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 ( 6414 )
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MacArthur Fellows, 1981-2018: Gender, Race and Educational Attainment
Kaba, A. J. (2020). MacArthur Fellows, 1981-2018: Gender, Race and Educational Attainment. Sociol- ogy Mind, 10, 86-126. https://doi.org/10.4236/sm.2020. Read more
Posted on 26 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Dreaming Birds
Maria Popova, Do Birds Dream? NYTimes, March 26, 2024. A study of zebra finches — songbirds whose repertoire is learned, not hard-wired — mapped particular note... Read more
Posted on 26 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Back to Basics
Posted on 25 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Thirteen Ways to Think About an A.I. @3QD
Sometimes they come hard, and sometimes they come easy – I’m referring to long-form blog posts, here at New Savanna, but especially once-a-month... Read more
Posted on 25 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Nobel Laureate, Angus Deaton is Having Doubts About Economics
Angus Deaton, Rethinking my Economics, Finance and Development, International Monetary Fund, March 2024. Economics has achieved much; there are large bodies of... Read more
Posted on 24 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
What's College For, Anyhow? [Do They Study at Harvard?]
Aden Barton, AWOL from Academics, Harvard Magazine, March-April 2024. I recently started using an application that tracks my work, producing weekly summaries... Read more
Posted on 23 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Fecundity and Implementation in a Complex Universe
I'm bumping this post from October 2011 to the top of the queue for two reasons: 1) in its discussion of abundance it contains seeds to the idea of arena,... Read more
Posted on 23 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Foto: Memories of 51 Pacific
Posted on 22 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
ChatGPT on a Remark Leonard Bernstein Made to Duke Ellington [intention,...
I have been arguing recently that meaning consists of intentionality and semanticity, where intentionality inheres in the relationship between the... Read more
Posted on 21 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Look Who Came to Dinner: The Harlem Renaissance [100 Years Ago Today]
Veronica Chambers and Michelle May-Curry, The Dinner Party That Started the Harlem Renaissance, NYTimes, March 21, 2024. On March 21, 1924, Jessie Fauset sat... Read more
Posted on 21 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Our Need for Meaning and Coherence
Steven J Heine, Travis Proulx, Kathleen Vohs, The Meaning Maintenance Model: On the Coherence of Social Motivations, Personality and Social Psychology Review... Read more
Posted on 21 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Is It Time to Disrupt the Disrupters?
Ashley Goodall, Mass Tech Layoffs? Just Another Day in the Corporate Blender. NYTimes, March 21, 2024. The article begins by talking about the current Silicon... Read more
Posted on 21 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Are We Facing Collapse Through Complexity?
We are seeing Joseph Tainter's "Collapse of Complex Societies" thesis playing out in real-time.A complex society trying to solve problems by adding more... Read more
Posted on 21 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Dissociating Language and Thought in Large Language Models
Mahowald et al., Dissociating language and thought in large language models, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, March 19, 2024,... Read more
Posted on 20 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Band Stability and Success in Rock
Farvaque, E. For those about to rock… is stability a determinant of rock bands success?. J Cult Econ 48, 145–166 (2024). https://doi.org/10. Read more
Posted on 20 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Hello There!
Posted on 20 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
What's in an Illustration? Sam Altman in the NYTimes
Back on March 31, 2023, Cade Metz did an article on Sam Altman for the NYTimes. Near the beginning we have these three paragraphs: Many industry leaders, A.I. Read more
Posted on 19 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Room Across the Hall
Posted on 19 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Elle & Toni – I've Just Seen a Face
In the last week I've become a fan of Elle Toni: Elle Cordova (formerly known as Reina del Cid) and Toni Lindgren are indie folk musicians and songwriters... Read more
Posted on 19 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
GPT, the Magical Collaboration Zone, Lex Fridman and Sam Altman
I was making one more run around the web before I buckled down and got back to a major writing task, when I came across the brand-spanking-new conversation... Read more
Posted on 18 March 2024 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY