Each spring brings a new outburst of graffiti activity at Aldeen Park here in Rockford. Regular themes are who loves whom, religion, death motifs, and comments about sex. This year I learned that Jesus kills demons, Nathan and Angela are an item, All you need is Love, and A bag of donuts makes a party. […]
Graffiti at Aldeen Dam, 2017 Read More »
Six years ago, I snarkily conjectured that the egailtarians would go after libraries on the grounds that most of their content was inaccessible to the deaf and blind. That was meant to be a reductio ad absurdum. But now the Department of Justice has gone after UC Berkeley’s online library for precisely that reason. The
First Chipotle, now Berkeley — egalitarianism wins again Read More »
Here is a list of the 30 most polluted cities on Earth. Per country, here’s where those cities are located: India: 14 China: 6 Saudi Arabia: 3 Pakistan: 2 Iran: 2 Bangladesh: 1 Cameroon: 1 Uganda: 1 All of them are clustered in the bottom half of rankings for economic freedom. Which reminds me of
Free markets versus pollution? Read More »
Don’t you care for my love? she said bitterly. I handed her the mirror, and said: Please address these questions to the proper person! Please make all requests to head-quarters! In all matters of emotional importance please approach the supreme authority direct! — So I handed her the mirror. And she would have broken it
“Intimates,” D. H. Lawrence Read More »
Immanuel Kant famously said this: “Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.”[1] And this: “The history of *nature*, therefore, begins with good, for it is God’s work; the history of *freedom* begins with *badness*, for it is *man’s* work.”[2] And he regularly makes other slights against human nature. So
Kant versus human perfectibility — strange interpretations Read More »
For use in my courses, additions to my Texts in Philosophy page. All files are PDFs. William Bennett and Milton Friedman, Open Letters on the War on Drugs, from The Wall Street Journal (1989). Nathaniel Branden, “Self-Esteem in the Information Age” (1997). Max Forrester Eastman (1883-1969), excerpt from Reflections on the Failure of Socialism (1955).
Texts in Philosophy — very early 2017 additions Read More »
I am quite the international trader, it turns out. Earlier today I put on my made-in-Argentina jacket and my new made-in-India shoes and got into my made-in-Japan truck. I stopped for gas at a British petroleum station and chatted with its owner, a guy from Mexico. To help pay for it all, I taught my
Free Trade Makes You a Better Person [Good Life series] Read More »
I was interviewed for PanAm Post by columnist María Marty. The 13-minute interview itself is in English with Spanish subtitles and is prefaced by Ms. Marty’s summary in Spanish. PanAm‘s title is “América Latina debe abandonar su victimismo y abrirse al mundo” (“Latin America Needs to Abandon Its Victimization and Embrace the World.”) The topics:
Interview: “Latin America Needs to Abandon Its Victimization and Embrace the World” Read More »