Science fiction weekend
One thing needs saying. Too many of those book titles I linked to in the last post turn out to belong to pretty awful books. I browsed through them over the weekend. Intriguing titles and intriguing chapter titles, but nothing worth reading. Well, actually I borrowed one which might be good. A pretty good experience was the TMCC theater production of Weird Romance, two one-act science fiction musicals. The fun one was The Girl Who Was Plugged In, based on a story by James Tiptree Jr. I actually found the story in two different collections (1 2), both of which are probably more interesting than the stuff I was tuning into the other day.
Later today I think I will take a peek at a discussion of the book Fahrenheit 451. I've never read the book but have seen the movie. I didn't find it all that enthralling. I think there is a serious flaw in the story as the movie presents it. There's this society, which must include the whole world, that bans books and burns books totally--no exceptions--but it also is a technologized society with medicine, motor vehicles, flying machines, weapons, flamethrowers (to burn the books), railroads, and so on. Books are banned to protect people from being confused by contradictory views. But all that technology can only come into being through a history of confusion, a history of errors. It's not going to come into being without contradictory views being worked out over time. I'll check out the discussion and see if I'm missing something (or if the movie is missing something).
Some usual suspects and more reading possibilities:
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism ... shows how neo-liberal Washington Consensus fundamentalism dominates the world with America its lead exponent exploiting security threats, terror attacks, economic meltdowns, competing ideologies, tectonic political or economic shifts, and natural disasters to impose its will everywhere. Wars are waged, social services cut, and freedom sacrificed when people are too distracted, cowed or bludgeoned to object. Klein describes a worldwide process of social and economic engineering she calls "disaster capitalism" with torture along for the ride to reinforce the message--no "New World Order" alternatives are tolerated
--Stephen Lendman
Did you hear the good news on The Jena 6? The adult conviction and potential 22 year sentence of Mychal Bell has been overturned. This comes less than one week before widespread protests scheduled for this Thursday in Jena, Louisiana. Since this case and the fate of the other five boys are a looooong way from being resolved mass protests will continue as planned
--Charles Modiano
Violence is integral to Zionism: not incidental to it.
--M. Shahid Alam
Like agricultural societies around the world (and in strong contrast to the mercantilist Puritans), the Cavalier culture that emerged during these early generations was tradition-bound, static, patriarchal and hierarchical, suspicious of book-learning, and more than a bit authoritarian--attributes which were buttressed by the teachings of Virginia's state-supported Anglican churches. As a direct result, Virginia very soon distinguished itself with the widest inequities in wealth, social mobility, education, domestic conditions, and political rights in colonial America.
--Sara Robinson
Those who join a panic make a panic.
--H.G. Wells
[W]e can never sever our links with the past, complete with all its errors. It survives in accepted concepts, in the presentation of problems, in the syllabus of formal education, in everday life, as well as in language and institutions. Concepts are not spontaneously created but are determined by their "ancestors." That which has occurred in the past is a greater cause of insecurity--rather, it only becomes a cause of insecurity--when our ties with it remain unconscius and unknown.
--Ludwik Fleck
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Later today I think I will take a peek at a discussion of the book Fahrenheit 451. I've never read the book but have seen the movie. I didn't find it all that enthralling. I think there is a serious flaw in the story as the movie presents it. There's this society, which must include the whole world, that bans books and burns books totally--no exceptions--but it also is a technologized society with medicine, motor vehicles, flying machines, weapons, flamethrowers (to burn the books), railroads, and so on. Books are banned to protect people from being confused by contradictory views. But all that technology can only come into being through a history of confusion, a history of errors. It's not going to come into being without contradictory views being worked out over time. I'll check out the discussion and see if I'm missing something (or if the movie is missing something).
Some usual suspects and more reading possibilities:
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism ... shows how neo-liberal Washington Consensus fundamentalism dominates the world with America its lead exponent exploiting security threats, terror attacks, economic meltdowns, competing ideologies, tectonic political or economic shifts, and natural disasters to impose its will everywhere. Wars are waged, social services cut, and freedom sacrificed when people are too distracted, cowed or bludgeoned to object. Klein describes a worldwide process of social and economic engineering she calls "disaster capitalism" with torture along for the ride to reinforce the message--no "New World Order" alternatives are tolerated
--Stephen Lendman
Did you hear the good news on The Jena 6? The adult conviction and potential 22 year sentence of Mychal Bell has been overturned. This comes less than one week before widespread protests scheduled for this Thursday in Jena, Louisiana. Since this case and the fate of the other five boys are a looooong way from being resolved mass protests will continue as planned
--Charles Modiano
Violence is integral to Zionism: not incidental to it.
--M. Shahid Alam
Like agricultural societies around the world (and in strong contrast to the mercantilist Puritans), the Cavalier culture that emerged during these early generations was tradition-bound, static, patriarchal and hierarchical, suspicious of book-learning, and more than a bit authoritarian--attributes which were buttressed by the teachings of Virginia's state-supported Anglican churches. As a direct result, Virginia very soon distinguished itself with the widest inequities in wealth, social mobility, education, domestic conditions, and political rights in colonial America.
--Sara Robinson
Those who join a panic make a panic.
--H.G. Wells
[W]e can never sever our links with the past, complete with all its errors. It survives in accepted concepts, in the presentation of problems, in the syllabus of formal education, in everday life, as well as in language and institutions. Concepts are not spontaneously created but are determined by their "ancestors." That which has occurred in the past is a greater cause of insecurity--rather, it only becomes a cause of insecurity--when our ties with it remain unconscius and unknown.
--Ludwik Fleck
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11