It is often claimed that every contemporary ethical dispute is really a debate between Charles Darwin and the Pope. On the one side there is a secular (im)morality which finds it acceptable and desirable ruthlessly to use and sacrifice individuals. On the other, there is Christian morality which asserts that every single human being has …
Children of Men is obviously not a film about infertility as a biological problem. The infertility Cuaron’s film is about was diagnosed long ago by Friedrich Nietzsche, when he perceived how Western civilisation was moving in the direction of the Last Man, an apathetic creature with no great passion or commitment. Unable to dream, tired …
Our blindness to the results of systematic violence is perhaps most clearly perceptible in debates about communist crimes. Responsibility for communist crimes is easy to allocate: we are dealing with subjective evil, with agents who did wrong. We can ever identify the ideological sources of the crimes-totalitarian ideology, The communist Manifesto, Rousseau, even Plato. But …
This is why we are consciously relieved when we turn to reading after being occupied with our own thoughts. But, in reading, our head is, however, really only the arena of some one else’s thoughts. And so it happens that the person who reads a great deal—that is to say, almost the whole day, and …
There is one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. All the rest-whether or not the world has three dimensions, whether the mind has nine or twelve categories- comes afterwards. These are games; one must first answer. And …
The debate among Americans about illegal immigration is itself a discussion about prices. Critics charge that illegal immigrants lower the prices of natives’ labor by offering to do the job for less. They argue that immigrants impose a burden on natives when they consume public services, like education for their children and emergency medical care. …
Waste, in fact, confronts us with the same value propositions as anything else. The price we put on it-what we will trade to have it, or have it go away-is a function of its attendant benefits or costs. A bagful of two-rupee plastic bottles is more valuable to an Indian child who hasn´t eaten today …
By excessive individualism we mean the belief that the prime duty of the individual is to make the most of her own life, rather than to contribute to the good of others. Of course, some degree of individualism is necessary for survival, and individual choice and self/determination are vital ingredients of a good life. But …
Dublín, Irlanda, 1729 Es un asunto melancólico para quienes pasean por esta gran ciudad o viajan por el campo, ver las calles, los caminos y las puertas de las cabañas atestados de mendigos del sexo femenino, seguidos de tres, cuatro o seis niños, todos en harapos e importunando a cada viajero por una limosna. Esas …
On 28 April 2004 the CBS television network broadcast photographs taken by American soldiers at the Baghdad Correctional Facility (Abu Ghraib). They showed Iraqi prisioners stripped and piled up to form human pyramids. Prisioners were naked and hooded. Many had clearly been tortured. Some photographs showed men forced to simulate fellatio. The perpetrators were not …