Category Archives: Philosophy

What matters is that something is happening – AmandaAchtman.ca

Hans Jonas was born into a German Jewish household in 1903. As a boy, he longed for excitement. However, the most exciting events always seemed to be happening elsewhere. It seemed unlikely that he could fulfill his boyhood “dreams of glory” in the monotony of everyday life there.

Before the First World War, the most significant world events in his memory had been the sinking of the Titanic and the Balkan Wars. Comparing these events to his “charmed life — in a country that had known nothing but peace for decades, that was flourishing economically, and as a child in a comfortably situated family,” he found his life and the lives of his family members to be very boring.

— Read on amandaachtman.ca/2020/03/18/what-matters-is-that-something-is-happening/

Did Edmund Burke Support the American Revolution? ~ The Imaginative Conservative

Again, it is possible that Burke actively disliked the principles of the American Revolution, but there exists no such evidence one way or another. What we do know is that Burke, when pushed, supported the American cause for independence, though he very much lamented the breakdown and breakup of the British commonwealth.

From my perspective, Burke was a vital ally in the cause, as patriotic to the American cause as any American revolutionary leader. He not only defended our cause, he did so in a way that could have easily been regarded as treasonous by his own people.
— Read on theimaginativeconservative.org/2020/03/edmund-burke-support-american-revolution-bradley-birzer.html

eCHOS OF GILBERT HIGHET?

READ MYRON MAGNET’S THOUGHTFUL PIECE.

https://www.city-journal.org/humanities?utm_source=City+Journal+Update&utm_campaign=70042a1bd0-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_03_16_01_31&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_6c08930f2b-70042a1bd0-109326713

No one captures the tragic paradox of culture more poignantly than the twentieth century’s greatest poet, William Butler Yeats, who came away from the carnage of World War I fearing that we humans “are but weasels fighting in a hole”:

Civilisation is hooped together, brought
Under a rule, under the semblance of peace
By manifold illusion; but man’s life is thought,
And he, despite his terror, cannot cease
Ravening through century after century,
Ravening, raging, and uprooting that he may come
Into the desolation of reality:
Egypt and Greece, good-bye, and goodbye, Rome!

As our own civilization ravens and uproots, only to come into the desolation of false and lying illusion, so far more farce than tragedy, that’s my worry, too. Watching the hard-eyed troops surge by in Communist China’s 70th anniversary parade in October, the rank upon rank of fit young men and women toting high-tech weaponry and marching with eager determination, as if treading down all before them, it was hard not to wonder how we’d fare if we ever had to fight them, given President Xi Jinping’s undisguised imperial designs. As I watched, I couldn’t help remembering the 2016 photos of American sailors kneeling in humiliated submission on the deck of their U.S. Navy patrol vessel, which they had allowed diminutive Iranian gunboats to seize without firing a single shot in the Persian Gulf. Did they not believe, had they not been taught, that they had anything worth defending?

Myron MagnetCity Journal’s Editor-at-Large, is a National Humanities Medal laureate.

US SAILORS IGNOMINIOUSLY CAPTURED IN JANUARY 2016
SOMEHOW I still take hope in the fact US Marines would not have given up so easily.

1939’s “Stagecoach”: The Reign of Justice and Redemption ~ The Imaginative Conservative

The stagecoach, just about to leave town, despite the threats from the Apache, represents American society in every aspect. The local Marshall, Curly, rides shotgun, protecting the stagecoach’s driver, Buck, and their passengers. The passengers include, of course, Boone and Dallas (forced to leave, regardless of danger), a whiskey drummer from Kansas City, Kansas (Mr. Peacock, though everyone refers to him as the Reverend), and, critically, the seemingly-ill wife of an army officer and a high-class lady from Virginia (Mrs. Mallory). As the stagecoach departs, a notorious southern gambler, Mr. Hatfield, attaches himself as “protection for the lady,” and, just as the stagecoach is about to exit town, Gatewood—now illegally in possession of the bank’s money—joins in a getaway attempt, knowing that the telegraph lines have been cut by the Apaches.

En route, Ringo “Henry” Kidd (John Wayne) hitches a ride, having broken out of prison to avenge the killings of his father and brother in Lordsburg. Whatever his crimes, the Kidd is clearly appreciated for his honesty and his good skills.
— Read on theimaginativeconservative.org/2020/03/stagecoach-reign-justice-redemption-bradley-birzer.html

Big Big Train's Passenger Club: update #3

Well, it’s that time.  That glorious time.  Two weeks later, and Friday.  This means that Big Big Train has updated, once again, its Passenger’s Club membership-only fan service. And, for this third update, I am reminded yet again how good BBT is.  This week’s update comes in four (well, really five) parts.

First, there’s a new song, one written by Greg roughly ten to twelve years ago.  It’s a love ballad for his wife, Kathy. Tender and fluid, “Sundial” might have ended up on Bard. Thus, it can probably be regarded as a “b-side,” if BBT created such things.  I like the song quite a bit, and it fits nicely onto the Master Passengersonglist/album I’m slowly compiling as BBT releases each new song.

Second, there are a number of really nice photos taken during the Grand Tour rehearsals.  Honestly, when the Passenger Club first emerged on February 14, I thought this was the weakest part of the service.  But, I’m proven wrong here.  There are no weak parts to the service, and these photos are really interesting. I’m not sure if I’m allowed to repost them, so I’ll refrain from doing so.  But, I like them—really nice captures of the band.

Third, Nick Shilton give us yet another fascinating look into the marketing and branding side of the Big Big Train business. Shilton has a winsome writing style, and he clearly understands that the band must continue to innovate as entrepreneurs as well an innovate as artists. He sums up everything best about BBT in his final sentences of his update: “The BBT ethos is to strive for top quality in everything that the band does. If on occasion we fall short of that with the Club, we’re sure that you will let us know and we will always seek to rectify any issue as soon as possible.”

Fourth, BBT has released not one but TWO new videos!  One is of the orchestration conducted at Abbey Road Studios, and the other is a “Behind the Scenes” look at the creation of the “Make Some Noise” video. When this first came out, I loved Dave Gregory’s “Slash” hat. If anything, I love it even more seven years later. There’s something quite humorously rebellious and defiant about the hat.

Well, there you have it. Granted, the world kind of reeks at the moment, and we’re either suffering or waiting to suffer—but that doesn’t negate the importance and permanence of the good, the true, and the beautiful. No matter how miserable things might get, BBT reminds us yet again that excellence really does matter.

The Bardic Depths – “The Bardic Depths” | The PROG Mind

The Bardic Depths offers an interesting combination of genres.  At its core, the band plays a progressive rock that revels in subtlety, as even the heavier riffs are gentle and easy on the ears.  However, you will find that some of the tracks are akin to progressive electronic/ambient, so not “rock” at all.  Even further, and as the album progresses, you will find a huge portion of jazz fusion in the mix, so be ready for quite a lot of saxophone and bassy grooves.  Somehow, the band puts this all together and makes it work well.
— Read on theprogmind.com/2020/03/13/the-bardic-depths-the-bardic-depths/

The Revival of Socialism ~ The Imaginative Conservative

This was, to be sure, a more innocent time. And, to be certain, there was even a time in my high school years—a less jaded time—in which I assumed most Americans were raised in the same manner and believed as I did. President Reagan, Prime Minister Thatcher, and Pope John Paul II were normal leaders of the West, not extraordinary ones. Many of my teachers—clearly the children of the New Left and the 1960s—revealed to me a blatant hypocrisy.  While they shouted for love, they behaved as would-be tyrants, hypocrites . . . not all . . . but many.

Somehow, and in a myriad of disturbing ways, my delusions and illusions and wishes and hopes and dreams and subjective realities collapsed over the years. Not that I lost faith in liberty, but I’ve certainly lost faith that others kept the faith, if they ever actually had it.

The evidence is more than clear. Communism, socialism, and progressivism have each made huge comebacks, re-entering political discourse blatantly and, just as importantly, very quietly, over the past decades. Even the very words “socialism,” “communism,” and, especially, “progressivism,” have reacquired respect and a semblance of dignity in many circles of public thought and discourse.
— Read on theimaginativeconservative.org/2020/03/revival-socialism-bradley-birzer.html

Tears For Fears’ Roland Orzabal in the Big Chair: The SDE interview | superdeluxeedition

SDE: What is it, do you think, about the album, that resonates so much with people? Is it just the fact that it’s got massive hit singles on it, or is it something more than that?

RO: I think… I mean, at the time it felt completely disjointed, that we were clutching at straws regarding available songs. We started off with two or three songs and bits of b-sides and within one month I came up with ‘Shout’, ‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’, and ‘I Believe’. And I think it was when we did ‘Shout’ that we really moved to a completely different gear.

The secrets are in the arrangement and production, because it really is superb
One of the reasons it was called ‘Songs from the Big Chair’, I probably told you this a million times, is that it felt disparate; it wasn’t like The Hurting which was almost like a life work for us. Albeit we were teenagers. Hence the title ‘Songs’ because it just seemed to me like eight separate songs, and even the track ‘Listen’ was an Ian Stanley [keyboard player] demo and made while we were recording The Hurting. But I don’t know why… I think it was possibly the fact that we’d done our initial first demo’s in Ian’s house in Bath. And then he won a little bit of money from the publishing, we built the studio there in a bigger room, in his house. And I think it was almost like coming back to the West Country and even [producer] Chris Hughes had links to Bath, because his mum lived there. So, I think getting out of the huge studios and into this real intimate [setting], the birthplace of Tears for Fears almost, which was Ian Stanley’s house. I think that created this, you know, more of a calm but hot-housed environment. Plus, this massive input of new technology, like the Fairlight, the Synclavier and the Drumulator. We had all these cutting-edge sounds to play with and I think that the secrets are in the arrangement and production, because it really is superb.
— Read on www.superdeluxeedition.com/interview/tears-for-fears-roland-orzabal-in-the-big-chair-the-sde-interview/