Enjoying the view from Limbo
I see that I am overdue for an update on conditions here in the new global front in the war on the coronavirus outbreak. As of Wednesday morning, March 4th (Korea time), this country has 5,186 confirmed cases of the virus, with 32 deaths. That makes a mortality rate of around 0.6% — which, again, must be measured against the extreme likelihood that...
Here is a current headline from the standard in Western journalism, The New York Times: “Doubts Linger as Democrats Vote: ‘I Don’t Think We Have a Perfect Candidate.’” If by “perfect,” the NYT and its doubters mean “someone who is not a blithering idiot,” then they do indeed have reason for doubt. If by “perfect,” they mean someone slightly less Marxist than the...
To the shock of absolutely no one who has ever watched a United States primary season unfold, there is a new poll, released in the last moments before Super Tuesday, showing that Joe Biden, who seems to have no idea where he is or to whom he is speaking at any given moment, and has no clear positions on anything, other than that...
Anaxagoras says the world is comprised of innumerable seeds of all things, which are grouped into various proportions, these proportions determining each thing’s identity, by a whirlwind controlled by Mind. Aristotle’s own theory of the intellect is influenced by this Anaxagorean imagery, as he equates “controlled” with “known,” and Anaxagoras’ seeds with his own notion of potency (matter). Anaxagoras believes the cosmos, qua...
Similar to the 2016 primaries, the Democratic Party establishment is currently pulling out all the stops — which means all the candidates not named Biden — in a desperate attempt to block Bernie Sanders from winning the party’s presidential nomination. This in spite of his popular support among that plurality of Democrat voters who are tired of their party’s slow boat to communism,...
What motivates? A feeling that we need something, without knowing quite what it is. If we knew what we needed, it would no longer have much power to move us — and hence, perhaps, we would no longer need it very much. From the preceding, we may conclude that all essential motivation is indirect. For there must be a thing we can point to...
It’s March 1st, and therefore as good a day as any, and better than most, to share an Emily Dickinson poem about hope, change, and time. Dear March — Come in — Dear March — Come in —How glad I am —I hoped for you before — Put down your Hat —You must have walked —How out of Breath you are —Dear March,...
Time for our Coronavirus Global Panic Update. Twenty seconds ago, I checked the latest official totals of confirmed cases and deaths here in Korea: 3,150/17. That works out to a mortality rate of just over 0.5%, which means yet another drop in the rate, as the numbers here come ever-closer into line with typical flu death numbers. Meanwhile, Donald Trump has publicly told...
It’s a quiet Saturday here in Day Something of the emergency to end all emergencies. I am hiding out in my favorite work space, trying to make the most of the unexpected time afforded by the corona-virus-delayed start of the spring semester. “Never let a crisis go to waste,” as Rahm Emanuel, a Clinton-Obama strategist and thug, famously said. Without further ado, then,...
Several days ago, I wrote a short piece about Socrates’ description of the Earth to his companions, as he sat in his prison cell awaiting the hemlock. Today, as a spiritual escape from the moral prison formed of modern politics and the mass hysteria of coronavirus, I would like to reflect on one of the key themes of that famous episode in the...
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