I shall adopt these mental representations forthwith!

Shogun by James Clavell - My interest in Japanese history prompted this one. Listening to an Audible recording with a narrator who seems to groan the words rather than speak them and who places emphasis oddly. Still good.

Modern Times by Paul Johnson - I've been reading this for quite some time. I picked it up after finishing Johnson's History of the American People and hearing Rob Long recommend it in one of the podcasts. Great stuff.

Reamde by Neal Stephenson - Got a review copy of this for free and I'm glad I scooped it up. Present day techno-thriller with enough information on MMO's, the Russian Mafia, urban Chinese social conditions, and linguistics to satisfy a librarian. I also enjoyed his Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, and Diamond Age.

I must warn you: I purchased Gormenghast for exactly the same reason and found it to be a huge disappointment. As a fellow Ricochetti, let me advise you to feel no guilt about putting it aside as soon as it becomes too much work. I felt duty bound to finish all three and found the experience miserable.

YMMV.

Do you consider bio-ethics to be inherently religious? Take, for example,  Unit 731. They conducted medical research that only took into account feasibility and return.

I realize you could argue this is close to violating Godwin's law but the parallel between the two situations is close enough for me to chance it.

If you don't care for that, what about the Guatemala syphilis experiments? 

In the end the question of how a government defines personhood and what rights are recognized as a result must be answered. The answer doesn't necessarily have to be overtly informed by religious or philosophical ideas; for the pragmatist and eliminative materialist, the emergence of a unique genetic code can serve as a good indicator of personhood.

Many great books and authors have already been listed; I will only mention a couple that haven't come up already:

Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges - Strange and beautiful stories that have have the disturbing weight of reality despite their untrustworthy narration and sometimes bizarre conceits. Worth the effort. (Now if only I could read him in Spanish.)

The Fifth Head of Cerberus, There are Doors, and Book of the Long Sun - Wolfe feels like a long form Borges to me. Frequently untrustworthy narration, beautiful phrasing, and rewards close/re-reading. Identity is a is a frequent theme of his and no one I've read explores it better.

I've not read anything other than the title of this post, yet I am ready to sign up.

I, for one, welcome our new Canuck overlords!

Trace:

I don't think Mollie's point runs counter to libertarian principles. As she said, she isn't calling for government action to change the situation; she is calling for individuals to act to change the situation.

You equate this with the locavore or Buy Local movement and that analogy is useful; in all three instances people are attempting to change  minds via argumentation and the clash of ideas. Just because some of these ideas are moronic doesn't mean that we shouldn't put forward ideas about what is best for our society.

If I posted that Americans have a tradition of respecting our parents and attempts to denigrate that are wrong-headed, would you find that to be coercive, anti-liberty, and meddling in the affairs of others? Or what about a tradition of donating our time money to charity? Capitalism has nothing to say about such activities, aside from them being poor investments in monetary terms.

Does that make them merely pet-projects or personal causes we should not advocate for publicly? That sounds like aggressive, politically correct relativism rather than libertarianism to me.

(Not that I am an expert, mind you. ;))

They may not line up to vote for Obama but they certainly could stay home. In my (inexpert) opinion, the GOP would lose a small fraction of the evangelical vote and gain virtually nothing by dropping its explicit support of Israel.

Not to mention that Republicans are already considered to be crypto-anti-semites by many on the left. Any signaling strong enough to impact these supposed center-left/libertarian voters willing to change their votes is strong enough to be used as an antisemitism bludgeon by far left partisans and the media. (But I repeat myself. <3)

Jonathan Haidt developed his Moral Foundation Theory which lends credence to this idea, but in a more positive way.

He conceives of six moral dimensions that most societies recognize, one of them being purity. He found that most liberals place a huge emphasis on care and fairness while neglecting all the others, while conservatives tend to value the dimensions about equally.

So perhaps this psychologist is merely identifying the fact that conservatives tend to be more ethically balanced than liberals. ;)

To answer the question and miss the point:

I would put Ambassador John Bolton in charge.

If he was unavailable I would put his mustache in charge, as it is still more qualified than Valerie Jarret.

You're right; it does look quite similar. Although the analogy breaks down when you consider that our body politic would do just fine if it consisted entirely of red arteries and no blue veins...

Bungie (the developer of Halo) is obviously a part of the vast right wing conspiracy!

You should definitely read at least the original trilogy of books. Beyond that they become increasingly esoteric; I finished the fourth but didn't enjoy it nearly as much as the others.

I've not read the Brian Herbert books because I have an aversion to writers continuing someone elses work. (Although I did enjoy John C. Wright's Null-A Continuum in A.E. van Vogt's universe.)

This is one of the best episodes of any podcast I've heard on the site. (And I have heard some amazing episodes from some amazing podcasts here.)

Lets see. I've got... nothing.

AdBlock to the rescue.

(Although I could be convinced to disable it for Ricochet if that would be worthwhile. I do it for a couple other sites I like a lot less than Ricochet.)