Following a screening and discussion of the film Good Night and Good Luck, which documents news journalist Edward R. Murrow’s fight with Senate demagogue Joseph McCarthy, some students in Stephen Ambra’s Contemporary Ethical Issues class – a class I was invited to participate in – were asked to read a copy of Murrow’s famous “wires and lights” speech and examine if his words remain...

Why is it okay for network television to broadcast expletives in the Steven Spielberg movie, Saving Private Ryan, but wrong to broadcast expletives from Cher at an awards show broadcast? Why is it okay for the FCC to object to nudity in an episode of NYPD Blue, but not in airing nudity from another Spielberg classic, Schindler’s List? These are just some...

Tenzin Gyatso is the fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet. He is both head of state (in exile) and the spiritual leader of the Tibetan people. He is admired and esteemed worldwide as a man who has championed policies of nonviolence. His consistent compassionate nonviolence, even in the face of great aggression, led to his receiving the Nobel Prize for Peacein 1989....

On August 6, 1945, at 8:15 a.m., U.S. forces destroyed the city of Hiroshima, Japan with the first atomic bomb used in warfare directly killing an estimated 80,000 people. Injury and radiation increased that total to 90,000 to 140,000. Three days later, a second A-bomb was used to destroy Nagasaki directly killing another 60,000 to 80,000 men, women and children....

In the hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan, Franklin Roosevelt had to make a number of critical decisions for the country; not the least of which was standing before Congress and the American people to clearly explain what had happened and what America’s response would be. While Roosevelt was responsible for a number of significant decisions in...

19th century American writer, artist and philosopher, Elbert Hubbard, wrote that “Every man is a damn fool for at least five minutes of every day; wisdom consists in not exceeding the limit.” That’s certainly one limit that I strive to achieve. However, true wisdom comes slow to most of us. For me, it’s comes at the crossroads of knowledge, experience,...

Have you had a talk with your son or daughter about bullying?  Do they recognize the difference between good-natured teasing and behavior that crosses the line into bullying? Every week we hear another tragic story involving bullying or hazing either by direct encounter or the high-tech version known as cyber bullying. “Insults, name calling, relentless teasing, and malicious gossip,” ethicist...

On Friday, November 4, Central Pennsylvania’s Patriot-Newswas the first to break the story on allegations of sex abuse on at least 8 young boys by former Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky that go back as far as 1998. In ’02, staffer Mike McQueary personally witnessed another attack by Sandusky. Since that time, anyone with a microphone, camera crew or blog...

The sacred cow of protection from unwanted sales calls has been breached. “Telemarketers,” the New York Times writes, “increasingly are disguising their real identities and phone numbers to provoke people to pick up the phone. ‘Humane Soc.’ may not be the Humane Society. And think the I.R.S. is on the line? Think again. Caller ID, in other words, is becoming fake ID…....

We are facing a serious issue of intergenerational ethics when it comes to the proliferation of nuclear power. For the value of power today, we pass on the problems of nuclear waste to future generations. Yesterday, I was invited to attend a talk by Daniel Hirsch, Lecturer on Nuclear Policy at the University of California at Santa Cruz. Considering the...