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Commentary

A collection of 38 issues

Akshardham: A Spiritual Theme Park

The huge red sandstone and marble monument, visible from the nearby highway, stands alone, proud, and out of place. The local road abutting the walled complex has a few informal ‘checkpoints’ where men in plain clothes check cars. As our Maruti Zen lurches into the ‘complex’, the true enormity of

Bemoaning Delhi

Delhi doesn’t look like anything. It is amorphous, and as misshapen as only third world cities can be. It is but a mass of hutments, box-like houses built to occupy every available inch of space (and a couple more created by bribery) crammed together across narrow lanes interspersed by

Shining India: The Marvel of Marble

The Singapore Airlines flight SQ 408 landed at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi at 8:45pm, a full 15 minutes ahead of schedule. Unfortunately, there was no gate available to greet the early arrival. After waiting for about 15 minutes, a gate was found and the weary passengers

The Role of Argument in Natural Sciences, Law, and Social Sciences

The following article has been written by Chaste, who has contributed to this blog before. I will assume for the purposes of this piece that argument is the dominant form of writing in academia. This is also true of public discourse, but this piece will limit itself to academic writing,

Vague Apprehensions

“There is a possibility of a terrorist attack.” Or, “There is a heightened possibility of a terrorist attack.” These statements are often interpreted as, “There is a high (or very high) probability of a terrorist attack.” These are not sensible interpretations. Of course, news media do plenty to encourage such

The Problem in Immigration Reform?

The following article has been written by Chaste, an astute commentator who has written for Spincycle before. Note: The author has used the phrase, “illegal workers” only when the illegality is specifically implicated. Elsewhere, he has used the phrase “foreign workers.” Discussions about immigration reform have acquired a feverish intensity.

Social Science in a Guest Appearance in the Play, Capitalism

Social scientists are technology’s historians, anthropologists, sociologists, and scientists—measuring the social impact of technology. It is important to note that all this activity is forever doomed to survive in the echo chambers of the forgotten consciousness of society and consigned to only enter in casual desultory (or heated

Opining About the Perils of Opinions: The Opinion Poll Model of Policy Making

Public opinion is central to the democratic political process and it has never been more important that today, when opinion poll numbers are constantly cited in the media to buffet policy choices. It behooves us hence to foremost understand opinions and the process of opinion change, and then to think

Arguing Ethically

Everyday conversation is generally a site for exchanging social pleasantries, exchanging trivia and anecdotes or ‘shooting the breeze’, and reaffirming identities, among other things. Occasionally these everyday conversations take the shape of amorphous dilettante arguments about politics and culture, and even more rarely they turn into serious arguments. But the

Waxing poetic

“India has a growing middle class estimated at 300 million people.” Emily Wax 300 million is an astounding figure and just a shade below the US population. If indeed India has a “growing” middle class that is 300 million strong, then the US and the rest of the world better