Bbenzon
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 ( 6874 )
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In Honor of Our Future Robot Overlords, Let’s Conduct a Thought Experiment:...
Let's arrange some propositions along a scale from -10, totally unbelievable, to +10, totally believable. For example: (1) The sun will come up tomorrow. +10 (2... Read more
Posted on 04 December 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
“VICTORY IS MINE!” – Active Engagement with Computing in Connected Learning
I have a few comments – really just one – about the December 1 Webinar: Connected by Design: In this session Kim Jaxon, Jaimie Hoffman, Danielle Astengo,... Read more
Posted on 03 December 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Rereading Goethe’s Faust 2: An Unnatural Act and a Change of Plan
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Faust, Parts One and Two. George Madison Priest, tr. New York City: Alfred A Knopf. 1963. It’s been a slog. Read more
Posted on 02 December 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
On the Waterfront, Starship USS Hoboken and Space Shuttle Limulus Polyphemus
Posted on 01 December 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Day “The Juice” Died
“The Juice,” of course, is OJ Simpson, running back extraordinaire. And – I know – he’s not dead. He’s currently doing 33 years in a Nevada prison on various... Read more
Posted on 01 December 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Who Owns and Controls Public Space? Increasingly, It's the .01%
First came REVS COST, then the High Line followed. Media mogul Barry Diller has just pledged a bucket load of cash to build a new public park in the Hudson Rive... Read more
Posted on 01 December 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Distort Shreds It on the Pep Boys Wall
Posted on 30 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Codger Web: Virtual Villages Connecting Cyberspace and Meatspace
Conjunctions between virtual space and physical space: retirees, teens, and graffiti writers. The New York Times is running an article about virtual villages... Read more
Posted on 30 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Rereading Goethe’s Faust 1: From Man to a Cosmic Epic
I had forgotten that the Faust legend, and hence Goethe’s epic drama, was ultimately based on the life of a real person, Georg Faust. Read more
Posted on 29 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Fotos: Graffiti and the Homeless at an Abandoned Building in Jersey City
Posted on 28 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Crimes Against Family: What Do Bill Cosby and the United States Military Have...
I’m sure I watched I Spy a time or three back in the day, but I didn’t watch it regularly. I DID watch The Cosby Show regularly. Read more
Posted on 28 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Rereading Goethe’s Faust 0: Assessing My Life at the Dawn of a New Era
I read Goethe’s Faust during my freshman year at Johns Hopkins. Prof. Harold Jantz – “one of the foremost Germanists of his generation” – offered a one-credit... Read more
Posted on 27 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Culture Will Have Arrived as an Area of Serious Study When
when things like truth, love, beauty, and justice are widely recognized as core human needs and motivators, as important as the need for food, water, shelter,... Read more
Posted on 26 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
And Scotty Said, "Computer, Tell Us a Story"
And so the computer did. Sorta. November is NaNoGenMo (National Novel Generation Month), started last year by Darius Kazemi, says The Verge. Nick Montfort’s... Read more
Posted on 26 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Policy, Strategy, Tactics: Intellectual Integration in the Human Sciences, An...
Roughly three decades ago, in my final year on the faculty at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, I participated in an exercise to rethink the School of... Read more
Posted on 25 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Some Basic Solid Forms, Natural Geometry
Posted on 25 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Formal Citation for Blog Entries
How do you cite a blog post in formal academic writing? Martin Fenner at PLOS tells how (from 2011, ancient times in web-years). APA, MLA, Chicago, BibTeX. H/t... Read more
Posted on 25 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Parameters of Pedagogy 3: Courses I Have Taught (or Taken)
Now that I’ve put some ideas on the table – Vygotsky, coaching, lecturing – I want to describe four different courses, three of which I’ve taught, one that I... Read more
Posted on 24 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
From Multiple Personalities to Dissociative Identity Disorder
Below the asterisks I've copied some remarks about this disorder from my article, First Person: Neuro-Cognitive Notes on the Self in Life and in Fiction, PSYART... Read more
Posted on 24 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Robert Boyd on Cooperation
Why do humans cooperate in ways that other mammals don't? In the non-human world almost all cooperation can be explained in terms of genetic relatedness... Read more
Posted on 24 November 2014 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY