Public figures such as actors, politicians, and athletes should expect people to be interested in their private lives.

Public figures such as actors, politicians, and athletes should expect people to be interested in their private lives. When they seek a public role, they should expect that they will lose at least some of their privacy.

This statement is fundamentally correct; public figures should indeed expect to lose their
privacy. After all, we are a society of voyeurs wishing to transform our mundane lives; and one
way to do so is to live vicariously through the experiences of others whose lives appear more
interesting than our own. Moreover, the media recognize this societal foible and exploit it at
every opportunity. Nevertheless, a more accurate statement would draw a distinction between
political figures and other public figures; the former have even less reason than the latter to
expect to be left alone, for the reason that their duty as public servants legitimizes public
scrutiny of their private lives.

The chief reason why I generally agree with the statement is that, for better or worse,
intense media attention to the lives of public figures raises a presumption in the collective mind
of the viewing or reading public that our public figures' lives are far more interesting than our
own. This presumption is understandable. After all, I think most people would agree that given
the opportunity for even fleeting fame they would embrace it without hesitation. Peering into
the private lives of those who have achieved our dreams allows us to live vicariously through
those lives.

Another reason why I generally agree with the statement has to do with the forces that
motivate the media. For the most part, the media consist of large corporations whose chief
objective is to maximize shareholder profits. In pursuit of that objective the media are simply
giving the public what they demand a voyeuristic look into the private lives of public figures.
One need look no further than a newsstand, local-television news broadcast, or talk show to
find ample evidence that this is so. For better or worse, we love to peer at people on public
pedestals, and we love to watch them fall off. The media know this all too well, and exploit our
obsession at every opportunity.

Nevertheless, the statement should be qualified in that a political figure has less reason to
expect privacy than other public figures. Why? The private affairs of public servants become
our business when those affairs adversely affect our servants' ability to serve us effectively, or
when our servants betray our trust. For example, several years ago the chancellor of a
university located in my city was expelled from office for misusing university funds to renovate
his posh personal residence. The scandal became front-page news in the campus newspaper,
and prompted a useful system-wide reform. Also consider the Clinton sex scandal, which
sparked a debate about the powers and duties of legal prosecutors vis4-vis the chief executive.
Also, the court rulings about executive privilege and immunity, and even the impeachment
proceedings, all of which resulted from the scandal, might serve as useful legal precedents for
the future.

Admittedly, intense public scrutiny of the personal lives of public figures can carry harmful
consequences, for the public figure as well as the society. For instance, the Clinton scandal
resulted in enormous financial costs to taxpayers, and it harmed many individuals caught up in
the legal process. And for more that a year the scandal served chiefly to distract us from our
most pressing national and global problems. Yet, until as a society we come to appreciate the
potentially harmful effects of our preoccupation with the lives of public figures, they can expect
to remain the cynosures of our attention.





Issue 17
"The primary goal of technological advancement should be to increase people's efficiency so

that everyone has more leisure time."

The speaker contends that technology's primary goal should be to increase our efficiency for
the purpose of affording us more leisure time. I concede that technology has enhanced our
efficiency as we go about our everyday lives. Productivity software helps us plan and
coordinate projects; intranets, the Internet, and satellite technology make us more efficient
messengers; and technology even helps us prepare our food and access entertainment more
efficiently. Beyond this concession, however, I find the speaker's contention indefensible from
both an empirical and a normative standpoint.

The chief reason for my disagreement lies in the empirical proof: with technological
advancement comes diminished leisure time. In 1960 the average U.S. family included only
one breadwinner, who worked just over 40 hours per week. Since then the average work week
has increased steadily to nearly 60 hours today; and in most families there are now two
breadwinners. What explains this decline in leisure despite increasing efficiency that new
technologies have brought about? I contend that technology itself is the culprit behind the
decline. We use the additional free time that technology affords us not for leisure but rather for
work. As computer technology enables greater and greater office productivity it also raises our
employers' expectations--or demands--for production. Further technological advances breed
still greater efficiency and, in turn, expectations. Our spiraling work load is only exacerbated by
the competitive business environment in which nearly all of us work today. Moreover, every
technological advance demands our time and attention in order to learn how to use the new
technology. Time devoted to keeping pace with technology depletes time for leisure activities.

I disagree with the speaker for another reason as well: the suggestion that technology's
chief goal should be to facilitate leisure is simply wrongheaded. There are far more vital
concerns that technology can and should address. Advances in bio-technology can help cure
and prevent diseases; advances in medical technology can allow for safer, less invasire
diagnosis and treatment; advances in genetics can help prevent birth defects; advances in
engineering and chemistry can improve the structural integrity of our buildings, roads, bridges
and vehicles; information technology enables education while communication technology
facilitates global participation in the democratic process. In short, health, safety, education, and
freedom--and not leisure--are the proper final objectives of technology. Admittedly, advances
in these areas sometimes involve improved efficiency; yet efficiency is merely a means to
these more important ends.

In sum, I find indefensible the speaker's suggestion that technology's value lies chiefly in the
efficiency and resulting leisure time it can afford us. The suggestion runs contrary to the
overwhelming evidence that technology diminishes leisure time, and it wrongly places leisure
ahead of goals such as health, safety, education, and freedom as technology's ultimate aims.





Issue 18
"Money spent on research is almost always a good investment, even when the results of that
research are controversial."

I agree with the speaker's broad assertion that money spent on research is generally money
well invested. However, the speaker unnecessarily extends this broad assertion to embrace

research whose results are "controversial," while ignoring certain compelling reasons why
some types of research might be unjustifiable. My points of contention with the speaker
involves the fundamental objectives and nature of research, as discussed below.

I concede that the speaker is on the correct philosophical side of this issue. After all,
research is the exploration of the unknown for true answers to our questions, and for lasting
solutions to our enduring problems. Research is also the chief means by which we humans
attempt to satisfy our insatiable appetite for knowledge, and our craving to understand
ourselves and the world around us. Yet, in the very notion of research also lies my first point of
contention with the speaker, who illogically presumes that we can know the results of research
before we invest in it. To the contrary, if research is to be of any value it must explore
uncharted and unpredictable territory. In fact, query whether research whose benefits are
immediate and predictable can break any new ground, or whether it can be considered
"research" at all.

While we must invest in research irrespective of whether the results might be controversial,
at the same time we should be circumspect about research whose objectives are too vague
and whose potential benefits are too speculative. After all, expensive research always carries
significant opportunity costs--in terms of how the money might be spent toward addressing
society's more immediate problems that do not require research. One apt illustration of this
point involves the so-called "Star Wars" defense initiative, championed by the Reagan
administration during the 1980s. In retrospect, this initiative was ill-conceived and largely a
waste of taxpayer dollars; and few would dispute that the exorbitant amount of money devoted
to the initiative could have gone a long way toward addressing pressing social problems of the
day--by establishing after-school programs for delinquent latchkey kids, by enhancing AIDS
awareness and education, and so forth. As it turns out, at the end of the Star Wars debacle we
were left with rampant gang violence, an AIDS epidemic, and an unprecedented federal
budget deficit.

The speaker's assertion is troubling in two other r~sp,ects as well. First, no amount of
research can completely solve the enduring pr~l~rm of war, poverty, and violence, for the
reason that they stem from certain aspects of human nature--such as aggression and greed.
Although human genome research might eventually enable us to engineer away those
undesirable aspects of our nature, in the meantime it is up to our economists, diplomats, social
reformers, and jurists--not our research laboratories--to mitigate these problems. Secondly, for
every new research breakthrough that helps reduce human suffering is another that serves
primarily to add to that suffering. For example, while some might argue that physics
researchers who harnessed the power of the atom have provided us with an alternative source
of energy and invaluable "peace-keepers," this argument flies in the face of the hundreds of
thousands of innocent people murdered and maimed by atomic blasts, and by nuclear
meltdowns. And, in fulfilling the promise of "better living through chemistry" research has given
us chemical weapons for human slaughter. In short, so-called "advances" that scientific
research has brought about often amount to net losses for humanity.

In sum, the speaker's assertion that we should invest in research whose results are
"controversial" begs the question, because we cannot know whether research will turn out
controversial until we've invested in it. As for the speaker's broader assertion, I agree that
money spent on research is generally a sound investment because it is an investment in the

advancement of human knowledge and in human imagination and spirit. Nevertheless, when
we do research purely for its own sake without aim or clear purpose--we risk squandering
resources which could have been applied to relieve the immediate suffering of our dispirited,
disadvantaged, and disenfranchised members of society. In the final analysis, given finite
economic resources we are forced to strike a balance in how we allocate those resources
among competing societal objectives.





Issue 19
"Creating an appealing image has become more important in contemporary society than is the
reality or truth behind that image."

Has creating an image become more important in our society than the reality or truth behind
the image? I agree that image has become a more central concern, at least where short-term
business or political success is at stake. Nevertheless, I think that in the longer term image
ultimately yields to substance and fact.

The important role of image is particularly evident in the business world. Consider, for
example, today's automobile industry. American cars are becoming essentially identical to
competing Japanese cars in nearly every mechanical and structural respect, as well as in price.
Thus to compete effectively auto companies must now differentiate their products largely
through image advertising, by conjuring up certain illusory benefits--such as machismo, status,
sensibility, or fun. The increasing focus on image is also evident in the book-publishing
business. Publishers are relying more and more on the power of their brands rather than the
content of their books. Today mass-market books are supplanted within a year with products
that are essential the same---except with fresh faces, rifles, and other promotional angles. I
find quite telling the fact that today more and more book publishers are being acquired by large
media companies. And the increasing importance of image is especially evident in the music
industry, where originality, artistic interpretation, and technical proficiency have yielded almost
entirely to sex appeal.

The growing significance of image is also evident in the political realm, particularly when it
comes to presidential politics. Admittedly, by its very nature politicking has always emphasized
rhetoric and appearances above substance and fact. Yet since the invention of the camera
presidential politicians have become increasingly concerned about their image. For example,
Teddy Roosevelt was very careful never to be photographed wearing a tennis outfit, for fear
that such photographs would serve to undermine his rough-rider image that won him his only
term in office. With the advent of television, image became even more central in presidential
politics. After all, it was television that elected J.F.K. over Nixon. And our only two-term
presidents in the television age were elected based largely on their image. Query whether
Presidents Lincoln, Taft, or even F.D.R. would be elected today if pitted against the handsome
leading man Reagan, or the suave and poliricaUy correct Clinton. After all, Lincoln was homely,
Taft was obese, and F.D.R. was crippled.

In the long term, however, the significance of image wanes considerably. The image of the
Marlboro man ultimately gave way to the truth about the health hazards of cigarette smoking.
Popular musical acts with nothing truly innovative to offer musically eventually disappear from
the music scene. And anyone who frequents yard sales knows that today's best-selling books

often become tomorrow's pulp. Even in politics, I think history has a knack for peeling away
image to focus on real accomplishments. I think history will remember Teddy Roosevelt, for
example, primarily for building the Panama Canal and for establishing our National Park
System--and not for his rough-and-ready wardrobe.

In the final analysis, it seems that in every endeavor where success depends to some
degree on persuasion, marketing, or salesmanship, image has indeed become the central
concern of those who seek to persuade. And as our lives become busier, our attention spans
briefer, and our choices among products and services greater, I expect this trend to continue
unabated--for better or worse.





Issue 20
"Most of the people we consider heroic today were, in fact, very ordinary people who
happened to be in the right place at the right time."

I agree with the statement insofar as our heroes tend to be ordinary people like us. However,
I strongly disagree with the further assertion that people become heroes simply by being "in
the right place at the right time." If we look around at the sorts of people we choose as our
heroes, we real/ze that heroism has far less to do with circumstance than with how a hero
responds to it.

I concede that heroes are generally ordinary people. In my observation we choose as our
heroes people with whom we strongly identify--people who are very much like us. In fact many
of us call a parent, grandparent, or older sibling our hero. Why? My intuition is that the more a
person shares in common with us----m terms of experience, heritage, disposition, motives, and
even physical attributes-----~e more accessible that person's heroic traits are to us, and the
stronger their attraction as a role model. And few would dispute that we share more in common
with immediately family than with anyone else.

However, the statement's further suggestion that people become heroes merely as a result
of circumstances not of their own choosing is simply wrongheaded. Admittedly, circumstance
often serves as a catalyst for heroism. After all, without wars there would be no war heroes. Yet
this does not mean that we should lionize every member of the armed forces. I find quite telling
the oft-used idiom "heroic effort," which suggests that mere coincidence has little to do with
heroism. If one examines the sorts of people we select as our heroes, it becomes evident that
heroism requires great effort, and that the very nub of heroism lies in the response, not in the
circumstance.

Consider the ordinary person who overcomes a personal obstacle through extraordinary
effort, fortitude, or faith---thereby inspiring others toward similar accomplishments. Sports
heroes often fall into this category. For example, Lance Armstrong, a Tour de France cycling
champion, became a national hero not merely because he won the race but because he
overcame a life-threatening illness, against all odds, to do so. Of course, widespread notoriety
is not a requisite for heroic status. Countless individuals with physical and mental disabilities
become heroes in their community and among their acquaintances by treating their obstacles
as personal challenges--thereby setting inspirational examples. Consider the blind law student
who inspires others to overcome the same challenge; or the amputee distance runner who
serves as a role model for other physically challenged people in her community. To assert that

individuals such as these become our heroes merely by accident, as the statement seems to
suggest, is to completely misunderstand the very stuff of which heroes are made.

Another sort of hero is the ordinary person who attains heroic stature by demonstrating
extraordinary courage of conviction--against external oppressive forces. Many such heroes
are champions of social causes, rising to heroic stature by way of the courage of their
convictions; and, it is because we share those convictions--because we recognize these
champions as being very much like us----~at they become our heroes. Such heroes as India's
Mahatma Gandhi, America's Martin Luther King, South Africa's Nelson Mandela, and Poland's
Lech Lawesa come immediately to mind. None of these heroes was born into royalty or other
privilege; they all came from fairly common, or ordinary, places and experiences. Or consider
again our military heroes, whose courage and patriotism in battie the statement would serve to
completely discredit as merely accidental outcomes of certain soldiers being "m the right place
at the right time." I think the preposterousness of such a suggestion is clear enough.

In sum, the statement correctly suggests that heroes are ordinary people like us, and that
opportunity, or circumstance, is part of what breeds heroes. However, the statement overlooks
that serendipity alone does not a hero make. Heroism requires that "heroic effort," or better yet
a "heroic response," to one's circumstances in life.