Tag Archives: Chaninah Maschler

Creativity

June 6, 2022 – 6:26 am

Index to this series

In the Platonic dialogues, Socrates frequently mentions τέχνη (technê), which is art in the archaic sense: skill or craft. The concern of this post is how one develops a skill, and what it means to have one in the first place.

Books quoted or mentioned in the text, by Midgley, Weil, Thoreau, Tolstoy, Byrne, Wittgenstein, Arendt, and Alexander

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By David Pierce | Posted in Collingwood, Education, Euclid, Homer, Midgley, Pirsig, Plato, Principles of Art, Thoreau | Also tagged , , , , , , , | Comments (4)

Be Sex Binary, We Are Not

July 7, 2020 – 4:51 pm

Content warning: suicide.

The following sentence is bold in the last paragraph of an essay: “the science is clear and conclusive: sex is not binary, transgender people are real.” I don’t know what the writer means by this. As far as I can tell, as a biological concept used for explaining reproduction, sex has two kinds or parts or sides or aspects, and the essay tacitly affirms this; at the same time, obviously persons called transgender exist.

☾ ♂ ☿ ♃ ♀ ♄ ☉

The title of the essay is a command: “Stop Using Phony Science to Justify Transphobia.” I can support that. I don’t even need the qualifier “phony.” If transphobia is the kind of morbid fear suggested by the suffix “-phobia,” then science ought to help dispel this, not promote it.

One might also just say, Stop using phony science.

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By David Pierce | Posted in Plato, Science, Sex and Gender | Also tagged , , , , , | Comments (5)

Mood

March 10, 2020 – 5:53 pm

Executive summary. The English grammatical moods—indicative, imperative, subjunctive—were not understood till the nineteenth century, according to an 1882 doctoral dissertation, On the Use of the Subjunctive Mood in Anglo-Saxon. Considering illustrative passages that happen to be from Plato, Alfred Douglas, Evelyn Waugh, and especially John Donne; looking ultimately at John McWhorter’s 2015 essay, “English is not normal”; I review the subjunctive mood, grammar in general, and my own lack of understanding till I was in college.

Copyright page and table of contents, side by side, of Concise Oxford Dictionary Continue reading →

By David Pierce | Posted in Grammar, Plato, Poetry, Strunk and White | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments (1)

On the Odyssey, Book I

November 9, 2019 – 7:25 am

  • In reading his rendition of the Iliad, having enjoyed hearing Chapman speak out loud and bold;

  • having enjoyed writing here about each book, particularly the last ten books in ten days on an Aegean beach in September of this year (2019);

  • having taken the name of this blog from the first line of the Odyssey;

  • having obtained, from Homer Books here in Istanbul, Emily Wilson’s recent translation (New York: Norton, 2018);

    • Book on table, Wilson's Odyssey Continue reading →

By David Pierce | Posted in Collingwood, Homer | Also tagged , , , , | Comments (6)