Issues
Issue 40: March/April 2003
EDITORIAL
Life Begins at Forty…
by Rick Lewis
NEWS
News: March/April 2003
Computer ‘Brutus’ programmed for prose • Journalist tells cult: come clean on clone claim • American philos vote on war • Alabama governor mandates “ethics classes”
ARTICLES
Challenge My Beliefs?
Philosophy instructor Richard Reilly talks to students about questioning God.
Earth to Russell
Chad Trainer on the limits of Russell’s views on space exploration.
Forgotten Philosophers: Herbert Spencer
Tim Delaney on the survival of ‘survival of the fittest’.
Human Freewill and Divine Predestination
Antony Flew untangles some confusion about David Hume, St Thomas Aquinas and the fiery fate of the damned.
The Compleate Logician, or Miss Blackmore’s Unspeakable Sin
Mike Alder asks what is wrong with being charmingly illogical.
The Distribution of Power
Lars Elgstam argues for direct democracy and decentralization.
The Enlightenments
The famous 18th Century Enlightenment was actually different things in different places. Toni Vogel Carey on a tale of several cities.
Euthanasia Debate (I)
Tim Chappell explains “Why Euthanasia is in Nobody’s Interest”.
Euthanasia Debate (II)
Joachim Jung’s “Withdrawing from Life” challenges Tim Chappell.
Euthanasia Debate: Counterpoint (I)
Joachim Jung’s reply to Tim Chappell.
Euthanasia Debate: Counterpoint (II)
Tim Chappell’s reply to Joachim Jung.
INTERVIEWS
Richard Taylor
Richard Taylor is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Rochester and an internationally renowned ethicist. Tim Madigan tracked him down to discuss Schopenhauer, metaphysics and the intriguing art of beekeeping.
LETTERS
Letters
Scapegoating Israel • Falsifying Thoughts on Popper • You Must Be Joking • Focus on Philips • The Nun’s Priest’s Choice • A Philosopher Changed My Life, Too • Life and Death • Kant and Babies • Original Texts Pointless? • Faith and Reality • Home on Mars
COLUMNS
Dear Socrates
Having returned from the turn of the Fourth Century B.C. to the turn of the Twenty-First A.D., Socrates has eagerly signed on as a Philosophy Now columnist so that he may continue to carry out his divinely-inspired dialogic mission.
The Beauty and Utility of Logic
by Joel Marks
REVIEWS
Human Nature After Darwin by Janet Radcliffe Richards
Glenn Branch ponders Janet Radcliffe Richards’ book about the current state of Darwin’s revolution.
John Rawls: Towards a Just World Order by Patrick Hayden
The late John Rawls was a giant of political philosophy; Abdelkader Aoudjit peruses Patrick Hayden’s study of his ideas.
My Big Fat Greek Wedding
Our film columnist Thomas Wartenberg ponders the pitfalls of cross-cultural coupling as he watches this season’s romantic comedy hit My Big Fat Greek Wedding.
FICTION
“If good can’t prevail”
On “No Negotiations with Terror”. By Chengde Chen.
Justifying the Search
by Raymond Tallis
Double Edge
by Richard Taylor