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Index for this page...(Be aware some links below may have expired.)
All The Following Items Were Posted On April 1, 2005 1. Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) Ancient Greek Realist Philosopher
From Metaphysics. More information about Aristotle in the Academy. 2. Socrates (c. 470-399 B.C.) Ancient Greek Philosopher
From Plato's The Apology. More information about Socrates in the Academy. 3. José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955) Recent Spanish Philosopher
From The Origin of Philosophy. More information about José Ortega y Gasset in the Academy. 4. Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) Danish Existentialist Philosopher
From The Point of View. More about Soren Kierkegaard in the Academy. 5. Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) Recent British Philosopher
From Analysis of Mind. More about Bertrand Russell in the Academy.
FOR THE RECORD 1. The Fourth Annual "Tarnished Halo" Awards - Winners. The Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF) has announced the winners of its 4th annual "Tarnished Halo" Awards! CCF awards these prizes to America's most notorious animal-rights zealots, environmental scaremongers, celebrity busybodies, self-anointed "public interest" advocates, trial lawyers, and other food & beverage activists who claim to "know what's best for you." The following is just a small sample, so be sure to go to www.ConsumerFreedom.com to see the whole list. The "Reverend Rooster" Category: Awarded to Al Sharpton, the publicity-seeking preacher, for joining PETA to crow at KFC restaurants and attempting to instigate a boycott from the African American community. It's odd that Sharpton would stand side-by-side with PETA, which advocates a complete end to chicken consumption. When the reverend emerged from prison in 2001 after a four-week hunger strike, he didn't ask for tofu and lentils. He told a crowd of well-wishers: "I'm going to walk through Harlem just to settle in again, then I'm going to Amy Ruth's for some fried chicken." That restaurant's menu carries a dish named after Sharpton -- it's chicken and waffles. The "Porn Identity" Category: Awarded to the wingnuts at the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) for their unnerving obsession with adult entertainment. With virtually millions of analogies in existence, these food prudes regularly equate America's favorite foods with pornography, even going so far as to dedicate the back cover of their monthly newsletter to complaining about "food porn." This year they called Hardee's new Monster Thickburger a "snuff film." The "Pants on Fire" Category: Awarded to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for being forced to admit that their much-publicized claim that obesity kills 400,000 Americans every year was wildly exaggerated. A recently completed internal investigation has revealed that the CDC ran roughshod over its own scientists to support the phony number and then covered up the mistake. One skeptical CDC researcher even told Science magazine he feared that speaking out would cost him his job. Source: TownHall Conservative Alert 2. A British Crime Wave is on Its Way to the U.S.! There is a story in The Guardian, one of the United Kingdom's major newspapers, about two British men who are planning to criss-cross the entire United States and engage in a massive, weeks-long crime wave. They intend to literally break dozens of this country's laws and are bragging openly about their plans. There is more to this story, of course, and many U.S. citizens will probably be sympathetic with the intentions of these "criminals." The laws they intend to break are of the "absurd" variety and there are thousands of those on the books at the local, state, and federal level. They intend, however, only to break about 45 of them, according to the newspaper account. Among the laws they are planning to violate are:
The British "criminals" will travel around 18,000 miles (assuming they don't get caught and incarcerated!) and the trip will take an estimated eight weeks. The few stupid laws they plan to break are only the tip of the iceberg. According to a website devoted to "dumb laws," the following laws are among the 25 most absurd:
There's a lot more "so stupid it's hard to believe" laws out there. Go to the Dumb Laws website and have some fun looking around. 3. Political Websites to be Censored by U.S. Government? Online political censorship in the U.SA.? It may be on the way -- and soon. Bradley Smith is a member of the Federal Election Commission (FEC). He's also a strong believer in the importance of vigorous online political speech. And right now, he's worried. In an interview with CNET News.com, Smith warns that the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign finance restrictions may soon be applied to the Internet, thanks to a recent ruling by a federal judge that any coordinated political activity over the Internet must be regulated. This new decision essentially overturned the FEC's vote in 2002 to exempt most Internet communications from the notoriously restrictive McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. The results could be devastating for online free speech. Some examples:
It sounds unbelievable. Yet, says Smith: "We're talking about any decision by an individual to put a link [to a political candidate] on their home page, set up a blog, send out mass emails, any kind of activity that can be done on the Internet. "The impact would affect email lists, especially if there's any sense that they're done in coordination with the campaign. If I forward something from the campaign to my personal list of several hundred people, which is a great grassroots activity, that's what we're talking about... " The McCain-Feingold law does have a press exemption. But that won't necessarily protect bloggers and online journals, Smith said, because "the statute refers to periodicals or broadcast, and it's not clear the Internet is either of those." Indeed, CNET News.com notes that federal law limits the press exemption to a "broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine or other periodical publication." Smith fears this has the potential to wipe out the blogging revolution that has so dramatically affected journalism and politics in the past few years. Fundamental online grassroots political activism could obviously be squelched as well. Smith further says: "Senators McCain and Feingold have argued that we have to regulate the Internet, that we have to regulate email. They sued us in court over this and they won. "It's going to be a battle," Smith says, adding that if Congress doesn't demand freedom for online political speech and activism, "then I think grassroots Internet activity is in danger." Sources: CNET News.com and World Net Daily (Thanks to James W. Harris of the Advocates for Self-Government and The Liberator Online for the above information. If you would like a free subscription to the Liberator Online, visit: http://www.self-gov.org/liberator/maintain.html.) 4. The Cable News Ratings Game The fact: Of Three Cable News Networks, MSNBC Falls to Fourth in Ratings. MSNBC is now rated fourth in what had traditionally been considered a three cable news channel universe. In a Tuesday night dispatch, the AP's David Bauder reported that "CNN Headline News has supplanted MSNBC as the third-place cable news channel" in both daytime and prime time, though he noted that the ratings for both, over the first three months of the year, "are relatively minuscule" with CNN's Headline News Channel averaging 337,000 viewers in prime time compared 328,000 watching MSNBC. FNC's prime time attracted twice as many viewers, at 1.9 million, than did CNN with about 900,000 -- but that still means about three times more watch CNN than MSNBC at night. CNN Headline News has supplanted MSNBC as the third-place cable news channel. CNN's sister network recently started a new prime-time lineup that has gotten off to a strong start, particularly a legal-oriented talk show with Nancy Grace. The new format replaced the continuous half-hour newscasts that CNN Headline News still carries for most of the day. But in its first month, the changes enabled the network to eclipse MSNBC in the prime-time ratings, according to Nielsen Media Research. For the full day, CNN Headline News also beat MSNBC for the first three months of the year.... The numbers are relatively miniscule -- Headline News' prime-time average was 337,000 viewers to MSNBC's 328,000 -- but they're important for perception and for the business of television news. Fox News Channel remains far and away the most popular cable news outlet, and its prime-time average of nearly 1.9 million viewers for the first quarter is up 14 percent over the first three months of 2004 -- an impressive increase considering last year was an election year. CNN's prime-time average of 896,000 was down 1 percent from last year, Nielsen said. Grace, who benefited from a busy month of legal news including Michael Jackson's trial, averaged 518,000 viewers in March, Nielsen said. That instantly made her show more popular than anything on MSNBC, including "Hardball" with Chris Matthews.... Source: CNN Headline News Passes MSNBC in Ratings 5. The Left Coast Report Exposes the New "Fox Blocker." It sounds like a product made to be sold on Air America. Sam Kimery of Tulsa, Oklahoma, has invented a device that he calls a "Fox Blocker." It's a metal object that's screwed into the back of a TV set and blocks out the Fox News Channel. Kimery claims to be a former Republican but sounds more like another former G.O.P. guy: David Brock. He contends that Fox News' top-level management dictates a conservative journalistic bias. When describing the Fox News Channel, Kimery told the Associated Press: "I might as well be reading tabloids out of the grocery store. Anything to get a rise out of the viewer and to reinforce certain retrograde notions." CNN execs would love it if Kimery's invention sold well. Fox has averaged twice the viewers in prime time that CNN has brought in, according to Nielsen Media Research. The Left Coast Report has a device that appropriately handles the nightly news broadcasts of ABC, NBC and CBS. It's called "Brick on a Rope." Source: The Left Coast Report, compiled by James L. Hirsen and the staff of NewsMax. "We stand today at a crossroads: One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other leads to total extinction. Let us hope we have the wisdom to make the right choice." -- Woody Allen, American writer, actor, and movie director.
Some interesting & provocative articles on other websites: The Climate Debate - When Science Serves the State, by N. Joseph Potts: The "fact" of global warming is today as entrenched in the government-sponsored academy as ever was Lysenko's theory that acquired traits, such as selfless devotion to the common good, could be inherited by the children of parents so indoctrinated. In the abject retraction by the journal that carried Soon and Baliunas's heresy, Climate Research, they announce the resignations of their editor-in-chief and two other editors. Creationism, pluralism and the compromising of science - The trouble with 'teaching the controversy', by Joe Kaplinsky: The rise of creationism in the USA is taken as evidence that fundamentalist Christianity has become a powerful force in society. But scepticism towards science does not just come from traditional Christianity. Liberal relativism has been important in creating a climate in which creationism is tolerated. Many Americans, not just scientists, now worry that the teaching of biology will be replaced by religious indoctrination. The spread of fundamentalist Christianity is seen by many to be a force for a renewed far right political agenda, and in particular to be responsible for the election victory of George W Bush. The Intellectual Incoherence of Conservatism, by Hans-Hermann Hoppe: Modern conservatism, in the United States and Europe, is confused and distorted. Under the influence of representative democracy and with the transformation of the U.S. and Europe into mass democracies from World War I, conservatism was transformed from an anti-egalitarian, aristocratic, anti-statist ideological force into a movement of culturally conservative statists: the right wing of the socialists and social democrats. Harvard's President, by Charley Reese: The president of Harvard, Larry Summers, upset the feminists by suggesting that there might be some biological reason why more men than women occupy the top positions in science and mathematics. Oh, how the feminists howled, joined by their eunuchs. This was a sacrilege against the concept of gender equality. It is also an excellent opportunity for a little lesson in general semantics. How To Renounce Your Citizenship - Tips from Bobby Fischer, By Brendan I. Koerner: The saga of Bobby Fischer, whom the United States is trying to extradite from Japan, keeps getting weirder and weirder. The former chess champ, who ran afoul of U.S. law by playing a tournament in the former Yugoslavia 12 years ago, now wants to renounce his American citizenship. How does an American go about renouncing his citizenship? 'Agents of persuasion'? Just say no - GPs should defy government orders to 'reshape unhealthy behaviour', by Dr Michael Fitzpatrick: A discussion paper produced by the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit is valuable in making explicit some of the key themes of the government's public health policy that are generally obscured by the rhetoric of choice and empowerment. Its title - 'Personal responsibility and changing behaviour' - is creepily intimate and subtly intimidating, reflecting the peculiar combination of the therapeutic and the authoritarian that is distinctively New Labour. Anti-intellectualism at Harvard, by Walter E. Williams: Dr. Larry Summers, Harvard's president, remains under siege for remarks made in his Jan. 14 address to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). Dr. Summers suggested that there might be three major reasons why women are underrepresented in the higher reaches of science and ranked them in order of importance. Saudi Venom in U.S. Mosques, by Daniel Pipes: Those of us following the development of Islam in America have for years worried about the unhealthy influence of Saudi money and ideas on American Muslims. We watched apprehensively as the Saudi government boasted of funding mosques and research centers; as it announced its support for Islamist organizations such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations; as it trained the imams who became radicalized chaplains in American prisons, and as it introduced Wahhabism to university campuses via the Muslim Student Association. Diagnosis - State-Sanctioned Murder, by Stephanie R. Murphy: The latest in a long history of capital punishment: a California judge recently sentenced convicted murderer Scott Peterson to die at the hand of the state. Peterson's sentencing brings up a debate that has all but evaporated from public discourse in the recent past. Is the death penalty a moral impropriety, or is it justified for violent criminals? There are five methods of execution currently used in the United States: hanging, firing squad, electrocution, gas chamber, and lethal injection. Lethal injection is by far the most common; it is used in 37 of the 38 states which administer the death penalty (Nebraska uses electrocution as its sole method of execution). Most people also consider lethal injection the most humane method of execution. Girl Problems in Op-Ed Land, by Michael Kinsley: When the New York Times anointed Maureen Dowd as a columnist nine years ago, I gave her some terrible advice. I said, "You've got to write boy stuff. The future of NATO. Campaign spending reform. Throw weights. Otherwise, they won't take you seriously." The term "throw weights" had been made famous by a Reagan-era official who said that women can't understand them -- whatever they are, or were. But clearly the term had bubbled into the man's mind for reasons that many women understood better than he did himself. Bush's Napoleon Complex - What the French experience in Spain could teach us about Iraq, by Gregory Cochran: No two wars are ever the same any more than you can step on the same banana peel twice. That said, Napoleon's invasion and occupation of Spain, from 1808 to 1814 -- the war that gave us the word "guerrilla" and was immortalized in Goya's "Third of May," the war that drained France's army, smashed Napoleon's reputation for invincibility, and left Spain thrashing like a broken-backed snake for decades -- has striking similarities to our invasion and occupation of Iraq. Should You Eat Chocolate?, by Dr. Joseph Mercola: Whether or not eating chocolate helps or hurts one's health has been a highly controversial topic. However, researchers are moving the debate to more of a consensus. The evidence appears overwhelming that the consumption of dark chocolate can improve both glucose metabolism (diabetic control) and blood pressure. English Usage, Old and New, by Joseph Sobran: These are the times that try English majors' souls. The sacred rules we were taught, and struggled to grasp and live by, are violated in the daily papers, not to mention radio. Doesn't anyone these days know the difference between may and might? I grant there are gray areas where either can be argued. But there are some areas that aren't gray: "I might go to the movies tonight." Who's Afraid of Intelligent Design?, By Jay Mathews: My favorite high school teacher, Al Ladendorff, conducted his American history class like an extended version of "Meet the Press." Nothing, not even the textbooks other teachers treated as Holy Writ, was safe from attack. I looked forward to that class every day. My biology class, sadly, was another story. I slogged joylessly through all the phyla and the principles of Darwinism, memorizing as best as I could. It never occurred to me that this class could have been as interesting as history until I recently started to read about "intelligent design," the latest assault on the teaching of evolution in our schools. Many education experts and important scientists say we have to keep this religious-based nonsense out of the classroom. But is that really such a good idea? Terri Schiavo, the State, and the Culture of Death, by William L. Anderson: I write this piece on Good Friday, one of the most important days of the Christian Calendar. Within a few days from now, Terri Schiavo will be dead because the courts have ordered that she be starved to death. Anyone who tries to intervene by giving her even a sip of water is arrested and led off in handcuffs. In the United States, starving a dog to death would result in arrest and imprisonment; starving a human being to death is state policy. (Yes, I know she is brain damaged, but she is not &endash; as ABC News falsely reported in what can only be called a "push poll" &endash; on life support.) A principled and fundamental opposition to the savage murder of Terri Schiavo, By G. Stolyarov II: By the time you read this, chances are that Terri Schiavo will be dead. In a land of plenty, where her parents are more than willing to feed her, where millions of thoughtful and concerned citizens have campaigned for her continued provision of sustenance, she is nonetheless condemned to wither away, literally, by a method that would be considered cruel and unusual punishment when applied to the worst of serial rapist-murderers: starvation. Private money and time has been volunteered to support her; Bob and Mary Schindler, Ms. Schiavo's parents, have, in a blatant display of statist intrusion, been denied the ability to use it. Public Opinion and the Promotion of Liberty, by Alberto Mingardi: Educating the public has historically been the means by which classical liberals have tried to change the societies in which they lived, and move them in a more classical liberal direction. In a manner of speaking, liberals have always appealed to the means of persuasion. This is at least for two major categories of reasons. How to Mix Religion and Politics, By Edward Feser: We are constantly told by liberals -- or "progressives," or "the reality-based community," or however it is they are marketing themselves this week -- that religion and politics ought never to be mixed. Religion, it is said, should be confined as far as possible to the private sphere. In the public square, it is secular considerations alone that ought to get a hearing. The problem with these claims is that there is absolutely nothing serious to be said in their defense. Why Does the Muslim World Lag in Science?, by Aaron Segal: By any index, the Muslim world produces a disproportionately small amount of scientific output, and much of it relatively low in quality.1 In numerical terms, forty-one predominantly Muslim countries with about 20 percent of the world's total population generate less than 5 percent of its science. This, for example, is the proportion of citations of articles published in internationally circulating science journals.2 Other measures -- annual expenditures on research and development, numbers of research scientists and engineers -- confirm the disparity between populations and scientific research.
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