The Function of Cynicism at the Present Time
Written by Roger Crisp
Last month, Helen Small, Merton Professor of English Language and Literature, gave a fascinating and wide-ranging presentation in the New St Cross Special Ethics Seminar Series, on the function of cynicism at the present time. She is currently writing a book on the topic with the support of a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship. Continue reading
Freezing critique: privileged views and cryonics
Cryonics – the practice of freezing people directly after death in the hope that future medicine can resuscitate them – is controversial. However, British Columbia is the only jurisdiction with an explicit anti-cryonics law (banning advertising or sale of cryonics services), and a legal challenge is apparently being put together. The motivations for the law appear murky, but to some this is a rights issue. As Zoltan Istvan notes, “In a world where over 90 percent of the people hold religious views of the afterlife, cryonics could become a noteworthy global civil rights issue. ” Maybe the true deep problem for getting cryonics accepted is that it is a non-religious afterlife, and we tend to give undue privilege to religious strange views rather than secular strange views.
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