Timothy Roberts

My Word!: Plagiarism and College Culture by Susan D. Blum

April 2011, no. 330

Plagiarism, like death, taxes, and hangovers, will always be with us. Tackling the problem historically, anthropologist Susan Blum demonstrates how this scourge has traditionally infested selective entry tests like fleas on rats. Her fascinating exposé of the ingenious techniques used to conceal plagiarism during the imperial Chinese court’s brain-bending entrance exams, for example, demonstrates that nothing has changed. Yet while Blum’s historical perspective prevents her from obsessively blaming ‘today’s youth’, she nevertheless acknowledges plagiarism’s increasing prevalence.

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Timothy Roberts reviews 'The Real Global Warming Disaster: Is the Obsession with "Climate Change" Turning out To Be the Most Costly Scientific Blunder in History?' by Christopher Booker

by Timothy Roberts •

March 2011, no. 329

Timothy Roberts reviews 'The Real Global Warming Disaster: Is the Obsession with "Climate Change" Turning out To Be the Most Costly Scientific Blunder in History?' by Christopher Booker

Christopher Booker is appalled that humanity has thrown its glimmering record of progress on the pagan bonfire of environmentalist superstition. He is shocked that the scientific community is helplessly in thrall to a cabal of corrupt hacks masquerading under theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s confected rubric. He is dumbfounded that ‘natural’ climatic fluctuations have been spun into some deranged ‘global warming’ conspiracy theory.

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The Australian Book of Atheism edited by Warren Bonett

by Timothy Roberts •

March 2011, no. 329

Timothy Roberts reviews 'The Australian Book of Atheism' edited by Warren Bonett

Once mainly associated with shrill killjoys and desiccated reductionists, atheism has recently received a jolt of adrenaline from Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, and others. Yet while these writers delight in exposing religion’s philosophical deficiencies, their tone is predominantly negative. Fortunately, The Australian Book of Atheism goes beyond simply rehashing the New Atheists’ explanations of Why God Doesn’t Exist. Divided into ‘Overview’, ‘Personal’, ‘Education’, ‘Social and Cultural’, ‘Politics’, ‘Philosophy’, and ‘Religion and the Brain’, this collection offers a more nuanced picture of atheism than does the recent crop of celebrity-authored blockbusters.

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