Ethics

Cornel West’s Note to Obama: “How Deep Is Your Love For Poor And Working People?”

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson 5 Comments

Just a couple of days ago, BBC News posted a video message from Princeton Professor Cornel West to President Barack Obama, on the occasion of Obama’s first anniversary in office. Unfortunately, the video itself cannot be embedded here, but if you click on West’s picture to the left, it will take you to the BBC…

The Orchid Hypothesis

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson 10 Comments

On my way back from the APA conference a week ago, I picked up a copy of The Atlantic in Laguardia to read on the plane ride home. In it, there was a fascinating article by David Dobbs called “The Science of Success,” which discusses the influence of certain genetic factors on social/psychological development. Dobbs…

Friendly Fire

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson 3 Comments

The disagreement between AnPan and I that has been taking place on our blogs (here and here) has reminded me of why I feel fortunate to have good friends like him. As it just so happens, this also is the time in the semester (at my instiution) when most of the first-years are deep into…

Right, Real, True… and Other Relative Terms

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson 2 Comments

Lest I get too comfortable with my tiny, marginally-significant place in the blogosphere, thinking that we’re all friends here and readers of this blog are basically in agreement on the stuff that really matters, all of us interacting virtually in a kind of harmonious echo-chamber of progressive philosophical wonderment… yeah, lest I get too comfortable…

#Hashtags

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Comments Off

The Uncanny Valley

June 9, 2024 Dr. J 3 Comments

[Update: This post is the first in an ongoing series about the Uncanny Valley. Click here to read them all.] A couple of weeks ago when I was teaching Descartes’ Meditations, one of my students made reference to something called the “uncanny valley,” which I had never heard of before but which sounded really fascinating….

The Uncanny Valley 2: Racial Appearances

June 9, 2024 Dr. J 5 Comments

[This is a continutation of my previous post on the uncanny valley. If you don’t know what the uncanny valley is, you may want to go back and read the previous post first.] In 1931, at the beginning of the dénouement of the Harlem Renaissance, conservative (some would say “reactionary”) African-American author George Schuyler penned…

“Heart of Stone” Music Video

June 9, 2024 Dr. J 2 Comments

You may remember my mentioning a couple of months ago on this blog (“Video Killed the Philosophy Professor“) that I had my first experience shooting a music video for one of my original songs. Well, here’s the final product. Directed by Dana Gabrion and Chris Morgan. Photography by Chris Morgan. Starring: Max Maloney, Marlinee Iverson,…

The Tie That Binds

June 9, 2024 Dr. J Comments Off

At the beginning of the 2008 film Doubt (an adaptation of John Patrick Shanley’s play by the same name), a priest challenges his congregation with an unorthodox sermon about the nature of the ties that bind us together. Father Flynn (Philip Seymour Hoffman) asks his flock: “What do you do when you’re not sure? ”…

Human, All Too Human (In Memorium: Michael Jackson)

June 9, 2024 Dr. J 2 Comments

The memorial service for Michael Jackson is being broadcast on television here in the United States today and, not surprisingly, there is mixed reaction from talking heads and the public. There is no denying that Michael Jackson will go down in history as the archetype of a “pop icon,” nor that he was an almost-unrivaled…

Cornel West’s Note to Obama: “How Deep Is Your Love For Poor And Working People?”

The Orchid Hypothesis

Friendly Fire

Right, Real, True… and Other Relative Terms

#Hashtags

The Uncanny Valley

The Uncanny Valley 2: Racial Appearances

“Heart of Stone” Music Video

The Tie That Binds

Human, All Too Human (In Memorium: Michael Jackson)

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Archives

Categories

Meta