According to John Stuart Mill, in a liberal democracy all is permitted save what is prohibited. And what can be prohibited must be demonstrably harmful. But what’s meant by harm? It can’t be just a setback of interests. Your opening a coffee shop across the street from mine might set my interests back considerably, and … Continue reading THE HARMS RACE
racism
TRUTH versus RECONCILIATION
The truth-value of an utterance – for example that I’m going to die on such and such a date – is very often at odds with (what J.L. Austin called) its perlocutionary value – what it does for the speaker and/or listener. As it happens my affairs are in order, so if you happen to … Continue reading TRUTH versus RECONCILIATION
THE RHETORICIAN AND THE PHILOSOPHER
A Janus word is one that means one thing but also its opposite. Example: sanction. There are word-pairs that sound like they mean the opposite but don’t, like flammable and inflammable. And then there are word-pairs that sound like they mean the same thing but mean the opposite. Example: disgruntled and gruntled. Who’d have thought … Continue reading THE RHETORICIAN AND THE PHILOSOPHER
INDIGENOUS STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LETHBRIDGE
The social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has argued that a university can task itself to seeking the truth, or to promoting social justice, but not both. Why? Because the truth is sometimes incompatible with the promotion of social justice. A university that tries to have it both ways is going to fail at both, and as … Continue reading INDIGENOUS STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LETHBRIDGE
NECESSITATED HYPOCRISY
There are a few things that I get that other people don’t. If this weren’t so I wouldn’t be of much use to them, now would I? So no, since it’s not hubris, no apology warranted, so none forthcoming. And then there are a few things other people get but I don’t. For example, I … Continue reading NECESSITATED HYPOCRISY
THE SAME-SEX MARRIAGE DEBATE
In the course of his travels, Gulliver came upon an island very much like our own. Not unlike how it was for us, the complementarity of their genitalia was for most of their history the sine qua non of reproduction, and reproduction was serious business for pretty much everyone. But because reliable birth control had … Continue reading THE SAME-SEX MARRIAGE DEBATE
