Inequity & Mormonism
The recent Harper’s article suggesting Mormons have a mindset of seeking after gold and riches irked a lot of people. (See for instance this post by Russell Fox) Frankly I don’t think the article deserves much consideration. It’s just poorly researched and sourced with some mind bogglingly dumb connections made. I am intrigued though by [...]
Approaching Justice
Chris H. has a blog up on theory, culture and Mormonism. We’re ideologically pretty separated (he’s a liberal, I’m conservative, he’s a neo-Kantian of sorts ethically whereas probably Levinas and Derrida come closest to my ethical views to the degree I have any) Still I always enjoy my discussions with him.
Russell Fox Responds
Russell Fox responds to that hack job on Mormons in Harper’s. Also a response at the Deseret News.
Science and Religion Conflict?
Only 15% of scientists at major universities think there is a conflict between science and religion. I’m actually surprised it’s that low. I guess the New Atheists have been less persuasive than it appeared. More surprising was that a majority saw both science and religion as “valid avenues of knowledge.”
More FTL Neutrinos
More on faster than light neutrinos from the ever wonderful xkcd.
Scientists Safely Can Sequence Fetus DNA
Scientists can now safely sequence the genome of a fetus. Should they? I’d say yes but I can understand why some anti-abortion people might disagree. It’s interesting since we chose not to get the Down Syndrome test on our children since of course we’d not abort had we discovered the disorder.
Americans Overreport Church Attendance
Americans over-report church attendance. (Linked to in the comments to one of Razib’s posts) It’s from a year ago but was interesting I thought you folks might like it. This issue of the difference between what one does and self-reporting is a constant one to keep in mind when evaluating certain polls.
FTL Neutrinos?
Faster than light neutrinos discovered? I’m betting this doesn’t pan out on further investigation.
Religion, Autism and Cognitive Style
Razib has a slew of fantastic posts on religion today. Most of it is just going over some studies that have been discussed at quite a few blogs. The first post, “Atheism as Mental Deviance” (he’s using that term technically) deals with the recognition that autistics are more apt to be atheist than normal. Honestly [...]
Nietzsche Family Circus
The Nietzsche Family Circus.
Democracy of Objects
Levi’s Democracy of Objects is available online as HTML. A PDF version is supposed to follow soon. I’ve not read it yet (still working on Harman’s books).
Academic Freedom
I tend to think that academic freedom as idealized is a big myth. I found this comic today that seems to express part of my view. (The other part being all the politics at many universities)
Early Journals in JSTOR
Early journals now available for free on JSTOR. You might remember the controversy about JSTOR and old documents from a few months back.
Laser Fusion
Sorry for no OOO posts yet. I want to really understand it before putting my foot in my mouth. In the meantime I saw a link to the BBC story about laser fusion over at Slashdot today. Interestingly this is what I worked on back in my days at LANL. It seems to me that [...]
Ambiguity and Logical Statements
Ambiguity and logical statements: web comic version.
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