In George Orwell’s Animal Farm , the seven commandments that guide the animals are eventually reduced to one: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” While humans have always applied this standard to the animal kingdom (e.g., house cats are more equal . . . . Continue Reading »
Poet and translator Sarah Ruden will no longer publish with Yale University Press following its decision to remove the controversial Danish images—and all other images—of Muhammad from Klausen’s The Cartoons That Shook the World , and in a letter to the editors of The New Criterion . . . . Continue Reading »
“The scientists” continually assure us that biotech will be conducted ethically and with full control. It isn’t now, in my view, but it may soon get worse. Under new rules about to go into effect in the UK, scientists will be able to create cloned human/animal hybrid cloned . . . . Continue Reading »
Peter Minowitz, the author of the meticulous and fascinating STRAUSSOPHOBIA: DEFENDING LEO STRAUSS AND STRAUSSIANS AGAINST SHADIA DRURY AND OTHER ACCUSERS, seems to have some way of alerting himself whenever his cool title is mentioned on the web. I heard from him very soon after I listed . . . . Continue Reading »
On Saturday, Nobel Prize winner Norman Borlaug died at the age of ninety-five. Few men have ever done more good for the human race— yet few people today know who he is or what he did. Classically Liberal explains why he was one of the most important persons of the modern age : In this . . . . Continue Reading »
A recent paper published in the journal Neuroethics argues for minimizing animal suffering by creating beasts that lack the ability to sense pain . This reminded me of a collection of thought experiments, The Pig That Wants to Be Eaten , by philosopher Julian Baggini. The thought . . . . Continue Reading »
In “A Just War Theory of Homeschooling” (InsideCatholic.com), William Fahey reminds us that homeschooling, while desirable in some circumstances, “can also become a destructive ideology”: Contrary to the Catholic understanding of education, there is a rising individualism . . . . Continue Reading »
Among the more revealing moral dilemmas are those that arise less for the actors themselves than for others evaluating the actions after the fact. One such case is that of British reporter Stephen Farrell, rescued from the Taliban on September 9 at the cost of two dead: his Afghan interpreter and a . . . . Continue Reading »
“Last summer’s marriage wars” —as Mary Eberstadt describes them in our current issue—pose anew the question whether divorce has also evolved in ways worth debating. In the inaugural issue of National Affairs , Brad Wilcox’s “The Evolution of Divorce” . . . . Continue Reading »
As I’ve mentioned here before, this year it’s fallen to me to teach the First Communion class at church. Three weeks into the experiment, and already I’m realizing afresh what I knew going in: I am not a classroom teacher. I know how long it takes one kindergartener and one second . . . . Continue Reading »
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