Bbenzon
Description
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. Intellectually, I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
MY BLOGS
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New Savanna
http://new-savanna.blogspot.com/
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
LATEST ARTICLES ( 7820 )
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Virahanka-Fibonacci Numbers
Let’s stop teaching the bogus rabbit story that Fibonacci told. These numbers originally came from poetry and music! pic.twitter. Read more
Posted on 28 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Physicist Kip Thorne on the Importance of Collaboration in Science
Sean Carroll interviews Kip Thorne, who got the 2017 Nobel Prize in physics, along with Rainer Weiss and Barry Barish for the detection of gravitational waves. Read more
Posted on 27 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Web of Knowledge: A Model of Cognition from My 1978 Dissertation
I’ve now uploaded Chapter 4 of my dissertation, “The Web of Knowledge” to Academia.edu: https://www.academia.edu/37862208/The_Web_of_Knowledge. I did my... Read more
Posted on 27 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Receptive Multilingualism, How Fascinating!
Victor Mair, at Language Log: In the latest The Atlantic, Michael Erard describes a fascinating linguistic phenomenon: "The Small Island Where 500 People Speak... Read more
Posted on 27 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Here's to Your Personal Moonshot
Are you working on your moonshot? pic.twitter.com/PuiPvUZnK3 — Adrian Neibauer, EdD (@MrNeibauer) November 20, 2018 This image embodies rather nicely the... Read more
Posted on 26 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Disaster That is Palm Oil, Or: Look Before You Freakin' Leap!
Abrahm Lustgarten, Palm Oil Was Supposed to Help Save the Planet. Instead It Unleashed a Catastrophe. NYTimes Magazine, November 20, 2018. Read more
Posted on 26 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Hiromi Plays Beethoven – but What Would HE Think About It?
As far as I can tell literary studies will remain committed to pre-computational intellectual formations for the foreseeable future and... In the early 1970s I... Read more
Posted on 25 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Emergence of Rank 4 Thought in Evolutionary Biology, with Some Reflections o...
A week ago I ran up a post, Innovation, stagnation, and the construction of ideas and conceptual systems, where I argued that conceptual exhaustion is one reaso... Read more
Posted on 25 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Site of the Remains of Jersey City's Van Leer Chocalate Factory, December...
Posted on 25 November 2018
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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MOONSHOT: Does Project Apollo Bring Us to Redefine Humanity? [TALENT SEARCH]
A couple days ago I ran up a post, What’s a (metaphorical) moonshot? [TALENT SEARCH], where I looked at a couple of articles where Mercatus Center fellows talke... Read more
Posted on 24 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Ambiguity in Self-Other Processing
Christophe Emmanuel de Bézenac, Rachel Ann Swindells, and Rhiannon Corcoran, The Necessity of Ambiguity in Self–Other Processing: A Psychosocial Perspective Wit... Read more
Posted on 24 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Psilocybin as a Treatment for Depression
Psilocybin Could Soon Be a Legal Treatment for Depression. Johns Hopkins Professor, Roland Griffiths, Explains How Psilocybin Can Relieve Suffering... Read more
Posted on 23 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Once Again, the Failure of the Nation-state as a Form of Governance
Writing in the Financial Times, Maark Mazower discusses Leonard Smith, Sovereignty at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 (Oxford 2018), and Paul Hanebrink, A... Read more
Posted on 23 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Fotos: Shadows
Posted on 23 November 2018
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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Power in Cultural Evolution and the Spread of Prosocial Norms
Nathan Cofnas, Quarterly Review of Biology 93 (4):297–318 (2018). Abstract According to cultural evolutionary theory in the tradition of Boyd and Richerson,... Read more
Posted on 23 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Yet More Notes About the State of Literary Criticism, with an Eye Toward a...
Yes, I know, I’ve been over this ground many times before, nor will this (ever) be the last. In particular, I’m thinking of this as following my recent post,... Read more
Posted on 22 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
William Benzon, 1912-1998: He Went Out Swinging and Smooth Shaven
He died 20 years ago, yesterday, Nov. 21, 1998. My father, William Benzon, was born on Jan. 31, 1912 in Baltimore, MD, and died November 21, 1998 in Allentown... Read more
Posted on 22 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Around and About Hte Mouth of the Long Dock Tunnel in Jersey City
Posted on 22 November 2018
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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What’s a (metaphorical) Moonshot? [TALENT SEARCH]
On the webpage where the Mercatus Center announced the Emergent Ventures program, we find this paragraph: “Throughout the past year, Mercatus scholars have... Read more
Posted on 21 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
How is Facebook Going to Regulate Hate Speech on Its Platform? An Independent...
Evelyn Douek, Facebook’s New ‘Supreme Court’ Could Revolutionize Online Speech , Lawfare, November 19, 2018. Mark Zuckerberg has suggested that an independent... Read more
Posted on 20 November 2018 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
