… 'The Hobbit' & Secrets of Smaug the Dragon | Finances Online™.
Pretty fascinating stuff.
Thursday, December 12, 2013
Maybe only truth …
… Joan Acocella: Is There Justice in the Book of Job? : The New Yorker. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
In Answer to Job, if memory serves, Jung sees the book as having to do with God's self-realization.
In Answer to Job, if memory serves, Jung sees the book as having to do with God's self-realization.
"Where were you when I Created?"
Mark Larrimore, the director of the religious-studies program at the New School, has published “The Book of Job: A Biography” (Princeton University Press), which is a “reception history,” chronicling the answers given to that riddle by commentators from the midrash—the rabbinical meditations that were first compiled in the third century—down to Elie Wiesel...The true ending, Wiesel preferred to believe, was lost. More recently, he has changed his mind, and settled on the idea that Job merely chose silence, not submission. Job, he wrote, had “learned that he lived in a world that was cold and cynical—a world without true friends,” but one, nevertheless, in which “God seeks to join man in his solitude.”
Which is the mystery of the Cross...
A thought for today …
We are born knowing nothing and with much striving we learn but a little; yet all the while we are bound by laws that hearken to no plea of ignorance, and measure out their rewards and punishments with calm indifference.
— Paul Elmer More, born on this date in 1864
Wednesday, December 11, 2013
Trendy Words ...
So I have noticed the word "so" proliferating myself...
The emergence of a new grammatical entity signifies an elision not of words but of the orderly thought that is the precondition of orderly expression. We see a lapse into vagueness, a failure or refusal to construct any sort of argument.
Retiring from academia ...
As I expected, people in mid-career didn’t like the decision at all: I’m rejecting what is the center of their lives, and it will be their center for another decade or two and—I think this is a big issue—it raises intimations of mortality. Americans do not like mortality.
The surprising reaction was people at the beginning of their careers: they were enthusiastic, perhaps because I’m showing that the academic life—which can look pretty grim (and is) at that point—does not have to be a life sentence.
Hmm …
… What Hitchens got wrong: Abolishing religion won’t fix anything - Salon.com. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I agree that abolishing religion won't fix anything, but the logic on display at the beginning is peculiar. If the basic premise of the New Atheism is reflected in the syllogism at the top, then it is simply another example the fallacy of the undistributed middle. And post hoc, ergo propter hoc doesn't confuse cause and effect. It confuses cause with sequence.
But the New Atheism, by taking on so much of the form of religion, demonstrates why religion can't really be abolished. It can, however, change shape.
I agree that abolishing religion won't fix anything, but the logic on display at the beginning is peculiar. If the basic premise of the New Atheism is reflected in the syllogism at the top, then it is simply another example the fallacy of the undistributed middle. And post hoc, ergo propter hoc doesn't confuse cause and effect. It confuses cause with sequence.
But the New Atheism, by taking on so much of the form of religion, demonstrates why religion can't really be abolished. It can, however, change shape.
Weather report …
… The Left Hand of Ogden Nash | The Era of Casual Fridays. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Someone has to remind the National Geographic Channel—needs to remind all American channels—that Americans aren’t adorable.Depends on the American, I would think.
The choices are …
… WLT’s 75 Notable Translations 2013 | World Literature Today. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
The envy of Big Brother …
… Tom Stoppard: State surveillance of personal data: what is the society we wish to protect? (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
It had to happen. When all that possibility of expansion became available the spooks were going to avail themselves of it as naturally as night follows day.
A thought for today …
Like Midas, the Rationalist is always in the unfortunate position of not being able to touch anything, without transforming it into an abstraction; he can never get a square meal of experience.
— Michael Oakeshott, born on this date in 1901
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Pure Dutch …
… The Streak — The Barnes & Noble Review. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
By the mid-'80s, at any rate, Leonard was solidly in bestsellerdom, the fat of the land, lauded and blurbed by Stephen King over here and Christopher Lehmann-Haupt over there. Money and respect? Dangerous, very dangerous. A combination to kill one's muse stone dead. He could have got bored or begun to repeat himself. Instead he hit what I propose to call The Streak:Freaky Deaky (1988), Killshot (1989), and Get Shorty (1990). Three years, three radically different novels, three effortless expansions or elaborations of Leonard-ness. "Chris Mankowski's last day on the job, two in the afternoon, two hours to go, he got a call to dispose of a bomb." So beginsFreaky Deaky -- Instant Leonard, weighted just right, the eye hopping from clause to clause like one of those little bouncing balls on the screen of a karaoke machine. The line could read -- by the old dispensation should read -- "It was Chris Mankowski's last day on the job, and at two in the afternoon,with two hours to go, he got a call to dispose of a bomb." But it doesn't, so where those words are missing we have negative space -- a jazzily charged absence that defines the affect of the book. The inner ear picks it up, registers it, appreciates it. And the inner ear feels…cool.
Longform Update ...
David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker...defined longform as “lengthy, relaxed, deeply-reported, literary nonfiction.” He added, “I think it’s fantastic that the first law of evangelical Web theology, that no one would read anything long on the Web, has been overturned thoroughly.”
Inquirer Ownership Update ...
George Norcross III has become the majority owner of the Inquirer, Daily News and philly.com. Norcross is expected to announce his purchase of tech industry titan Kris Singh‘s shares in Philadelphia’s largest news organization later this afternoon.
Women Read Mid-Century Men
"I remember putting On the Road down the first time a woman was mentioned. I was just like: 'Fuck. You.'
And there's more, too...
And there's more, too...
Contingency and necessity …
… O’Connor on Explaining Everything | The Prosblogion. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
Boohoo …
… In No Regrets, women writers talk about what it was like to read literature's "midcentury misogynists." (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I have grown tired of people and their grievances.
I have grown tired of people and their grievances.
When women read the hyper-masculine literary canon, their discomfort is punctuated by the knowledge that their male peers are reading these books, identifying with them, and acting out their perspectives and narratives.
And what do women do when they read the feminine literary canon?
Art and faith …
… More Artists, Fewer Intellectuals | The American Conservative. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
A thought for today …
It is not in the nature of politics that the best men should be elected. The best men do not want to govern their fellowmen.
— George MacDonald, born on this date in 1824
Whatever your politics ...
Monday, December 09, 2013
As she should …
… Keanu Reeves, I'm sorry I doubted you - Telegraph.
I think Reeves's performance as William Hurt's sidekick in I Love You to Death is priceless.
I think Reeves's performance as William Hurt's sidekick in I Love You to Death is priceless.
Behavior has meaning …
… Everyone on the Couch by Theodore Dalrymple - City Journal. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
The nearly complete exclusion of the meaning of behavior from diagnoses turns psychiatry into a merely bureaucratic process, in that each diagnosis will have its prescribed, reimbursed—though not necessarily effective—treatment. Incoherence often results. To qualify as intermittent explosive disorder, the DSM-5 asserts, an individual’s outbursts should not have tangible ends, among them power and intimidation. Yet if we exclude such ends, it becomes inexplicable as to why outbursts should commonly occur in response to a minor provocation by a close intimate or an associate. To be devoid of tangible ends, the outbursts would have to occur completely at random, and they seldom do, certainly not among 2.5 percent of the population. The editors seem to have reflected little on the meaning of their own work.
The need for good sense …
… RealClearReligion - G.K. Chesterton vs. Conspiracy Theorists.
Duhem did not invent this concept of good sense. The 17th century mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal once distinguished between l'esprit de géométrie (the geometrical mind) and l'esprit de finesse (the subtle or keen mind). The former is a rational faculty necessary for logic and geometry. By contrast, l'esprit de finesse, though rational, requires something more: a subtleness or nimbleness of thought. Duhem's idea was that this rational je ne sais quoi is a necessary part of scientific inquiry.
Some dark choices …
… Most Wanted: Critic's Picks for 2013 - The Barnes & Noble Review. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Henri Cole and James lord …
… Street of the Iron Po(e)t, Part IX : The New Yorker. (Hat tip, Christopher Guerin.)
A thought for today …
A good book is the precious lifeblood of a master spirit.
— John Milton, born on this date in 1608
Sunday, December 08, 2013
Hmm …
… What Are the Right Questions About Catholic Fiction? (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
This critique has a couple of problems. First, it is always best to focus on what a writer chooses to write about rather than what he has chosen not to write about. Second, while everything said about the changing publishing scene is correct, that change did not bring about what the article addresses, and are connected to that only marginally.
The importance of induction …
… The University Bookman: Can Rationalism Make it in the Long Run? (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
The Rationalist inverts the order of practical thought and action: he thinks abstract principles, which Oakeshott argues can only arise out of reflection on practice, stand at the beginning and give guidance and clarity to practical affairs. The typical Rationalist move, then, is down-market Cartesianism: couple a zealous skepticism against what is old with a credulous devotion to what is “unprejudiced” and new. The typical quality of Rationalist politics is that political discourse turns more and more to the articulation of principles, also called “ideals,” which will be said to lead deductively to certain policies. These deductive schema relating principles to political conclusions are ideologies. Opponents do not merely hold different opinions, they are, demonstrably, wrong. Would that it were hard to find examples of this political style in America today.
Inquirer reviews …
… Katie looks at Billy Collins: Heaps of poems, ideas and detail and humor.
… Spero Lucas, hero or antihero.
… Wide-ranging saga of American left.
… Spero Lucas, hero or antihero.
… Wide-ranging saga of American left.
Serial Fiction Blogging ...
A few months ago I started a story, in serial form here. By serial form I mean each blog entry is, more or less, a chapter, and I have been adding to it as time permits. I've updated it yet again, and if you want to spend some time reading on (what in Philadelphia is) a rainy, snowy, cold December day...
The conceit is that I found these pages in a series of handwritten notebooks in a box of material left in a remote storage facility I had rented-- like a narrative style from the old Victorian fiction days...
The original blog then splits, for reasons told in the story, and twin blogs (like twin strands of DNA? hmmm) continue...
The story starts here ...
The conceit is that I found these pages in a series of handwritten notebooks in a box of material left in a remote storage facility I had rented-- like a narrative style from the old Victorian fiction days...
The original blog then splits, for reasons told in the story, and twin blogs (like twin strands of DNA? hmmm) continue...
The story starts here ...
A thought for today …
The past is an old armchair in the attic, the present an ominous ticking sound, and the future is anybody's guess.
— James Thurber, born on this date in 1894
Saturday, December 07, 2013
Going Mainstream or the Journal gets it ...
These neurobiological findings suggest that the APA hasn't gone far enough in changing its categories. The issue isn't that sometimes people believe they are of a different gender than they actually are. Remarkably, instead, it's that sometimes people are born with bodies whose gender is different from what they actually are.
I tried to fix link -- it's a little squirrely for some reason for non subscribers -- if you want to read the article in full as a non subscriber you might have to go thru this Google link: https://www.google.com/search?num=100&client=firefox-a&hs=Zue&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&q=robert+sapolsky+wall+street+journal+transsexuals&spell=1&sa=X&ei=c2OkUpoLxaGRB-SvgdgD&ved=0CCwQvwUoAA&biw=1152&bih=578
Appalling …
… Instapundit � Blog Archive � LAW ENFORCEMENT: Kansas City Police Allegedly Threatened to Shoot Homeowner’s Dogs if He Refused …
I am the son of a policeman and the uncle of another, but I am increasingly dismayed over the behavior of our gendarmerie.
I am the son of a policeman and the uncle of another, but I am increasingly dismayed over the behavior of our gendarmerie.
The Pope and economics …
… Rescuing the Bottom Billion From the Pope’s Peronist Economics & New English Review. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Happily, we are all free to ignore the Pope's economic opinions, which seem to be singularly ill-informed and parochial. They remind me something Dr. Johnson said about some fellow's poems, that they were both original and good, but that, unfortunately, insofar as they were original, they were not good, and that insofar as they were good, they were not original.
Overcoming ignorance …
… The Redemption of E. D. Hirsch by Sol Stern - City Journal. (Hating, Dave Lull.)
Hmm …
… Godless spirituality for secularists - Philosophy and Life. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
… perhaps the nascent secular interest in spirituality marks a change. The task of redressing the imbalance is about nothing less than shifting mindsets, but when unexpected parties - like the RSA or self-conscious atheists - come out about spirituality, new connections become possible. Conversely, those who needed no persuading but find the s-word difficult must swallow their disdain and be prepared to treat the word as a placeholder for a society striving to revive these half-forgotten insights about what it is to be human.I'm religious myself, and have my reservations about "spirituality," but Mark is right.
The Donkey
When fishes flew and forests walkedAnd figs grew upon thorn,Some moment when the moon was bloodThen surely I was born.
With monstrous head and sickening cryAnd ears like errant wings,The devil’s walking parodyOn all four-footed things.
The tattered outlaw of the earth,Of ancient crooked will;Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb,I keep my secret still.
Fools! For I also had my hour;One far fierce hour and sweet:There was a shout about my ears,And palms before my feet.
A thought for today …
I like trees because they seem more resigned to the way they have to live than other things do.
— Willa Cather, born on this date in 1873
Friday, December 06, 2013
Attaining mastery …
…Anecdotal Evidence: `Filching Fire from the Gods'.
I am reminded of the story that Hokusai, who died at 89, remarked on his deathbed that, had the gods granted him another 10 years, he could have been a really good painter.
I am reminded of the story that Hokusai, who died at 89, remarked on his deathbed that, had the gods granted him another 10 years, he could have been a really good painter.
Who knew?
… Rudyard Kipling's Poems Reviewed By Christopher Benfey | New Republic. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
This review is about Kipling, not the reviewer. It is, in fact, compellingly informative.
This review is about Kipling, not the reviewer. It is, in fact, compellingly informative.
Depends on what you mean by lazy …9
… Lazy Journalists Aren't to Blame for Death of Print - Bloomberg.
Turning out copy is one thing. Making sure that what you write is intellectually sound is another. Swallowing every half-assed nostrum that comes along is lazy, and people catch on.
Turning out copy is one thing. Making sure that what you write is intellectually sound is another. Swallowing every half-assed nostrum that comes along is lazy, and people catch on.
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