Break in transmission
Early this Friday, 10 September, until about 11a.m, this blog may be unavailable for about 2 hours owing to annual maintenance.
Archive of posts filed under the Uncategorized category.
More on ataraxia
The British philosopher and author Prof AC Grayling comments that “Passion suggests something active to us,” he says. “But if you look at the etymology of the term, it’s passive – it’s something that happens to you – like love or anger or lust – that was visited on you by the gods. Unlike passion, …
Thought for the day
~ Old Italian proverb… After the game, the King and the pawn go into the same storage box.
In memoriam
Yesterday, my brother-law, Martin Dean, died of heart failure in a hospital in Taunton, England. He had been in poor health for quite a long time. He was an economic historian, a tourism officer and local Council employee, and author of a book on railways. Rest in peace, Martin. We will miss you. (Forgive me, …
How can we be more like Iceland?
How can we become more like Iceland? That’s the question we should be asking. This sub-Arctic nation of only 330,000 people beat England at soccer, along with Argentina. And the reason for its success? A national plan, introduced 20 years ago, to promote clean living. It was introduced in response to authoritative American research on …
Road safety, or lack of it
Since 2010 the number of pedestrians killed by cars in Europe and US has steadily increased every year, in the States by 41% in the ten years between 2008 and 2018. It is more dangerous, per kilometer of travel, to be a pedestrian than to be a driver or passenger in a vehicle. Worldwide, more …
A drilling rig in the South China Sea
Industry has always had a nasty habit of plundering the natural world “before science has understood its importance”, says Chris Packham. And that’s what’s happening right now on the ocean floor. We know more about the surface of Mars than about the deep seabed. On almost every mission “scientists discover new species”. Yet with almost …
What is this life about?
What is all this about, this life? Is it just a big income, a fancy house, and expensive vacations? Is it even about a good-looking girlfriend or spouse who makes other men envious? This seems to be a pervasive attitude, as the gap between rich and poor inexorably widens. Well, of course I would expect …
Abortion
Abortion rates in the developed world have been declining for 25 years and are at an historic low. There were 27 abortions per 1000 women between 2010 and 2014, down from 40 per 1000 between 1990 and 1994. The total number of abortions fell from 12 million to 7 million in 2014. Because of the …
Nuts
On average, U.S. adults put on one pound of weight every year. Researchers looked at the diet and weight of more than 280,000 adults taking part in three long-term research studies. Over more than 20 years of monitoring, participants were asked every four years about their weight and, among other things, how often, over the …
A poem to relieve the gloom
Kefalonia We came, we saw, we sunbathed Odysseus, who came from Ithaca, just next door, Found Kefalonia a bore. No dragons, no beasties, no Charybdis or Scyllas, Just a load of young Brits drinking beer in their villas. From the earliest moment when he was a boy, He wanted adventures, like leveling Troy. But …
Time to say farewell to steak?
Soon, most of us will stop eating beef, and it won’t be because we’ll all agree with vegans that meat is murder. It’ll be due to the logic of advanced capitalism. The alternatives to meat now being developed – plant-based substitutes and vat-grown meat produced from cultured animal cells – will taste the same as …
Student mental illness (Part 2)
Statistic of the week: 75% of diagnosable mental illnesses crop up by the age of 24, driven by fear of failure and the eternal chatter about how essential it is to get a job straight out of college. American psychologists are increasingly seeing children with ADD and some kind of executive functioning problem among college students …
Student mental illness ( Part 1)
A surge in anxiety, mental breakdowns, depression and stress is sweeping British university campuses. Above all, a growing proportion just seem terrified of failure, and experience the whole process of learning and assessment as an unforgiving ordeal that offers no room for creativity or mistakes,” says William Davies, lecturer at Goldsmiths and author of The …
Thought for the day
Crises Eruptions Anxieties Stressful encounters Document losses House keys mislaid Dents in the bumper Disappointments Rain on your parade Promised phone calls never happening No less than five political fundraising calls in a day Netflix buffering for twenty minutes The local food store is out of milk, tea and cereal The boiling coffee pot has …