Montaigne’s words on anger

Philosophy / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

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“There is no passion that so shakes the clarity of our judgment as anger,” Montaigne wrote in Book II of his Essays (Chapter 31). “It is a passion that takes pleasure in itself and flatters itself.” That strikes me a very Buddhist statement, a comment lifted from the Dhammapada, although Montaigne was a solid Catholic. It certainly has a similar wisdom. I have seen that anger cloud the judgment of people in political debate, on many stages from national to local. It blinds people to the reality of the issues, and carries them on a wave of self-induced pleasure, as ……… click below for more ↓

Dave Clark Five

Culture / Music & Reviews / Personal ReminiscencesLeave a comment

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We’re sitting on the front deck listening to British Sixties Radio, an internet radio station we like and listen to a lot, and they just played the Dave Clark Five doing Glad All Over. That song came out on the UK charts in January, 1964, reaching North America a bit later. Fifty years ago this year. I was a young teenager then, not long moved to a new apartment, going to high school, and listening to the music of the British Invasion on the transistor radio I carried everywhere with me. In another year or so, I would be moved ……… click below for more ↓

Shock Top beers

Food & Drink / Personal ReminiscencesLeave a comment

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Just tried two American beers from St. Louis: a Belgian White and Raspberry White, both in cans. The former has coriander, lime and lemon peel, the latter has, of course, raspberry flavour. I personally prefer the former, Susan the latter. I haven’t tried either with the slice of lime I put in most beers, but will next time. The lime will help cut the sweetness of the raspberry. I am impressed: they are delightful, fruity and refreshing beers for a Sunday afternoon in the fading sun, on our new front deck. Got them from the LCBO today, new things to ……… click below for more ↓

Montaigne’s library

Books & Reviews / Personal Reminiscences / Philosophy / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

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I read yesterday that Montaigne had a library of 1,000 books, of which he was very proud. It was his retreat – the room he went to where he wanted to get away from things and write. Machiavelli, too, had a study with a small collection of books he treasured, albeit a much smaller selection. Both, however, treasured the classic Greek and Roman authors, the wisdom of the ages. One thousand books is a remarkable collection, given that printing was barely a century old, and books were still quite expensive. He would have treasured every volume and known each title ……… click below for more ↓

Finding my muse in Montaigne

Blog & Blogging / Books & Reviews / Culture / Philosophy / What I'm Reading NowOne Comment

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Muse: a source of inspiration; especially a guiding genius; the imaginary force thought to provide inspiration to poets, writers, artists, etc. A muse, for modern writers, is that indefinable force that drives us to write. It’s part imagination, part inspiration. I suspect there’s a heady brew of psychology and biology at work, too. Why write instead of, say, paint? Or sculpt? Or compose? I don’t know. It just is, for me, the thing my muse – however you define that – compels me to pursue. It compels others, though in different ways, and many in much more creative and innovative ……… click below for more ↓

Another fad bites the dust

Bread & Baking / Food & DrinkOne Comment

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The gluten-free fad took another major hit to its already weakened credibility this week when researchers who had first diagnosed “non-celiac gluten sensitivity” found out that, oops, they were wrong. It doesn’t exist. A story in Business Insider tells the tale. In one of the best examples of science working, a researcher who provided key evidence of (non-celiac disease) gluten sensitivity recently published follow-up papers that show the opposite…It seems to be a “nocebo” effect — the self-diagnosed gluten sensitive patients expected to feel worse on the study diets, so they did. They were also likely more attentive to their ……… click below for more ↓

Two new books

Books & Reviews / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

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Yesterday I received two new books from Amazon: The Complete Works of Michel de Montaigne translated by Donald Frame, and How to Live: A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer by Sarah Bakewell. Montaigne lived and wrote in the 16th century, shortly after Machiavelli, and like the latter developed a new way of writing and seeing things. He might be described as the West’s first blogger in that he wrote about himself in a way that presaged today’s online bloggers. I look forward to reading his works and Bakewell’s biography and critique. I know little ……… click below for more ↓

My Grandfathers’ War

History & Biography / Politics / Social Order & Disorder / War & MilitaryLeave a comment

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One hundred years ago World War I began, a war that started as a clash in a tiny, almost unknown Balkan state and blossomed into a violent, gruesome war that spread across Europe, the Middle East and reached into Africa and Asia. Within a few years, tens of millions would be dead, the political face of the world changed and almost all of the great royal houses of Europe would be deposed and broken. An entire culture, a society of class and place, was overthrown. The timeline of the origins of WWI is complex and, from this century of temporal ……… click below for more ↓

New post on the Municipal Machiavelli

Books & Reviews / Municipal Politics / PoliticsLeave a comment

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I’ve written a short post that I trust will serve as an introduction to a longer piece I plan to write. It’s on the letter of Quintus Tullius Cicero to his brother on how to win an election (written circa 64 BCE). You can read it here: ianchadwick.com/machiavelli/quintus-ciceros-letter-on-elections/ I will be working on a more in-depth analysis of Cicero’s letter and a comparison with Machiavelli’s works and other political pieces in the near future.

What’s in a (Popular) Name?

Critical Thinking / Psychology & Sociology / Social Order & Disorder3 Comments

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“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet.” Juliet, in Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2) A recent article in The Atlantic about how our names impact our lives got me to thinking about how and why we name our children – and what they say about us, about our parents, what our names mean to others of their generation. And why are some names popular at certain times in history. Like now. According to babycenter.com, these are the ten most popular baby names for 2013: Girls: Sophia Emma Olivia Isabella Mia Ava ……… click below for more ↓

Neolithic site dig uncovers sophisticated structures

Critical Thinking / Culture / England and Britain / History & Biography / Media Issues / Places & Geography / Science & TechnologyLeave a comment

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A Neolithic site in the Orkney Islands shows our ancestors had sophisticated building skills more than 5,000 years ago. According to a story in The Scotsman, A groundbreaking excavation of a 5,000-year-old temple complex in Orkney has uncovered evidence to suggest that prehistoric people were a great deal more sophisticated than previously thought. The archaeological dig at the Ness of Brodgar, which is still in its early stages, has already thrown up discoveries that archaeologists say will force us to re-evaluate our understanding of how our ancestors lived. The picture that has emerged so far points to a complex and ……… click below for more ↓

Ruthful, funct and doleless

Books & Reviews / Language & Grammar / Style & usage / Words & etymologyLeave a comment

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Why can’t someone be clueful, only clueless? Hapful, not simply hapless? Aweless instead of just awful? Ruthful not merely ruthless? Doleless, not just doleful? Gormful, not just gormless? We can be thoughtful or thoughtless, careful or careless, mindful and mindless. Why not ruthful and gormful? Why not the qualities of ruthiness, gormliness and doleliness? Can we be kempt or just unkempt? Couth or just uncouth? Gruntled or just disgruntled? Shevelled or just dishevelled?* Maculate or just immaculate? Domitable, or just indomitable? Ruly or just unruly? Can we come ravelled instead of just unravelled? Can we member a corpse instead of just ……… click below for more ↓

Six years ago…

Blog & Blogging / Personal ReminiscencesLeave a comment

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I received a notification last week from WordPress noting that I registered with them six years ago. Six years with their blogging platform… happy anniversary to me… what, no flowers? Party favours? Is this my modern life: email reminders from software companies? That got me thinking about dates and anniversaries. And in trying to recall them all, keep the dates straight. Pull the weave apart and follow the threads backwards. Why are we humans fixated with numbers that are easily divisible by five and ten? Is there any more relevance, more importance to an anniversary of 5, 10 or 20 years than ……… click below for more ↓

Gangs of Feathered T-Rex

Animals & BIology / Evolution & Paleontology / Science & TechnologyLeave a comment

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Imagine, if you will, an early morning scene in the late Cretaceous. The air is quiet as the day warms. At the edge of a large forest a plain of ferns ripples in the light breeze (grass would not evolve for another 20 or so million years). Under the canopy of the ancient beeches and maples, there is movement. Nothing fast, just a hint. A flash of mottled colour against the background. A glint of light off an eye. A soft snuffling. A feather falls silently to the forest floor. Among the nearby ferns, a pack of ceratopsians grazes, adults watching the ……… click below for more ↓

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