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 ( 7356 )
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Friday Fotos: Some Varieties of the Horizontal
Posted on 18 August 2017
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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The Rhetoric of Interpretation in Literary Criticism
This is a follow-up to my post, Description, Interpretation, Explanation, and Evaluation as Rhetorical Roles in Literary Criticism [#DH]. Read more
Posted on 18 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Alone in the Sky: 432 Park Ave., Manhattan
Posted on 17 August 2017
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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In Defense of Freud
George Prochnik reviews Frederick Crews, Freud: The Making of an Illusion, in the NYTimes. Crews, as you may know, is a literary critic who was a Freudian... Read more
Posted on 17 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
NCIS, Boundary Issues: Terrorism, Sexual Harassment, and Rambling on
As I mentioned in this post, I’ve been watching a lot of NCIS and wondering why it’s perhaps the most popular show on network TV. Read more
Posted on 16 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Swear Words in American Books
Jean M. Twenge, Hannah VanLandingham, W. Keith Campbell. The Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television: Increases in the Use of Swear Words in American... Read more
Posted on 16 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
In Search of a Small World Net: Computing an Emblem in Heart of Darkness [#DH]
This post is about aesthetics, one bit of Conrad’s craft. What’s the semantic ‘center’ of Heart of Darkness? I think Conrad has indicated that quite clearly... Read more
Posted on 15 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Nina Paley's God-Mother, a New Animation
God-Mother from Nina Paley on Vimeo. Nina says: Music: Kalimankou Denkou (Godmother Denkou) Bulgarian folk song, arranged by Krassimir Kyurkchiysky Performed... Read more
Posted on 15 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Chimps Can Learn Rock-paper-scissors (sorta')
Jie Gao, Yanjie SuMasaki Tomonaga, Tetsuro Matsuzawa. Learning the rules of the rock–paper–scissors game: chimpanzees versus children. Primates (2017)... Read more
Posted on 15 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Darwin’s Demon: A Thought Experiment About Complexity in Biology
Imagine a large vat containing prebiotic soup. Somewhere outside the vat is a source of free energy, like the sun provides to the earth. The vat is divided... Read more
Posted on 14 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Emergence of Cumulative Culture, Or What Dawkins Got Right
This is a follow up to my post, Gestalt Switch in the Emergence of Human Culture. I want a way to differentiate my version of culture from the current... Read more
Posted on 13 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Universal Kid Space & Kiddie Lit
I was reminded of what I call “universal kid space” some years ago when I was at one of Nina Paley’s “frunches” – a weekly lunch-gathering of people interested... Read more
Posted on 13 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
New Savanna Cracks 10K Hits Per Day for the First Time
Yesterday day New Savanna had over 10,000 page views and already has almost 5,000 as of 7Am this morning: Until roughly the beginning of the year I got between... Read more
Posted on 12 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
What's out There, Anyhow? [#DH]
From deep within a Twitter convo that started I don't know where: pictures show what they show. The question we're posing is, what other literary phenomena not... Read more
Posted on 12 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Zipf's Law Explained?
Sander Lestrade, Unzipping Zipf's law, PLOS One, August 9, 2017, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0181987. Abstract: In spite of decades of theorizing, the... Read more
Posted on 11 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
What’s on My Plate. I Ramble Through NCIS, Cultural Evolution, Description,...
I’ve got a number of posts planned for the near future, perhaps even the very near future. But I’m not sure in just what order I’ll be writing them. Here’s (som... Read more
Posted on 11 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Islamic Philosophy
Carlos Frankel, Deprovincializing Philosophy, LA Review of Books (July 29, 2017), a review of Peter Adamson, Philosophy in the Islamic World (Oxford UP 2016). Read more
Posted on 11 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Fotos: Sunrise, August 9, 2017
Posted on 11 August 2017
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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Gestalt Switch in the Emergence of Human Culture
The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has just published a collection of 18 articles on culture and cultural evolution: Sackler Colloquium on... Read more
Posted on 10 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Analyzing the Corpus of Trump Tweets [#DH]
David Robinson has been analyzing Trump tweets. For example: A number of different people have clearly tweeted for the \@realDonaldTrump account over time,... Read more
Posted on 10 August 2017 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
