Book Description
Learn to utilize the Law of Attraction to attain anything you want! Learn the science behind this remarkable ability, and eliminate all blocks that stand between you and extreme wealth
Customer Reviews:
A Three Timer.......2007-09-06
This was indeed a good read and uplifting to one's basic inner instincts just what we need in todays madding world! Bob is kind of a turn on as well.
Excellent Read........2007-08-24
Straight forward, honest, hard hitting style of writing for people who want more information and instructions on The Law of Attraction. This author obviously lives "The Secret" on a daily basis!!
Wealth beyond Reason.......2007-07-27
Just the perfect follow up ( or precurser) to The Secret. Both books pretty much support the thinking of the other and in many instances they clarify some points in boh books. An excellent read for those interested in improving their personal growth and emotional wealth as well as tangible wealth.
Understanding That You Are Deserving!.......2007-04-11
This is truly an amazing book. Bob brings about easy to understand strategies, principles, practices, advice, and so much more. Again, I say easy to understand, meaning not so deep it becomes meaningless to the general public. Bob is truly a mentor I intend to keep on my radar. I loved this book.
Very enlightening!!.......2007-03-30
I have read many books on the Law of Attraction over the last six months and although I kept learning new techniques and the foundations about why this law is absolutely true, I must admit that Wealth Beyond Reason has had a huge impact. The book is straight to the point about what you need to do to purposely and intentionally activate the law and why it simply does not work for most people (and how to avoid those mistakes). I can go on and on about how great of a book this is and since reading it, I have started to have some great results in my life.
In the past I might have seen these circumstances as "coincidence" but after reading the book I have learned how to leverage these experiences into acquiring more of what I want out of life. I highly recommend the book to anyone that is currently a student of Law of Attration.
Book Description
Rogues, published in France under the title Voyous, comprises two major lectures that Derrida delivered in 2002 investigating the foundations of the sovereignty of the nation-state. The term “État voyou” is the French equivalent of “rogue state,” and it is this outlaw designation of certain countries by the leading global powers that Derrida rigorously and exhaustively examines.
Derrida examines the history of the concept of sovereignty, engaging with the work of Bodin, Hobbes, Rousseau, Schmitt, and others. Against this background, he delineates his understanding of “democracy to come,” which he distinguishes clearly from any kind of regulating ideal or teleological horizon. The idea that democracy will always remain in the future is not a temporal notion. Rather, the phrase would name the coming of the unforeseeable other, the structure of an event beyond calculation and program. Derrida thus aligns this understanding of democracy with the logic he has worked out elsewhere. But it is not just political philosophy that is brought under deconstructive scrutiny here: Derrida provides unflinching and hard-hitting assessments of current political realities, and these essays are highly engaged with events of the post-9/11 world.
Customer Reviews:
Derrida Deconstructs the notion of "Rouge States".......2006-11-05
If you are in to Derrida, political science, contemporary political philosophy, understanding the contemporary political landscape, and notions of a new Democracy to come - this is a must read.
Book Description
What should be done about airplane safety and terrorism, global warming, polluted water, nuclear power, and genetically engineered food? Decision-makers often respond to temporary fears, and the result is a situation of hysteria and neglect--and unnecessary illness and death. Risk and Reason explains the sources of these problems and explores what can be done about them. It shows how individual thinking and social interactions lead us in foolish directions. Offering sound proposals for social reform, it explains how a more sensible system of risk regulation, embodied in the idea of a "cost-benefit state," could save many thousands of lives and many billions of dollars too--and protect the environment in the process. Cass R. Sunstein is the Karl N. Llewellyn Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago. Appointed by President Clinton to serve on the Advisory Committee on the Public Interest Obligations of Television Broadcasters. His many books include Republic.com (Princeton, 2001) and Designing Democracy (Oxford, 2001). He has worked in the United States Department of Justice and advised on law reform and constitution-making in many nations.
Customer Reviews:
A short review of 'Risk and Reason'.......2004-08-08
It is sometimes referred to as "emotional decision making", when after accidents which cause loss of life, government authorities decide to spend irrational huge budgets to try to prevent these accidental risks from happening again. This 2002-book of Prof. Sunstein from the U of Chicago explains the sources of such irrational behaviour and comes up with novel ideas what can be done about it. This book contains a great deal of new material, but it also draws on Sunstein's publications in the J of Risk and Uncertainty, Stan L Rev., and his 2001-book 'The cost-benefit state', amongst others.
The book gives the reader a lot of recent case studies, such as the sniper murders in the Washington DC area in fall 2002, the SARS epidemic, the Love Canal controversy in the 80s, as illustrations of people's unjustified fear, which in the same time neglects the real hazards, such as obesity, indoor air pollution, sun exposure, etc.
Risk and Reason advocates the government to produce cost benefit analyses (CBA) before choosing an emotional course of action. Sunstein argues in his book to see CBA as a pragmatic tool, designed to promote a better appreciation of the consequences of a certain regulation, rather than a form of unethical, barely human calculation, treating health and life as variables for some kind of huge maximising objective function. The author succeeds in delivering this message to the reader very well.
Sunstein urges toward four alternative strategies in optimal cost-saving risk regulation: disclosure of information to the public, economic incentives, risk reduction contracts and free market environmentalism. With the economic incentives he means financial penalties for harm producing behaviour, and tradable emission rights (similar as the Kyoto protocol is designed to reduce global warming. The alleged fact that risk creators might be given a right to create harm is shown to be false.
Political.......2003-08-14
Sunstein is a lawyer. He is neither a scientist nor an economist. His advocacy of (what he calls) "rational" and "scientific" models of risk evaluation appears to be motivated by politics, not good science or economics. Be wary of his methodology and his rigor.
Insights Into Rational Risk Management for IT Professionals.......2003-01-18
While this book focuses on government regulation of health and environmental risks (regulation is government-speak for risk management), IT risk managers can learn a lot about IT risk management from the book. For example, Chapter Three is entitled "Are Experts Wrong?", which will tell you why you need to be cautious about adopting "Best Practices." Chapter Five is entitled "Reducing Risks Rationally," just what every risk manager should be striving to do. Sunstein makes a very convincing case for the value of cost benefit analysis in managing risks. If you are responsible for risk management, get this book and read it.
Huge Helping of Reason, Needs Salt.......2002-12-02
The bottom line on this book is clear: our governance of risk to the public tends to be managed by political gut reaction rather than informed investigation; there is no clear doctrine for studying and articulating risk (for example, distinguishing between high risks to a few and low but sustained risks to the many, or between three levels of cost-benefit analysis so that choices can be made); and the best form of risk management may be through the effective communication of risk information to the public rather than imposed costs on private sector enterprises.
As reasoned as the book is, it also constitutes a direct attack on all those who expouse the "precautionary principle." While I do not agree completely with the author, who seems to feel that rational study allows for the discounting of any risk to the point where it can be economically and politically managed at an affordable cost, he certainly take the debate to an entirely new level and his book is--quite literally--worth tens of billions of dollars in potential regulatory risk savings.
Most compelling is his methodical aggregation of data from several sources to show that the cost of saving one life (he notes that we fail to distinguish adequately between a life saved for a few years and a life saved for many years, or between young lives saved for a lifetime and old lives saved for a brief span of time). Table 2.1 on page 30 is quite astonishing--of 45 major regulated risks, one (drinking water) costs over $92 billion per premature death averted; eight including asbestos cost between $50 million and $4 billion; seven including arsenic and copper cost between $13 million and $45 million; 14 including various electrical standards cost between $1 million and $10 million per death averted; and 15 cost less than $1 million per death averted.
What cost human life? Even on this there is no standard, and even within a single regulatory agency (e.g. the Environmental Protection Agency) there are different calculations used in relation to different risks being regulated. The author does a really fine job of comparing the public perception of the value of a life saved ($1.3 million for automobile-related risks, $103 million for aviation-related risks) with the values used by the government and the courts, which vary widely (into the billions) but seem to hover between $10 million and $30 million per life saved and without regard the the number of life-years actually involved.
The heart of the book is in its conclusion, where the author proposes a four-part strategy for dramatically reducing the cost of regulatory risk management, suggesting that we focus on 1) disclosure of information to the public; 2) economic incentives; 3) risk reduction contracts; and 4) free market environmentalism. With respect to the latter, he is strongly supportive of allowing the "sale" of pollution privileges between nations and industries and companies.
For additional observations on reducing risk to the future of life see my reviews of Joe Thorton on "Pandora's Poison," Raffensperger and Tickner on "Protecting Public Health & The Environment," Novacek on "The Biodiversity Crisis," Czech on "Shoveling Fuel for a Runaway Train," Lomberg on "The Skeptical Environmentalist," Helvarg on "Blue Frontier," and Wilson's "The Future of Life."
Cass Sunstein and Lawrence Lessig join Jerry Berman and Marc Rotenberg and Mike Godwin as America's "top guns" in responsible law-making. This book makes a great deal of sense, is worth a great deal of money, and should guide the future evolution of regulatory and information-driven risk management.
Book Description
Here at last is the account of the O.J. Simpson case that no one else has dared to write, that no one else could write. In Outrage, the famed prosecutor of Charles Manson and bestselling author of Helter Skelter goes to the heart of the trial that divided the country and made a mockery of justice. Vincent Bugliosi, who never lost a murder case, brilliantly outlines the five reasons why O.J. Simpson got away with murder: the worst possible jury, a sloppy and incomplete prosecution, a fatal change of venue, judicial error that allowed the defense to play the race card, and a weak summation and rebuttal that barely addressed the defense's frame-up and conspiracy theories. He reveals:
--The offer Marcia Clark and Bill Hodgman should never have refused.
--The bluff that saved the defense's cardboard case.
--What Deputy Sheriff Jeff Stuart overheard when Rosey Grier visited Simpson in jail.
--The 17 words Johnnie Cochran used to cover his argument that could have been his undoing if caught.
--Why the jurors never heard Simpson's first police interview-- filled with self-incriminating statements that alone could have convicted him of murder.
1. What mistake in jury selection could have cost Marcia Clark the trial--even before she argued the case?
2. What did Simpson do to make sure the gloves wouldn't fit?
3. How did Judge Ito's behavior towards Marcia Clark prejudice the jury?
4. Why did the prosecutors suppress Simpson's "smoking gun"?
5. How did Johnnie Cochran con the jury?
6. Who might really have suggested that Simpson try on the evidence gloves?
Customer Reviews:
Had Bugliosi been the prosecutor, Simpson would have been put away without parole - where he belongs!.......2007-10-01
In light of O.J. Simpson's latest legal troubles (to which I now firmly believe in the power of "what goes around comes around"), I must say that I was completely bored with the so-called "Trial of the Century" media circus in 1995 and did not believe, for one second, that Simpson was remotely innocent (it's nice to see, all these years later, how his most vociferous defenders then have changed their tune now).
The American legal system is a complete joke and the media circus of the O.J. Simpson trial proved it ... and then some! The whole thing reminded me of the so-called "Manson Family" trial in 1970 (that I read about in newspapers on microfilm) for the murders of Sharon Tate, et. al., the previous year. So it's very fitting that retired Los Angeles District Attorney Vincent Bugliosi, who put that clown Manson and his pack of zombies away, would comment on another media circus that would occur a quarter of a century later where the victims were, once again, completely forgotten.
I firmly believe had Mr. Bugliosi prosecuted Simpson, he would have been in the can - without the possibility of parole - right where he belongs!
District Attorneys Marcia Clark and Christopher Darden, along with judge Lance Ito, were more concerned with becoming celebrities than in doing their jobs - and that was to be the voice of Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman in the courtroom. It was a given that Simpson's so-called legal "Dream Team" would turn the proceedings into a circus, but the judge and the DAs played the game, too, and it left doubts as to the level of their professionalism (and rightfully so).
At 19 years old, I was so disgusted with reading and hearing about Marcia Clark's hairdo, whether or not Clark and Darden had something going, how Ito shaved his face this week that I would run away from the TV everytime the proceedings were on or if the case was being covered on the nightly news. I know now, as I knew then, that I didn't miss anything - and Mr. Bugliosi's book reinforced that point.
I read Mr. Bugliosi's book not too long after its release and I concur with another reviewer in that if there's anyone who still believes in Simpson's "innocence," this book will shatter that ... and then some!
Mr. Bugliosi does what a competent attorney would (and should) do and that is making Swiss cheese of the other side's case. He ripped everyone involved with this case brand new ones - he shot major holes through the defense, but also appropriately ripped Clark and Darden for being more concerned with fame than in doing their jobs.
I'm not crazy about DAs or the legal system in general, but folks such as Vincent Bugliosi are one of the very few bright spots of the entire legal system.
Sometimes one can't help but feel the system is aptly titled the "criminal justice" system and I certainly felt that way after the verdict was read (and then to hear those biased jurors say they believed he was guilty, but let him off because of the Rodney King brouhaha really soured me on the whole jury thing).
But if every lawyer - defense attorney, district attorney, even judges - had the same set of legal standards and integrity that Vincent Bugliosi displayed during his career (who lost exactly one murder case out of a hundred in his career, among other case wins), I honestly believe the public wouldn't be so down on lawyers. His professionalism certainly comes through in this book. - Donna Di Giacomo
Maybe overwritten, never overstated.......2007-07-13
Reading, and re-reading parts of this book, cause this layman to wonder why some points were either mis-handled by the Prosecution or simply ignored. Bugliosi brilliantly points out how they consistently let their witnesses appear as incompetents or liars; how they mishandled *the* key piece of evidence - why would the man on trial use this evidence against himself in view of the whole world?; why wouldn't they discuss the Bronco chase?. I reflected upon them not using the witness (considered an undependable "star-gazer") to a person resembling O.J. Simpson driving erratically at about 10:50pm [though her violation of deposition security standards was enough to invalidate her taking the stand]; not making reference to a recently completed motion picture starring (or featuring?) the man on trial playing a character who murders people in the night, using a similiar weapon? (Just maybe these images were still in his head after the film was completed?). Why the Prosecution team couldn't simply state up front that "We are here to prove that the blood of *three* people was found at that scene; and one of those people sits at the Defense desk in this Courtroom" (?).
Bugliosi scrutinizes, with microscopic vision, the way a courtroom, the place where the law is administered in the eyes of God, into low slapstick. He doesn't look for reasons outside the trial - he simply analyses the scene, and then we can look at it with a combination of dismay and hope.
Absolutely Brilliant..........2007-06-19
Too bad Bugliosi couldn't have prosecuted this case...Orenthal James Simpson would be behind bars today if he had.
I, like the author, watched with disgust as Simpson got away with the brutal murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman. When I saw this book in my local bookstore several years ago, I snatched it up. I knew that Vincent Bugliosi had written "Helter Skelter" about his prosecution of the Manson family, and that was one of the scariest things I had ever read...I could also see, by the title of this book, that Mr. Bugliosi was as revolted by the spectacle of the Simpson trial as I was.
He points out the many, many mistakes made by the prosecution in this case, which ought to have been a clear win but instead turned into what could almost be called a comedy of errors...if it wasn't such a tragedy.
For the reviewer who stated that Nicole was a party girl, etc....who cares if she was?? She did not deserve to be slaughtered, nor did Ron Goldman.
O.J. Simpson did these crimes and is walking around free, playing golf, smiling, and laughing it up. One can only hope for an afterlife, so that Mr. Simpson can finally get what's coming to him...an eternity in hell.
Honest, Straight-Forward Analysis of the OJ Trial.......2006-11-10
Bugliosi details all of the mistakes made during the prosecution of OJ Simpson. He describes outlandish mistakes by both the prosecution and the defense and how, given the volume of damning evidence, the case should have been a slam-dunk. Lawyers are too much like politicians--getting caught up in the media coverage and focusing way too much on appearances, forgetting the substance of the situation. You'll see exactly why this was the most famous and most screwed-up trial in American history. Fie on the whole lot of them, including Simpson. Great reading!
Or How I Would Have Won.......2006-09-21
Vincent Bugliosi, author and prosecutor who successfully convicted Charles Manson as conspirator in the Helter Skelter murders of Sharon Tate and the LaBiancos, catalogues the mistakes of the prosecution, the judge, the media, the jury and the case.
In short, Bugliosi states what the defense should have not been allowed to do, what the judge and prosecution should have done, and how the jury should have responded. In other words, had he been prosecutor, he tells us how he would have done it differently and won.
We learn the results of O.J.'s lie detector results here. He scored a minus 22. This is about the lowest score a person can receive. He lied. We also learn how Bugliosi would have attacked the defense's assertion that the three (white) detectives conspired to convict O.J. Simpson with planted evidence.
Bugliosi's argument is that conspiracy to frame a person charged with a crime punishable by death is itself a crime punishable by death in California. The defense would have had us believe that two detectives on the verge of retirement would have entered into a conspiracy with a detective they didn't know (Mark Fuhrman), and plant or taint evidence against Simpson because they were racist. For their supposed racism, they would have risked their careers, pension, jail and death to get Simpson. Bugliosi makes a strong argument here that this would have been a stretch especially for three savvy detectives. The prosecution failed to challenge this wild assertion.
He makes Judge Ito out to be what he was, a man who bent over backwards to appease the media and the defense when the latter should have been held in contempt many times.
This is about the trial more than the story of O.J. Simpson, a man whose story has divided a nation in a way that hasn't occurred until our current political divisions.
Like more than half the nation, I am so convinced that he did commit those murders, I would bet the mortgage, and my career.
Sadly, the belief in innocence or guilt falls right along racial lines.
Average customer rating:
- Pragmatism, the Law, and the Political Economy of Sexuality
- Fun and Fascinating
- A Mind-opening Book
- Posner and the Sexual Revolution
- A Major Breakthrough
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Sex and Reason
Richard A. Posner
Manufacturer: Harvard University Press
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ASIN: 0674802802 |
Book Description
Sexual drives are rooted in biology, but we don't act on them blindly. Indeed, as the eminently readable judge and legal scholar Richard Posner shows, we make quite rational choices about sex, based on the costs and benefits perceived.
Drawing on the fields of biology, law, history, religion, and economics, this sweeping study examines societies from ancient Greece to today's Sweden and issues from masturbation, incest taboos, date rape, and gay marriage to Baby M. The first comprehensive approach to sexuality and its social controls, Posner's rational choice theory surprises, explains, predicts, and totally absorbs.
Customer Reviews:
Pragmatism, the Law, and the Political Economy of Sexuality.......2006-12-08
Judge Richard Posner's 'Sex and Reason' has influenced me more then any book I recently read, lead me to a complete reevaluation of what the Law is, and what it should be.
In this review I wish to concentrate less on Judge Posner's approach to the regulation of sex, although we will get there, but to his general approach to Jurisprudence. Becuase if 'Sex and Reason' taught me anything, it is that the way lawyers 'do' the Law is in need of thorough revision.
From my perspective as a third year law student in Israel, most of what the Law deals with is the meaning of words. Lawyers and Judges argue about whether or not various actions fall into various legal categories, and, particularly, about ways of interpreting statues and precedents. The main questions are 'how should one interperate the law'? and 'By what method does one decide which interpretation of the Law is best'?
In the United States, the main 'field of battle' regarding these questions are between the various Originalist positions (roughly, those who believe that words in statues mean what the people who wrote them meant), textualists (those who believe that texts should be read to be internally consistent) and living conbstitutionalists (the ones who believe that times change and the constitution - indeed, all laws - change with the times).
In Israel, the main contribution is by former Supreme Court Chief Justice and professor of Law, Aharon Barak. By Barak's lights, statutory interpretation is not originalist, nor is it textualist ("the interpretor is not a linguist" is his famous catchphrase - sounds better in Hebrew). Rather, Barak subscribes to a form of Living Constitutionalism which for want of a better term I'll call contextualism (Sometimes, misleadingly in my view, refered to as 'Purposive appraoch') - Barak argues that you can learn about the meaning of laws and decisions from their wider environment - the principles, laws and mores of the society. When faced with a legal question, Barak will strive for Harmoney not with the language of other statues, but with their intentions, so that all Law would create a single, ideologically cogent, fabric. In paraphrasing Hillary Rodham Clinton, one may say that according to Barak, It Takes a Village to decipher a Law.
I emphasises these different approaches in order to demonstrate that the criteria by which we decide whether an interpretation of the law is good are very unclear. But accept, for the moment, that one of these goals is superior to the others, and that we can evalutate various interpretations based on these criteria; We are still left with the question of what the marginal untility of trying to improve our interprative approach according to one of these criteria is.
Suppose a new study slightly imroves our understanding of the original meaning of the U.S. Constitution. Let's say that after a great deal of historical study and analysis, professor A has improved our understanding of the meaning of a certain clause by 5 %. Now interpretations are 5% more likely to correspond to the original understanding of the terms in question.
Well, so what? Are we, as a society, better off because we get a slight improvement in statue interpretation? That is highly unlikely. Even if we accept that one method of interpretation is correct, that does not mean that its outcomes are good. Indeed, it is unlikely that s study of 18th century political philosophy, or a comperative study of the spirit of law, will lead to good social outcomes. If you accept that it will, congratulations: you have just passed from the domain of Jurisprudence to the realm of theology.
From of social point of view, imrpoving stuatory interpretation based on any of the above criteria is a huge waste of time; a great deal of effort and resources are spent on things that will not, frankly, matter.
What I glimpse in Richard Posner's 'Sex and Reason' is an alternative: Pragamtism. The alternative is implicit here; I assume, not having read any of his other books (but I do frequest his excellent Blog, written jointly with econmist Gary Becker), that this approach is developed further elsewhere.
'Pragmatism', as I understand it, is about making positive statements about the consequences of various legal rules, and then chosing the best one. This requires sound theoretical analysis (Posner, and I, see the foundation of it in economics, but in principleit can be founded on psychology, anthropology, sociology, or many other fields, and Posner used reasearch from all these fields in his book) of the situation, and especially empirical research to find if the theory holds. Thus, a pragmatic approach to the questions of legal interpretations and doctrine requires first making positive inquiries into the subject; Only then should we make a normative judgement.
An example for this kind of reasoning would be the case for the supply of contraception to Teenagers. In the United States, some conservatives oppose supplying sexual education and contraception to Teenagers, and promote abstinence instead (in prgrams such as "The Silver Ring Thing", "True Love Waits", and "Free Teens"). Reasearch, however, demonstrated that such programs rarely decrease the negative side effects of Teenage sexuality such as unwanted pregnancy and disease (pp. 270-271). As Posner writes "the idea that puritanism may actually increase ... unwanted births is difficult to accept, but ... only because effective puritanism... would have the oppositve effect. A Puritan ethic that has only a modest effect in reducing the amount of teenage sex may produce more teenage pregnencies and unwanted births than moral indifference to such activity would" (p.272).
Now, in my view, this kind of analysis should be paramount in deciding legal questions such as whether government support for abstinence programs should be deemed constitutional. Perhaps the legal rethoric allowing the government to fund such projects is powerful - but legal niceties should not obscure the underlining realities.
Fun and Fascinating.......2005-12-17
Judge Posner is the finest legal mind of the current age, and "Sex and Reason" is precisely what you'd expect from him. Bemoaning the lack of empirical study that supports modern day sexual jurisprudence, the author takes it upon himself to correct the oversight. Empiricism is not wanting in the book; footnotes are omnipresent, filled with broad support and delightful nuggets.
The book begins with an investigation of sexuality throughout the ages. Sociobiological principles are explained and taken as postulates (women, on average, seek quality, whereas men seek quantity). Posner builds his model of rational sex--dismissing easily typical objections to economic modeling of human behavior--and usng it, attempts to unearth truths about some of the more risque periods of history. We are treated to an analysis of Greek pederasty, the rise of companionate marriage in the Christian church, prostitution throughout the ages, countless other subjects.
Modern sexual jurisprudence is investigated: Griswold is discussed, critiqued, defended. Utilitarian approaches are ventured forth in an attempt to justify Roe. Posner discusses cultural policy issues at the helm of modern debate, and offers us his own bright proposals: a free market in adoption, for instance, coupled with a thorough and unabashed defense.
Richard Posner's mind is nimble. His arguments are fun, light, powerful, thrown forth quickly into the crucible. So criticize what he says: one gets the feeling Posner wants nothing less. Be fascinated as insights are bred from left field. The book will make you think (about sex, no less, as if a person needed any prodding in that direction), make you smile, and it will make you, as it made me, quite impressed with a certain seventh circuit jurist.
A Mind-opening Book.......2002-03-30
Reading Judge Posner's book is a humbling experience. Much of what I thought I knew about sex is a tiny fraction of what this book has documented, analyzed and argued.
I have known that many early Greek luminaries, such as Plato, Socrates and Sophocles were homosexual. This book puts these mere points of interest in a wholly different light by exploring the social settings of the early Grecian (Athenian) society: that the early marriages were not companionate, that women in that society, including wives, were sequestered, that boys and girls were raised separately, and not by the mother, that pederasty was almost an accepted social institution, etc.
I have always believed that homosexuality is a rooted genetically, although it is not binary factor. This book puts homosexuality, through the use of the "Kinsey scale", into different degrees and clearly distinguishes between homosexual tendency and homosexual activity, and defines the opportunistic homosexual in economic terms. With very simple reasoning, this book explains why urbanization seems (only seems) to foster homosexuality and the emergence of homosexual enclaves such as San Francisco and New York.
This book also explains, again through an economic model, why the black men in this country seem (again, only seem!) to be sexually aggressive and promiscuous, whereas sexual abuse of off-spring children (girls) have a higher incidence in white households.
I am also enlightened on how the child birth, which in the early days often caused the death of the mother, created serial polygamy (polygyny, to be more precise) and that the widower, who were older and more economically established men, puts young bachelors at a competitive disadvantage in securing a mate, especially in the early industrial society where the cost of marriage was high.
I am enlightened to the role of the Church as the promoter of companionate marriage and how its fairly profound effect on this social institution. And also why the Church "overtly condoned prostitution and covertly condoned monastic homosexuality."
There are many other issues, such as infanticide, fornication, adultery, divorce, coercive and abusive sex, pornography, adoption, surrogate child-bearing ... to which Judge Posner gave interesting and informative treatment.
The thoroughness with which Judge Posner analyzes a problem is unmatched. Although I am not always completely convinced by his reasoning (because some of the arguments are necessarily qualitative and intuitive,) but the plausibility is striking. And I am frequently amazed by the different angles with which he looks at an issue, and the amount of facts and data he brings forth to support his views. When facts contradict what his theory predicts, he graciously points that out. In the conclusion of the book, Judge Posner, with scholarly grace and modesty, points out that his work was exploratory, a learning process for himself, and was not being presented as definitive.
Judge Posner's writing style is very good. The book is never boring, though some of the information and arguments are repeated due to the inter-relatedness of many of the issues. Throughout the book, the Judge's remarkable analytic skill can be felt. At one point, the Judge mercilessly took apart the New Jersey Supreme Court's opinion of the Baby M case (Stern vs. Whitehead) and clearly showed how judges, lacking knowledge on the subject matter and often ignorant about economics, proceeded to vote their own prejudices, and substituted rhetoric and sloppy logic for judicial analysis. This one episode, which clearly illustrates the reason he wrote this book, as he stated in the introduction, is worth the price of the book.
How many judges are as good as Judge Posner? Since he has published so much, chances of his ever being nominated and confirmed to be a justice of the High Court must be pretty slim, considering the infamous borking effect. This is just as well. I wishfully think his publications probably has a greater influence on the society, especially the legal community, than if he were appointed a justice.
Having read several of Judge Posner's books, I mark him down as one of a handful of top-notch intellectuals in my estimation.
Posner and the Sexual Revolution.......2000-08-14
Chief Judge Posner's book is an erudite and interesting one. Whilst often regarded as a conservative for his scholarly analysis of economic issues in a market economy, this book is not conservative. It appears basically supportive of the sexual revolution. Its utility is at its greatest when it applies neutral economic analysis to the social aspects of sex. It is at its weakest when in the enthusiasm for the novelty and power of its analytical insights, it at least appears to derive moral or normative conclusions that do not necessarily follow from the positive analysis. It reflects the dangers that both libertarian Austrian economists, such as Ludwig von Mises and social democratic economists have both seen in trying to apply insights derived from markets to non-market transactions - here sexual ones. Accordingly, whilst Chief Judge Posner speaks supportively of certain aspects of Swedish policy in relation to sexual matters and expressly and by inference against the traditional conservative Judeo-Christian attitudes to sex in those areas, economic analysis does not dictate that viewpoint. Values dictate that choice, but economics can illumine the consequences of those choices. In sum, an able, readable, but a very personal work, which could be read by those who are not familiar with the limits to the economic analysis of law - an area Posner has brilliantly contributed so much to - as conclusively determinative of issues which cannot be resolved by that positive analysis alone. Whilst less accessible in view of the use of math, Professor Becker's works are closer to a neutral analysis of many of these important questions.
A Major Breakthrough.......2000-07-06
In this book Richard Posner manages to singlehandedly turn legal scholarship on its head. He examines human sexuality from a myriad of perspectives--literature, sociology, evolutionary biology, morality, and history. He does so with impeccable scholarship, demonstrating not only that he is widely read in these diverse areas, but that he has something to say. The book is worth reading for just that.
But Posner's more impressive accomplishment is his singular approach to the regulation of human sexual behavior. His rational choice, economics of law approach is compelling. Even if you are not entirely convinced, Posner builds a powerful case for both academic and policy debate.
Posner's approach contrasts with most legal scholarship, which is lifeless and rarely bothers to consider the social sciences. Posner's book shows the intergal link between law, politics, and economics. It is also approachable and direct. You can't read Sex and Reason and not feel your deeply held beliefs directly challenged by a kind and discerning intellect. He is passionate, articulate, and eminently readable.
Posner's book has become a lightening rod in legal circles and is a must read for any serious reader in the area.
Book Description
Is legal reasoning rationally persuasive, working within a discernible structure and using recognisable kinds of arguments? Does it belong to rhetoric in this sense, or to the domain of the merely 'rhetorical' in an adversative sense? Is there any reasonable certainty about legal outcomes in dispute-situations? If not, what becomes of the Rule of Law? Neil MacCormick's book tackles these questions in establishing an overall theory of legal reasoning which shows the essential part 'legal syllogism' plays in reasoning aimed at the application of law, while acknowledging that simple deductive reasoning, though always necessary, is very rarely sufficient to justify a decision. There are always problems of relevancy, classification or interpretation in relation to both facts and law. In justifying conclusions about such problems, reasoning has to be universalistic and yet fully sensitive to the particulars of specific cases. How is this possible? Is legal justification at this level consequentialist in character or principled and right-based? Both normative coherence and narrative coherence have a part to play in justification, and in accounting for the validity of arguments by analogy. Looking at such long-discussed subjects as precedent and analogy and the interpretative character of the reasoning involved, Neil MacCormick expands upon his celebrated Legal Reasoning and Legal Theory (OUP 1978 and 1994) and restates his 'institutional theory of law'.
Book Description
This noteworthy book develops a new theory of the natural law that takes its orientation from the account of the natural law developed by Thomas Aquinas, as interpreted and supplemented in the context of scholastic theology in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
Though this history might seem irrelevant to twenty-first-century life, Jean Porter shows that the scholastic approach to the natural law still has much to contribute to the contemporary discussion of Christian ethics. Aquinas and his interlocutors provide a way of thinking about the natural law that is distinctively theological while at the same time remaining open to other intellectual perspectives, including those of science.
In the course of her work, Porter examines the scholastics' assumptions and beliefs about nature, Aquinas's account of happiness, and the overarching claim that reason can generate moral norms. Ultimately, Porter argues that a Thomistic theory of the natural law is well suited to provide a starting point for developing a more nuanced account of the relationship between specific beliefs and practices. While Aquinas's approach to the natural law may not provide a system of ethical norms that is both universally compelling and detailed enough to be practical, it does offer something that is arguably more valuable — namely, a way of reflecting theologically on the phenomenon of human morality.
Customer Reviews:
Looking ahead by looking back.......2005-07-15
After reading this book twice, I've come to the conclusion that Dr. Porter is on to something that the rest of us mere mortals can find useful in our understanding of natural law and the compelling argument she gives us to turn back to the Scholastics, especially Aquinas, to find our own way to think and live in accordance with virue in twenty-first century society. This is not an easy book for those not familiar with Dr. Porter's work. ("The Recovery of Virtue" is a wonderful first introduction to this brilliant scholar and beautiful writer.) However, keep at it and you will partake in a thoughtful, cogent argument on the importance of Scholastic views on morality that would serve us well today.
Amazon.com
"We met no Jimmy Cagneys or Robert Mitchums among the inmates in the prisons we visited. We found ourselves, rather, in the company of a pathetic crew of intellectually limited, dysfunctional, half-mad, occasionally explosive losers. Long before these men wound up on death row, their similarly limited, primitive, impulsive parents had raised them in the only fashion they knew.... These brutish parents had set the stage on which our condemned subjects now found themselves playing out the final act. It was a drama generations in the making."
Psychiatrist Dorothy Otnow Lewis, working in a professional partnership with neurologist Jonathan Pincus, has been steadily accumulating and publishing (in medical journals) evidence that almost all vicious criminals have some combination of (1) a childhood of abuse and/or neglect, (2) brain injuries through accident or abuse, and (3) psychotic symptoms, especially paranoia. This fascinating and well-written book, aimed at a wide audience, takes the form of a memoir in which Lewis tells us about the events that led her to study violent patients and about some of her more interesting cases, especially those on death row. Far from being another shallow "oh wow" book about conversations with horrifying killers, this is a thoughtful, humane examination of the horrible experiences that most murderers have endured, and a penetrating analysis of how subtle signs of brain damage in these people have been missed by other researchers. Lewis has an engagingly humble and personal way of writing about her experiences, which makes her findings all the more credible. --Fiona Webster
Book Description
Everyone has felt the urge to kill. Most people don't kill. Some people do. Dorothy Otnow Lewis, a psychiatrist and an internationally recognized expert on violence, has spent the last quarter century studying the differences between those who do and those who don't. Among the murderers she has examined are the notorious killers Ted Bundy, Arthur Shawcross, and Mark David Chapman, the man who shot John Lennon. Now, she shares her groundbreaking discoveries--and the chilling encounters that led to them.
Guilty by Reason of Insanity is the gripping, brilliantly written true story of Dr. Lewis's search to understand those who kill. The unforgettable cases revealed here clearly illustrate how the disparate elements of brain damage, paranoia, and family brutality combine to create a killer.
It starts at a juvenile court in New Haven. A thirteen-year-old girl--out of the blue, in broad daylight--has stabbed her best friend to death before an audience of gaping classmates. Dr. Lewis convinces her colleague, the eminent neurologist Jonathan Pincus, to help her figure out why. Thus begins a collaboration that continues to this day.
The passion to understand the underpinnings of violence draws the Lewis-Pincus team to the psychiatric and forensic wards of New York City's Bellevue Hospital, and then to prisons around the country--eventually leading to the corridors of death row and to an infamous gallery of condemned killers.
There we meet a thirty-six-year-old woman who forms a sexual attachment to a fourteen-year-old boy. Together, they kidnap, torture, and ultimately murder a teenaged girl. Suddenly, in the midst of the interview with the doe-eyed, soft-spoken murderess, a menacing, male persona appears and Dr. Lewis finds herself face-to-face with her first case of multiple personality disorder, a condition she never before believed existed.
We sit in on the psychiatric evaluation of a condemned boy who, at seventeen, raped and murdered a seventy-six-year-old nun. Only after his death does Dr. Lewis discover the grotesque secrets of his childhood that finally explain his murderous rage and his bizarre choice of victim.
Powerful, controversial, and utterly absorbing--including an intense final interview with an executioner--Guilty by Reason of Insanity is a tour de force, a compelling odyssey of one extraordinary psychiatrist striking a delicate balance between emotion and objectivity. It will forever change the way you think about crime, punishment, and the law itself.
Customer Reviews:
An Invitation to Voyeuristic Readers.......2007-05-31
This book has the attraction of a car wreck. Ooh, look, somebody's worse off than me!
It's interesting in a time-passing way, but the evidently low priority it occupied in the author's and publisher's minds is evidenced by several howling bloopers, of which the worst is on page 187 of the hardbound version, where pathetic proofreading produces the sentence,
"A death row psychiatrist's allegiance is torn between Hypocrites and the state." Umm, really? How about Hippocrates?
If you can get the book free and wish a pastime of creepy head cases, this is the book for you.
The Author is Guilty of being Delusional.......2006-11-11
I had the misfortune to waste several hours reading this tripe and would have to put it down, shake my head, and marvel at how naive a "trained professional" could be. I am a criminal defense attorney and have become a pretty good detector as to when I am being conned. Dr. Lewis fails to possess this quality and actually manages to feel compassion for someone like Ted Bundy and many other cold-blooded killers that she profiles. Sure, a crummy home life can scar you for life, but there are plenty of people who had crummy lives as children and have managed to live their lives without harming anyone - much less brutally murdering someone. Give me a break - some people just come out of the box broken and the only way to "fix" them is to remove them from society...permanently.
Excellent Read, but..........2006-04-29
I started reading this book, and found myself unwilling to put it down until I completed it. It confirmed what many of us in mental health services believe- that killers are created, not born. There were a few elements missing that I would have liked to see in the book. I wonder what the prevalence or the changes in killers post-Reagan era, when federal funding was drastically cut to mental health services (especially psychiatric hospitals). I can't help but think if psychotic parents weren't able to have children and torture them, would there be less killers today. I was disappointed to find that Dr. Otnow did not reference any treatments to help her clients. As a therapist, I would want to know if there are effective treatments available to utilize with human beings so damaged. Despite these deficits, it is still a great read.
harrowing look at the consequences of torturous childhood abuse.......2006-01-31
Dorothy O. Lewis has dedicated her life's work to study why human beings murder. Her impressive, excellent book "Guilty by Reason of Insanity: A Psychiatrist Explores the Minds of Killers" is a harrowing read. It is shocking to learn about the actual acts of murder. They are usually seen as nothing but completely senseless evil acts-until the appalling, perverted physical and sexual violence and abuses, which these murderers had endured as children, come to light. Exposed to brutal, merciless whippings, beatings, and abused in abhorrent ways as sexual slaves-some of them through being sodomized-they had to manage to survive their childhoods from hell in a constant state of terror. Many people still want to believe that people are born evil; or that evilness afflicts a person out of nowhere; or that some innate evilness makes a human being kill. But that is not true.
The murderers whom we get to know in this gripping book have been through unspeakable horrors. They have damaged brains and mental illnesses. But the decisive and common factor for murderous acts is the experience of extremely traumatic childhood abuse. In many cases the barbaric, perverted torture caused the mind of the tortured child to split into multiple personalities. Dorothy Lewis, trained at Yale in a traditional, psychoanalytic way, could at first not recognize this devastating reality that helped these children survive and dissociate from their unbearable ordeals. Her interviews, wherein she gains a murderer's trust so that the split personalities dare to come out and communicate with her-with their own names and characteristics, like a different way to talk, to look, to move-are stunning, shocking, and painfully fascinating.
Why do we look at murderers only as evil, perverted people who just must be put away or even silenced forever through the death penalty? Why don't we try to gain all possible information about what produced their crimes? To understand what makes a murderer kill does not mean to excuse the crime or to let him or her out of jail. Society has the right to be protected. But we could learn so much from every murderer about the origins of terrible killings and how to prevent them-if we felt the responsibility to find out the reality and truth, and the reasons behind them. Thus, we could create a new, vitally important awareness about the devastating dangers and consequences of permitting violence against children.
It is a great loss for humanity's growth that society is so blind, deaf and without any compassion for the ordeals of the victims of unfathomably monstrous childhood torture, which these murderers had to endure over and over again. In their interviews with Dorothy Lewis, they shared what happened to them often for the first time in their lives. Many of them could not remember any of it and could not explain why they had scars on their backs, their behinds and other parts of their bodies. Only dissociated parts, formed by their minds to help them survive, remembered the horrific abuses. It was frustrating to read how long it took and how skilled the interviewer had to ask her questions until these harrowingly mistreated human beings would share anything about their past-which they did only when they had come to trust this bright and sensitive psychiatrist.
It was mind-boggling to read that they did not want to reveal what they had suffered as children because they were afraid to paint their parents in a `bad light' and to loose their families if they did so-which they feared especially when they were close to their executions and any information about their own plights might have saved their lives. Their parents were nothing but relieved if the truth remained a secret, hidden away-even if it meant that their child would be executed and had no chance of having his or her life spared through information that would throw light on their violent insanity.
It was moving and interesting to read how Dorothy Lewis describes her path from her confining training at Yale in the `Freudian tradition' to arrive at her realizations, brought about by her experiences through these interviews-that human beings, who suffer traumatic, barbaric abuse in childhood can become violent murderers and people with multiple minds.
Murders are nothing else but the visible final acts of too many acts of agonizing violence inflicted on powerless, helpless, defenseless, innocent children-a reality which society does not wish to recognize. Society only takes note, often in sensational ways, of this final act and how to punish the criminal who committed it-but does not wish to be informed about all the crimes of their parents and other caretakers that led to this crime.
Dorothy Lewis has worked together with Jonathan Pinkus, who has written the book "Base Instincts." They found three factors that need to come together to entice a murderous act: child abuse, mental illness, and brain damage. As I read about the cruelty and violence committed against these children, on a regular, often-daily basis, I wondered who would think that any adult could survive such ongoing torture, continuing for years, without severely damaging and traumatic consequences for his brain, mind, soul, body and sanity. Adults, tortured like that, would find sympathy and understanding, maybe even help. A child, in the possession and at the complete mercy of merciless, insane parents or other cruel, perverted abusers with power over the child, cannot find help or sympathy in his/her childhood-and rarely in court. Justice is a concept that never even touches these lives.
Excellent.......2005-03-13
This is a great book about a doctor who works with inmates on death row. She interviews famous people like Ted Bundy. It is really liberal minded though which didn't change my mind about the death penalty, but it was an interesting look from another person's perspective.
Book Description
Voted one of Christianity Today's 1996 Books of the Year!In his first book,
Darwin on Trial, Berkeley law professor Phillip E. Johnson took on the heavyweights of science. And he got their attention, even provoking a response from neo-Darwinist Stephen Jay Gould in the pages of
Scientific American. Now Johnson's back with a book that expands his critique from science to law, education and today's culture wars.Is God unconstitutional?Why is morality forced out of public school curriculum?Can Christians believe in God and evolution?Why aren't we getting anywhere in the debate over abortion?Will the Grand Unified Theory solve the riddle of the universe?Johnson dares to answer these and other tough, touchy questions. He reveals why naturalism (the philosophy that the material world is all there was, is and will be) has become "the established religious philosophy of America," supplanting Judeo-Christian belief. He shows how naturalism undergirds science, law, education and popular culture. And he argues that naturalism has even infiltrated the church--marginalizing opposition as irrational, and encouraging Christians to adopt a more "reasonable" stance.In
Reason in the Balance, Johnson writes energetically and persuasively--chapter by chapter zeroing in on the chinks in the argument for naturalism. He explores nearly every acre of today's cultural battlefield: God, sex education, evolution, abortion, cosmology and particle physics, what our public schools should teach, the basis of law, the meaning of reason and a few other things that matter. Armed with biblical truth, common sense and a clear understanding of his foe, he steps out like David to fell the intellectual Goliath of our day.
Customer Reviews:
This should be read w. "The trouble with Physics".......2007-07-28
In "The trouble with Physics" the author frequently slams christans as illogical and irrational while using terms like "faith on science" etc. "The trouble with Physics" is not an easy read but it is enligtening as to the humanity that science is done under. The politics, money and passions which make it less tha absolute truth.
This is the point that Philip Johnson makes as well. While these learned folks have huge bias and egos which are prejudiced automatically against certain points of view. Reason and logical rational thought that is objective overcomes these barriers in all of us.
In Praise Of Illogical, Irrational Thought From A Very Bitter Angry Old Man.......2007-05-20
For years University of California, Berkeley law professor Phillip Johnson has been on a fanatical crusade against what he perceives as the evil aspects of modern American society, placing blame primarily on the shoulders of atheistic liberal evolutionists like the late Stephen Jay Gould, Niles Eldredge and Richard Dawkins, to name but a few of the eminent scientists who have found themselves unexpected targets of his well-written, but nonetheless, quite vitriolic, and intellectually bankrupt, prose. How sad it is to read the words of a gifted writer like Johnson who truly is out of his league with respect to comprehending what science exactly is, and why evolution makes a lot of sense as both a scientific fact and a scientific theory. His harsh, dismal view of American society stands in stark contrast to the optimistic vision expressed by my friend Ken Miller, a Brown University professor of biology, in his excellent book "Finding Darwin's God", which was published originally around the same time as this vitriolic diatribe. Ken, a devout Roman Catholic Christian, has no problems reconciling his faith in God and his acceptance - based on years of excellent scientific research - of the fact of evolution, and of the Theory of Evolution via Natural Selection as the most likely explanation for the rich biological diversity which Planet Earth holds. Johnson's "Reason in the Balance: The Case Against Naturalism in Science, Law & Education" argues so strongly in favor of injecting a supernatural bias into science, law and education that it expresses a view which would be regarded by the United States Supreme Court as contrary to the original desires and hopes of the Founding Fathers responsible for drafting the United States Constitution; in plain English, they would rule that his view is unconstitutional. A view that isn't "reason in the balance", but instead, a dubious, deceitful one that praises illogical, irrational thought. Instead of wasting your time thinking of buying this book, please strongly consider instead the superb books written by Ken Miller, philosophers Richard Pennock and Philip Kitcher, paleobiologist Niles Eldredge, and anthropologist Eugenie Clark which I cite in my Listmania! List entitled "Why Evolution is Science & Creationism Isn't" (http://www.amazon.com/Why-Evolution-Is-Science-amp-Creationism-Isn-t/lm/R1288DTMHQJI13/ref=cm_lm_byauthor_title_full/103-2708890-6723846). Otherwise, by purchasing this book, you are unwittingly giving some credit - when none is due - to the inexcusable, deceitful declarations of a very bitter angry old man.
A Clear Look at the Devastating Consequences of Modernism.......2007-05-05
This is a must read for parents and those planning on attending college. I smile at the reviewer that says science is based on observable data, while omitting that much of evolution is based upon assumptions that cannot be observed, much less proven. Students beware. If you have faith in God, your faith will challenged, marginalized, scoffed at, and maybe worse when you enter college. Read Darwin on Trial and Reason in the Balance to bring you hope. Phillip Johnson is meticulous in his examination of 'scientific naturalism', 'materialism' or in his words, modernism. His point is that it is not science, but religion and it is antagonistic towards God.
Mr. Johnson does not discuss "possible" outcomes of relativism. Instead, he provides clear examples of severe problems in our schools and universities and the fervent attempts by secularists to remove religion from education. I taught school for 9 years and saw continuing examples of Arthur Leff's famous "Sez who?" Is this book easy to read? No. Is it essential to understanding the religious dogma of scientific naturalism and how to combat it? Yes.
Brilliant, insightful analysis .......2007-02-06
One of the most important books I have read. A masterful discussion of the merits of Theism and Naturalism for the claim to truth and reason. Dr Johnson gives a stunningly compelling defense of the rational merits of Theism, carefully exposing the false claims and destructive effects of Atheistic Naturalism in science, education and law. If you want to be equipped to know and win battles against the rising tide of secularism, "Reason in the Balance" is essential reading. You can make a secularists head spin exposing their absurdity, and get them thinking critically about the bankruptcy of dominant secularist presumptions in the culture today.
Excellent assesment of the perennial struggle between faith and naturalism in society.......2007-01-25
After reading Desmond Curran's ill-informed review, all I'm left to wonder is whether or not he even bothered to read the book. If he had, he might have actually addressed the purpose of the book, which was to show that basing law, education and science purely on naturalism produces very questionable results. Johnson notes that it produces societies that begin to lose their notion of acting in the common good and instead turn inward and focus on creating their own personal space and prosperity to the detriment of society as a whole. Naturalism rejects the notion of any concrete moral guideposts, and therefore people who subscribe to it feel no obligation to act on anything except their own subjective and ever-changing beliefs. It's a good and fair point he makes, and even a number of athiests over the centuries have noted that mankind would probably lose all moral sense of direction without some sort of faith in their lives.
This isn't to assume that the faith community is without flaw...it certainly has its share of skeletons in the closet. But overall, naturalism and its focus on subjective laws has brought us such horrors as Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao Tse Tung (all fervent believers in "natural" law). These men were responsible for nearly 100 million deaths in the 20th century alone, and to a large degree acted that way because they had no moral absolutes to follow, only their own subjective guidelines.
Mr. Curran's comments about religion may contain a hint of truth in them, but rather than offer any evidence to support his attack, he just levels a rant at Johnson while ignoring the horrific track record of his own worldview, apparently that of naturalism. I would suggest he reread the book with an open mind, since his comments show he didn't bother to read very far. Mr. Johnson wasn't "preaching" to scientists as Mr. Curran alleges ... he simply showed that the worldview that's largely accepted by scientists (naturalism) provides a weak foundation for building a healthy society.
Book Description
With a new foreword by Sanford Levison, a new appendix on Terry Shiavo, and updates on the appointment process and detainees in Guantanomo Bay, this engaging and lively text examines the relationship between law and politics and emphasizes the political importance of sound legal reasoning.
Reason in Law examines the intersection of law and politics: legal reasoning. It teaches students how to examine judicial decisions, encouraging them to become âthoughtful judges of judging.â Using cases ripped from the headlines–such as the Alabama federal courthouse âTen Commandmentsâ case, Ashcroft v. Oregon, and Lawrence v. Texas–authors Carter and Burke teach through illustrative examples and have assembled a gallery of fascinating cases to engage student interest. Ultimately, the text attempts to answer the question: âHow can a pluralistic society be ruled legitimately?â If people of differing political allegiances can interpret the same legal text quite differently, how can the rule of law be properly applied?
Customer Reviews:
Great Legal Analysis Introduction........2005-10-31
Authors Carter and Burke create a brief but effective legal analysis tool in the form of their text, "Reason in Law."
By examining the relationship between the law and politics, the text asks that students attempt to become "thoughtful judges of judging" while becoming familiar with and trying to answer the ultimate issue, that being: "how can a pluralistic society be ruled legitimately if people of differing political allegiances can interpret the same legal text quite differently, . . . then how can the rule of law be properly applied?"
I have required this text for my Constitutional Law course students, and must caution the potential buyer that an understanding of civics must be possessed before the book can be read and understood in light of it's full spectrum.
Packed with current events, cases and controversies pulled right from the headlines of the newspapers, this text is compatible with any political science or legal curriculum. Illustrative cases and questions complete and summarize each chapter thus creating tools for the student to use so as to grasp the legal concepts, meanings, and interactions of law and the contemporary legal process.
Informative and thought provoking. Four stars.
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