
A number of media outlets are gleefully running headlines about a “civil war” within the conservative movement in America. While the term “civil war” is a little overblown, it’s true that fissures and fractures are appearing on the right, with prominent conservative voices – many of whom were formerly allied – turning on and denouncing
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The artificial intelligence debate is immediately polarizing. We’ve all heard our family or friends talk about it. AI is either seen as a boon or met with severe pessimism. But there’s a middle ground worth considering. This isn’t about championing AI as the solution to all our problems. Rather, it’s about realizing that AI literacy
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English philosopher John Locke once advised that children should have “shoes so thin, that they might leak and let in water, whenever he comes near it.” Yikes! I thought when I first read that passage in “Some Thoughts Concerning Education” years ago. The mother’s heart of caution within me still balks at that idea … but
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A few years ago, I took some adolescent grandchildren to the grocery store and was astonished by their wonderment. One had never set foot in a grocery store, and the others were infrequent visitors, to put it mildly. They learned some things that day, like how to pick out the best bunch of bananas and
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Going through some old, family documents this week, I stumbled upon a clipping from “Harvard Magazine” that included an address given by Reverend Peter J. Gomes of Harvard University to the school’s graduating seniors in 1982. It’s a heart-felt and lively address, which is reproduced below. What stands out most is that Rev. Gomes recognized that
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If you ever want to get an interesting – sometimes shocking – glimpse of today’s culture, try reading the advice columns that populate many of the nation’s newspapers. A letter to Slate’s “Dear Prudence” column caught my eye today. The letter writer explained that a friend (“Chrissy”) in her late 30s was still dealing with the effects of her parents’ divorce, roughly
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