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Index for this page...(Be aware some links below may have expired.)
All The Following Items Were Posted On February 1, 2006 1. Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German physicist and philosopher
Read about Albert Einstein in The Radical Academy. 2. Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) Natural philosopher in the early modern period
Read about Galileo Galilei in The Radical Academy. 3. Rudolf Carnap (1891-1970) German-American philosopher of Logical Positivism
Read about Rudolf Carnap in The Radical Academy. 4. Willard Van Orman Quine (1908-2000) American philosopher and logician
Read about W.V. Quine in The Radical Academy. 5. Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) English philosopher of Neo-Realism
Read about Albert North Whitehead in The Radical Academy. 6. Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German physicist and philosopher
Read about Albert Einstein in The Radical Academy. 7. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) German Idealist philosopher
Read about Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel in The Radical Academy. 8. Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) British philosopher of Neo-Realism
Read about Bertrand Russell in The Radical Academy. 9. Heraclitus (540 B.C.-480 B.C) Ancient Greek philosopher
Read about Heraclitus in The Radical Academy. 10. Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) British philosopher of Neo-Realism
Read about Bertrand Russell in The Radical Academy.
FOR THE RECORD: POLITICS Fox's "24" - a favorite prime-time show for many conservatives (and one of the few shows that I watch - J.Dolhenty) - just pulled in its best ratings ever with its fifth-season premiere and the first of two back-to-back episodes. This season's first episode of "24" averaged 17 million viewers and a 7.3 rating in the 18-49 demographic. "24"'s second hour finished with 15.5 million viewers and a 6.7 in adults 18-49. These are phenomenal figures that speak volumes about what sort of entertainment post-9/11 Americans seem to prefer. Contrast this to the tepid response to George Clooney's "Syriana," with its anti-American message about the 'causes' of Islamic terrorism, and one begins to see that Americans are ready to watch entertainment that deals with our current War on Terror - but also that they're sensitive to the messages that entertainment contains. Will Hollywood learn this lesson? Perhaps. A good sign will be whether the Academy showers "Syriana" with nominations later this month ... 2. Send An Annoying Email And Go To Jail You know that guy whose blog you hate? Well, don't post an anonymous comment telling him what a blockhead he is. If you do, you'll face a stiff fine and two years in prison. That's because a new law signed by President George W. Bush makes it a crime to post annoying Web messages or send annoying emails without disclosing your identity, according to Declan McCullagh of CNET News.com. In a January 9 article, McCullagh says the "felony annoyance" provision is part of the Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act. It was signed into law by Bush on January 5. Section 113 of the bill expands existing telephone harassment law to make it a crime for someone to use the Internet "without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy." The law, which could make criminals out of millions of Americans next time their finger hits the send button, apparently does not define "annoy," or specify when mild irritation becomes criminal annoyance. McCullagh quotes San Francisco resident Clinton Fein, who asks: "Who decides what's annoying? That's the ultimate question." (Fein has reason to be worried. He runs a Web site that allows people to send "obnoxious and profane" postcards via email. It's called Annoy.com. He might as well turn himself in now.) McCullagh notes that anonymous speech has long been protected under law, especially in political matters. In 1995, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of an Ohio woman to distribute anonymous political pamphlets. Even Ben Franklin used a pseudonym to criticize the British government. "Our esteemed politicians can't seem to grasp this simple point, but the First Amendment protects our right to write something that annoys someone else," writes McCullagh. Source: 3. Report: Chinese Internet Control "Surprisingly Effective" Back in the 1990s when the Internet was first getting established in China, President Clinton said that trying to control and censor the Internet would be like trying to nail Jell-O to the wall. Today China has more than 100 million Internet users - but the Chinese government's control of online content has been surprisingly effective, according to a report in Business Week. Beijing has a vast infrastructure to monitor any potential online dissent. The agencies that perform that task employ more than 30,000 people to prowl Web sites, blogs and chat rooms on the lookout for offensive content and scammers. By contrast, the entire CIA employs an estimated 16,000. Almost all Internet entities in mainland China are provided with a list of hundreds of banned terms to watch out for. Foreign companies that host their sites on servers in China are pressured into signing an agreement not to disseminate information that "may jeopardize state security and disrupt social stability," according to the U.S. State Department. The individuals who manage a Web site are held responsible for its content. That leads companies to err on the side of caution and self-censorship, said Nicholas Bequelin, a researcher for Human Rights Watch in Hong Kong. All Internet traffic entering and leaving China must pass through government-controlled gateways - a bank of computers - where e-mail and Web site requests are examined, Business Week reports. E-mail with such offending terms as "Taiwan independence" or "democracy" can be blocked. Postings critical of the Communist Party occasionally appear during a crisis, but censors remove them from Web site archives within months or even weeks, according to Bequelin. Internet cafes, where many Chinese go online, must use software that records data on each user, making anonymity close to impossible. And bloggers must register with authorities. Chinese control of the Internet recently made headlines when Google announced that to avoid potential conflicts with government censorship efforts, it would introduce a search engine in China that excludes e-mail messaging and the ability to create blogs. The Paris-based group Reporters Without Borders condemned the Google move as "hypocrisy" and called it "a black day for freedom of expression in China. "The firm defends the rights of U.S. Internet users before the U.S. government, but fails to defend its Chinese users against theirs." 4. PS: I Plan To Ignore This Law When is a law not a law? When the president says it isn't. At least, that's what President George W. Bush is now claiming. In the latest White House power grab, Bush says he has the power to ignore any bill he signs into law. He made that claim most recently in early January, when he issued a "signing statement" about a law that bans the U.S. government from torturing suspected terrorists. Congress passed the law and Bush signed it -- but he then issued a "signing statement" saying he reserves the right to ignore the law whenever he chooses. In his statement, Bush said he would interpret the law "in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the president," according to a Knight Ridder Newspapers story (January 6). Bush has claimed expansive powers as the nation's commander-in-chief to wage war against terrorism. Previously, he said he has the power to ignore existing laws that restrict domestic wiretapping without a warrant. Critics say Bush's signing statements upset the balance of power between the three branches of the federal government. "It's nothing short of breathtaking," said Portland State University professor Phillip Cooper. "In every case, the White House has interpreted presidential authority as broadly as possible, interpreted legislative authority as narrowly as possible, and pre-empted the judiciary." Other presidents have issued signing statements, but Bush has issued more (500-plus and counting) and has claimed more expansive powers with them. Critics note that if a president doesn't like a bill, he has the power to veto it. But why issue a veto -- which might be overridden by Congress -- when a president can just arbitrarily declare any law null and void? "So much for the ability of Congress to legislate, if the President can simply declare anything it passes whatever he decides it should be," wrote Tom Engelhardt and Nick Turse on LewRockwell.com. Sources:
5. Wouldn't We All Like To Do This - But, Then, Why Don't We?
6. "King George": A Recipe For Tyranny President Bush's arguments for warrantless wiretaps pose a grave danger to American liberty, says libertarian syndicated columnist Jacob Sullum: "Members of Congress have been known to vote for legislation they haven't read. But is it possible Congress authorized warrantless wiretaps without realizing it? "That's what President Bush implies when he defends the National Security Agency's warrantless eavesdropping on Americans' phone calls and e-mail messages by citing the 'Authorization for Use of Military Force' that Congress approved three days after the September 11 terrorist attacks. More fundamentally, Bush seems to believe the Constitution gives him the power to authorize this surveillance, no matter what Congress or the courts might have to say about it. "Even people who have complete confidence in this president's good faith and good judgment should worry about his sweeping assertion of executive power, which has implications for his successors. In areas such as military tribunals, detention of "enemy combatants," and administrative subpoenas, Bush has shown an alarming tendency to cut the legislative and judicial branches out of decisions about how to prosecute a war on terrorism that will continue long after he leaves office. This combination of unilateralism with a perpetual state of emergency is a recipe for tyranny." Source: "A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you have." -- Gerald Ford, 38th president of the United States 8. Acknowledgments Some of the information included in our "For the Record" section may come from one or more of the following sources or is referred to us by that source. The subject matter or any views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the Center for Applied Philosophy or any of its associates. It is simply presented for your information and thoughtful reflection. COUNSELING CORNER: A Few Things A Stressed-Out Woman May Say At Work
A LITTLE OF THIS & A LITTLE OF THAT A Little Wisdom: Patience is the ability to idle your motor when you feel like stripping your gears. A Little Advice: To be sure of hitting your target, shoot first, and call whatever you hit the target. A Little Question: When vultures fly, are they allowed carrion luggage? A Little Put-Down: My brother will never go where he's told... until he dies. A Little Proverb: "We cannot prevent the birds of sorrow from flying over our heads, but we can refuse to let them build nests in our hair." -- Chinese proverb A Little Reflection: I want to die in my sleep like my grandfather... Not screaming and yelling like the passengers in his bus. A Little Observation: Democrats can't get elected unless things get worse -- and things won't get worse unless they get elected. A Little Quote: "Some men come by the name of genius in the same way as an insect comes by the name of centipede -- not because it has a hundred feet, but because most people can't count above fourteen." -- G. C. Lichtenberg (1742-1799) German physicist, writer. A Little One-Liner: They told me I was gullible...and I believed them! A Little Definition: Procrastination - The art of keeping up with yesterday. A Little Quip: Death is life's way of telling you - you're fired! A Little Legal Shmegal: Income Tax has made more liars out of the American people than Golf.
Some interesting & provocative articles on other websites: Michael Savage's long, strange trip - How a Jewish kid from the Bronx went from swimming naked with Allen Ginsberg to spewing the ugliest bile on talk radio, by David Gilson: At first glance, Michael Alan Weiner seems like an improbable candidate to be America's angriest, most vicious conservative radio host. Born 60 years ago in the Bronx, Weiner has lived in Northern California for most of his adult life, making a living as an herbalist and nutritionist. He communed with Fijian traditional healers, got married in a rain forest and studied ethno-medicine at the University of California at Berkeley. He swam naked with Allen Ginsberg, dreamed of being the next Lenny Bruce and wrote a rambling novel about a half-mad alter ego. His son's middle name is Goldencloud. For years, he made a name cranking out a pile of books on alternative medicine, recommending bizarre remedies such as using vitamin C to stop AIDS and kicking cocaine with coffee enemas. Dawkins: Religion equals 'child abuse' - Scientist compares Moses to Hitler, calls New Testament 'sado-masochistic doctrine': Controversial scientist and evolutionist Richard Dawkins, dubbed "Darwin's Rottweiler," calls religion a "virus" and faith-based education "child abuse" in a two-part series he wrote and appears in that begins airing on the UK's Channel 4, beginning tomorrow evening. Entitled "Root of All Evil?," the series features the atheist Dawkins visiting Lourdes, France, Colorado Springs, Colo., the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and a British religious school, using each of the venues to argue religion subverts reason. The Pol Who Drank Too Much - Can a lush run the country?, by Geoffrey Wheatcroft: Although booze and sex aren't exactly comparable -- few of us mind if our airline pilot is an unfaithful husband, but we surely hope he's sober-- the new puritanism about drink is perturbing if you think of those we would have been deprived of by the new strict standards. Bill O'Reilly and the Contradiction of the Conservative Movement, by Michael J. Hurd: Prompted by a rather heated exchange with David Letterman on the Late Night show, conservative Bill O'Reilly put the following in his "talking points" the next day on Fox News: "Right now, there are two main issues dominating the culture war in America, the role of God in the public arena and the war on terror ..." Run that by me again? Someone to watch over you - CCTV cameras, identity cards, phone taps - our liberty is at risk from this lust to control society, by William Rees-Mogg: Rousseau gave the first modern warning. In 1762 he published his Social Contract, which contains the famous statement: "Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains." H.G. Wells gave a similar warning in 1895 in The Time Machine. For modern readers, the two great novels are Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, published in 1932, the year before Hitler came to power; and George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, published in 1949. The curious rise of anti-religious hysteria, by Frank Furedi: It is the Anglo-American cultural elites' insecurity about their own values that encourages their frenzied attacks on religion. Dora the Exploiter - When kids inspired by cartoon characters demand junk food, how can parents resist?, by Jacob Sullum: "Look!" exclaims my 3-year-old daughter, pointing excitedly at a box of cookies in the supermarket. "It's Dora! And Boots!" I nod and smile. "Yes, it is," I say, and we move on. I do not feel injured by this exchange. But according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), a D.C.-based health nanny group, if I lived in Massachusetts the incident would be worth at least $25 in statutory damages. Attacking Lobbyists: The Real Problem is Government's Ability to Grant "Favors", by Walter Williams: Jack Abramoff, the Washington lobbyist who's pled guilty to charges of conspiracy, fraud and tax evasion, has showered millions of dollars on the campaign coffers of both Republican and Democrat congressmen. Like a kid caught with his hands in the cookie jar, many congressmen seek to distance themselves by purging their coffers of Abramoff money. War Against Reason - The "Intelligent Design" Scam, by Owen Williamson: The current ID offensive must be exposed and confronted for what it is: a vicious, carefully-planned political (not primarily religious) attack against the American people, perpetrated by a tiny, mendacious clique of well-educated and ideologically-driven right-wingers with virtually unlimited funding and unrestricted media access. [Eds. Note: This is a Marxist publication, but it's interesting sometimes to read what they have to say.] Moral relativists just a rationalization away from a crime, by Frank Salvato: Recently, on Hannity & Colmes, a segment was aired on which one would have thought everyone to be in agreement. The issue was teachers having sex with their students. What I witnessed left me astounded. Not only did the representative from the Massachusetts Bar Association (MBA) condone a sentence for rape that didn't involve any jail time for the teacher, he tried to rationalize the relationship between the teacher and the student. Vatican supports science: What if God spoke, and said: "What's this intelligent design stuff? That ain't science!" Would ID proponents keep on talking? "Well, not if you redefine science" ... "There's too many holes in the theory of evolution" ... "Life is too complex for it to be the product of random mutation" ... "This is academic censorship!" Natural science holds wisdom of ages, by Dick Warner: When Plato died 2,353 years ago his star pupil, Aristotle, set up the Peripatetic School at the Lyceum, just outside the walls of Athens. He was soon joined by Theophrastus, who was another former pupil of Plato's and 15 years younger than Aristotle. These two men were the first modern naturalists. Objectivism in the Culture - A Man of Science Crusades Against Intelligent Design, by Ray Girn: Last December, a Pennsylvania Federal District court ruled that the Dover School District cannot teach "intelligent design"--the theory that the complexity of life indicates the existence of a divine "designer"--as a scientific alternative to Darwin's theory of evolution. Watching the case closely was Dr. Keith Lockitch of the Ayn Rand Institute, a man who has dedicated himself to educating people about the nature of the intelligent design movement. Rights Schmights, by Max Borders: In "The Metaphysics of Conservatism" Ed Feser presents an annotated history of Western philosophy with the hope of guiding us to the idea of Natural Rights. He doesn't say that outright, but it's clear that Feser is concerned about the loss of certain principles summoned from "natural law."
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