Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has attracted some controversy recently over his call for affirmative action in social psychology. Haidt polled his colleagues over their political affiliation during a lecture and found that only a tiny m…

In book 4 of Homer’s Odyssey, Odysseus’s son Telemachos arrives in Sparta to quiz Menelaos on whether Odysseus is still alive and if so where he might be. Menelaos reduces everyone (including himself) to tears by telling everyone how sad he…

One of the great success stories of British science in the last 30 years was the introduction of In Vitro Fertilisation by Steptoe and Edwards in 1978. They should have won the Nobel Prize. Around 3% of babies are now born after IVF. Testin…

The Ture Sventon books are a series of Swedish children’s detective stories written by Åke Holmberg 1948-1973. They are locally well-known and appreciated, but henceforth Ture Sventon i Paris (1953) will likely not be republished. The…

There is a pair of interesting stories connected to animal ethics in the media at the moment. One is an exposé of bad practices that persist in many British abattoirs — a mix of cruelty and sloppiness that is against the rules but happens r…

Quick reminder of a forthcoming talk at the Oxford Playhouse on the 11th February, given by Philosophy Bites author Nigel Warburton: What is philosophy? Who needs it? Writer and podcaster Nigel Warburton, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at th…

On Monday, Belgian endocrinologist Francis Coucke appeared before the ‘Orde van Geneesheren’, a national body responsible for enforcing standards within the medical profession. Dr Coucke risks a two year suspension from the profession beca…

Over the last few days the Australian media has been covering Sydney based Charlie Teo’s auction of ring side seats in his operating theatre. The auction is reported as raising about $1500 for a children’s cancer charity and while this migh…

Most scientific journals demand declarations by their contributors of any actual or potential conflicts of interests. In the case of contributors to ethics journals, everything about the contributor raises a potential conflict of interest. …

Notice that the first word of this post is red. Point your mouse cursor at the words as you read them, and each subsequent word will be marked as ‘read’. You are now being graded on how quickly you read these words. And there’s a little rew…