Suggested readings, 21st March 2021

Here are some interesting articles I've read over the past week I think are worth checking out.

David Spiegelhalter, “There's no proof the Oxford vaccine causes blood clots. So why are people worried?” 15 Mar, The Guardian.

"Some anxiety about a new vaccine is understandable, and any suspected reactions should be investigated. But in the current circumstances we need to think slow as well as fast, and resist drawing causal links between events where none may exist."

Bryan Schonfeld and Sam Winter-Levy, “Faster vaccine trials could save lives without sacrificing ethics.” 18 Mar, Boston Globe.

"Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, public health experts have debated whether to allow challenge trials to go forward. The benefits could be substantial: Though vaccines developed through conventional trials have already been approved, challenge trials could accelerate the development of more effective treatments and second-generation vaccines, potentially saving lives -- especially with new variants appearing all the time."

Tom Chivers, “Five rules for fact-checking shakey statistics in the news.” 19 Mar, WIRED.

"I want to help readers understand the numbers in the media a bit better: to talk about common ways in which they go wrong, and how to spot them. Here are five of the most important."

Andrew Solomon, “How Polyamorists and Polygamists Are Challenging Family Norms.” 15 Mar, New Yorker.

Polygamy and polyamory, despite their sociological distinctions, share many features.

John Phipps, “Why In Our Time remains the best thing on radio.” 20 Mar, The Spectator.

"In Our Time is the best thing on Radio 4, possibly the best thing on the radio full stop. It is broadcast regularly from a parallel universe where everyone is interesting, everything is worth knowing and anyone can know it if they want to. It gets the best out of its medium by being somewhat contemptuous of it. It understands that the overproduced trimmings of modern radio are entirely extraneous. There will be no sound effects, no music and no catchphrases."

Michael Huemer, “Why Humans Fight.” 20 Mar, Fake Nous.

Why do humans go to war? Philosopher Michael Huemer considers a number of possibilities.

Comments

Should We Use Neuroenhancement Drugs to Improve Relationships?

A version of this article was printed in Humanism Ireland , July-August, Vol. 147 (2014) L ove, it is fair to say, is probably the strongest emotion we can experience. It can come in many different forms: love of one’s parent, sibling, or child. Though most people consider romantic relationships—which include companionship, sexual passion, intimacy, warmth, procreation and child-rearing—as the most significant component of one’s life; and it is probably the thing we find discussed more than anything else in novels, films and music. Committed romantic relationships tend to occur within the institution of marriage—something that is ubiquitous to most, if not all, cultures. Indeed, relationships today, which are primarily love-driven, are not just confined to marriages, as many couples sustain relationships outside of wedlock. Being in a love-driven relationship is considered important for most people, as it contributes to happiness—something we a...

Is Adult Incest Wrong?

An version of this article was printed in Humanism Ireland , March-April, Vol. 151 (2015) Incest is something most people find morally objectionable and it's one of the most common of all cultural taboos. The British Medical Association’s Complete Family Health Encyclopaedia (1990) defines incest as “ intercourse between close relatives,” that usually includes “intercourse with a parent, a son or daughter, a brother or sister, an uncle or aunt, a nephew or niece, a grandparent or grandchild.” The Oxford English Dictionary ’s definition is a little broader: it doesn’t confine incest to just intercourse, but to “sexual relations between people classified as being too closely related to marry each other.” Most countries have some kind of law against incest—though consensual adult incest is not a crime in France, Spain, Russia the Netherlands, and a host of countries in South America. In England and Wales, however, t he Sexual Offences Act 2003 ...

A Critique of Abortion and Infanticide

Not many ethical issues are as vigorously fought over as abortion these days. Unsurprisingly, the standpoint of the different sides—put simply, those who are in favour of abortion and those that are against it—have not achieved much in shifting the beliefs of their opponents. Abortion was illegal in almost all western states until the late 1960s; in 1967 Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales) changed its laws to permit abortion on broad social grounds. In the Row v Wade 1973 case, the United States Supreme Court held that women have a constitutional right to abortion in the first six months of pregnancy. Many other western nations like France and Italy have subsequently liberated their abortion laws. Ireland and Northern Ireland, however, have held out in opposition to this movement. Abortion in Ireland remains illegal under the 1861 Offences against the Person Act and in 1983 an amendment to Ireland's constitution states that an embryo, from the p...

Nothing as It Seems

Search This Blog