It’s controversial holiday time, again. Yaaayyy!!! Columbus Day is celebrated as a U.S. federal holiday (since 1936) in honor of the intrepid explorer Christopher Columbus’ initial landing in the Bahamas and, therefore, the Americas. The facts that Columbus was a) not the first non-native to “find” the New World (ask Leif Erickson) and that b) […]
I have another excerpt from Dr. Ben Carson’s book America the Beautiful to share today. As an African-American man who grew up in the Civil Rights Era and struggled to become a respected professional in his field, Carson has had a front-row seat to both racial bigotry in America and to the great strides made […]
I’m not the first to try something like this, so some of these may sound a little familiar. Others, not so much. I limited myself to ten for the obvious biblical parallel, but obviously more could be devised. Hope you like it! The 10 Liberal/Progressive Commandments 1. Do not have any other gods before… Nah, […]
“There are two ways of being happy: We must either diminish our wants or augment our means — either may do — the result is the same and it is for each man to decide for himself and to do that which happens to be easier.” — Benjamin Franklin Tonight’s post is just a quickie […]
“Sure I wave the American flag. Do you know a better flag to wave? Sure I love my country with all her faults. I’m not ashamed of that, never have been, never will be.” — John Wayne, iconic American actor I actually started writing this post quite awhile ago, adding and/or adjusting verbiage now and […]
I love Florida. (Or, at least, NE Florida.) There are certain things I kind of miss about NJ — well, the area where I lived, anyway — and I still have friends there. But, despite the humid summers and hurricane warnings, I’ve come to appreciate Florida. And, I also appreciate our (relatively new) governor, Rick […]
“Use soft words and hard arguments.” — English proverb “Soft words are hard arguments.” — Thomas Fuller (emphasis mine) Among the various books I have in progress, lately I’ve been reading Arguing with Friends: Keeping your friends and your convictions by Paul Buller. It’s a relatively thin book, but I only read 2 or 3 […]
Part 6: Avoiding Presumptions “A presumption becomes a self-refuting assertion.” — R. Alan Woods Following hot on the heels of “Part 5: Facts Over Feelings”, today’s logical fallacies involve inappropriate presumptions that confuse and invalidate one’s argument. (Of course, I would never do this! … OK, OK, maybe.) Sometimes when making a case or […]
Part 5: Facts Over Feelings “Feelings should never supersede rational thought… so, if you feel that you’ve got the answer, you should think some more.” — Julie Ann Elliott-Morton Up to this point in the series, we have dealt with the basics. We learned about the fundamental laws of logic, categorical propositions and logical relationships. […]
Today’s post is a bit more philosophy-rich than I am usually comfortable with and, thus, than I would normally post. But, as I was reading the book named below (and stretching my brain cells), I realized that the topic and observations are at least as, if not even more, relevant today than when written almost […]
