To mark the birth of William Alexander Percy here is a paper published in the Fudan Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences. Here is Bertram Wyatt-Brown’s Introduction to the 2006 edition of Percy’s Lanterns on the Levee. And here too is James E. Person Jr.’s look at Percy’s memoir.
You are cordially invited to the tenth international conference of the Michael Oakeshott Association to be held at the Catholic University of Portugal in Lisbon, September 19-22, 2019. The theme is “Philosophy, Poetry, and Conservatism.” We hope to engage Oakeshott scholars as well as students and non-academics with an interest in the thought of Michael Oakeshott—one of the 20th century’s greatest British thinkers. Inquiries and abstracts (a maximum of 500 words) should be sent to Corey Abel. The deadline for submissions is August 30th, 2018 and should include the title of paper, the full name of the author(s), affiliation, CV, and an email address.
I’m pretty much in accord with Matt’s assessment of the CAO Maduro. My topping the cigar with a large fishing knife and yet still coming very close to a clean cut is a testament to the built quality. The Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper was gorgeous and the burn was incredibly even. A good all round smoke and one that a novice may well find very congenial and cost-effective — sadly, I didn’t have an Islay to accompany it but next time . . .
My chum, Péter Érdi, editor of Cognitive Systems Research, has alerted me to the open access memoir (63 pages) by neuroscience grandee Michael Arbib.
Giving me the opportunity to talk to these visitors was one of the ways in which McCulloch contributed more to my graduate education than any other professor at MIT. When I thanked him, he told me that the best thanks would be to offer similar kindness to the young scientists I would have a chance to mentor in future years, a commitment I have done my best to honor.
When asked to define epistemics, I explain that epistemics is to epistemology as physics is to physiology, which is about as clear as it gets. At that time, the School’s main function was to put on a public lecture about twice a term, after which the group would retire to the Staff Club (which had an excellent collection of single malts) and drink the night away.
We formulated the issue as this: “Is God more like embarrassment or gravitation?” The former is not the vulgar claim that God is an embarrassment but rather that God might be a human construct, varying from one social group to another – just as what is embarrassing (consider nudity) may vary greatly from one culture to another – and yet be rooted in human nature. Similarly, the social construction of God might emerge from a human need for protection or to still fears of death or otherwise add a specifically human meaning to life (Arbib). Conversely, God, like gravitation, may be an external reality which we can only partially apprehend (Hesse). For the latter, consider that Newton and Einstein offer different theories of gravitation but, no matter what the theory, gravitation itself is not a social construct – under normal conditions (e.g., no jet pack) you will still fall to the ground if you jump from a building.
It’s been exactly a decade since my chum George Feaver crossed the finishing line. Here’s his bibliography and more.
A meditation on writer Walker Percy’s The Moviegoer, opens at The Front Gallery in the St. Claude Arts District.
A most elegant close-grained review essay of Mark Rowlands’ Memory and the Self: Phenomenology, Science and Autobiography by Christopher Jude McCarroll in The Journal of Mind and Behavior.
[E]verything bears witness to what we are, our friendships and enmities, our glance and the clasp of our hand, our memory and that which we do not remember, our books and our handwriting. Untimely Meditations Nietzsche, 1876/1997
Here is the first (and timely) offering from the series Palgrave Studies in Classical Liberalism.
This recent book sounds most appealing what with a chapter entitled “Walker Percy’s Search”. An endorsement by Brian Smith is recommendation enough.
manwithoutqualities 