Roger Scruton demonstrating that there’s no start to what he knows about popular music.
And the latest example? Have a look at this from an article in Issue 22 of The Philosophers’ Magazine (a title which sounds vaguely familiar):
Subjects like sociology, psychology, religious studies and history, which adjoin philosophy, all require empirical support, which is interpreted within the lines of a largely unquestioned methodology. Philosophy is the only subject in which the basic … Read the rest
Education Gap
Mar 17th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonJohn Ogbu’s study suggests some painful reasons for the black-white gap in education. Critics say he downplays social factors.… Read the rest
Drought Finished the Maya
Mar 17th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonDroughts in 810, 860, 910 C.E. may be what ended the Mayan civilization, evidence suggests.… Read the rest
Conspiracy Theories
Mar 17th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonWhy conspiracy theories persist in the face of the facts.… Read the rest
Designer Babies?
Mar 17th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonNot likely, says Steven Pinker, because the genetics of behavior is far too complicated.… Read the rest
Yum, Gefilte Fish
Mar 16th, 2003 7:56 pm | By Ophelia BensonWell, this is a fun item for the eve of war. Even, or do I mean especially, if it’s not really true that many Jews worldwide are hailing this nonsense as a modern miracle. Perhaps that’s just a bit of casual journalistic exaggeration, hmm? After all there are only two witnesses, and the fish is no longer talking, to say the least. Surely the smallness, the minusculity, of the number of witnesses ought to give the most credulous believer pause. Two. I ask you. At that rate couldn’t any one of us get any other one of us to join in a fun-loving prank and tell the world any old thing? ‘My garden gnome suddenly recited page 7 of … Read the rest
More Weeds, Spiders, Bird Food
Mar 16th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonNew research indicates GM crops may be beneficial for environment in some ways.… Read the rest
Paradigm Shifts in Medicine
Mar 16th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonA doctor on the ever-moving target of medical knowledge.… Read the rest
Carpe Diem
Mar 16th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonSeconds from becoming gefilte fish, a carp shouts warnings in Hebrew. According to two witnesses. David Hume, anyone?… Read the rest
Do Fish Have Free Will?
Mar 16th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonCarlin Romano reviews Daniel Dennett’s Freedom Evolves.… Read the rest
Fun at Skool
Mar 15th, 2003 8:23 pm | By Ophelia BensonJohn Sutherland has redeemed himself. I took issue with him a few weeks ago when he wrote a column recommending the UK imitate the US in using athletic scholarships to increase minority access to higher education. I think there are some serious drawbacks to that way of doing things, so I said as much. But I think he’s right on the money here. I’ve nattered about this issue of students as consumers several times on B & W. I’m glad to know other people are noticing. One would think it would be self-evident that 18-22 year olds might possibly want qualities in their teachers other than scholarship or the ability to inspire, and that hence their evaluations would be of … Read the rest
The Action is on the Surface
Mar 15th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonJanet Malcolm interviewed on journalists as vampires, psychoanalysis as literary technique, lawsuits and more.… Read the rest
Would an SAT Help?
Mar 15th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonWould an aptitude test like the ones used in the US help recruit working class students to university in the UK?… Read the rest
Theory, Theory Everywhere
Mar 15th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonHow do people manage to generate ‘theory wars’ out of teaching a basic skill that should be learned before university?… Read the rest
Student Consumers
Mar 14th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonSpot on. John Sutherland on student evaluations: ‘the one criticism which is never made is: “This professor is just an entertainer”.’… Read the rest
Competing Goods
Mar 14th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonTargets or no targets? How does one increase university admissions for excluded groups without discriminating against currently-included groups?… Read the rest
Discrimination Against Men?
Mar 14th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonWomen’s colleges are ‘all full of lesbians now,’ is one rumour. ‘And what if they are?’ asks Joan Bakewell.… Read the rest
Liberty Letters
Mar 13th, 2003 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIn The Great War we had liberty cabbage, now it’s…Freedom Toast? What planet is this again?… Read the rest
How to Make Bloody-Minded Women
Mar 12th, 2003 7:42 pm | By Ophelia BensonThe last women’s college in Oxford has just voted to remain a single-sex college. I’m always interested in these campaigns to keep women’s schools single sex, and the idea (which I tend to believe) that single sex education is good for girls and bad for boys. I went to a single sex school myself, one that combined with a boy’s school the year after I graduated. I regretted it at the time but later decided I’d been lucky. If nothing else, I derived the benefit (at least I think I did) that it never crossed my mind for an instant that women were supposed to shut up and let men do the talking. So when I went to a double-sex … Read the rest