Tanner Lectures on Human Values, The Vol. 27$35.00Edited by Grethe B. Peterson 296 pp., 6 x 9 The Tanner Lectures on Human Values, founded July 1, 1978, at Clare Hall, Cambridge University, was established by the American scholar, industrialist, and philanthropist Obert Clark Tanner. Lectureships are awarded to outstanding scholars or leaders in broadly defined fields of human values, and transcend ethnic, national, religious, or ideological distinctions. From “Politics and Polarization” "The election in 2004 left our country deeply divided over whether the country is deeply divided. For some, America has become a politically polarized nation composed of people who detest George Bush and others who detest John Kerry, a split that in their view began even earlier, perhaps with the arguments over Bill Clinton in the 1990s, and that will continue well into the future as angry liberals confront equally angry conservatives.… By ‘polarized’… I mean an intense commitment to a candidate, culture, or an ideology that sets one group apart from people in a rival group. That commitment is revealed when a losing candidate is regarded not simply as wrong but as corrupt or wicked, when one culture is regarded as morally superior to every other one, or when one set of political beliefs are thought to be entirely correct and a rival set as wholly wrong.” Contents and Contributors Allan Gibbard, University of Michigan: “Thinking How to Live with Each Other” Margaret Marshall, Massachusetts Supreme Court: “Tension and Intention: The American Constitutions and the Shaping of Democracies Abroad” Ruth Reichl, Gourmet: “Why Food Matters” Marshall Sahlins, University of Chicago: “Hierarchy, Equality, and the Sublimation of Anarchy: The Western Illusion of Human Nature” James Q. Wilson, Pepperdine University: “Politics and Polarization” and “Religion and Polarization” |
