Remarkable Insights from Working with Translators

Posted on February 1, 2019 by JMN

nyti.ms/2UzwdPr

A connection between languages

On this day in 1786, a Briton living in India delivered a discourse on a little-known proposition: that Sanskrit, Persian, Latin, Greek and other languages might have a common source.

The commentary set off the field of comparative linguistics. Its fruits are known today as the concept of Proto-Indo-European, a mother language for dozens of tongues. The idea revolutionized not only the study of language, but also the sense of human history.

(NYTimes, 2-1-19)

(c) 2019 JMN.

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Planck’s Comment (from Reddit)

Posted on January 30, 2019 by JMN

TIL Max Planck was told by his professor not to go into physics because “almost everything is already discovered.” Planck said he didn’t want to discover anything, just learn the fundamentals. (r/todayilearned)

Me. Ditto. Music. That guitar.

(c) 2019 JMN.

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What’s Done

Posted on January 30, 2019 by JMN

What’s done is dung and cannot be undung.

(Karl Ove Knausgaard. Quoted by Dwight Garner in his review of Chris Christie’s “Let Me Finish,” NYTimes, 1-28-19)

(c) 2019 JMN.

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Opinion | Warning! Everything Is Going Deep: ‘The Age of Surveillance Capitalism’ – The New York Times

Posted on January 30, 2019 by JMN

Deep learning, deep insights, deep artificial minds — the list goes on and on. But with unprecedented promise comes some unprecedented peril.
— Read on www.nytimes.com/2019/01/29/opinion/artificial-intelligence-surveillance.html

… Deep trust and deep loyalty cannot be forged overnight. They take time. That’s one reason this old newspaper I work for — the Gray Lady [i.e. The New York Times] — is doing so well today. Not all, but many people, are looking for trusted navigators.

(Thomas L. Friedman, “Warning! Everything Is Going Deep: ‘The Age of Surveillance Capitalism’,” NYTimes, 1-29-19)

(c) 2019 JMN.

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Fixing To

Posted on January 30, 2019 by JMN

[Drawing by Tom Jones]

I’m fixing to get back into the swing of things blogwise. Since November I’ve been immersed in a Mediterranean voyage of discovery and recovery in the family nature of things.

“Fixing to” (the “g” is silent) is a Texas colloquialism meaning “in the throes of preparation for doing” or “gripped by anticipation of pending effort to accomplish” or “about to undertake” something. You hear it in expressions such as “I’m fixin’ to cook supper.” It’s like saying, “I haven’t started yet, but heading for the kitchen is on my mind.”

Kind visitors to Ethical Dative whom I’ve neglected: Kindly abide my lapse. I’m fixin’ to catch up with some of what I’ve missed of your work.

(c) 2019 JMN.

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The Prado Turns 200

Posted on January 28, 2019 by JMN

nyti.ms/2S6Mi1u

The exhibition, called “A Place of Memory” and running through March 10, shows how, right from the beginning, the Prado navigated the often choppy waters of Spanish politics, as the country went from being an imperial power to a nation divided by civil war, and then through dictatorship to the democracy it is today.

(c) 2019 JMN.

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Study suggests wood type has little effect on guitars’ sound

Posted on January 27, 2019 by JMN

According to many musicians, in order to have the best sound possible, an acoustic guitar has to be made from the “right” type of wood. Unfortunately, such wood often comes from endangered, unsustainably-harvested trees. A new study, however, suggests that wood type makes essentially no difference.
— Read on newatlas.com/guitar-wood-types/58139/

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Follow the Money

Posted on January 27, 2019 by JMN

www.artorbiter.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Pat-Steir-Facebook.jpg

“It was unimaginable to everyone around me that a small girl — not even a big strapping girl — could live a life as an artist and stay alive and committed,” Ms. Steir said. Her father had gone to art school but, with four children to support, couldn’t achieve his dream of being an artist. He encouraged his daughter to be a poet because he thought she would make more money.

(Hilarie M. Sheets, “Pat Steir Gets Discovered, Again,” NYTimes, 1-18-19)

(c) 2019 JMN.

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Looking Through Viral Writing

Posted on January 24, 2019 by JMN

The lesson here is really to question, what is the genuine source of this content and how is it being frames [sic]. And then, how is that framing elevated by the the news media that you’re looking through?” said Louis Matsakis, who writes about cyber security and online culture for Wired.

(CBS News, “Twitter nixes account that helped to spread viral confrontation video,” 1-23-19)

(c) 2019 JMN.

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In Search Of

Posted on January 20, 2019 by JMN

… In the actual history of the human race “traditional masculinity” as a single coherent category simply does not exist.

To pluck only Western examples, there is no single “traditional” model that can encompass strong, silent types and romantic poets, chivalric knights and laconic cowboys, the sorrowing Young Werther and the stiffened upper lip, the machismo of the Mediterranean and the mysticism of the Celts, Jimmy Stewart and Cary Grant and John Wayne.

(Ross Douthat, “In Search of Non-Toxic Manhood,” NYTimes, 1-19-19)

(c) 2019 JMN.

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