The question, what is dominant, human ‘nature’, or ‘nurture’ (culture), has been the motivating force in a debate that has waged since at least the 18th and 19th centuries — for instance in the work of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (see his prize-winning Academy of Dijon essay on the question, whether human morals had improved by, or […]
cinema
Posted inEquality, Gender violence, General, Health, Media, Tech
Walls and razor wire, or acceptance of different others?
Two days ago, November 9 2019, marked 30 years since the fall of the Berlin wall, and the irony has not escaped some people, that today one witnesses walls going up again everywhere. Nick Miller, in the Sydney Morning Herald (November 2 2019), for example, writes: Thirty years ago the Berlin Wall fell, pulling the […]
Posted inGeneral, Health, Media
Season 2 of True Detective — A ‘noir’ reflection of our broken society?
When the first season of True Detective was broadcast — with Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey as two detectives out to solve a case that seemed intractable in the extreme, with a gritty cinematic style and refusal to compromise itself for the sake of satisfying the usual Hollywood saccharine, sentimentalist demands regarding plot structure — […]
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Should one question technology’s drive for dominance?
In a sense, the titular question, above, is redundant. Technology is, after all, already dominant — a claim that hardly needs to be substantiated with evidence; it is there for everyone to perceive on a daily basis. Not that the objects of ‘perception’ are self-evident in any straightforward way. In social reality a good deal […]
Posted inEquality, Gender violence, General, Health, Lifestyle, Media
Sense8 – The full spectrum of life and love
Although I have done work on the astonishing Netflix television series, Sense8 (a play on ‘sensate’) before, it was restricted to the first season. Since then, I have viewed the Christmas Special, the second season, as well as the two-and-a-half hour conclusion-substitute for a third season (which was ‘inexplicably’ cancelled by Netflix), Love Conquers All, […]
Posted inEnvironment, General, Media, Tech
‘Beyond Humanism’ in Wroclaw, Poland
We are in the beautiful and ancient city of Wroclaw, Poland (the former Breslau, in German), at the 10th International ‘Beyond Humanism’ conference, where theorists of post- and transhumanism come together (in a different country) every year. It is the third of these inter- and multidisciplinary conferences that we have attended, and as before, the […]
Posted inEnvironment, General, Health, Media, Tech
The destructive approach to nature: ‘Geostorm’
We are in Porto, Portugal, for an interdisciplinary international conference, and already we are impressed by the beauty of this old city. As usual, because I find seats on a passenger jet too uncomfortable to sleep, I used the time to catch up on some movies, including I, Tonya, with Margot Robbie’s Oscar-quality performance in […]
Posted inEquality, General, Media
The arts and transformation of the self and the world: ‘Take the Lead’
Recently, I had the privilege of delivering the opening address at the launch of Louisa Punt-Fouché’s volume of poetry, ‘Ek skryf met Bloed en Bene’ (read it here), at the newly established art gallery on her and her husband, Ian Punt’s Kredouw Olive Estate, in the Swartberg. Surrounding myself and all the guests gathered there […]
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The craving for power
The hankering after power is as old as human beings; no, older – it is as old as the first unicellular being that emerged from the primeval morass of evolution. After all, like all organisms since then, it would have tried its primitive best to survive, to stave off death. And isn’t that already an […]
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What makes for a good life: Scott’s ‘A Good Year’
On the way to and back from Tokyo, I treated myself on two viewings (after seeing it once, I could not resist watching it again) of Ridley Scott’s uplifting film, ‘A Good Year’ (20th Century Fox, 2006), and was impressed, once again, by the director’s ability to work convincingly in different genres. After all, judging […]
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‘In Bruges’: Film-making at its best
Martin McDonagh’s dark crime-comedy In Bruges (Universal Studios 2008) represents film-making at its best. Without excessive reliance on the special effects with which Hollywood is infatuated (and infected), and simply by employing the basics of cinema – successive images and sounds – it manages to draw its audiences into the unlikely world of professional assassins, […]
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The lost sense of community: Christopher Nolan’s ‘Dunkirk’
Christopher Nolan’s recently released feature film Dunkirk not only fills a long-existing gap in cinematic coverage of important historical (particularly wartime) events; it also highlights something of contemporary significance: the glaring difference between the world of the 1940s and that of today, namely the strong sense of community that animated people back then, and which, […]