Tag Archives: Twitter

The Age of iSolation

Posted by on February 20, 2013 21 comments
Cover of "Kindle Wireless Reading Device,...

Cover via Amazon

After my three hour committee meeting, one of my colleagues, Steve, and I had a conversation that began with Twitter and ended up as a general discussion about the coming age of iSolation (trademarked).

Steve told a story of the eerie silence as he approached his classroom and how what greeted him was not an empty room, but a room full of students all interacting with their smart phones, tablets and other devices. No one spoke or paid the least attention to anyone around him or her. I added my own tale of feeling vaguely disturbed by students walking in groups, yet interacting only with their phones and not each other. Unless, perhaps, they were Tweeting or texting the people with them.

The conversation then turned to the push for online learning and how it might be the case that we will see the last generation of students who get to choose between being taught in person and being taught online. Naturally, the push for online learning is driven mostly by economic concerns: having masses of students enrolled in online only classes that are auto-graded (or graded by low paid graders) would replicate the exploitative or automated model (or both) of factories. This would mean far lower costs and thus far higher profits for those owning the machines of education and the lucky few left to run the process.

We did, however, set aside the economic motivation to consider an important question (at least for educators): would the online model be better than the traditional model in terms of providing quality education?

This sparked a side discussion about digital books and digital music. Steve is Jazz person and is of the school of thought that the analog approach is superior to the digital approach-not just in terms of the music but also in terms of the social aspect. He spoke of how he used to go to music stores and be able to discuss music with others of like interest. The idea of joining a Facebook group to post about Jazz had little appeal to him, perhaps even less than the vision of people downloading digital music in iSolation from each other.

I added in my view of books-namely that while I find the Kindle very appealing because it allows me to carry hundreds of books when I travel, I still value the experience of reading an actual book.

Thinking about this, I realized that my preference was based not in any rejection of digital books (I like my Kindle and love the books I sell for the Kindle). Rather, I value the full aesthetic experience of reading an actual book. There is, I contend, a different aesthetic experience when it comes to a physical book: its design, the weight in one’s hand, the act of turning the pages, and so on all create an experience that has aesthetic value and one that cannot be (as of yet) replicated by a digital book. In support of this claim, I made an analogy between seeing a movie and going to a play based on the same story. While the movie will provide an aesthetic experience, the play will provide a different one in virtue of its nature. Likewise, the same would seem to hold for digital books and actual books.

Being a philosopher, I did note that our concern over the shift to the digital world might simply be a manifestation of the usual lamentations of people as they grow older and things are not as they were when they were kids. I imagined my ancestors of long ago lamenting the kids and their new-fangled writing and how it would wreck everything. Why not, I imagined them saying, just stick with speaking and remembering? As such, I believe it is important to consider that my concerns are fueled not by reason but by feeling.

That said, I believe it is equally important to consider that my concerns might have a foundation-that is, worrying about the age of iSolation is not just a matter of yelling at the damn kids to get off my lawn, but a point of legitimate worry regarding the road we are now following.

In conclusion, buy my damn books.  Then get off my damn lawn. :)

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Sex & Resignation

Posted by on June 16, 2011 18 comments
Anthony Weiner

Image via Wikipedia

As night follows day, sex scandals follow politicians. Being an American, I hear the most about our fine politicians and their various scandals. However, this sort of thing is hardly limited to the United States.

While the Anthony Weiner episode has been dominating the American media, this incident does raise a general question about when a politician involved in a sex scandal should step down. After dragging out the tragic drama, Anthony Weiner finally decided to resign his position. This puts him in stark contrast with fellow New Yorker Chris Lee. After his shirtless-photo-Craigslist scandal, Lee promptly resigned.

Weiner’s career-ending injury was, of course, self-inflicted. The fatal blow was not his virtual infidelity. It was, of course, his decision to launch a prolonged campaign of deceit. If he had simply admitted to his behavior, then he would have been regarded as creepy but he might have not have been pushed to resign. Without the attempted cover up, the bump in his briefs would have probably been a brief bump in his career.

It might be argued that such virtual misdeeds would be sufficient grounds for resignation. After all, Chris Lee resigned after attempting to have an affair via Craigslist. This does have a certain appeal. After all, a politician is supposed to serve the interests of his people and he cannot do his job properly if he is caught up in a scandal.

This does have considerable appeal. To use an analogy, many jobs (including my own) restrict the outside employment that an employee can undertake. The reason is, of course, that outside employment can interfere with the primary job. While being caught up in a scandal is not a job (though it might have been caused by one), it can have the same effect by consuming far too much time and focus. Of course, if the person is able to keep the scandal from impacting his duties, then this argument would fail in that case.

It can also be argued that members of a political body who cannot keep their own members under control are unfit for office. This falls under the general question of what sort of unethical behavior (or violation of social norms) would be grounds for expecting a politician to resign.

One obvious answer is to refer to the rules specified by office. As with any job, there are conditions of employment and these set the limits of allowed behavior. Provided that these limits are not violated, then there would seem to be a lack of justification to expect a resignation-even when the person behaves in ways that are regarded as inappropriate or even unethical.  For example, a university professor typically cannot be fired merely for having an affair since his job does not specify marital fidelity as a condition of employment.  Naturally, having an affair with a co-worker or student could be grounds for dismissal, but not because it is an affair but most likely because the university has rules against that sort of behavior.

Naturally enough, if a resignation is expected, this often means that there are not actual grounds for kicking the person out As far as I know, inappropriate (but not illegal) sexual behavior is not grounds for being given the boot from most political offices. Lying, except for the obvious case of doing so under oath, also does not seem to be against the  usual rules. If it were, then the halls of most governments would be empty.

Obviously enough, people are sometimes expected to resign even when they have not actually violated the rules. In the case of politicians, this happens often enough in cases involving sex.

It can be argued that politicians who are involved in sex scandals that do not break the relevant rules should still be pushed to resign. This could be done on ethical grounds. While we tend to regard politicians as an unethical lot, we still expect them to behave in ways we consider appropriate when it comes to sex and regard such violations as unethical. A rather appealing argument is that if a married politician will betray his wife, then he cannot be trusted and hence should leave office.

An obvious reply is that as long as the politician has not actually acted in ways that are relevant to his job, then his betrayal of his wife is not relevant. After all, a man can be relentlessly unfaithful to his wife and still be very competent and capable in his job.

Another appealing argument is that if a politician is engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior and has tried to conceal it, then it would seem reasonable to suspect that he might be up to other misdeeds and concealing them. The obvious reply is that such behavior (provided that it does not cross over into the criminal realm) is not actually relevant to job performance and the person’s competence. After all, I suspect that most married men are involved in some degree of what would be considered inappropriate behavior, yet they are able to function in their jobs.

Naturally, the above would apply to women as well as men. However, it is far more common for male politicians to be involved in such scandals than female politicians.

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Weiner & Tragedy

Posted by on June 6, 2011 15 comments
Anthony Weiner

Image via Wikipedia

Congressman Anthony Weiner recently made headlines over a Tweeted photo of a groin. He denied that he had sent the photo and insisted that he had been hacked. However, his handling of certain questions led many to doubt his veracity. In a press conference on June 6, he admitted that he had sent the Tweet and that he had lied to cover this up.

The press conference was a rather interesting in four ways. First, he accepted full responsibility for his actions and did not try to shift the blame to anyone or anything else. Second, he noted that his actions were due to a weakness and flaw in his character. Third, he answered question for about thirty minutes, visibly taking a beating. Fourth, his wife was not present-which is something rather unusual when an American politician has been caught in a scandal involving a sexual element. Seeing this conference started me thinking about tragedy in the Aristotelian sense.

Briefly put, a tragedy has two main aspects: the nature of the action and the nature of the main agent. In terms of the action, a person has to go from happiness to misery via a mistake on his part. Second, the agent needs to be good, but not overly so. The fact that the downfall was due to an error on the person’s part enables people to feel fear-”there, but for the grace of God, go I.” The fact that the person is basically decent enables people to feel pity. After all, when bad things happen to wicked people, we are not generally inclined to feel for them. However, when bad things happen to decent people, this tends to elicit feelings of pity.

In Weiner’s case, he clearly has gone from happiness to misery. He has been revealed as a liar and his wife is certainly not happy with him. His chances of being re-elected have been diminished. This misery is, of course, self inflicted and the result of poor choices: though he is married he was inappropriately  involved via Twitter and Facebook with women and when he accidentally exposed himself, he chose to lie about it.

Looking at things honestly, I think that most of us can easily imagine being in a situation somewhat like Weiner’s. After all, social media makes it very easy to communicate with people and engage in what might begin as harmless friend making that devolves into flirting. As Weiner himself pointed out, social media is not to blame for our failings-but it does provide a rather slippery social slope. Social media also provides an instantaneous way to be stupid, thus sometimes shorting out one’s better judgment. Email and blog commenting also have a similar effect: it is easy to dash off a thoughtless email or comment and then realize the full extent of the stupidity when it is too late.

When people make mistakes, especially shameful mistakes, they are rarely inclined to admit to these errors. Rather, people tend to do just what Weiner did: try to conceal the error and then resort to lying. This, as Weiner knew, merely makes things worse by compounding the original error with more poor and unethical choices.

As such, it seems quite reasonable for most of us, especially us men, to think “yes, I could have been a Weiner.” For the record, I have never sent a “junk shot” via Twitter. However, I have made decisions in life I regret and hence have some sympathy for Weiner. I do, however, have far more sympathy for his wife.

What is obviously more controversial is whether he is basically a decent man who made a mistake or not.  Obviously enough, Weiner is not morally outstanding. He was involved with women via social media in a way that he felt comfortable sending “junk shots.” He also lied to cover up his misdeeds. However, he does not seem to be a wicked man. Assuming he is not lying again, his relationships with the women allegedly did not go beyond the realm of social media. While this was hardly ethical, it was not wicked or evil. While his lying was also unethical, he did not violate his oath of office or break any laws. As such, the extent of his immorality was fairly minor-lies told to cover up something shameful and embarrassing. As lies go, his lies are rather low on the evil scale.Weiner also appeared (although it is hard to judge from a single press conference) to be sincerely repentant and remorseful for what he had done-especially the hurt he had inflicted on his wife.As such, Weiner does not seem to be a wicked man who was brought low by his wickedness. Rather, he seems to be a basically decent sort of person who chose poorly due to flaws in his character. As such, it seems reasonable to consider the situation as a minor tragedy-at least in Aristotle’s sense.

Naturally, if new information is forthcoming, my assessment might well change. If Weiner actually had “relationships” with one or more of the women or was faking his emotions during the press conference, then his status as a decent, but flawed, person would come under greater question.

In any case, Weiner is yet another example of why honesty is the best policy. Of course, an even better policy is to not do stupid stuff that one might feel tempted to lie about.

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Argubot

Posted by on November 9, 2010 35 comments
Robot Monster... ahora resulta que los robots ...
Image by Javier Piragauta via Flickr

One interesting phenomenon is that groups often adopt a set of stock views and arguments that are almost mechanically deployed to defend the views. In many cases, the pattern of responses seems almost robotic-in many “discussions” I can predict what stock arguments will be deployed next.

I have even found that if I can lure someone off their pre-established talking points, then they are often quite at a loss as to what to say next. This, I suspect, is a sign that a person does not really have his/her own arguments but is merely putting forth established dogmarguments (dogmatic arguments).

Apparently someone else noticed this phenomenon-specifically in the context of global warming arguments and decided to create his own argubot. Nigel Leck created a script that searches Twitter for key phrases associated with stock arguments against the view that humans have caused global warming. When the argubot finds a foe it then engages by sending a response tweet containing a counter to the argument (and relevant links).

In some cases the target of the argubot does not realize that s/he is arguing with a script and not a person. The argubot is set up to respond with a variety of “prefabricated” arguments when the target repeats an argument, thus helping to create that impression. The argubot also has a repertoire  that goes beyond global warming. For example, it is stocked with arguments about religion. This also allows it to maintain the impression that it is a person.

While the argubot is reasonably sophisticated, it is not quite up to the Turing test. For example, it cannot discern when people are joking. While it can fool people into thinking they are arguing with a person, it is important to note that the debate takes place in the context of Twitter.  As such, each tweet is limited to 140 characters. This makes it much easier for a argubot to pass itself off as a person.  Also worth considering is the fact that people tend to have rather low expectations for the contents of tweets which makes it much easier for an argubot to masquerade as a person. However, it is probably just a matter of time before a bot passes the Tweeter Test (being able to properly pass itself off as person in the context of twitter).

What I find most interesting about the argubot is not that it can often pass as a human tweeter, but that the argumentative process with its targets can be automated in this manner. This inclines me to think that the people who the argubot are arguing with are also, in effect, argubots. That is, they are also “running scripts” and presenting pre-fabricated arguments they have acquired from others. As such, it could be seen as  a case of a computer based argubot arguing against biological argubots with both sides relying on scripts and data provided by others.

It would be interesting to see the results if someone wrote another argubot to engage the current argubot in debate. Perhaps in the future argumentation will be left to the argubots and the silicon tower will replace the ivory tower. Then again, this would probably put me out of work.

One final point worth considering is the ethics of  the argubot at hand.

One concern is that it seems deceptive: it creates the impression that the target is engaged in a conversation with a person when s/he is actually just engaged with a script. Of course, the argubot does not state that it is a person nor does it make use of deception to harm the target. Given its purpose, to argue about global warming, it seems to be irrelevant whether the arguing is done by a person or a script. This contrasts with cases in which it does matter, such as a chatbot designed to trick someone into thinking that another person is romantically interested in them or to otherwise engage with the intent to deceive. As such, the argubot does not seem to be unethical in regards to fact that people might think it is a person.

Another concern is that the argubot seeks out targets and engages them (an argumentative Terminator or Berserker). This, some might claim, could be seen as a form of spamming or harassment.

As far as the spamming goes, the argubot does not deploy what would intuitively be considered spam in terms of its content. After all, it is not trying to sell a product, etc. However, it might be argued that it is sending out unsolicited bulk tweets, which might thus be regarded as spam.  Spamming is rather well established as immoral (if an argument is wanted, read “Evil Spam” in my book What Don’t You Know? ) and if the argubot is spamming, then this would be unethical.

While the argubot might seem like a spambot, one way to defend it against this charge is to note that the argubot provides what are mostly relevant responses that are comparable to what a human would legitimately  send in response to a tweet. Thus, while it is automated, it is arguing rather than spamming. This seems to be an important distinction. After all, the argubot does not try to sell male enhancement, scam people, or get people to download a virus. Rather, it responds to arguments that can be seen as inviting a response-be it from a person or a script.

In regards to the harassment charge, the argubot does not seem to be engaged in what could be legitimately considered harassment. First, the content does not seem to constitute harassment.  Second, the context of the “debate” is a public forum (Twitter) that explicitly allows such interactions to take place-whether they involve just humans or humans and bots.

Obviously, an argubot could be written that would actually be spamming or engaged in harassment. However, this argubot does not seem to cross the ethical line in regards to this behavior.

I suspect that we will see more argubots soon.

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Firesheep & Evil

Posted by on October 26, 2010 14 comments
Picture of notebook screen with Facebook and F...
Image via Wikipedia

In America there is a saying “guns don’t kill people.” Some wits add “people with  guns kill people.” While this saying is just that, a saying, it does put a handy slogan on a view about moral responsibility. On the face of it, the sayings are dead on: while a gun can be used to kill a person, guns are not themselves moral agents. As such, a gun bears no moral responsibility for any deaths that it might be used to bring about.

The gun debate has been done to death in America, so I thought it would be interesting to switch the focus a bit while still sticking with the general issue of responsibility for harm. To be specific, I will be looking at a hacking program called Firesheep (not to be confused with the browser Firefox or the emulator Sheepshaver).

Firesheep was written by Eric Butler and adds easy to use hacking functions to the Firefox web browser. The add on lets users view information in internet cookies at sites such as Twitter, Facebook. Flickr, Tumblr and Yelp.  Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your view of the matter) Firesheep is limited in what it can do. It can allow a user to get usernames and session number IDs but it cannot be used to get passwords. In effect, it allows users to view information (such as person’s Facebook or Amazon account) but does not let users do anything that would require a password. It is also limited to hacking on the same network. However, this means that if you are reading this blog on a public wi-fi, then someone with Firesheep could be reading through your darkest Facebook secrets. Like that time you…well, you know what you did. And so does that creepy fellow sitting two tables down.

Butler makes it clear that he sees himself as a white hat: he is hacking to expose vulnerabilities so that they will be fixed.  Interestingly, he does directly address the moral issue at hand:  “The attack that Firesheep demonstrates is easy to do using tools that have been available for years. Criminals already knew this, and I reject the notion that something like Firesheep turns otherwise innocent people evil.”

On the face of it, Butler is quite right. Firesheep, like other tools, is not some sort of cursed weapon that can possess the mind of potential victims and compel them to do evil (unlike television which does just that). The same is, obviously enough, true of other potential harmful pieces of technology, such as guns and junk food. As such, Butler and the other folks who make such tools available are not directly accountable for what people do with the tools. As the arms dealers probably say, “I just provide the weapons, the customer does the actual killing.” I do not, however, mean to suggest that Butler had any malign intent in creating and releasing Firesheep. Rather, he seems to be like Dr. Gatling-hoping that his creation will do good rather than further evil.

There is, however, a somewhat deeper concern. Namely that providing the tools that makes misdeeds easier makes a person accountable to a degree. While the person who invents or distributes such tools or weapons does not make people evil or make them do misdeeds, the person does make such misdeeds easier. As such, the person providing the tool does play a causal role in the misdeeds-especially if the tool or weapon serves as a “but for” cause. For example, if someone would have been unable to track down and start stalking an ex without using Firesheep, the ex would have not been stalked but for Firesheep. As such, making misdeeds easier does seem to bring with it a degree of moral accountability.

Butler does. of course, anticipate this sort of criticism. As he notes, the tools already exist to do just what Firesheep does. Firesheep is just better known and easier to use. To use an analogy, Butler is not inventing the gun. He is merely making the gun easier to use.

Other folks, myself included, are helping make Firesheep famous. Following the above logic, this would also make me and the others folks contributors in some cases. For example, if somebody (not you, of course) reads this post, learns of Firesheep and then hacks an ex’s Facebook account to find and stalk the ex, then I have contributed to that misdeed. Of course, my contribution is extremely limited and hence so is my moral accountability.

“Firesheep doesn’t hack. People hack with Firesheep.”

Thoughts?

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Deleting Principles

Posted by on September 23, 2010 29 comments
Police
Blog Police (Image via Wikipedia)

Despite the post name, this is not about getting rid of your principles (although that could be handy for folks considering a career in politics). Rather, it is about when it is acceptable to delete comments from a blog post.

To start off, let me get the easy ones out of the way. As I argued in an earlier post, deleting spam and web droppings seems perfectly acceptable. No blog has an obligation to serve as free advertising for spammers and web droppings have as much right to remain as bird droppings.  Now on to matters a bit more controversial.

In general, there seem to be two main areas on which to assess whether a comment should remain or be banished by deletion. These are, obviously enough, tone/style and content.

In regards to tone/style, those that are excessively negative tend to provide a basis on which to delete in a principled way. Examples of negative tone/style include being needlessly hateful, needlessly condescending, or needlessly hostile. As others have noted, being negative (or, to be more technical, an ass) out of proportion to the provocation seem to provide grounds for considering deletion.

Not surprisingly, drawing a line that will allow consistent deletion can be a challenge. Despite this challenge, a consistent principle seems to be rather desirable. After all, as in law and ethics, the rules should be consistent and non-arbitrary. That way people know, in advance, what sort of behavior is acceptable and what is not. From a practical standpoint, this also helps avoid conflict over such matters and this is generally a good thing for a blog. After all, the idea of having a blog is to attract readers and active participants rather than drive them away.

Blog moderators will vary in what is considered tolerable in regards to tone/style. Those that prefer a rougher approach will tolerate more negative tones and styles. Those who wish to have a nicer environment or prefer a blog that seems more professional in character will no doubt tolerate less.

As a general principle, it does seem reasonable to expect civil behavior. Since there is already a well established set of principles in this area, it makes good sense to assume (unless otherwise noted) that these general principles apply on a blog. For example, being hateful, using needless vulgarities and being excessively condescending all violate the intuitive standards of civility.

However, to the degree that these are a matter of etiquette there is a great deal of flexibility. After all, what counts as rude or negative  is often a matter of context.  For example, some people are quite comfortable with the casual use of “obscene” words and see them as part of everyday vocabulary. So, while it seems reasonable to accept the general principle that  excessively negative comments should be deleted, what counts as excessively negative will need to be defined by the blog moderator, preferably by working with the community of the blog.

On my own blog, I follow the “common sense” rules of civility: don’t be needlessly hateful, keep the obscenity in check, avoid being excessively condescending, and show the degree of respect that one would like to receive in return. Since I lack Victorian sensibilities and have been hardened by years of online gaming, I tend to be fairly tolerant of some rough talk-provided that there is some merit to the comments. This provides a nice transition to the matter of content.

Deleting on the basis of content is perhaps the most controversial (with some notable exceptions like spam). In some cases, it will seem quite acceptable to delete comments. For example, comments that entirely lacking in relevance but are full of racist, sexist or other hateful remarks are excellent candidates for deletion.Not surprisingly, many blogs have rules against such comments (as well as against comments that can cause legal trouble, such as threats and libelous claims).

In these cases as well as less extreme cases, a reasonable principle seems to be to weigh the positive value of a comment (its merit measured in terms of what it adds to the discussion) against the negative aspects of the comment. These negative aspects can include both style/tone and content. For example, a comment might be relevant to a post and raise a legitimate criticism of said post, but it might be presented in a condescending tone and might also contain insulting content.

As is to be expected, if the positive value of the comment is determined to be outweighed by its negative aspects, then deletion would seem to be justified. This can be justified by the obvious fact that the person making the comment could have written the comment without the negative aspects and thus made her point without all the negative tone/style or content. There is, after all, generally no need to be an ass and no one has a right to expect that such needless “assing” will be tolerated.

On  my own blog I am inclined to tolerate a fair amount of negative content or style/tone, provided that it is offset by an even greater amount of positive content. Rather than deleting such comments, it seems that a better approach is to at least make an attempt to persuade the person to be less negative and thus contribute more to the discussion.

Some blogs take the approach of deleting comments that disagree with the slant, agenda or goal of the blog. For example, a liberal blog moderator might delete any criticisms that are conservative in nature even if the comments are well reasoned and civil.

While blog moderators have the right to do this, this does not seem like an appropriate approach to such comments. Of course, my view is based on the assumption that an open discussion that allows criticism is both valuable and desirable. Other folks, obviously enough, see “discussion” as a tool for advancing a specific agenda or view and thus have no tolerance for any opposing views or criticism. That, I believe, is the wrong way to run a blog on both moral and critical thinking grounds. I’ll leave my reasons here for the discussion that is likely to follow.

In the case of a philosophy blog, this sort of approach would seem to grossly violate the traditional spirit of philosophy. As such, on my own blog I never delete comments because they are critical of my views, arguments, or beliefs (or those of others).

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An April Puzzle

Posted by on April 1, 2010 21 comments
A male Golden Retriever named Tucker.

Image via Wikipedia

Imagine, if you will, a philosopher who has gone mad (or madder, if you prefer). After countless counterexample, tons of thought experiments, sundry syllogisms, and endless enthymemes his mind (or functional states) have gone totally Cartesian.

However, the philosopher is able to present a mask of sanity to the world (or perhaps he merely thinks he does-maybe no one notices his madness because he is, after all, a philosopher) and he announces he will give a talk and hand out free money. He puts on his grue suede shoes and makes his way to the talk.

There he finds you (assuming that you exist) and several other folks. After giving his talk on deconstruction and the ephemeral ethics of Avatar in a post modern context, he invites everyone to partake of the free beverages and money.

Unfortunately, the mad fellow has drugged the beer. Your last thought, as you fall to the floor, is whether or not androids can eat cream of eclectic beeps.

At some point you awaken, finding your self firmly tied to a giant Venn diagram. Your right hand is free and you notice several buttons within reach. In front of you are several monitors and a set of speakers.

The mad philosopher’s voice booms forth from the speakers: “As you can see on the monitors, I have other people and things here. Like you, they are bound and helpless. Did I mention the bombs? I did, didn’t I?”

After a brief random diatribe on an inverted spectrum, the mad philosopher continues.

“Since you read philosophy, you no doubt have an inkling of what is happening. You see, I am tired of mere thought experiments. I want a real experiment and you are part of it. So, here is the experiment:

I have tied several people and things to these big Venn diagram things. Each one has a bomb on it that will kill or destroy the person or thing on the diagram. Well, the fetus setup is  a bit different, but more on that. Being a fair and impartial rational being, I am also stuck to a Venn diagram.

But you, my good fellow, have something we do not: buttons to push. If you push a numbered button, the corresponding bomb will go off. Then everyone else goes free. If you push two buttons, the corresponding bombs will go off and so will my bomb. If you do not push a button within ten minutes, all the bombs except mine will go off.

Here are your choices.

Button #1: You go ‘boom.’
Button #2: A golden retriever named ‘Mr. Kickass’ goes ‘boom.’
Button #3: A pregnant woman who has a tiny, tiny bomb attached to the fetus. It will kill the fetus but not her.
Button #4: This will decapitate the pregnant woman, but leave the fetus alive.
Button #5: The Mona Lisa. Yes, the real one. I stole it. It goes up in flames.
Button #6: Some guy you don’t know. Or do you? He goes ‘boom.’
Button #7: Some gal you don’t know. Or do you? No, you don’t. She goes ‘boom.’
Button #6: A violinist. He’s really good. He goes ‘boom’, but only after some music is played.

So, which button do you press? Or do you push two?”

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Philosophy in the Short

Posted by on December 24, 2009 61 comments
Ernest Hemingway

Image via Wikipedia

Ernest Hemingway claimed that his best story was only six words long: “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Twitter challenges the Twits to tweet profoundly in 146 characters or less. Naturally, this raises the obvious question: can philosophy be done in such tiny packages? After all, we philosophers are known for being rather long winded (or long fingered…if that is how one would change this to a key board metaphor). To make this challenge more interesting, let us see if philosophers can do more with less. As such, I introduce the Philosophy in Three words or 73 Characters (or less) Challenge. Spelling, as always, does not count. Winners will receive the 3 seconds of fame it takes to read and puzzle over their phits (philosophy bits).

Happy Holidays to all.

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