March 2009
9 posts
stimulus spending
squashed:
Jake Lodwick asks:
What is one thing the government could do — one mistake they could make — that would convince you they cannot ‘fix the economy’ by spending more money and creating new rules?
In other words, is your belief falsifiable?
But let’s turn this around. Are there any signs that would make you think that serious government intervention is necessary? There is a certain...
the handshake
I came across a post about excessively firm handshakes, and it immediately brought to mind the climate of fear that has been instilled in my workplace by one of our executive handlers, who steely grip has become the punchline for a good many jokes—and the panicked moment of sudden terror in just as many nightmares. Now, when I say ‘steely grip’, I am referring to a handshake that...
“In an industrial society which confuses work and productivity, the necessity of...”
– Raoul Vaneigem, The Revolution of Everyday Life. I first read Vaneigem (and thus, Debord), during my second year of undergrad, and to say that I was deeply influenced by Situationist thought seems something of an understatement. It was more like someone had thrown a stick of dynamite in my brain. ...
“People who talk about revolution and class struggle without referring explicitly...”
– Raoul Vaneigem, The Revolution of Everyday Life
on democratic politics
rabsteen:
This class of political managers have managed to shift important questions about the direction societies take away from the public realm, largely by pretending these questions don’t exist. Instead they appear peripherally, sometimes through art or literature and even less often through music.
We don’t just see this disengagement in the decline of voter turnout, it’s all around us. ...
Vatican hosts Darwin conference →
Scientists, philosophers and theologians from around the world are gathering at the prestigious Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome to discuss the compatibility of Darwin’s theory of evolution and Catholic teaching. Christian churches were long hostile to Darwin because his theory conflicted with the literal biblical account of creation […]
A leading American scholar of biology,...