beliefs, books, freedom of speech, thoughts

Philosophical Thoughts

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In the last few days I’ve been reading a philosophy book. “OMG what is this guy on? He reads philosophy – for fun!”

Well in truth it isn’t a very taxing philosophy book, because what I’ve been reading is The Form of Things by AC Grayling. Grayling is Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London and writes regularly for a number of periodicals including my favoured New Scientist. He is also a literary journalist and a broadcaster. So he’s not just a thinker, but he writes well and in an intelligible style.

The Form of Things is a collection of short (mostly 2-3 pages) essays drawn from his recent journalistic writings. Its subtitle: Essays on Life, Ideas and Liberty in the 21st Century tells you precisely what it’s about. It ranges widely over subjects such as language, beauty, funerals, reflections on people, fox-hunting and ID cards. It is a book to dip into rather than read cover to cover; and that’s how I’ve approached it as each of the essays stands in its own right. Let me give you a few gems (the title of each piece is the essay from which it comes). Whether you agree with them or not, they should at least thought provoking…

Dance
At almost any exhibition of contemporary art the thought that crosses one’s mind is: Is this rubbish, or am I missing the point? One could take the view that most of it is indeed rubbish, but of a useful kind: for it takes a lot of compost to make a flower -and flower lovers live in hope. Cynics say that the problem is the existence of art colleges, where people spend their time gluing cereal boxes to bicycle tyres (conceptual art), or demand that people watch them doing it (performance art) …

Hedonism
Human history has been weighed down with ordinances of denial from those who claim to know what the gods want of us – which seems mainly to be that we should not enjoy ourselves, even though they have given us natures attuned to pleasure.

God and the European Constitution
No one has ever fought a war because of disagreements in geology or botany; but humanity has bled to death over the question of whether a wafer of bread becomes human flesh when a priest whispers incantations over it. This stark contrast needs to be taken seriously; for until it is, we condemn ourselves to repeat the futile quarrels of the past.

Humanism and Religion
Religious folk try to turn the tables on people of a naturalistic and humanistic outlook by charging them with ‘faith’ in science or ‘faith’ in reason. Faith, they seem to have forgotten, is what you have in the face of facts and reason […] No such thing is required to ‘believe in’ science or reason. Science is always open to challenge and refutation, faith is not; reason must be rigorously tested by its own lights, faith rejoices in unreason. Once again, a humanistic outlook is as far from sharing the characteristics of religion as it can be. By definition, in short, humanism is not religion, any more than religion is or can be a form of humanism.

Rochester and the Libertines
The word ‘libertine’ was first applied in the 1550s to a sect of Protestants in northern Europe who, with unimpeachable logic, reasoned that since God had ordained all things, nothing could be sinful. They proceeded to act accordingly. Their views were regarded with horror by both Catholics on one side and Calvinists on the other…

Free Speech
It should by now be a commonplace, though alas it is not, that the right response to attempts by violent enemies to coerce our society is to reassert the very liberties and values that make them attack us in the first place. To restrict ourselves out of fear of what they might do is to give them the victory they seek. If they were able to impose their will on our society, they would deprive us of many of the liberties distinctive of a Western democracy. Why do it to ourselves?

Maybe more later.

current affairs, freedom of speech

Depositing the Bankers?

There’s an interesting piece in yesterday’s Times by Sir Ken McDonald, QC, the recently retired DPP. In it he takes the West’s (and especially Britain’s) politicians and legislators to task for getting the balance of the criminal justice system wrong, viz:

[…] If you mug someone in the street and you are caught, the chances are that you will go to prison. In recent years mugging someone out of their savings or their pension would probably earn you a yacht […] too many people and too many institutions function as though they are beyond the reach of the criminal law.

In Britain we had an additional burden: legislators who preferred criminal justice to be an auction of fake toughness […] So no one likes terrorists? Let’s bring in lots of terror laws, the tougher the better. Let’s lock up nasty people longer, and for longer before they are charged. Let’s stop medieval clerics winding up the tabloids. Let’s stop off-colour comedians outraging homophobic preachers. Let’s pretend that outlawing offensiveness makes the world less offensive.

This frequently made useful headlines. But it didn’t make our country or any other country a better or safer place to live. It didn’t respect our way of life. It brought us the War on Terror and it didn’t make it any easier for us to progress into the future with comfort and security.

Our legislators faltered because they seemed to ignore the fact that what makes good politics doesn’t always make good policy. And they didn’t want to tackle the more complex issues that really affect safety in people’s lives. It was easier to throw increasingly illiberal sound bites at a shadowy and fearsome enemy.

In Britain, no one has any confidence that fraud in the banks will be prosecuted as crime. But it is absolutely critical to public confidence that it should be […] Do people believe this will happen? No, they don’t […]

Forget the paranoiac paraphernalia of national databases, identity cards and all the other liberty-sapping addictions of the Home Office. Forget the rhetoric and do something useful. If the Government really wants to protect people beyond armoured-vest posturing, here is the opportunity […]

Let’s have fewer terrorism acts, fewer laws attacking our right to speak frankly and freely. Let’s stop filling our prisons with junkies, inadequates and the mentally damaged. How apposite in 2009 to have, instead, a few more laws to confront the clever people who have done their best to steal our economy.

Hat-tip: Bystander at The Magistrate’s Blog

nudism, thoughts

The Right Balance

It sounds to me that model, novelist and actress Sara Stockbridge has the balance about right. In a curious piece in The Herald, she admits to having no problem with her body and once having walked the catwalk nude (except for her boots):

“I’ve never had a problem with my body. I went down the catwalk naked once. There was an encore and I’d already gone off and started taking all my clothes off and I was naked, and they were like, come on, come on, there’s an encore’, and so I ran back on in just boots with nothing on. I have no problem with being naked. There are much more scary things than being naked. Like singing karaoke.”

Why is it that everyone isn’t so well balanced? After all we all know, give or take the odd scar, what’s underneath our clothes.

Hat-tip Diary of a Nudist

books, memes, personal, photography, science

Memories Meme


Memories Meme, originally uploaded by kcm76.

This week’s Flickr Photo Meme is about Memories. As usual here are the questions and my answers:

1. What is a special memory of childhood? Hot summer days camping at nudist club; I would have been about 10; in consequence I’ve never been uncomfortable with my body or anyone else’s
2. A memorable romance with? Faith, when I was a postgraduate; I was 23. she was 32; she taught me a lot
3. What was the most memorable gift you have ever received? My first camera, a Halina, has to be up there near the top; I don’t recall exactly when I was given it but I must have been about 12 or 13; look where it has gotten me!
4. What place have you visited that had a memory attached to it? Rye, East Sussex; I remember it from camping with my parents when I was 4 or 5 and have been back numerous times in recent years with Noreen
5. What was a memorable occasion that you recently attended? Almost any meeting of the Anthony Powell Society; this trip to the Widmerpool area of Nottinghamshire was an interesting day!
6. What was the most memorable toy you ever had? My teddy bear and black cat, both of which I still have, must be very near the top of the list
7. Who is the most memorable teacher you ever had? There were many, but Bob Goss and Derek Beadle, who taught me Chemistry and Physics, respectively, in the 6th form were probably the stars
8. Do you have a special collection that is memorable? My Memories, of course! I’m not really one for collecting personal mementos
9. What is your most cherished memento? Noreen, for lots of reasons and not just because she married me!
10. What trophy, ribbon, award, certificate are you most proud of that serves as a memory of an important event? My PhD, not just for the academic stuff but for all the formative extracurricula things too
11. It would be wonderful if all memories were good, but some aren’t; is there a bad memory that you carry with you? Breaking up with my first fiancée, Jill, at the start of our second year as undergraduates; I nearly failed my Part I exams as a result
12. What is your favourite summer memory? Playing Cricket, not that I was ever any good

1. Mother & Son, 2. FAITH: Earth element focal art bead pendant/necklace 1, 3. Halina 35X, 4. Rye, 5. AP Soc Members at Wysall, 6. Little Black Cat, 7. is there a shark behind me? …is that a yes?, 8. memories collage, 9. Noreen, 10. Student Life, 11. Jack and Jill went up the hill, 12. Playing Cricket

As always these are not my photos (except numbers 1, 5, 6, 9 which are mine) so please follow the links to enjoy the work of the photographers who did take them!

Created with fd’s Flickr Toys.

amusements, arts, personal, photography

Rusty, the Danish Bacon Hound


Rusty, the Danish Bacon Hound, originally uploaded by kcm76.

Ladies and Gentlemen! Let me present, at no expense to this august establishment, Rusty, the Danish Bacon Hound.
We must apologise for the state of his coat, he’s in need of a good hose down as he’s clearly been grubbing around the pig pens.
(Made from thin white card after a design by David C Mills.)

[Later] Noreen thinks he should be called Streaky rather than Rusty, this also being a characteristic of the coats of Danish Bacon Hounds.

books

Book Marketing

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Today I got an email. Well actually I probably got well over 100, between work and home. But one stuck out. It was from Abebooks who are marketing 30 Novels Worth Buying For the Cover Alone. It’s an interesting way to sell – and buy – books, and certainly makes for a striking advert. Does it work? Well I guess it must, or at least it stands a good chance, otherwise Abebooks wouldn’t have perpetrated it. Punters? Well, given that he probably can’t read, isn’t this how Joe Average buys books anyway? Of course people like us wouldn’t. Would we?

Oh and just so you know the 30 novels are:

  • Skim, Mariko Tamaki and Jillian Tamaki
  • Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
  • A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess
  • Vacation, Deb Olin Unferth
  • South of the Border, West of the Sun, Haruki Murakami
  • Sharp Teeth, Toby Barlow
  • The Noodle Maker, Ma Jian
  • Everyone’s Pretty, Lydia Millet
  • The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera
  • Fruit, Brian Francis
  • The Separation, Christopher Priest
  • The Chess Machine, Robert Lohr
  • The Last Jew, Yoram Kaniuk
  • The Monsters of Templeton, Lauren Groff
  • Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Vol. 1, Elji Otsuka and Housui Yamazaki
  • The River Wife, Jonis Agee
  • My Mistress’ Sparrow is Dead, Jeffrey Eugenides
  • Beowulf, Seamus Heaney
  • Strawberry Fields, Marina Lewycka
  • The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson
  • Memorial, Bruce Wagner
  • The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
  • The Archivist, Martha Cooley
  • Tree of Smoke, Denis Johnson
  • Arkansas, John Brandon
  • The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, Michael Chabon
  • Parasites Like Us, Adam Johnson
  • Hypohypothesis, Heather Folsom
  • Rant, Chuck Palahniuk
  • The Boys in the Trees, Mary Swan

Of which I have heard of just FOUR and read the grand total of … ONE!

current affairs

A Sorry Mess or a Public Scandal?

Like many others, for example Wat Tyler over at Burning Our Money, the writer of the Leader in yesterday’s Times is deeply unimpressed with the ongoing soap opera that is the sorry mess we call a banking system. Specifically yesterday’s Leader Writer is railing against the debacle which is the Lloyds TSB “takeover” of HBOS. These two quotes are quite telling:

Instead of steadying the financial system, the merger has further undermined it.

The episode shows a lack of foresight, competence and financial understanding; at such vast expense for the taxpayer, it is also and increasingly a public scandal.

It grieves me to be right but “I told you so!”, to the extent that as Lloyds TSB shareholders we both voted against the merger and declined to indulge in the recent Lloyds TSB share issue (at a price which was above the market rate at the time of the offer).

Sad, bitter and twisted because I’ve seen my investment go down the tubes? No, actually. We bought a small number TSB shares when it was privatised 20 years or so ago (since transmogrified into Lloyds TSB shares when these two banks merged) and we have since recouped our initial investment several times over in dividend payments. And the current share price is around what it was when we bought those shares – although that is less than 10% of its peak price. Our investment is small and luckily we can afford to lose it: never gamble with more than you can afford to lose! So no, I’m not bitter. Just annoyed at the incompetence and unprofessionalism of it all.