AnalPhilosopher

Dennis Mangan sent a link to this debate about PETA's Bucket of Blood campaign against KFC. Thanks, Dennis.

Keith,

Thanks for sending me your recent blog entry [see here] on eating meat. I am not a purist in the sense you attribute to me. Of course, I agree that the state of affairs of one woman being raped is objectively LESS BAD, than the state of affairs of twenty-four women being raped. I acknowledge the comparative judgment. I just don't think it gets the rapist (or you) off the hook. Even committing one rape is so bad that the rapist deserves serious moral sanction. I know you think of rape as an extremely heinous instance of wrongdoing. I don't think that, in the case of rape, you would maintain, of a person who regularly rapes 24 women a year, but who out of conscience cuts back to only one rape a year, that that person has done enough where rape is concerned. One rape is one too many. Better than twenty-four? Yes. Good enough. NO!

How is your position on eating fish any different?

Your friend,

Mylan

Yes, Texans say "Y'all," as in "Y'all come back now, y'hear?" I don't think I ever heard this expression in Michigan, where I spent the first twenty-six years of my life. We would say "You guys." I may have heard it a few times in Tucson, where I lived for five years before moving to Texas. I'm pretty sure I've never said it myself, although perhaps one day I will. I'm becoming Texan.

Sometimes you hear "All y'all," which is short, I gather, for "All of you all." Why not "All of you"? Why not "Tejas"? It's the way things are. A few months ago, while waiting for a train to pass, I read the graffiti on the cars. One item jumped out at me: "Fuck y'all." I like to think a Texan wrote it, or maybe someone mad at (or envious of) Texans.

Today's link is to The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

War, n. A by-product of the arts of peace. The most menacing political condition is a period of international amity. The student of history who has not been taught to expect the unexpected may justly boast himself inaccessible to the light. "In time of peace prepare for war" has a deeper meaning than is commonly discerned; it means, not merely that all things earthly have an end—that change is the one immutable and eternal law—but that the soil of peace is thickly sown with seeds of war and singularly suited to their germination and growth. It was when Kubla Khan had decreed his "stately pleasure dome"—when, that is to say, there were peace and fat feasting in Xanadu—that he

heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war.

One of the greatest of poets, Coleridge was one of the wisest of men, and it was not for nothing that he read us this parable. Let us have a little less of "hands across the sea," and a little more of that elemental distrust that is the security of nations. War loves to come like a thief in the night; professions of eternal amity provide the night.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)

To the Editor:

"Militants in Europe Openly Call for Jihad and the Rule of Islam" (front page, April 26) reports on the growing cry for Islamic supremacy in Western countries. These European militants spoke freely and proudly of terror bombings to split the Western alliance and of bringing the fight for Islamic supremacy to Europe.

These are not wild threats made by fools. These are the goals of a movement already well advanced.

After Hitler published "Mein Kampf," the world knew about his racial theories and plans for world domination but largely dismissed them as the rantings of a madman. After he became leader of Germany, and even after he began to gobble up parts of Europe, the threat was not taken seriously.

What does it take to wake us up? Senators in Washington question why we didn't mobilize against vague warnings of a terror attack. While that lapse might be forgiven, how will we excuse our lack of preparation and the failure of public alarm in the face of plans for a war on Western civilization that has already begun?

BARRY A. WADLER
Hackensack, N.J., April 26, 2004

On a lighter note, here is a link to a T-shirt company that may be of interest (but in which I have no financial or other interest). I, personally, need a T-shirt like I need a blow to the head. I get a T-shirt at nearly every bike rally and footrace I do. I've done 327 bike rallies and over a hundred footraces. My walk-in closet is filled with T-shirts!

How many times have you heard it said that the war in Iraq was a "war of choice" rather than a "war of necessity"? The implication (hard to miss) is that we didn't have to wage war. We wanted to. Or rather, President Bush wanted to. There's even a whiff of whimsy about "war of choice," as if President Bush sent soldiers to die for little or nothing, just because he felt like it. This is of course obscene, but our political discourse has become obscene in recent years. There seem no limits—not even decency—to what is said.

Let's unpack the distinction between the two types of war. There's a sense in which no war is necessary and every war is chosen. Was it necessary that the United States enter World War II? No. We could have taken the hit at Pearl Harbor and stayed out of the fray. But we chose to fight. The question we should be asking is whether the choice to wage war in Iraq was a good choice, not whether it was a choice. Some choices are good, some bad. Just think of the choices you make every day.

Suppose I learn that my neighbor is tormenting his dogs. I try to persuade him to stop, but he won't. I hear howls every night. Since persuasion doesn't work, I try manipulation. I cajole, plead, and even deceive. That doesn't work, either. Finally, I resort to coercion. I threaten the neighbor with harm if he doesn't stop tormenting his dogs. If this doesn't work, I'm left with two options: do nothing or use force. Suppose I break into my neighbor's back yard and liberate his dogs. Is that a break-in of necessity or a break-in of choice? It's a break-in of choice. But it's the right choice.

Perhaps the distinction between wars of choice and wars of necessity is supposed to map onto the distinction between aggressive and defensive wars, or between wars one starts and wars to which one responds. Saying that the war in Iraq is a war of choice is to say that it's a war of aggression, with the implication that this is unacceptable.

But as even Jonathan Glover (hardly a warmonger!) points out, not all wars of aggression are wrong and not all defensive wars are right. (See Jonathan Glover, Causing Death and Saving Lives [Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1977], 268-70.) The question is not what type of war it is, but whether it's right or wrong. This is a normative question. It needs to be faced directly.

May I suggest that we stop distinguishing between wars of choice and wars of necessity? It not only doesn't resolve the important normative questions about war; it obscures them. The main task of the philosopher, in my view, is to elucidate and clarify. Okay, the main task of the analytic philosopher is to elucidate and clarify. Some philosophers seem hell-bent on obfuscating.

I believe it is the duty of every intellectual to be aware of the privileged position he is in. He has a duty to write as simply and clearly as he can, and in as civilized a manner as he can; and never to forget either the great problems which beset mankind and which demand new and bold but patient thought, or the Socratic modesty of the man who knows how little he knows. As against the minute philosophers with their minute problems, I think that the main task of philosophy is to speculate critically about the universe and about our place in the universe, including our powers of knowing and our powers for good and evil.

(Karl R. Popper, "How I See Philosophy," chap. 1 in The Owl of Minerva: Philosophers on Philosophy, ed. Charles J. Bontempo and S. Jack Odell [New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1975], 41-55, at 54-5)

Here is the letter (advertisement) to which Martin Luther King Jr replied in his famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail." Written by eight white clergymen, this letter appeared in The Birmingham News. King read the letter in his jail cell and composed his reply in the margins with a pen smuggled in to him by his attorney. Here (PDF) and here (HTML) is King's reply, which David Luban calls "perhaps the most famous document to emerge from the civil rights movement."

See here for a post about soy milk.

Benefactor, n. One who makes heavy purchases of ingratitude, without, however, materially affecting the price, which is still within the means of all.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)

Bill Keezer over at Bill's Comments has some interesting posts, including one on religious belief. See here.

I posted the six negative letters I received about my Tech Central Station column "Explaining Liberal Anger." I did not post the hundred or more positive letters I received. Two of the six negativists took me to task for saying (or implying) that all liberals hold the views I ascribed to liberalism. This is supposedly overgeneralizing, which is supposedly bad.

This misconceives what I was doing. Twenty-six years ago, Ronald Dworkin, a prominent liberal, published an essay entitled "Liberalism," in which he distinguished between what is constitutive of liberalism and what is derivative from it. The constitutive part is, in Aristotelian terms, the essence of liberalism—that without which it would not be liberalism. The derivative part is accidental. Dworkin asked, for example, whether commitment to the market is of the essence of liberalism or a mere means to achieve liberal ends. It's a mere means, he said. If it should turn out that some other means achieves liberal ends better than the market, then the liberal should abandon the market.

To Dworkin, the essence of liberalism is equality. Not liberty; not neutrality; but equality. And not equality of opportunity, either. Equality of resources. According to Dworkin, "market allocations must be corrected in order to bring some people closer to the share of resources they would have had but for . . . various differences of initial advantage, luck, and inherent capacity." Some of the letter-writers expressed amazement that I would ascribe such a view to liberals. I suggest they read John Rawls and Ronald Dworkin, the two greatest liberals this country has produced. They seem ignorant of the past thirty years of political philosophy.

When I say that liberals believe this or that, I'm not making a claim about everyone who considers himself or herself a liberal. I'm not reporting the results of a survey. I'm making a claim about liberalism. There are two possibilities. Either I've got liberalism wrong or the people who consider themselves liberals aren't really liberals. The letter-writers assume the former. This is uncharitable to me. But then, liberals tend not to be charitable to those with whom they disagree. I believe you can see that in the letters I posted, which are eager to condemn and insult me but reluctant to engage me on intellectual ground. If you think I've got liberalism wrong, you need to give the correct account.

By the way, Dworkin's essay appears as chapter 8 in A Matter of Principle (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985), 181-204. You might also read chapter 9: "Why Liberals Should Care About Equality," 205-13. (The quotation in the third paragraph of this post comes from this chapter; see page 207.) And while you're at it, read John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, Belknap Press, 1971; rev. ed., 1999). Then, to top it off, read this essay by John Kekes and this essay by Peter Berkowitz.

To the Editor:

Like all asymmetric conflicts, the continuing "debate" on abortion rights (front page, April 26) is not a true debate because there is little direct intellectual engagement between opponents.

On one side the issue hinges on individual rights, while the other sees abortion as an act of murder. The crux of the debate is rarely discussed directly: the legal delineation of when life begins, whether at conception, the time a fetus is independently viable, or birth.

Unfortunately such a discussion requires difficult scientific, philosophical and religious discourse that is far too profound for an America that was built by uniting heterogeneity with simple ideologies. It is far easier to march in the name of personal freedoms or call someone a murderer.

HENRY WU
Philadelphia, April 26, 2004

[I]f men are not devils, neither are they angels; and the fact that they are a mean between these two extremes is something which makes a system of mutual forbearances both necessary and possible. With angels, never tempted to harm others, rules requiring forbearances would not be necessary. With devils prepared to destroy, reckless of the cost to themselves, they would be impossible.

(H. L. A. Hart, The Concept of Law, 2d ed., with a postscript edited by Penelope A. Bulloch and Joseph Raz [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994], 196 [first edition published in 1961])

Are you really a professor of philosophy? Listen to yourself [see here]:

1. Liberals believe everyone ought to control the same amount of resources.

2. They believe that no one is born to advantage and if any one is, the state must neutralize that.

3. Liberals believe that all misfortune, any misfortune, needs addressing and social engineering.

4. They believe only accidents account for differences in wealth.

5. They give no account whatsoever to personal responsibility.

6. They say folks are only functions of our circumstances and they hold no belief in the value or autonomy of the person.

7. Liberals will not, cannot, argue rationally, and when met with opposition, they allege ignorance, stupidity or evil.

I list what you have said because the cumulative effect of these propositions leads me to think that you really are a liberal agent trying to inflame whomever reads what you wrote such that he or she will simply go over to the liberal side out of frustration with the quality of your thought.

The great irony winding its way through your piece is that it exemplifies much about what you complain, particularly on the point of rational argument. A list of windy, overstuffed bromides of caricature dominates your piece and I'm afraid it gets an F.

I think many of you folks at Tech Central Station simply like talking to each other.

Sincerely

Itzik Basman
a proudly liberal, atheist Canadian

I've done 327 bike rallies. If you're wondering what a bike rally is like, see here. This rally was the Collin County Classic, held on 8 June 2002. I rode 65.54 miles that day at an average speed of 17.08 miles per hour. Not one of my faster rallies, but I had fun. Get on your bike and ride!

desert, n.

1. Deserving; the becoming worthy of recompense, i.e. of reward or punishment, according to the good or ill of character or conduct; worthiness of recompense, merit or demerit.

b. In a good sense: Meritoriousness, excellence, worth.

c. personified.

2. An action or quality that deserves its appropriate recompense; that in conduct or character which claims reward or deserves punishment. Usually in pl. (often = 1.)

b. A good deed or quality; a worthy or meritorious action; a merit. ? Obs.

3. That which is deserved; a due reward or recompense, whether good or evil. Often in phr. to get, have, meet with one's deserts.

Here is the only image of Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg, where he delivered his famous address. Here is some background information. Here is the text of the address.

To the Editor:

Re "A Stronger Force in Iraq" (editorial, April 25):

Now that we are trying to find a politically palatable solution to getting out of Iraq, I offer a democratic solution: Let the United Nations hold a vote in Iraq with one question: Do you want the United States to leave or to stay?

If more than 50 percent say "stay," then we'll stay with the backing of the people. If more say "go," we'll teach them the meaning of democracy by leaving.

JOHN LIPUMA
Flushing, Queens, April 27, 2004

Teetotaler, n. One who abstains from strong drink, sometimes totally, sometimes tolerably totally.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)

"Deep down, liberals deny that anyone is responsible for anything." [See here.] George W. Bush is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent Iraqis. The CIA is responsible for Saddam Hussein's rise. Reagan was responsible for Saddam's stalemate with Iran and development of anthrax and other WMD's.

I am responsible for my own life and education. The state is increasingly responsible for burdensome public tuition rates.

"Liberals, unlike conservatives, are zealous. Like all zealots (true believers), they are eager to implement their program, but when they attempt to do so, they meet resistance."

This is false on its face. Calling some liberals zealous is acceptable, but your omission of the apocalyptic frenzy of the modern conservative movement shows your ideological agenda. Pray who has been responsible for the Oklahoma City, the Atlanta Olympic, and countless abortion clinic bombings? Conservatives following an ideology espoused by our President and Attorney General. President Bush looked to his "higher father" and invaded Iraq in order to carry out the grand vision of Paul Wolfowitz and the rest of the Neocons: A new Middle East that accepts Western Philosophy and American Capital, pumps crude oil, and accepts Israel's ethnic cleansing.

We are angry at the Zealots: Bush II, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Richard Pearl, etc. and all their bilious apologists.

To call liberals angry and ignore the public tantrums of Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, betrays your motive: Agitprop. One would expect more from Philosophy Professor. Maybe something about the decreasing civility of public discourse or something along those lines. But that would be too much to ask for from a Conservative Propagandist.

Of course, you ARE publishing in the oh so glamorous TCS. . . .

Andrew Portner

Several readers have expressed puzzlement about the word "desert," as in the expression "responsibility and desert." It's not a typographical error. "Desert," as in giving people their just deserts, means deservingness. Good behavior deserves reward; bad behavior deserves punishment. Have you seen Unforgiven (1992)? The character played by Clint Eastwood says to the character played by Gene Hackman, "Deserve's got nothin' to do with it." He meant, and should have said, "Desert's got nothin' to do with it." This inarticulate line ruined the film for me.

If you want to read up on desert, see George Sher, Desert, Studies in Moral, Political, and Legal Philosophy, ed. Marshall Cohen (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987). See also Joel Feinberg, Doing and Deserving: Essays in the Theory of Responsibility (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970), esp. chap. 4 ("Justice and Personal Desert"); and Geoffrey Cupit, Justice as Fittingness (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), chap. 2 ("Justice and Desert").

The e-mail is still pouring in. My Tech Central Station column "Explaining Liberal Anger," which I wrote in fifteen minutes (it was supposed to be a blog entry), is being posted and linked to on other sites, such as Front Page Magazine. I've been invited to appear on Hannity & Colmes. I'm getting reprint requests.

Almost all the e-mail has been favorable. Several people begged me to write a book. Many described their own journey to conservatism. Some thanked me for articulating what they think and feel. I posted the nasty letters on this blog, not so much to embarrass their authors (although they deserve it) as to prove my point that liberals have lost the capacity to reason. They think righteous indignation and name-calling amount to argumentation. Make up your own mind. As I say in my column, I was a liberal for many years. I know the mindset, the secrets, the tactics. I'm a traitor to liberalism as far as liberals are concerned. I'm to liberalism what Richard Rorty is to analytic philosophy.

My inbox contains eighty-nine messages. Oops! Two more just came in. I'll try to respond to ten writers a day until I'm done. Bear with me. Thanks for taking the time to write, whether you agree or disagree with me. I hope you find my blog interesting and provocative. Blogito ergo sum!

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) was, by all accounts, a brilliant philosopher, mathematician, and geometer. I admire him very much, although I reject his theism. Pascal famously argued that it's prudent to believe in God, since, if your belief turns out to be true, "you gain all," while if it turns out to be false, "you lose nothing." This is known as Pascal's Wager. It's not an argument for the existence of God. It's an argument for belief in God. It's not an epistemic argument. It's what Michael Martin calls a beneficial argument. (See Michael Martin, Atheism: A Philosophical Justification [Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1990], chap. 9.) You should believe in God, Pascal says, not because there's evidence for God's existence, but because it's good for you. It's in your interest.

I've defended Pascal in print against what I consider ill-founded and unfair criticism. It's no criticism of Pascal's argument that his premises aren't universally accepted. He didn't direct his argument to everyone. He directed it to a numerically small class of individuals: his backsliding Christian friends. He constructed an argument the premises of which he knew these friends accepted in the hope of inducing them to accept its conclusion. It's a brilliant specimen of the Lockean argumentum ad hominem (which is not to be confused with the ad hominem fallacy; see here for a discussion of the difference).

At one point in his discussion of the wager, Pascal has his critic say that, while he (the critic) is persuaded that belief in God is beneficial, and would like to believe, he can't just make himself believe. What should he do? Pascal recommends attending mass and taking holy water. The idea seems to be that if you go through the motions of belief, you will eventually find yourself believing. Belief in God isn't something one does. It's something that happens to one.

Here's where I get puzzled. Why does Pascal think that mere belief suffices for eternal life and happiness? He explicitly disclaims any knowledge of God's existence or attributes. If I were God, I would inquire into the grounds or antecedents of belief. Wouldn't you? Frankly, I would not be impressed if I were told that my interlocutor believed in me out of self-interest. That's sycophancy. I would probably be more impressed by a conscientious agnostic or atheist. Nor does Pascal emphasize the consequences of belief. Shouldn't believers have to act upon their belief in order to earn salvation? Perhaps Pascal thought that works would flow spontaneously from belief; but if he thought this, he should have said so and given reason to believe it. He makes it seem as though it's the fact of belief, and nothing else, that matters. He must think God a fool.

Today's link is to A Philosophical Chronology, by Peter S. Fosl. See here. Peter (here is his homepage) teaches at lovely and historic Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky.

I haven't seen my mother in over ten years (since 31 December 1993), so she would probably love to see me on Hannity & Colmes. But I'm a writer, not a talker. Sorry, Mom.

Hello,

My name is Tara Nicaj and I work on the show Hannity & Colmes on the Fox News Channel. I am writing to invite you to appear on our show to discuss your article titled, "Explaining Liberal Anger." We would really love to have you on to talk about this so if you could get back to me I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks!

Best,

Tara Nicaj
Hannity & Colmes
Fox News Channel

Wow. Do you really believe all that [see here] about all liberals? I am not familiar with your style of writing. Was that article intended to be humorous? If not may I be the first to say that labeling such a large group of people with such gross generalizations might be a poor way to get your point across. Perhaps you are used to inflammatory speech to get the attention of disinterested [sic] students at UT.

Wish I had time to address each point but like many liberals I have to work for a living and must get to it. I must confess, though, that the more I read your article the more speechless I become. I will just file it under "can't say anything good, better to say nothing" as I was taught as a child. Wow.

Dana Park

Does anyone remember Michael Deaver? Deaver worked for Ronald Reagan. He understood, better than anyone then or since, that images matter. Someone asked Deaver if he were concerned about a negative story on one of the nightly newscasts. Deaver said he was not the least bit concerned. In fact, he was delighted! When queried, he explained that the images of Reagan that accompanied the story were favorable. Reagan was smiling and in charge. People don't listen to the words, he said; they see the images.

The flap about John Kerry's medals is much ado about nothing. But those images! Look: This country is still divided about Vietnam. It will be divided for as long as anyone who lived through it is alive. John Kerry may have fought valiantly for his country, but he turned against his fellow soldiers when he came home. Night after night, we see images of John Kerry with long, scraggly hair, wearing military fatigues on the streets of the nation's capital, in the company of other scruffy protesters, causing trouble. These images are being seared into the nation's consciousness.

Don't say Kerry was in the right. That's irrelevant. Many people think the war was right and that those who protested it gave aid and comfort to the enemy. Images don't lie. We see how Kerry behaved thirty-odd years ago. We see the crowd he ran with. We see the tension he sought to generate. I'm afraid this election is over, folks. Journalists will do everything they can to make it a horse race (for their own selfish reasons), but it's over. By the time the first Tuesday in November rolls around, John Kerry will be reduced to an America-hating, rabble-rousing, antiestablishment hippie.

Suffering that is merely contingent, visited on us without explanation, is unendurable. But if we inflict it on ourselves we can understand it, and extend our understanding to the whole of life.

(Michael Tanner, Nietzsche, Past Masters, ed. Keith Thomas [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994], 73 [paraphrasing Nietzsche])

Keith,

Judging by your unbounded enthusiasm for King [see here] it seems you don't know that he was actually a plagiarist. Even the text you lectured on (that "gave you chills") is lifted from other authors. The doctorate he "earned" was massively plagiarized, as seen from the conclusion of the committee at Boston University, which was appointed to look into the matter in 1991. Their decision is curious: "No thought should be given to the revocation of Dr. King's doctoral degree from Boston University," because he plagiarized "only" 45 percent of the first half of his dissertation and "only" 21 percent of the second.

You can find many other details in the book by Theodore Pappas, and here is a link to an instructive review of that book. No, Keith, don't worry, I don't expect you to publicize this on your blog (although I wouldn't mind). I just wanted to help you in your struggle to overcome remnants of your liberal prejudices.

Ian Trump

Twice, adv. Once too often.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)

I lectured today on Dr Martin Luther King Jr (1929-1968). His "Letter from the Birmingham City Jail," composed and first published in 1963, is not only the most important document of the American Civil Rights Movement; it's a rhetorical and philosophical masterpiece. It gives me chills. During my reading of it this morning with my Ethics students, I was chilled several times. I see new things—allusions, parallels, tropes, arguments—every time I read it.

It's mind-boggling how much King accomplished in his thirty-nine years. He earned a Ph.D. degree from Boston University. He met with two presidents (Kennedy and Johnson), the Pope, and his idol, Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948). He received the Nobel Peace Prize. He wrote books. He traveled hundreds of thousands of miles a year giving speeches. He raised a family and ministered to his congregation. The world would be a much better place than it is—by any reasonable standard—if King had had a normal lifespan.

I can't say that I have always admired King. His religion, for example, is off-putting. But you can admire aspects of a person and even the whole person (i.e., the person all things considered) without admiring every aspect. If I had children, I would teach them about King's life and work.

A reader, Richard Jansen, just sent a link to this column by Charles Krauthammer. It's almost two years old, but I hadn't read it until a few minutes ago. Krauthammer has a different take on the liberal-conservative divide.

Today's link (see here for an explanation) is to Guide to Philosophy on the Internet, by Peter Suber.

Please read this column by Richard Cohen of The Washington Post. (You may have to create an account, but it's free and takes only seconds.) Cohen is incredulous that President Bush has widespread support among the American people, especially after recent events, such as the hearings of the 9-11 Commission. "Don't you see how stupid he is?" Cohen asks. "Don't you see how inarticulate he is?" "Don't you see how uncurious he is?" ("Uncurious" is the latest liberal epithet.) "How can you support, much less vote for, someone like that?"

Here's the subtext: If you support President Bush, for whatever reason, you're as stupid, inarticulate, and uncurious as he is. Bernard Goldberg has explained liberal bias in the media far better than I can. (See here, here, and here.) Liberals, he says, don't even realize that they're ideologues. They live in a hermetically sealed world of like-minded people who never question their dogmas. They think that their world is the real world and that anyone who rejects or questions it is an ideologue or fanatic. Could this be why liberals resort to name-calling and manipulative rhetoric rather than taking the time to persuade rationally? They simply can't believe that anyone disagrees with them or sees things differently.

Perhaps one day liberals will regain the capacity to reason. I welcome that day, because I believe in rational discourse. I'm not holding my breath.

I read your recent article ["Explaining Liberal Anger"] and was struck almost immediately by the following: "The first thing you must realize is that liberals have a program. They are visionaries. They envision a world in which everyone controls the same amount of resources."

Shouldn't that be "some liberals"? Do ALL liberals envision such a world? Pretty sloppy use of a universal, for someone who allegedly teaches logic. Academic standards aren't what they once were, I suppose.

Here is another: "Deep down, liberals deny that anyone is responsible for anything." If this is so, then how come so many liberals despise Bush as being responsible for starting an unnecessary war in Iraq? The mere fact that so many liberals are blaming the neo-con warhawks at the Pentagon for fueling the war frenzy is an obvious rebuttal of this claim; but there are many, many more. If liberals lacked the notion of responsibility, then they would also lack the concept of blame, which is obviously not the case.

I submit that if you are just going to write nonsense you at least have the decency not to post your supposed academic credentials along with them. You make philosophers as a whole look plainly stupid when you make such basic mistakes. A conservative's Bertrand Russell you are not. I won't bother taking apart any more than this—it was painful enough just allowing these blatant clunkers to come crashing through my mind. I can safely say that everyone who has read that article has been made dumber for having read it—except perhaps the willing swine eager to inhale this swill, whose intelligence level probably stayed right where it is.

Surely there are intelligent critiques of "the liberals" that can be constructed. What you have shown here, if anything, is that you can't be bothered doing the work it takes to make them.

Thomas W. Kerner
Washington, D.C.

As someone who also would describe himself as a former liberal, I must say that your description of liberals [see here] goes beyond being totally asinine, it is imbecilic.

A definition of comparable stupidity would be to describe a conservative as someone who thinks that everyone gets exactly what he/she deserves, and that it is morally wrong to help anyone since that would mean that he/she is getting more than he/she deserves.

Michael Moore no doubt would agree. Is that really who you want identified as your opposite number?

Sincerely,

Gene Salorio

Dear Mr. Burgess-Jackson,

I came across your article "Explaining Liberal Anger" on the Internet, and I have to say it is laughable!

(Is that what passes for academic scholarship at a Texas University?)

I am not a US "liberal," but I don't know any US liberals calling for the abolition of wealth and privilege in the United States.

Not even the communists in China are preaching against capitalism . . . have you not heard yet, that capitalism has blown communism out of the water?

Your attempted analysis and criticisms of US "liberalism" are old, hackneyed, "conservative" cliches and fantasies about "liberalism."

Your statements are essentially incompetent.

Sincerely,

Michael Schmitt
New Jersey, USA

To the Editor:

Re "Going Early Into That Good Night" (Arts & Ideas pages, April 24):

I teach a course on the social history of rock 'n' roll. Buried in your article about poets dying younger than other writers is a statistic that confirms what I tell my students: if you want to die young, become a rock musician!

Musical entertainers have an average life span (57 years) shorter than that of poets, novelists, playwrights or nonfiction writers.

Since rock music emerged as a popular musical form only in the mid-1950's, it will be a few decades before a life-span study of such musicians can be done. I am confident that rock musicians will show the shortest life span of any profession, given their proclivity for alcohol, smoking, drug abuse and other life-shortening activities.

Perhaps this reflects the kind of people who become rock musicians: risk-takers.

RICHARD SORRELL
Lincroft, N.J., April 24, 2004
The writer is a professor of history at Brookdale Community College.

We know we must die; we would rather not, but why must we suffer angst, engage in theatrics and create myths for ourselves. Why not simply face it and get on with the living of our lives?

(Kai Nielsen, "Death and the Meaning of Life," chap. 13 in The Meaning of Life, 2d ed., ed. E. D. Klemke [New York: Oxford University Press, 2000], 153-9, at 155 [essay first published in 1978])

My twentieth Tech Central Station column, "Explaining Liberal Anger," is up. See here. I'm being inundated with e-mail, most of it laudatory but some of it, well, angry.

Hi Keith,

This [see here] is a topic that is close to my concerns at the moment. Australia exports tens of thousands of live sheep to the Middle East every year. Last year, one shipment was refused by Saudi Arabia, and 58,000 sheep spent months at sea, without room to move and in temperatures around 100 degrees. Thousands died. Refusal of shipments is fairly common (of course, the sheep certainly suffer even when all goes to plan; some sheep are too stressed to eat, and starve to death). Information here.

Here's where religion comes in: the sheep are destined to be slaughtered by Muslims performing a religious duty. You write that no religion requires meat eating. True, so far as I know. But some religions require killing: Islam, and also Santeria (see P. Casal, "Is Multiculturalism Bad for Animals?" Journal of Political Philosophy [March 2003]). The shipments are refused because apparently the Koran requires that the sheep be in good condition: obviously, that's hard to guarantee when they're shipped from Australia. This is a big debate at the moment in Australia (I'm addressing the Australian Veterinary Association annual conference on the topic). Of course, I want the sacrifices stopped. But I think given the mutual mistrust between Islam and the West right now, this has to come from their side. We can only hope. . . .

cheers,

Neil

Dr Neil Levy
Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics
University of Melbourne
Parkville, 3010
Australia

For a masterful analysis of the concept of bullshit by a master philosopher, Harry G. Frankfurt, see here. As my teacher Joel Feinberg put it, "Conceptual clarification is the most distinctively philosophical of enterprises" (Joel Feinberg, Harm to Others, vol. 1 of The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law [New York: Oxford University Press, 1984], 17). I would go further and say that it's the only philosophical enterprise. Philosophy just is conceptual analysis. This week I discuss Frankfurt's classic essay with the students in my Seminar in Research Methods and Philosophical Writing. I could have chosen any of a number of essays, including many by Feinberg (see here). I chose Frankfurt's, and that ain't no bullshit.

Two great philosophers (and conservatives) were born on this date: David Hume in 1711 (old-style calendar) and Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein in 1889.

Here is the final paragraph of Andrew Sullivan's column about Bob Woodward's new book, Plan of Attack:

Which brings one to the real winner of this book: the president. As in the previous book on the Afghanistan war, "Bush at War," the president emerges in this book as a shrewd, fair, diligent, decisive and moral man. He asks the right questions. He makes the tough calls. I have no problem with someone with Bush's responsibility praying as he makes those calls. And reading the book makes me admire this man's calm under fire and composure under immense pressure. Which is, of course, what Bush wants me to believe. And it's what Woodward, in classic form, has delivered.

Exactly. How often have you heard it said—as a criticism—that President Bush sees things in black and white, good and evil? Thank goodness! Americans are tired of waffling, weaseling, nuancing, parsing, hemming, hawing, and vacillating. We have a president with character, values, conviction, and judgment. There's a place for nuance in the moral life, but not when it comes to the security of the American people. Evil is evil. It must be confronted. Come election day, Americans will have to decide what they want: a modern president or a postmodern president.

Democrats are terrified by Ralph Nader. See here. The more they attack him, the more they alienate the tens of thousands of Nader supporters who admire and respect him. I love it. Go Ralph!

By the way, I'm tired of hearing that, contrary to what Ralph says, there are fundamental differences between President Bush and John Kerry. From Ralph's point of view, both parties are beholden to corporate interests. This is his main concern. He isn't saying that the parties are alike in all respects. He's saying that on the most pressing issue facing the country today, there's little or no difference. Ralph is a populist. The Democrat party is not a populist party. It's the party of powerful, entrenched left-wing interests—what we might call professional do-gooders.

Is America ready for a klutz in the White House? See here.

The Portland, Ore., branch of the Independent Media Center—one of the most virulent Angry Left Web sites around—has a page devoted to the death in combat last week of Pat Tillman, the pro football player turned Army Ranger who died in combat in Afghanistan last week. This is offensive stuff, so you might want to skip it, but we think it's worth shining a light on. The page begins with a Washington Post story about Tillman's death under the headline (Indymedia's, not the Post's) "Dumb Jock Killed in Afghanistan." This is followed by reader comments. A sampling (quoted verbatim except for expletives):

"Tillman chose to go to Afghanistan. He's partially reponsible for the deaths of hundreds, maybe thousands of Afghan civilians. No need to feel sorry for him, other than feeling bad that he was brainwashed into serving as a grunt."

"it's amazing the kind of attention this insignificant incident is going to cause. well, he was rich, white, and an american. 10,000 (brown) iraqis get killed, and it barely merits a mention in the american news. how utterly f---ing sad."

"To be honest I wish I could feel sorry for the guy, but the truth is I really feel nothing at all. To many have died and too much money has flowed into the pockets of Dick Cheney to even worry about it."

"if he 'sacrificed' anything it was his common sense. He had a good American thing going and blew it."

In fairness, not all posters agree. "I'd like to correct the ridiculous headline that preceeds [sic] this story," writes one: "Brave American sacrifices friends, family and fortune in defense of his country. Pigs on IndyMedia can now continue to exercise free speech, sacrifice nothing and spew hate."

Today's link is to a collection of philosophical materials compiled by Douglas W. Portmore: "Portmore's Annotated Guide to Philosophy on the Internet." See here.

Given the leftist ideology that prevails on college campuses, we should use the expression "higher indoctrination" rather than "higher education." It's disgraceful. This essay by philosopher John Kekes should be required reading for every administrator, instructor, staff member, and student in every college and university across the land. I've been a college student or a professor for almost twenty-nine years. What Kekes describes is true.

Grammar, n. A system of pitfalls thoughtfully prepared for the feet of the self-made man, along the path by which he advances to distinction.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)

To the Editor:

Your April 22 front-page article regarding the rising numbers of students from higher-income families at American colleges and universities misses a very basic point.

Sure, the children of the wealthy have advantages. But the children of successful parents are more likely to be successful not simply because their parents were wealthy but because their parents had the skills necessary to create that wealth. The parents did not inherit doctors' degrees; they earned them because they possessed intelligence and drive. Thus the odds that the children possess the same qualities and therefore are admitted to institutions of higher learning should be neither a surprise nor a negative.

STEVEN BECKER
New York, April 22, 2004

"Animals kill each other, so why can't we kill them?" Anyone who lectures on the moral status of animals, as I've been doing for twenty years (almost to the day), has heard this question dozens of times. It has a powerful appeal to certain minds. But it's thoroughly, almost ludicrously, confused.

Nobody doubts that animals kill each other. It's just that nothing of a normative nature follows from that fact. In general, that something is the case is no reason that it ought to be the case. This principle—that one cannot validly infer an "ought" statement from "is" statements—is known as Hume's Law, after the eighteenth-century Scottish philosopher David Hume (1711-1776). (Some people mistakenly call it "the naturalistic fallacy," but that refers to something else.) Imagine a parallel argument: "People murder each other, so why can't I murder?" Pretty lame, eh?

Let's reconstruct the questioner's reasoning to make it valid. In other words, let's make it so that the conclusion follows logically from the premise(s). This will focus attention on the truth or acceptability of the premise(s). Perhaps the person who asks the question is reasoning as follows:

1. Predation is morally permissible.
2. When humans kill and eat other animals, they are preying.
Therefore,
3. It is morally permissible for humans to kill and eat other animals.

This reasoning would justify interspecific predation but not murder.

The problem with the reasoning is that the first premise is nonsensical. It has a false presupposition. To say that predation is morally permissible is to presuppose that the animals who engage in it are moral agents, capable of reasoning and acting on principle. No animal is a moral agent. Only humans are moral agents. Only humans, therefore, are morally responsible for their conduct. Predation is just a fact about our world. Those who engage in it are neither blameworthy nor praiseworthy.

It might be said that if no animal is a moral agent, then no animal has moral status. But moral status comes in two forms: moral agency and moral patienthood. Children are moral patients, but not moral agents. The severely retarded are moral patients, but not moral agents. The senile are moral patients, but not moral agents. Are we to cast these individuals out of the moral community because they cannot reason or act on principle? To be a moral patient, one needs only interests, and animals clearly have interests, the main one being in not suffering.

There's also a relevant difference between humans and animals that undermines the analogy. Humans don't need animal flesh in order to survive. Many animals (the carnivores) do. (Humans are omnivores, not carnivores.) Even if animals were moral agents, and therefore morally responsible for their conduct, it would not follow from the fact that they kill and eat each other that humans may follow suit. In the case of animals, it's self-defense (which is not to say that they think in those terms). They kill to survive. They have no choice. Humans don't need to kill animals to survive. We have a choice.

At this point it might be said that something has to die for another thing to live. This is true, but, as I argued a week ago (see here), there are morally relevant differences between animals and plants. Both are alive, but only animals can suffer, and suffering is intrinsically bad. Humans must eat. Nobody denies that. They do not have to add to the world's suffering in order to do so.

Isn't it odd that the people who ask the question posed at the outset don't look to the animal world for moral guidance in other areas? If we're to emulate animals with respect to diet, why shouldn't we emulate them with respect to habitat, reproduction, child-rearing, hygiene, social structure, and other matters? Let's not be selective! I suspect that people who ask the question aren't thinking clearly and carefully. They're groping for a reason to continue eating meat.

The peace party today cannot be explained by age, income, or education. In a Gallup analysis of polls conducted in January and March of 2003, majorities regardless of age, income, or education supported the war, though not in equal numbers. One exception to this picture is that large numbers of people with advanced degrees tended to be implacable opponents of the war. Schooling does not make a difference, unless you have acquired a lot of it. Indeed, postgrads are one of the most reliably liberal groups in America today. But there are large differences in support and opposition to the war that center on political party, ideology, and race.

Democrats were twice as likely to oppose the war as Republicans, and blacks were more opposed to it than whites by almost the same margin. Taken as a whole, women were somewhat more opposed than men, though this difference varied depending on whether the women had children, worked, or lived in rural areas. Mothers were less opposed than other women, and stay-at-home mothers were less opposed than working ones.

Party differences have deepened over the years. In a recent paper delivered at Princeton University, political scientist Gary Jacobson noted that, before the terrorist attacks of September 11, the gap between Democratic and Republican support of President Bush was wider than it has been for any prior president, including Bill Clinton. Before September 11, 88 percent of self-identified Republicans supported Bush; only 31 percent of self-identified Democrats did. This 57-point gap was the largest Jacobson had ever found. After September 11, support for President Bush sharply increased, but the gap in party attitudes toward Iraq remained sharp. In March 2003, 57 percent of liberal Democrats opposed military action against Iraq while 95 percent of conservative Republicans supported it.

(James Q. Wilson and Karlyn Bowman, "Defining the 'Peace Party,'" The Public Interest [fall 2003]: 69-78, at 71-2)

Dear Keith

I was a bit disappointed that despite all your usual appeal to reason, argument, and your declared opposition to purely emotional responses you reacted so angrily today [see here] just because someone dared not to like your blog. You refer to a philosopher colleague as "some idiot" who does "not know how to read," but you don't so much as address his reasons for criticizing you (and you even manage to misrepresent his comments). He may be wrong, of course, but why the rage? Hey, relax, if somebody posts a mildly negative opinion about your website, it's not the end of the world!

Ian Trump

I just posted an item about pâté de foie gras over at Animal Ethics. See here.

I know Peg Kaplan loves playing bridge, which sometimes takes her out of town, but she needs to stay close to her keyboard. Here is her latest batch of blog entries. The one on the United Nations is especially good. I may write something on that topic soon.

Steve from Iowa (see here for his blog) suggests that I add a comments section. I've addressed this before, but let me say more. In effect, I have a comments section. But your comments must go through me. I try to post at least one letter a day (in my "From the Mailbag" feature). The letters are lightly edited. It may seem as though I post only flattering letters, but I don't receive many unflattering ones. I would not hold back on posting a nasty or unfavorable letter to make myself look good. You know me better than that. Didn't I post many letters from Dr Leonard S. Carrier, with whom I disagree about the morality of war in Iraq?

I realize that comments sections are common in the blogosphere, but I prefer the newspaper model. Letters come in; some get selected for publication. Letters, to be published, should be well-written, well-reasoned, topical, and interesting. Don't be disappointed if your letter doesn't get published. Many of the letters I write to newspapers don't get published. Hell, some of my scholarly essays don't get published! This is the sort of disappointment one must learn to live with. Rest assured that I read every letter received. I appreciate your readership. Without you, this blog would be a diary. There's nothing wrong with that, of course.

By the way, you may have noticed that there are recurring features on this blog. I decided to post "Texasisms" on Fridays, "Who Says Scholars Are Humorless?" on Saturdays, "Peeves" on Sundays, and "Confusions and Fallacies About Animals" on Mondays. Why these days? Because they make up my weekend. (I teach on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, so I have four-day weekends.) During the summer, when I have no teaching or service responsibilities, I may add additional features.

While I'm discussing the mechanics of this blog, I might add that I try to do several things each day. First, I post a quotation from some book or article that I'm reading (or have read). The aim is to pique your curiosity. Second, I post a quotation from Ambrose Bierce's The Devil's Dictionary. I hope you enjoy his wit and cynicism as much as I do. Third, I post a letter from either The New York Times or The Dallas Morning News, which are the two newspapers I read every day. I read the online edition of the former and the print edition of the latter. Fourth, I post a letter from a reader. (See above.) Fifth, I post something philosophical that I have written.

Remember: Although the blog is named "AnalPhilosopher," it has never been purely philosophical in nature. As I say in the sidebar to the left, it is "Analytic Philosophy (and Other Stuff) in the Anal-Retentive Tradition." Some idiot named Brian Weatherson commented early on (see here) that there wasn't much philosophy (or good philosophy) on my site. He must not know how to read. Keep in mind, too, that the philosophical material I post is not necessarily up to scholarly standards. My blog entries are the equivalent of drafts. Some of them are little more than brainstorming pieces, designed to elicit feedback or solidify my thoughts. I hope my philosophical colleagues keep that in mind. If you wouldn't judge Bertrand Russell's philosophical work by his talks on the BBC, you shouldn't judge my philosophical work by what appears on this blog.

Think of it this way. I'm an analytic philosopher. I'm not an engineer, an artist, a plumber, or a scientist. My philosophical training affects how I see things, how I understand things, how I speak, and how I write. Whatever I write about in this blog, whether it's bicycling, politics, animals, religion, running, morality, music, photography, or baseball, is seen through a philosophical lens. If you like looking at things philosophically (or anal-retentively), you may find my blog interesting. If not, you may not. Thank goodness there are other blogs for your perusal!

Today's link is The Philosophers' Magazine Online, which is the Internet version of a print publication.

Carnivorous, adj. Addicted to the cruelty of devouring the timorous vegetarian, his heirs and assigns.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)

How many times have you heard an athlete thank God for his or her victory? I've heard it hundreds of times. But think about it. If God wanted A to win, then God wanted A's competitors to lose. If God helped A win, then God helped A's competitors lose. Why would God care whether the Boston Red Sox beat the New York Yankees or whether Gail Devers wins a sixty-meter dash? But there they are, giving God credit.

I don't mean to be disrespectful or uncharitable. Perhaps what these athletes are trying to say is that they thank God for (1) creating them, (2) sustaining them, and (3) giving them the capacity to compete. But if this is what they mean to say, they should say it whether they win or lose, not just when they win. By saying it only when they win, they imply that God is interested in such things as who wins a contest. I'm an atheist, but I like to think that if I'm wrong and there is a god, he or she will be concerned with more important things.

Keith:

Each year of life necessitates decisions. We all do the best we can with what we are given and the years of decision-making lead to the naturally egotistical conclusion that our decisions have been RIGHT. Our opinions are CORRECT. Our judgments (on the whole) SOUND. This is the human condition. MY brain has sorted through the debris of life and has distilled truth. It is in this Field of Dreams that we all gather. Thus opinions are firmly held because they represent the products of a lifetime. Yet despite this we all seem convinced that OUR arguments, skillfully offered in JUST the right tone or order or nuance can somehow convince others that THEIR decisions and opinions are incorrect! The supposition is that WE have been able to ferret out truth and wisdom with our years while the OTHER guy has not. In my experience, this wall is impenetrable (just like the FBI and CIA wall . . .). My socialist friends will remain forever socialist. A lifetime spent attempting to dissuade has been for naught. We exist realizing certain areas of discussion are best left alone. But I go to bed each night struggling to find JUST the right argument to crack their safes. The ONE magic potion that will "set them free." The door that will finally swing open for them. In a word, pathetic! Most of us "enlightened" folks face others of equal "enlightenment." Socialists put heads to pillows each night trying like the devil to turn capitalists away from their folly. So in the end, one wonders (after we all put on a few years . . .) just how futile the debate is? My closest friends—friends I'd call on for help and KNOW it would be coming, friends I'd trust my life with—will go to their graves convinced we should share and share alike. My fumes of capitalist rhetoric blow away with yesterday's breeze. It ends with my penciling "It's Hopeless" on my CATO membership check each year.

Best,

Will Nehs
Oconomowoc, WI

To the Editor:

If American undergraduates are staying away from science and technology, as Thomas L. Friedman says (column, April 22), it may not be for lack of government support. As a second-generation technology worker now looking for a job, I would discourage any student from seeking his or her fortune there.

My father's career in chemistry didn't get him all the way to retirement, although he made a decent finish as an expert witness and insurance consultant. Despite broad experience, demonstrated adaptability and up-to-date skills, it doesn't look as if I can get 10 more years' work in computer programming.

Technology educations are expensive, and careers may not be long enough. Better to do something you love—and be prepared for the downside if that love is science or technology.

JOSEPH A. MARTIN
Chelmsford, Mass., April 22, 2004

It is sickening and dismaying, but many still imagine that Nietzsche's central message was a sermon in praise of ruthlessness. (And this thirty-three years after the publication of Kaufmann's translation!) That distortion of Nietzsche may give some adolescent emotions a quick flaring rush, yet it may also be a devious tactic, for nothing makes it easier to dismiss Nietzsche than to first transform him into a crude boor. All the same, it is a travesty.

(Frithjof Bergmann, "Nietzsche's Critique of Morality," in Reading Nietzsche, ed. Robert C. Solomon and Kathleen M. Higgins [New York: Oxford University Press, 1988], 29-45, at 44)

[A]n institution which has an internal aim may also have an external value. Consider friendship. The internal aim of friendship is the well-being of someone loved, but its benefit is greater than that. What friends desire is only a part of what they achieve. They achieve, for example, a reciprocal affection, and their own security. But they do not aim at what they achieve, for that would be to treat the other as a means, and so to deny the spirit of friendship. Likewise people will achieve education only if they desire it for its own sake. But what they achieve will be far more than that. They will acquire the ability to communicate, to persuade, to attract and dominate. In any social arrangement, such abilities must be advantages; but education can never be pursued merely as a means to them, even if they are its natural consequence.

(Roger Scruton, The Meaning of Conservatism, rev. 3d ed. [South Bend, IN: St. Augustine's Press, 2002], 142)

To the Editor:

David Brooks ("Clearing the Air," column, April 20) suggests that the Bush administration "could have moved aggressively to find another way forward" when it became clear that the Kyoto treaty to limit greenhouse gas emissions "was never going to be ratified by the Senate."

In fact, under President Bush's policies, the United States is leading the world in initiatives to curb the growth of greenhouse gas emissions, particularly in the development of new energy technologies that will also reduce America's dependence on foreign oil.

These efforts include developing hydrogen fuel technologies designed to replace gasoline with pollution-free hydrogen; carbon sequestration technologies to remove greenhouse emissions from coal and other fossil fuels; efforts to make nuclear power, which produces no greenhouse gases, safer and more economical; research into nuclear fusion as a power source for the future; the FutureGen project to develop a coal-fired power plant that emits no pollutants or greenhouse gases; and incentives to expand the use of renewable energy sources like wind and solar.

SPENCER ABRAHAM
Secretary of Energy
Washington, April 22, 2004

Colin Jones, "The Great Chain of Buying: Medical Advertisement, the Bourgeois Public Sphere, and the Origins of the French Revolution," American Historical Review 101 (February 1996): 13.

Roger F. Friedman, "It's My Body and I'll Die If I Want To: A Property Based Argument in Support of Assisted Suicide," Journal of Contemporary Health Law and Policy 12 (fall 1995): 183.

Eric B. Easton, "Closing the Barn Door After the Genie Is Out of the Bag: Recognizing a 'Futility Principle' in First Amendment Jurisprudence," DePaul Law Review 45 (fall 1995): 1.

James West Marcovitz, "ronald@mcdonalds.com—Owning a Bitchin' Corporate Trademark as an Internet Address—Infringement," Cardozo Law Review 17 (September 1995): 85.

Pamela S. Karlan, "Still Hazy After All These Years: Voting Rights in Post Shaw Era," Cumberland Law Review 26 (1995): 287.

Dear Dr. Burgess-Jackson,

Excuse the intrusion, but I read your blog when I was updating mine. I wanted to try and address your query on Vegemite [see here]. Vegemite is available at the Whole Foods Market in Dallas. I've never been to the one in Arlington but they most likely carry it there. It is a lot more expensive here in the US but that's just a fact. They also carry Marmite which is the UK version of the yeast extract with a different texture and taste, but many claim it's something altogether different.

I returned from Australia a couple of months ago with a large jar of Vegemite in my luggage. I enjoy it and will likely have to go to Whole Foods and buy more when my big jar runs out. I've also seen it at a UK specialty foods store on Lower Greenville in Dallas.

There are many recipes on their website. It smells bad but is very nutritious. It contains a very high concentration of B vitamins which I found useful to combat some of the effects of hangovers while I was in Australia.

I like it on toast, that's about all I can tell you.

Good Luck,
Troy

Ansel Easton Adams died on this date twenty years ago. Here is what I wrote in my journal:

Ansel Adams, a famous photographer who took pictures of such landmarks as Yosemite National Park and Sequoia National Park, died today at the age of eighty-two. I remember going to the Detroit Institute of Arts with my brother, Gary, a couple of years ago to see an exhibition of Adams's works. They were beautiful. I especially liked his portrait of Yosemite Valley during a winter storm. It was breathtaking. One of these days I want to go to the Center for Creative Photography here at the University of Arizona, where many of Adams's photographs are housed. He apparently spent a lot of time in Tucson just prior to his death. I just love black and white photographs of nature.

Everyone seeks immortality. Some achieve it through procreation. Some achieve it though faith. Some achieve it through their works. Adams left a magnificent body of work.

This tells you everything you need to know about the Left. (Thanks to The Argus [Nathan Hamm] for the link.)

Tim Peck helped me find my missing Show Desktop icon. (See here.) It wasn't where he said it would be, but the path he specified gave me enough information to conduct an effective search. The icon was in the System subfolder of the Windows folder of the C: drive. I dragged the icon to the quick-launch toolbar, where it used to reside. Thanks, Tim!

With all due respect, when I read your entry on Vegemite [see here] I thought you were joking. Vegemite is an Australian staple that hasn't really caught on anywhere else, and speaking from personal experience I find it utterly gross. But then, it's one of those things where you either love it or hate it.

Charity

I know that animals do many things better than we do, but this does not surprise me. It can even be used to prove that they act naturally and mechanically, like a clock which tells the time better than our judgement does. Doubtless when the swallows come in spring, they operate like clocks. The actions of honeybees are of the same nature; so also is the discipline of cranes in flight, and of apes in fighting, if it is true that they keep discipline. Their instinct to bury their dead is no stranger than that of dogs and cats which scratch the earth for the purpose of burying their excrement; they hardly ever actually bury it, which shows that they act only by instinct and without thinking. The most that one can say is that though the animals do not perform any action which shows us that they think, still, since the organs of their bodies are not very different from ours, it may be conjectured that there is attached to these organs some thought such as we experience in ourselves, but of a very much less perfect kind. To this I have nothing to reply except that if they thought as we do, they would have an immortal soul like us. This is unlikely, because there is no reason to believe it of some animals without believing it of all, and many of them such as oysters and sponges are too imperfect for this to be credible.

(René Descartes to the Marquess of Newcastle [William Cavendish (1593-1676)], 23 November 1646, in The Correspondence, vol. 3 of The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, trans. John Cottingham et al. [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991], 304)

Steve Headley, a.k.a. Texas Conservative, is in Holland, where bicycles rule. See here for his report, replete with photographs. Thanks for the report, Steve! Now I see why Holland produces so many top-notch bicyclists. Of course, we Texans have the one at the very top (see here). When you think about it, Texans are at the top of most lists. The most powerful person in the world is a Texan. He wasn't born here, but, like me, he got here as soon as he could.

Every year I do a bike rally in Italy, Texas, which is located forty-two miles south of downtown Dallas (as the crow flies). Naturally, when I began going there in 1990, I pronounced the town's name "it-a-lee," with three syllables and stress on the first syllable. That's how the name of the European nation is pronounced in the United States. (See the Oxford American Dictionary [New York: Oxford University Press, 1980], 352.)

But several years ago, I read that residents of the Texas town pronounce its name "it-lee," with two syllables and stress on the first syllable. While I haven't talked to many locals, I have heard it pronounced this way, so I assume that what I read is correct. Interesting, eh? (No, I'm not Canadian.)

Now I'm wondering about something else. If I were describing my friend Maurizio Mori, who attended graduate school with me at The University of Arizona before returning to his native Italy (the nation), I would say "i-tal-yan," with stress on the second syllable. (See the OAD.) Residents of Italy, Texas, must say "it-lee-an." It's a shame if they don't, for it would be illogical. I'll try to find out this summer. I'll stop on main street if I have to. Better yet, I'll hit the Dairy Queen.

To the Editor:

Regarding your April 16 editorial "Pork, Sweet and Sour," concerning the spending habits of Congress:

Both liberal Democrats and so-called conservative Republicans have given up balancing the budget. Only Senator John McCain and a few others are seriously fighting the deficit. Everyone else believes that the best way to grease the wheels of re-election is to load up on billions of dollars' worth of pork-barrel projects.

Democrats and Republicans have morphed into one inside-the-Beltway party. Their philosophy is to continue to increase spending above the rate of inflation. Liberals won't say no to social welfare programs. Conservatives love any military spending. Both support corporate welfare subsidies. They are leaving the next generation an inheritance of government debt in the trillions of dollars.

No wonder a majority of Americans stays home on Election Day. We need the silent majority to vote this November.

LARRY PENNER
Great Neck, N.Y., April 18, 2004

Immoral, adj. Inexpedient. Whatever in the long run and with regard to the greater number of instances men find to be generally inexpedient comes to be considered wrong, wicked, immoral. If man's notions of right and wrong have any other basis than this of expediency; if they originated, or could have originated, in any other way; if actions have in themselves a moral character apart from and nowise dependent on, their consequences—then all philosophy is a lie and reason a disorder of the mind.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)

I understand your sentiment [see here], but here are a few points:

• Surely we should not stay in Iraq for 5-25 years as an occupying power, but since we took the proper action and deposed a dictator, we should spend enough time to give the Iraqis a chance at building their nation. I understand that we plan on transferring sovereignty this year. Our troop levels and basing rights after that transition should be determined as a result of a treaty between the US and the new, imperfect Iraq. It is of enormous strategic value to the US to have bases in Iraq, analogous to the bases we maintained in Europe during the cold war.

• If our departure from Iraq has the appearance of a withdrawal under pressure, similar to Spain's recent action, the consequences will be disastrous. I do not fear another Saddam so much as another Afghanistan—a failed state that was a safe harbor for terrorists.

• If it appears that Iraq will not be stable enough to transfer power to as a state, rather than simply exit, we can instead actively support an independent Kurdistan (this involves playing real hardball with Turkey). The Kurdish people have demonstrated that they do deserve a state.

• If another Afghanistan rises from a failed Iraq, eventually we will have another September 11, only with WMD. Deep in my heart, I think that if this happens we will treat the people of the Middle East about as well as we treated the American Indians—decimate them, take everything they have, and lock the survivors up in reservations. I do not want this to happen. We have proven that we are capable of it, both technologically and morally, yet that seems not to have the proper deterrent effect. How can we change this?

Ben
Duluth, GA

No, I'm not talking about Elvis. A couple of weeks ago, the Show Desktop icon on my Windows XP toolbar took on a strange appearance, so I deleted it. Does anyone know how to get it back? I've searched my hard drive in vain.

I just finished reading Julian Baggini and Peter S. Fosl, The Philosopher's Toolkit: A Compendium of Philosophical Concepts and Methods (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2003). At the end of this book (which, by the way, I commend to you) is a list of Internet resources for philosophers. Each day or so, I'll visit one of the sites and link to it here in my blog. As I do so, I'll provide a permanent link on the left side. Thus, if you forget how to reach a site, you can get to it via AnalPhilosopher. Perhaps some of the sites to which I link will link to me in return.

Today's site is EpistemeLinks. Enjoy! (Thanks to Drs Baggini and Fosl for doing the legwork.)

Maybe I haven't been paying attention, but there's animosity between the cable-television and satellite-television industries. I don't mean competition, which is healthy; I mean animosity, which is destructive. The advertisements I've seen recently are downright mean. In an ad for cable television, actor Dan Aykroyd looks into the camera and says, "The dish is a disease." Satellite television is running ads featuring pigs, the implication being that cable television costs more. "Who let the pigs in? Whuh. Whuh." I think it's a variation on a popular song, although I never heard the original.

There must be a lot of money at stake for these mean-spirited tactics to be used. I can just hear executives from one of the industries saying, "We've got to hit these guys hard." The other industry takes it personally and responds in kind. The nastiness escalates. Come to think of it, this is what happened in American politics during the past two decades. (I date the meanness to the Bork nomination.) Think about the Democrat filibusters of President Bush's judicial nominees. This is unprecedented. Democrats are not even allowing the Senate to vote. What are the chances that the next Democrat president (eventually there will be one) will get his or her judicial nominees confirmed? Do you think Republicans will forget? They're elephants!

Our culture is becoming uncivil. Rational persuasion of the sort inculcated by philosophy had a chance before. It has no chance now. Adversaries and competitors are enemies. Fairness, honesty, and restraint are forgotten virtues. Honor and good sportsmanship have lost their meaning. The end justifies the means.

Bill Keezer over at Bill's Comments just sent a link to this essay from today's Wall Street Journal. Thanks, Bill!

Peggy Noonan is widely regarded as a stylish writer. She's also a sharp political analyst. Read this essay on President Bush and see for yourself.

James Taranto posted a link to this image on Best of the Web Today. Read the sign at the right. Don't you love liberals?

Has anybody eaten Vegemite? I haven't, but I want to. Where can I get some? I've never seen it in a grocery store. What does it taste like?