Bram Fischer was born in 1908 into an eminent Afrikaner family in South Africa, and seemed destined for prominence in white South African life. His path, however, was an unexpected one. As a Rhodes Scholar he saw the rise of Nazism in Europe and travelled to the Soviet Union. Some time after his return to South Africa he joined the Communist Party, and from then on was involved in the iconic moments of the anti-apartheid struggle, working alongside figures such as (...) Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu. Fischer was a lawyer, and in his role as an advocate played a part in the major political trials of the era, leading the defence of Mandela and the other accused in the Rivonia Trial of 1964. Soon after, he went underground in disguise to help lead the resistance. Ultimately, he was sentenced to life imprisonment, and when he died the authorities would not release his ashes to his family. His story raises a number of issues for our times as well as his. There are questions of belonging and hospitality: who is included in the circle of the home, whether domestic or national. There is the challenge of what it means to live in an inhospitable world and sustain one’s commitment nonetheless—something that faces many around the world. There are also ethical issues surrounding Fischer’s revolutionary role as a lawyer. The article ranges from Namibia in the 19th century to issues of climate change in our own in considering how we respond when the world becomes inhospitable. (shrink)

This book evaluates a range of contemporary social and political questions in light of Catholic social teaching, philosophy, great political thinkers, and America's founding tradition. It is a strong and focused defense of traditional Catholic approaches to the questions of our time, and the vast array of material covered makes this book an invaluable reference for anyone interested in contemporary politics.

In October 2015 I supervised a series of séances in Hanau, Germany with Felix Circle physical medium Kai Mügge. The purpose was to try to obtain better documentation of Kai’s table levitations than my team was able to achieve in Austria in 2013 (Braude, 2014). Although that goal was not met over the course of four séances, we nevertheless witnessed some interesting phenomena that are difficult to explain away normally given the control conditions imposed at the time. These include object (...) movements beyond the reach of the sitters, a very strange “exploding” sound from the séance table, and some extended levitations in which the table seemed to sway or swim in mid-air. But what may be most interesting about this series of séances is the way the phenomena reflect the complex, and tortured, underlying psychodynamics of the occasion. Indeed, what readers need to know about the FEG phenomena has as much to do with personalities involved as with the phenomena themselves. As a result, this report focuses as much on the background to the investigation as on the investigation itself. (shrink)

This essay examines Darwin's positiva use of theology in the first edition of the Origin of Species in three steps. First, the essay analyses the Origin's theological language about God's accessibility, honesty, methods of creating, relationship to natural laws and lack of responsibility for natural suffering; the essay contends that Darwin utilized positiva theology in order to help justify descent with modification and to attack special creation. Second, the essay offers critical analysis of this theology, drawing in part on Darwin's (...) mature ruminations to suggest that, from an epistemic point of view, the Origin's positiva theology manifests several internal tensions. Finally, the essay reflects on the relative epistemic importance of positiva theology in the Origin's overall case for evolution. The essay concludes that this theology served as a handmaiden and accomplice to Darwin's science. (shrink)

Traces Western ideas of corporeal bodies from Plato to contemporary feminist and postructuralist writings, with the purpose of reexamining the good, identified in Plato as that which gives authority to knowledge and truth.

By their nature, the most vexing social problems reflect collisions between social and economic interests of parties with highly divergent views and perspectives on the cause and character of what is at issue and the consequences that flow from it. Conflicts around biotechnology applications are good examples of these problems. When considering the potential consequences of proposed biotechnology applications, an enormous range of perspectives arise reflecting the breadth of different and often competing interests with a stake in life's future.This essay (...) starts from an assumption that the traditional tool of cost‐benefit analysis is not adequate for adjudicating competing claims around the introduction of new biotechnology applications. It tends to require implicit simplifying assumptions that reduce or mask true underlying levels of complexity and uncertainty, and the results it produces deliver a definitive and singular answer, as opposed to a multiplicity of outcomes. In this essay, I describe some of the key elements of formal scenario planning to show how CBA could be redeployed as a supporting tool within the broader decision support methodology of formal scenario planning. (shrink)

The patient safety movement seeks to reduce the number of avoidable injuries and diseases that patients suffer while in hospital. Two regulatory strategies in support of that movement are explored here. “Required disclosure” would rely on market responses to an increase in publicly available information about hospital errors. “Performancebased regulation” would require hospitals to reduce their error rate or suffer substantial financial penalties. Both approaches are designed to give medical service providers incentives to promote safety without resorting to “command and (...) control” regulation under which government experts tell hospitals how to act. (shrink)

This paper offers a new interpretation of Bernard Williams’s infamous claim that the demands of morality violate our integrity. It begins by showing how Williams’s critique targets an underexplored demand for genericity in moral philosophy. It then argues that while this demand is currently a foundational methodological commitment in moral theorizing, it cannot always be met without distorting the very values that theorizing intends to accommodate. Through careful consideration of the importance of practical experience for appreciating the value of ground (...) projects like human relationships, the paper reinterprets the integrity objection as a radical pushback against the way moral philosophy, by and large, represents the phenomenology of personal valuing. This conclusion offers two contributions. First, it reimagines a significant and yet poorly understood implication of Williams’s argument. Second, it raises a new challenge in an old debate: does moral philosophy fairly represent the values it purports to be about? (shrink)

The ability to evaluate scientific claims made in various media sources is a critical component of scientific literacy. This study compares how a group of 12th grade students and a group of specialists, including scientists and policy analysts with expertise in global warming, evaluated an editorial about global warming published by an oil company on the World Wide Web. Participants were asked to read the editorial and were asked a set of interview questions about it. Examples from the specialists’ interviews (...) indicate the kinds of responses that are possible with in-depth scientific knowledge. In comparison, although some examples from the students’interviews illustrate competent performance for a nonexpert, other student responses illustrate possible pitfalls. The approach of the present study affords a constructive route for formulating goals for scientific literacy. The approach permits identifying examples of students evaluating scientific claims in more or less competent ways—claims that are in the context of an important socioscientific issue and an actual media source. (shrink)

The use of automobiles is a major cause of worldwide environmental disruption, including global warming. Policies designed to curb the environmental impact of automobiles present tradeoffs that high school graduates should be prepared to evaluate. This article compares how a group of high school students and a group of specialists with expertise in transportation issues, climate change, or both evaluated two policies designed to ameliorate the impact of automobiles. The policies were a $1 per gallon gasoline tax and a “feebate” (...) policy, which creates additional fees on the purchase of fuel-inefficient automobiles but offers rebates on the purchase of fuel-efficient vehicles. One goal of the study was to identify knowledge and beliefs that students bring to the task as well as to identify misconceptions they may have. Another goal was to identify knowledge used by the specialists that may be accessible or useful to high school students. (shrink)