Philosophy Begins In Wonderon January 16, 2020Philosophy begins in wonder, they say. But they also say that curiosity, as a mirror image of wonder, is an intellectual pursuit. I had read this in a bite-sized philosophy book some years ago. This had convinced me that human enquiry was neither silly nor irrelevant. It was either a preliminary quest or mature enquiry […]
Hermeneutics of loveon January 8, 2020Interpretation is fairly familiar to the legal fraternity. It is also somewhat known to those who are tasked with explaining meanings of things to young minds. If a ten-year-old asked you about ‘McDonaldisation’, you would have to explain what it means by disaggregating it and arranging its meaning to his/her understanding.Of course, this much is […]
Women and Men: Two Sides of the Same Coinon January 5, 2020Women and men form the basis of a family unit, which holds the pivot of the moral fabric of our society. Their union should be safeguarded by encouraging married couples to strongly commit to the welfare of the other, which includes understanding each other without prejudice and blame-game. As they are two sides of a […]
Socratic teachingon December 22, 2019The right to education is guaranteed in Pakistan by Article 25-A of the Constitution of Pakistan 1973. It states that “the state shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of five to sixteen years in such manner as may be determined by law.” It was incorporated into Chapter 1, the […]
Analytical Philosophy: redundant or relevant?on December 17, 2019In his book From the Greeks to Post-modernism, Professor Wayne Morrison draws our attention to the lack of conceptual clarity about law and its difference from non-legal ideas such as force, morality, customs, sociology and religion. When I first came across this as a law student it was difficult to make sense of it as […]
Morality or aspiration?on December 10, 2019The famous ‘trolley problem’ bears witness to the fact that it is not always easy to tell what our moral duties are in a given situation. I think there is truth in this because I have seen people trapped in figuring out what they are required to do. Take the example of a person (hereafter […]
Seven basic valueson December 6, 2019Do you ever wonder what gives you happiness? Maybe you do and maybe you do not. Either way, you take a short pause, think a little, and like John Steinbeck’s American dreamer instantly think: wealth. After all, in the presence of limited resources, what brings us many things we need or desire is money. Take […]
May justice be done!on December 2, 2019One of the relentlessly awaited and hankered occurrences in the matrimonial timeline of the South Asian couples is the birth of a child, particularly a boy. The male child is the apple of the eye, the beacon of hope and silver lining in the cloud that is anticipated to bring glad tidings like pride to […]
Moral Imperativeson November 8, 2019You have probably heard it somewhere or read it in a self-help book, “We are the authors of our lives.” If you were a literalist, you probably thought it meant having control and check over one’s life. However, if you were a Kantian like me, you thought, “We are the authors of our lives as […]
Our canvass of lawon October 29, 2019When we paint law on our layman canvass, we either shade it green–something that should be promoted and celebrated–or red–something that should be demoted and discredited. This green/red dichotomy means that our understanding of the law is bound up with our everyday experience of law between benefit and harm. For those who benefited from the […]