1  IntroductionWhat I mean to criticize here is a cluster of ways of talking about human beings that have existed for a long time, but have typically made use of the word "identity" since that usage was popularized in the 1950s by a psychologist who called himself Erik Erikson and who I think was a crackpot.  That word has legitimate uses, but as ( Read more... )

Through the years, we've grown used
     to the truth-telling boor,
          so rejoice in the yeast
               and its white lies on  beer ---
in the bubble-borne boost
     to the bedlam where you're
          a contented old beast
               in a Happy New Year.

(1991)

It is not just movies (http://come-to-think.livejournal.com/5669.html) that engage my confabulation mechanism.  Casual researches have revealed that I was harboring utterly false versions of recent history:

Musical chairs in San Francisco: Harvey Milk was the mayor.  Dan White, the ( Read more... )

Evidently, if the appeal to nature is foolishness, it is natural foolishness, and as such deserves some attempt at sympathetic understanding.  A notable attempt at a balanced view is provided by Bertrand Russell.  In "What I Believe" he saysThere is a certain attitude about the application of science to human life with which I have some sympathy, ( Read more... )

In medicine and ethics there is a strong tendency to identify nature, in some sense, with norms.  One can get away with that in some cases, but a lot depends on details.  Here I consider four specimen organs.

3.1  HeartsHearts pump blood, and that is almost all they are good for. That was discovered only recently, and only in one culture, but is ( Read more... )

2.1  Nature as a stand-in for GodIf you do not believe in God, it is rhetorically helpful to have some other powerful authority to appeal to.  That has been an increasingly important maneuver among primitivists in recent times ( Read more... )

The appeal to nature as a criterion (or the criterion) of value is an ancient habit of our culture whose continuing popularity has irritated me for most of my life.  It is in Aristotle and the canon law and the Declaration of Independence and the advertisements for shampoo.  Some years ago I looked up "nature" in a philosophical dictionary & was ( Read more... )

http://xkcd.com/1378/
When my father bought his place in Vermont in 1935, the seller pointed to the huge maple tree next to the house & said "There's always a cool breeze comes out of that tree".

Reading:  M. Mitchell Waldrop, The Dream Machine: J.C.R. Licklider and the Revolution That Made Computing Personal (Viking, 2001).  Jim gave it to me ( Read more... )

( Read more... )