by Carl Howard | Apr 22, 2011 | Atrocities and Oppression, Blog Topics, Society
You are born in a communal barracks and your parents have no time to show you any affection. Your earliest childhood memories are of constant, excruciating hunger, as food is heavily rationed. You also know work from a very early age: you and your peers work in a...
by Carl Howard | Apr 19, 2011 | Atheism and Religion, Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Science and Skepticism
Video Link By now you’re probably familiar with the tide-goes-in-tide-goes-out memes. If so, skip to “What you might not know”. If you’ve been under a rock, here’s a quick description. So, David Silverman (the president of the American Atheists) is appearing on...
by Carl Howard | Apr 14, 2011 | Atrocities and Oppression, Blog Topics, Society
A follow-up from yesterday’s post, which in turn is a followup of my earlier musings about cults of personality. The story I described yesterday is of course real. I might have gotten some of the details wrong (vague as I tried to make them) but this really is what...
by Carl Howard | Apr 6, 2011 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Charity and Philanthropy, Resources, Food and Environment
One of my Facebook friends recently posted this status: “if there was as much enthusiasm for curing cancer or ending child poverty as there is for the latest gadgets the world would be a better place”. My gut reaction was to agree. I mean, it’s probably a feeling most...
by Carl Howard | Mar 29, 2011 | Atheism and Religion, Blog Topics, Blogging the Bible
[EDIT: Argh! Yet another posting schedule wardrobe malfunction. Apologies if you saw the half-baked version of this] A month ago someone I know emailed me to ask my interpretation of the Tower of Babel story for a freelance job that required some interpretation of...
by Carl Howard | Mar 22, 2011 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Charity and Philanthropy, Race, Society
Yesterday I posted about how compassion can be problematic in philanthropy. The “don’t donate to Japan” clusterfuck is a great example. It started with Good Intentions Are Not Enough suggesting that people wait to donate to Japan, to see if and how much is needed and...
