Ethics

“Trial by Internet” and the Presumption of Innocence

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Professional Academy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Women and Gender Issues 0 Comments

Only a couple of weeks ago, I noted on this blog (in “Philosophy’s Gatekeepers”) that it had been 190 days since the last major breaking-news story about sexual harassment or assault in professional Philosophy. That was a noteworthy fact, And then, last Friday, the Thomas Pogge story broke. I’ll just direct readers to the news coverage…

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Adulting

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Pop Culture/Film/Literature, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive 0 Comments

As a general rule, I’m not a fan of the contemporary obsession with gerunding (#seewhatIdidthere), i.e., turning words that were perfectly fine being nouns, perfectly fine accepting the assistance of helping verbs to make sense of some phenomenon, into stand-alone verbs themselves. My allergy to this practice is, for the most part, a consequence of countless, maddening…

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Anonymity

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Codifying Civility and Collegiality, Digital Humanities, Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Pop Culture/Film/Literature, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive 0 Comments

What difference does a signature make? I’ll assume that the phenomenon of trolling is one familiar to most of us on the interwebs, a phenomenon that is, in turns, infuriating, exasperating, unpleasant, and often genuinely hostile and threatening. There’s much to abhor about trolls– their pettiness and vitriol, their disregard for basic conversational decorum, their…

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Torture

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Democracy, Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Torture 0 Comments

Several years ago, a friend and colleague of mine invited me to come speak to his class about torture. The class was a writing seminar organized around the theme of “citizenship” and my colleague was feeling (understandably) frustrated because, in his words, he “just didn’t feel like [he] had the tools or the knowledge to…

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Handy Guide to Tone-Policing

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Codifying Civility and Collegiality, Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive 0 Comments

I won’t even bother with summarizing or linking to the most recent debacle in the Philosophy blogosphere.  Instead, I’ll just note that, commensurate with the rest of the nation, the discipline of Philosophy has a real problem determining between when one ought and ought not “tone-police.” I’ve said my peace (here) before about tone-policing and/or…

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Temptation

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Ethics, Philosophy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, The Search for Values 0 Comments

Today is Ash Wednesday, which marks the first day of Lent on the Western Christian calendar. Many observant Christians fast or practice some other manner of self-denial for the duration of the Lenten season, commemorating Jesus’ forty days in the desert where (as recounted in the canonical Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke) he was…

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Merit

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Democracy, Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Public Philosophy, Race and Racism, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching, Women and Gender Issues 0 Comments

The first text I assign in my social and political philosophy course is a short story by Jorge Luis Borges entitled “The Lottery in Babylon.” In it, Borges’ narrator tells the story of his former home, Babylon, where (over the course of many years) a lottery evolves from being a voluntary game of chance into a mandatory…

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Mortality

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Democracy, Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive 0 Comments

I am fairly certain that I watched a man die in the street in Memphis last Saturday night. [TW: disturbing content follows] I say that I’m “fairly certain” because, the truth is, I still do not know for sure.  In the past several days, I’ve recounted the events of that night to a few friends,…

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Risk

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Democracy, Digital Humanities, Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Public Philosophy, Race and Racism, RMWMTMBM Archive, Women and Gender Issues 0 Comments

In the January edition of the New Yorker, there was a story (“The Hit List”) about the so-called “Islamist war” on secular bloggers in Bagladesh.  It begins with the murder of blogger Avijit Roy: atheist, rationalist and advocate of scientific understanding.  (Roy: “The vaccine against religion is to build up a scientific approach.”) It is a…

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Utility

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Democracy, Ethics, J.S. Mill, Philosophy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching 0 Comments

Roughly 90% of the courses I teach are in moral and political philosophy, which means I am regularly given cause to lecture on utilitarianism. In my experience, almost all students arrive in the classroom as what I call “default utilitarians.” I say “default” because I think, in most cases, their’s is not so much a…

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