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Reminiscence of a Symphony Performance. In the last issue of the Quarterly, Ken Blackwell and Tom Stanley related the story of how British composer Graham WHhettam had dedicated his 4th symphony, Sinfonia Contra Timore "to Bertrand Russell and all other persons who suffer imprisonment and other injustice for the expression of their beliefs or the convenience of politicians and bureaucracies." This dedication had apparently kept the symphony off the BBC until protests by Russell and other public figures got it performed on that network. Robert Davis, one of the original founders of the BRS and Society President from 1975-82, writes to tell us more about the symphony, as well as to correct some mistaken rumors about his health: Regarding the note in Issue 119 of Graham Whettam and his symphony #4 dedicated to Russell: we played this for members interested in hearing it at the 1978 Annual Meeting. I had learned of it and the troubles getting it aired on the BBC and contacted Whettam. I met with him on one of my visits to Britain and he gave us a master tape. Warren Smith, at the time a recording mogul with his own studio, transcribed it to a tape and we played it at a lunch for those interested. It has no direct connection to Russell other than the dedication. It was a very "modern" piece, very dissonant. I usually loathe that sort of thing but I found it "interesting" none the less. Don Jackanicz, with a more sophisticated if masochistic taste in modern music, liked it. Unfortunately no one else did and I had people complain I had subjected them to it even though it was an entirely volunteer experience. In a 1978 letter to me when he sent the tape Warren stated that he was keeping the master until directed to send it to either the BRS Library or the Archives. I assume we did so and probably to the Archives which is where I think it belongs. Ken Blackwell or Tom Stanley may know. After 25 years, it may be of interest to be played at a meeting again.Heaven and Hell. Also in the last Quarterly, Peter Stone reminded us of Leo Rosten's interview of Russell concerning Russell's agnosticism. Rosten asked Russell what he would think if, upon dying, he found himself in Heaven and before The Lord. Anthony Flew writes and asks why Rosten wondered about Russell finding himself in Heaven, for "surely any old-fashioned Jew, Christian or Muslim would expect Russell, like the rest of us, to find ourselves in Hell." Flew also writes to suggest that a letter from him published in the last Quarterly was misprinted. The original letter has gone missing, and the editors are still struggling to come to grips with all the details of this typographical mystery, but this much is clear: In his May 2003 editorial, Peter quoted Russell's famous statement that "it is undesirable to believe a proposition when there is no ground whatever for supposing that it is true." Peter then went on to elaborate on this doctrine by explaining: "when talking about unicorns, minotaurs, or compassionate conservatives, one does not normally have to prove their non-existence; the mere lack of any evidence is sufficient reason not to believe in any of them." Flew then wrote to point out that in more than thirty years experience as one, he has not observed his fellow Conservatives to be conspicuously less compassionate than members of other parties. We think that even in its first form, Flew made his point with his usual incisiveness. More Flew News. On the 50th anniversary of the famous 1948 Copleston-Russell debate concerning the existence of God, William Craig and Anthony Flew met in Madison, Wisconsin to publicly debate the issue anew. That anniversary debate is now being published by Ashgate in a volume entitled Does God Exist: The Craig-Flew Debate, edited by Stan Wallace. The volume, as well as containing the edited transcript of the debate, also contains chapters critiquing the debate and discussing the issues raised by it. The volume is to appear in 2004. The original Copleston-Russell debate, as well as occurring in The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell (v. 11), has been published in the British, but not the American edition of Why I Am Not a Christian (the U.S. Jesuits would not give Father Copleston permission to publish it here), Bertrand Russell on God and Religion (1986), and numerous student anthologies. Re-Orientalism. New York City Roué and BRS Founding Member Warren Allen Smith sends us this report on two Honorary Members of the BRS. Taslima Nasrin, he tells us, is now a Guest Researcher at Harvard's JFK School of Government, using the University's libraries to research such subjects as patriarchy, Islamism, and rationalism. Nasrin is also featured in a new documentary film Fearless: Stories from Asian Women-The Price of Freedom, which had its U.S. premiere Friday, October 17th at the 7th Annual Hollywood Film Festival. Her new webpage is at: http://taslimanasrin.com. And BRS Honorary Member Ibn Warraq had an article on the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal (Monday, September 29, 2003), in which, following the recent death of Columbia University's Edward Said, Warraq accused Said of "having practically invented the intellectual argument for Muslim rage." Warraq goes on to further criticize Said's classic work Orientalism, in which Said first made the arguments to which Warraq takes exception. The Quarterly's Editorial Office Moves to NYC. After two and a half years of service, Peter Stone has stepped down as editor of the BRS Quarterly in order to accept a teaching position at Stanford and concentrate on research. The new editors are Rosalind Carey and John Ongley, and the new address for the editorial office, located at Lehman College-CUNY in the Bronx, is at the front of this issue of the Quarterly. The Bertrand Russell Society wishes to thank Peter for the excellent service he provided the Society for so long as editor of the Quarterly and to wish him much luck and happiness in California. The Society also wishes to thank Peter's Rochester crew – Phil Ebersole, Tim Madigan, Rachel Murray, David White, and Alan Bone - for the able work they did for so long in assisting Peter with the Quarterly. The new editors especially want to thank Peter and David White for all the help they gave with the transition of the Quarterly's editorship.ANNUAL MEETING NEWS ~ * ~ CALL FOR PAPERS ~ * ~ SUPPORT THE SOCIETY – ATTEND THE APA ~ * ~ Also at this year's Eastern APA will be a Colloquium on Russell and Frege. This will be on Tuesday, December 30, from 11:15 to 1:15. The first speaker, at 11:15, will be Matthew McKeon (University of Massachusetts-Amherst) speaking on 'Russell and Logical Ontology', with Edgar Boedeker (University of Northern Iowa) giving the commentary, and at 12:15, Joongal Kim (University of Notre Dame) speaks on 'Are Numbers Objects? Part II', with Christopher Pincock (Purdue University) giving the commentary. Keven Klement will chair the first session and Steve Gerrard the second. BRS BOARD ELECTIONS ~ * ~ IT'S TIME TO RENEW ~ * ~ |