I have never been a huge fan of the Tiffany Aching Discworld novels. Probably because I am no longer a young adult, despite what the barman at the Squinting Cat insists. Still, it was readable and the Nac Mac Feegle are cool characters.
Most excitingly, that makes the next Discworld novel Going Postal. Which, has now been built up so much in my mind that it can only be a huge disappointment…
The 1859 essay (very long essay) by John Stuart Mill sets forth his views on liberty. It contains a lot of things we take for granted in discourse today, but back then was probably original and challenging thought.
Below, I have picked out some of the thoughts I found most interesting.
On the persecution of truth. Mill suggests that maybe we should persecute it, because it cannot do truth any harm, but will weed out nonsense. However, he then counters by pointing out that there are lots of historical example of when truth was successfully dismissed. “Men are not more zealous for truth, than they are for error”. However, like a good trick in evolution (as Daniel Dennett would say), a correct idea will eventually be discovered time and time again.
On the origin of morals in Christianity, Mill points out that Christians have both Christian morals and societal morals, and only follow the Christian morals that match those of society. They don’t for example avoid shellfish or sell all their possessions to give the money to the poor.
He also argues Christianity is also inherently negative. Thou shall not, rather than thou shall. Then backing it up with the Heaven-Hell carrot-stick.
How do we balance individual liberty with the interests of society? Mill argues that we should basically be allowed to do whatever we want as long as it does not harm others. The “harm others” could be a broad church though. If the actions of a man harm his duty to his family for example, we could arguably interfere.
He also notes that you do not need to enforce everything through law. Social rules and conventions can also be used to police behaviour.
Mill argues for universal education, but only that the state should require parents to provide education for their child. He is against the state providing such an education because the state could use it to educate everyone to their own will.
If a Very Short Introduction lacked any context to Nietzsche’s work, Philosophy in an Hour provides the opposite. It is a 50-minute biography of Nietzsche’s life, with almost no discussion of what his work was about. It was entertaining and easy to follow though.
After that it moves on to a 20 minute afterword in which there is some discussion of Nietzsche’s ideas and even, crazy as it sounds, some quotes from Nietzsche’s work. Much better, but still not brilliant.
This is the first Oscar Wilde piece I have read. It is slightly shorter than the average novel, making it a very manageable read, as well as being a good story.
It is an interesting concept, the idea that the sin of your life is written across your face. Luckily of course, it is not the case. Elina’s face remains youthful and attractive despite spending almost the past two years “living in sin†as her Christian colleague regularly reminds her.
The response of the emergency services on 7 July was inspiring. But what I found more inspiring was what people did on 8 July. They got back on the buses, they got back on the underground, and they showed that they were no afraid.
Just like people did in the Second World War. Keep calm and carry on. These days that phrase is unfortunately associated with fuck-wit hipsters, to the point where it is easy to forget its important origins as a motivational poster to support the blitz. When the shit falls, you don’t run scared, you don’t get angry, you just carry on and show them you will not be victimised.
This book is rubbish.
I had the audiobook edition and it is narrated by Christine Williams. I did not get along with her voice. Its level, unemotional, snyhtetic none meant it took me quite a while to work out whether it was actually a human reading it or some kind of experiment to see whether a computer could voice an audiobook.
The content was no better. No real introduction was provided and nothing was ever put in context. There was a discussion of Nietzsche’s books, but with no provision for those who are not already familiar with the man or philosophy in general. I could not follow what was going on. Not what I was looking for in a book entitled introduction.
I was in a pub last week when I heard a song Snowy White – Bird In Paradise. Here it is:
If you are a Dire Straits fan, you might notice it sounds uncomfortably similar to Brothers in Arms:
Bird In Paradise came out in 1983, beating Brothers In Arms by two years.
I have not ready that many biographies, so it is hard to judge quality. However, I was impressed by Walter Isaacson. He has spoken to everybody. Well, perhaps not presidents, but most people not only those at Apple and Jobs’ family but also pretty much everyone who ever talked to Jobs, including many business-celebrities.
Isaacson says he hopes he has presented an honest book. You would certainly hope so, as the idea of Jobs being even more of an insufferable dick that he is portrayed in the book is a scary thing to imagine. A great man none the less, but a difficult one to get along with.
It got quite depressed with the first section of the book. There was Jobs, younger that I was, doing something he loved, building a great company, carving out his place in the tech industry. When I compare that to what I am doing with my life, I come off pretty poorly.
I was comforting to know that Jobs’ live was not all work and no play though. I sometimes wonder, when playing guitar or in the rare moments when I am actually relaxing, whether the true winners in this world are so driven they would never waste their time enjoying themselves and thus I am not one of them. However, Jobs has plenty of time for messing around bootlegging Dylan tapes and shouting at waitresses. That is not to say he was not a hard-worker when needed and an incredibly driven human being. But it does show you can you can something great while still having the time to obsess over a washing machine for a month.
I recently bought myself a copy of Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s River Cottage Vegetable Cookbook and I have been using the downtime over Christmas to working through some of the recipes. I’ve had mixed results.
Disastrously Sainsbury’s online do not sell Swiss chard – this is figuratively a middle class nightmare. It is also difficult because every single recipe seems to start with “chop and then fry a large onion”…
Chakchouka
Mostly made of peppers and tomatoes, then you bake a couple of eggs in it. The egg was good. It also smells increasingly nice as you cook it.
Pinto Bean Chilli
A bit of a hassle to make because you have to soak the pinto beans overnight. You also need to add plenty of chilli. The first one I did I had deseeded the chilli and it was a bit bland, whereas the second one that included the seeds was much better.
North African squash and chickpea soup
Barely looks anything like the picture.
Pearl barley broth
To really get the croutons right you need to let the bread go stale.
Beetroot soup
Nicer than it sounds. But that is a fairly low bar to beat.
Squash and fennel lasagne
This is also a pain to make. You have to bake the squash while sautéing the fennel and boiling the sauce before combing it all together and baking some more. Very nice though, probably due to the quantity of cheese in it. I think I actually prefer fennel cold.
Last month I took my mum to see The Who at Leeds Arena. It was nice to see a band worth going to playing there. The whole place was packed; I’ve never seen the arena have all of its sections open before. The couple behind us were talking about how they had not seen this band for 40 years.
They were excellent.
I was a bit cold at first as it was just Roger and Pete at the front of the stage, then a wall of amps, and the rest of the band behind almost curtained off. Of course those two are the actual “Who”, but Zak Starkey has been drumming for them for over 15 years now.
However, as the show went on it got better and better. They played for two and a half hours. I do not think I could do that at my age, let alone theirs. Especially Starkey as although he is a lot younger, he has the most intensive job and did not have any songs off.
