It seemed like a perfectly sensible policy at the time, but with the coherence of hindsight, it can now be seen as the first in a concatenation of cock-ups. The year was 1772. The East India Company was in charge …
Considerations on Civil Disobedience
Considerations on Civil Disobedience
by Bert Olivier at Brownstone Institute
In his essay, Civil Disobedience (published in 1849, p. 29), Henry David Thoreau writes:
The authority of government, even such as I am willing to submit to — for I …
How the US Government Turned on the People
How the US Government Turned on the People
by Peter St Onge at Brownstone Institute
The catastrophic mismanagement of Hurricane Helene relief is showing the American people that Washington’s dysfunctional but, worse, it doesn’t even seem to be trying to serve the …
Cut the Truth Out of Our Heads
Cut the Truth Out of Our Heads
by Jeffrey A. Tucker at Brownstone Institute
The censors are losing patience. They have gone from regretting the existence of free speech and gaming the system as best they can to fantasizing about …
Cut the Truth Out of Our Heads
Cut the Truth Out of Our Heads
by Jeffrey A. Tucker at Brownstone Institute
The censors are losing patience. They have gone from regretting the existence of free speech and gaming the system as best they can to fantasizing about …
Science, The Humanities, and Postmodernist Poison
Science, The Humanities, and Postmodernist Poison
by Russ Gonnering at Brownstone Institute
At a recent Brownstone authors meeting, Brownstone Fellow Thomas Harrington made a penetrating observation of one of the distinctive differences between Science and The Humanities. I look forward …
Evil in a Box
Evil in a Box
by Thomas Harrington at Brownstone Institute
One of my favorite songs from the classic movie Oliver Twist was “Who Will Buy?” which contains the following passage:
Who will buy
This wonderful morning?
Such a sky
You …
Schopenhauer: Humanity’s Fall to Irrationality
Schopenhauer: Humanity’s Fall to Irrationality
by Bert Olivier at Brownstone Institute
In the third section of The Birth of Tragedy out of the Spirit of Music (1872) Friedrich Nietzsche quotes the ancient tragedian, Sophocles, where he writes:
There is an …
The Man Who Shouts Fire in a Crowded Theater
The Man Who Shouts Fire in a Crowded Theater
by Daniel Klein at Brownstone Institute
In the Vice-Presidential debate, the Democratic candidate Tim Walz used shouting fire in a crowded theater to justify limitations on free speech. Ironically, he resembles …
Britain has learned nothing from Palestine
When I walk to my local supermarket in north Belfast, the journey takes me through a Catholic, Nationalist area, marked by Palestinian flags, to the edge of a Protestant, Loyalist area, where Israeli flags flutter, alongside Union flags, from the …
Britain has learned nothing from Palestine
When I walk to my local supermarket in north Belfast, the journey takes me through a Catholic, Nationalist area, marked by Palestinian flags, to the edge of a Protestant, Loyalist area, where Israeli flags flutter, alongside Union flags, from the …
Hypnosis, Stockholm Syndrome, and Hegemony
Hypnosis, Stockholm Syndrome, and Hegemony
by Toby Rogers at Brownstone Institute
As you know, here on my Substack I’ve been trying to understand why the last four and a half years have felt …
The Carbon Alarmists Are Silent about This
The Carbon Alarmists Are Silent about This
by Eric Hussey at Brownstone Institute
I value thought experiments as useful tools to understand how things work. Thought experiments, also known as idealized experiments, have a surprisingly noble history. For example, Albert …
Political Renewal, Intellectual Revival
Political Renewal, Intellectual Revival
by Bert Olivier at Brownstone Institute
It is undeniable that we stand at a historical juncture where something new is in the process of being born – preferably not W.B. Yeats’s ‘rough beast, its hour come …
Restrictive Schooling Imperils Our Children
Restrictive Schooling Imperils Our Children
by Charles Krblich at Brownstone Institute
Last week, my sons’ school went into lockdown. It wasn’t a drill. There was a real threat. Two high school-aged students, a boy and a girl, were discussing an alleged fight …