Category Archives: Culture

The Range of Human Perception

Posted on Tuesday 29 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Alternet, Chris Mooney: Why Right-Wingers Think the Way They Do: The Fascinating Psychological Origins of Political Ideology These experiments suggest that conservatives actually do live in a world that is more scary and threatening, at least as they perceive it. … Continue reading →

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American Christianity and Conservatism

Posted on Monday 28 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Andrew Sullivan strikes at Sarah Palin’s glib, despicable remark that “Waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists” — to which her audience cheered — with this post: Sarah Palin: Anti-Christian It reveals that vast swathes of American Christianity are objectively anti-Christian, … Continue reading →

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Dignity of our Lives: “I burst into tears”

Posted on Sunday 27 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

There was so much coverage of the right-wing outrage and vitriol over passing depictions of gay families in a couple TV commercials earlier this year, from Coke and then Nabisco, which I saw reported on some of the news sites … Continue reading →

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Cosmos So Far

Posted on Thursday 24 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

I should update my thoughts about the new version of the TV series Cosmos, since earlier I posted a mild critique about it needing to explain the background of scientific discovery – presenting not just the grandiose conclusions humanity has … Continue reading →

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Christian boycotts

Posted on Tuesday 22 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

From Joe.My.God, about numerous recent events. REMINDER: When major national Christian groups with millions of followers call for boycotts, that is a righteous use of the free market in order to preserve morality, marriage, family, and the American way. But … Continue reading →

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The Reality of Sexuality

Posted on Tuesday 22 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

From a few days ago, this post by Andrew Sullivan, on his blog, about a recent discovery of a particularly weird animal sexuality. The more we learn about nature, the more the notion that the universe reflects a cosmic version … Continue reading →

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Bunnies, Eggs, Spring

Posted on Sunday 20 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Everyone’s posting about Easter today, so I’ll acknowledge two or three of those posts, that capture better than I have time to do myself why I find the whole Easter tradition fascinating as a cultural development, but implausible and uninteresting … Continue reading →

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Interesting Links This Weekend

Posted on Sunday 13 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

There’s *another* great science show running [in addition to “Cosmos”], “Your Inner Fish”, based on the book by Neil Shubin, which explores the physiological resemblances among animals, from fishies to humans, that are of course one of the many lines … Continue reading →

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Mind/Brain and Mathematical Intelligence

Posted on Saturday 12 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Several interesting links today to articles I’ve not yet had a chance to read, but I’ll defer those to note this review in Entertainment Weekly of a book called Struck by Genius by Jason Padgett (and Maureen Seaberg… probably the … Continue reading →

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Diversity in Science Fiction, Two Examples

Posted on Friday 11 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

I’ve noted here and on Facebook that science fiction generally aligns with progressive values; science fiction is typically about speculating how things might be different, celebrating discoveries of what is new and celebrating conceptual breakthroughs of understanding, rather than reflexively … Continue reading →

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