31 OCT 2018 by ideonexus
Homo Laborans and Homo Faber
Homo Laborans sails in the sea of “making things” where work is an end in itself, and is dictated by the needs imposed by technology. Subjected to technology or pleasantly attracted by it, we are ‘Animal laborans’, as Arendt would say, being enslaved to the tasks we are immersed in by the will of technology. Our doing is comparable to the manual work of past industrial revolutions. Think, for example, of the smartest machines, which can alert their human handlers when they will need m...Folksonomies: two cultures
Folksonomies: two cultures
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notes06 JAN 2018 by ideonexus
Characteristics of Worldplay
Worldplay appeared to be a solitary, or perhaps intimately shared, pastime. Over the years nearly everyone in my extended family heard or saw something of Kar, yet immersion in that make-believe remained a solo pursuit for Meredith. Thomas Malkin, Hartley Coleridge, Barbara FoUett, and Stanislaw Lem also played alone. Friedrich Nietzsche played in the imaginary world of King Squirrel with his sister; C. S. Lewis played in Boxen with his brother.
Worldplay looked to be constructive, that is ... 1 notes
notes10 MAY 2016 by ideonexus
Characteristics of a Literacy-Building Classroom Library
• 300-600 books
• Wide range of reading difficulty
• Permanent “core” collection and regularly replenished “revolving” collection
• Variety of genres
• New books with appealing covers
• Attractive, inviting setting
The literature selection should include:
• Traditional stories: Familiar stories that are found in every culture, including fables, folk tales, myths and legends
• Fantasy: Stories that contain characters who may have superhuman powers that spark children... 1 notes
notes24 JAN 2015 by ideonexus
Animal Plants: Life Adapted to a Vacuum
"These remarkable creatures combine the characteristics of animals and plants and so I call them animal-plants. ..."
"All right. Don't get angry. Just explain how your creatures avoid getting dried up like mummies."
"That is simple. Their skin is covered with a glassy layer, thin and flexible but absolutely impermeable to gases and liquids and all kinds of particles, so that the creatures are protected from any loss of material. . . . Their bodies have appendages which look like wings and a...Folksonomies: speculation
Folksonomies: speculation
1 notes
notes24 DEC 2013 by ideonexus
Pragmamorphism
Anthropomorphism means attributing the characteristics of human beings to inanimate things or animals. I have invented the word “pragmamorphism” as a shorthand abstraction for the attribution of the properties of inanimate things to human beings. One of the meanings of the Greek word pragma is “a material object.”
Being pragmamorphic sounds equivalent to taking a scientific attitude toward the world, but it easily evolves into dull scientism. It’s pragmamorphic to equate material ...
1 Emanuel Derman on the habit of attributing properties of inanimate things to human beings, like PET scans to emotion, or IQ to intelligence. Like making a digital representation of an analog system.
27 NOV 2013 by ideonexus
Adventists Live Longer
In America here, life expectancy for the average woman is 80. But for an Adventist woman, their life expectancy is 89. And the difference is even more pronounced among men, who are expected to live about 11 years longer than their American counterparts. Now, this is a study that followed about 70,000 people for 30 years. Sterling study. And I think it supremely illustrates the premise of this Blue Zone project.
This is a heterogeneous community. It's white, black, Hispanic, Asian. The only t...Habits and characteristics of Adventists that may lend to their longer lifespans.
08 NOV 2013 by ideonexus
We are Ultimately Responsible for Our Fate
Thus it is that (to ensure feeding and breeding), "Nature" during the aeons of experimentation which we call "Evolution" has developed a variety of fixed preservative instincts, traits, and characteristics in the animal world. From the animal world, we as animals have inherited such of these instincts, traits, and characteristics as were necessary or most favorable to Man's survival and present dominance.
"Gifts": Peculiarly Human.
In addition to these, man lias acquired, attained, or bee... 1 notes
notesIf we choose to interfere with evolution and nature, then we are responsible for the consequences, but if we choose not to, then we are also responsible for the consequences.
08 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Characteristics of a Good Surgeon
It is necessary that a surgeon should have a temperate and moderate disposition. That he should have well-formed hands, long slender fingers, a strong body, not inclined to tremble and with all his members trained to the capable fulfilment of the wishes of his mind. He should be of deep intelligence and of a simple, humble, brave, but not audacious disposition. He should be well grounded in natural science, and should know not only medicine but every part of philosophy; should know logic well...Folksonomies: virtue
Folksonomies: virtue
1 notes
notesA list of talents and virtues.
05 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Survival of the Fittest Doesn't Apply to Animals in a Soc...
Such biological ideas as the 'survival of the fittest,' whatever their doubtful value in natural science, are utterly useless in attempting to understand society ... The life of a man in society, while it is incidentally a biological fact, has characteristics that are not reducible to biology and must be explained in the distinctive terms of a cultural analysis ... the physical well-being of men is a result of their social organization and not vice versa ... Social improvement is a product of...Folksonomies: society social darwinism
Folksonomies: society social darwinism
1 notes
notesWhere all members rely on all other members.
04 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Genetics Grew Up an Orphan
In a sense, genetics grew up as an orphan. In the beginning botanists and zoologists were often indifferent and sometimes hostile toward it. 'Genetics deals only with superficial characters', it was often said. Biochemists likewise paid it little heed in its early days. They, especially medical biochemists, knew of Garrod's inborn errors of metabolism and no doubt appreciated them in the biochemical sense and as diseases; but the biological world was inadequately prepared to appreciate fully ... 1 notes
notesGeorge Beadle in 'Genes and chemical reactions In Neurospora' describes out botanists, zoologists, and biochemists were uninterested in genetics as it dealt simply with the transmission of characteristics between individuals while there were greater things to study in the field.
