online archive

Ideologies, religion and sex

From The Mises Institute, an article on why government can't make decisions rationally. Who's for Big Government: One of the most predictable arguments is also one of the most useless: that politics comes down to a choice between being for "big government" or "small government". A review of A Power Governments Cannot Suppress by Howard Zinn. Form Political Affairs, Of Marx, Christ, and the Persecution of Radicals: How will humanity survive the capitalist threat? From Communalism, Janet Biehl on Theses on Social Ecology and Deep Ecology; Eirik Eiglad on Theses on Power; and an essay on Anti-Semitism in the Socialist Tradition. The right fights for the right: An Atlanta gathering features luminaries of the white nationalist movement. Cosmopolitan Si, Multicultural, No: The common culture may not be what it once was (and maybe it never was), but it is still enough to keep the conversation going. Restore truth and beauty to the Internet! Help cover Frum’s face!

From Christianity Today, a review of God's War: A New History of the Crusades by Christopher Tyerman; and yes, there are still Freemasons, including a reported 1.8 million members in the United States. And if the unconfirmed anecdotes ct editors hear regularly are to believed, Masonic cliques still wield power in several places. For the Love of Xenu: Scientology may be a bizarre faith invented by a sci-fi hack. But it's not a cult. Face to faith: Studying the Inquisition can help to distinguish between the best and worst of religion. From Skeptic, two reviews of The Physics of Christianity by Frank Tipler.

An interview with Brendan Sweetman, author of Why Politics Needs Religion: The Place of Religious Arguments in the Public Square. Cathy Young on Jerry Falwell's Paradoxical Legacy: Political victories and cultural failures. The return of Jesus "could be any time": An interview with Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins, authors of the Left Behind series. Millions believe the world's first openly gay bishop The Rt Rev V Gene Robinson is the Antichrist. Dangerous nonsense: Faith is not a form of mental fortitude, but an absurdity — which can give rise to atrocity. An interview with AC Grayling on atheism.

This is your brain on love: When you're attracted to someone, is your gray matter talking sense — or just hooked? Scientists take a rational look. Seven Deadly Sentiments: Evolutionary psychology helps us understand why we are ashamed of having forbidden thoughts that make us feel like lousy people. It tells us that these shameful feelings are hardwired—strategies that led to success on the Pleistocene savanna (and a primer). After exhaustively compiling a list of the 237 reasons why people have sex, researchers found that young men and women get intimate for mostly the same motivations (and more). Science of Sex: Scientists have now discovered that there are three separate sex drives that control the rules of the mating game.