Why Moral Philosophers Aren’t More Moral Than the Rest of Us (via Ockham’s Beard)

Courtesy of Wiki Commons

This is a fun article. Of course, as an ethics teacher I should probably worry, but I will continue to have faith that I will do okay.

I am still working my way through moral philosophy so this article had relevance for me. I hope you enjoy it as well. Read the comments, some of them are pretty fire breathing.

James Pilant

Brace yourself. Or sit down. Or both. Eric Schwitzgebel and compatriots have uncovered a startling revelation: professional ethicists don’t behave any more morally or courteously than non-ethicists. Full abstract of their paper: If philosophical moral reflection tends to promote moral behavior, one might think that professional ethicists would behave morally better than do socially comparable non-ethicists.  We examined three types of courteous a … Read More

via Ockham’s Beard

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My privilege is showing. (via Vomits Her Mind)

I like fighters. There are people out there who are just not going to take the status quo. This is one of them.

I have complete confidence that many of you will be in disagreement with some or all of her stances and beliefs. But pause for a moment and think what our society would be like without motion, without change, without difference, and most of all think what the world would be like if everyone agreed not to be different.

James Pilant

What I am about to write is important to me, and I think it's very important to my blog for me to take note of my biases, my privileges, my experiences. I live with scientists, and have been posing the question to them recently: does your personal experience, your bias, your privileges, your experience, do these things factor into how you interpret or accept new data?" This is important to the field of science. And, turning it inwards, I note: th … Read More

via Vomits Her Mind

Books I Want to Write Before I Die (via ‘Trick Slattery’s Blog)

Let us raise a glass to ambition and glory!
James Pilant

There are a number of books that I want to write before I die. As someone that has pessimistic tendancies, I do not think I will accomplish them all. I hold a full time job and have to write my books in my spare time, either on my lunch hour, or time that I make available to write after work. There really is only one book that I know for sure that I will finish(unless I get hit by a car or something of that sort), and that is the one I am current … Read More

via 'Trick Slattery's Blog

Don’t Look Now and Other Stories by Daphne du Maurier (via Eclectic Reader Book Review)

I read some Daphne du Maurier when I was growing up and, in this case, I saw the movie. I had a good time with her novels and can recommend them without condition. Please enjoy the review.

By the way, this is a good web site to subscribe to, if you enjoy reading and books.

James Pilant

The thing that struck me the most about this collection of stories is that it could have been classed as travel narratives just as easily as horror. I found it so interesting to read about exotic locations while at the same time getting a wonderfully-crafted suspense story! Don't Look Now I wanted to read this story after seeing the excellent movie with Donald Sutherland, and it certainly didn't disappoint! The pacing is delightfully slow with gr … Read More

via Eclectic Reader Book Review

Free Speech Friday: Harvey Fineberg: Are we ready for neo-evolution? (via Writing Success Program at UCLA)

The Third Choice – I think that would be a great name for a book on the subject. The third choice of mankind being taking control of our own evolution: neo-evolution.  We will take charge of our own evolution. It is inevitable. Probably, the United States, as it gradually  becomes an intellectual and scientific backwater, will pass legislation forbidding that kind of science. In a nation where science is continually overrode by religious zealots challenging evolution or attacked by industry front groups as if scientists were some kind of rationalist cult, you can expect to wind up as thoroughly second rate in the sciences.

But it will be done. it will be a pity that new form of humanity will be Polish, Chinese, Ukranian, but not American. But we can watch and fear as they race past us.

James Pilant

About this talk: Medical ethicist Harvey Fineberg shows us three paths forward for the ever-evolving human species: to stop evolving completely, to evolve naturally — or to control the next steps of human evolution, using genetic modification, to make ourselves smarter, faster, better. Neo-evolution is within our grasp. What will we do with it? As I browsed the front page of TED.com this morning, the nerd inside of me immediately h … Read More

via Writing Success Program at UCLA

A Quarter of a Century Since Chernobyl (via The Truth Journal)

Twenty-five years. Twenty five years to absorb the lessons of the last nuclear disaster and it just didn’t work out. The ad nauseum repeating of the mantra, “It’s different here.” Whether they meant more modern equipment, better management, more incentives, better regulation, it turned out to be nonsense.

Going back to Chernobyl after all these years is not a comforting journey. It is a trip into a ghostly irradiated land measuring 10,800 square miles, a facet of the aftermath of a nuclear disaster carefully unmentioned by the proponents of nuclear power. That’s about a third the size of Panama or five times the size of Rhode Island. Does that make you comfortable?

How much agricultural land can we afford to lose permanently? We need a thorough intelligent discussion of nuclear power in the United States, not back rooms and lobbyists, a public discussion.

This is a good article and has an attached video.

James Pilant

A quarter of a century has passed since the worst nuclear accident in history. On April 26, 1986, the Nuclear power plant at Chernobyl, Ukraine, in the then USSR, exploded leaking nuclear radiation about a hundred times the Nuclear explosion at Hiroshima. I cannot think of anything more but to say that the day reminds us why we should be so proud of Nuclear technology. After all, it allows us to make great changes to the way things work naturally … Read More

via The Truth Journal

The Undead: Life Sciences and Pulp Fiction (via Science. Technology. Ethics. Art. Media. Culture)

The idea that humankind could take control of evolution at this point in history is one I find compelling. The idea of the transhuman, a composite human of flesh and technology is soon to be a reality although the idea of cybernetic Koch Brothers reminds me of Dawn of the Dead without the comedy.

In the future, the mad billionaire will have incredible power to physically self manipulate while the proles will live brief painful lives of servitude to the technological demi-gods. I would hope for better but our society is a road map for the wealthy to manipulate and cheat their way out of social responsibility.

The world of the transhuman self proclaimed John Gaults may be our future, -

Ayn Rand’s cult of selfishness enshrined is a technological hell of demi-gods and worshipers.

James Pilant

cf. Director Prof Andy Miah will make two interventions at this remarkable event in Hamburg from May 12-14. The congress is unlike any other and will take place in film sets, which will be shot as scenarios, as though in a movie. Produced by the remarkable Mobile Academy, funded by the German Federal Cultural Foundation in cooperation with Kampnagel Internationale Kulturfabrik and Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities. 12 May TRAN … Read More

via Science. Technology. Ethics. Art. Media. Culture

Fukushima Cleanup: 30 Years, $12 Billion (via Mostly Tech)

How much alternative energy can you buy with 12 billion dollars over thirty years?

James Pilant

“Damaged reactors at the crippled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant may take three decades to decommission and cost operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. more than 1 trillion yen ($12 billion), engineers and analysts said. Four of the plant’s six reactors became useless when sea water was used to cool them after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami knocked out generators running its cooling systems. The reactors need to be decommissioned, Tepco Chairma … Read More

via Mostly Tech

Poll: Few confident US ready for nuclear emergency (AP) (via US General News)

Most of America’s nuclear preparedness is based on obscene accumulations of pro nuclear propaganda and assurances that nothing bad can happen. That’s not enough.

There is simply too much profit, too many billions of dollars of influence and power to make any individual looking at the situation comfortable with the pronouncements of government and industry.

It is always the same.

We are told -
1. It can’t happen.
2. The situation is not serious.
3. Nothing like this has every happened before.
4. Radiation is not that big a deal – (at this point there must be discussion of chest x-rays)
5. The situation is under control.
6. The problem here is not the situation which is under control but the panicked response of a population not properly informed about the minimal danger of radiation.
7. That reactor was an obsolescent design.
8. Our new reactors have solved these problems.
9. Nuclear power is necessary. We cannot produce enough electricity without it.
10. Critics of nuclear power are alarmists, misinformed, treehuggers, radicals, rabble rousers, anti-industry, anti-corporate activists, etc.
11. What do you want us to do? Go back to living in the stone age!!

If you want to add some more, please do.

James Pilant

WASHINGTON – Most Americans doubt the U.S. government is prepared to respond to a nuclear emergency like the one in Japan, a new Associated Press-GfK poll shows. But it also shows few Americans believe such an emergency would occur. Nevertheless, the disaster has turned more Americans against new nuclear power plants. The poll found that 60 percent of Americans oppose building more nuclear power plants. That’s up from 48 percent who opposed it in … Read More

via US General News

NUCLEAR CRISIS – U.S. HEALTH CARE UNPREPARED (via INFOQUANDO)

I thought I was going to read a brief analysis of American shortcomings in regard to nuclear disaster preparedness. What I got was a lengthy detailed report dealing with the problem from many different angles.

I recommend the post.

James Pilant

U.S. Health Care System Unprepared for Major Nuclear Emergency A Los Angeles police officer in a hazard suit keeps watch in a “hazardous material hot area” after the explosion of a “dirty bomb” during a simulated attack at a Port of Los Angeles dock on Aug. 5, 2004. (David McNew/Getty Images) by Sheri Fink, Special to ProPublica U.S. officials say the nation’s health system is ill-prepared to cope with a catastrophic release of radiation, despite … Read More

via INFOQUANDO