Author: Huenemann

Many of my students decide to go on to law school. Sometimes I worry that the decision is made for not the best reasons: a person is smart, wants to make money in a way that commands a certain degree of respect, and isn’t sure what else to do, so — law school. I haven’t gone to law school or been a lawyer, so I can’t really give a lot of advice about it. So I write letters of recommendation and hope everything works out.

But a couple of years ago I came across this interesting essay by Paul Gowder. It offers interesting insights about choosing a career in the law, and knowing whether it’s right for you. I highly recommend it to everyone thinking “law school.”

Also, you might want to read this further post: Why You Shouldn’t Go To Law School. (Answers: the jobs suck, lawyers are unhappy, you’ll be surrounded by jerks, have I mentioned the debt?, and the law will make you into the worst kind of person.) Just food for thought.

Check out SHAFT’s website here. (That’s “Secular Humanists, Atheists, and FreeThinkers,” a student organization at USU.)

I’m putting the latest Aporia issue in the envelope on my door (Main 208). The journal is an undergrad philosophy journal from BYU. Looks very good. If you’re interested in reading it, feel free to pick it up for a few days, and then return it to the envelope in case others want to read it. If you think you might want to submit an essay for publication, get more details through the “ANNOUNCEMENTS” box on the right.

Read all about it here.

“Statistically, it is more common for humans to be cooperative and to attempt to get along than it is for them to be uncooperative and aggressive towards one another,” he [anthropologist Robert Sussman] says. And he is not alone in this view. A growing number of experts are now arguing that the urge to wage war is not innate, and that humanity is already moving in a direction that could make war a thing of the past.

Tim Black reviews Susan Neiman’s book, Moral Clarity: A Guide for Grown-up Idealists:

Neiman writes: ‘We want to determine the world, not merely be determined by it; we want to stand above the things we may want to consume. You can call this the urge for transcendence, so long as you don’t call it mystical. We are born as we die, a part of nature, but we feel most alive when we go beyond it. And we go beyond it often – every time we explore the world instead of simply taking it in.’ She concludes: ‘To be human is to refuse to accept the given as given.’

Sounds like a good read.