Category: Uncategorized
-
Constitutional vandalism
Neither side of the row over Universal ID cards is free of contradiction, neither has a monopoly on logic or morality. The pros are (depressingly) allowing narrow political contingency to…
-
Didion’s lament
Joan Didion has been the unassailed Queen of the New York liberal elite for decades – essayist, novelist, political commentator. Her latest NYRB piece is hard-hitting but reads like a…
-
Memex lives!
Gordon Bell, engineer and innovator responsible for – among other things – the DEC VAX computer, has entered “nearly everything possible from his entire life” into his computer as part…
-
Anti-singularists
Singularities and other tech-determinist fantasies are shown the door in John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid’s The Social Life of Information. This is the sanest, most humane book I’ve read…
-
You’ll have to wait until the interval…
I’m afraid I’m bringing this concert to your attention about 15 months late. Luckily the ‘performance’ isn’t due to finish for another 637 years so you have time to get…
-
The Singularity
Proper Science Fiction writer Vernor Vinge is preparing his speech for the day the singularity doesn’t happen. Although I should probably get on with preparing mine for the day after…
-
A gruffalo? What’s a gruffalo?
If you’re in charge of small children (3 and up) and you can still get tickets, I think you should take them to see Tall Stories Theatre Company’s deliriously entertaining…
-
Forecasting
I’m bookmarking The FT’s page of predictions for 2003 from business, finance, politics, diplomacy and culture mainly so that I can check back next year to see how they did.…
-
New religions
If you were to invent a new religion – a post-enlightnment, post-Darwin, post-DNA, post-space travel religion – what would it look like? Would it scrap a conventional, external deity in…