ARTICLES:
In Praise of Passivity
Issue: 1:2 (The second issue)
Political actors, including voters, activists, and leaders, are often ignorant of basic facts relevant to policy choices. Even experts have little understanding of the working of society and little ability to predict future outcomes. Only the most simple and uncontroversial political claims can be counted on.
Issue: ()
Reply to Walter Block on Ethical Vegetarianism
Issue: 10:1 (the thirty seventh issue)
I address Walter Block’s recent criticisms of my book, Dialogues on Ethical
Vegetarianism. Methodologically, Block relies too much on appeals to
contentious and extreme assumptions. Substantively, most of his objections are
irrelevant to the central issue of the book. Those that are relevant turn on false
assumptions or lead to absurd consequences. In the end, Block’s claim to
oppose suffering cannot be reconciled with his indifference to a practice that
probably causes, every few years, more suffering than all the suffering in
human history.