Julian Baggini

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‘Very few people don’t value time by themselves.’ Photograph: Andy Mettler/REUTER

ReflexionesSocial

If you’re lonely this Christmas, I doubt you’ll feel any better for being repeatedly told how pitiful your situation is. I don’t want to play down the real problems of loneliness or put people off reaching out to those who would rather not be alone over the holidays, but I can’t help but worry that well-meaning concern is making many people feel worse.

It’s a bit like the unrelenting message we’re all getting about the health risks of poor sleep. For every insomniac it prompts to seek useful help, I bet it leads many others to worry even more about their irregular sleep patterns, only making the problem worse.…  Seguir leyendo »

ReflexionesPensamiento, Cultura y Ciencia

When I threw off my Christianity, I did not throw out my Bible, I just learned to read it properly. Intelligent atheism rejects what is false in religion, but should retain an interest in what is true about it. I don't think many of my fellow atheists would disagree. Why is it, then, that we are increasingly seen as shrill, bishop-bashing fanatics who are tone deaf to the spiritual? The answer, I fear, is to be found in St Paul's Letter to the Galatians: "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." In short, we had it coming.

Last week, in these pages, Madeleine Bunting spoke for many when she complained about the "foghorn volume" and "evangelical fervour" of the New Atheists, with their "contempt for religion".…  Seguir leyendo »

ReflexionesPensamiento, Cultura y Ciencia

I don't usually consider either the Ministry of Defence or the Vatican to be prescient founts of wisdom. But when two such different oracles issue remarkably similar warnings, you have to take notice. Earlier this week it was revealed in this newspaper how the MoD believes that "the trend towards moral relativism and increasingly pragmatic values" was causing more and more people to seek "more rigid belief systems, including religious orthodoxy and doctrinaire political ideologies, such as popularism and Marxism". Flash back to 2004 and you find Pope John Paul II encouraging the then Cardinal Ratzinger to challenge a world "marked by both a widespread relativism and the tendency to a facile pragmaticism" by boldly proclaiming the truth of the church.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalEconomía

We may like to root for the underdog and champion the poor and oppressed, but woe betide the little man who manages to stand tall and not just walk, but run. The latest plucky outsider to get too big for its boots is the Fairtrade Foundation, which certifies fair-trade products. As it celebrates Fairtrade Fortnight, there are numerous reasons for it to be pleased. There are now over 1,500 Fairtrade products on sale in the UK, and sales are rising at about 40% a year.

Yet a growing band of dissenters is claiming that these do-gooders are up to no good.…  Seguir leyendo »