I went up to the McMichael Collection recently. (Its history of ownership and control is unique in Canada, I think; see the Wikipedia article for more.) The sign at the entrance desk says an adult ticket is $20. I handed over a $20 bill.
“Twenty fifty,” said the attendant. I was a bit confused, but handed over a fiver and got change back.
My receipt said admission is $17.70, plus $2.30 HST (harmonized sales tax of 13%; in Ontario that is the combination of 5% federal tax and 8% provincial tax). That equals $20. A nice round number.
But then the receipt says: “Processing fee: $0.50.”
I emailed the gallery: “Why is the fee charged on cash payments?”
The response: “The Software Processing fee applies per ticket transactions including cash.”
I’m new to the Mindscape podcast by physicist Sean Carroll, but I’m very much enjoying some of the episodes. He’s a good interviewer, who gets right to the conversation and then asks good questions, lets the guest talk but prods them along or probes a point when needed, and never does what bad interviewers do: “Actually that’s really interesting, because I [insert long personal anecdote].” A few episodes that looked interesting didn’t turn out to be, because of the guest, but it’s always easy to delete a podcast episode and move on.
This line from psychologist Ellen Langer (in episode 279) made me laugh. In a section on flow she says: “It’s interesting because Csimaksihalyi—well, we called him Mickey, can’t pronounce his name …”
From chapter fifty-five (“Is She Mad?”) of The Claverings (1867) by Anthony Trollope:
Men and women say that they will read, and think so,—those, I mean, who have acquired no habit of reading,—believing the work to be, of all works, the easiest. It may be work, they think, but of all works it must be the easiest of achievement. Given the absolute faculty of reading, the task of going through the pages of a book must be, of all tasks, the most certainly within the grasp of the man or woman who attempts it! Alas, no;—if the habit be not there, of all tasks it is the most difficult. If a man have not acquired the habit of reading till he be old, he shall sooner in his old age learn to make shoes than learn the adequate use of a book. And worse again;—under such circumstances the making of shoes shall be more pleasant to him than the reading of a book. Let those who are not old,—who are still young, ponder this well.
“Song for the Luddites” by Lord Byron comes from a letter he wrote to his friend Thomas Moore from Venice on 24 December 1816:
As the Liberty lads o’er the sea
Bought their freedom, and cheaply, with blood,
So we, boys, we
Will die fighting, or live free,
And down with all kings but King Ludd!
When the web that we weave is complete,
And the shuttle exchanged for the sword,
We will fling the winding sheet
O’er the despot at our feet,
And dye it deep in the gore he has poured.
Though black as his heart its hue,
Since his veins are corrupted to mud,
Yet this is the dew
Which the tree shall renew
Of Liberty, planted by Ludd!
I love the last line of the first stanza, so I got the Paranoid Print Company to make a vinyl sticker of it (4 in. wide).
Photo of the sticker, black text on white
I have a couple of dozen to give away, so if you’re in Canada and want one, send me an address and I’ll put one in the mail.
Byron’s maiden speech in the House of Lords had been against the anti-Luddite Frame-Breaking Act of 1812. It’s on page 600 of The Works of Lord Byron Complete in One Volume at the Internet Archive.
As a working artist in his third decade of professional life, I’ve concluded that the point of art is to take a big, numinous, irreducible feeling that fills the artist’s mind, and attempt to infuse that feeling into some artistic vessel – a book, a painting, a song, a dance, a sculpture, etc – in the hopes that this work will cause a loose facsimile of that numinous, irreducible feeling to manifest in someone else’s mind.
The first half of that is basically Moore’s definition. The second half fits with Alfred North Whitehead’s longer definition, quoted in the original post.
Friday evening I saw Jürgen Geutermention David Golumbia’s book Cyberlibertarianism: The Right-Wing Politics of Digital Technology. He said, “It is probably the most important book about tech in the last decade.” I looked it up, then checked my library; we don’t have it, so I ordered a copy. Then I checked Wikipedia, and to my surprise there was no article about Golumbia, so I started one: David Golumbia. Two other people worked on it the next day.
It’s rare to find someone like this not covered already in Wikipedia, but it does happen.
I can personally attest that Rippah Chili Oil is very good. It has tamarind in it, which gives an unusual sweet note that’s really delicious. I get the hotter version, but the mild regular version is equally flavourful. It’s good on all the foods you might expect, and a dollop on an egg works really well.
It’s only available in Toronto, but I hope the business does well and can expand. This is good stuff.
Miskatonic University Press
