A nation without divine favor
Reading Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism I am struck again by the peculiarity of the American nation, and its fundamental radicalism. I have already stated that this is implicitly an Anglo-Protestant nation. As a point of fact Protestant churches were established and supported in most American states at the Founding, with Massachusetts not […]
Against infotainment
Steve has an interesting column up this week:Who will win the Super Bowl? Well, two minutes on Google leads me to a betting site that says the New Orleans Saints are +360, while the Indianapolis Colts are +385. (I don’t even know what those numbers are…
Seeing 2012
Daniel Larison on Palin’s Extremely Long Shot At The Nomination. Daniel’s argument is persuasive, but, I would add that the probabilities one projects are extremely conditional on local temporal circumstances. Even in the recent past John McCain’s candidacy went from being the clear favorite, to dead, to an unlikely win through capturing the largest segment […]
Razib Khan: Unlike Singer, Confucius recognised the natural impulse to impose a heirarchy on the value of human life
Unlike Singer, Confucius recognised the natural impulse to impose a heirarchy on the value of human life – and his ideas endured
No one will deny that Peter Singer can provoke. Most recently, in The Life You Can Save, Singer lays out a utilitarian argument for attacking world poverty, extending ideas from his 1971 essay, Famine, Affluence and Morality. Certainly the facts are indisputable, and the logic crisp.