Been a bum lately...

I've been a total bum - no climbing for a week now. Have not been inspired to do much but read...

So - I picked up this book - "What philosophers think" - interviews with 22 modern Philosophers.

I really liked the ideas presented in the first four interviews.

Peter Singer - a bit of an animal rights advocate - evokes the moral question of at what point does the life of an animal become more important than that of a human being (today?). No really - if you had 50,000$ - would you buy land for endangered tortoises or allow a child on cancer treatment to live an additional 3 months? Very good question.

Janet Radcliff Richards takes a fresh look at feminism. One of her observations is her belief that suffering is intrinsically bad. Ok - so to me this reminds me of the Dalai's words - the purpose of life is to be happy. May be a stretch. But think about it. I think that suffering is quite pointless. There are those who believe in prolonged suffering to benefit others. I am not talking Mother Teresa here - and in any case, I don't think she would believe that she was suffering at all. I am talking about the 70% of the population that goes around being unhappy for one reason or the other and expects someone else to feel guilty fo them. Snap out of it.

Helena Cronin also had a brand of feminism I can buy into. I guess I was born too late to be a feminist. I am so not looking to burn my bras. Can you say Victoria's Secret? Hello! However Helena correctly points out that the point of feminism is not to act like men. Having worked in a field that tends to have more men than women, I think that I've had to deal with my fair share of expectations from both men and women to behave like men. No thank you. I can do my job just as well - if not better - being myself. Trying to emulate men would be like saying that they got it right - as if!

The inclusion of two Physicists did upset me however - for two entirely different reasons. Alan Sokal - Ok so he has a point - but a philosopher he is not! Also - I think he is over simplifying reletivism just a tad bit. And Russell Stannard - because he is a bible bahser! All the other philosphers are using logic to explain their ideas. Stannards explanation - "Because he feels it!". Dude - you are not a philosopher, and I doubt that you are a good physicist.

More later....