Extremism and Violence People (pundits, politicians) have been trying to figure out the origins of political violence. We are told that such violence stems not from the radical left or the radical right but from being too radical. We need more political moderation, less “radicalization”. The dictionary (OED) gives us the following for “radical”: “relating […]
Political Violence Understandably, people are anxiously and angrily discussing the causes of our current spate of political violence. Is it caused by being of one political persuasion rather than another, as it might be right-wing political ideology? Well, do right-wing people from other countries exhibit the same levels of political violence? Evidently not. Same for […]
SH in Philosophy I see that Brian Leiter is reverting to the topic of sexual harassment and the surge in female enrolment in philosophy programs, both perfectly legitimate topics. If anyone would like to hear my perspective on this subject, as one caught up in it, I invite them to contact me and I will […]
Inside Knowledge Let’s try to recover some of the insights of seventeenth century philosophy which have been obscured by twentieth century philosophy.[1] I am referring to instrumentalism, operationalism, positivism, phenomenalism, and behaviorism. I offer for your consideration the following two propositions: we don’t know the nature of matter, and we do know the nature of […]
A Religious Blog What kind of text is this—this blog? I said a while ago that it is my New Testament. That implies a religious identity, so this a religious text. It is a statement of my religion: that is, a statement of my basic beliefs, values, and life-practices. My Sermon on the Mount (or […]
Back to School It is now twelve years since I stopped teaching philosophy, after thirty-eight years of doing it. There is no back-to-school for me. That always meant stopping work on my own stuff, beginning to teach classes again, meetings and hellos. What are my feelings on the subject? Many–some good, some bad. I think […]
What is it Like to be a Paper Clip? I know what it’s like to be me, because I experience it directly every day. I also know what it’s like to be you, more or less, because I know you are psychologically similar to me. I even know what it’s like to be a bat […]
A Bombing The recent bombing of a boat off the coast of Venezuela is probably the worst atrocity committed by the Trump administration so far. It was suspected of being a drug-smuggling boat and summarily blown up, killing all on board. No interception, no search, no due process—just destroyed under suspicion of illegality. The US […]
Best Ever Tennis Player Alcaraz and Sinner are clearly the best tennis players ever, as is generally acknowledged. Federer and Nadal wouldn’t stand much of a chance against them, even in their prime, and Djokovic is unable to best them now, or ever was. They are well ahead of their current rivals. They are the […]
Other Ontologies It would be generally agreed that ethics, logic, and mathematics suffer from ontological uncertainties. We don’t know what they are about. There are ontological disagreements that never get resolved. The metaphysics is obscure. I don’t need to spell this out. Is ethics about certain special objects and properties—the Good, the non-natural property of […]