Politics

Browsing the BBC’s magazine offerings last weekend, as I often do; I came across a piece by writer and philosopher Roger Scruton discussing whether the English should have a say on whether Scotland should be independent.  It is an interesting piece, coming from an Englishman looking on the referendum with a nationalist frame of mind of his own – but it makes many failings that I’d like to address (to be considered alongside a rebuttal today from Murray Pittock).  I’m not committed to either side — Read more →

To argue is natural; to debate is human. Debating is the art of structuring an argument in a way to ensure that the audience will agree with you, and therefore that you will win.  I learned when I had a brief experience with debating in secondary school that there are three specific forms of argument that can be used when debating, known as modes of persuasion. The first is ethos.  Ethos is the Greek for character, and this part of debating is an appeal to — Read more →

Perhaps one of the most significant events of the Scottish independence referendum campaign so far came yesterday as George Osborne announced definitively that should Scotland vote Yes in September, they will not be allowed to share the British Pound Sterling in a currency union with the continuing UK.  To add further weight to the statement, he was joined by the most senior financial representatives of the two other major UK political parties: Danny Alexander (Lib Dem, Chief Secretary to the Treasury) and Ed Balls (Labour, — Read more →