It’s cloudy and rainy in Seattle today and we had a rare dusting of snow last night. It’s a good day for reflection.
The World As It Is and The Way It Could Be
Category Archives: Advice
In Praise of Boredom
Joseph Brodsky (1940 – 1996)
In his wonderful blog “The Attic,” Bruce Watson, summarized Joseph Brodsky‘s views on boredom in “IN PRAISE OF BOREDOM.” I share the post below with my readers and encourage them to visit Watson’s site. Continue reading In Praise of Boredom
Online Game Addiction
1. THE PROBLEM
Discussions with more than a thousand college-aged students at one of the countries premier state universities have convinced me that video games ruin the social and scholastic life of many students. As a community, we must understand that this is indeed a problem. I don’t claim that this is our greatest social malady, but I do claim that many students—particularly computer science students at my university—have an addiction to these games. (And it is easy to infer that students at other institutions face this same problem.) Of course, the evidence for my claim, attested to by hundreds of students, is anecdotal. As such, it suffers from all the shortcomings of a non-scientific investigation; it is no substitute for serious investigation. With these caveats in place, I reiterate my concern about the effect contemporary computer games have on college students. Continue reading Online Game Addiction
How To Cope With This Stressful Presidency
What prepares men for the totalitarian domination in the non-totalitarian world is the fact that loneliness … has become an everyday experience of the ever growing masses of our century. The merciless process into which totalitarianism drives and organizes the masses looks like a suicidal escape from this reality. Continue reading How To Cope With This Stressful Presidency
What Should We Be Afraid Of?
My last post, “Guns are security blankets not insurance policies,” discussed the irrationality that often motivates people to possess firearms. This post tries to partly explain why fear in general is such a powerful motivator. Continue reading What Should We Be Afraid Of?