Auspundits

Intersection of Politics & Social Justice Theory

Occasional contributor, Professor Jim Franklin, has recently compiled and edited into book form a collection of essays that seeks to persuade the reader that an adherence to the key principles of social justice is a "foundation for prosperity". He outlines his arguments here and explores the political implications of social justice theory (yes, from a conservative viewpoint). I may have more to say about this down the road, but for now, buy Jim's book and read his online article.

The Global Warming Debate - Part Three

In part one, Auspundits contributor, Assoc. Prof. Jim Franklin at the School of Mathematics and Statistics University of NSW considered the question of whether the world has been warming unusually in recent decades. In part two, he considered whether the global mean temperature increase since the Industrial Revolution has been caused by burning fossil fuels. In this week's brief and final installment he answers the question: is there global warming on Mars?

The Global Warming Debate - Part Two

In part one, Auspundits contributor, Assoc. Prof. Jim Franklin at the School of Mathematics and Statistics University of NSW considered the question of whether the world has been warming unusually in recent decades. In this week's contribution, he asks the question: is the temperature increase caused by burning of fossil fuels since the Industrial Revolution?

The Global Warming Debate - Part One

Has the world been warming unusually in recent decades? This is the question that Auspundits contributor, Assoc. Prof. Jim Franklin at the School of Mathematics and Statistics University of NSW is seeking to answer in this post.

The Global Warming Debate - Introduction

Auspundits contributor, Polar Bear, has written of the consequences of science - in this instance, climate science - being mixed with religion.

Jim Franklin, Auspundits contributor, and Associate Professor at the School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of NSW, has given me permission to post his thoughts on the science in climate science.

My first year Mathematical Modelling class asked me to prepare one lecture on global warming. I will reproduce this in a two posts answering two of the main questions associated with global warming:

1. Has the world been warming unusually in recent decades?
2. If so, is the cause the burning of fossil fuels?

These posts will be forthcoming over the next two weeks.

Conservative: Pyschologically morally sounder

This deserves a link. According a published Science journal article:

Conservatives have more subsystems in their moral processing brain centers [than liberals do].

Well, I could have told you that a long time ago. Now, there is a scientific basis to this all.

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Co-blogger, Professor Franklin, long a moral and ethics thinker, makes the following remarks:

"Go for gut feeling, think up reasons afterwards" doesn't distinguish moral thought from any other kind of thought - including the perception of the validity of arguments. Nothing necessarily wrong with that either.

From the post,

Who knows, maybe genetic engineering will move libertarianism up in the ranks of moral reasoning styles.

Scary.

Moderation in Islam - Round Two

Recently, there have been a flurry of essays and blog posts devoted to analysing the cross-section of Islamic society dubbed "The Moderates". These were written hot on the heels of a major poll undertaken by University of Maryland/WorldPublicOpinion.org demonstrating amongst other things that a significant majority of Muslims polled support the restitution of the Caliphate and the "...strict application of Shar'ia..."

Two of my co-bloggers, Moose and Jim, have been in a protracted debate via email based on the following article at StrategyPage.com. I have received permission from both of them to publish edited versions of this exchange here.

Jim responds to Moose's initial foray.

How to create constitutional government?

The earlier discussion on Islam and "liberal democracy" raises the very difficult question of how political stability and rights-respecting constitutional government can arise. Naturally we would like to know why it hasn't arisen in Iraq when it did arise in comparable circumstances in 1945 in Germany and Japan (both countries with very little relevant tradition).