What, Why & How do we Know ?
Read Owen Barfield’s “Poetic Diction” and “History in English Words” a year or so ago, and blogged several items. [here][here][here]. I was doing a search on Barfield today in preparation for reading more of his work and came across two interesting sites. This review of Barfield’s “Saving the Appearances – A Study in Idolatry” on … Continue reading “Words as Idols”
Definition as a Coffin? “Hold your definition” is a plea by philosopher Daniel Dennett, often cited here on Psybertron, when dealing patiently with his scientific friends. Any discourse that starts with apparently clear definitions, manipulated solely by logic, is inherently limited by the fit between the history of those definitions and future of reality. At … Continue reading ““Definition as a Coffin” – Cybernetics to Systems Thinking”
On 19th January 2022 I interviewed Prof Henry Gurr and David Matos over Zoom, about their ZMM-Quality project(s) around the life and work of Robert Pirsig, author of “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” and “Lila, an Enquiry into Morals”. Ian Glendinning (IG): Since this is the first time we’ve done one of these, … Continue reading “Meet The Guys @ ZMMQuality”
There are some classic memes where smart-asses point out ambiguities, disagreements and exceptions to would-be rules. I’m thinking about two kinds here: “BODMAS” rules of algebraic computation [Brackets, Power(Order, Of), Division, Multiplication, Addition & Subtraction] and/or “I before E except after C” in spelling of “ie” and “ei” words in English The former tends to … Continue reading “Rules That Ain’t”
(Editorial Note : This paper was originally prepared for the 2005 Liverpool Conference on Robert Pirsig and his Metaphysics of Quality (MoQ). It is a personal non-technical view of the MoQ, and indeed the first part of paper is an entirely subjective and naive account of the author’s “thought journey” that led to reading Pirsig … Continue reading “It’s Evolutionary Psychology Stupid”
A month or so couple of weeks ago, I posted a holding post for a whole collection of posts I need to write. Despite more than a dozen significant posts since then, not to mention Tweets and Facebook posts, I’ve still barely acknowledged those I telegraphed then, even though some of the subject matter clearly … Continue reading “Post of Posts Catch-Up”
A post primarily to recommend a read I’ve not yet completed: Orientations, the autobiography of Sir Ronald Storrs, described by T E Lawrence as “The first of us …. always first, and the great man among us.” Conversely, Storrs a man with as good a handle on the flawed genius – “my little genius” – that … Continue reading “No.1 Among Us”
Just a few sketchy holding points for now … Finished Hofstadter’s Godel, Escher, Bach. Excellent to the end. Skimmed the tougher mathematically and notationally detailed sections – seemed important to get the thrust on trust, which I think I did. I think his final dialogue, almost explicitly explaining the “fugue” underlying all the dialogues throughout … Continue reading “Reading Updates”