Mind Matters is edited by Jonah Lehrer, the science writer behind the blog The Frontal Cortex and the book Proust was a Neuroscientist.

3 Comments

1. 1. Assegai 03:27 PM 6/10/08

   Social norms are constantly changing if they are inherently unfair that is why one gets people like Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela, if they had followed social norms well justice would not have been satisfied. I must agree with the article when same ethnicity is being discussed, but once you add different ethnicities and race the theory built above will fail, as one professor George Dei a sociologist said at the university of Toronto in a book on race relations in academia, no matter how good a theory from a black is, even the so called most liberal universities like Harvard have difficulty, I know a black where he was told by Harvard that he has done revolutionary stuff, but sorry, wrong color academia will refuse to accept it, in worst instances they take bits and pieces and claim it came from a white because that way it makes them feel better, only in a just society or were there is a single ethnic group or race are social norms not violated

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2. 2. emil47 07:02 PM 6/11/08

   I don't think that fairness is only a consequence of the fear of punishment. There exists such a thing like altruism. The social norms have an element of unfairness in any society. The problem is to try to change them when still surviving.

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3. 3. Brian Edward 05:07 PM 7/2/08

   What about juveniles who are tried as adults in criminal courts at the age of 14 and 15? Is that moral? Are their

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