Support First Things by turning your adblocker off or by making a  donation. Thanks!

Birthing and Rearing

In today’s Wall Street Journal Jonathan Last reviews Judith Walzer Leavitt’s Make Room for Daddy , a history of how men went from being unwelcome to expected in the delivery room. But Last notes that as men became more involved in childbirth, they became less involved in what came . . . . Continue Reading »

Debate?

If we are to engage in a discussion, debate, or civil argument it is imperative that we share some understanding of the ground of discussion; in this instance some comprehension of the “matrix of reality,” because recent developments clearly illustrate the pernicious effects of the . . . . Continue Reading »

Is Billy Collins Killing Poetry?

Compile a list of topics Americans feel compelled to form an opinion about—global warming, the job performance of Obama, the fate of Jon and Kate—and “contemporary poetry” will rank near the bottom. Most Americans, though, are not ROFTERs . If you’re a ROFTER you’re . . . . Continue Reading »

Global Warming Fundamentalism

What can only be called a fundamentalist wing has developed within the global warming movement.  One attribute of fundamentalism is a focus—and for some, an hysterical obsession—with end-of-the-world fear mongering, as in the warning just issued by “Nobel . . . . Continue Reading »

Note to Bill

The comment you left asking me if I knew of a source for those ribbon-bookmark thingies got lost in the blog-changeover shuffle, and I’m worrying about the repetitive-stress-injury potential which your breviary poses. Might these be what you’re looking for? You can order them from St. . . . . Continue Reading »

Re: Stephen vs. Stephen vs. Stove

Joe brings up an argument against Darwinism made by David Stove . I don’t really understand the argument as presented. In the first place, no one denies, as far as I know, that genetic mutations and natural selection still take place in human beings. That is one way that human beings develop . . . . Continue Reading »

Surveying More Cruciform Objects

Once years ago I was talking with the chaplain of our local university’s Episcopal Campus Ministry who had, for reasons I can’t now remember, invited me to lunch. She was new on the job, new in town, and new to me; in the course of the hour we spent together, I learned quite a lot about . . . . Continue Reading »

Kass the Natural Scientist

Let me begin by admitting that I should have called my previous post on Leon “Kass, the Dissenting Physician.” Despite “inchoate reservations” coming from both personal experience and reading Great Books, Kass, M.D. went on to pursue a PhD in biochemistry. (He couldn’t get . . . . Continue Reading »

Tags

Loading...

Filter First Thoughts Posts