Let’s start with a statistic: “Over the course of the last 25 years, sixteen teenage boys have committed a mass murder at an American elementary or high school.”* Additionally, many other teenage males were planning to kill but were discovered and prevented. So: Why so many (a) young (b) men desiring to (c) kill in […]
School shooters — three hypotheses Read More »
Contrast these two approaches to moral education: Text versions of the quotations above: “The essence of obedience is that a person comes to view himself as the instrument for carrying out another person’s wishes, and he therefore no longer regards himself as responsible for his actions.” (Stanley Milgram, Obedience to Authority, emphasis added) “Above all
Obedience: Milgram vs. Kant Read More »
On Wednesday at 4 p.m. Central, columnist Rob Tracinski and I will discuss those topics, followed by a Q&A, as part of TAS’s Current Events series. Register here.
Nietzsche has a reputation for being an individualist. But note this from his early The Birth of Tragedy: “the subject—the striving individual bent on furthering his egoistic purposes—can be thought of only as the enemy of art, never its source.” Nietzsche’s sometimes-yes-sometimes-not individualism is complicated. For more, check out my “Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand”
Was Nietzsche individualist? Art-versus-individualism version Read More »
Historically, “right wing” and “left wing” came into use in late 18th-century France, designating seating positions in the Assembly during the early stage of the Revolution. Birds of a feather flocked together. The “right wing” was animated in its opposition to the Enlightenment, whose philosophes had risen to prominence and were poised to transform society
What is “Right Wing”? Read More »
I was interviewed by philosopher Michael Robillard, Ph.D.. We covered six questions: 1.) Can you tell us a bit about who you are, as well as your academic background? Did you always want to be or envision yourself as a public intellectual? 2.) In your influential work, Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to
A few elements from the 1932 Platform of the Democratic Party. Overall the document calls for much expansion of government, but also these: * An immediate and drastic reduction of governmental expenditures by abolishing useless commissions and offices, consolidating departments and bureaus and eliminating extravagance, to accomplish a saving of not less than 25% in
1932 Platform of the Democratic Party Read More »
In his 1835 work on Religion and Philosophy in Germany, Heinrich Heine makes this strong claim about Immanuel Kant’s philosophy. While many have characterized Kant as fundamentally a man of reason and a paragon of the Enlightenment, Heine suggests otherwise: “But though Immanuel Kant, the arch-destroyer in the realm of thought, far surpassed in terrorism
Heine on Kant as the Robespierre of philosophy Read More »