Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University, has an interesting piece up about talking about religion in the classroom.  

Here's what I take to be the key passage stating the problem:

It may be the case that the most powerful force affecting the human future is demographics.  Will population continue to increase?  That seems unlikely, over the next century.  At some point all...

Inspiring, in its way. Wasn't it Mark Twain who said, "don't get it right, get it written"?

Is the "age of the expert as policymaker" coming to an end? 

In contrast, this from a...

This piece is getting some attention, which is fine.  Ray Monk is an excellent philosophical biographer, having done fine biographies of Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein.  He argues that had...

As a follow-up to my previous post about the crisis in institutions, I want to give a shout out to James Fallows, who with his wife Deborah, has been arguing for the past few years that while the...

In many ways we live in the most institutionally thick environment that humans have yet inhabited. Look inside your wallet: behold the many structures (drivers’ license, Social Security card, credit...

I'm teaching an "Engagement" class here at UVA entitled "The ethical state of the world" this semester, and one of my points is that "ethics" has now become an issue that has infiltrated parts of...

I don't know why I like certain mid-century mass-culture products, but I honestly do.  I like Fiestaware.  I like Mr. Rogers.  Someday I'll say more about Mr. Rogers in this space, though I doubt I...

If you are unclear about the theoretical background to the increasing discussion of "whiteness" in American higher education--perhaps even a little put off by it, or defensive about it (which has...

A piece about the Sumerian language that could have been interesting, but works fairly studiously to remain platitudinous.

In contrast, a pretty interesting piece on linguistic diversity, and...