The Greece v. Galloway symposium

The symposium held yesterday at the law school at my university went very well, I thought. The weather was brutal, with low temperatures and winds making it seem much colder. Combined with the snow left over from the previous night that had turned into slush and ice making walking unpleasant, to put it mildly, I wondered whether there would be many people who would venture out. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the auditorium was almost full, with students and faculty and members of the community braving the weather to come and hear about an issue that they clearly thought was important. [Read more…]

Pete Seeger and Johnny Cash

The internet has been full of tributes to the great Pete Seeger who died earlier today. Here is one clip that I particularly liked where he appears with another of my favorite singers Johnny Cash. Together they sing a rousing version of It takes a worried man, getting the audience to join in, which is something that Seeger loved to do. He realized the power of music to bring people together and raise consciousness and that music was something you did, not just listened to. [Read more…]

Neuroscience suggests that there is no soul

Neurophilosopher Patricia Churchland appeared on The Colbert Report to discuss with the host some of the latest developments in neuroscience and what they shed on old philosophical questions. She had to break the news to him, a practicing Catholic, that he has no soul (because none of us do) and that our moral sense arises from the circuitry and chemical activity of the brain. It is a good interview. He actually asks some sharp questions, dealing with the kinds of concerns a religious person would have, and gives her time to respond rather than taking up a lot of the time which can be a failing of his. [Read more…]

The lady of the house

Today was supposed to be a very cold day with the predicted high to be only 0oF (-18oC) with winds making it seem much colder so they decided to close schools across the region, and my university did so too. Underlining the unpredictability of weather, in actual fact the day is very sunny and the temperature right now (at mid-afternoon) is 9oF (-13oC) and there does not seem to be any wind, making it seem quite balmy, at least while I was out briefly to shovel the walkway. Yesterday with its winds actually seemed a lot colder. [Read more…]

Spoiling things for others

Although I have never banned anyone, I have had the occasion to delete one comment. This was in response to the post about spoiling film endings. In the discussion, commenters referred to various films that had surprise endings and discussed them without giving them away. Then someone came along and posted a comment that listed all the endings to every film that had been discussed. I deleted it so quickly that I suspect that most readers never saw it. [Read more…]

How money came to so dominate politics in the US

Last evening I went to talk given by Robert McChesney, a professor of communications at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign. He is a prolific author on the media and politics and he was speaking about the ideas in his new book (co-authored with John Nicholls) titled Dollarocracy: How the Money-and-Media Election Complex is Destroying America in which he argues that the idea of ‘one person, one vote’ has now become ‘one dollar, one vote’. [Read more…]

Pete Seeger, 1919-2014

Pete Seeger died today. He was an American treasure, a powerful voice for justice and peace all throughout his long and colorful life, whose musical and political influence extended well beyond the borders of the USA. I had heard of Seeger and knew his songs growing up in Sri Lanka. This entry in Wikipedia captures the strength and consistency of the principles that drove him and his refusal to back down when asked to compromise those principles, even if it meant going to jail. [Read more…]