Parents are mostly way too defensive about this. One friend claimed that she was supportive of me not having kids, but eventually accused me of hating her children b/c I was asking her about the health effects of pregnancy, etc. Come to think of it,…
Getting to the age where a good portion of my friends have kids, I realized that both adults and kids get in the way of each other's fun. Adults tell kids to stop doing this and that, but meanwhile kids keep them from having the wild parties…
"what can they do about it now, after all?"
Heh, maybe part of them agrees with you, and the last thing they want is to have it brought to their attention that not having children was an option!
Kristy--reading about atheist cavemen in Australia is surprising and dismaying. One thing that we can say about atheists, though, is that it is somewhat surprising to run across the kind of chauvinism you describe among atheists; I suspect that if…
You are swinging at the wind, Thomas, and you have been for some time. No one has suggested that Dawn read any historical works of philosophy--with the single exception of Spinoza, a suggestion that I did not happen to agree with. (Well, you did…
Thomas, since you like to argue, then quarrel with yourself:
"Philosophy is a vibrant, ever-changing discipline, and focusing on the past essentially means studying history, not philosophy."
"If you're a specialist, a historian…
Hi Dawn,
I'm glad that my suggestions proved useful (though Nate is right, of course, that nobody's advice is gospel!). I thoroughly enjoy being a part of this community. I learn a great deal every time I sign on.
Thomas, I find philosophical discussions fascinating; I find urination contests tedious. You seem to me more interested in the latter than in the former. No one on this thread was recommending that Dawn go back and dive straight into Kant—God…
Huxley is obviously an expert on Shakespeare.
It's Huxley who introduced me to Shakespeare's sonnets. Point Counter Point partially quotes sonnet CXXX ("My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun..."), which is still the…
I can't respond to this question, but here's what Shaw had to say about the matter:
I read Dickens and Shakespear without shame or stint; but their pregnant observations and demonstrations of life are not co-ordinated into any philosophy…
There's some speculation that Shakespeare was Catholic because his father had been Catholic. In addition, ghosts suggest the existence of Purgatory or "Limbo," which only Catholics believed in.
I'm a veteran atheist, but while I understand the battle cries against religious zealotry on many of these sites, I'm interested in joining a community that defines itself as being *for* something and not simply against religious belief. Yes, being a heretic can be isolating, and I have a special sympathy for those of you who live in red states (or in red parts of blue states), but I think that Greg Epstein has it right: Humanism needs to be about more than contempt for other people's views.
Don't get me wrong; I enjoy a good magic underpants joke as much as the next guy (in fact, I'm writing a book on religious satire), but if the conversation ends there, more often than not I feel empty.
Here are some things that I like; I've imported these lists from my Facebook page:
Activities: Hiking, rowing, tennis, walking from one end of Manhattan to the other, chess, reading, writing.
Favorite Music:
Gogol Bordello
Metric
Beirut
Tilly and the Wall
The National
Feist
Neutral Milk Hotel
The Thermals
Radiohead
Tapes ’n Tapes
Andrew Bird
John Vanderslice
Bishop Allen
Ratatat
Firewater
Arctic Monkeys
We Were Promised Jetpacks
Favorite TV Shows:
The Wire--after 4 nearly perfect seasons, David Simon and Ed Burns jumped the shark last year.
The Daily Show
The Colbert Report
The Office
Favorite Movies:
Blade Runner
Borat
Born into Brothels
Brick
Capturing the Friedmans
Conventioneers
Dirty, Pretty Things.
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Henry Fool
In Bruges
Joyeux Noel
Laurel Canyon
Little Miss Sunshine
Memento
Oldboy (brutal but brilliant)
Serpico
Sicko
Spellbound
Superbad
Tell No One
The Big Lebowski
The Dark Knight
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
The Edukators
The Graduate
The History Boys
THe Hudsucker Proxy
The Illusionist
The Lives of Others
The Motel (the low-budget Indy film)
The Painted Veil
The Princess Bride
The Simpsons
The Usual Suspects
The Village (underrated)
Touching the Void
Unknown White Male
The Godfather is wildly overrated. Other overrated flicks: Atonement, No Country for Old Men.
Favorite Books:
Moby Dick
The Satanic Verses
Pale Fire
Candide
Favorite bookstores (my feeble attempt to help save independent bookshops):
Boston/Cambridge: Raven Used Books, Brattle Book Shop, Commonwealth Books, MIT Press Bookshop
Burlington, VT: North County Books
Chicago: Seminary Co-op (not religious), Powell's, O'Gara & Wilson
Evanston, IL: Amaranth Books
Lincoln, NE: Bluestem Books, A Novel Idea
London: Foyles, in which Unsworths Booksellers is currently housed; London Review Bookshop; Judd Books.
Minneapolis: James & Mary Laurie Bookseller
Montreal: Le Mot / The Word (not religious)
NYC: Book Culture, The Strand (of course), St. Mark's Books, Crawford Doyle Booksellers
Paris: Librarie J. Vrin, Librarie Compagnie, Gibert Jeune, Galignani, The Red Wheelbarrow, Shakespeare and Company.
Portland: Powell's, Daedalus Books
St. Louis: Subterranean Books
San Francisco / Berkeley: University Press Books, Black Oak Books
Washington DC: Bridge Street Books
Best online experience: Maxwell's House of Books--always good.
Well, I'm just glad that you are doing okay, and that you're still here with us on A|N. I understand the busy part, so no pressure. Just wanted to make sure you were still with us.
Hi, thanks. I either want to do a biology phd, or some sort of science communication job. However with the job market at the moment, I will probably have to take whatever I can get! I see you like Radiohead, I saw them on Sunday at Reading Festival. They were by far the best band there!
C'est vrai. Et heureusement je vois que vos journalistes le disent! En revenant de mes vacances, j'ai un tout petit peu l'impression que le debat se calme. C'est peut-être une illusion, c'est peut-être insuffisant, mais vu de ce côté de l'Atlantique c'est un tout petit peu rassurant...
Indian food rocks! Unfortunately I haven't found an Indian restaurant I really like here in Lincoln, and I've tried a few. Also, there must be even less stop signs in Kearney, because quite a few are missing here in Lincoln too! My husband and I could not believe it actually, when we moved here, that entire streets on residential neighborhoods had no stop signs in either direction. We drove without stopping for about a month before we caught on! Thanks for your nice welcome... where do you live now?
Thank you! Unfortunately I'm not much of a city person... prefer peace and quiet. But I have found and few fun spots and there certainly are great museums here of which I'm a huge fan. The weather kills me though!
Oui, ça a effectivement l'air d'être très difficile, les projets de réforme du système de santé d'Obama. Il y a tellement de niveaux différents! Et avec toute la désinformation, il semble que ce soit difficile d'avoir une discussion sensée sur les vrais enjeux.
En Europe, dans chaque pays les gens râlent sur leur système de santé, parce qu'aucun n'est parfait. Mais au fond on est très contents de l'avoir, et personne ne voudrait avoir le vôtre à la place. J'espère beaucoup pour vous que ce sera possible de le réformer...
Ici aussi, les professeurs dans les sciences humaines travaillent beaucoup seuls. Mais c'est vrai, j'ai de la chance. Je travaille dans une faculté de médecine, où on a plus l'habitude de travailler en équipe et du coup les bioéthiciens aussi travaillent en équipe. C'est très stimulant. Et quand en plus les gens sont sympa...