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The headline on September 12 read: “Fatherhood Cuts Testosterone, Study Finds, for Good of the Family.”   The article – on the front page of the NY Times – told of a recent study that found that becoming a father and engaging in childcare decreases a man’s testosterone levels. For the scientists who produced the study, and for the newspaper’s science reporter alike, there is but a single, inevitable (and thus extra-cultural) consequence of this reported drop in testosterone levels: it makes men, on their view, less likely to seek multiple sex partners and more likely to be monogamous.  The decrease in testosterone is thus “adaptive” to parenting, by virtue of it leading a man to be more anchored to a child’s mother—with the presumption (in the study and news report alike) being that the child in question is indeed the father’s genetic child (as well as the mother’s). What these scientists and the NY Times's science journalist are entirely blind to is the possibi...

Back on May 7th, the headline in the NY Times read: "Pitzer College in California Adds Major in Secularism." The problem is that this headline was simply false.  No major was proposed; and none was approved. The NY Times article also reported the founding of a "department of secular studies" at Pitzer College (along with the major).  The truth or falsity of this second claim is more complex than the claim about the major--but this claim too is largely misleading.   To start, Pitzer prides itself on not having any "departments."  The closest analog to "departments" at Pitzer are odd beasts known as "Field Groups," and these "Field Groups" come in two kinds at the College.  The kind that is most like a department at other colleges are known as "Type A" field groups; there are also "Type B" field groups (which I will explain in a moment).  And the grain of truth in the NY Times story was that Pitzer Colle...

In a speech today that is not getting the recognition it deserves for exhibiting political-surrealism, Sarah Palin said, "I want all of our GOP candidates to take the opportunity to kill corporate capitalism..."   One obvious observation, in response, is that if there is a place in U.S. politics for right-wing attacks on "corporate capitalism," then there would seem to be a place for left-wing attacks on "corporate capitalism"--ones free of Palin's bizarre cynicism and awful demagoguery.  This, in turn, suggests that the reason the Democratic party has, for decades, failed to provide any serious left-wing criticism of the harms done by "corporate capitalism" is not that this would not be politically viable, but that the leading figures of the Democratic party are fundamentally intent on protecting corporate capitalism.   Attacks from the right--as history shows us--really are not a threat to corporate capitalism, so from Palin and her ilk,...

All of the Republican presidential candidates, save John Huntsman, have positioned themselves as "skeptics" about both biological evolution and anthropogenic climate change.   And Rick Perry—perhaps the Republican frontrunner—has been particularly vociferous on these topics.   Attacks on the teaching of biological evolution in the U.S. have historically been linked to religion, specifically to "Christian Fundamentalism."   Yet, that climate change, along with biological evolution, is now a target of these attacks suggests that religion is not the whole story.   What, then, is it that makes attacks on "science" appealing for much of the Republican base at this time?   The answer, I think, is that in these attacks, "science" represents professional-managerial expertise and, by association, the professional-managerial classes themselves.   In this regard, it is crucial that science is generally taught in K-12 schools through appeals to authority. ...

Two news stories from US cities over the last week are worthy of  notice.  New York City announced that it would require sex-education in both middle schools and high schools, in an effort to reduce both teeange pregnancies and STD rates.  And Boston Mayor Thomas Menino announced that his city would no longer participate in the Federal government's so-called "Secure Communities" program, arguing that this program (which ostensibly targets undocumented persons who commit crimes) has "negatively impacting public safety."  These are just two data points, but together they suggest that it is our cities -- far more than either the Federal or state goverments -- that are a source of informed and responsible public policy-making in the United States at this moment.  Other examples one might cite include the impressive long-term planning that has been started by Chicago to deal with the impact of climate change and the slow...

The composition of the bipartisan Debt Ceiling Panel bodes ill for there being serious cuts in the U.S. military budget as part of any "second phase" deal to reduce the U.S. deficit.  Put simply, the states with large military contractors are fully, if not overly, represented on the Panel.   Of particular note on the Democratic side is Senator Patty Murray of Washington.   Progressive commentators have generally responded favorably to her appointment (and conservative voices have singled it out for criticism), but Boeing is a major employer in Washington (with some 30,000 workers in the state) and its PAC is a major source of campaign funds for Murray.  Almost certainly, for example, the cuts in military spending that would be triggered if the panel reaches no compromise would hit, and perhaps eliminate, the 35 billion dollar contract awarded to Boeing this past February ...

I spent Saturday evening at the renovated  Fox Theater in Pomona watching (for a second time) the very good new documentary, "The Desert of Forbidden Art ," and then moderating a panel discussion with its co-directors, Amanda Pope and Tchavdar Georgiev. The movie tells an extraordinary story about an eccentric art lover, Igor Savitsky, who, during the Soviet era, managed to establish a museum of "forbidden" art in the very-out-of-the-way desert city of Nukus ( check the map ! ). Along with providing a nuanced and appreciative portrait of Savitsky's defiance and commitment to art, the film explores the relationship between aesthetic value and the processes that transpose aesthetic value into monetary value (or to invoke an old-fashioned Marxist term, into exchange value ).  In addition -- like Herzog's recent film, Cave of Forgotten Dreams -- this is a film in which the camera both appreciates and guides our appreciation of wo...