Adventus

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What's in a name?

I knew it was a mistake involving myself in political commentary*, but having taken the plunge, I guess I have to keep swimming, at least until the election. One of the things that has mystified me for years is how the label "liberal" came to be associated with support for government regulation of business, e.g. environmental and worker protection measures, or even (heaven forbid) financial transactions. I know that my colleagues in political science would have an answer to this, and I suspect it goes back to sometime in the 1980s, when Berke Breathed did all those comics about the General [my bad: the Major; it's been a long time] and Milo hunting liberals in the meadows of Bloom County. But knowing the little that I do about the history of the concept of liberalism as it developed in the 19th century, I must confess myself rather confused. This is the way John Stuart Mill (as Wikipedia puts it, "one of the first champions of modern 'liberalism'") s...
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Gut Reaction

President Obama is a bully and a show-off who thinks that he is the only one who knows how to make tough decisions. Governor Romney has a pleasant voice and kind eyes, and he listens when other people are talking.
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Joe the Plumber

Me, writing political commentary?! Stranger things have happened, like, for instance, having a candidate for president who is intelligent and articulate and able to put issues before what the other candidate's campaign is saying about him personally. So, I watched the debate Wednesday night with increasing hope and concern: is it possible that America might go so far as to elect a president who, while rich*, was also at the top of his class in school? Or are we going to fall yet again for the dumbing down of our politics to the level of personal grievance and feelings? It all hinges on Joe the Plumber. But who is he? I don't mean in real life; everyone knows that now . Even on Wednesday, Senator McCain didn't really care about who "Joe" was or his staff would have bothered to find out, for example, that "Joe's" full name is Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher and that he isn't even licensed by the Association of Plumbers, Steamfitters and Service M...
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The Sworn Book of Professor Peterson

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Peterson : I’m an odd sort of Christian, I suppose, for a variety of reasons.... There is an idea of the Eternal Soul, and it tends in Christianity to remain somewhat gendered, although there is an idea that it’s the Logos that is redemptive for males and females...and Logos is symbolically represented as masculine. I think that’s because the masculine spirit, so to speak, is freer in some sense than the female spirit, because it’s more tightly tied to the necessity of procreation and so forth. It’s something like that....  Societies have posited for a very long period of time that there’s something about human consciousness that transcends the limitations of the finite self. And you also mentioned the use of psychedelics, and obviously that was part of your experience of discovery. There’s a reasonable amount of evidence, and most of it was compiled by a man whose name, if I remember, was Wasson, who was an amateur mycologist, a student of mushrooms... R. Gordon Wasson . And he c...
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A Journey of 100,000 Words

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...begins with a single page. As I was looking through my files this morning, wondering what I had done with the word processing template for my last book, I found this schedule that I kept the autumn that I started work on it. Nostalgia and a reminder of how books are written: one day, one hour at a time. (Click on the images to enlarge.) As I recall, I finished the draft of the first chapter of that book a week later. Working more or less to this schedule, it took me another two and a half years (minus a term or two teaching) to get the book finished and to my publisher. So I guess I'm in for the long haul now with this next book, although I (and my prospective editors) very much hope it is not quite as long as the first one was. If you're curious, you can check that one out here . N.B. The times on the chart only reflect hours I actually spent sitting at my desk, writing.* I know I spent a good deal of time reading as well, but I didn't record that as such.** ...
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