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Photo Hope for the Week
Go, Blue Jays!
Quote of the Week
In the 18th century, the Industrial Revolution was one of several revolutions that overturned society. Mechanical creatures intruded into farms and homes, but still this invasion had no name. Finally, in 1802, Johann Beckmann, an economics professor at Gottingen University gave this ascending force its name [technology] . . . He hoped his outline [a textbook titled Guide to Technology] would become the first course in the subject. It did that and more. It also gave a name to what we do. Once named, we could now see it. Having seen it, we wondered how anyone could not have seen it.
Source: Kevin Kelly, What Technology Wants
Posted: 2025 Oct 18Or check out this TEDxSF by Kelly.
Music of the Week
Category Archives: Through Space
Did You Ever Wonder?
Seeing books used as props, anywhere other than on a theatre stage, baffles and annoys me simultaneously. Books, dagnab it, are not meant to to complement the wallpaper, but to inform, teach, divert, or elevate. Continue reading
Working This Weekend?
Now, you can argue about the wisdom of messing with the environment on any scale. But what hit me was his sense of working on — of belonging to — a noble and enduring endeavour that would last well beyond his lifetime. Continue reading
Mind the Hole
Holes in the desert, ranging from the Grand Canyon to burrows for tiny rodents, inspire awe, albeit short-lived. Skunks, on the other hand, inspire a more focused mindfulness. Standing on the edge of a hole in the ground, I take … Continue reading
The Place Where
A trip back to my place of birth and home for a few decades leads to ruminations on home – what it has been for deep thinkers and poets, and what it is for me. Home is the place where, … Continue reading
We Got a Few of My Favourite Things
The last of eight observations on a recent Caribbean cruise, with apologies to both Toby Keith and Oscar Hammerstein II. Favourite question and answer on an island tour: Fellow traveller: Are the roads always busy like this? Guide: Not sometimes. … Continue reading
We Got Buyers, We Got Accosters
As we move through the Caribbean, the view changes with the location, but two things stay the same. The wind keeps blowing, and the crew keeps selling. Continue reading
We Got Rich Folks, We Got Poor Folks
The sixth of eight observations on a recent Caribbean cruise. In my own mind, I’m not rich: I work for a living, I make trade-offs, I watch my budget. But the Caribbean islands make me feel as uncomfortably rich as … Continue reading
We Got Photo Takers, and Music Makers
The fifth of eight observations on a recent Caribbean cruise. Brring, brring. It’s oh-six-hundred and something-or-other. The automated wake-up phone call startles me awake, as it has every morning since we sailed. We always seem to be (over)eating at sunset, … Continue reading
We Got Shoppers, We Got Sellers
The fourth of eight observations on a recent Caribbean cruise. Making my still-uncertain way from cabin to, well, anywhere on this ship, I pass shops selling cruise line souvenirs, jewelry, fine timepieces (aka ‘watches’), specialty liquors, leather accessories, and modern … Continue reading