Author: Huenemann

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.

See Brian Leiter’s list here. No, we didn’t make it; but I’m sure we would have, had it been a “Top 11” list.

Duh.

… 59 percent of students in a new survey reported that at least half of their lectures were boring, and that PowerPoint was one of the dullest methods they saw. The survey consisted of 211 students at a university in England and was conducted by researchers at the University of Central Lancashire.

Students in the survey gave low marks not just to PowerPoint, but also to all kinds of computer-assisted classroom activities, even interactive exercises in computer labs. “The least boring teaching methods were found to be seminars, practical sessions, and group discussions,” said the report. In other words, tech-free classrooms were the most engaging.