Peter Lawler
Professor of Government, Berry College
Peter Lawler is Dana Professor of Government and former chair of the department of Government and International Studies at Berry College. He serves as executive editor of the journal Perspectives on Political Science, and has been chair of the politics and literature section of the American Political Science Association. He also served on the editorial board of the new bilingual critical edition of Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America, and serves on the editorial boards of several journals. He has written or edited fifteen books and over 200 articles and chapters in a wide variety of venues. He was the 2007 winner of the Weaver Prize in Scholarly Letters.rnrnLawler served on President Bush's Council on Bioethics from 2004 – 09. His most recent book, Modern and American Dignity, is available from ISI Books.rnrnFollow him on Twitter @peteralawler.
So the Big Think’s AGE OF ENGAGEMENT is advertising a showing of Carl Sagan’s hugely influential film CONTACT. The film will be shown, appropriately enough, as an excellent example of how […]
So I saw MONEYBALL. It’s a fine movie. Brad Pitt has exceeded Robert Redford in his capacity to convey brooding and ironic depth—while adding envy, resentment, and parental love. Jonah […]
I’ve delayed my promised post on the the final episode of the instant classic TV show FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS in order to give you time to view it. Sports, especially […]
So here’s the advice of the maverick philosopher: The solid bourgeois may dismiss as so much nonsense philosophy, poetry, and other products of questers and romantics—all the while subscribing to […]
Kris Broughton, a classy and eloquent BIG THINKER, is a particularly fervent defender of our president. Nonetheless, he’s warming up to MITT ROMNEY. He even believes that his anti-Obama rhetoric […]
So there’s a lot of excitement about dolphins on BIG THINK these days. If we can figure out how to communicate with them, we can figure out how to communicate […]
1. So the best news from the Emmys is that FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS won two key awards—for writing and for lead actor (Kyle Chandler as the Coach)—in the category of […]
Yesterday was Constitution Day. Let’s face it. It’s a commemoration that hasn’t caught on. A few years ago Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia snuck through some legislation requiring that every […]
So I promised you proof that David Brooks is better than he says: He doesn’t really submit himself to the authority of the latest studies in neuroscience, and he still […]
1. The post on David Brooks is coming. But for now—due to popular demand—some comments on the Tea Party debate. 2. The problem with the Tea Party members is somewhat […]
So obviously the division of human inquiry into the sciences and the humanities is ridiculous. Reality, after all, is one. The opinion of scientists tends to be that they’re all […]
I thought I’d have one more 9/11 post—this time on 9/11. I’ve gotten a couple of emails accusing me of hating Muslims. Well, I don’t. I’m, of course, also aware […]
1. So my apologies for just not getting the Hitchens post yesterday done properly. It was sloppy, the link magically disappeared, I somehow managed to post it twice, and I […]
Hitchens always speaks his mind, and that’s always good, even when he’s not right. So he’s told us that God is not great and that, in fact, God ruins everything. He’s […]
So I’m in Seattle at the meeting of the American Political Science Association. The APSA meeting has to be one of the diverse and tolerant academic associations in the world. […]
Carl Scott is probably the blogworld’s leading expert on the content of rock music (both words and music). He calls that content, once in a while, its ideological dimension. Carl both is […]
I just read this great essay by Ari N. Schulman in that indispensable journal THE NEW ATLANTIS with the telling title “GPS and the End of the Road.” One of Schulman’s […]
It’s surely appropriate that I follow up a post on my SUMMER VACATION with one on the two kinds of WORK of the college teacher. More than one person who read […]
So one of the guys at Panera Bread this morning asked my view on the FLAT TAX or FAIR TAX or whatever. My reponse was that my objection to the […]
Our BIG THINKING friend Robert de Neufville has outlined an important component of President’s Obama’s case for a second term. Sure, the economy is tanking. And so are the president’s ratings, because […]
Here we find a most lucid talk on the ethics of the uninhibited pursuit of indefinite longevity. The speaker (Mr. Stolyarov) criticizes me, David Brooks, and Daniel Callahan for being pro-death, which is […]
Here’s the information on our final conference of three funded by the University of Chicago: 2pm THURSDAY will feature a high successful and stunningly philosophical transplant nephrologist (kidney doctor) defending, based […]
So here’s some more on THE HELP. My first post dealt with the film’s display of the middle-class racist tyranny, mainly of women, in Jackson, Mississippi in1963. My opinion is […]
Well, this is the first time ever that I’ve taken the “cultural studies” approach of featuring the themes of race, class, and gender in talking about a work of art. […]
ROBERT DE NEUFVILLE, my fellow BIG THINKER, has said I said I think raising taxes is never the right thing to do. His rhetorical strategy is to show all Republicans […]
So voters in primaries are more enthusiastic and more principled than those in general elections (because the turnout is smaller and those who really care show up). That’s even more […]
The intelligent design community has responded to my confession of ignorance. They say that “intelligent design” is the God of the physicists and the philosophers, what, in fact, we can know by nature. We […]
Here you can read the reaction of “the intelligent design community” to a recent article of mine. This post, of course, is double-down shameless self-promotion, because it includes both praise of […]
Once again I find inspiration from one of my former students for a post. Here’s his FACEBOOK request: “I’m interested to hear your thoughts on the ‘Palestinian Chicken’ episode of […]
This conservative post has nothing to do with the ISI conference, but it does have to do with education. All over the internet, we find the conclusion that America is […]