earthli News 3.7
<![CDATA[Quotes > earthli News 3.7]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/2026-05-06T22:21:07+02:00https://www.earthli.com/news/icons/webcore_png/app/news_100px.png
<![CDATA[You're not crazy; I'm crazy.]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=61062026-04-18T10:18:00+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
joke,
"I used to do drugs. I still do, but I used to, too."
[Girlfriends]
"I don’t have a girlfriend but I know a girl who would be really mad if she
heard me say that."
[Baked potatoes]
[image]
"I like baked potatoes. I don't have a microwave oven, and it takes forever to
bake a potato in a conventional oven. Sometimes I'll just throw one in there,
even if I don't want one, because by the time it's done, who knows?"
[Slip covers]
"This one commercial said "Forget everything you know about slip covers," so I
did. And it was a load off my mind. Then the commercial tried to sell slip
covers, but I didn't know what the fuck they were."
[Laziness]
"I write jokes for a living, man. See I sit in my hotel at night, I think of
something that's funny and then I go get a pen and I write it down. Or, if the
pen's too far away, I have to convince myself that what I thought of ain't
funny."
[Bananas]
"My friend asked me if I wanted a frozen banana, and I said "No... but I want a
regular banana later, so yeah.""
[Escalators]
"I like escalators, because an escalator can never break; it can only become
stairs."
That's "graceful degradation"
for you.
]]>
<![CDATA[Learning is not wisdom]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=61032026-04-12T23:07:02+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The spice of life]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=61012026-04-10T09:48:43+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Gettin' that bag is as old as time]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=60602026-02-28T17:10:51+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[How like us the ape]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=60242026-02-08T21:45:35+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
(How like us the ape, this utterly hideous animal!)
]]>
(How like us the ape, this utterly hideous animal!)
]]>
<![CDATA[There are no geniuses in a crowd]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=59232025-12-17T21:12:20+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
,
which I read in "2005"
.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The title is a play on the expression, "There"...
]]>
, which I
read in "2005" .
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The title is a play on the expression, "There are no atheists in foxholes."
]]>
<![CDATA[Grudges are a waste of time]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=58502025-12-07T15:12:50+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Our problem is obedience]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=58002025-12-05T08:53:41+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[They're right there]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=57992025-12-05T08:49:43+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[They can't help themselves]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=57192025-11-11T21:59:57+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A powerful illusion]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=57182025-11-11T21:21:16+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[AI do be like that]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=57172025-11-10T22:40:06+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A euphemism for colonization]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=57162025-11-10T22:18:32+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Hyrum says that an author does not own their API]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=56822025-09-03T14:50:02+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The society we've chosen]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=56732025-08-19T15:18:13+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Cloudy with a chance of firing squads]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=56232025-08-01T22:35:38+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Havel on Hope]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=55172025-05-19T12:28:18+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[High road vs. low road]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=54802025-05-18T22:07:00+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Sparing the enduring and ennobling from the hungry, hasty, and selfish]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=55052025-05-18T14:36:09+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
, where it
was described as "We’ll probably never hear another president speak as
forcefully in defense of forests as LBJ did on signing the legislation creating
Redwoods National Park."
That's probably true. People don't talk like this anymore in the U.S. Other
presidents would say things like this, though. Claudia Scheinbaum, for example.
]]>
<![CDATA[Commencement thoughts]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=55032025-05-16T11:43:32+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
, a short
article about NYU's craven response to "NYU student denounced Israel’s
genocide in Gaza during his graduation speech to roaring applause."
"Try to imagine at least once a day that you are not an American. Go
even further: try to imagine at least once a day that"
...
]]>
, a short article
about NYU's craven response to "NYU student denounced Israel’s genocide in
Gaza during his graduation speech to roaring applause."
"Try to imagine at least once a day that you are not an American. Go even
further: try to imagine at least once a day that you belong to the vast, the
overwhelming majority of people on this planet who don’t have passports,
don’t live in dwellings equipped with both refrigerators and telephones, who
have never even once flown in a plane."
It also included this brilliant quote of Salman Rushdie,
"Since I have come to believe that such defiance is an inevitable and essential
aspect of what we call freedom, I thought I might commend it to you. For in the
years to come you will find yourselves up against gods of all sorts, big and
little gods, corporate and incorporeal gods, all of them demanding to be
worshipped and obeyed – the myriad deities of money and power, of convention
and custom, that will seek to limit and control your thoughts and lives.
"Defy them; that’s my advice to you. Thumb your noses; cock your snooks. For,
as the myths tell us, it is by defying the gods that human beings have best
expressed their humanity."
[image]As Robin writes, this is not how the elites act.
"what do the leaders of NYU do? Freak out about this student, their commencement
speaker, who had the audacity to refer to “the atrocities currently happening
in Palestine,” and, so, naturally, is having his diploma revoked.
"[...]
"What a juvenile society we live in."
]]>
<![CDATA[Learning from books]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=55002025-05-04T07:58:30+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[We have always manufactured consent]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=54882025-04-20T11:56:33+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Perfection is a one-word oxymoron]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=54792025-04-13T11:03:06+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Show. Don't tell.]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=54582025-04-05T21:02:13+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
"[image]In May, 1886, Chekhov wrote to his brother Alexander, who had
literary ambitions: “In descriptions of Nature one"
...
]]>
"[image]In May, 1886, Chekhov wrote to his brother Alexander, who had literary
ambitions: “In descriptions of Nature one must seize on small details,
grouping them so that when the reader closes his eyes he gets a picture. For
instance, you’ll have a moonlit night if you write that on the mill dam a
piece of glass from a broken bottle glittered like a bright little star, and
that the black shadow of a dog or a wolf rolled past like a ball.”"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[1] Found the original on "Мастер-класс по текстам от
Чехова" by turizmufa <Источник:
https://tenchat.ru/media/2663632-masterklass-po-tekstam-ot-chekhova>,
"Не говори мне, что светит луна; покажи мне
отблеск света на битом стекле."
]]>
<![CDATA[Stop sucking up to The Man]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=53482025-01-26T18:08:55+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[This simple rule for ruling works every time]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=53142025-01-07T08:58:08+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
...
]]>
, it was a
then-young Bill Moyers himself to whom Johnson said this, presumably in the 60s.
Moyers quotes him as having said it in response to " some ugly racial epithets
scrawled on signs [he's spotted during the motorcade.]" So, it seems that he was
not describing a recipe he'd planned on using, but simply the power of the idea
of racism.
The article states further,
"One of the secrets of his success was the ability to speak the racially
insensitive language of his fellow Southerners. He understood them. He
understood their reluctance and in some cases downright refusal to tear down the
walls of racial segregation. He knew racism from the inside, and he knew well
the role the rich and powerful played in promulgating it."
To balance this just a bit, I also found this other quote from good ol' boy
Lyndon B. Johnson,
"I'll have those n**gers voting Democratic for the next 200 years."
This is the same man who turned up the heat on the Vietnam War to the
temperature that would end up cooking at least two million Vietnamese, whom he
considered to be "hordes of barbaric yellow dwarves".
]]>
<![CDATA[Predatory capitalism is inevitable, until it isn't -- pass it on]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=52752024-11-24T21:51:43+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[It was true forty years ago; it's true today]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=52682024-11-09T20:32:53+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Take off everything that's not the damned fiddle.]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=52572024-11-03T18:11:14+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Seek the less-convenient truth]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=52552024-10-28T08:19:26+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Clear as an azure sky of deepest summer]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=52362024-10-26T22:50:26+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[They're fighting for control of the Thunderdome]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=51982024-10-12T22:01:58+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The purpose of books]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=51692024-09-15T12:45:57+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
is"[image]Ich glaube, man sollte überhaupt nur solche Bücher lesen,
die einen beißen und stechen. Wenn das Buch, das wir lesen, uns
nicht mit einem Faustschlag"
...
]]>
is"[image]Ich glaube, man sollte überhaupt nur solche Bücher lesen, die einen
beißen und stechen. Wenn das Buch, das wir lesen, uns nicht mit einem
Faustschlag auf den Schädel weckt, wozu lesen wir dann das Buch? Damit es
uns glücklich macht, wie Du schreibst? Mein Gott, glücklich wären wir eben
auch, wenn wir keine Bücher hätten, und solche Bücher, die uns glücklich
machen, könnten wir zur Not selber schreiben. Wir brauchen aber die Bücher,
die auf uns wirken wie ein Unglück, das uns sehr schmerzt, wie der Tod
eines, den wir lieber hatten als uns, wie wenn wir in Wälder verstoßen
würden, von allen Menschen weg, wie ein Selbstmord, ein Buch muß die Axt
sein für das gefrorene Meer in uns. Das glaube ich."
]]>
<![CDATA[Bad people, unworthy of love]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=51632024-09-06T18:09:32+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Freedom as a means of control]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=50552024-04-28T10:38:22+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A society without oppression is an illusion...]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=50352024-04-18T12:03:48+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Gore Vidal's Storm Warning in 1961]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=50172024-04-15T14:36:05+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The law is a backstop]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49952024-03-03T20:36:50+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The High Road and the Low Road]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49912024-02-22T07:45:56+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Understanding should come before expression]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49902024-02-22T07:42:13+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[There's nothing for it]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49892024-02-21T08:08:10+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Capital punishment is first-degree murder]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49802024-02-18T00:09:48+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[An equal-opportunity comrade]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49652024-02-03T19:46:15+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Lock it in so it works for me]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49612024-02-02T22:57:21+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Practice makes perfect]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49592024-01-29T19:46:45+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
.
]]>
.
]]>
<![CDATA[Mind Control]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49262024-01-08T22:02:36+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Oppression => Occupation => Resistance => Repression => Terror => Counter-terror]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49202023-12-30T10:04:59+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The inexorability of the machine]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=49072023-12-26T09:36:08+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[At least it's entertaining]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=48912023-12-10T12:33:27+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A good habit indeed]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=48842023-12-08T20:53:33+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Why you so exercised? This is why.]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=48852023-12-08T20:52:40+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A state has no conscience, no sense of justice]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=48832023-12-08T10:57:57+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[C-Beams]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=48722023-11-25T19:54:30+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Misplaced priorities]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=48412023-10-25T21:33:52+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[History doesn't care about justice]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=48292023-10-15T00:25:37+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Where do your loyalties lie?]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47612023-07-29T13:25:25+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Limiting the View]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47582023-07-17T06:10:00+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Oligarchs of War]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47572023-07-16T22:19:19+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Demons]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47542023-07-07T13:24:44+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The order of things]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47512023-06-28T21:08:52+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Uncertainty beats incorrect certainty every time]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47492023-06-19T18:11:50+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Concision takes time]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47282023-04-28T17:58:34+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Artists and Revolutionaries]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47182023-04-16T20:36:09+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The Catch-22 of the mind]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=47042023-03-14T22:03:36+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[We are a shoddily designed experiment]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=46622023-01-22T13:42:10+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Lies capitalists tell themselves]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=46592023-01-16T22:10:46+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
.
[image]
]]>
<![CDATA[Teleportation, of a sort]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=46582023-01-13T16:25:49+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[But why go faster?]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=46252022-12-03T13:06:00+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Burn bright or go home]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=46192022-11-26T20:27:18+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Warmongering usurping diplomacy is madness]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=46052022-11-11T11:53:11+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
.
]]>
<![CDATA[You're nobody until...]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45942022-11-06T22:11:36+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Ironically deluded]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45902022-10-24T22:19:39+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Finally: a good definition of a fascist]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45772022-10-01T12:41:32+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Cannon Fodder]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45622022-09-09T22:30:34+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The old switcheroo]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45572022-09-04T03:14:14+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Enjoying the view from a local maximum]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45502022-08-16T17:13:43+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Can it be both?]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45492022-08-15T04:46:15+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Carl Sagan predicts the Idiocracy]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45472022-08-12T14:21:39+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Aggressively Defensive]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45452022-08-05T16:14:37+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Running Society Sensibly]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45442022-08-01T01:33:04+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[As went Britain, so goes the U.S.]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=45132022-06-04T00:30:48+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Even you don't believe that...]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=44942022-04-18T12:01:49+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Message sent]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=44882022-04-10T13:59:00+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
. Alternatives are,
"The single biggest problem in communication is the"
...
]]>
. Alternatives are,
"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken
place."
"The greatest problem with communication is the illusion that it has been
accomplished."
"The most serious danger in communication is the illusion of having achieved
it."
"The great enemy of communication is the illusion of it."
I like what the quote investigator determined to be the original version.
]]>
<![CDATA[Keep Fighting]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=44722022-03-13T21:14:58+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Schrödinger's Thought]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=44712022-03-13T18:43:13+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The Tin Man and the Scarecrow]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=44552022-02-24T22:15:30+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Consumption trumps Creation]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=44452022-02-15T10:45:39+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The Hidden Violence]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43812021-12-10T22:16:48+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Truth is a bitter pill]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43752021-11-30T17:04:18+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The Show]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43742021-11-30T16:59:45+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A matter of scale]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43672021-11-16T23:20:52+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
. But the
first time I heard something similar was on the "Dress to Kill comedy album" by
Eddie Izzard , where he
did the following bit,
"You know, we think if somebody kills someone, that's murder, you go to prison.
"You kill 10 people, you go to Texas, they hit you with a brick, that's what
they do.
"20 people, you go to a hospital, they look through a small window at you
forever.
"And over that, we can't deal with it, you know? Someone's killed 100,000
people, we're almost going, "Well done! You killed 100,000 people? You must get
up very early in the morning. I can't even get down the gym!"
]]>
<![CDATA[Sleep Cold]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43652021-11-12T23:39:10+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Violence is violence]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43112021-10-25T22:54:49+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[When two is equivalent to one]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43102021-08-05T12:37:02+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Retribution, not justice]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=43032021-07-24T23:59:39+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Revolution is not safe]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=42962021-07-09T23:28:41+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The first revolution]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=42982021-07-09T23:28:33+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[You just don't get it, man]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=42032021-03-11T22:37:12+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
commemorates the recent death of Lawrence Ferlinghetti with a wonderful
story, not directly about Ferlinghetti, but about one expert witness's
testimony at his trial for obscenity for having published Howl. It
wasn't so long ago in America that people were being...
]]>
commemorates the
recent death of Lawrence Ferlinghetti with a wonderful story, not directly about
Ferlinghetti, but about one expert witness's testimony at his trial for
obscenity for having published Howl. It wasn't so long ago in America that
people were being prosecuted for obscenity.
That trial was in 1957. Just over 60 years later and it seems kind of
far-fetched to think we may see the like again. The goal is to sanction
unsanctioned [1] ideas, to keep them from polluting people's minds, distracting
them from the self-evident and officially accepted truth. Why bother with a
trial and its messy rules of evidence -- why risk a public and official and
potentially ideologically damaging loss -- when you can try and pillory heretics
on social or the mainstream media or both?
"Among other things, Ferlinghetti published Allen Ginsberg's Howl, and was
prosecuted for obscenity because of that. One particular passage from that trial
sticks in my head, as reported in Edward de Grazia, Girls Lean Back Everywhere
335-36 (1992); the colloquy was with an expert witness, literary critic Mark
Schorer, who was testifying to the poem having ""redeeming social importance"
":"
"Prosecutor: I presume you understand the whole thing, is that right?:
"Schorer: I hope so. It's not always easy to know that one understands exactly
what a contemporary poet is saying….
"Prosecutor: Do you understand what "angel-headed hipsters burning for the
ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night"
means?
"Schorer: Sir, you can't translate poetry into prose. That's why it's poetry.
(Emphasis added.)"
Wonderful.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[1] I thought it would be fun to use the diametrically opposed definitions right
next to each other. It was.
]]>
<![CDATA[A matter of degree]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=41812021-02-19T21:52:12+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Unbreakable / Unverwüstlich]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=41802021-02-19T21:49:27+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[How to ask the Internet]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=41782021-02-15T14:07:21+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Dragging him down]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=41132020-12-13T16:11:22+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Democracy is machine learning?]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=40802020-11-02T21:23:06+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[How the Few Rule]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=40652020-10-31T17:13:51+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Hunter S. Thompson called it almost 50 years ago]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=40782020-10-31T17:13:12+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Definitions of Diplomacy]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=40622020-09-27T14:27:06+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Memory]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=40572020-09-25T23:05:04+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
. Both are quite nice. I had to
look up "Thomas Merton"
.
]]>
. Both are quite nice. I had to look up
"Thomas Merton" .
]]>
<![CDATA[A surfeit of unearned confidence]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37482020-09-25T23:00:26+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Fortune-telling]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37472020-09-25T23:00:21+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Soft tyranny]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37842020-09-25T22:59:58+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[By all means]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=40562020-09-25T22:49:26+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Puritanism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=40552020-09-19T12:22:53+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Focused laser-like on the present]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=39702020-05-06T21:10:05+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Shit Rolls Downhill as Public Policy]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=39692020-05-03T18:01:24+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Rising above the muck isn't even that hard]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=39672020-05-02T23:10:56+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[We've known for a long time]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=39662020-05-02T20:57:48+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
referred to the image below,
[image]
It's nicely put together, but it's also not the original quote, which
someone included in the comments in a giant wall of text from an English
translation.
I found the "original in German"
:
"Die kapitalistische"
...
]]>
referred to the image below,
[image]
It's nicely put together, but it's also not the original quote, which someone
included in the comments in a giant wall of text from an English translation.
I found the "original in German"
:
"Die kapitalistische Produktion entwickelt daher nur die Technik und Kombination
des gesellschaftlichen Produktionsprozesses, indem sie zugleich die
Springquellen alles Reichtums untergräbt: die Erde und den Arbeiter."
The translation on the Reddit link is:
"Capitalist production, therefore, develops technology, and the combining
together of various processes into a social whole, only by sapping the original
sources of all wealth—the soil and the laborer."
The side-by-side English translation from the link to the original is:
"Capitalist production, therefore, only develops the techniques and the degree
of combination of the social process of production by simultaneously undermining
the original sources of all wealth – the soil and the worker."
I think a combination of the two would be more correct. The first one places the
"only" in the wrong place whereas the second one invents "degree of" out of
whole cloth.
After that preamble, here's my translation:
"The capitalist product therefore develops only the techniques and combination
of social processes of production by undermining the two geysers of all wealth:
the soil and the worker."
As with "the Hegel quote going around"
, it's not as sexy as the
re-imagining in the poster.
]]>
<![CDATA[Learning from History]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=39352020-04-04T09:26:07+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The sunken cost of being conned]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=39322020-03-29T21:33:25+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Eco on Writing]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=39062020-02-16T12:22:04+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Beats Thinkin']]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=38452019-11-15T15:41:08+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Fanaticism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=38442019-11-15T15:38:20+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[If Wishes were Mutexes]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=38292019-10-29T13:51:43+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
"Although holding a lock across process boundaries may sound
questionable to you, most other platforms try to use imperfect
heuristics to fix concurrency issues. Or they just hope race conditions
don’t happen. In my experience, prayers are not a very effective"
...
]]>
"Although holding a lock across process boundaries may sound questionable to
you, most other platforms try to use imperfect heuristics to fix concurrency
issues. Or they just hope race conditions don’t happen. In my experience,
prayers are not a very effective concurrency primitive."
]]>
<![CDATA[Going along to get along]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=38082019-10-06T17:36:59+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[On successfully navigating tricky grammatical seas]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=38032019-10-06T12:35:05+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Institutionalized Poverty]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=38022019-10-06T12:29:42+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Incuriosity Killed the Human]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=38002019-10-04T17:38:09+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[MVP is a lie]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37912019-08-30T23:08:41+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[On Tripping Alone]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37862019-08-28T07:54:34+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Well-trained]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37812019-08-16T07:44:20+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Film as a way of seeing into the past]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37612019-07-07T22:36:38+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A lunar metaphor for corruption]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37602019-07-07T22:35:39+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Unknown Unknowns in Computing]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37592019-07-07T22:33:25+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[No Sense of Humor]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37302019-04-14T16:11:14+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Words to live by]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37082019-02-23T10:39:35+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Capitalism's Achilles Heel]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=37072019-02-17T18:25:03+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[American Foreign-Policy, in a Nutshell]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=36992019-02-09T20:45:34+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[James Tobin on the 'paper economy']]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=36862019-01-22T19:48:05+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
[1].
"I [suspect] that we are throwing more and more of our resources,
including the cream of our youth, into financial activities remote from
the production of goods and services, into activities that generate high
private rewards disproportionate to"
...
]]>
[1].
"I [suspect] that we are throwing more and more of our resources, including the
cream of our youth, into financial activities remote from the production of
goods and services, into activities that generate high private rewards
disproportionate to their social productivity. I suspect that the immense power
of the computer is being harnessed to this 'paper economy', not to do the same
transactions more economically but to balloon the quantity and variety of
financial exchanges."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[1] The quote seems to be quite real. I did a bit of digging and came up with
the original paper (scanned, JPG), called "On the Efficiency of the
Financial System"
(PDF). It has been much-cited in several papers, like "How Big Is Too Big?
On the Social Efficiency of the Financial Sector in the United States"
(PDF), "Too Much Finance?"
(PDF) as well as the article "Bankers: Who Needs Them?" by David Futrelle
. The post "James
Tobin on ‘paper economy’ and short-sighted speculation-generating
financial instruments"
has a link to the PDF above and includes a longer version of the citation,
showing it to continue with,
"[...] For this reason perhaps, high technology has so far yielded
disappointing results in economy-wide productivity. I fear that, as Keynes
saw even in his day, the advantages of the liquidity and negotiability of
financial instruments come at the cost of facilitating nth-degree speculation
which is short-sighted and inefficient."
]]>
<![CDATA[Why so angry?]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=36612019-01-10T21:13:52+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The True Self]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=36602019-01-10T21:08:58+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[True Nobility]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=36582019-01-07T20:59:41+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
offers quite a
bit of clarification.
]]>
offers quite a bit of
clarification.
]]>
<![CDATA[Hate vs. Envy]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=35932018-10-28T22:12:04+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Stewart Lee on Racism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=35812018-09-13T21:55:49+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Debt is a weapon in the class war]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=35602018-07-22T08:47:45+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[In Denial]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=35232018-02-17T12:39:04+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Keep fighting]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=35162018-02-06T18:17:41+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Magic]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34892017-12-22T07:20:50+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[We Want You]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34672017-12-09T08:57:20+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[I'll be mellow when I'm dead]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34492017-10-07T11:10:01+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Mission Civilatrice]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34462017-10-02T16:38:06+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Down the Ladder]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34382017-09-05T10:25:10+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Comedy is Tragedy ...]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34252017-07-19T22:55:58+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Kill the Messenger]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34222017-05-20T10:17:55+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Nothing has changed in 125 years]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34212017-05-14T20:17:58+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[You can't win a rigged game]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34202017-05-14T20:14:19+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[How many more lives do we have?]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34172017-05-01T14:33:56+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The more you know, the more you know you don't know]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34092017-04-17T13:42:39+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Herding Sheep]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34042017-04-04T07:25:58+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Costs nothing? Worth nothing.]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34032017-04-03T20:09:48+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
, it is actually
an English translation of the Latin proverb "Quod gratis asseritur,
gratis negatur" ("what is freely asserted is freely dismissed"),
which was commonly used
...
]]>
, it is actually an
English translation of the Latin proverb "Quod gratis asseritur, gratis
negatur" ("what is freely asserted is freely dismissed"), which was commonly
used in the 19th century.
]]>
<![CDATA[Fakes of fakes]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34022017-04-03T19:00:22+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A realization]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=34012017-04-02T21:39:04+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A technocratic solution]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=33732017-02-13T07:13:51+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Letting go]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=33622017-01-26T20:14:58+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Untrained Pilots]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=33592017-01-20T22:26:34+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Less well-known Adam Smith]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=33492017-01-06T07:56:02+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Rage Against the Machine]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=33412017-01-02T09:15:22+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Why propaganda works]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=33332016-12-30T10:41:08+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Capitalism is the engine behind racism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=33312016-12-29T21:40:29+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[New England in a Nutshell]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=32832016-06-15T10:29:15+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Ruthless Introspection]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=32642016-05-16T12:16:27+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Inverse Arrogance]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31712015-11-17T23:00:51+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Invisible Privilege]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31462015-07-25T17:51:13+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Defensive Economics]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31452015-07-20T20:30:54+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[We are watching and we are Legion]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28042015-05-26T06:05:27+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The main advantage of a type-safe language]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=30092015-05-26T06:04:22+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[On the inadequacy of language]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31402015-05-22T06:09:47+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[XX beats XY]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31302015-04-05T12:48:09+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[It's all relative]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31172015-03-01T15:35:47+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Depose the King]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31142015-03-01T14:18:11+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Invisible violence]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31102015-02-28T18:11:16+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[My entire life it’s been like this]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=31002015-01-21T22:15:38+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Believe everything you read]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=30702014-12-05T09:12:27+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[When you really start learning]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=30452014-10-09T18:31:05+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Doing something worthwhile vs. working for a living]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=30132014-07-13T11:06:13+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Big Business]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=29232014-02-09T23:03:12+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The job of a descriptivist linguist]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=29462014-02-03T23:03:11+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The Self-hating American]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=29182014-01-13T22:01:41+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Inspiring eyes-open cynicism (it's just a ride)]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28962013-12-09T22:42:05+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[On Plagiarism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28922013-11-13T21:33:23+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[What the Wizard of Oz actually does]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28682013-07-14T22:06:21+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
puts
some very interesting words in the wizard's mouth that explains his role
quite well. After Dorothy and Co. have revealed him to be a fraud -- a
mere man rather than the all-powerful wizard they'd imagined him to be
-- he says,
"[...] Now then, you can either persist in your dull revelation, "
...
]]>
puts some very
interesting words in the wizard's mouth that explains his role quite well. After
Dorothy and Co. have revealed him to be a fraud -- a mere man rather than the
all-powerful wizard they'd imagined him to be -- he says,
"[...] Now then, you can either persist in your dull revelation, or you can
close the curtain and return to your world where good and power can allow
without wicked dross, and where the broken vessels of your lives can be made
whole by the caprice of an inscrutable demigod."
I think it's safe to say that not many of us persist in the dull revelation.
]]>
<![CDATA[Falling through the cracks]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28612013-06-29T12:30:51+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Democracy and Capitalism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=27882013-06-29T12:17:21+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The world of animals]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28192013-06-29T12:16:51+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Racism is, apparently, a thing of the past in America]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28602013-06-29T12:13:06+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Learn philosophy; it's important]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28522013-06-10T22:53:03+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Triangulating to mediocrity]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28182013-04-28T15:55:59+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Intensity]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28092013-03-06T18:33:24+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Relative effort]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=28072013-03-06T18:24:07+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Absinthe]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=27972013-03-02T13:10:14+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[For some people? There is no cure.]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=27192012-11-24T17:49:49+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Progress defined]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=27162012-11-16T05:36:38+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The luck of the draw]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=27102012-11-07T21:17:02+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Ignorance is self-perpetuating]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=27042012-11-06T20:29:33+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[English as inveterate lexical criminal]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=27032012-10-28T21:41:22+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
...
]]>
for the reference.
]]>
<![CDATA[Being funny for a living]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=26742012-07-15T20:23:40+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Re-election Stump Speech]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=26452012-04-22T15:50:04+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Accident versus Design]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25942011-12-31T09:36:48+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Henry Rollins on Music Prices]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25812011-12-08T22:50:24+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A Devastating Book Review]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25772011-11-30T20:40:55+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Freedoms]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25742011-11-20T20:03:54+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Dave Chappelle on Richard Pryor]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25662011-10-15T23:03:49+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A Measure of Freedom]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25402011-07-28T17:34:27+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A Fitting Epitaph]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25262011-05-03T22:38:13+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[All Good Programming Languages Suck]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=25112011-03-27T13:38:26+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[If we can't, then no-one can]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=24982011-03-13T15:07:12+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Either Or]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=24942011-03-11T23:38:16+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Therein Lies the Rub]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=24892011-02-24T18:53:56+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Wait up!]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=24742011-01-22T09:58:57+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[A One-Rule User Manual for the Internet]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=24492010-12-24T06:09:13+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Internet Society]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=24342010-10-04T19:24:05+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Soccer in America]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=24082010-06-13T22:39:57+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[U.S. Policy]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23932010-05-23T11:22:18+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[What it is to be Liberal]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23882010-05-15T00:33:04+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The Right Question to Ask]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23842010-05-08T22:17:26+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
,
which included photos from the war 35 years ago. It...
]]>
, which
included photos from the war 35 years ago. It was one of the few thoughtful
comments on a page full of jingoist fools defending the notion of America's
essential goodness and the necessity of war in the face of all historical fact.
]]>
<![CDATA[Money]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23772010-05-06T06:23:38+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Americanism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23532010-03-27T10:42:50+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Roosevelt on Republicans and the Free Market]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23352010-02-07T12:34:02+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Dorchen on Libertarians]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23262010-01-28T08:17:54+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Evil is in the Eye of the Beholder]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23082010-01-08T22:50:48+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[The Poor are Honest]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=23012009-12-31T09:32:26+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA["Market", "Progress", "Development" and "Reforms" Redefined]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22982009-12-30T13:10:55+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[It Never Happened]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22932009-12-29T18:28:04+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
]]>
<![CDATA[Cynicism]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22812009-12-23T22:17:19+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Revenge-Taking Through Murder]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22672009-12-15T22:57:54+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
about the death penalty. At a guess, 90% of the participants were in favor of
killing for revenge or as punishment or to "serve as a lesson to others."
Orwell's take on it -- having been up close and personal with revenge for the
most heinous of acts -- is that it is much easier to see enemies as almost
supernaturally powerful monsters capable of near-superhuman feats of evil in the
abstract; up close and stripped of power, their base [1] humanity (and, in one
case, clear mental illness) are overpoweringly evident. James-Bond-villain-like
evil is mostly confined to stories and fantasy. That is not to say that evil
does not exist or is not done -- quite the contrary -- but that the demonic
intent ascribed to the perpetrators of such acts is, in almost all cases, absent
and the cause is much more banal and, ultimately, less reassuring. If great evil
is perpetrated for mundane reasons, it's all the more offensive; dressing it up
in fantasy, however, does no-one any good, least of all a society's ethos.
The entire essay is well worth a read (and is also quite short).
A more recent example in the U.S. (but also elsewhere) is the incredible
prevarication about the myth of Al Qaeda, where it is more reassuring to believe
that "they" -- those heinous murderers -- are intent on destroying our entire
civilization rather than that they are scattered, partially religiously
brainwashed individuals with nothing left to live for except delusions of
religious reward. Though the theory that acts ascribed to "Al Qaeda" are
actually the work of desperate individuals or groups with very specific
grievances is much more logical and actually borne out by evidence. However,
those that lose loved ones to senseless acts of violence are easily susceptible
to stories expanding their loved one's death as a part in a larger epic in which
civilization hangs in the balance.
No-one wants to lose anyone for some stupid reason and, yet, most such deaths
are for stupid reasons. When a man loses an entire family in a bombing --
carried out inaccurately and acting on faulty information, but done anyway for
bureaucratic or political reasons (stupid, stupid, stupid) -- he seeks revenge,
but that is stupid as well. When that man takes several others with him in his
self-immolation, the revenge exacted by the military or state on his countryman
only multiplies the senselessness to ludicrous proportions.
Can the individual be more easily excused for his act because of his desperate
straits? Because he has nothing left to live for? Or what of the functionary
simply doing his or her job, a cog in the works, and carrying out a small step
in the procession that leads to a bombing run? Who is more to blame? Who is
truly, humanly aware of the suffering being perpetrated? It can best be argued
that those at the top, those in charge of enacting state terror are the most to
blame. Though they too are abstracted far away from the consequences of their
actions, it is their callousness and selfishness that catalyzes the cycle of
violence. For they exact violence with a purpose: To take, to control, to win
what belongs to someone else. But here we return to the question of evil; are
those at the top evil because they make deals in which they and their friends
profit but millions die? Confronted with such a pathetic monster in person --
take a Rumsfeld, for example -- one would see only a babbling old man.
It is predominantly the innocent, the uninvolved and the helpless that suffer
for all of these stupid acts. The cycle of revenge-taking does not end until one
side acts on the realization of its futility. The only way to end it is to
relieve desperation in the poor -- leave them and their resources in peace or,
at the very least, recompense them fairly -- and, at the other end, to stop
those in power from casually starting these fires of revenge simply for personal
gain. We as a society tend to vastly underestimate the cost in terms of lives
and wealth incurred by such actions.
How often is a representative corrupted for what amounts to a pittance in order
to allow something to happen that will cost billions? The representative gets a
kickback (perhaps) or gets more jobs in his or her district and gets re-elected
so that they can get more graft. The jobs are to build military equipment, which
must be used somewhere, so that representative votes for war. The war costs us
all hundreds of billions of dollars, millions of lives and untold lost
opportunity costs, all so that the representative has a second home and a fat
pension. The societal desire for revenge is so easily manipulated to support
this system for, were society less thirsty for revenge for slights -- both real
and perceived -- it would be much harder to get re-elected when one wages war.
[1] The word "base" here is used in the sense of lowest and meanest.
]]>
<![CDATA[The Road Not Traveled]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22502009-12-01T22:38:09+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Misplaced Pride]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22452009-11-27T13:24:51+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[When immoral is made legal]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22402009-11-16T09:31:19+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Hard Problems]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=22002009-09-04T19:01:52+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Christianity]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=21982009-08-18T22:02:30+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Laws, not Confidence]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=21932009-07-12T22:55:05+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Confusion]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=21922009-07-07T20:26:21+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Reasons Trump Conclusions]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=21862009-06-23T18:33:22+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Power]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=21792009-06-12T17:20:19+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Definition of Reality]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=21692009-05-21T11:17:41+02:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Revolution is Inevitable]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=20852009-01-19T10:25:57+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Keep the Mystery Alive]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=19842009-01-15T22:22:21+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
writes,
"The earliest"
...
]]>
writes,
"The earliest known appearance of the adage discovered by QI occurred in a
book titled “Mrs. Goose, Her Book” by Maurice Switzer. The publication
date was 1907 and the copyright notice was 1906. The book was primarily
filled with clever nonsense verse, and the phrasing in this early version was
slightly different:5
"It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool, than to
talk and remove all doubt of it.
"Most of the humorous content of “Mrs. Goose, Her Book” has the imprint
of originality, and based on currently available data QI believes that
Maurice Switzer is the leading candidate for originator of the expression."
]]>
<![CDATA[Choosing Sides]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=20672009-01-04T20:09:01+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Enemy of Knowledge]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=20642009-01-03T22:48:10+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Corruption]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=20532009-01-02T10:51:28+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[When Last We Were Out of Ideas]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=20392008-12-27T23:13:25+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco
<![CDATA[Role Reversal]]>
https://www.earthli.com/news/view_article.php?id=20302008-12-22T21:06:16+01:00https://earthli.com/users/marco