Was locked up with no food or water for four days before crucifixion.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
Aren’t You Sorry You Missed Luce Irigaray? 
Jun 20th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Remaining only in sameness or impersonal neutrality leads either to paralysis or to uncontrollable acceleration.… Read the rest
Endemic Confusion
Jun 19th, 2005 10:29 pm | By Ophelia BensonPZ Myers has an excellent post on – broadly speaking – the tension between religion and science. Narrowly speaking it’s on a non-excellent post by the widely over-rated Eugene Volokh (though I gather he’s less over-rated now, ever since that post on what a good thing it is to torture certain criminals to death in front of an enraged crowd). And he makes a point that I’ve made here more than once. It’s a very, very widespread mistake and confusion, even among people who – you would think – really ought to know the difference. It’s pretty ominous and disturbing that the confusion is so pervasive even among educated people like lawyers and journalists. Clearly everyone should be learning … Read the rest
Words Matter, Differences Matter, Truth Matters
Jun 19th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Pavel Litvinov notes: exaggeration for the sake of attention is a bad move.… Read the rest
Nicholas Kristof Phones Mukhtaran
Jun 19th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
She is free, but her passport is still confiscated.… Read the rest
Michael Ruse Eyes the ‘Slippery Slope’
Jun 19th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘Darwinism’ a threat to belief in a caring omnipotent deity.… Read the rest
Sally Satel on ‘The Ethical Brain’
Jun 19th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Untangling how we arrive at moral and ethical judgments. … Read the rest
Eve Garrard Asks: Why is Israel Singled Out?
Jun 19th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
It’s no good saying ‘Because we think it’s worse’ – that’s a circular argument.… Read the rest
What’s All the Fuss About?
Jun 19th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Romanian nun dies in ‘exorcism’; common practice, priest says.… Read the rest
Planet of the Hats
Jun 19th, 2005 | By PZ MyersI know you will not believe me, but I swear it’s true: I’m not of this earth. I fled here years ago because my home planet was driving me crazy. Let me explain.
My home world is very much like this one. It’s populated by billions of bipedal primates, who are just like people here: sometimes foolish, sometimes wise, sometimes hateful, sometimes generous. They are grouped into cities and nations, and sometimes they have wars, and sometimes they cooperate. You really would have a hard time telling our two planets apart, except for one thing.
The hats.
My people are obsessed with hats. Almost everyone wears them, and a lot of their identity is wrapped up in their particular style. … Read the rest
Maybe There’s a Paragraph Missing
Jun 18th, 2005 8:25 pm | By Ophelia BensonHad lovely fishing trip. Caught a shark, a couple of eels, a sting ray, and an otter that seems to have been dead for some time. All made a very nice bouillabaisse, served with aioli and a hearty pain de compagne and some Chef BoyArDee canned ravioli. That’s the best meal I’ve had in awhile!
But life is not all holiday. Back to the dear old religious hatred bill. Frank Dobson does a not very compelling job of arguing for it in the Guardian, it seems to me. Maybe I’m missing something.
… Read the restDo you believe that anyone should be allowed to incite hatred against other people on the grounds of their religious belief? I don’t, even though I have no
Joan Bakewell Asks a Recurring Question
Jun 18th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Why are religions so tough on women?… Read the rest
Alarm About African Boys ‘Sacrificed’
Jun 18th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Police report says trafficked children are being branded witches by pastors. … Read the rest
Dutch Immigration Minister Orders Imams to Leave
Jun 18th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Justice ministry said imams tried to recruit Muslims for Jihad.… Read the rest
Collection of Wobbly Arguments
Jun 18th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Is that the best they can do?… Read the rest
Martha Nussbaum on Henry Sidgwick
Jun 18th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Insistence on ‘point of view of the Universe’ not as obtuse as had been thought.… Read the rest
Sartre Wanted to Be Both Spinoza and Stendhal
Jun 18th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Easy and tempting to mock Sartre as poseur and hypocrite.… Read the rest
Amartya Sen on the Argumentative Indian
Jun 18th, 2005 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Indians are not all ‘spiritual.’… Read the rest
Magic vs. Modernity
Jun 18th, 2005 | By Thomas R. DeGregoriIn the European Enlightenment, the belief was that science and reason
would soon sweep myth and magic into oblivion. For some, myth included
religion while others operated in terms of some variant of Deism or even
Theism, believing that there was an unknown power beyond what was known and
knowable to humans. In fact, many scientists, then and now, could fully
exercise their religious convictions and interpret them in such a way as
not to allow them to interfere with scientific understanding. For those for
whom there was no conflict between science and religion, it was because
particular statements or religious beliefs about the way the things work
always gave way to emerging facts and theories of scientific inquiry.
Science … Read the rest
Like an Anglican Clergyman From Central Casting
Jun 17th, 2005 7:40 pm | By Ophelia BensonWell, that’s one way of looking at it.
The story of science and religion since the Middle Ages has been one of estrangement rather than conflict. When the Aristotelian synthesis shattered, science and theology drifted apart, becoming at last disconnected universes of discourse.
Quite a good way, if you want to avoid talking about some obvious inconvenient facts. Quite handy to pretend that science and religion are just two ‘universes of discourse’ as opposed to two fundamentally different enterprises. Shifty, though. For one thing, how did we get from science and religion in the first sentence to science and theology in the second? Shifty, shifty. But the crucial move of course is to call science a universe of discourse.… Read the rest
