Author Archives

I’ve completed all but defence of my thesis for a masters in philosophy. My disciplinary interest has been in the acquisition and maintenance of our beliefs. But I also have a background in the study of rhetoric, linguistics, and philosophy of language. I’m taking a hiatus from the student life, but am intellectually active. For example, I’m a research assistant for my husband, Paul, a social and political philosopher. Paul and I regularly discuss and vet each other’s work. So, while I don’t have a PhD, neither am I simply pulling things out of my derriere.

Paul and I delight in our four pets: Barsi, a Border Collie-Pyrenees cross, Howard, a German Shepherd-Bernese-Pyrenees cross puppy, and two cats, Mr. Tinky and Rorschach. Between us we have three wonderful sons and their three respective equally wonderful partners, and we delight in all. We live in Lethbridge, Alberta and, until covid, we travelled overseas throughout our summers.

• Saturday Morning Pam-toons. The Safest Place for the Heretic is Holding Torquemada’s Robes.

  By pammentations on May 1, 2021 • ( 1 )

• The Lesser Known Logical Fallacies.

  By pammentations on April 30, 2021 • ( 3 )

  If you’ve ever taken a logic and critical thinking course, you’ll have learned about logical fallacies. Logical fallacies are patterns of bad reasoning that occur so often they’re given their own special names. Ad hominem arguments are directed at the… Read More ›

• Thought experiment: the last humans. (Thoughtlets. XL.)

  By pammentations on April 30, 2021 • ( 0 )

  Thought experiment. Imagine some cosmic event renders all humans sterile. After a number of decades pass, humankind literally enters a Golden Age, with an exclusively senior population. Although, ‘senior’ might lose its current meaning when the youngest among us is… Read More ›

• Thoughlets. XLIV.

  By pammentations on April 28, 2021 • ( 2 )

  Do you ever wonder what future generations will look like? Look in a mirror. You are the future generations of those who lived before you. And do you ever wonder what future future generations will think of you and your… Read More ›

• The Work-Life of Mackenzie, My Son & Guest Contributor, In Pictures.

  By pammentations on April 25, 2021 • ( 2 )

• Saturday Morning Pam-toons. Guest Post Mackenzie Knight. Sometimes Work Does Make Freedom.

  By pammentations on April 24, 2021 • ( 1 )

  In debates between energy and the environment, nuance is too often lost. My son, Mackenzie, and his wife, Jamie, live on a property in North Central Alberta. Mackenzie works in the patch and has recently begun an alternative career as… Read More ›

• Saturday Morning Pam-toons. End of the Clapham Line. Guest artist Mackenzie Knight. (Repost Sept. 2020)

  By pammentations on April 24, 2021 • ( 1 )

  The Man on the Clapham Omnibus The ‘Man on the Clapham Omnibus’ is an hypothetical reasonable, ordinary person used in English law courts as a standard to judge the actions of real people in given situations — particularly to determine… Read More ›

• Saturday Morning Pam-toons. Rock and Baton.

  By pammentations on April 17, 2021 • ( 2 )

  As also because a man cannot tell when he seeth men proceed against him by violence whether they intend his death or not. Thomas Hobbes, A.P. Martinich and Brian Battiste, Eds, Leviathan, Broadview, 2011. Part I, Chapter XIV, 8. p… Read More ›

• Saturday Morning Pam-toons. Footnotes to Plato.

  By pammentations on April 10, 2021 • ( 2 )

  The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. –A.N. Whitehead– Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality, Gifford Lectures 1927-28, New York: The Free Press, 1973. Internet Archive, accessed… Read More ›

• Hume on Persuasion.

  By pammentations on April 9, 2021 • ( 1 )

  In On War Carl Von Clausewitz says war is a continuation of politics by other means. Or cf. Foucault, who suggests this definition might be the inverted: politics is a continuation of war by other means. My interest is in the ‘other… Read More ›