A rare glimpse of climate debate within the finer margins of reason

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Gk9gIpGvSE It seems in the last decade especially narratives about climate have become increasingly saturated with a certain distinguishable hysteria, which, I would argue, is detrimental to rational discourse on what is undoubtedly an important issue of our time. It doesn't help that popular media coverage on climate science is generally poor, if not altogether …

A New Global Agricultural Trend? Some Interesting Facts and Points of Analysis

New research has suggested that, for the first time on record, global farmland is in decline. Moreover, it has been estimated that, with respect to global farmland, "Every two years, an area roughly the size of the UK is abandoned". How could this be? And what is the driving force behind this trend? The facts …

The Enlightenment, Science and Core Humanistic Values in a Post-Factual World

R.C. Smith Over the course of the last few years, I’ve been re-reading a lot of books on the enlightenment (mostly in my spare time), including many notable texts by such prominent enlightenment thinkers as Kant, Hume, Descartes and so on. My interest in the philosophes dates back to when I was a teenager, where …

Social Pathology, Philosophy of Reason and Bloom’s “Against Empathy” – On Science, Ethics, and Knowledge

R.C. Smith To think of ethics is likely today to evoke the idea of empathy. Similarly, in the context of many mainstream discourses within social theory, to think of empathy is often to evoke philosophical consideration in the field of radical ethics. The same is true with the order of terms reversed. It is not …

Review: “The Gods in Whom They Trusted” – On Science, Knowledge and Ethics (Part 2)

R.C. Smith Ethics of Experience In think, ultimately,  what we read in The Gods in Whom They Trusted is a set of philosophical formulations that take the human tendency to formulate faith-based constructs, fundamental principles of “life direction”, “core or ultimate convictions”, or “visions of life” – very much in the philosophical sense of absolute first principles – as universal. …

Review: “The Gods in Whom They Trusted” – On Science, Knowledge and Ethics (Part 1)

R.C. Smith Introduction I recently read through and had time to consider Arnold De Graaff’s The Gods in Whom They Trusted: The Disintegrative Effects of Capitalism – A Foundation for Transitioning to a New Social World (2016). This book in particular is one, I think, that can best described as being part of the broader …

Reclaiming the Enlightenment: Grounding Normativity

[An earlier unedited draft of this article was written with contributions by Arnold De Graaff. It has since become single authored and has been revised, updated and shortened.] R.C. Smith The Interrelated Nature of our Global Crisis: A Summary i) The situation today – A brief statement of need “The Enlightenment”, Theodor Adorno and Max …

THE ALL-PERVASIVE PRESENCE OF THE BIGOT – UNDERSTANDING THE PERSISTENCE OF PREJUDICE AND HOW TO COMBAT IT

[Originally published by Heathwood Press – 15 September, 2015] Stephen Eric Bronner The Bigot: Why Prejudice Persists 235 pp. – $40 ISBN: 978-0300162516 Yale University Press, 2014 By R.C. Smith Two weeks ago, 71 refugees from Syria were found dead in an abandoned lorry in Austria. This marked yet another dark day in Europe, the …

REFLECTIONS ON RITUAL VIOLENCE: THE WAR ON TERROR, THE PARIS ATROCITY, AND ROADS TO PEACE

[Originally published by Heathwood Press – 16 November, 2015] By R.C. Smith This will either be the age of humanity or its opposite.[i] There is no in-between. As much as I detest a black and white course of analysis, there is no middle here, there is no nuance or greater complexity; we have reached or are …