,

issue nine fII winter 2000

contents

NEWS AND fEATUR.ES

6 NEWS HOUND Eugenics row, thinker of the millennium and a course closure

8 OPINiON Brian Leiter's regular column plus guest comment from Marilyn Mason

9 MEDiA WATCH A new look for our survey of philosophy and philosophers in the mass media

11 SHIFTING BELIEF Jeremy Stangroom Analysis of our survey into how philosophy shapes belief

ESSAYS

15 QUANTUM CONFUSiON Christopher Norris Should realists be worried about quantum mechanics?

18 THE SANTA WAGER Dennis Shawn Pruitt An argument to satisfy the doubting child

19 DOOMSDAY SOON? Nick Bostrum Have we under-estimated the chances that the end is nigh?

13 VELVET PHILOSOPHERS Julian Baggini The philosophers and the underground universities behind the Iron Curtain

Doomsday, p19

DISCUSSEON

23 OPEN DEBATE: THE MORAliTY OF DRUGS Paul MacDonald MacDonald replies to your objections to his article in TPM7

Quantum confusion, p15

28 DISCOURSE: THOUGHT AND THiNKER Michael Ignatieff and Ben Rogers discuss philosophy and biography contents 15

~iug the~aj9r politi£~d': details onp~ge 34

CONFERENCE BRIEFING

30 THE PROBLEM OF EVIL Susan Dwyer Christian Perring Philosophers and psychiatrists get together to discuss if evil is a case of madness or pure moral badness

THE PHILOSOPHERS' REVIEW

51 New publications reviewed including

HOBBES: A BIOGRAPHY A P Martinich Jonathan Walmsley

PHILOSOPHY, COMPUTING & THE iNTERNET Jeremy Stangroom

THE MACiNTYRE READER Ed. Kelvin Knight Claude Pehrson

THE MYTH OF LIBERAL INDIVIDUALISM Colin Bird Salam Hawa

PHILOSOPHY FOR DUMMIES Tom Morris Julian Baggini

PRIMERS Short articles on the basics

58 SNAPSHOTS HENRY SIDGWICK Bart Schultz THOMAS PAINE Robin Harwood

60 ETHICS MASTERCLASS Peter Singer discusses the classic objections to utilitarianism

REGULARS 21 PHILOSOPHY@THE.lNTERNET Jeremy Stangroom The best of the web

22 SCI-PHI Mathew Iredale The evolution of free will

27 THE CLINIC Tim lebon Philosophical counselling

57 DARRYL'S DIARY Darryl Stafh.md Philosophy events

62 Q&A The questions that really count

63 BERTRAND'S BREAK Sue Johnson Concise or cryptic crossword

64 LETTERS 66 THE SKEPTiC Wendy Grossman

The Philosophers' Magazine/Winter 2000