December 2009
Radiohead — A Reminder
November 2009
Revelation
I fear that the common perception of the word has warranted severe antipathy in the minds of secularists, not to mention has become vulnerable to attacks ever since the exegesis of Plato’s theory of “divine illumination.” ‘Empty the mind of all false beliefs,’ he said, ‘and wait for illumination to occur.’ Later, when St. Augustine Christianized the said...
Kitchen Stories: The Failure of Objectivism
For a film that virtually has no dialogue, deadpan character expressions and a sparse musical underscore, Kitchen Stories is a docudrama that articulates a good deal about humanity by spending much of its time as Derrida would say “in the margins.” Set in the wintry Alps of Norway, the story is based on a project by the Home Research Institute (HRI) in Sweden that analyzes the domestic habits...
The Truman Show (Extended Review): Reality, Media...
Everything in my reality—the activities I engage in, the friendships I acquire, the family I love, the beliefs I form (about art, politics, religion, morality, the afterlife)—are predicated upon the assumption that my life is truly and authentically mine to live, not something counterfeit or staged. I am the author that gives meaning to my reality. I am, so to speak, the star of the show. In...
Superheroes
I believe in superheroes; their eminence, powers, valor, names—all of which are replete with divinity and likened unto the human condition, worthy of our veneration. Humanity is a collection of superheroes, each which possess a special set of skills that characterize them as a singular X-man or X-woman. It might even be argued that the journey to self-discovery is to awaken to your...
Radiohead — Lull
“Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once...”
– Bertrand Russell
The quote reminds me of several eccentric things:
I think of Bruno’s eccentric star/mini-sun conjecture and how it was considered heretical by the Inquisition.
Or how Copernicus’ eccentric heliocentric plan essentially stripped the Inquisition of its autocracy.
Or...
Scientists hold their breath as LHC prepares to... →
azspot:
The machine, which occupies a 27km tunnel 100m beneath the French-Swiss border, will probe some of the deepest mysteries of the universe by crashing subatomic particles into one another at close to the speed of light.
The collisions are expected to reveal tantalising signs of new physics that could include extra dimensions of space and “supersymmetry”, a theory that calls for every...
Wes Anderson Week: My Private Screening with...
filmosophy:
by Wes Anderson
I already had Pauline Kael’s phone number because I’d found it when I was looking through somebody’s Rolodex a couple of years ago. ”Hello. My name is Wes Anderson. I’m calling for Pauline Kael, please.” I had immediately recognized her voice (from a tape I have of her on ”The Dick Cavett Show”) when she answered the telephone, but I wanted to give her a chance to...
"Army of Shadows" Review
Seeking to Explore the Morality of Violence
Army of Shadows is no doubt bleak, unsentimental and deliberately sluggish. Its director, Jean-Pierre Melville, clearly held no pretention to romanticize the “adventures” of war or paint any resistant movement in sanguine colors. If anything, the film is shamelessly unapologetic as it pays homage to those doomed souls of the French Resistance during...
Filmic Reality according to Kracauer, Deren and...
The differing views on reality as held by Kracauer, Deren and Prince offer somewhat similar and somewhat different approaches. Reality for Kracauer must first begin with the scientifically concrete, physical world. In his essay, “Basic Concepts,” he tells us that films can only gain aesthetic credibility if they build from their basic properties: the raw data of the physical world. After this has...
Why Christianity Is Failing in America →
azspot:
The Gospel demands something of us. It also forces us to see with a different set of eyes, God’s.
The person confronted by the truth of the Gospel is like the person in the world of the movie The Matrix who is given the choice to take the red pill and see the world as it is from a different set of eyes or take the blue pill and stay blissfully doped against reality.
And that person,...
A 360 degree view of the Universe →
miianwilson:
fuckyeahspace:
The result of the two-year long, worldwide Gigagalaxy Zoom Project, this website shows a 360 degree view of the Universe as seen from our solar system.
—-
so. damn. cool.
Any time science fiction authors, religious...
Truth
optimisto:
Honesty is the most sincere attempt at expressing something, whether they be expressions from the imagination, observations on surrounding circumstance, or an emotion being experienced.
Truth implies an objectively shared event or perception based on reality or factual circumstance. There are people who use the word subjectively - “My truth is different from your truth” but they’re...
Our Dorito "Crash-the-Super-Bowl" Spot →
We made the following for a potential super-bowl spot. time will vindicate.
“I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not...”
– Richard Dawkins (via tmblg)
For being so intelligent, Dawkins does a fine job of sounding like a fool. I’ve no inherent love for institutionalized religions, but this sort of woeful, sweeping generalization smacks of the very same blind dogmatism that legitimate rationalism seeks to dispel.
...
Homosexuality, Metrosexuality, Normality &...
During my shift at OG the other day, I noticed a table of four males dressed considerably well. Not only were their clothes matching and looked as though bought from Banana Republic or Forever Twenty-One, but they each had scarves, sweater vests, earrings, stylized hair, and scented perfume that permeated the atmosphere. In addition, their mannerisms were very feminine and each of them had lisps....
He Wishes For the Cloths of Heaven
miianwilson:
Started #23
Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths, Enwrought with golden and silver light, The blue and the dim and the dark cloths Of night and light and the half-light, I would spread the cloths under your feet: But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
Megane (i.e. Glasses): A film that utilizes the...
In his autobiographical novel, “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,” Robert Pirsig and his son Chris hop on a motorcycle and head east with “plans…deliberately indefinite, more to travel than to arrive anywhere.” For them the journey holds primacy over the destination, the process over the end product. There is never a rush, never a desire to get anywhere in particular. Instead, there is...
Spencer Russell — Cyborgs
“How many...