Abstract This paper reads like – because it is – a meditation. Its ‘moments’ are these: That like cases are to be treated alike seems to be the core axiom behind all our moral and political reasoning. And yet this… Read More ›
political
A PROOF THAT EGALITARIANISM IS EITHER FALSE OR BANAL
Abstract In this paper I argue that the only equality that need be postulated between agents qua heading into a theory of normative ethics and/or politics is that the agents in question be equally involved in interactivity in which there’s… Read More ›
A PROOF THAT LIBERTARIANISM IS EITHER FALSE OR BANAL
Abstract In this paper I consider all 243 positions that could constitute libertarianism and show that all but a few are false and the few remaining are banal. I argue further that all 243 versions must issue a promissory note… Read More ›
CHILDREN OF A LESSER GOD (Repost, November 2020)
Presented at the Seventh World Conference on Metaphysics at the Pontifical University of Salamanca, Spain, Oct 24-27, 2018 ABSTRACT: By a political theodicy is meant an attempt to harness our theological resources to ameliorate the evil we do and suffer… Read More ›
A HOUSE DIVIDED, AND KEEPING IT THAT WAY
In one my first entries in this blog, “First to the Tribe”, posted on September 14, 2016, I noted – not as a criticism but as a simple observation – that none of us can afford to do all of… Read More ›
JANUARY 20, 2021
If Donald Trump wins the election – whether by hook or by crook, it won’t matter, at least not from a Constitutional perspective – then there won’t be a Constitutional crisis to worry about on November 4th. But he’s taken… Read More ›
AN ANALYSIS OF MIRACLES IN THREE AWKWARD PHILOSOPHICAL MOMENTS
I. What is a Law of the Land? Thomas Hobbes thought that in a state of nature there’s “no government at all, except the government of small families, the concord whereof dependeth on natural lust,” I’m not sure the concord… Read More ›
‘TWAS AND ‘TIS ALWAYS THUS
There isn’t a single person – or a married one for that matter – who hasn’t done something unworthy of himself. Even that Jesus fellow overturned tables that didn’t belong to him. So if we only erect statues to “he… Read More ›
IMMIGRATION, INVASION, OCCUPATION, AND CONQUEST
Few and far between are polities that manage to keep the foreigner out for long. As we’ve seen from the druthers of Donald Trump and his followers, by immigration is not meant the immigrant is necessarily welcomed in her new… Read More ›
ACCOMMODATION
Right and wrong are moral terms. Just and unjust are political. But whether we want to know what’s right or what’s just, in either case form follows function. And so the first question to ask is what do we want… Read More ›