A few days ago, I co-hosted a screening of Night of the Living Dead for our school's "American Studies" and "Philosophy and Religion" student clubs. My main job was to briefly introduce the movie by waxing eloquent on the history and philosophical significance of zombies. For the history stuff, I mostly stole what I can … Continue reading Night of the Living Dead
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Escape Fire: Rescuing the American Health Care System
I teach Medical Ethics at Fitchburg State University, and so naturally the Nursing students thought that I would be a good fit for their panel discussion following a screening of Escape Fire: Rescuing the American Health Care System. This documentary was released in 2012, and has some won some awards (Best Documentary Produced Within the Last … Continue reading Escape Fire: Rescuing the American Health Care System
The Kraus Project – Jonathan Franzen on “What’s Wrong with the Modern World”
- alternate subtitle - all you out there not talking nonstop about your phones/tv/etc., otherwise complying with my proposed rules for CTA conversations, the ones who are just staring into the phones "minding your own business"? You annoy me as well. - second alternate subtitle - I review what Jonathan Franzen, Paul Reitter, and Daniel … Continue reading The Kraus Project – Jonathan Franzen on “What’s Wrong with the Modern World”
Proposed Rules for Conversations on the CTA
This is admittedly a long shot, but on the off chance that every person I'm forced to listen to on the CTA who speaks loudly enough for me to hear them were to read this, and then take my advice, the world would be a better place. I think specific recommendations may help in a … Continue reading Proposed Rules for Conversations on the CTA
Nash Disequilibrium
This weekend I watched a biography of the mathematician John Nash (of A Beautiful Mind fame). As many of you probably know, in his early 20s Nash was on his way to becoming a world-historical mathematician, but then spent the next 30 years or so suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and circulating in and out of … Continue reading Nash Disequilibrium
Top Five Glenn Gould Records That Aren’t Bach
Glenn Gould is best known as a Bach keyboard music specialist, and despite his protests to the contrary, that's clearly his oeuvre's biggest strength. Nonetheless, Gould did record a bunch of other things, and many of them have given me a lot of listening and re-listening pleasure. So here goes a Desert-Island-Top-5 type list. … Continue reading Top Five Glenn Gould Records That Aren’t Bach
On Nozick, On Williams
Bernard Williams and Robert Nozick are two philosophers I really enjoy reading. Seeing one directly address the other in print is strangely amusing, like finding out that two good friends you had met at different places and times in your life actually know each other (I had assumed, I suppose, that although Williams and Nozick … Continue reading On Nozick, On Williams
Six Scenes from the Life of John the Baptist
This week I turned right, past the second floor's brightly lit impressionism welcome room, into the middle-ages and renaissance European area. This is a period of art I know very little about, save for the crash course I got 15 years ago travelling through Italy with two art history enthusiasts. Back then, I was not … Continue reading Six Scenes from the Life of John the Baptist
Temkin on Inequality
The subject of this post--the first in a series on philosophical discussions of equality and inequality--is a fascinating essay ("Inequality") by the philosopher Larry Temkin. Here's Temkin in all his brainy glory: I had heard of Temkin before--I knew him by reputation as a very good ethical and political philosopher--but I had never read any … Continue reading Temkin on Inequality
Is Consistency Overrated?
Conventional wisdom--where I come from, at least--tells us that we should ferret out inconsistencies in our beliefs and eliminate these inconsistencies. That's a big part of what it means to be a reasonable person. So, to take just one particularly stark example, I should not complacently accept an epistemic situation in which I believe that P … Continue reading Is Consistency Overrated?
Original Positions 