Obviously, a lot of the world’s attention is currently on Iran and the political turmoil there. I don’t think that this blog is the place to make comments about the disputed presidential election – but I am reminded of a story from a couple of years ago, and it’s worth airing here. One of the […]
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I’m Glad it’s all Over
A little while ago, I mentioned Jamie Ross’ admirable Cancerous Capers blog. Well – for all the best reasons – there won’t be any more updates. His reason? Having cancer was tedious enough; but with radiotherapy over, banging on about not having it would be even more tedious. Assuming he gets the all-clear in a couple […]
Just One More Drugs Post, then I’ll Stop.
I can stop, you know. Any time. Honest. Perhaps as something of a counterbalance to the generally pro-decriminalisation stuff I’ve been posting for the past couple of months, it’s worth pointing to Alexandre Erler’s piece on the issue on the Practical Ethics blog. The tone of the post is thoughtful and more sympathetic to the […]
Anyone’d Think I was Addicted
It’s another one of those posts about drug policy, I’m aftaid: this week’s All in the Mind covered the Portuguese experiment with decriminalisation (about which I posted recently), and is available to listen for the next few days. Depressingly, one of the contributors dropped a fairly broad hint – accurately, I think – that the UK […]
Is this the Apogee of Reality TV?
Maybe it’s all those essays I’ve been marking that’ve melted my brain a bit and made me unduly receptive to the potential for puerile jokes about pregnancy porn… but I saw this on the BBC News front page last night, and it made me giggle… […]
The Telegraph has Got me Worried – or Given me an Investment Idea
A short time ago, I mentioned George Pitcher’s extraordinarily lame showing on the Today programme, when he was invited to talk about assisted suicide. I included a link to his blog – and, I admit it, this was partly intended so that he’d get an “incoming link” notification and either make a comment here, or refer […]
In this Month’s JME
I have to admit that I’m a bit suspicious of empirical work in ethics: my general instinct is to be less interested in what people actually think or do or want than in what they ought to think or do or want. But it’s also true that empirical work can confirm or cast doubt on […]
More on DNA Retention
Not so long ago, I blogged about the government’s stupid-and-scary response to the drubbing it got at the ECHR concerning the retention of genetic information gathered from arrestees. It would appear that the police have managed to make the policy even more dispiriting than it was already: they’re arresting people in order that they can […]
I’m going to break a private promise to myself.
That promise was to observe the difference between academic ethics and activism, and to eschew the latter. But please, please, please take a couple of minutes to read this article and the statement that goes with it, and then to sign the petition. This is not about putting the boot into the British Chiropractic Association. […]
Open Access
Keith Taylor Tayler (sorry!), in a reply to the Purdy post below, raises the question of why journals are so expensive and inaccessible to those who don’t have institutional access. It’s a very good question – and one that Brian Leiter’s recently been mulling, too. (UPDATE: This is a point that applies equally well to […]