Vera Mont

Please stop saying something and then telling me you meant the opposite and then saying you didn't mean the opposite. It's very confusing. Truth has n...

No: I'm stating that artifice is an attribute of creatures whose intelligence and imagination enable them to build complex structures from simple mate...

Whoa! That's a lot to digest. Given that you explicitly stated How could you have meant the opposite? In what way do you make something unacceptable, ...

All human society as we know it is artificial. And yet it's natural that an intelligent, imaginative species should elaborate on its social organizati...

Almost as traumatic as figuring out how to reset the clock in the car. Discovered that the new car has a DST button. I found a solution for the clock ...

Of course; our drives and our experiences are the source of all our story-making. They just had to be healthy and willing. Later on, the males decided...

The mating rituals to which we are accustomed may be invented by human cultures, but the fact of mating rituals goes back 500,000,000 years. Birds and...

Fair enough. You don't actually have to die or get seriously ill in order to be adversely affected by outside pressure to conform, and most of the hum...

So, we can look forward to another pandemic. What fun!! The disruption of sleep patterns is caused by messing with the clock - so, same difference. If...

It's consolidation of power in the hands of designated agents. The strucuture may be decreed by religious dogma, caste distinction, military might or ...

That's not exactly what I meant. Suppose we keep to one culture for the moment. There may be a rigid religious establishment that dictates what everyo...

There are as many kinds of rebellion as there are 'establishments', traditions, authorities, beliefs and systems to rebel against. There are also many...

And that is wrong! Anybody sent abroad by their employer should be given time to recover from the flight before they're expected to carry out an assig...

By pay attention, I meant attach some significance to and try to identify the origin and meaning of the imagery. Treating dreams as entertainment - as...

I would guess, because you don't pay attention to them. Perhaps you have a trouble-free life with few difficult challenges. It's also possible that yo...

Is this question open to the public? My answer would be: a lot! Several of my best art pieces were literally 'dreamed up' - though I admit that a coup...

I doubt it would be easy to document, given the number of old people making international flights twice a year. Another issue that could perhaps be ta...

A good deal of the 'creative process' - technological, scientific and artistic - takes place while dreaming. In dream state, the mind of free of exter...

In the more northern latitudes, where DST is rigidly implemented, we still have to get up in the dark and, if we have a longish commute or errands on ...

I see no reason why everything in the world, including sunlight, should be subject to the convenience of business. It's certainly no good for anyone e...

Maybe all those and then some.

Okay. It's good to know that all publications always abide by the law and that there is a law on the books to cover every situation in which publishin...

Really? If you were the managing editor of a widely circulated news outlet, would you never ask: If I print the address of a material witness in a mur...

I suppose it does. Civilization may not be worth saving, but I believe reason is --- was --- would have been --- whatever the correct tense is now. Ye...

That's the saddest thing I've read all week! It's official: we can add post-reason to post-truth in the designation of our era.

I wasn't talking about rules. I was talking about common sense.

Two news outlets, like any two people, may interpret the same facts differently. They may choose different events to report on and provide more or les...

This rarely gets a mention in the Assange case, but hacking into protected sites and private accounts is not considered legitimate journalism.

They knew that it would offend some people. That doesn't automatically mean you shouldn't publish it. There are far more compelling criteria - at leas...

Quite frankly, I wouldn't want his hacking operation in my country, either!

Is this somehow relevant to the ethical responsibility of the press in general? Didn't WickyLeaks articles appear in The Guardian, The New York Times,...

Sweden has diverse news outlets, some politically partisan, some not, most owned privately, some government subsidized. The press there has more guara...

Lots of people disagree. How does that affect an editor's responsibility for deciding what to print and what to avoid?

If they can't avoid it, because the damn grey cataract slides across their computer screen uninvited and unwanted, with his stupid fat smirking face. ...

As outsiders, that European population would see the Trump issue as an American one, and the various attitudes their editorials represent would be fro...

Is this news reportage, editorial comment, or an open discussion? Who were "they"? And this conversation is broadcast 24 hours a day, exclusively? Or ...

That can't be helped: public services tend to concentrate on serving the public, not special interests. It's biased toward educating the public, regar...

How could they, knowing that Boss Murdock can overrule it at any time?

Okay. The Supreme Court agrees with you. Yet newspaper editors the world over know exactly which articles they should not publish.

It may be controversial, but encouraging people to oppress, rape and kill other people should still be illegal, as far as I'm concerned. The legal lan...

Some faction is always mad about something, whether it's done by doctors, teachers, lawyers or climate scientists. The disgruntled/offended/irate port...

I'm not familiar with this pledge as a requirement for journalists, editors or publishers. As far as I know, every publication is free to express an e...

I think all news sources should be held to a minimum standard of accuracy in the reporting of events, statistics, demographic information and quotatio...

At my house, bowties are reserved for cabbage noodles. Fried cabbage requires a robust past to hold on to. I have 12 clear plastic jars of different p...

On the up-side, Putin et al will probably decide the issue for us all.

I'm sure you'll find one if you really want to. But finding a reason to live and actually doing something something positive is a commitment. As you d...

Our kind. We don't think in terms of species - that's another label humans impose; we think of those who are enough like ourselves to mate with and sw...

Vegetarian cabbage rolls. I didn't actually cook them today, but two weeks ago. A small head of cabbage yields enough leaves for about six meals, pres...

We fish don't wear human-imposed collective names. We are individuals of our kind. Only humans stick labels on other beings and place them in some art...

I was a fish in a past life and I can tell you: some fish enjoy swimming about and some are unhappy and some are bored and one recalls having been a h...