I have been a member of The Institute

for Philosophy & Public Policy for just over ten years. Although

I am now involved with several other institutions, this is the one I care

most about. We had a regular staff meeting this morning. The Institute

has just produced a book entitled War

After September 11. It’s a good small volume of essays, and it appeared

in bookstores just six months after we conceived the idea. Today we discussed

creating a whole series of such "fastbacks" on the philosophical

dimensions of current issues. The next volume, we agreed, will concern

biotechnology.

I had a conversation and did some emailing today on the whole idea of

using mapping software to diagram the field of deliberative democracy

I now have a clearer idea how

this could be done, technically. I also agreed to go to Connecticut in

April for a conference on deliberation sponsored by the Democracy

Project of the Center for Values in Higher Education. And the proofs

of The Civic Mission of Schools arrived, looking fine.