No one can accuse me of being fair. But were I to be, then yes, every discipline has its own vocabulary, its own syntax, its own rules of inference … Words, phrases, sentences, they all take their meaning from the… Read More ›
Black Lives Matter
“YOU KEEP USING THAT WORD. I DON’T THINK IT MEANS WHAT YOU THINK IT MEANS”
From the Most-Memorable-One-Liners-in-Cinema file, this one’s from The Princess Bride. And here are just some of my favourite words or phrases that don’t mean what either the speaker or the listener thinks they mean: BLACK LIVES MATTER: No one thinks all… Read More ›
HUMOUR
There’s an important difference between twisted and sick. Dead baby jokes are twisted, but telling them at a SIDS funeral is sick. It might relieve the tension in the room, but I’d hold off unless you really know your crowd…. Read More ›
GRIST FOR THE PETITION
I’ve been trying for years now, but to no avail. And so I’ve finally given up hoping for death threats. Instead I’ve decided to settle, if I can get even this, for a petition for my dismissal. To that end… Read More ›
BLACK LIVES MATTER AND THE SJW’S DILEMMA
Here’s something I do know. As with everywhere else on the planet, there was tribal warfare in Africa long before European colonialism. What I don’t know – but I stand to be instructed – is whether that colonialism mitigated that… Read More ›
HOW TO MAKE WHITE LIVES MATTER
Now that Asian Lives Matter has eclipsed the Black Lives Matter movement, if only for a week or two, I wonder what it’ll take to get a White Lives Matter movement off the ground. Probably some black man walking into… Read More ›
IN THE WAKE OF THE ‘INCURSION’
Since the – let’s just call it an ‘incursion’ – into the U.S. Capitol on January 6, CNN and MSNBC have been awfulising it as “the end of the American experiment in democracy”, while Fox has been downplaying it as… Read More ›
MY NEW YEARS WISH FOR AMERICA
With the election finally called, the “You’re fired!” signs have been coming out, as we all knew they would. And given Trump’s bravado, Biden would certainly be entitled to join in the crowing. But he’s not. And wisely not. After… Read More ›
THE MEANING OF BLACK LIVES MATTER
Had Rudolf Carnap been around today, he’d have pointed out that “x lives matter” is not a well-formed formula. Well-formedness requires that “x lives matter to some y”. And at that, perhaps only at some time t, and only under… Read More ›
DOGWHISTLING
If I ask whether the blind date you’re setting me up with is good looking, and you answer that she has a wonderful personality, you’re not just saying something about her personality. Likewise, then, no one denies that all lives… Read More ›
Paulosophical Vimplications 