Author Archives

Joseph Goldstein Interview (continued)

(first installment here)
Wright: If somebody gave you just two sentences to characterize the essence of Buddhism generically, could you even do that?
Joseph Goldstein: The Buddha did. He summed up the whole thing in one sentence. He said, “Nothing whatsoever is to be clung to as I or mine.” He said, “Whoever understands this [...]

Robert Wright interviews Joseph Goldstein

Among the tricks recommended in the voluminous online “how-to-blog-more-regularly” literature is: Write ‘em ahead of time and set ‘em up to post automatically in the future. I’m going to try that as a way of clearing out some of the stuff that’s been sitting around in my Drafts folder for a long time.
First [...]

Burma Cyclone Relief Fund

For anyone who’s wanted to help victims of Cyclone Nargis in Burma, but has been reluctant to donate because of reports that the country’s military leaders are not allowing aid into the country or confiscating it and distributing it as their own: there’s a way to provide aid that will go directly to those in [...]

Kim* on Philosophy of Mind

*(not this guy)
Kevin Kim is a reader and occasional commenter on this blog, and a blogger himself. Moreover, he’s the author of a (self-published) book entitled Water from a Skull: Essays on Religious Diversity, Christianity, Buddhism, Mind, and Other Things that Matter. I recently purchased a copy, thinking that reading it [...]

Reflections on C.S. Lewis

A few weeks ago I received, quite unexpectedly, a copy of C.S. Lewis’s Surprised my Joy from an old college friend. I couldn’t turn down such a direct invitation, so I’ve read it. Here’s a report.

Unimpressed by Joy

I’ve never been much of a Lewis fan; but, since I haven’t read very much [...]

This I did not know

If Walden was Thoreau’s flight from the market economy, it was, equally, a flight from women, from domesticity, from family life. He walked to town, nearly every day, to dine with friends; his mother often cooked for him…. Above all, he cherished his manly self-sufficiency (even though he carried his dirty laundry to Concord for [...]

Tetsugakuka no monogatari

My old colleague Dave Hildebrand has a penned (or keyboarded) a collection entitled FOUR HAIKU ON THE APA CONVENTION. Here are a couple of samples:
My book is just out.
See it here, amidst the dreck?
Pity the backlists!
Matrix of tables
Saunter forth, meet your makers.
Pluck you from job hell.

Let him be praised with great praise

A story in this morning’s Austin American-Statesman bears the headline “Parents feel ‘alienated’, seek ouster of school’s principal.” According to the story,
The parents said [Austin High School Principal John] Hudson does not support parents, students or teachers, and said he does not revere some of the 126-year-old school’s traditions. They fault him for cutting [...]