RIP Maurice Sendak
Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul. When writers make us shake our heads with the exactness of their prose and their truths, and even make us laugh about ourselves or life, our buoyancy is restored. We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over and over again. It’s like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea. You can’t stop the raging storm, but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the people who are together on that ship.
Blue.
OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG. This is exactly what I’ve been wanting OS X to become, and more: the integration of the iOS apps directly into the Mac. I’m literally salivating over this right now. Aaaannddd… You can download the Beta version of Messages. RIGHT. NOW. Which I am currently doing.
This article does a good job at (quickly and briefly) revealing the inadequacies of grand judgments based on neuroscience (also called neurobabble, or neurotrash by some). Neuroscience is fascinating stuff, but its claims are often so far-reaching as to give pause to anyone taking them seriously.
“The fact is, of course, that anything at all which we experience, whether it does or does not have causal determinants in the outside world, has to be experienced through our brains. Which means that you will find neural correlates for literally everything that human beings do or think. Because that’s what the brain is for: to do stuff and think about stuff.”
Regardless of how you feel about animal rights, this article shows just how much power companies like McDonald’s and WalMart have in setting industry standards. And not just for animal welfare: companies like this can effectively change de facto health and wage standards with the push of a button. Pretty fascinating. And a little scary.
Islands - “Grey Funnel Line”, A Sleep & A Forgetting (Deluxe Edition) released today.
Printable Valentine’s Cards from awesome shows.
Movie Trailer of the Day: Well that didn’t take long: The first official teaser trailer for Timur Bekmambetov’s Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter has been released, only a day after the first footage surfaced online.
The film, which stars Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Anthony Mackie, Alan Tudyk, Dominic Cooper, Rufus Sewell, Jimmi Simpson, and Benjamin Walker as Honest Abe, is set to open in theaters June 22nd.
“Are you a patriot or a vampire?” I cannot wait to see this.
You know that book review I posted the other day from the Times regarding Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman? No? Well here it is. But regardless of whether you got a chance to read it, here’s something even better. A TED talk from Dr. Kahneman himself. Check it out if you get a chance. Interesting thoughts on memory, the self, and some odd statistical findings. TED talks. Always fun.
“In this work, Spinoza approaches the issue of individual liberty from several perspectives. To begin with, there is the question of belief, and especially the state’s tolerance of the beliefs of its citizens. Spinoza argues that all individuals are to be absolutely free and unimpeded in their beliefs, by right and in fact. ‘It is impossible for the mind to be completely under another’s control; for no one is able to transfer to another his natural right or faculty to reason freely and to form his own judgment on any matters whatsoever, nor can he be compelled to do so.’”
A short article on a couple of video games with more than entertainment value. (Yes. Zelda is one of them.)
I certainly don’t agree with all of this, but I’m recommending you read it anyway. If the book is accurate, this is really because the end of the review was more positive than negative, and my immediate remembrance of it colors my remembered experience strongly enough to suggest that you read it too. In fact, if the reviewer is right, you may not experience it much at all. You’ll just read it and reflect on your past experience. It’s all we may really do anyway, says the reviewer. And with that, I respectfully disagree.
