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tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-247613912015-07-17T22:11:46.770+10:00Metamagician and The Hellfire ClubRussell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-23039833783654871982015-07-17T22:11:00.004+10:002015-07-17T22:11:46.779+10:00Gawker's gutter journalism

I have a new post about the Gawker site's gutter journalism over on the Cogito blog.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-24891212883220432612015-07-11T23:34:00.000+10:002015-07-11T23:34:23.156+10:00Skin Game by Jim Butcher - "Best Novel" category, Hugo Awards voting 2015Just quickly, I was not overwhelmed Skin Game - the 15th novel in Jim Butcher's Dresden Files series - but it does show what everyone told me: that Butcher is a skilled and serious craftsman. Again and again, he brings complex situations and perceptions alive with astute first-person writing.

The story basically involves a supernatural heist, complete with backstabbings and betrayals - plus cleverly choreographed magical battles. This is not necessarily my kind of thing, though I expect I'd have found Skin Game more enjoyable if I'd come to it with a previous knowledge of the series. The character interactions are clearly important, but they'd be more meaningful for someone already familiar with these characters, and perhaps emotionally invested in them and their fates. Butcher has a monstrous fan following, and I can see why, even if this book, taken in isolation, did not strike me as so extraordinary as to merit an important international literary award.

I'd not begrudge Skin Game a Hugo Award if it works out that way. It is on the ballot at least partly because of its appearance on the "puppies" slates, but that in no way shows that either the book or its author is undeserving. I'll leave it at that, I won't be voting it down merely because of the Sad Puppies situation, but I'll see whether any of the other nominated novels strike me as more obvious winners in the category or inspire me to greater eloquence.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-24166332217303865002015-07-10T17:27:00.002+10:002015-07-10T19:40:36.162+10:00World Fantasy Award nominationsThe nominations list has been announced for this year's World Fantasy Awards. The list includes a collection by talented Australian author Angela Slatter... and another by one of my dearest friends, Australian author/editor/critic Janeen Webb. The latter, Death at the Blue Elephant, is especially dear to my heart, not only because of my affection for its author, but also because I was honoured to launch it officially in Melbourne last year. It is a very strong collection indeed.

Note that there is little, if any, overlap between these lists and the "puppies" slates that dominate the Hugo Awards nominations this year. One item that is both Hugo nominated and WFA nominated is The Goblin Emperor. However, it was not on the slates of the "Sad Puppies" and "Rabid Puppies" groups.

As I've said before, the puppies may have had a worthwhile role if they'd genuinely been seeking out the best quality work that might normally be overlooked because of an alleged "usual suspects" mentality or even some kind of suspected or alleged bias at the Hugos against politically conservative authors.

But most of what they did was just promoting their own narrow group of preferred authors. A more genuine exercise might have thrown up brilliant new work by the likes of Angela Slatter or Janeen Webb. I have not engaged in over-the-top rhetoric attacking the political motivations and moral characters of the "puppies", and I will not do so, but I do remain unimpressed by their slate-making exercise.

Here is the complete WFA list:

Life Achievement Winners

Ramsey Campbell
Sheri S. Tepper

Novel

 Katherine Addison, The Goblin Emperor (Tor Books)

Robert Jackson Bennett, City of Stairs (Broadway Books/Jo Fletcher Books)

David Mitchell, The Bone Clocks (Random House/Sceptre UK)

Jeff VanderMeer, Area X: The Southern Reach Trilogy (Farrar, Straus and Giroux Originals)

Jo Walton, My Real Children (Tor Books US/Corsair UK)

Novella

Daryl Gregory, We Are All Completely Fine (Tachyon Publications)

Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen, "Where the Trains Turn" (Tor.com, Nov. 19, 2014)

Michael Libling, "Hollywood North" (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Nov./Dec. 2014)

Mary Rickert, "The Mothers of Voorhisville" (Tor.com, Apr. 30, 2014)

Rachel Swirsky, "Grand Jeté (The Great Leap)" (Subterranean Press magazine, Summer 2014)

Short Story

Kelly Link, "I Can See Right Through You" (McSweeney's 48)

Scott Nicolay, Do You Like to Look at Monsters? (Fedogan & Bremer, chapbook)

Kaaron Warren, "Death's Door Café" (Shadows & Tall Trees 2014)

Kai Ashante Wilson, "The Devil in America" (Tor.com, April 2, 2014)

Alyssa Wong, "The Fisher Queen," (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, May/June 2014)

Anthology

Ellen Datlow, ed., Fearful Symmetries (ChiZine Publications)

George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois, eds., Rogues (Bantam Books/Titan Books)

Rose Fox and Daniel José Older, eds., Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History (Crossed Genres)

Michael Kelly, ed. Shadows & Tall Trees 2014 (Undertow Publications)

Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant, eds., Monstrous Affections: An Anthology of Beastly Tales (Candlewick Press)

Collection

Rebecca Lloyd, Mercy and Other Stories (Tartarus Press)

Helen Marshall, Gifts for the One Who Comes After (ChiZine Publications)

Robert Shearman, They Do the Same Things Different There (ChiZine Publications)

Angela Slatter, The Bitterwood Bible and Other Recountings (Tartarus Press)

Janeen Webb, Death at the Blue Elephant (Ticonderoga Publications)

Artist

Samuel Araya

Galen Dara

Jeffrey Alan Love

Erik Mohr

John Picacio

Special Award—Professional

John Joseph Adams, for editing anthologies and Nightmare and Ligthspeed magazines

Jeanne Cavelos, for Odyssey Writing workshops

Sandra Kasturi and Brett Alexander Savory, for ChiZine Publications

Gordon Van Gelder, for The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction

Jerad Walters, for Centipede Press

Special Award—Non-professional

Scott H. Andrews, for Beneath Ceaseless Skies: Literary Adventure Fantasy

Matt Cardin, for Born to Fear: Interviews with Thomas Ligotti (Subterranean Press)

Stefan Fergus, for Civilian Reader

Ray B. Russell and Rosalie Parker, for Tartarus Press

Patrick Swenson, for Fairwood Press

Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-27639617429046485352015-07-05T17:09:00.001+10:002015-07-05T21:35:43.844+10:00The End: What Science and Religion Tell Us about the ApocalypsePhil Torres has a new book due late this year from Pitchstone: The End: What Science and Religion Tell Us about the Apocalypse. You might want to watch out for it - I wrote a foreword for the book, having been provided with a copy of the manuscript. I wouldn't have done this if I didn't think it was a terrific book.

Torres has done a good job of this, discussing planetary and civilizational risks and what we might be able to do about them. His point about religion is not that any of it is true; it's that the world is full of apocalyptic ideologues who not only believe prophecies of the last days, but are actually prepared to do what they can to bring about Armageddon. He goes into this at considerable and fascinating length.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-63156284987159788072015-07-04T19:03:00.002+10:002015-07-04T19:29:30.159+10:00The Trouble With "Islamophobia"

The title of this article places the word "Islamophobia" in quotation marks for the very good reason that I propose to talk about the trouble with the word itself. First, this is not an innocent word. It has a specific, very recent origin and history, particularly a history of deliberate politicking for its acceptance. It is all too easy to use this new word, "Islamphobia" - and with it the very idea of Islamophobia - as a stick to beat people who are attempting to engage in genuine dialogue about the nature of Islam, particularly its more radical and/or political forms.

This is not to deny that some dislike of Islam, or impatience with Muslims and their spiritual leaders, has a quasi-racist character, motivated by parochialism and xenophobia, and sometimes a racist dislike of Arabs in particular. "Islamophobia" is a suspect word, but there is clearly such a thing as anti-Muslim bigotry.

The bigots and the critics<o:p></o:p>

It is not coincidental that so much of the public criticism of Islam as a religion, and of Muslims and their practices, emanates from European political parties and associated groups found on the extreme right. These organisations typically promote an intense, even bigoted nationalism – combined with what they portray as a defence of Christian traditions and values, and an endangered "Christian identity." They thrive on a fear of strange cultures and a fear of change.<o:p></o:p>

An obvious problem for critics of Islam who do not share these values is that they may find themselves painted with the same brush. Conversely, extreme-right critics of Islam can gain a degree of respectability by co-opting issues and adopting stances that many politicians and members of the public find compelling. E.g., extreme-right figures have attacked such practices as forced marriages, honour-killings, female genital mutilation, and highly conservative apparel for women such as the burqa and the chador. All of these are legitimate targets for criticism.

At the same time, many Muslims in Western countries continue to suffer from suspicion, cultural and personal misunderstanding, discrimination, and outright intolerance that sometimes rises to the level of harassment and violence. It's legitimate to oppose this bigotry while alsofearing Islamist groups that seek to impose some version of Islam by force.

The situation creates a complex set of advantages, disadvantages, and risks. The extreme right benefits from the availability of politically respectable criticisms of Islamic thought and associated cultural practices. As this goes on, however, there is also a risk that the word "Islamophobia" will be used to demonize and intimidate individuals whose hostility to Islamism, or even to Islam itself, is based on what they perceive as its faults. In particular, we should remember that Islam contains ideas, and in a liberal democracy ideas are fair targets for criticism or repudiation. Religious doctrines influence the social and political attitudes of their adherents in ways that merit public comment (favourable or otherwise), and many religious leaders and organizations exert immense power or influence. It is in the public interest that all this be subjected to monitoring and criticism.

Indeed, there are reasons why right-wing organizations have borrowed arguments based on feminism and secularism. These arguments are useful precisely because they have an intellectual and emotional appeal independent of their convenience to unpleasant opportunists. Regardless of who uses these arguments, they plausibly apply to certain elements of Islam, or at least to attitudes and practices associated with it. In any event, it is an inescapable fact that politicalIslam is a threat to global peace and to liberal ideals. <o:p></o:p>

Whether or not they are put in good faith on a particular occasion, nothing precludes the arguments being put sincerely, and perhaps cogently, by individuals with legitimate concerns.

Thus, there are genuine reasons for some people who are not racists, cultural supremacists, or anything of the sort, to criticize Islam, or certain forms and manifestations of Islam, or to express hostility towards it. These relate to disapproval of various doctrines, canons of conduct, associated cultural practices, and so on, to the power wielded by Islamic leaders and organisational structures, and increasingly to the ambitions and actions of Islamists such as ISIS.<o:p></o:p>

Take-home lessons

A number of lessons can be drawn from all this. One is that opponents of Islam, or some of its forms and manifestations, cannot reasonably be expected to keep quiet when accused of racism or the quasi-racism of "Islamophobia." When these accusations are misdirected, they are likely to inflame passions even further, though they may intimidate some individuals into silence.<o:p></o:p>

This suggests that we understand that racism and bigotry do not underlie all hostility to Islam. Beyond a certain point, there is too much disadvantage in walking on eggshells. We don't have to do it all our lives.

Key Words: Russell Blackford, ISIS, Islam, "Islamophobia", honour-killings, female genital mutilation.

Note: This short article was first published by what was then the Secular Global Institute in September 2014.
Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-58984835321060945202015-07-04T14:07:00.002+10:002015-07-04T14:07:55.448+10:00Why "The Hellfire Club"?

This piece was originally posted on the Skeptic Ink blog network during the period when I moved the blog there, and it was, indeed, just "The Hellfire Club". It has since reverted to its original name "Metamagician and the Hellfire Club"...

===============

Now and then, I am asked why I named this blog "The Hellfire Club" (it was originally "Metamagician and the Hellfire Club", but that's another story).

The primary reference, of course, is to the libertine clubs of the 18th century that used this name. Members of those organisations thumbed their noses at the sexual and other mores of the time, and one of the hints in the title of the blog was that this would, ideally, be a blog for a fairly tight-knit group of people who would not have much regard for conventional moral ideas, sacred cows, unexamined social assumptions, and the like.

The blog attracted some (modest) popularity, and has gained an audience that is critical, thoughtful, and (quite rightly) happy to disagree with my views. So it is certainly not the tight-knit bunch of my friends that I expected way back in 2006. Still, I think the part about not just accepting social convention at face value still applies. This is a place where many conventional notions of virtue and moral goodness are considered … questionable. And not just conventional ones, favoured by the social majority. All forms of dogma, authoritarianism, moralism, and moral panics and posturing are treated with skepticism here.

As I've said before (on the old site), it has never been solely, primarily, or dedicatedly an atheist blog, so the title was not especially about the idea that we are unbelievers on our way to Hell (in the view of theologically orthodox Christians). However, I welcome that implication: my co-editorship of 50 Voices of Disbelief (followed by my co-authorship of the forthcoming 50 Great Myths About Atheism) got me more involved in the organised atheist movement, and it certainly makes the scornful joke more relevant.

Of course, there's also the association with the villainous Hellfire Club of the X-MEN mythos, itself an embroidered version of the original libertine clubs. Those Hellfire Club members – particularly Emma Frost – are almost the blog's mascots.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-58451036291848557572015-07-01T20:11:00.002+10:002015-07-01T20:19:52.959+10:00Unwarranted disciplinary action against Q&A producerThis story reveals that a disciplinary warning, for employee misconduct, has been issued against Q&A executive producer Peter McEvoy over the recent appearance of terrorism suspect Zaky Mallah on the show. Mallah was allowed to ask a prepared question from the audience - and to enter into a brief exchange with a panellist.

I am no fan of an Islamist hothead, if that's how he's best described, such as Mallah. His only credentials for appearing on the show seem to relate to his past brush with the law, and giving him such an opportunity to air his views to a mass audience could be considered a poor decision: in effect, it rewards his bad conduct.

It turns out, furthermore, that Mallah has made at least one vile, sexist comment on Twitter, aimed at two female journalists.

All that said, many people get public exposure from bad behaviour that makes them notorious, and at least Mallah was invited on the show to discuss an issue to which his views and his troubled past had some relevance. As for the sexist tweet: first, many people, perhaps including many politicians, would be considered "inappropriate" to appear on television if all it took was one obnoxious public comment (whether made on Twitter or elsewhere); second, people should not normally be considered so tainted as to be beyond the pale, and refused platforms, merely for something said (if what he said was defamatory, as it may well have been, there are remedies available in the civil courts); and third, a broadcaster cannot, and should not, trawl through the Twitter feeds of all potential guests to ensure that platforms are given only to people who are squeaky clean. All things considered, I'm not convinced that this really was such a bad call by McEvoy.

I am especially concerned that this action against McEvoy has happened so soon after the dismissal of Scott McIntyre by the SBS.

If an employee repeatedly makes poor, embarrassing judgments, it can add up to unsatisfactory performance; and that may, indeed, eventually be grounds for dismissal. But even if I could agree that Peter McEvoy displayed poor judgment with Q&A's invitation to Mallah, an act of poor judgment is not the same as an act of misconduct such as to merit disciplinary action. It sometimes appears that disciplinary actions by employers, including outright dismissals and menacing demands for resignations, are being taken at the drop of a hat.

In the case of this action taken against Peter McEvoy, the ABC has itself shown atrocious judgment, and it has created an impression of bowing to pressure from the executive government. The government itself appears far too willing to use its power to go after specific individuals who displease it.

I expect to say more about this sorry chain of events, and meanwhile I look forward to what comes of the review of Q&A now being conducted by Shaun Brown and Ray Martin. When it appears, I'll scrutinise their report with interest.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-34603612011158635342015-06-27T19:36:00.002+10:002015-06-27T19:36:26.521+10:00Even political conservatives should now embrace same-sex marriageI argue the case at Cogito.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-73177910339072745982015-06-24T13:30:00.000+10:002015-06-24T13:30:19.890+10:00Follow up article on SingerI have a follow-up article on Peter Singer on the Cogito blog: "I Stand With Peter Singer". This deals with a misguided campaign for Singer's resignation or dismissal from Princeton University. More generally, it deals with illiberal attempts to punish and deter unwanted speech on issues of public importance, as opposed to meeting it with criticism.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-70171930847660839552015-06-22T16:31:00.003+10:002015-06-22T16:56:45.263+10:00Shakespeare, Science Fiction, and all that...Gregory Benford has republished (with my permission) our exchange from 2000 on greatness in science fiction, what works might stand the test of time, and similar issues. As Greg notes, we are presenting the discussion as it happened, not updating our views. Still, the issues remain topical and what we wrote back then may have its ongoing merit and interest. Check it out!

Note: I wrote several media tie-in novels myself, not all that long after my contribution to this discussion was first published. As a result of that experience, I'd now be less snarky about media tie-in work. That said, I worked hard in my Terminator books in an attempt to achieve an equivalent of the movies' "knowingness and high production values". I don't always see this in media tie-in work, but I have a much better understanding of the exigencies of that kind of writing, especially of what can be involved in producing novelisations. Successful tie-in writers are highly skilled people. It remains the case that they are unlikely to produce work comparable to that of Milton, Shelley, or Shakespeare.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-20406371447905685322015-06-20T17:14:00.001+10:002015-06-26T12:49:23.720+10:00The Monsters of Jurassic WorldNew post on the Cogito blog. This is also a small taste of the sort of thing that may get into the discussion in my book that I'm writing for Springer.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-26054210434620205462015-06-18T20:37:00.001+10:002015-06-19T14:27:38.013+10:00My work cut out for me!The good, if slightly daunting, news today is that my proposal for a book on the tyranny of (public) opinion looks like it has been picked up by Bloomsbury's academic line. Right now, in fact, it seems that all four(!) book proposals that I've been discussing with publishers over the last year or so are going to come to fruition. Unless there's an unanticipated glitch, that means I am going to be very, very busy. Stay tuned for more on the details in forthcoming posts.

For now, here are the four books, that I have at various stages of discussion with publishers and various stages of work in progress.

1. A short monograph on fundamental moral theory for Palgrave Pivot. This is now written, but still has to go through the pipeline. It should, however, appear later this year.

2. A book on moral philosophy and science fiction - particularly about the representation of various moral themes in SF - for which I have signed a contract with Springer. This is not due with the publisher until late next year, so we're looking at a publication date no sooner than 2017.

3. An edited (with Damien Broderick) collection under discussion with Wiley-Blackwell, where the current situation is very positive. More about this another time.

4. The book mentioned above with Bloomsbury.

Again, the manuscript of the Palgrave Pivot book is already complete - so it is far ahead of the others in the process. In all cases, I am not starting entirely from scratch. Much effort has gone into each of them already over a period of years, and fairly intensively in the past year during the development of proposals. All the same, there is much writing/editing/associated work to come.

With large projects coming to fruition here, or just getting off the ground, there will have to be some shuffling of other priorities. I have some book chapters and talks scheduled, and will go ahead with those. But for example, my pet, or boutique, project of reading much of the Hugo nominated material for 2015 - and commenting on it here - will probably be even less complete than I might have expected. I'd hoped to read all the nominees in the "Best Novel" category and to comment on them before the voting date, but that now looks unrealistic. I might have to restrict myself to discussing one or two of those books, and I may not even manage all the novellas in time to write about them before voting time.

Still, all these green lights that I seem to be getting of late add up to wonderful news for me. They are all exciting projects, and I think these books, when (all going well) they all eventually emerge, are going to constitute some of the best work I've done.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-58539179243058141152015-06-17T22:29:00.003+10:002015-06-17T22:29:46.416+10:00Matthew Beard on vigilante justiceIn another post at Cogito, Matthew Beard discusses the philosophy of vigilante justice - using as his springboard the TV series Arrow (based on DC's character The Green Arrow). I'm looking forward to seeing more in the promised series of posts on this.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-55913677424080129702015-06-17T21:40:00.000+10:002015-06-17T21:40:12.399+10:00Post at Cogito re Peter Singer and disinvitationsThis post was prompted by Peter Singer's disinvitation as a speaker at the Cologne Philosophy Festival. More generally, no one has a right to chosen as a conference speaker - but once invited (and having accepted) people do have a legitimate expectation of not being disinvited for controversial views and on the basis of pressure on the conference organisers.

Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-20182951585461236802015-06-16T16:25:00.001+10:002015-06-16T19:26:19.107+10:00Jurassic World is a monsterBox Office Mojo reports that Jurassic World has broken records for the biggest ever box-office openings in the US (formerly held by the first Avengers movie) and worldwide (formerly held by Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2).

Although there was some buzz about Jurassic World as its release date approached, I don't think anyone, including the studio bosses, foresaw success on this astonishing scale. There's also reason to think it can hold on well - reviews (including my own) have been positive, even if not overwhelmingly so. The general idea from reviewers and from people I've talked to seems to be that the movie does a good job of following the formula that made the original Jurassic Park a record smasher in its own day, that it injects enough original ideas to breathe new life into the franchise, and that, above all, it is simply (though scarily) fun. Perhaps that last is underappreciated at a time when even superhero movies are often dark, troubling, and morally ambiguous.

It seems that there was a hunger for this kind of movie. It was probably helped by circumstances, with no serious blockbuster competition around its June opening date - furthermore, there is no serious competition coming up over the next two weeks. It's also the sort of movie that is inherently more likely to hold at the box office than a superhero flick (these tend to be very front-end loaded).

At the start of July, we'll see the newest instalment from the Terminator franchise, Terminator: Genisys. This also looks like an effort to breathe new life into a flagging franchise - the last two movies never attained the commercial success of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, or anything like the critical acclaim and iconic status of the first two movies. The creators of Terminator Salvation made a brave decision to deal with the future post-Judgment Day, which could have set in train a new line of movies, but they failed to capture the public's imagination. Terminator Salvation was a relative flop by Hollywood blockbuster standards, especially in the US market. Terminator: Genisys is clearly designed to get back to basics, but with new twists. We'll see whether that appeals.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-80065775886760349092015-06-15T21:49:00.002+10:002015-06-15T21:49:39.616+10:00Seth Baum's movie review of TranscendenceFor a change, I'm linking to a movie review by someone else: Seth Baum's review of Transcendence, which we published in the Journal of Evolution and Technology last year. Warning: This is (a bit) more like a full-scale academic discussion than an ordinary review, so it gives away the plot. Don't read it unless you've seen the movie or don't mind spoilers for it.

Transcendence flopped at the box office, which may be understandable for such a cerebral movie (even if the ideas were slightly dumbed down, and, indeed, could not have been dumbed down much further without becoming risible). It was never going to make the same kind of profit as an action blockbuster or even an SF movie - like Gravity or Interstellar - that combines a certain amount of genuine science with relentless scenes of intense danger and trauma.

More worryingly, Transcendence was also a failure with the critics; only a minority praised it. I can pick fault with it myself, but it's an involving, intelligent, thought provoking piece of cinema that deserved more sympathy and attention. Its failure with the critics and at the box office has to be a disincentive to others who might try something similar. If you're among those who are fond of Transcendence, you'll be interested in what Baum has to say.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-31883294663573293702015-06-14T21:12:00.000+10:002015-06-14T21:20:17.569+10:00Concluding comments on "Best novelette" category - Hugo Awards voting 2015The nominated works in this category are (in no particular order):

1. "Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust, Earth to Alluvium" by Gray Rinehart (which I reviewed briefly here).

2. "Championship B'tok" by Edward M. Lerner

3. "The Triple Sun: A Golden Age Tale" by Rajnar Vajra (I reviewed this and the Lerner story here; I thought Vajra's story was the stronger of the two).

4. "The Journeyman: In the Stone House" by Michael F. Flynn (one of the best-written of the nominated stories; perhaps my number two choice, though again with the feel of being an episode in something larger).

5. "The Day the World Turned Upside Down" by Thomas Olde Heuvelt.

And the winner is...

well, I don't know who will win this award. I will not be voting "no award" ahead of any of them. However, the standout is Heuvelt's surrealistic fantasy story, "The Day the World Turned Upside Down". This has enormous energy, wit, and emotional kick. It can be seen as one long metaphor for the shock and pain of a breakup. It would be a worthy winner in any year, and I recommend that you read it, if you have access to the Voter Packet, and give it serious consideration.

It's also the only story of the five that was not on the Sad Puppies slate. Make of that what you will - it did not influence my choice, since I really do think it's a much stronger, more distinguished, story than any of the others. But I'm sure, in current circumstances when assuming good faith is fairly uncommon, there'll be people who won't believe me about that.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-75513156552041784872015-06-13T16:30:00.000+10:002015-06-13T16:30:25.415+10:00"Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust, Earth to Alluvium" by Gray Rinehart - Hugo Award voting 2015This is another work nominated in "Best Novelette", and again we have a competent, thoughtful, but not especially distinguished, space adventure. The underlying theme involves conflict between humans and technologically advanced aliens, in this case the Peshari, a lizard-like bunch with a taste for open skies and a morbid distaste (or more than that) for anything to do with digging into the ground.

By my standards, which are not binding on anybody else, "Ashes to Ashes" suffers from being far too talky.

Be that as it may, having now read three (out of five) of the stories nominated in the "Best Novelette" category, I can't say that its list looks especially strong this year. Notably, all three nominees that I've read appear on both the "Sad Puppies" slate and the "Rabid Puppies" slate, and they give me no confidence that the people running the respective "puppies" campaigns looked very far to find high-quality alternatives to work by whomever they think are the well-networked, much-promoted usual suspects. I have not yet found a plausible winner in this category, but perhaps I'll be blown away by one of the remaining two novelettes on the Hugo ballot.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-46477031247256865542015-06-13T14:27:00.001+10:002015-06-13T14:29:02.948+10:00Thursday night success for Jurassic WorldAs a footnote to my review of Jurassic World, it appears from the Thursday-night sessions in the US that the movie is headed for sit-up-and-take-notice success at the box office - see this article at Box Office Mojo. An estimate of US$18.5 million for a Thursday night is appropriately monstrous, especially if this fourth instalment of the Jurassic Park franchise turns out to have staying power.

Perhaps all those years in development hell were helpful to Jurassic World. The franchise was declining at the time of the previous movie, and a fourth outing for the dinosaurs might have done badly around, say, 2005. Instead, the passage of time has made Jurassic World something special, allowed a few reinvigorating ideas to bubble up, and opened the way for a new cast of characters/actors. There's a buzz that I can't imagine would have been the case a decade ago, when the formula was getting tired.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-33230707666024340782015-06-12T20:29:00.002+10:002015-06-12T22:54:14.163+10:00Jurassic World reviewWarning: Some basic spoilers

It's been a long time since the last Jurassic Park movie, as this one was stuck in development hell for years. As usual when I review new movies, what follows will not reveal much in the way of plot twists, etc., but nor will it be entirely clear of spoilers.

What you most need to know is that Jurassic World is fun, exciting, and scary. The special effects are, as we were promised, a level above those in its predecessors - and at one point they made me jump out of my seat. There's a slightly old-fashioned aspect to the general tone and feeling, and not least to the movie's family, gender, and sexual politics. At one level it's an unabashed paean of praise to competent, rugged, under-appreciated he-men - to the sort of bloke who can ride a motorbike, shoot a gun, and wrangle a velociraptor.

That aside, it sticks closely to the formula I described in my previous post, though with a few noteworthy tweaks. The events take place twenty-something years after those shown in the original Jurassic Park, and the new owners of Isla Nublar and its inventory have finally managed to establish a huge theme park stocked with scientifically recreated dinosaurs. Inevitably - given the Murphy's-law logic of the Jurassic Park franchise - all hell breaks loose.

The big, scary monster of Jurassic World - "Indominus rex" - is not a genetically reconstructed beast from the Mesozoic era, such as we saw in the earlier movies, but an engineered monstrosity based primarily on T-Rex DNA... with additions to its genome to make it even more impressive (and hence dangerous). Thus, Jurassic World adds an additional coating of unnatural evil to its representation of genetic technology. While the more authentic (within the movie's reality) dinosaurs are amazing, wonderful, even sublime, Indominus rex is depicted as something closer to pure evil: a product of science gone mad, of human ingenuity corrupted by greed and hubris. Indominus rex is cunning, calculating, sinister, uncannily stealthy, and just plain cruel; she sets traps for human prey, and she kills other dinosaurs for sport even when she's not hungry.

The morality-play element is familiar, with some characters acting more or less as dinosaur fodder, some suffering fates that look exactly like karmic punishments, some enduring stoically, and one or two obtaining wisdom and redemption. As usual, there are children (a teenage boy and his younger brother) placed in harm's way, and (surprise!) these youngsters show moments of unexpected courage and ingenuity.

If you're a big kid at heart, love monster movies, or are any sort of fan of the franchise, do go and see Jurassic World, and don't forget your popcorn! Sure, it's formulaic. It won't change your life, and it has some hokey aspects. In other ways, though, it's the most frightening and creative instalment of the franchise since the 1993 original. Indominus rex is terrifying. You're in for a wild ride, and the two hours will rush past on a wave of adrenaline.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-18954144291899330822015-06-12T01:14:00.005+10:002015-06-12T23:54:30.307+10:00Jurassic Park I, 2, and 3With Jurassic World being released more or less as I write, I've been watching the first three movies in the franchise, released in 1993, 1997, and 2001 respectively. Commercially speaking, these were immensely successful, although this gradually declined after the original Jurassic Park, which set box-office records in its day and still ranks highly among the biggest cinematic drawcards of all time. Even a 3-D re-release in 2013 made significant money for the Jurassic Park franchise.

Watching them again, I was struck by these movies as morality plays. Good guys (of both sexes) and children are menaced by the dinosaurs, but invariably escape. The dislikeable characters come to humiliating ends (this is especially obvious in the first movie), and there's the all-too-common element of "black guys die first" - doubtless shaped by various social pressures to do with casting, etc., rather than by any conscious racist intent, but still prominent, illusion-breaking, and a source of annoyance.

Leaving aside the minor characters - often non-white - who are merely dinosaur fodder, there's a sense that the dinosaurs act as instruments of fate to give characters whatever they deserve, even if some must suffer for flaws and wrongdoings before they can be rewarded. Children are most likely to get out of the movies okay, but not before being terrorised and endangered to manipulate our emotions.

This gives the dinosaurs three aspects, and the movies seem quite knowing about all three, and about the tensions involved: the dinos are the products of an advanced genetic science that is almost always represented as evil (and associated with venal motives); yet at the same time, they evoke awe and wonder; and they also act as instruments of karma - of a sort of impersonal, fatalistic justice.

Some of this probably sounds cynical (some of it is!), but I love these movies, whatever their flaws. In many ways they are masterpieces of the cinematic art (though again, this probably declined after the original Jurassic Park). The complex, perhaps unstable, dramatic meaning of the dinosaurs makes the movies richer rather than undermining their impact. This aspect is well controlled, surely deliberate to some extent, and leaves the experience open to interpretation each time. There are technophobic, technophilic, and karmic elements in movies that look damn good (though the special effects are getting dated) and are always emotionally engrossing.

Jurassic World employs a new generation of SFX technology to make the dinosaurs come alive on screen, and from what I've heard it's successful. I have high hopes that it will, at the very least, look magnificent. I wonder how far the narrative will break the mould we've seen to date.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-30257755756114521702015-06-10T01:29:00.003+10:002015-06-10T17:47:49.939+10:00"Best Novelette" category - Hugo Awards voting 2015I'm now reading the stories in the "best novelette" category, applying to work between 7,500 and 17,500 words. That's a good length for a science fiction story, in particular: it provides room for the revelation and development of character and the exploration of an idea... without having to build a complicated plot or establish a large cast of characters. Stories in the upper range of novelette - or in the next range up, of novella - may be ideal for even moderately serious SF. From my point of view, then, it's unfortunate that there are commercial pressures for large publishers of SF and fantasy to favour long novels. These can certainly be engrossing, but they can also push out a lot of potentially interesting, innovative work.

At this stage, I've read only two stories in the category: "Championship B'tok" by Edward M. Lerner, and "The Triple Sun: A Golden Age Tale" by Rajnar Vajra. For my money, "The Triple Sun" was the stronger of the two, though both were competent stories of adventure in space (with elements of hard science fiction). Whether either is strong enough to be worth a major international award is another question. Again, I'd be happier to see "The Triple Sun" win the award, partly because it simply has better shape as a standalone story ("Championship B'tok" seems more like an instalment of something much longer; the problem isn't that it is, but that it seems like it is).

I'll get to the other nominees in this category soon, and we'll see if one of them is more a standout.Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-5839564839158200322015-06-09T13:50:00.002+10:002015-06-09T13:50:38.714+10:00My introductory post at CogitoI have just published my first - introductory - post at Cogito, a multi-author philosophy blog based at The Conversation. I'm pleased to have been invited to join this blog, as part of a diverse group of publicly visible Australian philosophers.

Check it out!Russell Blackfordhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-74978516170907962802015-06-08T19:46:00.000+10:002015-06-08T19:55:48.404+10:00We have the extraordinary evidence! Science, skepticism, and denialism

The following was originally published at Talking Philosophy in July 2013. It was a reconstruction (based on memory and my speaking notes) of my presentation, "We have the extraordinary evidence! Science, skepticism, and denialism", at The Amazing Meeting in Las Vegas. This was the 2013 iteration of the James Randi Educational Foundation's (JREF's) annual conference devoted to scientific skepticism.

Note that I cannot provide a transcript of exactly what I said, and nor had I prepared the talk in a form that could simply be read out. As usual in my presentations, I extemporised to a considerable extent.

My thanks for the photos to Miranda Hale (pic of the large screen), Jerry Coyne (pic taken from the audience) and Peter Boghossian (pic taken from backstage).

I discuss how our modern, scientific picture of the world did not come intuitively to individuals and cultures, but was hard won over hundreds of years. I go on to relate this to contemporary scientific skepticism and the concept of denialism.

Read on...

Indulge me while I say how pleased and privileged I feel to be at this great event. Though I've flown nearly 8000 miles to attend, I feel very much at home among all you welcoming, friendly, and refreshingly rational and reasonable people. When DJ Grothe invited me to speak at TAM, I felt honoured but also felt some trepidation: I am not a magician, a scientific investigator, or indeed any sort of scientist, so what sort of contribution could I make to your theme of fighting the fakers, addressing a group of hardened and seasoned scientific skeptics? Perhaps, however, a philosopher can offer you a perspective that's of general interest.

To do that, I'd like you to cast your minds back about 500 years. Now, I know none of us are quite that old, and I don't believe in reincarnation, as will come up again later in this talk. But we have a pretty solid historical record of the past five centuries, at least for many parts of the world. So I'm going to make some comparisons between, let's say, 1513 and 2013.

The lesson here is that what seemed like an ordinary, or at least acceptable, claim in 1513 might be an extraordinary claim now, and what would have seemed an extraordinary claim then might now be, in the relevant sense, an ordinary one. This is not because I take some relativist approach to truth, but simply because the reasonably available evidence has changed enormously over five hundred years.

In particular, I'd like you to think of European civilization in 1513. This was four years before Martin Luther confronted the indulgence seller Johann Tetzel with his famous Nine-Five Theses, catalysing the Protestant Reformation. It was thirty years before the publication of Copernicus' major work, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres, and about a century before Galileo's great scientific discoveries that arguably mark the beginning of modern science. Charles Darwin's work was over three hundred years in the future.

People in Europe five hundred years ago were, in effect, living in another world. That is, the information available to them was radically different from what is available to us today. No wonder they understood the world very differently.

The celebrated Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor has carried out a similar exercise to the one I'm asking of you, though his exercise relates specifically to the existence of God and the truth of Christianity. Taylor is himself a religious believer, but his 2007 book, A Secular Age, discusses how things changed over the past five hundred years to enable a movement from a society where belief in God is essentially unchallenged to the current situation in Western societies where it is, as Taylor puts it, "understood to be one option among others, and frequently not the easiest to embrace." For Taylor, it was virtually impossible, or unthinkable, not to believe in God five hundred years ago, whereas today, as he puts it, "many of us find this not only easy, but even inescapable."

As I said, Taylor is not an atheist, and nor is it my purpose today to put an argument for atheism – for that you'll need to see my new book with Udo Schuklenk, 50 Great Myths About Atheism.

But it was not only belief in God that came easily in that era — all sorts of beliefs that seem bizarre to scientifically educated people today were commonplace, while the foundation stones of the modern sciences had not yet been laid. Taylor identifies features of life in early sixteenth-century Europe that made the existence of God just obvious to everybody, and importantly some of them apply more widely than belief in God.

First, the natural world was seen as testifying to divine activity, whether it was the appearance of order or the occasional extraordinary events that could not be explained by human knowledge at the time — whether plagues and natural disasters or years of exceptional fertility.

Second, if you lived in Europe in the sixteenth century the political and social systems were still closely integrated with the religious system. At all levels of society, it was assumed that human activity was underpinned by the activity of God, and all communal life was pervaded by religious ritual and worship.

Third — and this is very important — there was a strong sense for sixteenth-century Europeans of living in an enchanted cosmos, full of miraculous beings and powers.

Fourth, as Taylor adds, there was simply no well-developed naturalistic, secular alternative to religion and to what we'd now regard as superstition.

In my view, Taylor understates the degree to which science (in particular) changed things. There were undoubtedly other factors involved in the changes to how we think and understand world, but science as we know it was incredibly transformative. And in 1513, science as we now know it was in the future, as were modern styles of moral and political philosophy. Even humanistic learning, such as various kinds of textual and historical scholarship, was at a relatively early stage, despite the revival of classical learning that we know as the Renaissance, which had begun in Italy in the fourteenth century, but then proceeded through Europe in a very patchy way.

If you were living in the early sixteenth century, you'd have had no real reason to doubt stories of supernatural events, such as miracles, hauntings, and the effects of evil spells cast by witches.

Let me qualify that. It was quite well known that, for example, some seeming miracles probably had more ordinary explanations. There was also some cynicism and suspicion — it was well known that some holy relics were fakes and that some supposed miracles were fraudulent. You can find reference to this in Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, written over two hundred years before — and even in the work of St. Augustine well over a thousand years before. (Some of you will be especially familiar with Chaucer's crooked Pardoner, often referenced by the late Christopher Hitchens in his debates.)

Still, the late medieval world was a world without professional scientists, paranormal investigators, and the like. Even if you thought that some specific purveyors of miracles and relics were fakers and frauds, you probably didn't doubt that there really were miracles, ghosts, witches, and demons. There was no well-developed body of investigation and thought that you could draw upon for skepticism about all that, even if you were in the more educated classes of society. All the intellectual authorities that seemed trustworthy would have advised you, even required you, to believe in these things.

Today, of course, ordinary people still have problems knowing who to trust, who has genuine expertise. We live in a propaganda society, and we know that much of what we read or hear is misinformation. But at least we are in a position to examine who might genuinely be qualified to talk on a particular topic.

In the sixteenth century, there was no particular reason for an educated person to doubt that she lived in a world where supernatural forces were at work and supernatural events took place — even if not right here today, probably not far away or all that long ago.

Conversely, there would have been no reason to trust anyone who made such seemingly bizarre claims as that the earth revolves around the sun and rotates on its axis, that the earth is billions of years old, that human beings are descended from apelike forebears, or that the sacred history contained in the Hebrew Bible is highly inaccurate. From the point of view of someone living in early sixteenth-century Europe, all of these claims would have seemed extraordinary.

If I had time, I'd go into detail about the dramatic claim (so controversial in the era of Galileo) that the earth rotates on its axis. In the early sixteenth century and even a hundred years later at the time of Galileo's discoveries, the idea that the earth rotates scarcely seemed to make sense. Galileo had to do much arguing and much hard-core science to challenge the seemingly commonsense view. If you've never done so, please read some detailed accounts of how he went about this, such as that in Philip Kitcher's wonderful book The Advancement of Science (published in 1995).

For example, Galileo had to respond to the argument that an object dropped from a tower must fall "behind" the tower if the earth rotates. He used the example of an object dropped from the mast of a moving ship: for a sea-faring culture, this analogy had some imaginative salience. But in the end, he had to make extraordinary advances in physics, subsequently improved upon by Isaac Newton in particular, to create an imaginative picture of the universe within which the earth's rotation was no longer an extraordinary claim. Similarly, the idea that we are descended through a naturalistic process from earlier primates was truly extraordinary until the evidence was gathered — and of course, that evidence has been vastly augmented since the time of Darwin, about 150 years ago.

The point of this talk is that the modern, naturalistic picture of the world that even most religious people accept for most purposes, most of the time, did not come naturally to us. It was hard won.
It was won through extraordinary efforts — by Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Darwin, and many others, including people whom we'd normally regard as philosophers and humanities scholars rather than scientists. For someone in 1513, many of the most basic claims in our modern, scientifically-informed understanding would have been extraordinary. The reason why we now, quite rightly, accept them is because we actually have the extraordinary evidence, accumulated over hundreds of years.

For someone in 1513, many of the most basic claims in our scientifically-informed understanding would have been extraordinary. The reason why we now, quite rightly, accept them is because we actually have the extraordinary evidence, accumulated over hundreds of years. The reason is not that our modern understanding of the world is, prior to the evidence coming in, natural or intuitive, or because the old understanding of the world was inherently, prior to the evidence, counter-intuitive or bizarre.

When it comes to intuitiveness, or otherwise, don't even start me on relativity theory or quantum mechanics. The universe opened up to our inspection by science is very strange indeed, in the sense that much of what we have learned goes against our natural intuitions. For example, Edward O. Wilson has this to say:

The ruling talismans of twentieth-century science, relativity and quantum mechanics, have become the ultimate in strangeness to the human mind. They were conceived by Albert Einstein, Max Planck, and other pioneers of theoretical physics during a search for quantifiable truths that would be known to extraterrestrials as well as to our species, and hence certifiably independent of the human mind. The physicists succeeded magnificently, but in doing so revealed the limitations of intuition unaided by mathematics; an understanding of nature, they discovered, comes very hard. … The cost of scientific advance is the humbling recognition that reality was not constructed to be easily grasped by the human mind.
Relativity and quantum mechanics are not for, say, primary school children. Still, there is an exciting story to tell about the advance of science, about how our scientific knowledge was hard won — even in the face of human intuitions. I think we should introduce our children to this story as early as possible in their education. We can always learn more about it ourselves.

I take scientific skepticism to be essentially skepticism about claims that educated people should now regard as extraordinary — not because they are inherently bizarre but because they are anomalous within our hard-won, scientifically-informed picture of the world.

Think again of reincarnation. If reincarnation were true, if reincarnation were a genuine phenomenon, this would force us to revise our whole picture of the world to find some mechanism whereby it takes place. That makes it an extraordinary claim, and that is a reason to investigate it in a spirit of suspicion.

By way of analogy, many people make claims that run counter to the evidence from humanistic scholarship. For example, many people will not accept that Shakespeare's plays were actually written by Shakespeare (though the claim being denied was never an extraordinary one in this case). They claim the plays were written by, say, Christopher Marlowe, or Francis Bacon, or the Earl of Oxford.

Others deny terrible historical events, such as the Holocaust. There was once a time when the claim that the Nazis murdered nearly six million Jews in their concentration camps should have been regarded with suspicion, especially since much in the way of false propaganda was spread about the Germans during the first world war. We should always be cautious about atrocity propaganda, especially from our own side.

But of course, we know that the Nazi Holocaust did take place. We have the extraordinary evidence for these horrific events, and we have it in much detail. Given the picture that was built up by investigators immediately after the second world war and by historians since, we actually have the extraordinary evidence needed to believe in the occurrence of something as vast and horrific as the Holocaust. Someone who now denies those events does not deserve to be called by the honourable title of skeptic. Such a person is in denial of evidence that we actually have. Such a person is a denialist.

Initially extraordinary claims that actually acquire extraordinary evidence thereby change our picture of the world, or our understandings of ourselves and our situation. Once that happens, what were once extraordinary claims become normalised. Once they are sufficiently well established, those once-extraordinary claims can be used in arguments against new claims that are inconsistent with them. All the cumulative evidence that supports such a claim stands as evidence against any inconsistent claim.

So — the rotation of the earth was once an extraordinary claim. The onus was on proponents to gather the evidence. Skepticism about the claim was rational and warranted – though of course suppression and punishment were not. But the evidence has been gathered. Someone who denied the claim now would not deserve the title "skeptic": such a person would be a crank or a crackpot or a denialist (don't ask me what the difference is!).

We have, in our society, evolution denialists, Holocaust denialists, climate change denialists, and denialists of many other important claims for which we have the evidence, however extraordinary the claims might have been when first made, against the background of what it was then rational and reasonable to believe. That is a distinction that our children need to be taught, just as they need to know how hard won our current, evidentially informed, picture of the world actually was. I don't believe these things are well understood, even by most adults.

Let's do more about that.

Thank you, friends and colleagues. And thank you, JREF!Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-24761391.post-38814971691280685992015-06-07T21:01:00.001+10:002015-06-07T22:28:20.744+10:00Charity to those we opposeThis piece was first published at Talking Philosophy back in October 2014. I think it's still about right, and worth preserving on a site that I control, so I'm republishing it here...

I have a couple of old blog posts, one from mid-2008 and the other from early 2010 in which I am highly critical of Australian journalist Guy Rundle. In both cases, particularly the second, I'm quite snarky about Rundle – but I'm not going to apologise about either. Neither goes beyond my rather loose standards of civility; the criticisms are of substance in each case; and there is no realistic possibility that even a large number of posts of this level of aggression would tend to intimidate Rundle, someone with considerable cultural influence and easy access to very large platforms. By all means, make up your own mind about that. As for me… these days, my language might or might not be slightly more temperate, but I'm still fairly comfortable, even five or six years later, with the two posts as they stand.

So far, so good. Nonetheless, these posts were on subjects that I felt passionately about. In the first case, it was about the heated public debate in Australia during 2008 on the art of Bill Henson (a celebrated Australian and international photographer who'd been accused of, in effect, creating and exhibiting child pornography); in the second case, it related to the debates, throughout the relevant period, about the "New Atheism", during which "New Atheists" such as Richard Dawkins received a great deal of hostile criticism, including from other atheists who wished to take a softer approach to religion. I somewhat angrily defended Henson in one post and the New Atheist crew in the other. Again, you can make up your own mind about the cogency or otherwise of my defence, though (again) it was of substance on both occasions.

Still so good. But I've been very aware of late of how easily we (or some of us) find ourselves reaching for vitriolic and potentially silencing language when confronted by people who disagree with us on issues that we feel passionately about. When someone made a comment on Twitter yesterday, recommending Guy Rundle's new book, I immediately found myself replying with a pair of vitriolic tweets about Rundle which I've since deleted. Having made them, I found myself going into a mode of rationalising it in my mind. When I woke up this morning I realised this was nonsense and that I've held a somewhat irrational grudge against Rundle based on nothing more than disagreement on a couple of things (again, things that I felt passionately about) a few years ago. That's just silly and unfair.

It's no use saying that my original remarks in 2008 and 2010, linked to in the tweets, were substantive. The fact is that it's easy to judge someone in an unfair and sweeping way based only on a couple of disagreements in the past. I'd fallen into exactly that trap.

I deleted my remarks on Twitter, made a couple of tweets explaining why I'd done so, and apologised privately to the person whose original tweet I'd reacted to (who was cool with it). There's no use in apologising to Rundle himself – i.e. there was no real prospect that he'd been harmed or seen the offending tweets.

I could pat myself on the back for reacting fairly quickly and well in this case, but still… I didn't meet my own standards in the first place. I regret that. More importantly, the incident underscores that I, like many others, can be tempted to unfairness and a lack of charity toward other individuals provided only that they have, perhaps on more than one occasion, taken what I see as the "wrong" approach to an issue that engages my passions. If I can do this so easily, while already being aware of the problem, it's no wonder that I see so much of this sort of thing happen in social-media interactions. Well-meaning, decent people can quickly find themselves demonised, portrayed as morally corrupt, etc., over good-faith differences of view. Even if the latter seem (as Rundle's did to me) to be ill-informed and simplistic, they may turn out to have an element of truth, and even if that's not so they probably at least are the views of someone trying to sort through an issue in good faith.

In Rundle's case, he especially bothered me back in 2008 and 2010 because he was attacking targets who were already under serious public attack (especially in the case of Henson) and put arguments that had already been used, and in my mind refuted, many times (especially so in the case of the New Atheists). But there's another factor here. Rundle is a very well-known journalist in Australia. As mentioned above, he has access to large platforms and carries considerable influence. He's a major left-wing public intellectual in his own country. It can seem fine to make unfair and vitriolic attacks on such a person on the basis that it's "punching up".

This business of "punching up" and "punching down" merits more thought. First, Rundle really would be far better placed to do significant harm to my reputation than I am to harm his. He has much bigger platforms and many allies who also have bigger platforms. (For whatever it's worth, he also doubtless has enemies who are much more of a concern than I am.) There is definitely something in the idea that two antagonists in public debate can be greatly out of balance in power. In such cases, vitriol is far more damaging and potentially silencing when resorted to by the person with (considerably) more power. Indeed, people with large platforms should, arguably, be very reticent in what they say about relatively powerless individuals.

Still, I noticed one person toward whom I feel nothing but good will announcing a break from Twitter a few days ago, having endured too much abuse from others who disagreed with certain of her views on feminism. What she found especially hurtful was the large amount of abuse she'd received from other feminist women, as opposed to whatever she'd received (and been braced for) from anti-feminist men. As was noted in the brief Twitter discussion around her departure, some of those women may have thought that they were "punching up" at her… but what feels like punching up to the person doing the "punching" may feel very different to the person being "punched", especially if it's from more than one source and it's continuing. That can soon become exhausting and can be silencing.

There's no exciting moral to all this. I don't intend to turn into the civility police, and I don't suggest that we all walk on eggshells even when criticising very powerful individuals, institutions, ideologies, and ideological tendencies. That said, it's well to remember that even seemingly powerful opponents can be psychologically hurt and reputationally harmed. Furthermore, it does nothing to advance the search for truth and wisdom when we interpret opponents uncharitably or draw unfair, sweeping inferences about their intellectual ability and moral character, perhaps based on no more than a couple of disagreements. Indeed, many opponents may turn out to be correct; even the ones who don't may have something cogent and useful to say if they are allowed to discuss the merits of the issue rather than being subjected to tactics that silence their contributions.

To rally supporters and succeed in their struggles, political organisers may well need to pretend that their opponents are 100 per cent wrong. Yet, as Saul Alinsky notes in his celebrated (or notorious) Rules for Radicals, the opponent in a particular situation may actually, on an objective assessment, be more like 40 per cent right. But that message, alas, never rallied anyone. At the same time, Alinsky tells us, the organiser should be able to see things from both viewpoints once a dispute reaches the final negotiation phase. Here, tactical trade-offs can be made, which requires a more objective understanding of all the underlying interests and merits.

While those might be good rules for political radicals trying to achieve victories against slum lords, business corporations, or oppressive governments, it would take a rather extreme situation before philosophers ought to start thinking in that way. In normal circumstances, there's much to be said for searching out that 40 per cent, or even 4 per cent, of truth in an opponent's position if we want to make intellectual progress – and that includes trying to see the opponent fairly as a person. (If the opponent actually turns out to have 60 per cent of the truth, or perhaps more than that, even better.)
Again, I'm not the civility police. But rules for philosophers should involve attempts to be charitable and fair. This is a word to the wise… or in my case the not-always wise.Russell Blackfordhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com


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Virtual Printer Driver 10
The Virtual Printer driver for developers can be used with any application.Company: Two Pilots
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Category: Development::Active X
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Uninstall Manager ActiveX 3.6.8 - This ActiveX allows to remove unwanted programs from your system.
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Vickie Guerrero later made the match official via Tout.
- Also on the pre-show, The Miz asked Vickie Guerrero to book him in a pay-per-view match against Bray Wyatt. Vickie said Miz wasn't cleared to wrestle so she couldn't. Miz promised her there would be a fight instead. A segment between The Miz and Bray was planned as of last week.
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Finn Balor Hits Head On Ceiling During Match, Bayley Teases Raw Appearance, Neville - Xavier Woods
Jim Ross Talks About Hall Of Fame Selections, Reality Shows Exposing Wrestling, William Regal, More
Daniel Bryan On Fans Being Able To Change WWE's Plans, Brie's Match After Undertaker's Streak Ended
Dana White Says Ronda Rousey Vs. Cyborg Would Do 2.5 Million Buys, Cyborg On Rousey's Steroid Remark
Roddy Piper's Past Prophetic Comments About His Mortality, Piper "Bloodstained Memoirs" Scene, More
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WWE Officials Reportedly Want Tough Enough Competitor To Be Eliminated Next Tuesday
WWE Star Takes Homeless Couple To Restaurant, Returns With Big Group Due To "Distant" Manager
Update On New Gimmicks For Several WWE Talents


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Relevant offers
An Aussie furball with a devilish reputation is spinning up a storm at Auckland Zoo.
Four mischievous Tasmanian devils made their first appearance over Easter, but their arrival was due to tragic circumstances.
A rare contagious cancer has wiped out the Tasmanian devil's population by 80 per cent in Australia.
Auckland Zoo mammal collection development manager Bruce Murdock said the species was critically endangered because of the facial cancer.
"It's not the cancer that kills them, it's the tumours that enlarge and cause issues with eating and breathing normally. They end up dying within three or four months."
In the worst case scenario - where all the wild devils succumb to cancer - a captive population of more than 500 could be released into safe zones, he said.
Auckland Zoo is one of three New Zealand wildlife parks to home the devils as part of a conservation programme.
The zoo has thee male and one female Tasmanian devils.
But don't expect the devils to act like their famous cartoon cousin.
"They don't stand on their feet and spin around in the enclosure."
However, their screeches and screams were quite unique, he said.
Visitors to the zoo would find the devils most active in the morning and evenings, while devils prefer to sun themselves during the day.
There were no plans to breed the devils. Murdock said the first goal was to get them settled in to their new enclosure.
Pregnant female devils have more than 20 babies, called joeys or imps, but only the fittest four survive.
That is because the mother devil has only four teats for feeding.
Auckland Zoo hopes to raise awareness of the devil's plight through the new exhibit.
Fun Tasmanian devil facts
• They are the largest carnivorous marsupials in the world
• They are very smart, cheeky, social and mischievous
• They sneeze right before fighting
• Early Australian settlers thought their scream sounded like "devils" in the night
• When excited or distressed, blood flows to the ears, turning them bright red
- Fairfax Media
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Discussion Forum
Where does the term one-off come from? Among British foundry workers in the 1950s, the number of units produced from a given mold was designated with the word off. So if twenty widgets came off the line, you'd call that batch a twenty-off. A one-off, in turn, refers to a one-of-a-kind object, such as a prototype model. And although Kingsley Amis once called the term an American abomination, make no mistake: We have the UK to thank for one-off. This is part of a complete episode.
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Viral film takes novel approach
A film that takes an unusual approach to communicating a road safety message to young people was launched last week on YouTube.
The film, which is aimed at young drivers and their passengers, has no script, no professional actors, no crashed cars, and no bloodied crash victims.
Instead it features an ordinary young couple, who filmed the majority of the footage themselves using mobile phones.
The film has been made as part of the annual 'For my girlfriend' (FMG) campaign, which asks young men to take care of their female passengers. More girls aged 17-19 years die as passengers than as drivers, and the reverse is true of young men of the same age.
The film does not apportion blame, or even explain what may or may not have happened.
It simply reminds young people of the potentially tragic consequences when things go wrong on the road.
Jo Lazar, FMG campaign organiser, says: "There's no point in preaching to young people about road safety, or telling them what they should or should not do – they won't take any notice.
"Our film leaves it to them to decide what may or may not have happened, and simply reminds them of the potentially terrible consequences if things go wrong.
"The film has been created on a modest budget – it cost around £6,500 to make - and by publishing it on Youtube we hope to get it seen by as many young people as possible.
"We will also get feedback direct from viewers as to what they think of the film."
To see the film go to www.fmg.org.uk
For further information contact Jo Lazar on 01379 650112.
UN Global Road Safety Week 2015
4-10 May 2015: resources produced here in the UK
Practitioner database... Child resources for download FOC... Resources for educators FOC... Discussion forums... Overview...
PREVIOUS SURVEYSIs the current focus on cycling having an adverse effect on the safety needs of other vulnerable road users? YES: 72% | NO: 22% | Not sure: 6% (Total responses: 337) Should the new Government introduce a graduated licensing (GDL) scheme for newly qualified drivers? YES: 86% | NO: 12% | Not sure: 2% (Total responses: 157) Should helmets be compulsory for all cyclists? YES: 38% | NO: 61% | Not sure: 1% (Total responses: 314)
'Give everyone cycle space'
This Cycling Scotland campaign asks drivers to give cyclists, especially children and young people, sufficient space when overtaking.
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16 Nov, 2012 by Steven Crowder
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Father Hands Out Haymakers to Teenage Girl Punks for Attacking His Daughter [Video]Jun 29, 2015 | By Terresa Monroe-Hamilton
This dad punches the crap out of two girls attacking his daughter. Tell me you wouldn't do the same if a pack of thugs were beating on your child. I...Read More
Steven Crowder
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RBC predicts stronger Canadian economy ahead but weaker loonie
The Royal Bank is predicting relatively strong economic growth for Canada this year and next, although it says the loonie is about to fall even further.
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OTTAWA—The Royal Bank is predicting relatively strong economic growth for Canada this year and next, although it says the loonie is about to fall even further.
The big bank says in a new forecast that economic growth should hit 2.5 per cent this year, despite a stuttering start to 2014 caused by the winter deep freeze, with growth picking up to 2.7 per cent in 2015.
That's slightly stronger than the Bank of Canada's call for 2.5 per cent growth in both years and above many other private sector forecasts, which predict an even softer 2014.
As for the currency, RBC says the loonie hasn't ended its descent and expects it will trade at about 87 cents (U.S.) by the end of this year and dip to 85 cents by the end of 2015.
RBC chief economist Craig Wright says he believes Canadian exporters will begin benefiting from a stronger U.S. economy this year and get an added boost from the weaker loonie.
A weak currency makes Canadian exports less expensive in foreign markets and imports more costly to Canadians.
The loonie closed at 89.79 cents (U.S.) on Tuesday and was down about four-tenths of a cent in early trading Wednesday.
According to the Bank of Canada, the dollar's low so far this year was 89.09 cents US, in late January. The loonie last closed above parity with the greenback in early February 2013.
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The young vibrant artist, Nwaozo Obiajulu popularly known as MC Loph, who stormed the entertainment industry with a remix of popular highlife hit track, Osondi-Owendi,originally recorded by Osita Osadebe, is dead.
He died ,Wednesday, from injuries sustained in a fatal motor accident along the Benin-Ore road.
Vanguard gathered he was going for his traditional wedding in the eastern part of the country.
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The Panthers have implemented a team breakfast policy
Dec 13, 2013, 2:37 PM EDT
New Florida Panthers owner Vinnie Viola sat down with the Sun-Sentinel this week for a wide-ranging Q&A about a variety of topics, including the most important meal of the day.
How do you feel new coach Peter Horachek has done so far?
It's a process. We're doing things now that I think are going to sow the seeds of cohesion and camaraderie to create this culture of excellence. On practice days, the team has breakfast together now. I think that's important for guys to get to know each other outside of the confines of the ice and outside the confines of the normal to and fro of a hockey life.
It's worth noting that, under Horachek, the Panthers haven't been that bad. They're 7-8-1 through 16 games — a .469 winning percentage — which is significantly better than the 3-9-4 mark the club posted in the same amount of games under Kevin Dineen (a .313 winning percentage).
What's more, the club is playing some of the best hockey at the moment, possibly due to the collective sharing of Eggs Benedict. The Panthers have won three of their last four, including a pair of victories over the Detroit Red Wings.
Viola says the season has been hectic thus far, but expects more positive results as things progress.
"We have been learning an awful lot," he explained. "It's kind of like drinking out of a fire hose.
"We're more committed now to the principles that we believe in that produce long-term excellence in organizations. The team is, I think, starting to understand that everyone must work and everyone has to be absolutely committed to excellence. We're not going to tolerate anything but 100 percent dedication to the culture of the team first."
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