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Wednesday, September 22, 2004 |
Philosophers bring discussion down to earth. This year, the philosophy department's contribution to Webster Works Worldwide (WWW) is the betterment of society. Although WWW isn't until Oct. 6, the philosophy department purposely scheduled "Philosophy in the World: American Thought and Social Transformation," a conference on how philosophy helps to confront life's problems, on a date prior to WWW. [The Journal]
More:
"People are waking up to the fact that philosophy is working in their lives. It's why they think the way they think," McKenna said.
Colapietro preferred to call philosophy "cultural therapy" instead.
"I think philosophy might be mistaken as merely institutionalized discourse," Colapietro said.
Morse said the intent of the conference was to focus on universal human issues and not just rare idiosyncrasies suffered by a handful of people.
"Philosophy is a discipline that unfortunately too often remains abstract and aloof from everyday life," he said. "In this conference, as in the Webster Philosophy Department in general, we can see another kind of philosophy at work-philosophy that responds to the kinds of troubles we face in everyday life and that offers itself as a powerful resource for dealing with these troubles."
5:21:23 PM 
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Lisa Williams follows through, with Weblog Wishlist Redux.
Back before Bloggercon II, Dave started a thread on the future of weblogging tools. After printing out the 40+ pages of responses, I read through them and summarized the responses into a more easily accessible form with links to the authors of the comments. I noted that the formatting really didn't work, and spent some time maintaining and beautifying the Weblog Wishlist to make it readable again. As I did it, one of the things I realized is how few of the things that people asked for have happened. I created a newly annotated version, with text in red indicating what features are, to my knowledge, now available on the market. Notably, the features that people asked for that are now ...
[Learning The Lessons of Nixon]
5:10:54 PM
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History of blogging video
Chuck sez, "I thought I'd let you know about a little quicktime I just posted fast-forwarding through the history of blogs. It starts in 1999, spins around and flies back to 1660 and 1776, kareens through the 20th century and lands back in current blog-time." Link
[bOing bOing]
Also:
Computer industry to entertainment industry: we lied (right on!)
This amazing open letter to the entertainment industry, signed by the computer industry, is a nigh-perfect expression of what constitutes a successful approach to Internet technology. And it made me laugh my ass off.
We lied to you. In the golden 80s and 90s we told you micropayments and content protection would work; that you would be able to charge minuscule amounts of money whenever someone listened to your music or watched your movie. We told you untruths which we well knew would never work - after all, we would've never used them ourselves. Instead, we wrote things like Kazaa and Gnutella, and all other evil P2P applications to get the stuff free.
We told you these things so that you would finance the things we really wanted to build, not the things that you wanted to be built. We knew all along that DRM schemes do not work, and we knew that whatever we create can be broken by us. We don't care anymore, because your money made us bigger than you.
Look at us: every year, we churn out more computer games than your entire industry is worth. You know how we do it? We like our customers. We don't treat them like potential criminals, and try to make our products do less. We invent new things like online role-playing -games, where the money does not come from duplication of bits (which cannot be stopped, regardless of your DRM scheme) but from providing experiences that the people want.
We saw that you were old and weak. So we took advantage of it: told you things that you wanted to hear so we could kick you in the head in twenty years. Some of us told you that the future is going to be interactive - what did you do? You started to think how to make interactive movies (CD-I, anyone?), which is not what it really means, while we wrote games and tried to understand the new mediums, not how to bolt it on onto old things.
We lied to you. And we apologize for that, but it was for the greater good. So we're not the least bit sorry.
Signed: The Computer Industry
Link (via Blackbeltjones)
6:34:08 AM
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Remixing to Protest Sample Ruling. Music fans are miffed about a court decision that says musicians must get permission to sample tunes even if the remix bears no resemblance to the original. An activist group is sponsoring a remix project based upon the clip in question. By Katie Dean. [Wired News]
Also:
Airlines Told to Cough Up Data. The Department of Homeland Security is looking for some live data to feed its new Secure Flight watch-list system, so it will order airlines to fork over a months' worth of passenger itineraries. By Ryan Singel.
And:
Activists Find More E-Vote Flaws. More weaknesses appear in the Diebold electronic voting system that activists say could be used to rig the November election. The company says auditing procedures would catch any vote fraud. By Kim Zetter.
5:39:49 AM
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Grad School in Political Science or Philosophy for the Study of Political Philosophy?.
A student writes: "Having used PGR while going through the graduate admissions process last year, I thought I'd offer a suggestion. After studying philosophy and political science while an undergrad at [a liberal arts college], my main interest going into grad school graduate school was political philosophy/theory. The dilemma faced by someone like myself is whether to focus on political theory in a political science department or political philosophy in a philosophy department. I can't be certain, but I imagine there are a number of others who have faced or will face a similar dilemma."
This is typically a stark choice, since PhD work in Philosophy and Political Science, even with a primary interest in political philosophy, are very different paths to hoe.
. . .
[The Leiter Reports: Editorials, News, Updates]
5:37:38 AM
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iPodderX.
 Another fantastic iPodder has just been released for the mac. iPodderX is perfect for newbies and has some great features. It's simplicity is inspiring:
- Graphical User Interface
- A single app -- no install needed. Just download and run
- Editable feed list
- Easily adjustable cron scheduling
- Supports BitTorrent files
- Supports ANY enclosed file, not just audio
- Audio files get moved to iTunes, other files stored in a Download directory
[unmediated]
5:34:43 AM
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In e-mail this morning:
Dear Friend,
Some people don't like the Yes Men. Back in 2000 we inspired George
W. Bush to say that "there ought to be limits to freedom." The WTO
has twice called us "deplorable."
But those who get to see our new movie--in which these folks get
skewered--just love it. Many have told us they left the theater
exhausted from laughter, yet engaged and inspired. Many have even
said they think "The Yes Men" could make a difference in the thinking
of "middle America."
Just in case they're right, we have to do everything in our power to
make sure it gets there. And unless "The Yes Men" sells out this
weekend in New York and L.A., that will simply not happen.
If you live in New York, see our movie at the Sunshine or Lincoln
Square cinema. In L.A., go to the Pacific ArcLight or Laemmle Monica.
And buy your tickets in advance: visit
http://movies.channel.aol.com/movie/main.adp?mid=17410
What you will see will be the two of us, armed with nothing but
thrift-store suits, representing the World Trade Organization on
international TV and at conferences worldwide. You will see us
advocating the auctioning of votes to the highest corporate bidder,
the recycling of food in the Third World, and worse--and you will see
our corporate audiences applaud.
"The Yes Men" has garnered a lot of critical acclaim, festival
awards, and standing ovations. Naomi Klein has called us "Jonathan
Swift for the Jackass generation." But for folks in smaller cities to
see it and like it too, "The Yes Men" has to be seen by many
thousands of people in New York and L.A. this weekend.
So please: this weekend, if you live near New York or Los Angeles, go
see our movie. Take your friends. Take your enemies. Take people
you've never met. And forward this message widely.
That way, other people you've never met, who live in swing states,
will get yet another dose of political education in movie form--this
one coated in a thick, sugary layer of laughs.
And please: if you see us, pie us for this abject begging. Just make
it tasty.
Your friends,
The Yes Men
The Movie
Theaters
Advance tickets
5:31:40 AM
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New OpenCourseWare at MIT. MIT continues to grow its seed garden of Open Courseware. There are so many courses that I would work my way through, if I just had the time. I may have to make time for this one: Foundations of Computational and Systems Biology. By the way, the readings listed for each course are great. Sometimes I really miss the guidance... [GalaxyGoo Blog]
5:25:50 AM
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