How charming. The Supreme Court, as expected, reversed a lower court ruling with an unsigned decision, forcing photos of American soldiers mistreating detainees to remain under wraps.
The reasoning by the Court is fairly straightforward — the photos put soldiers in harm’s way:
In a brief, unsigned decision issued Monday without elaboration, the court cited a provision [...]
Archive for the ‘Ethics and Morals’ Category
Pics or it didn’t happen
Posted in Ethics and Morals, International Affairs, News, Obama, Politics, tagged abu ghraib photos, guantanamo bay, ignoring torture, photos, prisoner abuse, torture on December 1, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Maine and gay marriage
Posted in Ethics and Morals, News, Politics, tagged civil rights, gay marriage on November 4, 2009 | 2 Comments »
Ok, I just lied. I said I didn’t care about the elections tonight, but what I meant is that I didn’t care about the races for governor of NJ or VA, or NYC mayor, or NYC-23 Rep. But I do care about the gay marriage ballot issue in Maine. Before tonight, never before had any [...]
2nd Appeals Court to US government: torture will never have consequence
Posted in Crime, Ethics and Morals, News, tagged torture, depravity, evil, Crime, disgust, Maher Arar, John Ashcroft on November 4, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
I’m too disgusted even to write about it, so I’ll let Greenwald do it for me. Arar was an innocent Canadian with no connections to terrorism now or ever, who while traveling through the US was abducted by the US government, held without communication to anyone, and then shipped to Syria to be tortured for [...]
Why even bother with the Fourth Amendment any more?
Posted in Ethics and Morals, Media, Politics, tagged email, fourth amendment, internet, privacy, technology on November 4, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Unpersons hero Scott Horton notes another nail in the coffin for the Fourth Amendment in our permanent surveillance culture. Because of the increasing number of intermediaries between our information, we no longer have control over it or privacy with it.
From Horton:
The government sought to subpoena the emails of a suspect in a criminal investigation. It [...]
How’d that work out for Ender?
Posted in Ethics and Morals, History, Letters, Science, tagged air power, ender's game, forever peace, joe haldeman, soldiers, uav, warfare on October 22, 2009 | 1 Comment »
This preview of a new Frontline special discusses the lives of soldiers who pilot unmanned drones in Afghanistan.
This may well be a picture of the future of American warfare — pilots, thousands of miles away from their sorties, control killer robots, which deliver precision missile strikes, then go to their kids’ soccer games.
The moral ground [...]
Eulogy for the Renaissance man
Posted in Education, Ethics and Morals, History, tagged division of labor, epistemology, knowledge, monomath, polymath, specialization on October 6, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
I think Linus and I fancy ourselves polymaths or, at the very least, dabblers and dilettantes: despite my English teacher status, I could explain the laws of thermodynamics or solve a polynomial equation, whereas Linus, despite his scientific specialty, could easily expound on the various merits of The Wrens or detail the effect of the [...]
Texas Governor Rick Perry is complicit in murder
Posted in Assholes, Crime, Ethics and Morals, News, tagged capital punishment, Crime, death penalty, Justice, Rick Perry, Todd Willingham on October 1, 2009 | 1 Comment »
And he must realize it. You might recall that a few weeks ago I blogged here, here, and here about Cameron Todd Willingham, the man who was executed by Texas for a crime that never happened. He was put to death for allegedly starting a fire that killed his children, but subsequent examinations showed that [...]
Sex offenders and iPhone apps
Posted in Crime, Ethics and Morals, tagged Crime, iPhone apps, rape, sex crimes, sex offenders on September 30, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
At this very moment, the front-page story at cnn.com is about using iPhone applications to track sex offenders. With the tap of a touch screen, you can pull up a map of where you live, with highlighted addresses showing where sex offenders live. You can even see photos of them.
I’ve long been uneasy with these [...]
Vaccines and train switches
Posted in Ethics and Morals, Health/Medicine, Science, tagged ethical dilemma, hpv, morals, train switch, vaccination, vaccine on September 28, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
This article caught my eye, since the United Kingdom is one of the first countries to mandate the HPV vaccine and offer it to all girls before they are 18.
I always wonder about the vaccine naysayers, who warn that vaccines contain harmful side effects that will hurt children and whatnot. It has always struck me [...]
