July 2010 - June 2011: One Year of Philosophical Comment Statistics

So, this is some trivia before I go on my summer holiday, but if you follow this blog, perhaps also of some interest. Although the blog started late December 2009, the statistics function wasn't activated until May 2010, and the following didn't start to reach measurable levels until June-July that year. Thus, the statistics here presented cover almost a 12 month period starting from that.

1. Number of readers/hits

Over 18.000 in total

Over 1500/month on average

Over 346/week on average

Over 49/day on average

However, the deviation from the mean with regard to especially the weekly and daily averages is pretty drastic. In particular, the means are weighted down by the rather low following the first few months, so the daily hit average nowadays normally varies between 50 and 80. To work out the general picture, here's the trend for the entire period, with figures for hits/month:

2. Most popular posts
Here, it may be interesting to see an overview for the whole period, as well as for the last month. Obviously (and perhaps not surprisingly) the post on Wikileaks continues to be the hit piece by far. On second place, I'm quite happy to see that my take on some bad signs of current bioethics research has been a popular item. A rather late coming hit scoring pretty close to that is some recent comments on the ID card folly of Finland. Behind these three, it's a tight race between several posts on rather different topics. Some of these have been starting to move up the list some time after they were posted – something I interpret as a sign of having been early on a topic of forthcoming interest to a larger crowd, such as in vitro meat or uterus transplantation.

One year

Most recent month

3. Country of readers
This is quite an interesting one for me personally. When I started, rather naturally, my readers were mostly Swedes, but pretty soon the US readership started catching on, while the UK has been a strong runner up to those two in the last 6 months or so. Otherwise, I have been pleased to find that Philosophical Comment attract readers from all over the globe. To provide some perspective, here are images displaying the proportions for the whole period as well as for the most recent month:

One year

Most recent month

So, since I'll soon be off the computer for some time (one of my tricks for achieving some real rest during the short time of a Swedish summer), I guess the only remaining thing to say is thank you. To all of you who read, link, comment, repost, and so on.

See you in six weeks or so!

More on the Ethics of Uterus Transplantation

Here are two posts that continues to ad takes on the recent news of advanced plans to conduct uterus transplantation at the Sahlgrenska University Hospital in my town.

one at the Oxford Practical Ethics blog by Charles Foster that generated a bit of a discussion (with myself as one of several participants), and

another, very fresh, at the Journal of Medical Ethics blog by Iain Brassington.

In short, Foster takes the discussion to a meta-level, while Brassington wriggles it back to the floor of the clinic.

Enjoy!

Exercises in Hypocrisy: USA, Assad and the ICC

It is reported today in The Wall Street Journal, echoed in Swedish media, that the USA is making efforts to build a case against Syrian dictator, Bashar al-Assad, at the International Criminal Court (ICC), located in the Hague. Now, I'm all for having al-Assad gone as Syrian leader and prosecuted for what he has been doing to his people these last months. But, I must confess that I find it grossly hypocritical, bordering on the perverse, that it is the USA that is doing the pushing in that direction.

Why? For two simple reasons that work together (sources for this can be found here, here, here):

First, the USA does not recognise the legitimacy or authority of the ICC. In fact, the USA (together with China, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Qatar and Israel) voted against the Rome Statute, establishing the court, in 1998. There was a brief moment when (through President Clinton), USA was a bona fide signatory (which can be seen as a declaration of intent of a country). However, one of the first actions of G.W. Bush was to "nullify" that executive action, thereby effectively taking the US policy re. ICC back to square one. In any case, even as signatory, the US never ratified this signature (i.e. formally recognising the authority of ICC) and does not seem bent on doing anything in that direction any time soon.

Second, the USA is continuously putting a lot of effort into undercutting the legitimacy and authority of ICC that arises out of its recognition by many other countries), by setting up special agreements of immunity with countries that do recognise ICC. I don't know what's the price for those concessions, but USA being the economically and military most powerful country in the world, I suppose there has been a few offers that couldn't be refused.

Now, I personally think that it is a sad story that a country that is holding out itself as the leading force for freedom, democracy and justice in the world is unable to see the point of having a legal institution for war crimes and crimes against humanity that is not bound to any particular national interest. However, if that is the position of the USA, so be it. However, to hold that position and at the same time make use of ICC whenever it fits the national interest of the USA, that is highly problematic for more profound reasons.

First, it is a shame- and disgraceful attitude. It is the stance of the free-rider and the parasite. It is hypocrisy taking exponential proportions. And it undermines any claim to seriousness of the US ambition to be the world's leading force for the good.

Second, and this should actually worry US citizens, the US position means that – according to US official policy – the prosecution and possible incarceration of people by an alleged legal body that the US does not see as having legitimate authority is quite alright. Feel the taste of that one and think for a bit about how to square it with the condemnation of what al-Assad, Gadaffi and those other chaps have been doing to their citizens......