Marcus Herz was Immanuel Kant’s friend, a former student, and a well-educated man — he qualified as a physician and eventually became a professor of philosophy. Yet, “when Kant gave the MS. of the Critique to his friend Herz, a man much versed in speculation, Herz returned it half read, saying he feared insanity if
Kant, Herz and fearing insanity Read More »
The comic genius of Aristophanes, in which “Socrates” the sacrilegious philosopher explains to the not-too-bright Strepsiades where rain and thunder come from. Potty humor ensues. Socrates: That is because these are the only goddesses; all the rest are pure myth. Strepsiades: But by the Earth! is our father, Zeus, the Olympian, not a god? Socrates: Zeus!
The Clouds and “Socrates” Read More »
A new episode of my podcast series, produced by Possibly Correct out of Toronto. Audio: iTunes Stitcher YouTube Topics: Should Christians be socialists, and was C.S. Lewis a socialist? // Mere Christianity‘s themes // Liberal-libertarian principles — free-market economics and property rights, competence to run your own life, self-responsibility, self-respect and dignity for all, universalism
Christian Socialism and C. S. Lewis [Open College series] Read More »
Professional philosophers’ responses to the book. Nine reviews in total — six very positive, two overall positive, and one mixed. * Professor Curtis Hancock in The Review of Metaphysics (and can be read online here). * Professor Steven M. Sanders in Reason Papers. * Professor Gary Jason in Liberty (or PDF here.) * Dr. David
Ph.D. philosophers review *Explaining Postmodernism* Read More »
Love Is a Fallacy By Max Shulman Max Shulman (1919–1988) was an American humorist. He graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1942 and served in the military in World War II. His writing career included several collections of short stories and a Broadway play, “The Tender Trap,” which was later made into a movie.
Love Is a Fallacy (by Max Shulman) Read More »
Andrea-Dworkinism is alive in 2019. One of her followers, writing in The Guardian, makes this huge claim: “We are living in terrible times for women.” It’s true that bad things happen to women. Yet bad things happen to people pretty much however you group them, and this claim is a general indictment of the whole
“We are living in terrible times for women” Read More »
From Klaus Christian Köhnke’s The Rise of Neo-Kantianism (Cambridge, 1991): “In the 1870s Kant became the most frequently read of the classics in Germany’s universities” (p. 8) That decade marked the decline of Hegelianism and triumph of neo-Kantianism: “Immediately after the Franco-Prussian war [1870-71] things moved forward rapidly and neo-Kantianism as a whole rose rapidly in the
Köhnke on the rise of Kant after 1870 Read More »
“Chinese university suspends student because of dad’s bad social-credit score.” This collectivizing-of-guilt example reminds me of the commencement ceremony at my university a few years ago, at which Jenna Bush Hager, daughter of former president George Bush, gave an apolitical speech about her non-profit work. Several of our faculty members sat in stony-frowny-face, arms-crossed silence
Collective guilt — China’s social-credit scheme and other examples Read More »