tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-41910841965842498232024-03-13T08:29:43.621-04:00Wisdom of the WestIs there any such thing? Let's investigate—for good or ill. A blog about fiction and literature, philosophy and theology, politics and law, science and culture, the environment and economics, and ethics and language, and any thing else that strikes our fancy. (Apologies to Bertrand Russell)Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.comBlogger909125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-24370758802010376772024-01-03T11:29:00.005-05:002024-01-03T16:48:31.870-05:00SPREZZATURA —Your task once you put on the headset is to explore the world around you until you locate the beaver. The world presents itself much like a busy university setting in a large city. Student and professor types scurry and parade around the green, most silently, heads bowed toward the brick walks as if in contemplation. Your first thought is to find a zoo or a bio orJim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-26416760464208339492023-05-07T16:54:00.003-04:002023-05-07T17:00:33.748-04:00A Free Person's Worship"To abandon the struggle for private happiness, to expel all eagerness of temporary desire, to burn with passion for eternal things—this is emancipation, and this is the free man's worship. And this liberation is effected by a contemplation of Fate; for Fate itself is subdued by the mind which leaves nothing to be purged by the purifying fire of Time."United with his fellow-men by the strongest Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-1639361504349114412022-09-27T14:59:00.006-04:002022-09-27T15:05:50.822-04:00Walther Ruttman, Lichtspiel Opus 1 (1921)Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-77663152643551847782022-05-23T17:10:00.005-04:002022-05-23T17:10:54.480-04:00Achieving Kardashev Type 1 CivilizationAs anyone who's read much of what I've posted here over the years should know, besides Literature and Philosophy, I'm interested in things like climate change, renewable energy, desalination and potability of water, coral reefs, politics and the economy, and even Bitcoin. This article brings a lot of my interests together in a remarkable fashion, in fact reversing everything I ever thought—and Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-81306902965918643162022-01-31T13:23:00.001-05:002022-01-31T13:23:56.929-05:00THE LIAR'S PARADOX (Epimenides's too!)The Epimenides paradox goes something like this:“Epimenides the Cretan says, ‘that all the Cretans are liars,’ but Epimenides is himself a Cretan; therefore he is himself a liar. But if he be a liar, what he says is untrue, and consequently the Cretans are veracious; but Epimenides is a Cretan, and therefore what he says is true; saying the Cretans are liars, Epimenides is himself a liar, and Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-29314868186170904822021-11-05T11:11:00.003-04:002021-11-05T11:11:29.288-04:00Goodbye, Cruel (Social Media) WorldJaron Lanier, Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now.Here they are in his own words (but go to the link and find his book):1. You are losing your free will.2. Quitting social media is the most finely targeted way to resist the insanity of our times.3. Social media is making you into an asshole.4. Social media is undermining truth.5. Social media is making what you say Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-7595826025586461662021-03-27T17:13:00.004-04:002021-03-27T17:18:36.678-04:00Jekyll Island: Rising seas, Sinking ships, SpindriftJekyll Island, GA, is one of those places you can never forget. A barrier island of the coast of Brunswick, its inland salt marsh is a unique ecosystem of subtle beauty and calm. Its live oak trees dripping with beards of epiphyte Spanish moss are hauntingly lovely. There are bike trails and beaches and a historical district. We saw kingfishers and osprey and herons and cranes and all manner of Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-39198023716288330802021-02-21T14:47:00.002-05:002021-02-21T15:06:00.333-05:00An 'Other' MysteryHere’s a sad tale—but an interesting one. A mystery.Every morning for the past couple of weeks I’ve been woken up by the sound of a small bird banging against my bedroom window. It flies into the window, smashes into the glass with its beak, then settles back onto the ledge, and tries again. It happens over and over and over again. Dozens of times in a row.At first, I figured it was probably justJim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-9081597540191631012020-12-24T14:39:00.005-05:002020-12-25T14:21:20.876-05:00THING —> HAPPENHere are some things we know (or at least think we do):Our universe of space and time is something like 13.8 billion years old, and getting older every day. By contrast, average human lifespan is ~70 years. Humanity, our species, is only ~200,000 years old. Life itself, beginning with single celled organisms, is approximately 4 billion years old. In other words, it took over 9Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-71848712334922458072020-09-10T13:07:00.004-04:002020-09-10T13:21:03.729-04:00PANIC vs. PANDEMIC: DOING THE HARD MATHWe all know that hard decisions require hard trade-offs. Believe it or not, I take Trump at his word that he chose to downplay the deadly danger of the coronavirus to the American people because he didn't want to create "a panic" as he told Bob Woodward in taped interviews for Woodward's new book "Rage." So, what were those trade-offs?As a philosopher, I might frame the question along these linesJim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-29045725866506469482020-07-29T16:24:00.001-04:002020-07-29T16:42:13.192-04:00DON'T HATE ME!
Well, it's the silly season again. Less than 100 days to the quadrennial clusterfuck we call the Presidential election. That means we are going to be deluged with ads—online and in media—attempting to persuade us (if we are actually persuadable) of the superiority of a particular party or candidate.
The key word here is 'persuade'. There is a big difference between persuasion and manipulationJim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-35586812519708160032020-06-24T14:38:00.001-04:002020-06-24T15:54:43.956-04:00The Business of the Post-HumanR > G.
If you're even only vaguely familiar with Thomas Piketty's massive 700-page economics tome Capital in the Twenty-First Century (2014 English), you will be aware of the formula at its heart. In this equation, R = Return on Capital (which includes, among other things, profits, dividends, interest, rents, income); G = Economic Growth of the society. Thus, the annual return of the S&P Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-10475753014572185942020-06-08T12:48:00.000-04:002020-06-08T12:53:37.745-04:00What Is the Post-Human?Friedrich Nietzsche was the first (at least to my knowledge) to philosophize about I want to call the "Post-Human" in his novel (if that's what you want to call it) Thus Spake Zarathustra.
Zarathustra was written and published between 1883 and 1885. Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species (1859) and Descent of Man (1871) were in wide currency in European intellectual circles prior to its Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-85856214691022220692020-06-02T12:54:00.002-04:002020-06-04T10:39:44.392-04:00Let's Get This Right!
Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Six Principles of Nonviolence
The 20th Century saw a remarkable development in social history. Termed Satyagraha or Nonviolent Protest or Civil Disobedience, it fueled remarkable political changes in India, the United States, and South Africa. We all recognize the iconic names of the leaders of these movements, so much so we know them instantly by their last names: Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-77220157985407356252020-05-28T16:10:00.002-04:002020-06-01T10:58:15.397-04:00More Random Plague Thoughts (Again, Mostly Non-Political)—Let's start with a simple premise: This Coronavirus Pandemic is ABSURD
What does that mean?
"In philosophy, 'the Absurd' refers to the conflict between the human tendency to seek inherent value and meaning in life, and the human inability to find any in a purposeless, meaningless or chaotic and irrational universe."
It has no rational reason for being
It has no purpose
It has no meaningJim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-59730372003153678022020-05-15T14:11:00.000-04:002020-05-15T14:11:11.694-04:00Don't Be a 💩🏊♂️! I’ve been brooding about how this will likely be the first summer in decades I won’t be able to go out and swim a couple of miles every week. I’m not Masters level fast, mind you. But I love swimming. It's a full-body, cardio-vascular workout with no impact. My free-style recreational mile is usually just under 40 minutes—no toys or floaties or fins. And I do try to swim year round though my gym Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-4247524906567808342020-05-09T14:57:00.002-04:002020-05-09T14:57:49.712-04:00More Plague Thoughts — More Political This TimeI posted the following thread on Twitter a couple of days ago.
Ok. Hold onto your collective hats. It’s time for some (conspiracy) game theory. In a very memorable phrase, Trump’s campaign manager Parscale recently declared that his ‘Death Star’ campaign was about to launch on all platforms. 1/10
The next day, a massive disinformation conspiracy theory video appears on Facebook filled with a Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-53988517871173765722020-03-20T16:43:00.003-04:002020-03-20T16:46:37.230-04:00Random Plague Thoughts (Mostly Non-Political)
COVID-19, the Novel Coronavirus is NOT the Zombie Apocalypse.
But it's like nothing any of us alive have ever experienced.
The Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918 is our only global model precedent.
Though we have the experiences of China, S. Korea, and Italy to go by.
And these are so recent, their findings are hard to digest.
That flu was more deadly but not nearly as contagious.
One of the trulyJim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-14207631021134089712020-03-12T12:26:00.001-04:002020-03-12T12:26:12.667-04:00For Those Social Distancing DaysA five-hour tour through The Hermitage, apparently shot on an iPhone 11. Enjoy:
Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-49247190984212836602020-03-11T14:37:00.000-04:002020-03-11T15:35:18.735-04:00I Had a Day...Arrived Thursday afternoon in Deer Valley, Utah—just up the hill from Park City, a short drive from Salt Lake City. Woke up at 4:15 am; out the door at 4:45. Drove 4+ hours to Moab. Entered Arches National Park at 9:00 am. Hiked until 1:30. Lunch at the Moab Brewery; coffee at Moab Roastery. Entered Canyonlands National Park at 3:30. Hiked until sunset, ~6:30. Drove back to Deer Valley, arriving Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-74063610448116748892020-02-20T11:36:00.000-05:002020-02-20T12:05:46.059-05:00In ExtremisKey quotes from an article by Quassim Cassam in New Statesman entitled "Why Extremism Is a Question of Psychology, Not Politics" and Kevin Dorst at the Stranger Apologies blog.
Is 'extremism' a question of psychology and not politics? This is a question certainly worth asking. Cassam's talking about extremisms on both the right and the left here. His article raises the further question: If Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-85654593329722816012020-01-02T12:13:00.001-05:002020-01-02T12:13:24.549-05:00Top Ten Top Ten Lists of the 2010sLet's agree to get past the debate over when a decade (or century) actually ends: --19 (--99) or --20 (--00). [Personally, I'm persuaded that we normally count from one to ten and thus the decade truly ends next year around this time. But that's beside the point. YMMV.] The internet is rife now with lists and listicles of the "Best of" or "Top Ten ____" of the Twenty-Teens, 2010s, etc. Below are Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-77131997814425040882019-12-16T11:46:00.000-05:002019-12-16T11:51:27.874-05:00This Is About Right
CAT SPEAK by Brooks Riley
Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-15305069828976086232019-10-30T12:48:00.001-04:002019-10-31T09:59:50.536-04:00The Personal Is the PoliticalNot one given to overly personal revelations here, nor to magical thinking—after all, I'm a lawyer, a rationalist philosopher—yet I find myself compelled to write this post. Please indulge or ignore, as you will.
On November 9, 2016, I made a private vow: The day the current occupant of the White House was "elected" I shaved my head and stopped trimming my beard. I promised not to let my hair Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191084196584249823.post-82824328881208254612019-09-20T12:30:00.000-04:002019-09-20T12:30:40.986-04:00A Philosophical Guide to Make-BelieveKendall Walton's theory of fiction—Mimesis as Make-Believe: On the Foundations of the Representational Arts (1993)—visualized in a video by Nils-Hennes Stear (h/t Link Here) :
Jim H.http://www.blogger.com/profile/02088100982761595050noreply@blogger.com0