1/ A recent exchange with @dmarusic has reinforced a recent habit of thinking about John Rawls - not the value-policing "folk Rawls" enthusiasts (as Damir dubs them) - but the guy who wrote "The Green Book," as we called it in the '70s. #Rawls 2/ My copy of 'A Theory of Justice' (1973) is a fifth-printing 1973 paperback. The first third or so is full of my not-very-insightful, guy-in-his-twenties, marginal notes. I see no sign that I understood Rawls' detailed arguments.

1 This short tweet exemplifies both what I vale and what drives me crazy sometimes about @shadihamid .

The value part is easy. My faith in democracy has been shaken, and I benefit hugely from his reminders that political (and even spiritual) life under autocracy is far worse. 2 What I don't like so much is Shadi's "essentialism" (for lack of a better word). I can't tell whether this is just a rhetorical feature (Shadi being emphatic) or an actual philosophical bug. But ...