Two remarkable articles about sex–you know, coitus–have come across my screen in the past couple weeks, both of them refreshingly offbeat. The first comes from Alain De Botton, he of Religion for Atheists fame and the new How to Think More About Sex (not to mention one of the most consistently interesting twitterers out there). It appeared in The Wall Street Journal under the suitably provocative title, “Why Most Men Aren’t Man Enough to Handle Web Porn”. De Botton is interested in exposing, pun intended, the strange double-bind of what passes for discourse about sex in our culture, namely, that…
Can a Gorgeous Olympian Find Love…Please?
Lolo Jones, owner of a beautiful face, sculpted physique, one of sports’ coolest names and the American record in the 60 meter hurdles, can’t find a boyfriend. Why? She won’t sleep with any of her suitors. Male depravity has never been in more glaring display than when, as Jones reports, a man told her that having sex with him would “make her run faster.”
Jones is perhaps the first person I’ve ever heard make this admission without talking about their Christian faith. A saved celebrity virginity is almost always presented as a testament to the celebrity’s faith in God, and their…
Addiction / America / Conferences / Film / Humor / Music / Politics / Religion / Social Science / Week In Review
Another Week Ends: Brooks on Empathy, more Quiet Beatle, American Commandments, Kaling on Chick Flicks, Meth to Master, Pre-Marital Hanky Panky, Psycho Congress, Tweedy & Ryan Adams
1. David Brooks continues with his one-man campaign for a more realistic conception of human nature, and the implications it might have on ethical behavior, in his new column, “The Limits of Empathy.” This time he focuses on the question of motivation, exploring how easily/frequently something as ‘good’ as empathy is subordinated to self-interest (and laziness), ht TB:
People who are empathetic are more sensitive to the perspectives and sufferings of others. They are more likely to make compassionate moral judgments. The problem comes when we try to turn feeling into action. Empathy makes you more aware of other people’s suffering, but it’s not…
PZ’s Podcast: Sex Isn’t Everything
EPISODE 61
Or is it?
One thing sex apparently is, is Christianity’s nightmare.
Whatever one thinks about sex or issues related to sex, it seems to represent a credibility problem these days for the “faith once and for all deliver’d”.
In this podcast I don’t argue against or in favor of any specific attitude or position. Rather, I affirm the significance of the bodily, instinctual, and sexual aspect of life, for the way we live, for everyday grace in practice. Sex, however you understand it, is a deal breaker in human relationships. It animates, often unacknowledged, a host of decisions people make.
You could say…
Nymphomania and The Morally Disabled
Neuroscience Day, part two: An admittedly wild article from Slate, with the inspired title “Naughty By Nature”, looking at nymphomania through the lens of neuroscience and free will (and the profound lack thereof). Specifically, the article discusses what’s known as Kluever-Bucy Syndrome, which causes a neurological breakdown in the ability to control one’s sexual urges… [insert joke about the average male libido here], but more generally, it asks the question of whether or not neuroscience can/should explain moral lapses as well as cognitive ones. The examples they use are, by necessity, rather salacious, so be warned – seriously, folks –…
An Excess of Excess in Sex and Religion
The Guardian published a fascinating look at the human relationship with excess recently, from psychoanalyst Adam Phillips, entitled “Insatiable Creatures” (ht. A O’Connor). He starts with a general examination the morality and pitfalls of excess, then deals with sexuality at length before ending with religion. He’s particularly interested in what our propensity for excess says about us as creatures, a question that proves to be loaded, by definition, with an excessively unavoidable form of judgment. It’s pretty amusing, to say the least. Obviously we can’t embrace his perspective or his conclusions wholeheartedly, but the honesty is refreshing, and he’s clearly…
Sex, Fries and Videotape
As anyone who has ever spent time in a vegan store–or a Whole Foods for that matter–knows, questions surrounding the cultivation, harvesting, distribution and consumption of food have been infused with a self-righteousness that has to be experienced to be believed. “Paper or Plastic?” is no longer a question of taste, it’s a description of the state of your soul.
In a recent article entitled, “Is Food The New Sex?” Mary Eberstadt examines just this phenomenon. In the introduction she states:
Of all the truly seismic shifts transforming daily life today — deeper than our financial fissures, wider even than our most…
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