Here's a good question: why can't a woman go topless wherever a man can? Sorry . . . I'm not buying answers like "Because that is the way it has always been" or "Because they are women." Talk about equal rights! The prevalent dress code inequity is motivated by the…
Shermer and Chopra traded articles at Skeptic Magazine, but they really didn't communicate. Shermer got me on board with comments like this: Here is the reality. It has been estimated that in the last 50,000 years about 106 billion humans were born. Of the 100 billion people born before the…
I've previously written about the enormous number of synonyms for poop, speculating on why there are so many synonyms. I don't know if my suggestions were convincing to others, but the issue still intrigues me. As an epilogue to that earlier post, I offer this video, one of many elaborate…
Dick Cheney and other conservatives constantly warn us of the “China threat.” Check out these headlines and articles:
This belligerent U.S. attitude that insists that China will inevitably ripen into our next big enemy concerns me for two reasons.
First, why can’t the U.S. work toward an upcoming era of cooperation with China, rather than assuming that we must eventually go to war because China is an emerging superpower? This preference for aggression rather than cooperation is a xenophobic tactic that Neocons have previously used to make “enemies” out of many other countries with whom we should be working to develop strong relationships. What is China’s sin, by the way? China is doing the same things the United States does. For instance, China competing economically with vigor. China is accruing wealth. China is testing sophisticated weapons. China is expanding its influence into parts of the world where petroleum can be found in the ground. Yet the U.S. is paranoid about China. If our frustration is that the Chinese practically own us (along with Japan), that is our own fault that we can’t control our own profligate government spending. I’m not advocating being naive. Perhaps China will someday threaten American interests. I’m suggesting that we should save harsh rhetoric if that happens.
Second, I have a personal stake in …
You don’t know the word "palter"? I didn’t either, until I read a recent paper by Frederick Schauer and Richard J. Zeckhauser of Harvard. The paper’s abstract defines this incredibly useful term, palter: Abstract: A lie involves three elements: deceptive intent, an inaccurate message, and a harmful effect. When only…