The Water We Swim In: A Need to Look at Causes as Well as Effects.
There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says “Morning, boys. How’s the…
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Politics
47 posts
Christopher Hitchens’ Defense of the Enlightenment
Christopher Hitchens is my favorite writer. His books probably made up around 80% of my high school reading diet. I devoured everything he published, from his autobiography to his studies…
White Privilege: Is It a Helpful Concept?
In this article, I will argue that the concept of “white privilege” is a counterproductive way of framing concerns about anti-brown and anti-black racism in the West in general, and…
Medine Zaouiche and the Politics of Provocation
When French rapper Médine (real name Medine Zaouiche) decided to schedule a concert at the Bataclan theatre, where, in November 2015, Islamist jihadists massacred eighty-nine people, there was bound to…
The Immigration Crisis: Who is to Blame?
This was first published on inaswrites.wordpress.com. For a moment, just put yourself in this position: You’ve lived in the same village all your life—but you’ve always known that there’s a…
The Decline of Traditional Conservatism and the Rise of the Postmodern Conservative.
In a July 4 article in the New York Times, conservative icon Roger Scruton lamented “What Trump Doesn’t Get About Conservatism.” Scruton argues that Trump largely bypasses intellectual arguments about conservatism…
Anthro-Technological Decision-Making: A Lesson from the Cold War
Humanity’s capacity for critical thinking is of paramount importance to our survival. This remains true, even in our hyper real information age, in which Artificial Intelligence (AI) is playing an…
The Amorality of the Mob: Personal Reflections on the Evergreen Incident One Year On
It’s the one-year anniversary of the day on which mild-mannered leftist Jewish professor Bret Weinstein was confronted in his classroom by a mob of angry students. By a strange twist…
Who’s Afraid of the “Intellectual Dark Web”?
I have been meaning to comment on the sound and fury about Bari Weiss’ New York Times piece on the “Intellectual Dark Web,” an informal network of “heretics” and “renegades” who dissent…
Campus Speech Debate: The Nightmare of the Nineties is Alive
On Tuesday night I was lucky enough to attend a very engaging debate at the Comedy Cellar in New York City. Organized by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education and…
The Democratic Fundamentalist: A Response to Nathan J. Robinson’s “Socialism as a Set of Principles”
Three cheers for socialism! What’s not to like?
Understanding Human Nature Is the Best Way of Fixing Our Political Culture
Many factors contribute to political divisiveness and rancor. Some of them are natural and nearly inevitable aspects of fundamental human nature, but others are not. Of those that are not,…
The Philosophy of Nonviolence: The Lost Legacy of Martin Luther King
The 50th anniversary of the death of Martin Luther King, Jr. has come and gone. MLK Day is behind us. Yet there is no reason for us to stop talking…
Rhextortion: Misinterpretation by Proxy
The other day a friend linked me to a tweet from one journalist to another: “i think you want to be really careful,” it said, “about using language that sounds…
Sure, The Left Keeps Eating Itself — Who Can We Draft to Bite Back?
The protest faced by Jordan Peterson at Queen’s University was one of the latest in a series of events that continue to stir the tempest in a teapot that embodies…
Activism and the Conflict of Visions
I recently read Thomas Sowell’s classic work A Conflict of Visions. In it, he attempts to describe two different foundational worldviews, or visions, which are implicit in the thinking of…
Sam Harris, Ezra Klein, and the Politicization of Science
The year long feud between cognitive neuroscientist Sam Harris and Editor-at-Large of Vox Ezra Klein is one that has pitted advocates for a group identity based approach to politics against…
