by Carl Howard | Dec 4, 2012 | Atrocities and Oppression, Blog Topics, Charity and Philanthropy, Society
The headline is shamelessly plundered from this post by Greg Laden. The original context was indeed about ElevatorGate, so do get more detail there, not here. Greg’s title very aptly describes a certain style of argument. Basically, the idea is that when someone...
by Carl Howard | May 15, 2012 | Atrocities and Oppression, Biases and Fallacies, Charity and Philanthropy, Race, Science and Skepticism, Society
Kony2012 exploded just as I was leaving for overseas so I didn’t get a chance to post about it. Now that I’m back, it’s largely died off. Still, there are a few things that are important to discuss specifically now that attention has died off. And there are important...
by Carl Howard | Feb 5, 2012 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Charity and Philanthropy, Resources, Food and Environment
With the recent Susan G. Komen For The Cure brouhaha, the question of what charities (especially very large charities) spend their money on has been in discussion once more. If you’ve been under a rock, a quick recap. Susan G Komen has recently cut funding to a...
by Carl Howard | Jan 9, 2012 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Charity and Philanthropy, Science and Skepticism, Society
I thought a brief foray into cartooning (using material from other people’s hard work) would explain things better than words: I think ultimately it’s just another example of folk-Kantianism (ie. caring mostly about the “intent” of an act, quite literally an...
by Carl Howard | Aug 15, 2011 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Charity and Philanthropy, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Resources, Food and Environment, Science and Skepticism
In 2009 I set up a recurring (monthly) donation to the World Food Program. In mid 2010, I decided that I’d be quitting my job in early 2011 and taking a year off. As part of that I began to wind down some expenses to save up a bit more. One of the things to go was...
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...
