Read on Twitter
Best of 2020 from The Browser:
1/ An iconoclastic take on the history of philosophy by @FakeNousBlog. “We should think, for example, about what is the right thing to do, not what Kant said was the right thing to do." (Jan 2020) http://fakenous.net/?p=1168
1/ An iconoclastic take on the history of philosophy by @FakeNousBlog. “We should think, for example, about what is the right thing to do, not what Kant said was the right thing to do." (Jan 2020) http://fakenous.net/?p=1168
2/ Everything you could reasonably want from a heist story. High-class crooks, meticulous planning, safe-deposit boxes, storm drains, fake guns, bags of money — and a perfect get-away. (Feb 2020, by @joshdean66) https://www.gq.com/story/the-great-buenos-aires-bank-heist
3/ Imagined case study detailing a different way to organize & incentivize society to function. Per @robertcottrell, "as if A.P. Herbert and Jonathan Swift had put their heads together with Ted Chiang." (March 2020, by @slatestarcodex) https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/03/30/legal-systems-very-different-from-ours-because-i-just-made-them-up/
4/ An engaged approach to bird-watching, via Sibley's beautifully-illustrated book on North American birds. "You will learn faster if you can be an active observer — draw sketches, take notes, write poetry, or take photos." (April 2020, by @bjkingape) https://www.npr.org/2020/04/19/837047512/ever-wonder-what-its-like-to-be-a-bird-david-allen-sibley-has-some-answers
5/ Thrilling, discursive essay about depictions of the Mongols in 13C/14C European art & literature. Early travellers’ tales (eg.Marco Polo) sounded fanciful. Reality: when Mongol armies razed Russia & Hungary, it was terrifying. (May 2020, Pablo Maurette) https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/seeing-tartars/?ca_key_code=FA5LQA2
6/ “Using history to understand our present is a great impulse, but it means some of the false myths we tell about the Black Death & Renaissance are doing new damage". The Renaissance was not a golden age to actually live in. (June 2020, by @Ada_Palmer) https://www.exurbe.com/black-death-covid-and-why-we-keep-telling-the-myth-of-a-renaissance-golden-age-and-bad-middle-ages/
7/ A review of David Bentley Hart's 'Theological Territories' & 'That All Shall Be Saved'
"Hell is empty, and all the devils are right here."
(Summer 2020, by @alienvsrobbins) https://www.bookforum.com/print/2702/against-damnation-24038
"Hell is empty, and all the devils are right here."
(Summer 2020, by @alienvsrobbins) https://www.bookforum.com/print/2702/against-damnation-24038
8/ On Orde Wingate & Colin Gubbins, geniuses of irregular warfare in the modern era. Wingate "ate 6 raw onions a day & conducted press conferences in the nude while scrubbing himself with a wire brush." (Aug 2020, by Christopher D.Booth for @WarOnTheRocks) https://warontherocks.com/2020/08/when-youre-outnumbered-lessons-from-two-british-masters-of-irregular-warfare/
9/ Rome "did not see itself as a state which was harmed by private homicide" -- except parricide, where punishment was "to be sewn into a sack with a monkey, a snake, a dog and a chicken and thrown into the Tiber to drown". (Sept 2020, by @NuclearTeeth) https://www.historytoday.com/history-matters/how-get-away-murder
10/ "People who subscribe to ideology have thoughts, but are incapable of thinking for themselves. It is this inability to think, to keep one’s self company, to make meaning from one’s experiences, that makes them lonely." (Oct 2020, by @Samantharhill) https://aeon.co/essays/for-hannah-arendt-totalitarianism-is-rooted-in-loneliness
11/ Not all early settlers were strait-laced. Merrymount, a "neo-pagan experiment" & "fountainhead of erotic energy," was founded in 1626.
Appalled Puritans shut it down after 2 fun-filled years. (Nov 2020, by @WithEdSimon for @PublicDomainRev) https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/lord-of-misrule-thomas-mortons-american-subversions
Appalled Puritans shut it down after 2 fun-filled years. (Nov 2020, by @WithEdSimon for @PublicDomainRev) https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/lord-of-misrule-thomas-mortons-american-subversions
12/ Ancient Greeks knew that birds came & went with the seasons but the 'why' only surfaced by late 1800s. Theories: that birds hid & hibernated, or that they went to the moon - a round trip would take them a couple of months. (Dec 2020, by @drspacejunk) https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/when-birds-migrated-to-the-moon/
And, to cap off our yearly roundup, a bonus read from our most-recommended author of 2020, @AgnesCallard: What if humans do morality by way of vengeful grudges? (April 2020) http://bostonreview.net/forum/agnes-callard-philosophy-anger
