Philosophy – Plato’s Meno: What is Virtue? Where Does it Come From?

Like many of his dialogs, Plato’s Meno starts out with a simple question. But Socrates always needs to make things complicated, and so we end up with discussions that have echoes into modern science. Meno asks Socrates whether or not virtue is something that people learn, or if it comes by nature or from somewhere …

What to do now – a post on voting.

If you are upset over the overturning of Roe V. Wade, the response to gun violence, the January 6 insurrection, or any other political thing, then this post is for you. But first, this is for people who want to do something. If you are coming to argue the effectiveness of voting, the morality of …

History — Question Your Oracles: Herodotus, Putin, and the War in the Ukraine

The more history I read, the more it seems like it should be at the heart of people’s education. At least that way we won’t keep making the same mistakes. After reading Herodotus and then following what is happening in the Ukraine, I couldn’t help but feel like there was a parallel. One of the …

Modern Works – Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

Since I consider myself a generalist, I expected to like this book even before I picked it up. I have always felt like I needed to know about a lot of things, mostly because it seemed like you could never know what life was going to throw your way. Back in 1991, in a column …

Literature – Antigone Shows Us the Greek Chorus Was Social Media for Ancient Times

In Antigone, tragedy is used to explore big questions about to whom we owe a duty, who will tell us the truth, and what are the limits of power. The play picks up the story of the family of Oedipus. Now Creon is the king, and there has been an attack on the city. The …

Literature – What did Oedipus really do?

Our next reading is one we think we understand: Oedipus the King, by Sophocles.  We all know the story: Oedipus is a guy who was led by circumstances, or the fates, to murder his father and marry is mother. This interpretation of the play has rippled through history, giving us Freud’s “Oedipus complex” where a …

Modern Works – Why Head Transplants Require the Humanities – Mr. Humble & Dr. Butcher

What would happen if your head were transplanted onto a different body? Would you still be you? If we could transplant a head onto a different body, but that body could also be used to supply organs to other people who needed it – who should get the unused body? And how do we know …

A Pause on the Harvard Classics

This blog was originally started to talk about great books with other readers, while I worked my way through the Britannica Great books Reading List. In 2021, I tried to add the Harvard Classics daily reading this blog. I am putting the Harvard Classics on Pause for now. While I have really enjoyed the readings, …

Literature — A Tragedy on Trial, Basic Reproduction, and Ancient Greek Wrestling

We are back to the Britannica list for this post. Returning to Aeschylus, we have reached the end of Aeschylus’s Oresteia. Here we see the end of a series of murders which launched and capped a bloody war that destroyed the city of Troy. In the first play, Agamemnon was murdered by Clytaemnestra as revenge …

Harvard Classics – Bacon on Judges and the Supreme Court Debate

Anyone following this blog knows that I have not posted every day with the readings, but I am trying to catch and keep up. For this post, I am going to talk about the March 7 readings by Francis Bacon. The reading is about the role of judges in society. Keep in mind that Bacon …