Almost no pundit, politician or purveyor of good causes can today make their case without extolling its benefits for ‘the community’ or miscellaneous ‘communities’. The importance of community has become a touchstone of contemporary thinking, on both the political left and the right. It might be thought that what socialists and conservatives mean by community… Continue reading What actually is ‘Community’?
Author: Don Trubshaw
Don Trubshaw is a co-founder of the website Societal Values. He has a PhD in the philosophy and sociology of education and teaches in Higher Education.
Dilemmas regarding the justice of claims for national independence
As most of the world knows – although there are surely corners where the news has not permeated or imposed its importance on the local consciousness – the United Kingdom is undergoing a protracted political crisis in its attempt the leave the European Union. Views on the meaning of this differ, to put it mildly;… Continue reading Dilemmas regarding the justice of claims for national independence
An assessment of the status of climate change modelling as a scientific paradigm (part 2)
The latest news that the Antarctic has undergone rapid melting in the period 2014-2017 (Vaughan, 2019), undoing 35 years of gradual growth, one of the touchstones of climate change sceptics, effectively demolishes the argument that global warming is not real. Nevertheless, the pressure by activists for radical and immediate restructuring of the economy is potentially… Continue reading An assessment of the status of climate change modelling as a scientific paradigm (part 2)
Climate change as a scientific paradigm (part 1)
These past two weeks have seen an escalation in ecological activism with protesters taking control of the arteries of major cities in the UK, bringing traffic to a standstill, in order to force radical action on the government regarding climate control. While I feel encouraged by young people taking action over an issue they are… Continue reading Climate change as a scientific paradigm (part 1)
Beauty: more than the eye of the beholder (part 2)
Changes in the apperception of the beautiful across historical time and the very individuality of the experience of beauty, have led to a false doctrine of the relativity of beauty and the negation of the idea that there is anything essential, constant or communicable regarding beauty. In fact, the history of the development of knowledge… Continue reading Beauty: more than the eye of the beholder (part 2)
The Soul of the World: Teilhard de Chardin’s Evolutionary Pantheism and its Challenge to Secular Humanism
Despite the obvious attractions of secular humanism, particularly in freeing individuals from conformity to religious doctrines unsupported by science, and by transcending religious particularism and exclusivity by focusing on the universality of the human experience, there are several problems with it. One is, at a fundamental philosophical level, there is no more evidence (there might… Continue reading The Soul of the World: Teilhard de Chardin’s Evolutionary Pantheism and its Challenge to Secular Humanism
Beauty: more than the eye of the beholder (part 1)
In my estimation there is no more perverse doctrine than that which states that ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’. Not because it is not true that the experience of beauty is apprehended and appreciated at the level of individual perception, which is, in some sense, a redundant observation, but because of the… Continue reading Beauty: more than the eye of the beholder (part 1)
Book Review: Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life
London: Allen Lane, 2018; 412 pages, paper, £20 Jordan Peterson is one of a new wave of public intellectuals who have become known primarily through the medium of their presence on You Tube. Initially, he used the medium to broadcast his lectures given at the University of Toronto. However, he became more widely known about… Continue reading Book Review: Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life
Individualism and Absolute Values: the Fundamentals of a Free Society
Since antiquity, and particularly after Plato, philosophers have pondered on the question of the absolute values, of truth, beauty and goodness. Now, just as then, there have been advocates of their status as real, as well as sceptics. The twentieth century was mostly a sceptical period, although I predict a revival of interest presently, given… Continue reading Individualism and Absolute Values: the Fundamentals of a Free Society
The value of the self: three views on privacy in the digital age (part 2)
“All that is solid melts into air” (Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto) The most fundamental revolution and radical transformation of human nature and society may already be under way. The last vestiges of organic society are being eroded from human experience as we move towards becoming a totally virtual society. The organic ties that… Continue reading The value of the self: three views on privacy in the digital age (part 2)