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Due to my inability to finish my Weekly Links page in a timely fashion, I recently decided to create a secondary blog at Reflected Places to serve as a kind of intellectual clearing house. There I plan to simply post, as I come across them, interesting, informative and thought-provoking articles from my disparate readings. Here some brief summaries of some of the articles I found worthwhile this last week.
Enjoy!
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** Articles of the Week:
News-Oriented: US Presidential Election
1.) For Many Abroad, an Ideal Renewed: How people from across the world view the election of Barack Obama.
2.) White Houses Past: The Underside of the Welcome Mate. This article looks at the long history of Black Americans as they went from the makers of the White House to presidential occupancy.
3.) AL GORE: The Climate for Change. Al Gore’s bold take on how the economy and environment should be solved together.
4.) What Kind of US President Would Chinese Like?
Science-Oriented
5.) The Wonders of Blood: On the incredible abilities and capacities of human blood.
6.) Q & A: Of Two Minds: A brief text on why the brain has two sides or hemispheres.
7.) When Duty Calls: The Value of Voting, Beyond Politics. Scientists look at why we vote considering how statistically improbable that our vote will matter.
8.) A Conversation With Stuart L. Pimm: Asking ‘Why Do Species Go Extinct?”
Abroad-Oriented
9.) Their Own Worst Enemy: On the mismanagement by the Chinese government of properly marketing and showcasing China abroad. Since living in China these last couple months, it has become clear to me that things are much better in China than how the world understands the situation. One of my students once even claimed that the Chinese are the happiest people in the world.
10.) France. Sex. Problem?: Many of the traditional sexist barriers between the sexes have been shattered, except perhaps one: prostitution. While men are able to pay for their sexual pleasures, women up to now have not. Maybe this is changing or already has.
Educational Video of the Week:
Anthropologist Helen Fisher weaves the chemistry and neurobiology of love with poetry and story-telling to speak to us about *The Brain in Love *
Poem of the Week:
The Base of All Metaphysics
And now gentlemen, A word I give to remain in your memories and minds,
As base and finale too for all metaphysics.
(So to the students the old professor,
At the close of his crowded course.)
Having studied the new and antique, the Greek and Germanic systems,
Kant having studied and stated, Fichte and Schelling and Hegel,
Stated the lore of Plato, and Socrates greater than Plato,
And greater than Socrates sought and stated, Christ divine having studied long,
I see reminiscent to-day those Greek and Germanic systems,
See the philosophies all, Christian churches and tenets see,
Yet underneath Socrates clearly see, and underneath Christ the divine I see,
The dear love of man for his comrade, the attraction of friend to friend,
Of the well-married husband and wife, of children and parents,
Of city for city and land for land.
by: Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass Part V
Music Video of the Week:
S.H.E - Zhong Guo Hua 中国话
Quote of the Week:
“Democracy is the art of thinking independently together”
- Alexander Meiklejohn