NewsNote: The Hypersocialized Generation
Jeffery Zaslow of The Wall Street Journal opens his article with the story of a 17-year-old boy sent to the vice principal’s office after being caught sending text messages in class.  The vice principal, Steve Gallagher, told the boy to pay attention to the teacher, not to his cellphone.  Even as

NewsNote: Muslim Creationists and Western Elites — Get Out Much?
Every individual human being is embedded in a complex of culture, language, relationships, and ideas. What we see as normal is a product of our perception from within that embedded social location. It takes considerable intellectual effort to escape our own cultural cage. Furthermore, it is far easier to notice when others reveal their cultural assumption than when we reveal our own. That said, there is

Is Truth Really Plural? Postmodernism in Full Flower
The question of truth stands at the very center of the postmodern challenge. As with any major shift in human thinking, postmodernism comes packaged with both positive and negative elements. Positively, the general worldview of postmodernism reminds us that we are deeply embedded in cultural and linguistic systems that shape and influence our thinking. Furthermore, postmodernism can provide a corrective to epistemolo

NewsNote: Naughty Rodents — Your Brain without Dad
Do children need fathers? Fascinating research on that question is reported by Shirley S. Wang of The Wall Street Journal. Anna Katherina Braun, a German biologist, has been working with colleagues to understand the biological impact of single parenting.  Her research has focused on the degu, a small roden

NewsNote: Paganism “Just Another Religion?”
Samuel G. Freedman of The New York Times took a look at the resurgence of pagan religions and practices in postmodern America.  He found Michael York, a serious-minded pagan who observes Samhain “the autumnal new year for Pagans,” and the historic precursor to the modern holida