an article by Emma Jackson (University of Glasgow, Scotland) and Michaela Benson (Goldsmiths, University of London) published in International Journal of Urban and Regional Research Volume 38 Issue 4 (July 2014)
Abstract
This article examines how middle-class residents of an inner-London neighbourhood draw up socio-spatial and symbolic boundaries between themselves and their ‘others’. Through a discussion of accounts of two very different boundaries – the boundary of a multi-ethnic high street and a less clearly defined boundary of a neighbouring middle-class area – we argue that the production of middle-class identities is bound up with processes of disaffiliation not only from proximate stigmatised areas, but also from more upmarket areas and the people who populate them.
Against this background it becomes clear that middle-class claims to belonging are made through (1) the asymmetric processes by which the middle classes create and maintain spatial boundaries between themselves and racialized/classed others, and (2) the subtle processes of distinction that go on within the middle classes.
Nevertheless, relationships to place remain ambivalent, and as neighbourhoods undergo change, physical boundaries separating one area from another refuse to stay put. We argue that the re-inscription of such boundaries in the accounts of middle-class respondents are attempts to create a stable identity on the shifting ground of the contemporary global city.
Tuesday, 6 January 2015
Monday, 5 January 2015
The power to create
an article by Adam Lent published in RSA Journal Issue 2 (2014)
Governments, business and our institutions need to make the most of the technologies and methods that are transforming our economy.
The economist Eric Beinhocker once wrote that for 130,000 years of human history not much happened economically before all hell broke loose 250 years ago. He was not wrong. There were explosions of inventiveness, such as during the Roman Empire, but these would come to an end with the fall of the political system that sustained them. Average incomes improved at glacial rates: in the first century, most people could expect an income of around $1.20 a day; by the 18th, it had risen to $1.70.
This all changed in the late 1700s. Britain became the birthplace of an extraordinary revolution that would come to transform the world. Modern capitalism was being built on the back of an enormous flowering of commercial innovation: new machines, new products, new production systems, new business structures and new markets came to life.
Continue reading
Governments, business and our institutions need to make the most of the technologies and methods that are transforming our economy.
The economist Eric Beinhocker once wrote that for 130,000 years of human history not much happened economically before all hell broke loose 250 years ago. He was not wrong. There were explosions of inventiveness, such as during the Roman Empire, but these would come to an end with the fall of the political system that sustained them. Average incomes improved at glacial rates: in the first century, most people could expect an income of around $1.20 a day; by the 18th, it had risen to $1.70.
This all changed in the late 1700s. Britain became the birthplace of an extraordinary revolution that would come to transform the world. Modern capitalism was being built on the back of an enormous flowering of commercial innovation: new machines, new products, new production systems, new business structures and new markets came to life.
Continue reading
Can investments in better connected Cities make us happier?
via the City Growth Commission Blog by Thomas Hauschildt
Happiness and well-being are often used interchangeably. However, happiness is associated with the pleasant feeling accompanying certain events which then contributes to the general state of our well-being. Subsequently, unhappy experiences reduce our state of well-being and the reduction of those experiences should be at the heart of policy decisions.
Continue reading
Lots of links to other interesting items.
Happiness and well-being are often used interchangeably. However, happiness is associated with the pleasant feeling accompanying certain events which then contributes to the general state of our well-being. Subsequently, unhappy experiences reduce our state of well-being and the reduction of those experiences should be at the heart of policy decisions.
Continue reading
Lots of links to other interesting items.
Sunday, 4 January 2015
Trivia (should have been 19 October)
Sweethearts of Rhythm: 1940s
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
The International Sweethearts of Rhythm, the pioneering all-girl jazz-swing group, with bandleader Anna Mae Winburn in the 1940s. Guitarist Carline Ray, who died in New York earlier this month [July 2013] at age 88, is third from left.
View original post
Of course, being me, I could not let it rest there with just a picture.
http://youtu.be/94fcqEkPmSk
==========================================
The Underwater Sculpture Garden in Molinere Bay, Grenada
via Big Think by Robert Montenegro
Not many art galleries would let you inside wearing nothing but a swimsuit. Visiting the Molinere Underwater Sculpture Garden almost necessitates it.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
On human cruelty
Ian Buruma’s interests – Anne Frank, Clint Eastwood, kamikazes – are linked by a single question: Why do humans behave so atrociously?… more
==========================================
Card tricks with Willie Nelson
via Boing Boing by Mark Frauenfelder
==========================================
Unethical Behavior Begins With Minor Transgressions That Swell Over Time
via Big Think by Robert Montenegro
Do folks who routinely behave unethically just wake up in the morning and decide they want to be evil? While that'd be a nice and simple way of explaining why people do bad things, the truth is probably not as starkly black and white as we'd like to believe.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Good feminist
For a 1970s feminist like Vivian Gornick, there is cause for dismay today. Women’s liberation is in the doldrums, not likely to recover in her lifetime… more
==========================================
Beat your brain’s stupid hyperbolic discounting
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
Dispassionately, we know that cheating on our diets or procrastinating on our stupid deadlines isn’t worth it, but our stupid brains treat most future consequences as if they’re worth nothing, while treating any present-moment benefits as though they were precious beyond riches – so how do you get the “hyperbolic discounting” part of your brain to shut up and listen to reason?
Continue reading
==========================================
The lure of sounds
via OUP Blog by David Crystal
There’s something about the idea of ‘original pronunciation’ (OP) that gets the pulse racing. I’ve been amazed by the public interest shown in this unusual application of a little-known branch of linguistics — historical phonology, a subject that explores how the sounds of a language change over time. I little expected, when I was approached by Shakespeare’s Globe in 2004 to help them mount a production of Romeo and Juliet in OP, that ten years on the approach would become a thriving linguistic industry. Nor could I have predicted that a short documentary recording about OP for the Open University (which I made with actor son Ben in 2011) would for no apparent reason go viral towards the end of 2013, with 1.5 million hits in recent months.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Weapon for readers
Margins are for scribbling, pages for folding, spines for breaking. We have a responsibility to read with a pen in hand. Tim Parks explains.. more
==========================================
Brew coffee 19th century style with a balancing siphon
via Boing Boing by Andrea James
Looking for a whimsical yet scientific way to serve coffee or tea to guests with showy flair? Consider the Continental balancing siphon coffee brewer developed in the 19th century.
Continue reading
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
The International Sweethearts of Rhythm, the pioneering all-girl jazz-swing group, with bandleader Anna Mae Winburn in the 1940s. Guitarist Carline Ray, who died in New York earlier this month [July 2013] at age 88, is third from left.
View original post
Of course, being me, I could not let it rest there with just a picture.
http://youtu.be/94fcqEkPmSk
==========================================
The Underwater Sculpture Garden in Molinere Bay, Grenada
via Big Think by Robert Montenegro
Not many art galleries would let you inside wearing nothing but a swimsuit. Visiting the Molinere Underwater Sculpture Garden almost necessitates it.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Ian Buruma’s interests – Anne Frank, Clint Eastwood, kamikazes – are linked by a single question: Why do humans behave so atrociously?… more
==========================================
Card tricks with Willie Nelson
via Boing Boing by Mark Frauenfelder
==========================================
Unethical Behavior Begins With Minor Transgressions That Swell Over Time
via Big Think by Robert Montenegro
Do folks who routinely behave unethically just wake up in the morning and decide they want to be evil? While that'd be a nice and simple way of explaining why people do bad things, the truth is probably not as starkly black and white as we'd like to believe.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
For a 1970s feminist like Vivian Gornick, there is cause for dismay today. Women’s liberation is in the doldrums, not likely to recover in her lifetime… more
==========================================
Beat your brain’s stupid hyperbolic discounting
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
Dispassionately, we know that cheating on our diets or procrastinating on our stupid deadlines isn’t worth it, but our stupid brains treat most future consequences as if they’re worth nothing, while treating any present-moment benefits as though they were precious beyond riches – so how do you get the “hyperbolic discounting” part of your brain to shut up and listen to reason?
Continue reading
==========================================
The lure of sounds
via OUP Blog by David Crystal
There’s something about the idea of ‘original pronunciation’ (OP) that gets the pulse racing. I’ve been amazed by the public interest shown in this unusual application of a little-known branch of linguistics — historical phonology, a subject that explores how the sounds of a language change over time. I little expected, when I was approached by Shakespeare’s Globe in 2004 to help them mount a production of Romeo and Juliet in OP, that ten years on the approach would become a thriving linguistic industry. Nor could I have predicted that a short documentary recording about OP for the Open University (which I made with actor son Ben in 2011) would for no apparent reason go viral towards the end of 2013, with 1.5 million hits in recent months.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Margins are for scribbling, pages for folding, spines for breaking. We have a responsibility to read with a pen in hand. Tim Parks explains.. more
==========================================
Brew coffee 19th century style with a balancing siphon
via Boing Boing by Andrea James
Looking for a whimsical yet scientific way to serve coffee or tea to guests with showy flair? Consider the Continental balancing siphon coffee brewer developed in the 19th century.
Continue reading
Saturday, 3 January 2015
Trivia (should have been 18 October)
YWCA: 1906
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
Circa 1906
“Y.W.C.A. building, Detroit”
Once again the interesting stuff is at the periphery – note signage at right advertising Cracker Jack and the services of a “bell hanger”
8x10 inch glass negative, Detroit Publishing Co
View original post
==========================================
DIY rolling-ball clock
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
Christopher Blasius sells plans (€40) to make a Serpina "rolling ball clock" whose timekeeping is accomplished by rolling a ball around a laser-cut wooden frame, causing the frame to see-saw and sending the ball in the opposite direction.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
History of hogsheads, kegs and puncheons
Beer, whiskey, wine, grain, tobacco, molasses, cement, fish, coins: The barrel is far from a simple idea… more
==========================================
Chimps Outplay Humans in Brain Games
via 3 Quarks Daily by Madhuvanthi Kannan in Scientific American
We humans assume we are the smartest of all creations. In a world with over 8.7 million species, only we have the ability to understand the inner workings of our body while also unravelling the mysteries of the universe. We are the geniuses, the philosophers, the artists, the poets and savants. We amuse at a dog playing ball, a dolphin jumping rings, or a monkey imitating man because we think of these as remarkable acts for animals that, we presume, aren’t smart as us. But what is smart? Is it just about having ideas, or being good at language and math?
Continue reading
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
Circa 1906
“Y.W.C.A. building, Detroit”
Once again the interesting stuff is at the periphery – note signage at right advertising Cracker Jack and the services of a “bell hanger”
8x10 inch glass negative, Detroit Publishing Co
View original post
DIY rolling-ball clock
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
Christopher Blasius sells plans (€40) to make a Serpina "rolling ball clock" whose timekeeping is accomplished by rolling a ball around a laser-cut wooden frame, causing the frame to see-saw and sending the ball in the opposite direction.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Beer, whiskey, wine, grain, tobacco, molasses, cement, fish, coins: The barrel is far from a simple idea… more
==========================================
Chimps Outplay Humans in Brain Games
via 3 Quarks Daily by Madhuvanthi Kannan in Scientific American
We humans assume we are the smartest of all creations. In a world with over 8.7 million species, only we have the ability to understand the inner workings of our body while also unravelling the mysteries of the universe. We are the geniuses, the philosophers, the artists, the poets and savants. We amuse at a dog playing ball, a dolphin jumping rings, or a monkey imitating man because we think of these as remarkable acts for animals that, we presume, aren’t smart as us. But what is smart? Is it just about having ideas, or being good at language and math?
Continue reading
==========================================
The City of Literature: Books Set in Paris
via AbeBooks.co.uk by Jessica Doyle
Hemingway wrote, “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.”
It’s a book lover’s dream to wander the very streets that inspired Marcel Proust, Émile Zola, Samuel Beckett, Albert Camus, Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and so many others. You might step into the Salon at 27 rue de Fleurus where Gertrude Stein mentored Ernest Hemingway, or have a drink at the café littéraires Les Deux Magots and Café de Flore, the long-ago haunts of James Joyce, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ezra Pound and their fellow The Lost Generation writers.
Continue reading
WARNING: This is a market place. Keep a hold on your credit and/or debit cards.
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Whether tapered, snout-like, or hooked, the Jewish nose displays a remarkably diverse history in Christian art… more
==========================================
The life of a hoarder
via Boing Boing by Rob Beschizza
Corinna Kern documented the life of George Fowler, a compulsive hoarder. In her photographs is "a closeness between the young woman behind the camera and the old man in front of it." [Itsnicethat via Digg]
==========================================
Wow
via 3 Quarks Daily by Maniza Naqvi
This is the letter “wow”
Just Wow! At every turn, and corner in Istanbul — you are bound to say — Wow.
The obvious example is, of course, at the Basilica of Aya Sofiya—built by Emperor Justinian in 537 AD. Legend has it, that Justinian wanted this magnificent Eastern Orthodox Church, in its beauty and scale to rival Solomon's great Temple. So that even Solomon would have been Wowed.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
The case for Van Gogh’s suicide is tarnished by bad history, bad psychology, and bad forensics. So if he didn’t shoot himself, who did?… more
Stonehenge was a circle
via Boing Boing by Rob Beschizza
Stonehenge’s remains suggest a circle, but archaeologists have finally proven it after a drought revealed what lay beneath the grass.
Ten Trivial Items that I found interesting (some time ago)
Intelligence Is a Burden on Making Good Life Decisions
via Big Think by Orion Jones
Having greater intelligence can actually make you a more foolish person because intelligence breeds hubris, according to sociologists who study how intelligent people make life decisions.
Continue reading
==========================================
Mixing Up Settings: Town, Country and the Books of Lorna Hill
via An Awfully Big Blog Adventure by Emma Barnes
Last week I was in Northumberland. It's only a couple of hours from Leeds, where I live, but it feels like a different world.
Leeds is a big, bustling, ethnically diverse Northern city. The Northumberland coast, with its empty beaches, fishing villages and old-fashioned pubs, feels like a journey away in time as much as space. Even the tourist hot spots – like Lindisfarne – are tranquil, the cars abandoned once the causeway has been crossed, the many visitors wandering the windswept island by foot.
Continue reading
==========================================
Why Did Humans Advance Among Primates? Look to Ants For the Answer
via Big Think by Big Think Editors
In many of Edward O. Wilson's books, most notably his recent titles The Meaning of Human Existence and The Social Conquest of Earth, the famed biologist adopts a scientific lens to examine the quandaries of the human condition and other opaque areas of human knowledge. These are topics most typically explored by philosophers and sociologists, but Wilson approaches them with the scientific mind. For example, in the Big Think interview below, Wilson asks how Homo sapiens managed to separate from other primates and dominate the large animals of the world. Is this something science on its own can explain?
Continue reading
==========================================
10 Reasons Why Coffee Drinkers Are More Likely To Be Successful
via Lifehack by Casey Imafidon
I love coffee. I hope you do too. There is a ritual that comes with making it and the smell is wonderful. While others are yawning and trying to get their days going, coffee is like a punch in the face to wake you up into the real world. Perhaps you drink coffee all the time or merely sometimes, yet do not quite fully understand how pivotal it is to your success. If so, here is some news for you!
Continue reading
==========================================
Pain Relievers May Be Numbing Your Emotions
via Big Think by Natalie Shoemaker
Popping a Tylenol may do more than just alleviate that headache you've been suffering through; it may also be a potent solution for numbing emotions. Researchers, led by social psychology doctoral candidate Geoffrey Durso, have published a study in the journal Psychological Science, which reveals that “rather than being labeled as merely a pain reliever, acetaminophen might be better described as an all-purpose emotion reliever."
Continue reading
==========================================
Royal Mint to welcome visitors for first time with £7.7m museum
via The Guardian by Maev Kennedy
The Royal Mint is to open its doors to the public for the first time in its 1,100-year history. There will be tours, but no gold and silver samples.
A £7.7m museum and visitor centre showcasing the long history of coinage in the UK, designed by Mather & Co, will be built at the site in Llantrisant in South Wales, where the Mint moved in the 1960s to meet the challenge of creating a new coinage when the UK went decimal.
Continue reading
==========================================
10 Actors Who Played Against Type — and Failed
via Flavorwire by Jason Bailey
This Friday [would have been months ago!], Arnold Schwarzenegger does something you’d have never quite predicted: he plays the leading role in an indie drama. Even more surprisingly, he’s very good in it. His quiet turn as a Midwestern farmer in the family drama/zombie flick Maggie is both a strong performance and a smart move for the aging actor, whose action vehicles haven’t exactly burned up the box office lately; when what you do isn’t working anymore, it’s a good idea to try something new. But for every Robin Williams, Matthew McConaughey, or Albert Brooks who transformed their screen persona successfully, there’s another who didn’t quite pull it off.
Continue reading
==========================================
“Under the influence of rock’n’roll”
via OUP Blog by David George Surdam
Rock’n’roll music has defied its critics. When it debuted in the 1950s, many adults ridiculed the phenomenon. Elvis, Chuck Berry, and their peers would soon be forgotten, another passing fancy in the cavalcade of youth-induced fads. The brash conceit, “rock’n’roll is here to stay”, however, proved astute.
Continue reading
==========================================
Infested, About Bedbugs
via 3 Quarks Daily: Marlene Zuk at The New York Times
A book about bedbugs is, by necessity, a book about nearly everything: about travel and adventure, about our relationship to nature, about how scientists solve problems, about trust and whether we view strangers as friends or foes. It is a book about what people will do under extreme circumstances, and about environmental politics, and art and mental illness. It is even a book about kinky sex.
Continue reading
==========================================
The UK’s most eccentric library
via Boing Boing by David Pescovitz
In this week’s New Yorker, Adam Gopnik visits one of the more intriguing and strange European libraries, the Warburg Institute in London, a 115-year-old institution with a sadly uncertain future.
Continue reading
via Big Think by Orion Jones
Having greater intelligence can actually make you a more foolish person because intelligence breeds hubris, according to sociologists who study how intelligent people make life decisions.
Continue reading
==========================================
Mixing Up Settings: Town, Country and the Books of Lorna Hill
via An Awfully Big Blog Adventure by Emma Barnes
Last week I was in Northumberland. It's only a couple of hours from Leeds, where I live, but it feels like a different world.
Leeds is a big, bustling, ethnically diverse Northern city. The Northumberland coast, with its empty beaches, fishing villages and old-fashioned pubs, feels like a journey away in time as much as space. Even the tourist hot spots – like Lindisfarne – are tranquil, the cars abandoned once the causeway has been crossed, the many visitors wandering the windswept island by foot.
Continue reading
==========================================
Why Did Humans Advance Among Primates? Look to Ants For the Answer
via Big Think by Big Think Editors
In many of Edward O. Wilson's books, most notably his recent titles The Meaning of Human Existence and The Social Conquest of Earth, the famed biologist adopts a scientific lens to examine the quandaries of the human condition and other opaque areas of human knowledge. These are topics most typically explored by philosophers and sociologists, but Wilson approaches them with the scientific mind. For example, in the Big Think interview below, Wilson asks how Homo sapiens managed to separate from other primates and dominate the large animals of the world. Is this something science on its own can explain?
Continue reading
==========================================
10 Reasons Why Coffee Drinkers Are More Likely To Be Successful
via Lifehack by Casey Imafidon
I love coffee. I hope you do too. There is a ritual that comes with making it and the smell is wonderful. While others are yawning and trying to get their days going, coffee is like a punch in the face to wake you up into the real world. Perhaps you drink coffee all the time or merely sometimes, yet do not quite fully understand how pivotal it is to your success. If so, here is some news for you!
Continue reading
==========================================
Pain Relievers May Be Numbing Your Emotions
via Big Think by Natalie Shoemaker
Popping a Tylenol may do more than just alleviate that headache you've been suffering through; it may also be a potent solution for numbing emotions. Researchers, led by social psychology doctoral candidate Geoffrey Durso, have published a study in the journal Psychological Science, which reveals that “rather than being labeled as merely a pain reliever, acetaminophen might be better described as an all-purpose emotion reliever."
Continue reading
==========================================
Royal Mint to welcome visitors for first time with £7.7m museum
via The Guardian by Maev Kennedy
The Royal Mint is to open its doors to the public for the first time in its 1,100-year history. There will be tours, but no gold and silver samples.
A £7.7m museum and visitor centre showcasing the long history of coinage in the UK, designed by Mather & Co, will be built at the site in Llantrisant in South Wales, where the Mint moved in the 1960s to meet the challenge of creating a new coinage when the UK went decimal.
Continue reading
==========================================
10 Actors Who Played Against Type — and Failed
via Flavorwire by Jason Bailey
This Friday [would have been months ago!], Arnold Schwarzenegger does something you’d have never quite predicted: he plays the leading role in an indie drama. Even more surprisingly, he’s very good in it. His quiet turn as a Midwestern farmer in the family drama/zombie flick Maggie is both a strong performance and a smart move for the aging actor, whose action vehicles haven’t exactly burned up the box office lately; when what you do isn’t working anymore, it’s a good idea to try something new. But for every Robin Williams, Matthew McConaughey, or Albert Brooks who transformed their screen persona successfully, there’s another who didn’t quite pull it off.
Continue reading
==========================================
“Under the influence of rock’n’roll”
via OUP Blog by David George Surdam
Rock’n’roll music has defied its critics. When it debuted in the 1950s, many adults ridiculed the phenomenon. Elvis, Chuck Berry, and their peers would soon be forgotten, another passing fancy in the cavalcade of youth-induced fads. The brash conceit, “rock’n’roll is here to stay”, however, proved astute.
Continue reading
==========================================
Infested, About Bedbugs
via 3 Quarks Daily: Marlene Zuk at The New York Times
A book about bedbugs is, by necessity, a book about nearly everything: about travel and adventure, about our relationship to nature, about how scientists solve problems, about trust and whether we view strangers as friends or foes. It is a book about what people will do under extreme circumstances, and about environmental politics, and art and mental illness. It is even a book about kinky sex.
Continue reading
==========================================
The UK’s most eccentric library
via Boing Boing by David Pescovitz
In this week’s New Yorker, Adam Gopnik visits one of the more intriguing and strange European libraries, the Warburg Institute in London, a 115-year-old institution with a sadly uncertain future.
Continue reading
Friday, 2 January 2015
Trivia (should have been 12 October)
Private Area: 1965
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
1965
“Entertainer Johnny Carson working on the Tonight Show. Includes Carson standing backstage”
From photos taken for the Look magazine article Johnny Carson, the Prince of Chitchat, Is a Loner
View original post
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
1965
“Entertainer Johnny Carson working on the Tonight Show. Includes Carson standing backstage”
From photos taken for the Look magazine article Johnny Carson, the Prince of Chitchat, Is a Loner
View original post
==========================================
A beginner’s guide to drills and bits
Steve Hoefer returns with another guide to some of the things that make civilized life possible.
via Boing Boing
There are a dizzying number of ways to put a hole in something. Choosing the right way not only means that you get the right hole in the right place, but that you get it with the least amount of trouble and without damaging the material, your tools, or yourself.
Continue reading
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debateThe Victorian age abounded in amateur tinkerers. Let us praise the inventions – collapsible hats, revolving heels – that didn’t change the world… more
==========================================
Office Networks Reveal Which Co-Workers To Avoid During Infectious Outbreaks
via MIT Technology Review
Some of your co-workers are much more likely to spread disease than others. Now a new study of office networks reveals how to spot them.
Continue reading
==========================================
Affecting sculpture about our relationship to technology
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
Soheyl Bastami’s Extreme: an Iranian sculptor’s beautiful and trenchant take on our relationship to technology.
(via Super Punch)
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
History of beer
Babylonians, shamans, monks, farmers, patriots, industrialists: Brewers are an ancient and odd bunch. Every beer tells a story… more
==========================================
Knowledge is a sobering thing
via McGee’s Musings by Jim McGee
I sometimes wonder whether the thing that scares people about knowledge and science is how it can make you feel small and insignificant. This image is a visualization of the newest knowledge about where we on Earth fit in the universe. They’re calling it “Laniakea.”
It’s a very long way from when we thought that the Sun revolved around the Earth. For me, it engenders a sense of awe; what reaction does it trigger for you?
Continue reading
==========================================
Pop songs as sonnets
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
There’s a more readable image and further information here.
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Does time have a future?
One second per second is the speed of time, right? Not necessarily. It depends where (and when) you are.Unpacking a cosmic riddle… more
==========================================
Is ‘Progress’ Good for Humanity?
via 3 Quarks Daily by Jeremy Caradonna in The Atlantic
Rage against the machine: Luddites smashing a loom
(Chris Sunde/Wikimedia Commons)
The stock narrative of the Industrial Revolution is one of moral and economic progress. Indeed, economic progress is cast as moral progress.
Continue reading
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Babylonians, shamans, monks, farmers, patriots, industrialists: Brewers are an ancient and odd bunch. Every beer tells a story… more
==========================================
Knowledge is a sobering thing
via McGee’s Musings by Jim McGee
I sometimes wonder whether the thing that scares people about knowledge and science is how it can make you feel small and insignificant. This image is a visualization of the newest knowledge about where we on Earth fit in the universe. They’re calling it “Laniakea.”
It’s a very long way from when we thought that the Sun revolved around the Earth. For me, it engenders a sense of awe; what reaction does it trigger for you?
Continue reading
==========================================
Pop songs as sonnets
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
There’s a more readable image and further information here.
==========================================
Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
One second per second is the speed of time, right? Not necessarily. It depends where (and when) you are.Unpacking a cosmic riddle… more
==========================================
Is ‘Progress’ Good for Humanity?
via 3 Quarks Daily by Jeremy Caradonna in The Atlantic
Rage against the machine: Luddites smashing a loom
(Chris Sunde/Wikimedia Commons)
The stock narrative of the Industrial Revolution is one of moral and economic progress. Indeed, economic progress is cast as moral progress.
Continue reading
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