That Wendell Berry takes on the campus commissars (and their complicitous willingly martyred cannon-fodder individual manqué bidders) offers some inkling of hope for preserving liberality. But I fear we are just entering the beginnings of a Darkness at Noon moment — the prospect of a total eclipse is immanent. Check out Orwell’s article on Koestler’s Darkness at Noon reprinted…
It’s been reported on The Relatives FB webpage that Tony Corbitt (far left) has died. We lost Gean West earlier this year. acid funkfunkgean westgospelthe relativesTony Corbitt
Coming soon . . . Pride and Profit explores the ways in which Austen’s novels reflect Smith’s ideas. More than this, they provide colorful illustrations of Smith’s ideas on self-command, prudence, benevolence, justice, and impartiality as well as vanity, pride, and greed. A freely available symposium on Jack Russell Weinstein’s Adam Smith’s Pluralism: Rationality, Education…
George Clinton famously told Hazel to play “like your momma had just died,” and the resulting evocation of melancholy and sorrow doesn’t merely rival Jimi Hendrix’s work, but arguably bests a lot of it. Accompanied by another softer guitar figure providing gentle rhythm for the piece, the end result is simply fantastic, an emotional apocalypse…
“The Semiotics of Footwear” by Gustav Temple and Vic Darkwood in The Chap Almanac. The Oxford: As eloquent as a letter of recommendation from the Marquis de Sade, the Oxford singles a man out as a fellow worth serious consideration. A foot clad in well-polished and immaculately-crafted leather acts as a passport to the realms…
Patricia Churchland talking at the very excellent Santa Fe Institute. brain scienceCognitive neurosciencecomplexityconsciousnessdarwinEvolutionary PsychologyMaterialismMoral psychologyNeurophilosophyPatricia ChurchlandPhilosophy of mindsanta fe institutesituated cognitionSpontaneous order
Babette’s FeastfilmfoodgastronomyLa Grand BouffeTampopo
BBC popular write up of Simon Garnier’s co-authored Army ants dynamically adjust living bridges in response to a cost–benefit trade-off. antscollective behaviorcomplexitydistributed cognitionoptimizationroboticsself-assemblySelf-organizationSimon GarnierSpontaneous orderStigmergySwarm intelligence
When I was in the open ward and working on staff, he was very good to me. He immediately saw what I was getting at and helped me wire up my first lapsometer, read my article and refused to take credit as coauthor. “Too metaphysical for me,” he said politely, knocking out his briar. “I’ll…
Mishima once famously told his wife that “even if I am not immediately understood, it’s OK because I’ll be understood by the Japan of 50 or 100 years time.” The short answer according to the very excellent Mishima scholar Damian Flanagan is “no”. Today marks the 45th anniversary of Mishima’s death. Speaking of which see Yourcenar’s thoughts…
manwithoutqualities 