Daily Office
Grand Hours
Saturday, 5 February 2011
¶ Whenever we think of consciousness, and what it might be (if it means anything at all, which it probably doesn’t, by virtue of meaning too much for one word), we put ourselves in the place of Ramses II, who clearly thought that he was doing well. Knowledge has a history, people — which means that it has a future. Trust in us to get there without wasting time anticipating what will be found. Soul dust, indeed! (BBC Today; via MetaFilter) ¶ All things considered, we’re not terribly worked up about the recent decision in the Bombay High Court that upheld astrology as a science. The law itself is no more scientific than astrology. (Short Sharp Science) Leave astrology to Carl Sagan. (Bad Astronomy)
¶ We’re inclined to agree with Wayne Anderson, that “what Marcel Duchamp did to the history of art is comparable to the impact of the meteor that killed the dinosaurs.” That doesn’t mean that we want to read Anderson’s book, which, in Francis Naumann’s utterly and completely unfavorable review, sounds crochety and undigested. We’re grateful to Christopher Higgs for raising the subject, and we agree with him, that any book that makes you fighting made is some kind of success. (Toutfait; HTMLGiant) ¶ Anne Yoder explores the “alignment” of Arthur Rimbaud and David Wojnarowicz, as “miscreants, meddlers, thieves, deranged to the point of seeing, i.e., visionary.” We’re glad that they weren’t too deranged to get their work done, even though we wouldn’t have wanted to have them to dinner. ¶ But who cares about art anymore? It’s the artist that’s the thing. Felix Salmon writes about oligarch Victor Pinchuk flew Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons into Davos just to have them show up at a big non-WEF lunch. The meteor has definitely killed the dinosaurs.
¶ The incomparable Michael Lewis travels from Greece to Ireland — one begins to worry that airport officials will brand him as a terrorist before he can enter Spain or Portugal — and delivers a Vanity Fair piece, “When Irish Eyes Are Crying,” that makes a conclusive case that the Irish were as vulnerable to the ravages of optimism as Native Americans were to that old Irish staple, firewater. Most delicious sentence: “The politicians in Ireland speak Gaelic the way the Real Housewives of Orange County speak French.” ¶ At Crooked Timber, Henry Farrell surveys Irish politics and recent history. He offers three forecasts for the long-ruling Fianna Fáil, which may have outlived its historic combination of “nationalist ideology and right-of-center populism.”
¶ Noting a political likeness between “Metternich and Mubarak,” Bob Cringely reminds us that Europe was swept by revolutions in 1848 without any help from modern communications technologies. When the people are dissatisfied enough to rise up, they do so faster than Facebook can keep up. ¶ Cam Hui, at The Humble Student of the Markets, is also reminded of 1848, noting that discontent in China is becoming more open than ever. Tim Wu argues eloquently for dropping US charges against Julian Assange. (Foreign Policy)
Prosecution of WikiLeaks would hurt, if it not destroy, the credibility of the United States in claiming to be the world’s most vital advocate of an open Internet. It would send the dangerous signal that the United States only claims to uphold the virtues of an open Internet and free speech — until it decides it doesn’t like a particular website. There could hardly be a worse moment to send that message, to be telling the Arab world:Â Do as we say, not as we do.
¶ Writing about Montaigne and the very different wars of his time, Saul Frampton ventures a few speculations on mirror neurons that argue for the importance of physical proximity in human affairs, further dampening the effectiveness of remote communication in exciting times. (Guardian; via The Rumpus) ¶ Simon Roberts, we suspect, doesn’t know much about the producers of the little video that he showcases, but, much as we object to AARP as a special-interest group, we’re willing to trust its numbers for the sake of fun. Old people really do need Facebook; they can’t get out anymore. (We should know!) (The Ideas Bazaar)
¶ We congratulate our friend JRParis upon the award of a medal from his employer, marking 25 years’ service. He’s a good sport about the fact that he ought to have received it in 2007. There is no TGV, apparently, in the administration of SNCF. ¶ According to the British Toilet Association, Britain’s toilets were once “the envy of the world.” James Ward wants to know whose toilets are the envy of the world today. If that’s a bit too gross for your reading pleasure, James has also visited the Web site of the British Plastics Federation, where you’ll find the bastard word, “pultrustion.”
¶ The editors of The Morning News have the great good sense to refer us to a tour d’horizon of Egyptian politics by Adam Schatz that appeared last May. Despite its titles, “Mubarak’s Last Breath,” it was written at a time when the temperature of Cairene politics was set determinately at “business as usual.” Schatz is particularly good, toward the end, at placing Mohamen El-Baradei. ¶ Justin E H Smith recalls the style dictatoire that he encountered in Egypt, where young men made “menacing attempts at immediate friendship” — an almost comical phrase that, we’re nonetheless certain, ought to be taken at naive face value. (via 3 Quarks Daily)
¶ At The Millions, Henriette Lazarides Power writes about Ismail Kadare’s chilling version of a widespread Balkan folk tale, “The Three-Arched Bridge.” Ms Power already knew the story from her family, in Northern Greece. She had even crossed the very bridge itself, said to contain, in its foundations, the body of an immured volunteer. ¶ If Kyle Minor, stuck in Toledo, is going to miss the AWP thing in Washington, you can bet that he’s going to dream up a conference worth missing missing. The things that he’s sorry to have been left out of will be the envy of AWP attendees as well. Sing to us, Svetlana. In a nearby entry, Jimmy Chen soliloquizes for a lost soul who assumed that “Washington, DC” means “Deep Creek, Spokane, Washington,” and who wonders where everybody is. (HTMLGiant)
¶ The (depressing) state of play in the development of high-speed rail in the Northeast Corridor. John Mica, the new chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, is chasing the chimera of “private investment,” which is just about exactly 100% wrong-headed. We agree that Amtrak’s record is poor-to-terrible, but we attribute this not to government sponsorship (such as it is) but to the legacy of the old railroad companies that devolved into it. We need to send a troop of smart yong engineers, accountants and administrators to Europe and insure that they replace current managers upon their return. (The Infrastructurist) ¶ Why Republicans hate mass transit — as if you didn’t know. They may say that they’re against subsidizing enterprise, but, as Ben Jervey points out, that doesn’t stop them from providing massive support to automobile-related transport (roads, especially). Republicans like to help people who don’t need help. (GOOD)
¶ Lily Pons, glamour girl with a voice. (Stirred, Straight Up, With a Twist)
¶ Galaxy Quest — the 20th Reunion documentary! (via MetaFilter)
¶ Dominique Browning at the Taj Mahal. (Slow Love Life)
¶ Geoff Dyer loves Friedrich Nietzsche. (Guardian; via Maud Newton)
¶ Twilight on the syllabus at Ohio State. (GOOD)
¶ David Leonhardt talks to Tyler Cowen about necessary cultural changes. (NYT)
¶ Ayn Rand depended on government handouts in her battle, after a lifetime of smoking, against lung cancer. (GOOD)
¶ “Why I Am A Socialist” — In this moving testament, Wallace Shawn never uses the term. (Guernica; via MetaFilter)