Monsters exist, but they are too few in numbers to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are…the functionaries ready to believe and act without asking questions.- Primo Levi, born on this date in 1919
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Thought for the day ...
Friday, July 30, 2010
He seems a good candidate ...
... to me: Was Cardinal Newman a saint?
The purpose of a university, for Newman, was to ensure that those educated there had “a cultivated intellect, a delicate taste, a candid, equitable, dispassionate mind”. This, surely, is still the central aim of preprofessional undergraduate education. Whatever discipline an undergraduate pursues, or majors in, it is not so much the acquisition of that particular body of knowledge that is important, but the acquiring, through that discipline, of a sense of the aims and methods of science and scholarship. It is the function of liberal education to make one aware of the boundaries of the domains of the sciences, and give one a grasp of which questions can and which cannot be settled by science.
This week's batch ...
... of TLS Letters: Arthur Koestler and women, Mailer’s war, Operatic beds, and more!
Thoughtful ...
... An Agnostic Manifesto.
The person best-qualified to comment on this, of course, is Mark Vernon, whose After Atheism, which I read last summer, I cannot recommend highly enough.
I am well aware that many churchgoers regard their beliefs with an unwarranted certainty (unwarranted because, if one is certain, there is no need for faith). I never tire of repeating Newman's definition of faith: "being capable of bearing doubt." To assent or dissent to a belief in God is an act of faith, since you cannot be certain either way.
I think that Ron Rosenbaum is not as closely acquainted with the thought of Aquinas as he ought to be. Aquinas, after all, is the one who said that all things runs into mystery, and that we cannot know what God is, only what he is not. The agnostic is not someone who is especially attuned to the mystery of being, since any authentic act of faith must be premised on an acknowledgment of that mystery. The agnostic simply declines to make an act of faith. If agnosticism really involved a reverence for mystery, it would be rubbing elbows with faith -- as I believe Mark Vernon's does.
I am well aware that many churchgoers regard their beliefs with an unwarranted certainty (unwarranted because, if one is certain, there is no need for faith). I never tire of repeating Newman's definition of faith: "being capable of bearing doubt." To assent or dissent to a belief in God is an act of faith, since you cannot be certain either way.
I think that Ron Rosenbaum is not as closely acquainted with the thought of Aquinas as he ought to be. Aquinas, after all, is the one who said that all things runs into mystery, and that we cannot know what God is, only what he is not. The agnostic is not someone who is especially attuned to the mystery of being, since any authentic act of faith must be premised on an acknowledgment of that mystery. The agnostic simply declines to make an act of faith. If agnosticism really involved a reverence for mystery, it would be rubbing elbows with faith -- as I believe Mark Vernon's does.
Thought for the day ...
I cannot express it: but surely you and everybody have a notion that there is, or should be, an existence of yours beyond you.- Emily Brontë, born on this date in 1818
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Work in progress ...
... The Best Magazine Articles Ever. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Lots of the usual suspects, and I guess they mean best American magazine articles.
Lots of the usual suspects, and I guess they mean best American magazine articles.
A wonderful discovery ...
... courtesy of Dave Lull by way of the Maverick Philosopher: Don Colacho’s Aphorisms.
Here's one I especially like: "There is an illiteracy of the soul which no diploma cures." Indeed.
Here's one I especially like: "There is an illiteracy of the soul which no diploma cures." Indeed.
In the meantime ...
... here's Martin Amis on euthanasia.
Perhaps the problem with aging would seem less if we, like earlier generations, honored age instead of worshipping youth.
Perhaps the problem with aging would seem less if we, like earlier generations, honored age instead of worshipping youth.
Thought for the day ...
God does not die on the day when we cease to believe in a personal deity, but we die on the day when our lives cease to be illumined by the steady radiance, renewed daily, of a wonder, the source of which is beyond all reason.- Dag Hammarskjöld, born on this date in 1905
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Thought for the day ...
Whenever a theory appears to you as the only possible one, take this as a sign that you have neither understood the theory nor the problem which it was intended to solve.- Karl Popper, born on this date in 1902
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Let us pray ...
... for my friend Judith: The pen and the pain.
I'm concerned, of course. But I would even more concerned if I didn't know that Judith is tough as nails. She will more than survive.
I'm concerned, of course. But I would even more concerned if I didn't know that Judith is tough as nails. She will more than survive.
Pretty pathetic ...
... Journolisters Risked Their Integrity.
I can't ever remember any of my colleagues at The Inquirer talking like this about those they disagreed with. This guy Spencer Ackerman seems especially to revel in posing as a tough guy. Watch what you ask for, Spence.
The trouble with experts ...
... according to Richard Feynman: The Difference between ‘True Science’ and ‘Cargo-Cult Science’.
… there is one feature I notice that is generally missing in cargo cult science. … It’s a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty — a kind of leaning over backwards. For example, if you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid — not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you’ve eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked — to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.
Noir in brief ...
... On crime & thrillers: Manhattan Noir 2, The Classics.
Not so brief may be Paul's wait for that Philly collection. The collector, sources tell me, is my former colleague Carlin Romano, who just loves to take things down to the wire.
Fascinating ...
... Richard Strauss in Life and Death. (That sounds like John Gielgud doing the voice-over.)
In this corner ...
... Shav vs. Shakes.
Also, don't miss The Smiling Genius.
More here. I never realized that "Hot Diggity" was based on Charier's España.
Also, don't miss The Smiling Genius.
More here. I never realized that "Hot Diggity" was based on Charier's España.
The artist's situation ...
... `As Charming, and As Absolute'.
I never met Guy Davenport, but he was a friend of my late friend, the composer John Davison. Both went to Harvard, and Davenport taught at Haverford College for a couple of years. John was for many years the chairman of the music department at Haverford. His music ought to be better known.
Thought for the day ...
Statistics are the triumph of the quantitative method, and the quantitative method is the victory of sterility and death.- Hilaire Belloc, born on this date in 1970See also Meditation on Statistical Method. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Monday, July 26, 2010
A history professor's satori ...
... It turns out that Starbucks is just a company.
The author of this excerpt is also not a terribly elegant writer.
The author of this excerpt is terribly confused if he thinks that people today have fewer musical choices than they once had. They might have fewer musical choices at Starbucks, but the “increased consolidation of corporate media power” doesn’t seem to be helping record companies or keeping millions of people from discovering music — tens of thousands of songs — from all over the place on the Internet. Usually the concern we hear is the opposite — that there is no longer a central cultural resource, that the gatekeepers (editors, reviewers) don’t have the power they once did, that there are too many alternatives and people don’t know what to choose and we no longer have a shared national culture.
The author of this excerpt is also not a terribly elegant writer.
Try this out ...
... I Write Like. (Hat tip, Lee Lowe.)
I plugged in something from a blog post, something from a column, and something from a review. The results? In order: Cory Doctorow, H.P. Lovecraft, and Mary Shelley.
Postscript: I just plugged in a paragraph from a review I wrote of Julian Barnes's Nothing To Be Frightened Of and was told I write like Charles Dickens. Here's the paragraph:
I plugged in something from a blog post, something from a column, and something from a review. The results? In order: Cory Doctorow, H.P. Lovecraft, and Mary Shelley.
Postscript: I just plugged in a paragraph from a review I wrote of Julian Barnes's Nothing To Be Frightened Of and was told I write like Charles Dickens. Here's the paragraph:
However much Barnes may assent intellectually to the notion that our sense of self is an illusion, it has in no way eased his fear of death, and he should perhaps be warned that faith would not entirely dispel that, either. As Newman observed, faith means “being capable of bearing doubt.” The faith that my own chain of causation forces me to profess offers, not the assurance, but the hope that God in His mercy will forgive me my many sins and allow me, eventually, to take up residence in one of the humbler corners of a much better neighborhood of being.
Very interesting ...
... The Limits of the Coded World. (Hat tips, Lee Lowe and Dave Lull.)
The model in question holds that the universe exists in space and time as a kind of ultimate code that can be deciphered. This image of the universe has a philosophical and religious provenance, and has made its way into secular beliefs and practices as well. In the case of human freedom, this presumption of a “code of codes” works by convincing us that a prediction somehow decodes or deciphers a future that already exists in a coded form. So, for example, when the computers read the signals coming from the monkeys’ brains and make a prediction, belief in the code of codes influences how we interpret that event. Instead of interpreting the prediction as what it is — a statement about the neural process leading to the monkeys’ actions — we extrapolate about a supposed future as if it were already written down, and all we were doing was reading it.
The monkey experiment mentioned at the outset also involves a category error. "The monkeys were ... taught to respond to a cue." Well, the reason we practice something is so we don't have to think about it when we do it later. So being able to determine that the monkeys were going to do something they had been trained to do before they "thought" about doing it tells us nothing.
One thing in particular that Egginton says is especially interesting: "I am free because neither science nor religion can ever tell me, with certainty, what my future will be and what I should do about it." Yes, indeed. I'll start taking determinism a good deal more seriously when its predictive powers become more manifest.
On Saturday, Mark Vernon posted something that seems pertinent to this: Scream for help in dreams. Mark writes that "we're far less free than we think we are. Our conscious life is, in large part, shaped by the unconscious." I have never thought of my "self" as even fundamentally, let alone exclusively, my conscious self. So I don't identify my freedom with my conscious self either. I rather like Georg Groddeck's idea that we do not live so much as we are lived by our It. But that It is us, and it is free. Our conscious self is merely its epidermis.
Thought for the day ...
Idealism is the noble toga that political gentlemen drape over their will to power.- Aldous Huxley, born on this date in 1894
Sunday, July 25, 2010
I am envious ...
... San Francisco’s “finger man”: Zborowski revisited.
What I am envious of is that Cynthia is going to meet and talk with the great Robert Conquest. I can't wait to read what comes out of that. (BTW, thanks to having had friends in low places, I knew what a finger man is.)
What I am envious of is that Cynthia is going to meet and talk with the great Robert Conquest. I can't wait to read what comes out of that. (BTW, thanks to having had friends in low places, I knew what a finger man is.)
Gird your loins ...
... for the next big Nabokov controversy: Freeing "Pale Fire" From Pale Fire. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Today's Inquirer reviews ...
... 'The Hundred-Foot Journey' by Richard C. Morais: Slumdog sous-chef.
... The Washington Post and the Web revolution.
... Pearl Buck made the Chinese visible in the West.
... 'City of Lost Girls': A hard-boiled detective story with a romantic touch Factual nuggets, folksy insight in a Phillies doubleheader.
... The Washington Post and the Web revolution.
... Pearl Buck made the Chinese visible in the West.
... 'City of Lost Girls': A hard-boiled detective story with a romantic touch Factual nuggets, folksy insight in a Phillies doubleheader.
Thought for the day ...
In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.- Eric Hoffer, born on this dare in 1902
(Bear this in mind the next time you hear someone from old media complaining about new media.)
Saturday, July 24, 2010
OK, let's take a look ...
... I love this song (it evokes intense personal reminiscence). But let's be honest. It is utterly contrived. "I'm just livin' in a dump like this." Well, Bruce wasn't living in any dump at the time, and never had. "I'm sick of sittin' around here tryin' to write this book." Oh, come on. And yet, as I say, I love it. Maybe because I did live what he imagined. And he imagined it well.
In case you wondered ...
... Is It Safe to Eat Breakfast. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I usually don't get around to it until about noon, though I am usually up by 6. I don't usually wake up hungry and I only eat when I feel hungry. And yes, I do have coffee, but not until about 8:30. The bacon I eat is made up the street by Sonny D'Angelo and has no preservatives. I tend to eat a lot of fruit, and I prefer game meat. As for exercise, it's Chen-style tai chi and walking. Yesterday, despite blistering heat, I did nearly 10 miles.
Not so fast ...
... Your Move: The Maze of Free Will. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
It’s undeniable that the way you are initially is a result of your genetic inheritance and early experience.
OK. Well, here's my move: To begin with, one could argue -- and it seems a reasonable argument to me and sounder scientifically -- that while we are conditioned by our genetic inheritance and early experience, we are not determined by them. Since when do my experiences determine my subsequent behavior? They certainly influence it. Moreover, I don 't see that the notion of free will necessarily implies full and ultimate responsibility. My responsibility and my knowledge are both as finite as I am. My judgment is imperfect, and my choices may -- and often are -- flawed. Get real, professor.
(You may also know, contrary to popular opinion, that current science gives us no more reason to think that determinism is false than that determinism is true.)
Well, apparently Ian McEwan doesn't know that, given what he is quoted as saying in the final paragraph, that the "arguments [against free will] seem watertight." McEwan also says that "I take on full accountability for the little ship of my being, even if I do not have control of its course. It is this sense of being the possessor of a consciousness that makes us feel responsible for it.” But by his logic he isn't taking on anything. That's just the way he happens to feel, and he can't help feeling that way because he has been determined from the start to feel that way. You're either free -- to whatever extent -- or you're not.
Thought for the day ...
All human wisdom is summed up in two words; wait and hope.- Alexander Dumas, born on this date in 1802
Friday, July 23, 2010
Warning ...
... this may offend. I looked on YouTube for some of the punk bands I rather liked in the early '80s. Real punk bands. Not the synthetic crap that came later and persists to this day. I still have a whole bunch of 45s that I have to transfer to CD. Anyway, this is actually quite funny, as much of the original punk was. Though it is, I forewarn thee, raunchy humor. Remember that these were Frank's wild years. And, trust me, they were quite wild. Just think: You may be so offended, you'll never visit this site again! But there is so much unnecessary seriousness among litblogs. Bet Ed Champion likes this.
Ans jere's something even more offensive (though do note that the speaker could not speak if he met them):
Most underrated ...
.. great true rocker. What's a true rocker? Well, let's put it this way. I am a first generation rock 'n' roller. Bruce Springsteen is second-generation. Hence, even his best album -- Nebraska -- is in fact mannerist. My buddies and I in high school laughed our asses off about Charlie Starkweather. Hey, give us a break. We were only teenagers. Bruce was 9 when Charlie and Caril went on their spree.
Intriguing ...
... The Struggle for the (Possible) Soul of David Eagleman. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Though Eagleman’s scientific and literary lives seem radically different on the surface, they are part of the same creative endeavor: to deepen our understanding of a complex world we can never fully grasp. Since scientists mostly talk about what they know, Eagleman’s emphasis on our ignorance may seem out of character. Eagleman offers an analogy: The work of science is like building a pier out into the ocean. We excitedly add on to the pier little by little, but then we look around and say, “Wait a minute, I’m at the end of the pier, but there’s a lot more out there.” The ocean of what we don’t know always dwarfs what we do know, he says. “During our lifetimes, we will get further on that pier. We’ll understand more at the end of our lives than we do now, but it ain’t going to cover the ocean.”
Thought for the day ...
An age which is incapable of poetry is incapable of any kind of literature except the cleverness of a decadence.- Raymond Chandler, born on this date in 1888
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Birthday boy ...
... On Edward Hopper's SUMMER EVENING.
There is an excellent poem that pertains to this painting in Seeded Light, a review of which is scheduled to run soon, I hope, in The Inquirer.
Thought for the day ...
My scientific studies have afforded me great gratification; and I am convinced that it will not be long before the whole world acknowledges the results of my work.- Gregor Mendel, born on this date in 1822
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Why does it not surprise ...
... that Jacques Brel would have been taken with the role of Don Quixote? For if he as a madman lived, he surely as a wise one died.
Explaining my absence ...
Blogging has been light because (a) I had a review due that I found found hard to write (only so much space and I wanted to say more than I could) and (b) I just had the first of two root canal sessions. The second is on Friday morning, then they fit the cap. Ah, the pleasures of growing old.
Birthday boy ...
... Happy Birthday, Papa. Ernest Hemingway's Life In Photos/Hemingway On Crime.
I knew it was Hemingway's birthday and thought of quoting him for the thought for the day. But, being perverse, I went with Marshall McLuhan.
I knew it was Hemingway's birthday and thought of quoting him for the thought for the day. But, being perverse, I went with Marshall McLuhan.
Wasting passions, religious fervour ...
... and fits of torpor. What more could you want? Life in exotic Palo Alto.
Hmm ...
... Times loses almost 90% of online readership. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I already subscribe to the WSJ online and to the TLS (both Murdoch properties). I like the Times, but thought two subscriptions was enough.
I already subscribe to the WSJ online and to the TLS (both Murdoch properties). I like the Times, but thought two subscriptions was enough.
Danger zone ...
... Sticking the world together with words. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Foreign languages are unsettling. They remind us how arbitrary the mental world we live in is. Silence is worse. When we try to imagine consciousness without words, when we think of a day, even an hour, without any words in the head, we are overcome by a kind of vertigo. As when we think of death.
Thought for the day ...
An administrator in a bureaucratic world is a man who can feel big by merging his non-entity in an abstraction. A real person in touch with real things inspires terror in him.- Marshall McLuhan, born on this date in 1911
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Philly book scene ...
... Local Area Events. Featuring Sloane Crosley. I remember when Sloane used to visit my office in the days when she was a publicist. Glad to see she's doing well.
Thought for the day ...
Often have I wondered with much curiosity as to our coming into this world and what will follow our departure.- Petrarch, born on this date in 1304
Monday, July 19, 2010
Thought for the day ...
A human life is a schooling for eternity.- Gottfried Keller, born on this date in 1819
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Indeed ...
... Sentimentality is poisoning our society. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I am, I am pretty sure, immune to sentimentality.
Sentimentalists try to make up for a lack of feeling by emotional exhibitionism. Men who feel little for women or children often have their names tattooed on their arms; the tattoo says, in effect, "Look what I am prepared to do for you." This is all too often a prelude to abandonment; the man is prepared to have himself tattooed, but not prepared for the slow grind of lasting support, which requires genuine feeling.
I am, I am pretty sure, immune to sentimentality.
Recommended ...
... by Ed Champion: Jennifer Howard's review of Nicholas Carr's "The Shallows" and William Powers's "Hamlet's Blackberry".
Thought for the day ...
For me, poetry is always a search for order.- Elizabeth Jennings, born on this date in 1926
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Oh, really ...
... The Trouble With Amazon.
The loss of serendipity that comes with not knowing exactly what one is looking for is lamented by ex-Amazon editor James Marcus: "Personalization strikes me as a mixed blessing. While it gives people what they want—or what they think they want—it also engineers spontaneity out of the picture. The happy accident, the freakish discovery, ceases to exist. And that's a problem."
This morning, the intrepid Dave Lull sent me a link to a piece in the Guardian detailing various summer reading choices. Looking through it I learned that J.A. Baker's diaries and another of his books have been gathered together into a single volume that also includes his preternaturally wonderful The Peregrine. I just went to Amazon UK and ordered a copy. All of this seems to me every bit as serendipitous as stumbling upon it while browsing in a book store, which might never happen anytime soon in this country.
The notion that the more the choices you have the worse choices you make is risible on its face. It all depends on who is doing the choosing and what mental and experiential equipment one brings to the task.
The notion that the more the choices you have the worse choices you make is risible on its face. It all depends on who is doing the choosing and what mental and experiential equipment one brings to the task.
Much of interest here ...
... Let's get together: summer reading recommendations. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Some random comments:
I gather that Margaret Drabble Pharisaically exempts herself from private greed.
Richard Ford says, " think of Flem Snopes with a law degree." That would be Bill Clinton, right?
Thanks to John Gray to alerting all of us to new works by J.A. Baker.
What Richard Mabey has to say about Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini's book is most interesting.
Some random comments:
I gather that Margaret Drabble Pharisaically exempts herself from private greed.
Richard Ford says, " think of Flem Snopes with a law degree." That would be Bill Clinton, right?
Thanks to John Gray to alerting all of us to new works by J.A. Baker.
What Richard Mabey has to say about Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini's book is most interesting.
Bryan discusses ...
... Secular Britain. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Jesus said that his kingdom is not of this world. It might be better if more of his followers took him at his word. "... Smallbone is different, he is passionate. He prays intently. His relationship with God is the heart of the matter and we are intended to approve this relationship." It is so easy to think that one's political activities involve doing God's work. The work of the faithful is to pray.
Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler write in their book Connected, “One way to make social networks stable is to arrange them so that everyone is connected to a node that can never be removed… If God were seen as a node on a network, large groups of people could be bound together not just by a common idea but also by a specific social relationship to every other believer.”
Jesus said that his kingdom is not of this world. It might be better if more of his followers took him at his word. "... Smallbone is different, he is passionate. He prays intently. His relationship with God is the heart of the matter and we are intended to approve this relationship." It is so easy to think that one's political activities involve doing God's work. The work of the faithful is to pray.
Friday, July 16, 2010
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