Essays

Here are a few of my short essays on random topics. Some have been published elsewhere (e.g., as op-ed pieces), some not.

• On tastes and choices
  Some thoughts on the difference between taste and choice, and how they enter differently into moral assessment.
• Everybody speeds: Undermining the rule of law
  How the ubiquitousness of speeding undermines the rule of law by opening enforcement to complete subjectivity and capriciousness.
• With complexity, decks are stacked
  Thoughts on the 2003 shuttle disaster; risks, complexity and chaos in space exploration and ordinary life. (For Newsday)
• Is it TV that’s bad, or the study?
  Exposing errors of inference in a highly-publicized 2002 study purporting to link TV watching in childhood with later violence. (For Newsday)
• On bonds with others
  Meditation on the randomness of some of our deepest bonds with other people — especially the bonds of parenthood.
• Americans: Some “under God”, some not
  Commentary on the 9th Circuit Court’s ruling supporting striking “under God” from the pledge of allegiance as recited in public schools.
• Faith in the face of tragedy?
  On the traditional problem of natural evil as illustrated by the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean. (For The Baltimore Sun)
• Evolution and the grounds of religious belief
  On the “evolution as theory, not fact” textbook sticker controversy. (For The Albany Times-Union)