History Imaginaries in Science 13 Sep 202413 Sep 2024 I wrote a thing. I started out skeptical, but ended up convincing myself that “imaginaries” is a good concept. I am annoyed by this. Continue Reading
Freedom Good faith, bad faith and no faith in reasoning 7 Oct 201823 Nov 2018 We are hearing a lot of calls for there to be public debates with climate deniers, the alt-right (that is, modern fascists), creationists and antivaxxers, and this has led to people marking the so-called “paradox of tolerance” named by Karl Popper in his epochal 1945 Open Society and its Enemies: Continue Reading
Ecology and Biodiversity 50 words for snow 4: what counts as sociocultural? 3 Oct 20171 Mar 2019 Series Conceptual confusion The economics of cultural categories What are phenomena? What counts as sociocultural? Species Constructing phenomena Explanations and phenomena Jim Harrison made the following comment on the last post: … I have trouble understanding how you distinguish the s and the c in your pseudo equation. You mention… Continue Reading
Race and politics Thoughts on racism 31 Aug 201731 Aug 2017 For many years, I have been very hesitant to speak about race. I’m white (a stupid social construction in itself), male and middle class. Every time I make a comment, in come the critics, attacking me on everything from my own group identity (which, by the way, I do not… Continue Reading
Freedom The Abstract and the Concrete, or, the Road to Fascism 9 Apr 20179 Apr 2017 I was thinking about the way in which the anti-abortionists justify their views. I have always said that “Pro-Life” is a misnomer. Instead of being pro-life, they are pro-potential life. In order to protect potential lives, they ignore the needs and rights of those who have actual life – the women who cannot… Continue Reading
Ethics and Moral Philosophy Morality and Evolution 6: Moral dispositions 21 May 201422 May 2014 [Morality and Evolution 1 2 3 4 5 6 7] In any field that has statistical variation, it is necessary to isolate the variables. Biology is all about statistical variation of populations, and so we must expect that any account of morality that is based upon biology will have variation along a number of axes. Here… Continue Reading
Ethics and Moral Philosophy Morality and Evolution 5: biology and culture 20 May 201422 May 2014 [Morality and Evolution 1 2 3 4 5 6 7] I should note that there is no set historical sequence implied in the levels 0 to 4, apart from the fact that we were primates before we were humans, so some sort of historical transition from 0 to 1 must occur before any of the others…. Continue Reading
Ethics and Moral Philosophy Morality and evolution 4: Is morality fitness-enhancing? 19 May 201422 May 2014 [Morality and Evolution 1 2 3 4 5 6 7] If we agree that morality enhances fitness, because it enables cooperation, several questions arise: what sort of fitness enhancement does it provide and to what? In short, what is the selection process tracking? To say that morality provides a foundation for social cohesion and the consequent… Continue Reading
Ethics and Moral Philosophy Morality and Evolution 1: The Milvian Bridge 29 Apr 201422 May 2014 [Morality and Evolution 1 2 3 4 5 6 7] A while back I gave a talk to a group of theologians on the question of Darwinian accidents. It had no ethics content. The first question I was asked was “If you are an atheist, how can you have moral rules?” Like many others who talk… Continue Reading
Accommodationism Science outreach: A conversation 2 Feb 201420 Feb 2014 From the Freethinkers Blog Con: With PZ Myzer and Aron Ra. Continue Reading