Category: Great Questions

‘Seeds of Hope’ by Jane Goodall

March 18, 2013 at 2:30 pm

In this article for the Boston Globe, Adam Langer discusses Jane Goodall’s new work. He describes it as: Part reminiscence, part natural history, and part plea on behalf of the natural world, “Seeds of Hope” begins with Goodall’s childhood in Bournemouth, England, where she recalls spending hours in her favorite tree doing her homework, reading [...]

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Mo Yan’s Delicate Balancing Act

February 28, 2013 at 3:50 pm

Sabina Knight writes, in this review, of author Mo Yan’s receipt of a Nobel Prize and the controversy that arisen due this event. Here is a sample: Mo Yan won the Nobel Prize for his writing, not for political engagement. This essay thus offers a perspective on his politics based not on a few symbolic [...]

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Core Texts on Leadership

February 28, 2013 at 1:37 pm

Here are samples from the Odyssey, the Aeneid, and Don Quixote on the topic of leadership: My child, what strange remarks you let escape you. Could I forget that kingly man, Odysseus? There is no mortal half so wise; no mortal gave so much to the lords of open sky. ~ The Odyssey, Book I, [...]

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The Penelopiad: A Great Experience

February 26, 2013 at 12:49 pm

The Penelopiad turned out to be as interesting and multi-layered as we had expected, attracting about 35 Core students and many more theater fans! Following the events of the Odyssey from the female perspective, the play interwove the voice of Penelope and the voices of her twelve maids who are killed in the end at [...]

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Justifying Coercive Paternalism

February 26, 2013 at 11:58 am

In his compelling article, Cass Sunstein explores the validity of Mill’s ideas on government and the individual. Here is a sample: In his great essay, Mill insisted that as a general rule, government cannot legitimately coerce people if its only goal is to protect people from themselves. Mill contended that: The only purpose for which [...]

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Zachary Bos on Robert Bringhurst

February 25, 2013 at 2:31 pm

The Administrative Coordinator of the Core, Zachary Bos, recently wrote a letter to the Boston Finneganers regarding Robert Bringhurst’s books: Dear Friends, and members of the Boston Finneganers: I have a great deal of appreciation for Robert Bringhurst’s books – his interest and valuation of languages, literatures, and the technical means these comes to us; his sense of [...]

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The Essay as Reality Television

February 22, 2013 at 10:05 am

Adam Kirsch discusses whether or not essays are “extinct” as a form of writing, and references Michel e Montaigne, whose work is studied in CC201. Here is a sample: The essay, traditionally, was defined by its freedom and its empiricism—qualities that it inherited from its modern inventor, Montaigne. “What do I know?” Montaigne asked, and [...]

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Applying Confucian Ethics to International Relations

February 21, 2013 at 11:00 am

In view of CC102′s study of the Analects of Confucius, the Core presents an interesting discussion of Confucian ethics when applied to international relations. Here is a sample: Chinese ethics is a deontological system that has a continuity spanning a range from personal to public concerns, without differentiation. A good society, a good state, and [...]

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Where Stars Come From

February 20, 2013 at 3:24 pm

Watch this video on YouTube The Core shares an article from BU Today concerning the intriguing origin of stars, where CAS professor James Jackson answers some exciting questions. A sample: For years, Jackson, a College of Arts & Sciences professor of astronomy, and his international colleagues studied [a dark, opaque mass that astronomers call] “the brick,” [...]

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Charles McNulty on Depictions of Violence in Theater

February 19, 2013 at 12:49 pm

In this compelling article, Los Angeles Times Theater Critic McNulty discusses the controversial topic of violence in theater. Here is a sample: What is the line between acceptable and unacceptable violence in art? If gruesomeness is the criterion, much of Jacobean drama would have to be banned, including Shakespeare’s “King Lear,” with its graphic scene [...]

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