“Something of enormous global significance is happening almost without notice. For the first time since agriculture-based civilization began 10,000 years ago, the majority of humankind is no longer poor or vulnerable to falling into poverty. By our calculations, as of this month, just over 50 percent of the world’s population, or some 3.8 billion people, […]
More than half the world is middle class or higher now Read More »
Relevant for: Politics is downstream from culture, Where innovation happens, Where the Enlightenment did and didn’t take hold, and more. Source. Related: The Enlightenment Vision flowchart.
World Cultural Map charting traditional/secular and survival/self-expression values Read More »
One hundred years ago, Hilaire Belloc published The Servile State, with this provocative claim about his mixed intellectual world: “the effect of Socialist doctrine on Capitalist society is to produce a third thing different from either of its two begetters — to wit, the Servile State.” The nineteenth century was largely capitalist in theory and
The servile state — Belloc’s 1913 prediction Read More »
Updated for the new year: My collected posts on key thinkers from Homer, Socrates, and Augustine to Descartes, Kant, and Rand. Related: My Philosophers, Explained series.
Intellectual History page updated Read More »
The cartoon reminds me of an earlier post about Rimsky-Korsakov on the “hardship” of the composer’s life. According to Shostakovich: “Rimsky-Korsakov used to say that he refused to acknowledge any complaints from composers about their hard lot in life. He explained his position thus: Talk to a bookkeeper and he’ll start complaining about life and
The difficulties of being/not being an artist Read More »
“We have a panel discussion with Stephen Hicks, Professor of Philosophy, on the impacts of GenAI on the human condition.”
Interviewed by Israel’s Harry Kaufmann: Related interview: “Rand, Kant, Israel v. Islamists, & Career integrity”—Stephen Hicks with Vinay Kolhatkar and Roger Bissell.
A common trope is that art and science are opposed to each other. That, despite the long list of artistic innovators—from Leonardo, Michelangelo, Monet, and others—who self-consciously applied science and the fruits of technical engineering to make their independent visions real. Leonardo and mathematics, Michelangelo and anatomy, Monet and the chemical industry’s new pigments, and
Rock band Boston’s music: on the integration of science, engineering, and art Read More »