Preface to a Contribution

Shocking News From Home

2009-04-24T16:45:00.002+01:00

So, I miss home like whoa, pretty much all the time. I miss the neighbourhood I grew up in - I miss the streets I used to walk. Like Dunbar. But this is not how I like to be reminded of it.

I'm really shocked that the cockroach simile is getting used in Dunbar to refer to human beings. All I can think of is Rwanda...I know this is hardly RTLM level, but any time that kind of dehumanising language is used in public discourse it's intensely frightening.

The assumption that there are no homeless in Dunbar also seems to go unchallenged, even in the article - which is bizarre, since it's just clearly not true.

And worst of all, these people play some sort of representative role for people who, like me, grew up in this neighbourhood. And it makes me sick.

So I wrote a little note:

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am a long-time resident of the Dunbar area - although I am currently away at university, I grew up and spent twenty years of my life in and around Dunbar street. I love the neighbourhood.

Sadly, though, I was shocked and appalled to read this story: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2009/04/23/bc-dunbar-panhandlers-email.html

I could not believe that the residents association for the area that I was privilege enough to grow up in would display such atrocious attitudes! The entire thrust of the statement was bad enough, but comparing the homeless to cockroaches really made my stomach churn. That's precisely the kind of dehumanising language used to justify and facilitate crimes against humanity.

I'm sure that the resident's association didn't mean to use the same terms as the genocidaires in Rwanda, but you did support the criminalisation of poverty and homelessness. I am ashamed to see such lack of compassion, and such a NIMBY attitude in my neighbourhood.

Rather than tying up police time and contributing to the problem, perhaps the resident's association could do something constructive for the problem? A public apology for the attitude, and especially the chosen language, would certainly be a good start. But beyond that, the resident's association should look into taking a collection for one of the many charities working to address homelessness.

Last, I'd just like to say that contrary to public perception, there ARE homeless people who live in the community. While a number of organisations already do good work helping where they can, it would benefit us all if the residents association recognised that the homeless are our neighbours too - and not somebody else's problem to be moved along by the police.

I look forward to your response,

Teddy Harrison

They have a feedback form here if anyone else wants to add their voice.

Torture Revelations

2009-04-22T16:03:00.002+01:00

I don't know why this hadn't occurred to me as a possibility, but it never crossed my mind. I suppose I was so caught up in the even-if arguments: even if you're trying to get information to stop further attacks, even if you're sure they know something, even if you're sure they're bad guys, you still shouldn't torture.

So wrapped up in that, that I didn't think this might have been your straight-up inquisition-style torture people to make them tell you what you want, even when it's clearly not true. But apparently some of the latest revelations are that the abusive interrogations techniques (i.e. torture) were used to try to prove the false Saddam Hussein - 9/11 attacks link. No wonder they had to waterboard Kalid Sheik Muhammed 183 times in a month. The month? March 2003.

Puts a whole new, disgusting, evil light on things.

Good Friday Reading

2009-04-10T18:44:00.002+01:00

To make sure I'm not spouting nonesense in my thesis, I'm doing a little reading. Right now it is Desmond Tutu's No Future Without Forgiveness, and its a real treat.

This is just here as a note to myself, but written here the better to ensure I am held to it: if I am not in school next year, I am going to take the opportunity to read books that are well-written and interest me, and simply take from them what I will.

Shining Through

2009-04-07T17:24:00.002+01:00

Sometimes, it seems, the human spirit is indomitable.

This weekend was not a good one for news. While North Korea gave us what John Stewart has helpfully named "The Last Thing We F@#king Need" in the form of a fresh missile test, Italy was hit with a powerful and horrific earthquake.

So when that's on the mind, it's nice to hear a glimmer of hope shining through. From the heart of the destruction, "A 98-year-old woman was pulled out alive in L'Aquila after being trapped for 30 hours, local media report. She spent the time crocheting." [BBC]

Where would we be without indomitable grandmothers?

Happy thoughts for a Sunday morning

2009-04-05T14:00:00.002+01:00

I can hear a clock tower (St. Barnabas, I believe) from where I live now. Faintly, so as not to wake me up, but just so as to chime in a comforting way. It definitely feels like returning from exile.
In a clear sign that this is where I should be living, my first effort with pancakes on the new stove turned out beautifully, first try. That never happens!

This importance of a desk

2009-04-03T14:58:00.002+01:00

All this moving (4 homes in a month!) has made me think a lot about hearth and home, and what is important in a place to live. The phrase "hearth and home" gives some clue as to what used to be important - the fireplace used to be central to dwelling. As much as I am a fan of sitting around the fire, and perhaps nothing is more fully homely, it's just not that central in modern life. Perhaps the kitchen takes this role for me; I've found the ability to cook - and cook properly, not to microwave things - is something that makes me feel pretty grounded.

As someone pretty used to sleeping on floors and couches and bus or plane seats, this one might seem a little odd - but a decent bed is also pretty important. I think it may be that, while its actually pretty easy to get minimal rest anywhere, over the long term you need somewhere to fully retreat from the world. That probably means a bed at least as long as you are, that doesn't mess with your back, and at least 8 hours a night quiet enough to get proper shut-eye.

But the last one - and the one most surprising to me - is a desk. I figure this is probably a personality/occupational specific one. I'm sure for a lot of people a desk isn't so central. But lets face it - I may not necessarily end up "an academic", but I'm academic in the sense that whatever I do, its going to revolve around a desk of some sort. And although I thought that meant any flat service, the quality of the desk probably has a lot to do with how grounded I am. My desk at home, for instance - aside from just being beautiful - has a family heritage that is particularly grounding. It's also stocked with all the bits of stationery I've hoarded over the years, meaning that I'm fairly well equipped for most situations. In fact, when I had to set up tabs rooms for tournaments, I usually brought a box full of everything, so that I could set up a mobile deskspace that was at the very least functional - and it helped a lot. The other desk there was the first grown-up thing I bought with my own money, and signalled my transition to university.

I suppose in many ways I can work on any flat surface - but if its not a good desk, or more if its not become my desk, then it really does have an impact. Jobs I've done, for instance, where the desk is super anonymous and you don't customise it much, feel inevitably temporary. The desk in dorm last year in Oxford was a little like that - it was a big table, really, and while it was fairly functional it contributed to the sincerely temporary feeling of the place. This year has been bizarre; the desk in my first place was just not functional at all, and meant it was nearly impossible to work there. In between places have varied. But this new place - well, the desk "described as Sherlock Holmes-esque" is a beauty. It's old, dark wood...it hasn't been treated well, and so is falling apart, but that somehow adds to it all. And its got plenty of drawyers and pockets for things. So it feels mine already, and functional, and a place to get work done. And I've only been here two days and already it feels very homely sitting here. Oh, the big window with sunshine helps too ;)

Solidarity

2009-03-18T23:10:00.002Z

Solidarity seems to mean a lot of things to a lot of people. While it took on pretty specific meaning in the union movement (one I sometimes seem to worry it is losing), there is at base some notion of a unity of feeling. In that way, if in no other, it seems to have a lot in common with compassion.

Anyway, its a feeling and an idea I like. So I just wanted to record one way that I feel solidarity. Somehow, when I'm working alone on schoolwork (particularly at night), knowing that all over the place my friends are doing the same thing at the same time gives me a feeling - perhaps of unity of purpose, perhaps of suffering together - but its a feeling I like and hold onto. And somehow, being connected by the internet, with even the potential of instant communication - even if I don't actually talk to anybody - makes the solidarity somehow more real.

A little more constructive...

2009-03-17T12:28:00.002Z

So, I've been thinking. As per usual. But a lot of people are pointing out that we're in a bit of global crisis right now. Not only are we witnessing a direct meltdown of capitalism, in the form of a global financial crisis & recession/depression (depending on how gloomy you are), but its looking increasingly like we are pretty much doomed on the environmental front.

I prefer not to be gloomy, as it is spring. I feel like the basic point is that we need radical change - but radical change doesn't have to be huge or even difficult, it just has to be fundamental. And there are lots of ways of accomplishing that. So I thought I would think about things we can do with our time that are fun and fulfilling, but require fewer resources and do less damage.

So here we go:

libraries - using the library is free to you, but also the unit cost of another person using the library is negligible to the system. basically, its a matter of sharing resources that already exist. which is pretty awesome. also, there are some very cool libraries out there. and it's really fun, I discovered, to just go look for "a book", in general, rather than a specific book. you avoid disappointment when things aren't in - and I've found some of the best books I've ever read this way. (e.g.)
used books - if you can't find what you're looking for at the library, and really want to read that particular book, used book stores are a good bet. or if you want to build your own library, I suppose. but you can often get a good used book for less than it would cost to rent a movie! and you usually get more entertainment (time-wise) out of the book - plus you get to keep it! which means afterwards you can share it with friends (and get more books in exchange) - or even share with people you don't know
biking - uses way less resources than most transit to get you around, plus it gives you exercise (saving health care resources down the road?), is fun, and gets you outside. it's also a pretty quick way of getting around and hugely extends the range of what things are close and accessible. apparently it adds years to your life...if you don't believe me, believe them. also, apparently driving and getting stuck in traffic not only makes you angry, it gives you heart attacks.
skill-sharing - teaching is fun. learning is fun. teach somebody you know something you know and they don't. then vice versa. it'll be great.
old magazines - may be fun to read, at least selectively. but also great for cutting up and using to make collages and cards and things. I'm pretty sure you can get ahold of these for free...I would try local libraries (see what they do with old issues), coffee shops that have magazines, and anywhere that has them in a waiting room - dentist's offices, barber shops, etc. if all else fails you can usually get a box of them at the end of a church rummage sale for $1.

So there's five ideas...I'm sure there are tons more out there. This is a great list of other ideas.

Return of the Blog

2009-03-17T12:26:00.000Z

Once again, I have utterly failed to write on here for a long time. Once again, I remedy this with a pointless post.

Rhythm is really hard to spell. I realise that in writing, this makes little sense, since you can see how to spell it. But I can never remember. I try to put in a second y, which is clear wrong. But then try to look it up, and forget the first h, and then can't find it. It's very vexing.

Anyway, I'm hoping that by making a big deal of it, I will remember in future. Fingers crossed...

Birthdays

2009-02-12T10:16:00.002Z

Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln were both born on this day, 200 years ago.

You two were pretty sweet for a Tab and a Yank - happy 200th!

Oh, and steam trains...

2009-02-08T20:27:00.003Z

So this one I don't think heralds a return to anything, but is just sort of cool. A group of volunteers have been working since 1990 to create a new steam engine that can run on the main lines in Britain - contributors donated the price of a pint of beer a week, and experts donated their time, and just recently they've finished! The train has made its first runs, including a long-distance run from Yorkshire to London. It's worth scrolling down on that one to see the photo of the steam train pulling into the station alongside a modern engine.

A New Age of Sail?

2009-02-08T20:07:00.003Z

I've been musing for a while to anyone who will listen that maybe, in the future, there will be a return to sail as a way to transport commercial goods. After all, as fuel gets increasingly expensive, why not transfer goods that aren't particularly time-sensitive by a completely non-polluting and awesome form of transport? Of course, there are probably lots of issues involving unreliable weather and more expensive crew, but still, a boy can dream, no?

Well, I'm apparently way behind the time. The return of sail has already started - there's a French company shipping wine by sail to other parts of Europe, starting last year with a run to Dublin but with big plans for expansion. They've had at least one more ship running, but have chartered five. So far its mostly just carrying fair-trade, luxury goods, but even at that the French Association of Shipowners predicts that sailing ships could get up to 1/2 a percent of the shipping market worldwide (which is probably more than it sounds). Details here.

I had know that they were using fancy computer-controlled "Sky Sails" (giant kites, basically) to reduce fuel consumption on ships, but a return to actual sail for shipping is just so incredibly cool.

Old and New

2009-01-28T12:25:00.002Z

There's an old riddle about a town with two barbershops - one barber has a great haircut, the other's is terrible. Who do you go to? The guy with the terrible haircut, of course, as the barbers must cut one another's hair.

This isn't quite the same, but I think it might be a generally useful rule of thumb that if there are pretty old buildings and ugly new buildings, you probably don't actually want to be in the pretty old ones. You want to be in the ugly but functional new one next to the ugly old one, so that you can sit in comfort looking at the prettiness of the new one, rather than freezing in the gloom staring at a concrete monstrosity.

On a related note, props to Lord Rothemere and Vere Harmsworth, whoever you are, for creating the only place I know in Oxford that is reliably quiet, warm, and sufficiently well lit to actually get work done. I guess they save enough energy on the compact flourescent bulbs and motion-censor stack lights that they can put little space heaters next to each study carrel (oh, and the having individual study carrels? also good work...) Oh, and building yourself next to Mansfield gardens, which are pretty.

Sometimes we win a little

2009-01-21T14:19:00.001Z

So I'm just finishing up an edited volume on Virtue Ethics, which is on the whole interesting but a lot of it is not actually as relevant to my research as I think my supervisor thought it would be when she assigned it to me. Also, some of the articles are boring, others are stupid, and a couple were both, which is mega-frustrating.

But...

The good part is that the very last article is pretty amazing, and insightful, and I think super-helpful to my research. AND I reached the very insightful conclusion just as the Great Gate of Kiev started to play, so it felt very much like a climactic eureka movement. Which was about as exciting as it gets for spending the whole day in the library, really...

some more words

2009-01-21T12:54:00.002Z

aretaic - (adj) - of or pertaining to virtue or excellence
from Ancient Greek ἀρετή (aretē, “virtue or excellence”)

rebarbative - (adj) - unattractive and objectionable
from Old French se rebarber (to face each other "beard to beard", i.e. aggressively)

ephemera - (n pl.) - (1) things that exist or are used or enjoyed for only a short time (2) collected items, typically written ones, that were originally expected to have only short-term popularity

Could this work?

2009-01-19T14:00:00.003Z

Er, so nobody is likely to care about this, but anyways, I thought about it walking home from the grocery store (mostly because being entirely unable to solve my current space/storage issues makes me turn to speculating about future ones):

On workbenches, it's common to nail the lids of a number jars to the underside of a board - then you have handy containers for nails and screws etc.

Would it be possible to do similar in a kitchen - attach a number of jars to the underside of a (sturdily-built) cupboard? Then you could fill the jars with lentils, beans, rice, etc. Not only would it avoid spillage, I think it would end up quite pretty (with all the different colours)...kinda like the displays with jars of beads at bead stores.

Is there some reason I'm missing that this couldn't work and thus isn't as standard in kitchens as it is on workbenches?

le retour, 2009

2009-01-15T20:58:00.002Z

Returning to Oxford (which I've now down quite a few times) has brought a variety of feelings - bewilderment about where really home is, nervousness about new places to live, excitement for new terms, and so on. This time, I was mostly feeling anxious in the lead-up; this was probably the least I've ever wanted to come back.

But the return itself was much better than expected. I had a relatively smooth journey, with only small delays and the compensation of an empty seat beside me and no screaming children nearby. Arriving back at my lodgings was much more pleasant than I thought - it doesn't feel like home (even as much as my room last year did) but it does feel like a place that I live. There was at least a sufficient degree of comfortableness and familiarity for me to be pleasantly surprised. Plus, the welcome I received from my landlords was incredibly warm...apparently they like having me as a tenant and I compare favourably to previous lodgers. The books were also well-received, by parents and children alike. Oh, plus the older child has started pre-school, and I'm hoping that will help.

And then it was just groceries, cooking, unpacking (don't think I forgot anything absolutely crucial, just a few bits and bobs) and hopefully a good nights sleep!

So confused...

2008-11-10T17:15:00.003Z

I'm in a library at Oxford, in a silent study area, across from someone loudly eating a sandwich, next to someone rolling his own cigarette, by a few people talking...I'm just not sure exactly what happened/which dimensional portal I walked through on the way here.

Too Good

2008-11-09T22:03:00.000Z

Apparently, the band "The Doors" started as an opening act for a band called "Them"

So you could legitimately say "The Doors opened for Them", and it would be punny.

Tehehe.

*crack*

So...much...Russian...

Gasp

2008-11-09T20:16:00.001Z

As a metic student who gets full, free health care, I find this absolutely shocking.

On like nine levels. But we won't go there.

Just seriously? Private deportation of sick people?

Gah!

Naming

2008-11-09T19:36:00.003Z

Just as whether or not men can open doors for women throws a lot of progressives into a tizzy, what to about last names is an unresolved question.

As this guy points out, it still seems pretty unheard of for men to take their wife's last name. Hyphenation seems a popular option, but the double-barreled names (while sometimes super awesome, especially in England) can be unwieldy and sometimes pretentious-sounding. At any rate, it's very much a short-term solution; is the next generation to use four? And the magic of doubling means it pretty quickly gets über-ridiculous. Sometimes a woman simply keeps her own name, and the children take either the father's or mother's name. Sometimes they split the children up by gender. Some people have other creative solutions: I had one friend with three children in the family, and three last names: father's (first husband), mother's, and father's (2nd husband).

I don't think any of it really gets to the heart of the problem, though. Even if a women keeps her "own" name, it's still just her father's name; you haven't escaped from what some find problematic about the old system, namely, that as the woman moves from her father's to her husband's household, she switches their names...as an object rather than agent. So what is to be done?

I quite like the Russian system of naming (maybe cause its orderedness would have ruled out the mess I've got when ID is necessary). There is a first, given name. Then there is a last, family name. And the middle name is a Patrynomic - based on the name of your father. Now, obviously, this doesn't solve any of the previous issues, as the family name comes from your father as well as the patrynomic...but it might give us a hint.

You could just switch the a matrynomic and a patryomic, and abandon the family name altogether. Or, you could have a sort of hybrid system:

Give each child a first (given) name. This is their actual name, that people will call them.

Children take their family name from their parents.

So children have two names.

When you get married, the couple chooses a new name to be their family name.

So they then have three names: Given name, parent's family name (as middle name), new family name.

When/if they have their own children, the children take the new family name, and their given names...and so on.

Obviously this has lots of problems: just off the top of my head, there's the loss of continuity (family names don't go down through the generations) and it obviously substantially privileges marriage which some people may not like. But given that the people for who this is an issue are ones who are torn between their progressive values and the charms of tradition, the latter may not be such an issue. And the former is sort of the problem expressed as a positive, as it stands the male line keeps the name through the ages and the female just disappears all the time.

Anyhoo, I don't expect that anyone would actually do this, but I kinda like it --> especially that it gives the opportunity to actively found a new family with a new identity.

Oh, and you could follow the Russian practice of identifying people by their first & second names in formal settings , so that you don't have a problem with names changing over a lifetime (i.e. your name since childhood stays your work name, even if you take a new family name).

P.S. Nobody freak out, I realise I'm the only one keeping my family name going and I have no intention to drop it...

Cooking Failure and Success

2008-11-09T19:28:00.002Z

recent cookings:

Pancakes seem like a pretty safe bet. Aside from the time I forgot to put the eggs whites in, they seem to turn out pretty well. And people seem pleasantly surprised anytime it's not just white flour, milk and egg. I made them with jogurt for people after the election, and they seemed to be a hit (everyone certainly wanted seconds...) and I got envious looks as I made them in the house today.

Recipes not necessarily so much with the safe. I made one last week for a "cajun black-eyed peas soup" from a book that's usually good, but this was definitely fail. It wasn't bad, it just wasn't really good (maybe didn't use enough of the hot spices?) and it made way more than expected so I had to eat it all week.

In contrast, tonight I made a tomato soup by combining elements from a few recipes, and although it looked worrying half-way through, it's definitely delish...especially with a blob of sour cream. So success! And happy, well-fed Teddy.

More hotness from the Obama Team

2008-11-07T13:52:00.005Z

After a fantastic and just plain correct victory speech, Obama didn't even take a day off.

His chief of staff pick seems to signal a willingness to fight to get the change agenda through - and recognises that crisis is also opportunity that must not go to waste.

And now this - change.gov, which looks a lot like the campaign site except this time its about follow-through and getting the transition up and running in a way people can understand and participate in.

Hot. Want for Canada. Can't have. But good for world.

Yes, I'm reduced to only semi-comprehensible non-sentences.

P.S. OMGWYSIWIG this is amazing: america serves...they're really serious about public service

P.P.S. OMGLGBTQBBQ it just gets better -- most extensive nondiscrimination policy I've ever seen: details here but basically, the disabled and queer get more than just a shout-out in the victory speech

Confidence Intervals

2008-11-06T18:05:00.004Z

Our society seems to basically work on a 95% confidence interval - anything outside two standard deviations from the norm might as well not exist. And I don't just mean that this is the confidence interval that we use when we have to pick confidence intervals. I mean that we think in these terms about pretty much everything, whether we are conscious of it or not. When we make statements about what is or is not, or will or not happen, this is what we actually mean. The 2.5% outside of this doesn't have any meaning or existence - or might as well not.

Partly this is necessary - building up knowledge is, of course, principally an activity of tolerating the limits of our confidence in that knowledge. But where it become a problem is when we start talking about people. There, our epistemic habits (of working with the 95% interval) clash with our moral commitments to treat all people - or rather each person - with equal concern and respect. Suddenly, the mental tools we're so used to using don't have any way to keep up; they can't deliver what we morally need them too. I'm not sure we've come to grips with this.

A lot of academic research does, in fact, take place about people outside the confidence interval. Certainly much critical work is precise an attempt to bring them in. But it very much seems to be an exercise of "oh, and what about ____". Until we can manage to overcome or foundations in the 95%, it's going to remain a sideshow.

Judging the Wind

2008-11-06T18:00:00.003Z

When you learn to sail, they teach you a whole bunch of ways to judge the wind: you can look at flags, low clouds, smoke, wind indicators on other boats, the waves, judge the different feelings on your cheeks, all sorts of things...and then, as you go along, you just sort of develop an awareness (at least when you're on/by the water) of where the wind is coming from. It stumps being and/or for all of these things, and becomes a sort of back-of-your mind awareness based on all of them.

I think I use something similar when I'm cycling to judge the general traffic condition, which is why I'm finding it so hard here. There are just the obvious differences - other side of the road, different signs, etc. - from what I'm used to. But there's also a lot of information you don't get: people don't really signal or act in any predictable ways. And then there's the conflicting information you get from people just not obeying the laws, driving on the wrong side, swerving out into your lane, parking in the bike line, and jumping out in the middle of the street.

So over all, the back of your mind just ends up very confused and if you listen to it you get a start as you look up and there's a car hurtling towards you in your lane. Which makes biking a mental workout as well as a physical one.

New British Coins

2008-11-02T14:17:00.002Z

I got the funniest coin in my change the other day (it's a 5p piece): it looks almost as if it had been stamped wrong, because the design doesn't fit properly (its cut off all around). But that's the intention - it seems its part of an entire set that they're bringing out this year; the pound coin has the full royal arms on it, and then the rest of the coins each have a portion, arranged like so.

I think its super cool - the coins look very interesting and distinctive, so I'll definitely be looking out for others in change.

Just as a place to put this...

2008-11-01T18:26:00.002Z

really good article about food, written as a memo to the next president...I may want to come back this.

Oxford Makes You Old

2008-10-30T20:47:00.001Z

This is not new, but I've just remembered:

Some of my classmates here are getting gray hairs. And no, not the ones who are much older, two of the guys my age.

Craziness! I expected the OMG my classmates are getting married, I'm getting old...but not the we're going gray we must be gettting old...

Fingers crossed...

2008-10-29T12:39:00.001Z

"We walk through the door and we close it behind us and the simplicity of it is dazzling. That's how it happens."

Here's hoping.

C-c-c-c-cold

2008-10-27T21:07:00.003Z

Oct 27: the fleece blanket is back. Admittedly, I had to use it in June last year but that's just cause England sucks and there was no heating available for a bit (and it was cold and damp). The prospect of living with this thing around my shoulders for the next 8 months is not exactly making me happy.

On a funny note, they call radiators here "central heating."

ha. ha. ha.

P.S. After writing that, I looked it up and they are correct. But seriously - forced air you know, works and stuff.

P.P.S. Concern has been expressed for my wellbeing. I am fine, cuz I haz mah blankit. But seriously England, why choose inferior heating technologies? Why?

Unfairness

2008-10-23T19:26:00.001+01:00

It's not quite uphill both ways - but having to cycle into a strong headwind in no less than 3 directions on my daily bike commute seems like one of those things that just shouldn't be allowed.

On the plus side, I feel like the co-op's fair trade tropical juice deserves a shout-out for being delicious, and preventing low-blood-sugar headaches, and for letting you enjoy all of this while being pleased at doing your miniscule bit to help out poor farmers.

Release

2008-10-20T13:43:00.002+01:00

from the film "A Knight's Tale":

William: It's not in me to withdraw.

Prince Edward: No. Nor me. Though it happens.

I have - probably left over from all that "character-building" early education - a severe aversion to giving up on things, or withdrawing from anything. Thus, when I had to consider whether to drop a course this week, it led to some intense agonisation. Never mind that it was a course surplus to requirements, never mind that it was crazy amounts of unnecessary work, never mind that trying to get it done probably contributed to me getting sick, never mind that it was preventing me from making progress on my thesis, never mind that I wasn't even really all that interested after being to the first class: I couldn't give up, could I?

Well, after losing some sleep and probably giving myself a headache (and definitely an incredibly tense jaw), I did give up. And it feels great.

I sent off the irreversible e-mail a little while ago, and since then I can literally feel my shoulders relaxing with the removal of the figurative weight. Sometimes, I think I just need to learn to let go.

Maybe even learn not to take on so much in the first place ;)

The West

2008-10-17T20:32:00.003+01:00

I've always had an irrational preference for the direction West. I'm not sure exactly where it came from - perhaps from Tolkien's valorisation of the West, or from living in the "West beyond the West", or the west half of a city, or what...

But now I have a good reason. I'm currently living east of where I spend my days, and it's entirely the wrong direction to commute. Heading west in the morning and east in the evening means my back is to all the natural goodness...if you live west of where you work, then you're facing the sunrise/sunset for the whole commute.

On the plus side, tonight's sky was gorgeous and yesterday there was an amazing moon. Almost full (Waning Gibbous, actually, if anyone cares). And I got glimpses of both.

Safe Harbour

2008-10-17T10:40:00.001+01:00

This is a really good idea:

http://www.safeharbour.ca/

A Story of Soup

2008-10-13T22:18:00.002+01:00

Today was soup day.

Some friends went today to a neat restaurant that cooks different dishes every day (just a few), home-cooking style. Which is normally yummy and fantastic. Today, however, they were out of soup...but said it would just be a couple of minutes. We said we'd wait.

Half an hour later, there was finally soup, but it wasn't the carrot & lentil on the menu. It was...well, it was green. Beyond that I'm not sure. The consensus was that it was "what have we got in the kitchen to make soup with" soup. See, we figure that their standard answer when they run out of soup is "it will be a few minutes," and then people pick something else rather than wait. When we called their bluff, they had to throw something together...herbs, water and some thickening agent, as far as we could tell. And it took half an hour because they had to make it from scratch.

It was delicious, by the way. Just not sure if it had, you know, nutritional content.

So I decided for take 2 at supper - I still don't have my dishes so I can't cook properly, but the grocery store had ready-made soups. And, special for October, they have a halloween soup: pumpkin and haricot. And it's delicious! And it's pumpkin, which sort of makes up for no thanksgiving. Soooo all in all, I count that a win.

Trouble is, I keep forgetting in between spoonfuls that it's pumpkin. And it looks like butternut squash, so then that's what I expect, and I keep being surprised by the taste. My tongue is confusing my brain...

English Saturday, +/-

2008-10-11T23:13:00.004+01:00

+ 1 for crunchy fall leaves

- 1 for "no service on the Jubilee line"

+ 1 for gorgeous weather

- 1 for cruel and petty bus driver

+ 1 for having my spices back

+ 1 for voices from home

______________________

all in all, I think I came out ahead...

Translation

2008-10-09T13:34:00.003+01:00

I'm finding it shockingly hard to get back into academic langauge. After a summer of talking to people not wrapped in the linguistic cloak of academia - whether they be NGO workers, union activists, civil servants, or what have you - it would have been bad enough. But after another month of working on press releases, talking points, and campaign speeches, I'm not sure how I'm going to manage.

After all that time of keeping things simple - and I mean really simple - a lot of what I'm reading now just sounds unecessarily complex and obscure. For instance:

"The subjective and intersubjective sense of taboo-ness is one of the factors that makes the tradition of nuclear non-use a taboo rather than simply a norm."

I think that sentence has a reasonable meaning, but its unclear whether or not it matters. And this is just the IR course - I'm not sure what I'd do with critical theory right now.

Waking Up

2008-10-09T13:31:00.002+01:00

Vis-à-vis my last post:

"But a leading social scientist, speaking for background, suggested yesterday that Canadians see in Mr. Harper a Robespierre-type character, the French revolutionary leader who at first was embraced by the people for his unflappability, control and appearance of towering moral rectitude and then rejected by them for the same reasons."
- Michael Valpy, Globe and Mail

Maybe I'm not the only one to think that perceived strength and certitude isn't everything.
And maybe our reign of less-than-terror is coming to an end.

Fingers crossed.

Nuance

2008-09-04T20:08:00.002+01:00

from the Globe and Mail:

"The Tories plan to frame Mr. Harper as a minivan-driving hockey dad from the suburbs and chief rival Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion as an elitist professor who has difficulty articulating a vision, making decisions and relating to Canadians." (empahsis mine)

I know this may sound odd, but I think I want a leader who has difficulty making decisions. I'm not denying that decisions need to be made, but the issues that national leaders have to face are just plain difficult. Any who finds making decisions about them easy probably isn't thinking about them hard enough. And there's only so much guts feeling we can handle.

Motivations

2008-08-24T00:19:00.002+01:00

“At some point in the eighties a group of academics went to see P.W. Botha to tell him that things could not go on as they were. After listening to all of them, Botha stood up and said: ‘My dear Professors – you can come here with all your clever arguments and academic learning, but I, P.W. Botha, governs from a guts feeling.’
‘It’s the “s” that made me leave the National Party,’ one of them said afterwards.”

If I end up in politics, it may be for this reason. Not because they're ideologically wrong (although they are), but because they're idiots and they're wrong and they're running my country.

Curious - but you kinda gotta love it

2008-07-22T14:56:00.002+01:00

From a BBC story on the Indian Parliament:

"Members of parliament have been summoned from their sick beds and even prison cells to take part in the vote."

"I'm not going to do Nothing any more."

2008-06-08T22:42:00.000+01:00

"Never again?"

"Well, not so much. They don't let you."

A Pleasant Surprise

2008-06-03T23:20:00.002+01:00

Today was much better than I thought it was going to be. The rain was a hassle (I need to start wearing rain pants to class, I think), but the day had redeeming qualities. For one, the dryer actually worked (ish, it took an extra pound over normal but at least my clothes are dry and not all over my room like last time). For another, class was really good an interesting and helped straighten out something for the exam that I've been confused about since November. And this is a class that is, at best, very hit-and-miss, so that was very nice. And I feel like I'm making more progress with studying, which is greatly reassuring. So all in all not bad.

A thought: does it make any real sense to say that you own yourself? Or that you should? My feeling is that, while a lot of people take this basically for granted, its simply the wrong terminology. Sure, we're upset at the notion that others might own you (that is, we don't heart slavery) but that doesn't mean you need to; it doesn't mean you need to think of yourself as property at all. And I think that talking about self-ownership gets us into lots of bad places we'd rather not be.

Cost and Difficulty

2008-06-03T09:47:00.002+01:00

Looks like today is going to be fully of laundry, studying and rain. All of my favourite things. Hurrah.

Mumblegrumblemumblegrumble.

The studying isn't so bad, if I think about it. I mean, obviously its not bad compared to anything actually bad (like war) or genuinely hard (like...um...let's go with climbing a mountain). But it's also just not really bad or hard at all. So why do I mind so much? And why more than I used to?

I think studying actually has become easier over time: I'm better at it, and concentrating takes less effort than, say, in grade 4. The real change for the worse is, I think, in the opportunity cost of studiyng. So in grade 4 school sort of changed over and we just did revision for three weeks. And I don't think I would have been allowed to do anything else if I just shirked the studying. Whereas here, exciting Oxford stuff is still going around and I have to miss it all - the opportunity cost of studying is now not seeing eights week, not going to garden shows, not seeing special lectures, etc. Which is very frustrating.

Especially when I see the studying as less worthwhile. The only reason I have to study for this exam is to do well on it. I don't expect to retain any of what I'm learning at this point, and I don't expect to use any of it if I do. It's about debates I'm not interested in, and what I am learning is who said what. Sighz. Ah well, less than a week to go.

More Weather

2008-05-26T21:36:00.003+01:00

Before I start, yes, I have thoughts other than weather and triviality. However, academia is taken up all my profundity at the moment - so the blog remains for the preservation of ephemera. Is that even possible? Who knows...

So yes - weather. It's like November! Or, November as I think of it...cold, pouring with rain, and lots of wind. It's very bizarre and hugely messes with my sense of time. It makes me think it's not then end of third term, but first. It also makes me think it's 5pm when it gets dark - rather than 9:30. So subconsciously confused!

Rain rain go away...

Memory Weather

2008-05-10T13:18:00.002+01:00

The weather here is driving me absolutely crazy. It's warm, but overcast. For some reason, that reminds me very strongly of early summer while I was in undergrad - lazy days with not much to do and plenty of time to do it in. This is senseless, because I know the weather was frequently like this in Vancouver when I was studying for exams in school, yet somehow all it evokes is wandering around pocket parks in Vancouver or heading down to Jericho or Kits for a bit of early sailing. It even smells lik Vancouver. It's really bizarre, and disorienting, and NOT good for me getting any work done. Sigh. Why is it that Oxford being beautiful just makes me miss Vancouver more?

I like my mint tea in the green cup

2008-05-07T22:39:00.003+01:00

Lately I've been thinking a lot about what we really value in our lives - and what we aim for, and how (or if) that works out for us. Mostly without conclusion, largely to do with class and thesis, but a bit for myself.

Anyhoo, as I said - not much in the way of conclusion. But as I emerge from several days of fighting sickness-induced depression, I realised that some bizarrely simple things make me more pleased than they probably should. I made a list like that a long time ago: "Things that make me happy (more than they should)" but somewhere in the many computer disasters it's gone, sadly. This time it was just one that reminded me. I have two mugs here: identical, save that one is green and the other blue. And I really like it when I managed to do mint tea in the green mug and darker things like black tea and hot chocolate in the blue one. It doesn't always work out that way without doing dishes even more often than I already do, but when it does it makes me feel all nice. And considering that mint tea probably makes that list indpendent of the cup it is in, pretty good all around.

P.S. Yes, I know, the blog never gets out of the trivial. It does say preface right there in the title...promise big, deliver later ;)

Weird Weather

2008-04-19T14:24:00.002+01:00

HOW DO I MISS ALL THE SNOW??!?!?!?!?

Seriously, could one have predicted that I would miss snowy Oxford by being home for Easter and then miss snowy home by being back in Oxford at the END of April?

Return to Oxford (and its delightful insanity)

2008-04-18T20:44:00.002+01:00

So, today is deadline day. Oxford, in all its wisdom (or at least my corner of it) has decreed that everything will be due at once, that is, will be due at noon on the friday of nought week of the term after the course was taken. So that meant that I had four essays due today. And not only that I had multiple essays, but that everyone in the department (if not more than that) had essays due today. So an important day for things like, oh, say, printers to be operational.

At this point you can probably guess. I had been up for 20 minutes when a classmate (who's also in my college) called to wonder how I was planning to print - he had just been to the college computer room only to find out that it was closed for the day. Why today? It's unclear. Higher purpose? Mysterious ways? Simple sadism? We'll never no.

Un-fussed, the two of us proceeded to the vaunted Bodleian Library - surely they who possess a copy of every book published in Britain could print our essays for us. And indeed they could...but, only with great difficulty. We had to acquire a photocopy card (fortunately my classmate had one), top it up with prodigious amounts of British change, then print our files off a workstation. All this makes sense from...well...any other library printing I've ever seen. Here comes the crazy bit - the printouts then come out of a printer behind the desk. We count the pages by hand, and report the total to the staff, who then do all the math (with pencil and paper) to find the total charge (over 8 pounds each!). Then, we hand over the card and they work some magic with it. Oh, and halfway through the paper ran out and the staff were utterly flummoxed as to what to do. Once they figured out that it had run out, they searched fruitlessly for paper. Including - for real - lifting up books and looking under them. Why? It's unclear...maybe in case a single sheet was hiding there? After calling technical services, they finally succeeding in locating the paper - that was as far as I could tell next to the printer the whole time. Sigh. It was clearly the largest printing they had ever had to do.

Anyhow, we did in fact get the printing - all 122 pages (for me) - done, and the essays handed in. And fortunately I print infrequently enough that this can be pleasantly hilarious, not downright maddening.

Seriously though. How does this place not collapse around their ears?

On a lighter note:

2008-03-04T10:36:00.002Z

From Joseph Raz, on Incommensurability (he's an Oxford prof, which may be the only reason I find this funny):

"I value a walk in the park this afternoon more than reading a book at home. But one can successively change the odds, making the park a little windier, the book accompanied by a glass of port, until one would say that neither is better than the other."

Aside from being (to me) rather amusing, I think this may sum up a lot of what I find problematic about the other world that is the Oxford ivory tower.

Whoa...

2008-03-03T18:49:00.002Z

So...I just read an article for my last week of core MPhil courses that I had to read at the very beginning of my core Honours BA course...which has a weird symetry all of its own.

The even stranger part is how much it may have unconsciously shaped my thinking, since I didn't really remember it super well or think it had a big influence. But it really sums up a lot of things I think I now agree with about ethics, after running around in circles about it for a term. Which makes me think either my education has caused me to come to the same conclusions about some things as Isaiah Berlin did (acceptable...) or I've wasted a lot of time in the interim.

Oh, and the article is Part VIII of Two Concepts of Liberty, entitled "The One and the Many"

Mugabe

2008-02-29T20:59:00.003Z

Things Mugabe has called his opponents in the latest election cycle:

- prostitutes (many times)

- witches

- charlatans

- traitors

- two-headed creatures

- frogs

See, this is the sort of level of political discourse we should be demanding from our leaders.

Oh, and I only really feel to write a post this dumb because it's Leap Day, so nothing is real.

Life Less Ordinary

2008-02-11T23:30:00.000Z

You are abnormal.

Kind of a slap in the face, huh?

Try this:

You are extraordinary.

Better?

Think about it.

"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

2008-02-08T13:00:00.000Z

Quote of the day: "But who knows what the hell else is going on deep in the soul of a carrot?"

And I will start writing actual posts instead of just linking things, at some point, I promise.

So much awesome:

2008-02-07T09:36:00.000Z

seriously, just look...

and I thought there was never any good news in the world.

p.s.

2008-02-03T22:47:00.000Z

also I think I need to learn to write properly.

this may involve Orwell and a typewriter.

The Day the Music Died

2008-02-03T22:34:00.000Z

Today, apparently.

In better news, the next President of Serbia will not be from a party whose leader is currently on trial for war crimes. Huzzah!

Also, I know I'm late on this one, but if you haven't seen The Lives of Others, do so.

People are nice, too!

2008-02-03T16:09:00.000Z

The tone here has been way too depressing for a bit, so I thought I'd just note that people can be really very nice sometimes too, and that that can make a big difference. I'll just note three recent examples:

1) My classmate, who put in a huge amount of effort to put together a party for the rest of us to try and make sure we get to know each other as people, rather than just as fellow students. It was super nice of her AND it worked, which is awesome.

2) Ultimate at Oxford - apparently, an integral part of the games is not just being friendly in the actual competition, but then getting together and playing summer camp-style icebreakerish games afterwards. While this involves getting muddy in the winter, it is friendly and awesome and happy-making.

3) Nice people at the grocery store (which, by the way, seems to be gradually getting in more fair trade stuff...woot!) who have nice and friendly conversations with you at the grocery check-out and brighten up your day and welcome you to Oxford when your day isn't going great because carrying groceries is hard when you busted your shoulder playing ultimate.

So all in all, yay people! recently...

Really? Are you sure that's your example?

2008-02-01T14:42:00.000Z

So I was reading what is otherwise a very interesting article by one David Sussman entitled "What's wrong with torture" when I hit this passage:

"Consider a case where the police confront a very obese man who is trying to suffocate another by sitting on his chest. Like the terrorist, the fat man is defenseless before the police, who can wound or even kill him easily. Yet if the fat man dies or loses consciousness, the police lack the strength to shift him off his victim. Only the fat man can end his attack, even though he does not now need to do anything further in order for it to succeed. Here it seems that the police might well be justified in menacing the fat man or twisting his arm (or threatening to kill him) in order to get him to derail a set of events that he has intentionally set in motion, even though he no longer has to actively contribute anything to it. The terrorist relies on a bomb's mechanism to accomplish his goal, the fat man on his weight, and it is hard to see how this difference of method could be of any great moral significance."

Really? Why? Why on earth? Who are these people who call themselves moral philosophers? What strange and bizarre world have I stumbled into?

The key comes in the last sentence - the crazy fat man example is there to show us why it might be considered plausible that you could coerce a terrorist who has been captured but has planted a bomb into telling us where it is. So the fat man example is supposed to be so clear and so persuasive that it helps develop the other point by analogy.

Again...why? Why why why? Is there anything about the fat man example that's more plausible, more convincing? No! Then why on earth, given its utter irrelevance and the obvious relevance of the other example at hand (the captured terrorist bomb-planter) wander off into bizarre, unrealistic, and possibly (although I'm unsure on this) offensive hypothetical crazy-examples? Why why why!?!

Ok I'm done. Sorry, for anyone who actually reads this...its not so much intended for consumption as for venting purposes.

In more interesting news - well, not all news, but still more interesting, if also more depressing:

- garbage gyre

- why I feel the society I come from is a little ill around the edges - it would be cheaper to take care of people, and still we don't do it

Sometimes, I really love Oxford

2008-01-19T18:13:00.000Z

I was going to run to Mesopotamia today, but it was flooded.

For reals. Good thing I live in a tower.

No accounting for taste

2008-01-18T22:27:00.000Z

I just went to see what I thought was a fabulous new play. It's called "Yet tell my name again to me" (good title, no? from Tennyson apparently...) and is about Harriet Taylor and J.S. Mill's early love life. And it was truly a student play - not only acted and directed by students, but written by one as well. I thought the writing was great, the acting definitely fine considering, and overall made for an enjoyable and really thought-provoking evening.

Apparently I was in a minority...the people in the row in front of me couldn't stop giggling at the (rather serious) end of the first act, and the people to my left didn't come back after intermission. They said something about it being a bit too much, and voting with their feet, and left...

Sigh.

I think it's brave to write a play, and put it on. And especially a play about something like this. And more than that, I thought the brave effort paid off into a really very good play. I'm not sure what people expect out of this sort of thing, but I am sure I expect more out of people.

Dylan

2007-12-11T12:43:00.000Z

So I'm (by coincidence) listening to "The Times They Are A-Changin'" and reading an article about the climate negotiations in Bali. When did Canada become such an obstructionist power? And why does our generation have to resort to the protest music of the last to find something that seems apropos? Apparently one day recently Canada won first, second AND third place in the "fossil awards" for doing the most to hold up negotiations. In the totals, we're only behind the US - yes, that does mean we're ahead of Sauid Arabia. And yes, this makes me very very sad.

On the plus side, there's a Canadian company called Zenn that's making and selling electric cars. In the US. Not in Canada, because there's no approval for it yet....grrrrrr...although they did recently get approval in BC, so hopefully they'll be some rolling onto the roads there soon once they get distribution networks up and running.

anyway, check out the angry-making and the car story

New Media

2007-12-04T20:55:00.001Z

Somebody researching at the Oxford internet institute pointed out something interesting to me - despite the hype about the rise of new media, it's barely a drop in the bucket. We still overwhelmingly get our news and analysis from the same old sources. I felt this was a cynical way of looking at it, but then realised that I definitely am one of the people who fits his analysis: the podcasts I listen to are from the CBC and BBC, and all the news online I read is from the websites of traditional media sources. So I am faced with giving in to cynicism or changing my habits...and I'm going to try for the latter.

I've figured out (sort of) the RSS feed thing, but now am just looking for good stuff to fill it with...alternative news sources, interesting columnists, blogs, that sort of thing. Anything to balance out the perspectives I'm normally exposed to. And then I'm looking for other things too - good websites, maybe good newspapers, and particularly any interesting podcasts. Anyone in the ether with any ideas on this one?

Nostalgia is Odd

2007-11-27T12:05:00.000Z

Today, I am missing drinking hot chocolate in airport waiting lounges. Well, specifically, in the parts of the Calgary and Toronto airports that became so incredibly familiar from flying to and from debate tournaments all the time while I was in undergrad. It wasn't like I was there all that often...but it was several times a year in each of them, which is probably more often than I have been to a lot of places (restaurants, coffee shops, etc.) And yes, I know being stuck in an airport is a messed up thing to miss. But there it is...

Des Bon Mots

2007-11-24T13:11:00.000Z

So I continue coming across new words in random places (ok, half of them on free rice...but only half) and I figure that I'll maybe actually remember them if I throw a few up here. So, new vocabulary, take 2:

latitudinarian - (n) allowing latitude; showing no preference among varying creeds and forms of worship
pettifog - (v) quibble about petty points; practice legal deception or trickery
chary - (adj) cautious, wary (generally chary of ___); cautious about the amount one gives or reveals (e.g. chary with details...)

I find it amazing that what looks at first like a particularly unlikely typo for wary is in fact another word that means almost precisely the same thing. Trust the economist to use the one nobody has ever heard of...

Every plan is a tiny prayer

2007-11-21T14:35:00.001Z

"And it came to me then that every plan is a tiny prayer to father time."

- Death Cab for Cutie

I want to talk a little about plans, and making them, and why we keep doing it, and why it makes us feel better to do so. I started thinking about this recently because a father of a friend of mine died, and I realised then that I'm only OK with being away from home for so long (indefinitely, really) because of a number of assumptions I have about what and who I can return to eventually. The reality is that those aren't all safe assumptions - either I'm making prayers to father time in planning on the basis of such assumptions, or I'm willfully ignoring that chaotic nature of the future. And so I wonder a little what role making plans has in that process - what it is I do when I make a plan, and why it is that it salves the anguish of thinking about an uncertain future.

It's tempting to think of plans as an assertion of control over that uncertainty, of control over your life and your future and your being. Certainly, a plan that is carried to fruition is just that: a conscious determination of a definite path through a field of chaotic and uncertain possibilities. And making plans is both a symptom and solution to control issues; when life is out of control I tend to feel an urge to make plans. But more than that, doing so takes the pressure off gaining control over the present. Plans in that sense, by giving a feeling of future control, help us to tolerate present uncertainty.

I feel, however, it would be ultimately self-destructive to think of plans this way. We have to cope with the seemingly constant fact that the even the best laid plans of mice and thingumagummies go awry. Our plans fall apart as the future asserts its chaotic and destructive power over our fragile attempts to build certainty. If we think that by planning we control the future, we deceive ourselves.

Plans, then, can be a willful deceit, but I'm not very comfortable with that. The alternative, for me, is that plans can be a willful act of defiance. Our plans are our way of screaming in the teeth of the storm or building sandcastles in the path of an incoming tide. They're our way of acknowledging the impossibility of victory, but putting ourselves to the hazard nonetheless. Certainly, if you look into the abyss it stares back at you. But that doesn't mean you have to avert your gaze. I think the only solution is to keep making plans - even to make outrageous plans. As Kipling put it, "If you can make one heap of all your winnings/And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss." You may lose. Scratch that, you probably will lose, from time to time. But then the only thing to do, when you "watch the things you gave your life to, broken" is to "stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools."

There's beauty in simply escaping the paralysis that comes with awareness of the fragility of our existence and our creations. There's beauty in the attempt to make something anyway, knowing it's not likely to last. And maybe, there's even beauty in the breakdown of all of that. Either way, we win some or we learn some. And out of all of that, we make something we call life.

Illocutionary Power?

2007-11-13T14:28:00.000Z

So - some new words...there are lots here. Apparently this is where a certain old teacher of mine picked up a tendency to be delighted at any opportunity to use a neglected word.

A quick sampling:

polysemy - the coexistence of many possible meanings for a word or phrase
elision - omission of a sound or syllable when speaking; ommission of a passage in writing; the process of joining together or merging things, esp. abstract ideas
decoct - to boil down or crystallise; extract the essence of

The point of this is not, however, to show off my new vocabulary...it's that possibly the coolest online time-wasting game of all time has appeared on the web: http://www.freerice.com/index.php

It's a vocabulary quiz game - but for every word you get right, they can donate 10 grains of rice. Not much - but it adds up. So far, enough to feed 50,000 people for a day. And its only been online since October. Check out the "totals" page and see how fast it's growing. Then practice your vocabulary and feed the hungry!

Remembrance Day

2007-11-12T13:39:00.000Z

So I definitely slept through all the remembrance day stuff in this country, because their crazy debating tournaments don't end until so late. But I thought I should do something so I did a little remembrance of my own when it was 11:11 at home. I thought it would fall flat, but it actually worked really well - you can pull the last post and reveille and various poems off the internet in mp3 format and do the whole thing that way.

No tremendously profound thoughts in my moment of silence - just that I'm really, really glad I'm not having to fight a war.

Oh, and then we watched 300 in the MCR. And I remembered how much I disagree with it, in oh so many ways.

Politeness

2007-11-12T13:35:00.000Z

So, I've always thought of politeness as a formal of socially regulated empathy: that is, guidelines about how to treat one another kindly and with consideration. This seems to be radically at odds with the British notion of politeness, or perhaps more correctly etiquette. Here, it seems to all be about strictly following certain unwritten, unspoken rules (like about how to queue) and saying the correct things (please and thank you). There doesn't seem to be any link between saying thank you and meaning thank you, or between being polite and being kind. Hence, its perfectly OK for someone to shout at a stranger in Sainburys over a misunderstanding about places in line. I'm not sure I'll ever really understand.

Don't get me wrong - I really like it here, and a lot of people are both polite and friendly. But they seem to be two different things. In general, I'm beginning to find Britain more and more foreign feeling. It's not that anything is much different from back home, it's that it's all almost the same but very slightly different. And like the unreal plateau they hit with almost realistic computer graphics at some point, it makes you feel a little queasy.

Many worlds after all?

2007-11-09T12:45:00.000Z

So, there's been speculation for some time that Oxford may exist in a sort of parallel universe. Goodness knows, its been the inspiration for most of the great sub-creative worlds of 20th Century fantasy. But I think whatever the conclusion is on the general question, it is clear that the Senior Common Room (and high table) is a completely different world. There's a butler. A real one. And champagne (in the SCR), then dinner (including dessert) then you keep your napkin and carry it down to a different room where there's 2nd dessert with complicated rules about the direction of passing the port and dessert wine and lovely little plates of fruit, and then from there back to the SCR for coffee and tea. The whole thing takes almost four hours. And is filled with people with titles and college benefactors and just does not seem like something from a world I am used to at all.

Fog and Fireworks

2007-11-07T12:42:00.000Z

Two kinds of creepy in Oxford:

1) The fog. When this place does fog, it does it seriously and properly. As in, you go into an event and its sunny, and you come out and its dark and you can't see more than 50 yards. And the buildings, they loom. Seriously creepy. Cool, but creepy.

2) Guy Fawkes night. Although the big city-wide fireworks were on the weekend, on the actual Guy Fawks night (the 5th) there were lots of medium-sized displays at various colleges. But you can't really see them because of all the big buildings. Instead, what you get is the noise. It sounds pretty much like I would imagine sporadic small-arms fire as like, with periodic punctuations of artillery (larger fireworks?). Anyway, I thought I was being crazy about it until I was out walking and realised the insane echo effects they get off all the buildings and college walls and things...which is why it sounded creepy and like warfare around the corner instead of just fireworks. Oh, and given that in the past there was large-scale violence between town and gown, it kind of makes you think about why exactly the colleges are essentially fortified, walled enclosures.

Purity

2007-11-04T23:03:00.000Z

I totally forgot I big one when I was meandering along about positive and negative valuation: purity. Good, when you're talking about the genuine Canadian maple syrup I manage to procure for my pancakes this morning. Scary, when you start talking about blood or the like.

Intensity

2007-11-03T15:16:00.000Z

I've been thinking a lot about intensity recently. Partly I wonder how much a lot of our behaviour comes out of a desire for intensity of experience. For those of who lead such sheltered lives, it seems like relationships can be some of the the only really properly intense things that happen to us. Whereas others live intensity day in and out - and it seems to be them that write great poetry and stories and so on. I'm thinking of the war poets, or the Zabbaleen who write poetry to process their lives, or the street graffiti on the downtown East Side of Vancouver. I realise its a gross generalisation, but I think there's something to it. And I think a lot of what we do is chasing after some sort of intensity.

Anyway, there's not a huge amount to that thought - there seemed to be more when I was talking about it last night. But I have a question to think about - does time really heal all things, or just it just make them fade away? Does it just kill the intensity?

Wednesday's Entry

2007-11-03T15:02:00.000Z

So I'm terrible at keeping up with this. Pretend I made this post on wednesday evening.

A friend of mine is doing his research on the coptic garbage collectors of Cairo, known as the Zabbaleen. He gave a presentation on it tonight that raised some really fascinating issues (for me) - as did the continuation of the discussion in the pub. On a more mundane side-note, having someone take notes on what you're saying in a pub is a very weird experience. Half-flattering and half just plain odd. But in terms of what we were talking about:

What is dirty, and what is clean? The classic definition of dirt is, apparently, "matter out of place" and, if you think about it, that probably encompasses most of what we regularly think of as dirty. But for the Zabbaleen, living constantly amidst the garbage, it isn't things that are dirty. Instead, they speak of corruption and exploitation as dirty. Which leads on to a broader question about how we express negative and positive valuation. Since western political thought fused with Christian morality, the notion of good and bad/evil has been dominant. But before that, Greek thinkers were as likely to speak about things (people, societies, and so on) as healthy or sick. And then there's beautiful and ugly (which can be interestingly applied to valuation outside aesthetics), sacred and profane, and so on. How we speak of these things - and how we conceptualise them ourselves - can give radically different outlooks on how we interpret our lives and how we think we should respond to them. And that's before thinking about the other areas where these things get turned on their head...like when dirty is seen to be desirable.

There was more, but that's all I can remember and express (I wasn't the one taking notes...)

Ups and Downs

2007-10-29T23:06:00.000Z

So this weekend was a bit of a roller coaster. Or rather a very nice walk in the woods, except for falling in the pits with spikes in. Basically, had my sister visiting, which was in itself amazing. But also we had a really good time touristing it up around Oxford and seeing the bits I haven't seen yet, including the unbelievably cool museums that are scattered around. Old scientific instruments and dinosaurs aplenty. The less good part was the me hurting myself with sports (my knee and then just a particularly nasty bit of overexertion). I learned, to my detriment, that the lasting legacy of my quasi-Nietzschean sports schooling is an ability to push myself that radically exceeds my current level of physical fitness. Oh, but I forgot some more of the good bits, which included more time with new friends and seeing another play - King John, a lesser-known and less-performed Shakespeare.

Anyway, the last few days in general have made me put a lot of thought into relationships, and my role in them, and what that means to the other parties...there is such a diversity of relationships, and I could probably do a lot better by a lot of other people if I just thought a little more about how I impacted them. From the trivial and mundane - I had a nice chat with the lady at Sainsbury's today, for instance, that seemed to brighten both our mornings - to the very important, like the role I play in my sister's life. Anyway, no particularly profound thoughts yet - mostly just I think its something I should think about more with everyone, rather than the few people I do spend a lot of time thinking about how I relate to.

A thought and a question

2007-10-25T21:56:00.000+01:00

I had an interesting point made to me today about my educational heritage. I think of myself as coming from an academic family - both parents with PhDs, an older sister already finished a masters, book around all the time and so forth. But it was pointed out to me that I also have aunts and uncles who dropped out of high school and university, a grandmother who only finished grade 8, and a great-grandmother with only one year of formal education. And I'm at Oxford. I'm not sure what that does to my feelings about the responsibility that comes with being here. It was supposed to calm me, by pointing out that just being here is an achievement. I think it only makes me feel more like its a responsibility - I feel like the accomplishment in being here belongs to them, not me, and that I need to take the next step. I'm just not sure what the equivalent step is, starting from this point...

The question then - if you had two groups of people, living in complete separation - if there was no contact or possible causal relationship between the two - and one group was a lot better off than the other, is that unfair? Or rather, can you speak of it as unjust in any meaningful sense? Are differences between people morally relevant when there can be no relationship of any kind between those people?

And yes, political philosophy does seem to involve these crazy hypothetical questions. Seemingly (and hopefully) for good reasons, although that remains to be seen for sure.

Quick Notes

2007-10-25T10:08:00.000+01:00

A couple of quick notes:

1) I've realised I'm actually quite, quite bad at the seminar discussion format. It's fine when it operates at a relatively simplistic level - then it's easy to be concise and constructive with what you want to say. But if, for instance, you want to express to a bunch of Oxford students why exactly you think that lottery voting has no independent fairness value because its an unjustified reification of probability applied to a series of different one-off decisions, well it takes forever and nobody really understands what you're saying. And ends up more confrontational than necessary. I shall have to work on this.

2) re: last post, figuring out what you want to do, etc...I think this is a good place to be doing that. Went to another interesting lecture (on Rwanda, by a functionary in the current government) that got me thinking again and then had a really good, long conversation with a friend about things in the world we either feel strongly about or should do...I think part of the key to actually getting stuff done is to make sure you talk to other people about it, and then push each other/hold each other to it.

An Inauspicious Start

2007-10-24T15:29:00.000+01:00

So I've decided to begin a blog. Motivated primarily, like most people, by lack of productivity in other areas. But no matter - I think the idea is, at present, just to jot down some of my impressions of this place before I forget about them entirely.

The thing that has made the greatest impression on me today is, perhaps unsurprisingly, Hamid Karzai's speech at the Oxford Union. The whole thing was impressive, of course, but a couple of things struck me in particular.

First, that I found that I regard Karzai as much more of a genuine leader than I would my own prime minister or the leaders of many states - perhaps because of what he personally has to face down or the challenges his country faces, but perhaps also because of his bearing. He explicitly recognised that he was under constraints as President in terms of what he could and could not say, and that he wished he could speak as freely as a student. And yet he seemed to attempt to say as much as possible within those constraints; there were several times that I thought he was (quite successfully) dodging tricky questions, but invariably he was simply making preferatory remarks before confronting the tough issue head-on. He also seemed to construct his remarks within the constraints so that we could guess at how he genuinely felt, rather than the all-too-familiar obfuscation practiced by those who could be far freer with what they say.

Second, one of the questions was about the role of the Canadian troops in rebuilding Afghanistan, and his response touched me deeply. He was asked if the Afghan people wanted the Canadians there. I think recent poll data support his response, but the way he said it expressed something sharper than numbers can. He said that Canada's contribution was beyond generous, and the willingness of Canada to sacrifice her daughters and sons to help Afghanistan was something they were very grateful for. And then he paused a bit to search for words before saying that human language has not yet evolved to be able to express the kind of gratitude he means - which is why when he spoke at the Canadian parliament he said it in the simplest form possible: thank you. Something about the way he said this - about the feeling he could put into expressing it, really cut me to the core. I cried a bit (three tears). And it really made me upset about the level of debate over Canada's involvement in Afghanistan at home - the maneuvering, the jockeying for position, the inability of anyone, it seems, to give us a really good explanation of their stand.

I don't want to make it out like I think Karzai is the ideal leader or anything - but I was deeply impressed. And I certainly have a lot to think about. Not least the guilt I currently feel. Karzai prefaced his remarks by saying how great a pleasure it was to speak at Oxford. He said that all students, wherever they are, dream of going to Oxford (or Cambridge) - and that he had been one of them. It drove home again the ridiculous life of privilege I enjoy here. And so I'm not feeling good that knowing that, and thinking about it, all I have achieved since I got home is cooking lunch, washing dishes, doing a quarter of a reading and starting a blog. I need to figure out exactly what it is I am doing, and what it is I want to do, and how to bring the two closer together. Hopefully this whole writing things down thing will help.

That's it for this post - except for a closing thought (not mine) that sort of sums up what I'm trying to say:

"You are all busy. It's important to be busy,

but if you don't find the time to change the world,

then you're busy keeping it the way it is."

- Albert Jones, Boston janitor & volunteer bus driver