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Will the U.S. Pass a Point of No Return?

August 16, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

In the Atlantic, James Fallows reports on the Ancient Rome and Modern American analogies. Now, chapter four: crossing the Rubicon. Schnurer argues that this is more than just a familiar phrase. And he says that a U.S. Rubicon moment is in view—which would be triggered by a possible indictment of Donald Trump. At the end … [Read more…]

Posted in: Climate Change, Environment, Ethical and green living, Faits Divers, Obituaries, Pandemic, Politics, Racism, Sea Stories, Trump Tagged: Augustus, Catiline, Donald J. Trump, immunity, Julius Caesar, Marc Antony, Roman, Roman Empire, Roman Republic, Rome, Rubicon

The Black Reporter Who Exposed a Lie About the Atom Bomb

August 9, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

Charles H. Loeb defied the American military’s denials and propaganda to show how deadly radiation from the strike on Hiroshima sickened and killed. In the New York Times today is an account of the work of Charles Loeb, an American war correspondent in the Pacific in World War II.

Posted in: Environment, Faits Divers, Obituaries, Politics, Racism, Science, the Anthropocene Tagged: Atom Bomb, atomic age, Black journalist, Charles H. Loeb, Hiroshima, Japan, Maj. Gen. Leslie R. Groves, Manhattan Project, Nagasaki, National Negro Publishers Association, Propaganda, radiation, The Atlanta Daily World, U.S. Army, war correspondent, World War II

Spain bans small boats from stretch of water after orca encounters

August 8, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

In today’s Guardian, an article about the recent spate of encounters between small sail boats and Orca’s off the coast of Spain.

Posted in: Climate Change, Environment, Ethical and green living, Faits Divers, Science, Sea Stories, the Anthropocene Tagged: Cape Trafalgar, cetaceans, ferries, fishing, Galicia, Gibraltar, Orca, sailboats, Spain, whale watching

Ilona Royce Smithkin, Improbable Muse in Fashion and Art, Dies at 101

August 7, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

Over at the New York Times is a obituary about Ilona Royce Smithkin who lived a unique life.

Posted in: Faits Divers, Feminism, Obituaries, Thinking about Tagged: Ari Seth Cohen, entertainers, filmmakers, Ilona Royce Smithkin, muse, nonagenarian, orange-haired, photographers

Modern Times Playlist

August 3, 2021 by sergneri 1 Comment

Alan Chapman hosts Modern Times On Saturday nights between 10 and 12 P.M., on KDFC radio (and www.kdfc.com), Alan Chapman hosts Modern Times, his curation of modern “classical” music. I’ve been logging the titles played over the course of the last 18 months and present them here as a “Playlist” one can use to explore … [Read more…]

Posted in: Faits Divers, Modern Music, Thinking about Tagged: Alan Chapman, classical, KDFC, Modern Times, music, Playlist, radio, streaming

Roberto Calasso, Renaissance Man of Letters, Dies at 80

July 31, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

In the NY Times: Roberto Calasso, Renaissance Man of Letters, Dies at 80 A Florentine by birth, he was a polymath as an author and publisher (Kafka, Verdic philosophy, Greek mythology) who reached a wide international readership. In “The Art of the Publisher,” his reflections on his decades in publishing, Mr. Calasso was diffident about … [Read more…]

Posted in: Faits Divers, Obituaries, Sea Stories, Thinking about Tagged: 2021, Adelphi Edizioni, ancient human consciousness, author, civilization, Greek mythology, Ka, Kafka, Milan, myths, polymath, publisher, rituals, Roberto Calasso, shared stories, The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony, translator, Verdic philosophy

Yep, it’s bleak, says expert who tested 1970s end-of-the-world prediction

July 25, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

In the Guardian, Yep, it’s bleak, says expert who tested 1970s end-of-the-world prediction, A controversial MIT study from 1972 forecast the collapse of civilization – and Gaya Herrington is here to deliver the bad news

Posted in: Climate Change, Environment, Ethical and green living, Faits Divers, Future of Work, IT Failures, Pandemic, Politics, Science, Sea Stories, the Anthropocene, Thinking about Tagged: 1972, Beyond Growth, climate crisis, Club of Rome, Earth First!, economic growth, extreme weather, Gaya Herrington, geopolitical instability, Greenpeace, Limits to Growth, MIT, Population, social unrest, sustainability

Paul Auerbach, pioneer of wilderness and disaster medicine, dies at 70

July 21, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

In a Washington Post obituary, accomplishments and life of Dr. Paul Auerbach, pioneer of wilderness and disaster medicine, are detailed. Even with his extensive training in medical emergencies, Dr. Auerbach was unprepared for the devastation he encountered when he volunteered to travel to Haiti to care for victims of the earthquake that struck the Caribbean … [Read more…]

Posted in: Climate Change, Environment, Ethical and green living, Faits Divers, Obituaries, Science, the Anthropocene Tagged: climate change, Enviromedics, Human Health, Paul Auerbach, SEMPER, Stanford Emergency Medicine Program for Emergency Response, Wilderness Medical Society

Everyone should read this The 3 Simple Rules That Underscore the Danger of Delta

July 5, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

Everyone should read this From the Atlantic: The 3 Simple Rules That Underscore the Danger of Delta Vaccines are still beating the variants, but the unvaccinated world is being pummeled. By Ed Yong

Posted in: Faits Divers, Pandemic, Science Tagged: Alpha variant, AstraZeneca, B.1.1.7, B.1.617.2, breakthrough cases, Coronavirus, COVID-19, deadlier, Delta variant, Immunocompromised, Long-COVID, long-haulers, Moderna, Novavax, Pfizer-BioNTech, unvaccinated, Vaccines, variants

Jon Hassell, avant-garde US composer, dies aged 84

June 27, 2021 by sergneri Leave a Comment

A nice obituary, by Alexis Petridis on the Guardian for Jon Hassell, a musician who blew me away in 1980 with sounds I couldn’t categorize. I still can’t. as Eno put it, “one overriding principle in Jon’s work [was] that of respect – he looks at the world with all its momentary and evanescent moods … [Read more…]

Posted in: Ethical and green living, Faits Divers, Modern Music, Obituaries, Pandemic, the Anthropocene, Thinking about Tagged: 1980, avant-garde, Brian Eno, Can, David Sylvian, electronic effects, Fourth World 1: Possible Musics, global sounds, Hassell, Holger Czukay, Indian music, Irmin Schmidt, jazz, John Cale, Jon Hassell, Karlheinz Stockhausen, La Monte Young, Pandit Pran Nath, Peter Gabriel, raga, Robert Moog, sampling, Sterling Morrison, Talking Heads, Tears for Fears, Terry Riley, Theatre of Eternal Music, trumpet, trumpet player
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