Some instructors of baby logic define an enthymeme as an argument with at least one missing premise. Strictly speaking this is a mistake. If the premise is needed to render the argument valid, and yet it’s missing, then the argument… Read More ›
Social and Political Philosophy
BACKSTORIES
When looking up the etymology of a word, sometimes you need a backstory. For example, kleenex and hoover were once brand names. Or, how did we get ‘sincere’ from ‘without wax’? These are hardly grounds for complaint. But other disconnects… Read More ›
THE FEMINISATION OF THE UNIVERSITY
The Grumblers – and yes, we do have membership cards – argue about when our universities began their decline. But we’re all of a mind that it began with the admission of women. Which is not to say it was… Read More ›
FROM THE UNTHINKABLE THOUGHTS FILE
Well no, that can’t be right. If a thought were unthinkable I couldn’t think it, and if I couldn’t think it I couldn’t blog about it. On the other hand, by unthinkable I can’t just mean distasteful or unseemly. So… Read More ›
NOT ALL THAT SERIOUSLY
Let me come clean about how shallow a person I am. I’ll put myself in harm’s way for a thrill, but not for a cause. Not even to save the life of a loved one? Well maybe, if the likelihood… Read More ›
FROM THE LET’S-SETTLE-THIS-ONCE-AND-FOR-ALL FILE: THE TRANS ISSUE
If, as its etymology suggests, by ontology were meant the study of being, it wouldn’t have much to say, because being is an unanalysable primitive. That is, if you don’t know what it is for something to be, then I… Read More ›
AN OPEN LETTER TO MY FELLOW SAFS TRAVELLERS
You’re going to have to bear with me. Why? Because for what follows I’ll be trading in my SAFS hat for my philosopher’s one. And – and I’m sorry about this folks – sometimes philosophy, or at least good philosophy,… Read More ›
LIVING WITH THE JUDGMENT OF OTHERS
I’m a lone gunman, and I kill someone because and only because he’s black, or Indian, or Jewish, or Palestinian. Have I committed genocide? Clearly not. Suppose there’s a number of us, and we kill a number of people because… Read More ›
THERE SHOULD BE A LAW
It’s a well-known fact that Lee Harvey Oswald killed John Kennedy in Dallas on November 22nd, 1963. But it’s a little-known fact that he did so not because Kennedy was the President of the United States but because he had… Read More ›
POLITICAL ECONOMY MADE SIMPLE
Paying $3.99 for diapers instead of $4.19 gives Mom 20 cents more she can spend on lean ground beef instead of mostly filler. And that’s a good thing for kids. But governments need to fund themselves, and the ‘fairest’ way… Read More ›
Paulosophical Vimplications 