Still more on the death penalty, the Faith, and Justice Scalia

Last updated on: August 23, 2007 at 8:07 pm By rgarnett

For starters, and for what it’s worth, I also — like Alexham and Michael Joseph — oppose capital punishment. (That said, and like Alexham and Justice Scalia, I believe that the Constitution permits, though it constrains the application of, the death penalty.) And, as it happens, I was at the excellent, provocative conference (and presented this paper) at which Justice Scalia presented his essay, to which Alexham linked, indicating his disagreement with what he takes to be the position set... Read more

Justice Scalia on the Death Penalty

Last updated on: August 23, 2007 at 7:22 pm By alexham

Given the amount of comments generated by Michael J.’s recent post on the death penalty, I thought my co-bloggers and our readers might be interested in reading this article by Justice Anontin Scalia, entitled “God’s Justice and Ours.” Here’s the relevant excerpt: It will come as no surprise from what I have said that I do not agree with the encyclical Evangelium Vitae and the new Catholic catechism (or the very latest version of the new Catholic catechism), according to... Read more

Perhaps they should change their name to the Jacksonville Proaborts

Last updated on: August 23, 2007 at 6:03 pm By alexham

Disgusting. I hope and pray the Jacksonville Jaguars lose every game this season. Read more

Utilitarianism in Health Care

Last updated on: August 23, 2007 at 3:07 pm By Morning's Minion

The newest addition to the Atlantic’s impressive list of bloggers, Megan McArdle, an economist with strong libertarian leanings, does not approve of single payer health care systems. She makes on her argument on what she considers social justice grounds. Here is what she says: (more…) Read more

An Unnecessary Execution Leads to a Milestone

Last updated on: August 23, 2007 at 5:05 am By Policraticus

The State of Texas, in which I currently reside, has legally executed its 400th human person since it resumed use of the death penalty in 1982. As a Catholic, I find it extraordinarily distressing that 38 states in the U.S. administer the death penalty to some persons convicted of grave and heinous crimes. Texas has executed more than four times the number of convicted persons than any other state, and currently has 392 people on death row. Three are scheduled... Read more

What Causes Suicide Terrorism?

Last updated on: August 22, 2007 at 8:25 pm By Morning's Minion

When it comes to trying to explain why somebody would sacrifice their own life to kill their fellow human beings, we are presented with a bevy of possible reasons, ranging from economic deprivation to a ideology underpinned by blood lust. But Robert Pape, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, points the finger at something else: the occupation of a group’s territory. Building the first complete database on suicide terrorism since 1980, Pape studied examples from Lebanon, Sri... Read more

Descartes in the 21st Century

Last updated on: August 22, 2007 at 5:44 pm By voxnovablog

A little bit of fun… Michael Joseph has been working on an article about Descartes this summer, so as you can imagine I have heard quite a bit about this philosopher in the past few months. I saw this picture and I couldn’t resist to share it with all of you. It seems that Descartes’ cogito ergo sum has taken a new turn! (more…) Read more

Christian Persuasion

Last updated on: August 22, 2007 at 2:10 am By jonathanjonesuiwdpt

One of the greatest Saints of the Church, St. Augustine, was also a renowed teacher of persuasion. In Book IV of De Doctrina Christiana (On Christian Doctrine) he labels rhetoric as the “verbal expression of thought.” Moral judgments are awkward and difficult in a culture losing its confidence in certainty and wisdom, in St. Augustine’s time and in ours. Good rhetoric has as its root the actual. Included would be ethics, values, and a sermonic language that persuades by drawing... Read more

Abortion and Consequentualist Modes of Thinking

Last updated on: August 21, 2007 at 6:15 pm By Morning's Minion

Remember the argument that made Steve Levitt (“Freakomonics“) famous? Using a rigorously methodology, he held that legalized abortion in the 1970s explains a substantial part of the crime decline in the 1990s. People were outraged, with “conservatives” like Steve Sailor calling it “morally repugnant”. Let me first point out that I have no dog in this race. Having read the various exchanges a while back, Levitt seems to have the edge, but it is not a question that interests me... Read more

Thank you, and a question.

Last updated on: August 21, 2007 at 5:11 pm By rgarnett

Thanks very much to Michael, and to the others who commented on his post, for the warm welcome to Vox Nova. As I’ve said more than a few times over at Mirror of Justice — my blogging home — I think the conversation at Vox Nova is engaging and enlightening, and the blog a real success. Here’s hoping I am able, from time to time, to come up with worthy contributions. Here’s a question I’d like to pose — that... Read more