Topics

► Punishment

The recent government policy of releasing prisoners early in order to relieve prison overcrowding has not only caused anger in some quarters but has also raised the issue of what punishment is actually for. Do we undermine justice by reducing the suffering experienced by prisoners? ❰More❱

► Language

In the famous Bible story of the Tower of Babel mankind originally had only one language. This made cooperation in building a tower to the heavens simple but as a result of mankind's hubris God destroyed the tower and fragmented their languages. There are now 6,000 languages in the world but they are dying off at an increasing rate. In the modern age many see the demise of minority languages as a tragedy, akin to the loss of biodiversity in nature.

There have been many attempts over the centuries to develop an International Auxiliary Language so that everyone can return to pre-babel days. Latin served this function, via the church, for centuries, but in recent years Esperanto has been the most famous---and significantly unadopted. But why should that matter when we have English! It is the language of sea and air travel and has led to the British being very lazy in learning foreign tongues. Is this a matter for national shame? ❰More❱

► Humanism

Humanism is a philosophical and ethical outlook which places human beings, their well-being, freedom and capacity for reason at the centre of moral and intellectual life. It holds that human beings must seek meaning, knowledge and moral direction through reason, evidence, experience and reflection rather than divine revelation. How is it possible without the supernatural to find meaning and purpose in life? Can a humanist be happy and hopeful or is humanism a stark and pessimistic philosophy? ❰More❱

► Paranormal

Paranormal phenomena, parapsychology, psychical research: all these terms refer to the study of anomalous or supernatural phenomena for which we have no natural explanation. While conventional science examines and tries to explain natural phenomena that we have good evidence for, parapsychology tries to establish the reality of its phenomena by finding evidence. So are these phenomena real or the products of trickery or self-delusion? What kinds of experiments would establish the reality of these phenomena? ❰More❱