“The kiss is not only an expression of feeling; it is a means of provoking it. Cataglottism is by no means confined to pigeons” (OED, “cataglottism”).

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The discovery of one in a seaside development excavation, later realized to be kitsch imitation meerschaum, has unforeseen consequences in the subsequent preservationist/environmentalist debates–hinted, obliquely, to originate entelechically, these consequences by a Voegelinite in conversation with an inhabitant of seaside village. Titled, perhaps, “Immantenizing the Eschaton.”

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Is the title of a painting by Paul Laffoley. One of its features is the Agnosticon, described in Laffoley’s The Phenomenology of Revelation (Kent Fine Art, 1989) this way: The purpose of this device is to allow its user to engineer their doubt or faith processes. In my opinion, it is necessary to engineer doubt [...]

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“Every school boy in the streets of Göttingen understands more about four-dimensional geometry than Einstein. Yet , in spite of that, Einstein did the work and not the mathematicians.” So Palle Yourgrau quotes David Hilbert in A World without Time (Basic, 2005: p. 6). Or is there something about Göttingen I’m missing? Also, Bertrand Russell [...]

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Brian Cox starred in a German adaptation of The Invention of Morel. Perhaps I can succeed in tracking it down. Perhaps not in this case a “promoter of the first fucking degree.” Speaking of Deadwood, it’s worth pointing out–and perhaps the coda will address this–but it’s worth pointing out that the historical Seth Bullock was [...]

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I have to admit that I’m looking forward to the new Thomas Harris. The Silence of the Lambs, to be conventional, is a much better book than Hannibal, but I think the early Lecter promises to be good material. I’d recommend to all students of The Day the Earth Stood Still Paul Laffoley’s essay on [...]

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He told his questioners that Mr. Padilla was ignorant on the subject of nuclear physics and believed he could separate plutonium from nuclear material by rapidly swinging over his head a bucket filled with fissionable material. From the NYT.

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“‘Are you,’ I say to Joyce, hoping to draw him into conversation, ‘are you interested in murders?’ ‘Not,’ he answers, with gesture of a governess shutting the piano, ‘not in the very least.’” (July 30, 1931) From the fascismo period, I should note.

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I just picked up the Oxford World Classics omnibus edition of this in our Greenville-area megabook-jobber for what turned out to be about $3.33 (and The Meaning of Everything and an unambitious cookbook). I’d–surprisingly, given my natural interest–not read any of these brieflets before, and I’ve amused myself thus far with the Fanny Hill (the [...]

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I’ve personally always found more interesting than Lukacs and Gramsci, despite Tony Judt’s claim claim here that they are only of antiquarian interest. Several people I knew in graduate school were avid readers of The Spirit of Utopia, though I think I might have been the only person I knew to be interested in Goldmann’s [...]

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