Friday, January 31, 2014

Internet shaming in China


Cyber-bullying for both pro-social and anti-social reasons (the gentleman in the picture above insists that he was incorrectly identified as a cab driver who spat on a homeless man).

The article also discusses the new phenomenon of the internet-only celebrity, such as the iconic "milk girl" shown below:


Late Roman and early Christian attitudes towards sex


NYRB review of Kyle Harper's From Shame to Sin: The Christian Transformation of Sexual Morality in Late Antiquity.

Our robotic future: medicine edition


Numerous arguments in support of the view that doctors and nurses should be replaced by robots and computers. 

How to become wiser and more virtuous


"Regard him as one who
points out
treasure,
the wise one who
seeing your faults
rebukes you.
Stay with this sort of sage.
For the one who stays
with a sage of this sort,
things get better,
not worse."

(Dhammapada 76. Thanissaro Bhikkhu, translator.)

Brennan on the Non-Aggression Principle (NAP)

"It's an older code, but it checks out." Jason Brennan's blog post from last December critiques a common argument given in defense of libertarianism. Brennan is himself a libertarian, but regards the libertarian Non-Aggression Principle as a dialectical non-starter.