Rat Walks Again

This picture and story captures what's so heart-wrenching about the whole subject of animal experimentation. 




Rats with a spinal cord injury
that left their hind legs completely paralyzed learned to walk again on
their own after an intensive training course that included electrical
stimulation of the brain and the spine, scientists reported on Thursday.
Obviously the rats don't just have

Conference Behavior

I think this is funny.  So you
give a speech at a conference, and afterwards a couple comes up to you and
hands you a business card, saying (essentially) "care to join
us?"  For details and the card see
here.   Question:  when
should moronic behavior be treated as private vice, to be discouraged
informally; and when should moronic behavior be proscribed by the quasi-legal
standards of a community

My Sweet Lord

Song for the day is "My Sweet Lord" -- we've been having a George Harrison fest, as a result of watching the new(ish) Martin Scorsese movie about his life (which is very good).  There's something utterly ingenious about religious thinking.  I've noticed, as I age, that I'm getting more and more creaky, and it really, really sucks. Being a believer let's you think, as you fall apart, that you're

Attachment Parenting

I guess I have to read Elisabeth Badinter's book The Conflict: How Modern Motherhood Undermines the Status of Women, but I think it's going to be supremely irritating, judging by this review and Katha Pollitt's column, both in The Nation.  The bad guy du jour is "attachment parenting," which says good mothers/parents need to be in super-contact with their children, wearing them in slings,

Coyne on Evolution and Religion

Jerry Coyne has a new article out on how religiosity gets in the way of Americans accepting evolution.  I'm surprised he continues a pattern of reasoning that was widely criticized over a year ago.  First he dismisses religious scientists as "proof" of religion-science compatibility--




Some argue that the mere existence of religious scientists proves this compatibility,
but that is specious.

The Second Sexism (plus a mystery or two)

I have my eye on the book The Second Sexism -- to read it, or not to read it?  We will certainly review it at The Philosophers' Magazine and Benatar is writing an essay on discrimination against men for the magazine.  If nothing else, the book is intriguing, and it sure has a clever title. But ...

Honestly, I cannot say that I feel the problem of sexism against men looms large, especially

The Republican Brain

Something about the title of this book elicits skepticism. I wouldn't read a book called The Liberal Brain, if it were written by a conservative (did Ann Coulter actually write a book with that title)?  Why expect objectivity from a liberal trying to dissect the Republican brain?  Actually, if you read the book, you do get an answer.  Liberals, more than Conservatives, love to be fair and