‘His fiercest scorn has switched to the disciples of rationalism and of science.’
Category: Latest News
Welcome to our archive of news stories relevant to the project of fighting fashionable nonsense. The stories are drawn from the electronic pages of the world’s media. On this page, you’ll find links to those stories that have been featured on Butterflies and Wheels during the current year. At the bottom of the page, you’ll find links to separate archives of stories from previous years.
We’re always pleased to hear about news stories that you think should be featured on Butterflies and Wheels. Just send an email here, if you want to point one out to us.
A note about links
Inevitably links go out of date. We suggest, therefore, that you make hard-copies of the stories that particularly interest you.
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References not to Gramsci but to Sayyid Qutb
Self-appointed rebel heroes like to adorn themselves with flattering titles.
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Knowing our own Minds
Do we have privileged access but not peculiar, or peculiar but not privileged?
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Tories Pick Posh Leader Thanks to Hugh Grant
‘Notting Hill’ made it cool to be posh therefore Eton is okay. Eh?
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Nothing Like Squalor to Trigger Nostalgia
Fleet Street hacks get bad rap; Scoop, Boot, Beast, set tone.
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Richard Dawkins on the Illusion of Design
The unaided laws of physics could come to mimic deliberate design.
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New Homeopathy ‘Study’ a Tiny Bit Flawed
No control group, glaring exclusions and bias, little things like that.
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Instead of Celebrating Einstein Year
Physicists worry about dramatic decline in the number of pupils studying physics at school.
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Chet Raymo on Meera Nanda
What looks like tolerant ‘permission to be different’ is actually condescension.
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Naturalism v Supernaturalism
Worldview based on empirical inquiry, not faith or authority, is the clear choice against totalitarianism
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Having a Higher Truth is Different from Lying
And bullshitting is not the same as either.
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Garton Ash Talks to Hirsi Ali
Right to free speech is under threat from people whose position is: if you say that, we will kill you.
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Ayn Rand’s Version of Utopianism
It’s not just capitalism that Rand makes ridiculous by her worship.
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Founder of the Ljubljana Lacanians
Zizek grew up bingeing on philosophy books and Hollywood movies.
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Stephen Eric Bronner on the Enlightenment
Many on the left have come to consider the Enlightenment as imperialist and a form of domination.
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Eve Garrard on Gearty on Ignatieff
It’s no good saying our rights must never be violated if respecting one right involves infringing another.
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Just Pay No Attention
Catholics have been perfecting the art of ignoring the Vatican for centuries.
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Full Text of Lord May’s Speech to Royal Society
Enlightenment science and its consequences; Twilight for the Enlightenment?
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How Did Samira Munir Die?
Norwegian defender of women’s rights received death threats. Was this a ‘train accident’?
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Chomsky is not Sacred
The left has a tradition of guruising radical thinkers and cracking whips over its articles of faith.