In the words of a favorite comic, something is wrong on the internet. In a previous essay, I demolished the notion that how we consume information on the internet, specifically the process of distilling and refining who we read, contributes to the “crisis” of political polarization in our country. So thorough was my excoriation of …
Author Archives: Bill Goodwin
What’s Wrong With the Internet: Part One
If there’s one thing that aging newspapermen, self-righteous politicians, and “civic-minded” pundits love to decry, it’s the pernicious effects on modern man of the internet echo chamber. To hear the neo-Nostradamus types tell it, the partisan love of dialogue ranks just below Pig-pen’s ablutomania, but with far less entertaining effects. We apparently are but days …
Dissent: He That Hath Not Sinned
Mr. Benavides whimsical trip into an antique curiosity shop raises a raft of compelling issues. Are unintentional “evils” really no less reprehensible? When does a person become complicit in an immoral transaction? Can material possessions acquire a permanent moral taint? I will defer these questions for the time being, though I hope to return to …
Dissent: Fluid Notions of Recompense
One line contains the core of McArthur’s complaint: “Whatever might be said for such a policy, there’s simply no getting around the following fact: it makes the violent depletion of a child’s bodily fluids into a state-sanctioned method of discipline.” The core of my claim: “Is it?” What’s so bad about losing blood? Sure, if …
Previously: The Trouble With Transparency
Lawrence Lessig thinks the transparency movement is unreasonable. Bill Goodwin thinks we should make it inreasonable.