Monthly Archives: April 2024

Monoculture and Tribalist Thinking

Posted on Tuesday 30 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Travel perspectives; Is everything a cult now? If so, the word has lost all meaning; Is religion just a tribal marker? Then why do so many Christian zealots want to impose their beliefs on others, to the point of executions? … Continue reading →

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Our Trip to Austin

Posted on Monday 29 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Notes about our trip to Austin this past weekend, to visit and begin to settle the house and estate of my old friend Larry Kramer, who died last September. We flew to Austin Thursday, from Oakland via LAX; spent all … Continue reading →

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How Rugged Individualists Cannot Solve Global Problems

Posted on Wednesday 24 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

A note about my trip tomorrow to Austin; How Mike Johnson characterizes Republicans as “rugged individualists,” yet who can still not get along to solve actual problems; How Trump’s policies would increase inflation, and his fans haven’t noticed; More about … Continue reading →

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Somber News

Posted on Tuesday 23 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

I don’t want to make this too personal, or reveal too much personal information. Just to convey a lesson. Six months ago now, I announced that an old friend of mine, Larry Kramer, who’d moved to Texas in 2006 and … Continue reading →

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Violence, Evolution, Climate Change, and Cory Doctorow’s THE LOST CAUSE

Posted on Monday 22 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

How Republicans increasingly advocate violence; How Tucker Carlson doesn’t understand evolution, and his several dumb objections to evolution; How 10 straight months of record-breaking temperatures won’t persuade the skeptics; And a passage from Cory Doctorow’s 2023 novel The Lost Cause … Continue reading →

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Third Essay of the Weekend

Posted on Sunday 21 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

An Elizabeth Kolbert essay about the debate about the term “Anthropocene”; And Neil Finn’s beautiful lullaby “Faster than Light”. * This is Elizabeth Kolbert (author of The Sixth Extinction, one of the best nonfiction books of the 21st century; review … Continue reading →

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Two Essays

Posted on Saturday 20 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Frank Bruni on how everything is complicated, and the need to be humble; A New Yorker piece about how to understand misinformation. I have at hand two or three long essays that I plan to read and comment on, as … Continue reading →

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Tribal Notes

Posted on Friday 19 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Latest examples of tribal thinking, as many of my posts over the past months and years have compiled, clarified by my reading of Joshua Greene’s book and many others. Short items about indoctrination in Florida schools (“get them while they’re … Continue reading →

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Joshua Greene, MORAL TRIBES, post 2

Posted on Thursday 18 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Concluding summary and comments about this book. Some highlights: The author focuses on a modified utilitarianism, which he calls “deep pragmatism,” to solve tribal disputes in the modern world; He observes that “rights” are claims to end disputes, in order … Continue reading →

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Joshua Greene, MORAL TRIBES, post 1

Posted on Wednesday 17 April 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Here is a substantial book about human morality that offers ideas that, to me, help to knit together the ideas of others. For chronological context, this 2013 book follows, of course, the 1997 Pinker book that I recently read (review … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Notes, Morality, progress, Science | Comments Off on Joshua Greene, MORAL TRIBES, post 1