I strongly recommend Glenn Greenwald on Hitchens’ death, both for what it says about Hitchens specifically and an important general point: We are all taught that it is impolite to speak ill of the dead, particularly in the immediate aftermath of someone’s death. For a private person, in a private setting, that makes perfect sense. [...]
Monthly Archives: December 2011
Soundness is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition being a good argument
Posted by Chris Hallquist on December 15, 2011
11 comments
I had been meaning to write something about this, but I decided to bump it up my to-do list after seeing this comment from Ashtad: If you aren’t denying its validity (and by your apparent admission in the comment I replied to above, you aren’t), then you’re admitting that it is, at least, “halfway good” [...]
It gets better, but sometimes it gets worse first
Posted by Chris Hallquist on December 12, 2011
1 comment
For several years now, I’ve been wondering if the United States could one day transform into, well, a totalitarian hellhole. But when I’ve had such thoughts, I usually tell myself, “It’s unlikely. When you look at history, the general trend is towards things getting better. That includes governments becoming more free. In the history of [...]