April 2009
40 posts
“Faith rather than evidence is what’s keeping the bulls going.”
– Andy Xie
Prepositions and Digital Media
Which of the following passes?
I chat on Skype. I chat via Skype. I chat with Skype. I chat through Skype. I chat per Skype. I chat by Skype. I chat over Skype. Which qualify as preferred usages?
Email joel.anselm.dietz at gmail
S:
It seems that the old film Metropolis is a key inspiration for Technolyze. The whole setup with a city of machines in the sky and a “normal” city below is definitely borrowed, as is the idea of mechanizing the working class. - Metropolis doesn’t seem to evoke class struggle, but rather to dramatize organization and technology “out of history” (Orwell, on the...
We were a sea faring race and sailed forever upon the stars,
until our daugher taken, lost, to the waves and in the furies,
boundless, and unguarded
in their fight, forever crushing and uniting, loves, many,
and many, not.
Europa
Grasp my horn young maiden, and fly to the place where you were born. Civilization arose from frothy sea. And I enslaved you in the maze, no Daedalus, that would learn the secrets necessary for freedom. Oh brave Ulysses, lost on the waves, so much glory but, will he make his way home?
“The conservative movement today seems weaker than at any time since Lyndon...”
– David Goldman
Before coming to Liberty, I’d thought that Falwell was the gold standard for religiously motivated bigotry—he was, you’ll remember, the guy who said on national TV after the terrorist attacts of Setpember 11, “I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists… I point the finger in their face and say, ‘You helped this...
Shadow Bankers →
xkcd | Real Programmers →
I found you, my madonna, beheaded in a graveyard, and climbed the summit, and searched for the thorn. In between the wind and the rain, There was a cloud. Not a whisper but a brush with silence. My question as it was, unanswered.
The embrace has already taken me on Friday, good. And I stand between churches, and remember the omens, and the lady, and the dream. Here. Just as I forget the...
Leaving
Leaving but not left. Conversations transpire around me in French; occasionally someone speaks to me in English. I enjoyed the cheese at one such picnic and eventually, surprisingly, was connected to a local young Rosenzweig scholar. I discuss French and American approaches to femininity with a friend of both citzenships. I am lectured on how I should learn to dance (edit: better) in order to...
Flesh I
“Denn alles Fleisch, es ist wie Gras” states the scripture as trasmitted through Brahms Requiem. All flesh is like grass, that the wind blows upon and is gone. A metaphor for humanity. But transience is only one factor that we can use to describe our natural selves and various attempts at describing ‘transcendence.’
As described previously, there are various attempts to...
“Denn was ist die Erlösung sonst als dies,
dass das Ich zum Er ‘Du’...”
– Franz Rosenzweig
Washington Independent | Obama, Gates Agree on... →
Financial Crisis in the EU Map →
1 tag
Models for Thinking
I suggested in a discussion with a friend that the default metaphor for my thinking was a fractal. What I meant that was that, as in my post on dynamic taxonomies, that an initial pattern or descriptive model for a given set of phenomena can be described (in geometric fashion) where the focus on any given point of our model can be expanded and new geometric complexity revealed. That is, I can draw...
Dynamic Taxonomies
There are statically and dynamically-typed programming languages. Simply put, this means that objects in the language are forced to a given category at creation or not. Many programmers appreciate the constraints of static definitions/typing. Some prefer greater fluidity, which they claim confers additional power.
The problem of such conventions, whether limited to a single program in a given...
“Monogamy is not in our DNA”
– Noel Biderman, founder of online cheating service
There are bikes and bike stops scattered around the city. One can rent a bike for ~$1.30 a day. The first stop I visit rejects two credit cards of mine then accepts a friend’s. I am then able to rent a bike that does not work. I return it. I wait. I look at my options. I select the English language but am given only French past the opening screen. I guess what the panels mean. There is only...
In anticipation of my return to the USA. Selections from first page of Amazon Wishlist. Reading partners sought.
Muse in the Machine by David Gelernter
Machete Season: The Killers in Rwanda Speak by Jean Hatzfeld (Author), et al.
We by Yevgeny Zamyatin
The Old Tea Seller: Life and Zen Poetry in 18th Century Kyoto by Baisao (Author), Norman Waddell (Translator)
The Collected...
Free Association
Accompanying ambiguous sources of authority is the possibility of free association, not without problems. The increase of possible communities, volunteer and corporate, and low transfer costs loosens the ties between each member and their community, even as old associations — race, culture, locality — fade. Moreover, authority figures within each community also have low transfer costs....
Authority
The aforementioned monastic order expects absolute obedience with the expectation that such will be transformative both for subject and authority. Even if this is true — the ruler is forced to virtue by virtuous subjects — this says nothing about whom we should accept as authority, and on what basis. We are raised in a tradition, each has some measure of authority, even if it is simply...
Dante’s treatment of Paolo and Francesca is the most sympathetic given to any of the inhabitants of hell … That carnal love, of which Francesca and Paolo are accused, is so very like the true love Dante feels for Beatrice, his heavenly guide
Wikipedia
Single-minded authority will lead you to real obedience, and single-minded obedience on your part will make for just authority. Seeing in what spirit the brothers or sisters choose to obey, they cannot fail to be converted.
Excerpt, Jerusalem Community Rule of Life
The accordion player’s strumming fills the subway car. French youth stand by with wide smiles. I have failed to write yesterday, and not for lack of time. Strange dreams chronicle failures of mine, a warning of which I take insufficient heed; bested by desperate longings. I read a monastic rule, stumble over authority, and think of woman instead, passed possibilities. A postcard is found of...
As I stopped and peered out the window into the courtyard of my new abode, I felt immediately an incredible interest and connection to the lives around me. The woman in the window across, what was she doing? Whom did she live with? What did they do during the day? Did they have jobs?
But the thought of gainful employment, a recent obsession, soon faded, and I was simply listening to the music of...