“Was minimalism the last absurd, exhausted spasm of neophilia, the cult of the new that so defined modern taste? Or is it still, and will it remain, the ultimate refinement of aesthetic sensibility: the place we go when we have been everywhere else? The answer to both questions is yes.”
Tag: 2010
An Amoral Manifesto: A Philosopher’s Counter-Conversion
Joel Marks: “In a word, this philosopher has long been laboring under an unexamined assumption, namely, that there is such a thing as right and wrong. I now believe there isn’t. … The long and the short of it is that I became convinced that atheism implies amorality; and since I am an atheist, I must therefore embrace amorality.”
Towards A Theory Of Popular Culture, International Relations, And Zombies
“If it is true that ‘popular culture makes world politics what it currently is,‘ as a recent article in Politics argued, then the international relations community needs to think about armies of the undead in a more urgent manner. … The specter of an uprising of reanimated corpses also poses a significant challenge to interpreters of international relations and the theories they use to understand the world.”
AAMD Votes To Open Itself Up With New Eligibility Rules
The change “will transform the very character of the group, by removing what some members saw as protection and others as an obstacle, including the long-standing membership cap of 200 and the annual budget requirement for member institutions of at least $2.3 million.”
The Atlantic‘s ’14¾ Biggest Ideas of the Year’
Hanna Rosin on “The End of Men,” Michael Kinsley on “The Power of No,” Jeffrey Goldberg on the “Bonfire of the Knuckleheads,” Walter Isaacson on how “Information Wants To Be Paid For,” and 10.75 other “intellectual trends that, for better or worse, are most shaping America right now.”
The Danger In America’s Neglect Of Translated Books
Edith Grossman: “The dearth of translated literature in the English-speaking world represents a new kind of iron curtain we have constructed around ourselves. We are choosing to block off access to the writing of a large and significant portion of the world, including movements and societies whose potentially dreadful political impact on us is made even more menacing by our general lack of familiarity with them.”
Has The Internet Been A Force For Good? (Maybe Not.)
Evgeny Morozov: “Well, the Internet as we know it has now been around for two decades, and it has certainly been transformative. … But just as earlier generations were disappointed to see that neither the telegraph nor the radio delivered on the world-changing promises made by their most ardent cheerleaders, we haven’t seen an Internet-powered rise in global peace, love, and liberty. And we’re not likely to.”
Great Writers And The Substances They Abused
A handy chart groups well-known authors by their drugs of choice: Uppers, Downers, Alcohol and Psychedelics.
Globally, Japanese Exhibitions Draw The Most Visitors
“Japan’s museums remain in a league of their own when it comes to organising blockbuster exhibitions. In The Art Newspaper‘s 15th annual survey of attendance figures three Tokyo museums and one in Nara … fill the top four places,” and “average visitor-per-day statistics … are staggering.”
A Brief History Of Restaurant Criticism In New York
Robert Sietsema: “[In the 1970s, m]ost of the verbiage devoted to food in local newspapers concerned easy-to-make recipes, human interest stories, food travel writing, kitchen advice to housewives, and the occasional piece that sought to get you interested in wine. Every Friday, there would be a restaurant review in The New York Times.” My, how things have changed …