Archive for January, 2010

January 31, 2010 3

Sunday Sundries

By Robert Minto in Sundries

Over at the wonderful Faith and Theology blog, Kim Fabricius considers Obama and the Poverty of Niebuhrian Ethics, and then Glen Stassen re-consider’s Obama’s Nobel Speech Prize, with special reference to the under-discussed notion of just peace.
John Hobbins has an excellent post about Myth in the Bible.
Simon Ravenscroft points out that when it comes to [...]

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January 29, 2010 0

Oh no, he did it again…

By Robert Minto in Blogging, Plans, Prospects

You knew it had to happen. The moment I decided to make TVA a group blog, my endemic capitalist disease of diversification was coming down the pike.
I love the way TVA is working out — the balance between things like Kenny’s post about the politics of the RC-Anglican thing, Joel’s musing about apocalyptic movies, and [...]

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January 28, 2010 0

Barth on Historical Judgments

By Robert Minto in Books, History, Theology

I am now in possession of the unabridged version of Barth’s Protestant Theology in the Nineteenth Century. Incidentally, I read in the preface that he refused to write an introduction to the partial version that we have in the Dordt Library — he wrote that,
I cannot alter the fact that I see the whole affair [...]

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January 28, 2010 0

The State of the Union(’s Allusive Domain)

By Robert Minto in Politics, Rhetoric

Because I am one who frequently bemoans the lack of rhetorical education, readers may well imagine that I adore moments of national public focus on rhetorical events. These moments tend to be Presidential speeches — the only rhetorical events of enough interest to actually supersede (gasp) regular programming. (Incidentally, that, for me, is the overriding [...]

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January 28, 2010 0

The Mirror of Desire

By Matt Gerrelts in Desire, Philosophy

Plato’s Phaedrus pictures a philosophy of love and the soul which, besides its characteristic queerness, contains many fascinating links to contemporary philosophy. One point in particular that I am struggling to understand, however, is the assertion that the beloved sees himself in his lover. What Plato means by that, I am not sure. I quote [...]

January 25, 2010 0

A Digression On Eric Auerbach

By Robert Minto in Appreciation, Books

Interlibrary loan finally came through with the real version of the Barth book, so I can resume commenting on that tomorrow, but in the meantime I felt like reading something associated with my historiography class and took up my Prof on the throw-away suggestion Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature by Eric Auerbach.  [...]

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January 24, 2010 3

On Learning To Write (Without All the Usual BS)

By Robert Minto in Education, Rhetoric, Scholarship

I have experienced far, far too many writing courses. When I was homeschooled for a while in high-school, I read dozens of books on How to Write — How to Write Essays, How to Write Stories, How to Write Poetry. I read Zinsser’s book on non-fiction, Gardner’s book on fiction, and Williams’s book on style. [...]

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January 24, 2010 0

Sunday Sundries

By Robert Minto in Sundries

First, don’t miss our own Joel Veldkamp’s reflections on The Book of Eli.
For those completely unexposed to it, might be good to consider another perspective on Haiti, and a follow-up.
Should we preserve the dichotomy, history vs. myth?
An amusing map.
Garry Kasparov (that’s right, that Kasparov) on the fascinating subject of Chess Masters and the Computer.

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January 22, 2010 1

Historical Perspective in The Study of Anything

By Robert Minto in History, Thinking

Tell me if this is slightly contradictory: experts often refuse to comment on what figures or movements are most important in our present, because “we lack the historical distance” to know their real significance. But experts also often bemoan our anachronism because we fail to enter into the life of the past when considering the [...]

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January 18, 2010 1

Self-Love and the Symposium

By Matt Gerrelts in Desire, Philosophy

In Plato’s Symposium, Agathon asserts that Love is of surpassing beauty and goodness. After all, as he says, “since this god arose, the loving of beautiful things has brought all kinds of benefits both to gods and to men.” Although immediately flattering Agathon’s elegance, Socrates drastically changes the direction of the conversation by pointing out [...]

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