Even the mathematically averse among us today recognize the basic geometry that Radolph and Ragimbold failed to grasp, for we live in a numerate society, surrounded by countless manifestations of mathematics. Broadly defined as the ability to reason with numbers and other mathematical concepts, numeracy underlies our current information explosion. Its clichés dot popular speech: “do the math,” “crunch the numbers,” “figure the odds.” From birth to death, numbers track our lives institutionally and demographically. Some scorn such customs (think of Mark Twain’s “figures” of “lies, damned lies, and statistics”), but we all acknowledge numeracy as a cultural given, and agree that mathematics fuels the science, technology, and industry of our world.
Author: Douglas McLennan
Architects Are Using Virtual Reality To Give A Sense Of What Their Projects Will Feel Like
For centuries, architects have employed drawings and models to display and explain design plans. Virtual reality has turned things up a notch — some architects use the technology because it not only allows them to see a proposed building, it lets them get a sense of what it might feel like.
Head Of France’s National Arts Academy Fights For Support After Student Complaints Of Harassment
Jean-Marc Bustamante, the outgoing director of the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts (ENSBA), France’s national arts academy in Paris, has criticised the French culture minister for a lack of support after being attacked by students. This follows allegations of sexual harassment made by students against some of the school’s teachers earlier this year. An online petition on Change.org, demanding that the administration address the issue, has more than 1,000 signatures.
Here We Go Again – Reviving The Mozart Effect
A common test that detects electrical activity in the brain reveals “there is an anti-epileptic effect of Mozart music,” reports a research team led by Eliza Grylls. Three pieces of contemporary popular music did not have the same positive impact.
Rediscovering The Value Of CDs?
Many things once thought worthless—vinyl records, Brutalism—have grown in value. The Internet, which leaves no take unturned, has been predicting a compact disc comeback for years. After seeing what my lost Felt CD was now selling for, I began checking the prices of the CDs I’d held onto. A solo album by Kevin Rowland, of Dexys Midnight Runners, turns out to be worth $100 to $200 on Amazon. A couple Alex Chilton discs fall within the same price range. I was pleased, but scandalized too; I’d been so negligent with this treasure.
Revolving Door: UK Gets Its Sixth Culture Secretary In Six Years
Jeremy Wright takes up the position of culture secretary following four years as attorney general, legal adviser to the government. He replaces Hancock, who had been in the position since January this year, and becomes the sixth person to hold the post since 2012, following on from other MPs including Maria Miller and Sajid Javid.
The End Of HBO’s Boutique Quality?
Netflix is a production company of peerless scale when it comes to TV. It’s projected to spend $12 to $13 billion on original programming in 2018; meanwhile, HBO spent $2.5 billion on its shows in 2017. Netflix’s strategy is to overwhelm, pumping out fresh content at its subscribers and relying less and less on licensed material it doesn’t own. HBO has always had more of a “prestige” bent, taking a very long time to develop its shows and launching them with extreme fanfare, with an eye toward awards. But Stankey seems to view that deliberate pace as a result of laziness, and his desire to upend the network’s careful approach to putting out new shows (it only makes a handful per season) could mean the end of HBO as we know it.
Can There Be A Canon Of Western Literature In The Age Of The Internet?
“If the coherence and usefulness of the Western canon seem increasingly untenable today, for reasons that reach beyond ideology, the very concept of a canon — one critically authoritative corpus of thought — now feels harder and harder to countenance. Not only has the unfolding triumph of digital life supplied every claim and every authority with an effectively infinite number of criticisms, the digital revolution has called into profound question how any limited body of knowledge can claim canonical authority over a world where information is infinite.”
What A Dreadful Way To Pick The Winner Of A Book Prize!
The Golden Man Booker. “As a system of selection, this is a curious conflation of the single expert and the wisdom of crowds — or, if you will, super elitism and mob rule. After all, each novel on the shortlist was chosen by just one person (not nearly enough), and yet the winner was chosen by thousands (far too many). Having the unwashed public pick the best novel sounds wonderfully egalitarian, but it ignores all kinds of unanswerable questions about the self-selection and legitimacy of the voters.”
Rem Koolhaas: Digitally-Advanced Cities Will Be Efficient But Boring
“If we simply let cyberspace run its course to a future determined by Silicon Valley, those libertarian-minded engineers will paradoxically lead us to cities shackled by algorithmic conformity. It would be a neural network, yes, but one that operates in lock step.”