November 16, 2009

Cirkus Cirkor

This weekend I attended Cirkus Cirkor, the Swedish physical spectacle about life (a truly stunning performance work). Sadly, the cirkus has moved on from New York’s BAM. Try to catch it next year if you can!

November 12, 2009

The Origins of English Words by Joseph T. Shipley

(a short excerpt from section, Frequent Word Forms and Transformations).

In the 16th and 17th centuries, in the fervor of the English Renaissance, writers took pride in the invention of words from Greek and Latin sources. They proudly put forth their own creations, and disdainfully put down those of their fellows.

Thus Puttenham in 1589 boasted of having formed scientific, idiom, methodical, savage, audacious, numerosity, implete, politien; the last three have not survived. In 1592 Thomas Nashe heaped scorn upon Gabriel Harvey for having coined jovial, rascality, notoriety, extensively. In his play The Poetaster Ben Jonson makes John Marston spew out the words retrograde, damp, strenuous, spurious, defunct, clumsy, prorump, obstupefact, ventositious; the last three died aborning, although obstupefact sounds worth a resurrection.

Shakespeare, as might be expected, was the greatest wordfacturologist of them all. Well known is his one-time honorificabilitudinitatibus, with its long alternation on consonants and vowels. Less well know is the fact that of the 17,677 words Shakespeare used in his works, well over 1700 are recorded there for the first time, one new word in every ten. Here is a tiny sampling:  aerial, assassination, auspicious, barefaced, castigate, clangor, critic, critical, compunctious, countless, what the dickens, eventful, laughable, leapfrog, misplaced, monumental, seamy, lapse, hurry, perusal, sportive, impartial.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, these are the 100 commonest English words. Interestingly, the first word with more than one syllable is about (45), and the first noun to appear is time (55). You will find lots to learn on this webpage, you should take a read.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, these are the 100 commonest English words. Interestingly, the first word with more than one syllable is about (45), and the first noun to appear is time (55).

You will find lots to learn on this webpage, you should take a read.

“ Language is the garden of man’s mind; its fertility, and its beauty, rise from its roots. Il faut cultiver notre jardin (we must tend our own garden).
Voltaire
November 11, 2009

In this beautiful eight minute film, Making Andrew, by Dutch film maker Margot Donkervoort, you can see the process from start to finish of Guy Reid making a sculpture.

Since 2006, NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has been orbiting Mars, currently circling approximately 300 km (187 mi) above the Martian surface. On board the MRO is HiRISE, the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera, which has been photographing the planet for several years now at resolutions as fine as mere inches per pixel. In this photograph you see part of Abalos Undae dune field. (via Martian landscapes - The Big Picture)

Since 2006, NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has been orbiting Mars, currently circling approximately 300 km (187 mi) above the Martian surface. On board the MRO is HiRISE, the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera, which has been photographing the planet for several years now at resolutions as fine as mere inches per pixel.

In this photograph you see part of Abalos Undae dune field.

(via Martian landscapes - The Big Picture)

“ A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
Robert Anson Heinlein
November 10, 2009

waysiveavoidedstudyingforfinals:

If you’ve never seen this video, in which Mr. Rogers defends the use of public money for PBS, you really owe it to yourself to watch this.

A very beautiful video. I have watched it three times now.

What's your philosophy type?

Apparently I’m most similar to Zeno of Citium.

November 9, 2009
Union street community graden

Union street community graden

November 6, 2009
Writing back and forth with friend and physicist, PK, he said to me, “Learning is the time rate change of understanding.” This is how you can visualize that definition as an equation. My questions are: How do I define/ quantify Understanding? How do I define/ quantify Time? If you have any ideas, thoughts, suggestions, conclusions, insight, or inspiration please send it to me in email form!

Writing back and forth with friend and physicist, PK, he said to me, “Learning is the time rate change of understanding.”

This is how you can visualize that definition as an equation.

My questions are:

  • How do I define/ quantify Understanding?
  • How do I define/ quantify Time?

If you have any ideas, thoughts, suggestions, conclusions, insight, or inspiration please send it to me in email form!