Even a thick-skulled scholar can sometimes learn something new.

Some people, like the late John Rawls, say that we should set aside our religious and philosophical disagreements – our “comprehensive doctrines,” he calls them -- for the sake of practical agreement.  Others say that we can’t do that, and that it’s futile to try.

Can we, or can’t we?  It depends on what you mean.

Since we throw around so many buzzwords without thinking, a little bit of linguistic reverse engineering can tell us a lot about ourselves that we might not otherwise have noticed.  Let’s start with the buzzword “self-expression.”

Have you heard this line?  “Now that we know about brain physiology, it’s obvious that there could be no such thing as free will.”

That’s like saying that the circuitry of a cellphone determines the conversations which takes place on it.

A recent Wall Street Journal op-ed by Caroline Aiken Koster, A Summer Break From American Disunity, illustrated a widespread confusion about what’s wrong with us these days.  It was a touching essay, and I am all for unity, but I think a mild demurral is needed.

This is not a parody.  I wish it were.