Reinhold Niebuhr

A Man for All Reasons

Andrew J. Bacevich

Andrew J. Bacevich

Reinhold Niebuhr

“[Niebuhr] is one of my favorite philosophers. I take away [from his works] the compelling idea that there’s serious evil in the world, and hardship and pain. And we should be humble and modest in our belief we can eliminate those things. But we shouldn’t use that as an excuse for cynicism and inaction. I take away . . . the sense we have to make these efforts knowing they are hard.”—President Barack Obama

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Read

mentioned in class

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1872779,00.html

Libertarians for Rawls

A good Rawls summary

http://tinyurl.com/dxtrfg

OK, Rawls can't explain everything

http://tinyurl.com/ak2cln

WWRS?

What would Rawls say?

http://tinyurl.com/9zqtgm

BBC

http://tinyurl.com/ddz57x

Sam Adams

http://tinyurl.com/b59evz

Goat detained over armed robbery

http://tinyurl.com/cdporj

Please read this and consider it in the context of our discussion on Friday. (Think: rationality, Western thinking, the ability of an individual to pass a judgment, the importance of making better judgments, and reason and rationality).

new MRI

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/387-some-minor-science-news.html

Torture?

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/01/15/guantanamo.torture/

"Crawford, who studied interrogation and other military records, said al-Qahtani was forced to stand naked in front of a female agent, threatened with a military dog named Zeus, "forced to wear a woman's bra and had a thong placed on his head" during questioning, and "was told that his mother and sister were whores," the newspaper reported."

torture??

I wanted to note this today too

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/18/AR2008091802265.html?hpid=topnews

Friday, Jan 16th

I finally managed to convince one of my best friends to come to class and give a "guest conversation". The topic will be what we're covering now--the biological basis of our cognitions.

I'll see everyone on Friday, and I'll try to get to the questions that I could not answer today (Wednesday).

read Hitchens

http://www.slate.com/id/2208425/

Marilyn Monroe hormone

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,24913504-23109,00.html

Room Change 1/26

Jan 26th, from 9 until 10:05am, we will be meeting in room 304 DLC for a video conference.

Please mark this down on your calendars and remember to bring your questions about Islamic extremism.

read

http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/01/financebiology.html

read

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/01/12/decision.making/index.html

read

http://www.macworld.com/article/138142/2009/01/google_environment.html?lsrc=rss_news

Reminder

Read the Pinker article for our next class:


http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/magazine/13Psychology-t.html

We'll also be watching his TED talks.

Also, start thinking of questions for our terrorism expert. It looks like we'll be able to get a video feed!

read

http://www.therawfeed.com/2009/01/how-chinas-50-cent-army-could-wreck-web.html

read

http://www.slate.com/id/2207872/

read

http://www.slate.com/id/2207872/

important read

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/02/hitchens200902?printable=true&currentPage=all

read

http://www.theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=445