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Index for this page...(Be aware some links below may have expired.)
All The Following Items Were Posted On June 1, 2006 1. Epicurus (342?-270 B.C.) Ancient Greek philosopher
Read about Epicurus in The Radical Academy. 2. Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) German philosopher
Read about Arthur Schopenhauer in The Radical Academy. 3. Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) French "Romantic" philosopher
Read about Jean-Jacques Rousseau in The Radical Academy. 4. Voltaire (1694-1778) French Enlightenment philosopher
Read about Voltaire in The Radical Academy. 5. Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) American Transcendentalist philosopher
Read about Henry David Thoreau in The Radical Academy. 6. Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) Danish Existentalist philosopher
Read about Soren Kierkegaard in The Radical Academy. 7. John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) English Positivist philosopher
Read about John Stuart Mill in The Radical Academy. 8. John Dewey (1859-1952) American Pragmatist philosopher
Read about John Dewey in The Radical Academy. 9. Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher
Read about Thomas Jefferson in The Radical Academy. 10. Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German physicist and philosopher
Read about Albert Einstein in The Radical Academy.
FOR THE RECORD 1. Americans Know "The Simpsons" Better Than First Amendment Americans know far more about "The Simpsons" cartoon family than they do about the First Amendment. That's the depressing finding of a study by Chicago's McCormick Tribune Freedom Museum. The new museum is dedicated to building public understanding of the First Amendment. Their survey shows they've taken on a big task. Among its findings:
And it goes on. More people could name the three "American Idol" judges than could name 3 of the 5 First Amendment rights. They were also far more familiar with various popular ad slogans than with the First Amendment. Finally, large numbers had Simpson-esque misunderstandings of the First Amendment. For example, about 20% thought the First Amendment protects the right to... own a pet. Another 20% believed the First guarantees the right to drive a car. Source: http://www.mccormicktribune.org/mtf/pressroom/2006/pr030106.htm; Courtesy: Advocates for Self-Government 2. Jolie and Pitt To Do "Atlas Shrugged"? According to Variety, Lionsgate has picked up worldwide distribution rights to Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" from Howard and Karen Baldwin ("Ray"), who will co-produce with John Aglialoro. Superstar couple Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are rumored to be circling the leading roles of Dagny Taggart and John Galt, due to the couple's admiration for Rand. The 1957 "Atlas Shrugged" deals with the economic collapse of the United States, and dramatizes Rand's individualistic philosophy known as "objectivism." The story also features a violent, apocalyptic ending that could prove provocative for the post-9/11 world. We had the pleasure of showing a beautiful Italian adaptation of Rand's "We The Living" at the 2005 Liberty Film Festival. The restored film featured Rossano Brazzi and the recently deceased Alida Valli. Source: Jason Apuzzo and Govindini Murty at NewsMax.com 3. The Difference Between Conservatism And Libertarianism What's the difference between conservatism and libertarianism? Jacob Hornberger, president of the libertarian Future of Freedom Foundation, recently gave his own take on that question in this provocative and controversial piece, entitled "Conservatism vs. Libertarianism": The Conservative: I'm a conservative. I believe in individual liberty, free markets, private property, and limited government, except for:
The Libertarian: I'm a libertarian. I believe in individual liberty, free markets, private property, and limited government. Period. No exceptions. Source: "Conservatism vs. Libertarianism" by Jacob G. Hornberger 4. Study: Pot Doesn't Increase Cancer Risk People who smoke marijuana may be at less risk of developing lung cancer than tobacco smokers, according to a new study. Bloomberg news reports that in a study of 2,200 people in Los Angeles even heavy marijuana smokers were no more likely to develop lung, head or neck cancer than non-users, in contrast with tobacco users, whose risk increases the more they smoke. The findings are a surprise because marijuana smoke has some of the same cancer-causing substances as tobacco smoke, often in higher concentrations, said the senior researcher, Donald Tashkin, a professor at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California-Los Angeles. One possible explanation is that THC, a key ingredient in marijuana not present in tobacco, may inhibit tumor growth, he said in an interview. Source: NewsMax.com (Health Reports) Smart communists: A poll sponsored by the University of Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes found that 74% of Chinese agreed that "the free enterprise system and free market economy is the best system on which to base the future of the world." Shamefully, only 71% of Americans agreed with that statement -- putting the United States three percentage points behind communist China in its support for the free market. Source. A profit without honor: Why is it that people who hate capitalism don't object to making a tidy profit from the very system they despise? Case and point: Ralph Nader. In a review of Peter Schweizer's book, Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy, Liberty magazine (April 2006) points out that Saint Ralph has a personal fortune of $4 million, most of it invested in corporations like GE, Cisco Systems, and IBM. Maybe big business isn't so bad, eh, Ralph? Source. Lots of Libertarians: "Gallup polls have consistently found that 20 percent of Americans are neither liberal nor conservative but libertarian, opposing the use of government either to "promote traditional values" or to "do too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses." That's only slightly below the percentages for liberals and conservatives." -- "Where There Is No Vision, the People Perish," David Boaz, Cato Institute. Source. "Literacy in the North rose from 75 percent to between 91 and 97 percent between 1800 and 1840, the years prior to compulsory schooling and governmental provision and operation of education. In the South during the same time period, the rate grew among the white population from between 50 and 60 percent to 81 percent." -- Sheldon Richman, in his book Separating School & State (Future of Freedom Foundation.)
COUNSELING CORNER: Some More Problems With The English Language If you ever feel stupid, then just read on. If you've learned to speak fluent English, you must be a genius! This little treatise on the lovely language we share is only for the brave. Pursue at your leisure, English lovers. Reasons why the English language is so hard to learn: There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France (Surprise!). Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat. Quicksand works slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea or is it a pig. And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend. If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it? Is it an odd, or an end? If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and wise guy are opposites? You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and in which, an alarm goes off by going on. English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at all. P.S. - Why doesn't "Buick" rhyme with "quick"?
A LITTLE OF THIS & A LITTLE OF THAT A Little Wisdom: To the world you may be one person but to one person you may be the world. A Little Advice: When you're in it up to your ears, keep your mouth shut! A Little Question: Why do hot dogs come ten to a package and hot dog buns only eight? A Little Put-Down: If ignorance is bliss, you must be in nirvana. A Little Proverb: Do not use a hatchet to remove a fly from your friend's forehead. -- Chinese Proverb A Little Reflection: Professionals built the Titanic, amateurs built the Ark. A Little Observation: "Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning." -- Rich Cook A Little Quote: "I'm a great housekeeper. I get divorced. I keep the house." -- Zsa Zsa Gabor A Little Definition: Multitasking = screwing up several things at once. A Little Quip: I love the "swooshing" sound deadlines make as they go by. A Little Natural Law: "Law of Cybernetic Entomology"; There is always one more bug.
ELSEWHERE ON THE INTERNET Some interesting & provocative articles on other websites: Freedom vs. Unlimited Majority Rule, by Peter Schwartz: America's foreign policy has led to a bizarre contradiction. President Bush claims to be pursuing freedom in the world, so that Americans will be safer. Yet this campaign's results--a more zealous proponent of terrorism in the Palestinian Authority, and the prospect of theocracy in Iraq--are posing even greater threats to us. Lighting up with young kids in vehicle banned under bill, by Jake Bleed and Michael R. Wickline: Arkansas -- House Bill 1046 started out as a joke to just about everyone but Bob Mathis. And now it's his turn to laugh. The Hot Springs Democrat and reformed smoker spent much of this week in strong opposition to a bill to ban smoking in most workplaces. Victimless Crimes Are Crimes Against the State, by Manuel Lora: Possession/sale of controlled substances; having no ID/refusing to show ID; importing/exporting without paying taxes; buying/carrying guns without a license; selling services and goods without permits: what do all these things have in common? They are "victimless crimes." There is no crime if you hurt no one. Nor is there a crime if you hurt yourself on purpose or by accident. Yet the government has decided that the above should be criminal offenses. Our sacred honor - Defending the right to be moral, by Alisa Craddock: Homosexuals like to frame their agenda as the next great civil rights battle to be fought in America. But there is no right to be deviant. There is no right to impose deviant sexuality on the culture. There is no right to redefine marriage for the entire society. The Libertarian Heritage - The American Revolution and Classical Liberalism, by Murray N. Rothbard: On election day, 1976, the Libertarian party presidential ticket of Roger L. MacBride for President and David P. Bergland for Vice President amassed 174,000 votes in thirty-two states throughout the country. The sober Congressional Quarterly was moved to classify the fledgling Libertarian party as the third major political party in America. The biggest scandal, by Thomas Sowell: The worst thing said in the case involving rape charges against Duke University students was not said by either the prosecutor or the defense attorneys, or even by any of the accusers or the accused. It was said by a student at North Carolina Central University, a black institution attended by the stripper who made rape charges against Duke lacrosse players. The crisis in education, by Fred Hutchison: The crisis in public education is well known. High dropout rates, low test scores, deficits in reading, math, and history, and inarticulate young people who do not read books are so frequently reported in the news that we have almost come to expect bad news about education. Why are these chronic problems so difficult to fix? Athens and the US - The Decline and Fall, by Eric Phillips: Suppose there existed a world democracy with one vote for each person in the population. Is it not obvious, as Hans-Hermann Hoppe points out, that the world would adopt a flagrantly favorable policy towards China and India at everyone else's expense? Why the 'politics of happiness' makes me mad, by Frank Furedi: If you're unhappy with state-sponsored happiness programmes, clap your hands. I peruse the newspapers over breakfast and notice that yet another leading politician is set to give a speech praising the importance of happiness. The Evil Is In Our Government, by Paul Craig Roberts: Is the Bush Regime a state sponsor of terrorism? A powerful case can be made that it is. In the past three years the Bush Regime has murdered tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians and an unknown number of Afghan ones. Darwinism, Intelligent Design, and the Catholic Church: Darwinists ask us to trust them in their role as historical scientists. All the while many of them appear incapable of accurately interpreting even very recent historical events. I'm thinking of their understanding of recent Vatican statements about Darwinism and design. Getting religion right while leaning to the left, by Brad McIntyre: The political left is getting religion right. It's like a late-inning rally for a baseball team that finally decides to get some hits and score some runs rather than endure another loss. The Drug War's Latest Victim: The war on drugs is an attack on rationality. Reason lost yet another skirmish recently when the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced on April 20 that "no sound scientific studies" supported the medical use of marijuana. How do children learn about science and God?: Parents and teachers: take heed. It is through you that children learn about those things they cannot see. Things like the fact the earth is round, not flat; that our thinking and other mental processes occur in our brains; that germs exist and that there is a God. Socialism's Last Defender: This tragic state in which the Arab nation finds itself . . . cannot continue because if it continues at this pace it will threaten the civilization of the Arab nation with serious deterioration and could even lead to its extinction.
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