Religious enclaves encouraging women to go back to when they were men’s property, not their own.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
Self-awareness Switched Off During Concentration 
Apr 23rd, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Brain assumes a robotic functionality when it has to concentrate on a difficult, timed task.… Read the rest
The Myth of Productivity and the Function of Consumerism: An Institutional Perspective
Apr 23rd, 2006 | By Jim CornehlsProductivity is an economic term that, like others, has more than one meaning. First, there is overall productivity, meaning the collective ability of a society to produce goods and services. Second, productivity is used to explain the distribution of incomes within a society, where productivity is taken to mean the relative contribution of each of the so-called factors of production, land, labor and capital, to the production process. These two aspects of productivity are inextricably linked in the U.S. mixed economic system.
Efforts to measure productivity in the second sense are chimeras. Productivity is the result of mixing machinery, human effort, and community knowledge. Productivity does not exist independently of any or all of these. If a woman uses a … Read the rest
Creationism Conference in Derbyshire
Apr 22nd, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
To hear academics defend the view that God made the Earth in six days about 6,000 years ago.… Read the rest
Byatt on Roth
Apr 22nd, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Philip Roth is the great recorder of Darwinian Man, ‘a poor, bare, forked animal’.… Read the rest
Evolution Should be Taught as Fact, not Theory
Apr 22nd, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
We should no longer talk of the theory of evolution as ‘just an idea’, says Richard Pike.… Read the rest
Boredom
Apr 22nd, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Is boredom emotional recuperation, or is it just boredom?… Read the rest
Wot’s an Intellectual?
Apr 22nd, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
A bag of wind? A small-breasted man? A woman who doesn’t wash much? … Read the rest
Pre-emption
Apr 21st, 2006 8:00 pm | By Ophelia BensonThe thing about the cultural anthropoligical view is that, unless you are a cultural anthropologist, it’s not the place to stop. Because tolerance, acceptance, neutrality, non-judgmentalism never is the place to stop. That’s one of the advantages of being human, isn’t it – we are able to second-guess things, and ask for something better, so we should never permananently and thoroughly give up that ability and right.
We can suspend it at times, obviously. You don’t go to a friend’s house and tell her how to do things. (On the other hand, if you somehow discover that serious abuse is going on, you may want to intervene, with all the attendant difficulties and worries that possible duty raises.) But that … Read the rest
Expert in Postmodern Theory Helps Out
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Simply a theory that suggests there is more than one way of looking at the world. Ah.… Read the rest
Top Sydney School’s Boring Approach to Shxpr
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
You can read Othello in two of three ways: ‘Marxist, feminist, race’. Zzzzz.… Read the rest
Geoffrey Wheatcroft: Blair is Worse Than Bush
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The harder Blair’s arguments are looked at, the more curious they seem.… Read the rest
Sean Wilentz on Bush’s Historical Standing
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Unswerving adherence to a simplistic ideology that abjures deviation from dogma as heresy.… Read the rest
Peter Wilby on ‘Faith’ Schools
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Parents want them because they have better discipline.… Read the rest
Australian Creationist Begins Tour of Britain
Apr 21st, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Will give a series of talks over three days at anonymous Lancashire secondary school. … Read the rest
Spiegel Samples Some Friday Prayers
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘If a woman, even a Muslim woman, is naked and you have no way of covering her up, it is legitimate to kill her.’… Read the rest
Muslim Students Complain of Fundamentalism
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Students training to be imams at London college cite doctrines which describe nonMuslims as ‘filth’.… Read the rest
Iran Cracks Down on Women’s Clothing
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Taxi drivers will be responsible for passengers dressed ‘inappropriately’.… Read the rest
Torture Doesn’t Work
Apr 20th, 2006 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Military common sense has been abandoned in favour of the brutal, politically driven shortcut.… Read the rest
