Saturday, January 8, 2022

Bureaucracy.....................

 Bureaucracy is a permanent decoupling of activity from morality. A bureaucrat isn’t paid to understand the rules he enforces or the forms he is required to have you fill out. There is no “why” involved in his life, and so he allows no common sense or flexibility to inform his actions. Bureaucracy is there for its own sake; it is its own justification. Bureaucrats are often called civil servants, but in reality they provide no service at all: It is you, the individual citizen, who must come to serve them, to follow their instructions, to bend the knee and do exactly what they say, as a token of submission to the powers that be. Otherwise no license, no permit, no job.

-Dan Gelernter, from this post

thanks

Fifty years ago...................................


The Allman Brothers........................................Melissa

Seems true...................



 via

No sweat.................................




 more fun here.

Checking in.................................

 .....................with Gilbert Keith Chesterton:

If Patrick Henry could arise from the dead and revisit the land of the living, and see the vast system and social organization and social science which now controls, he would probably simplify his observation and say, "Give me death."

I do seriously think that the most profound criticism of the culture of our time can be found in a sentence which, I believe, was written by Artemus Ward, which runs, I think:  "It isn't so much people's ignorance that does the harm as it is their knowing so many things that ain't so."

Religious and philosophical beliefs are, indeed, as dangerous as fire, and nothing can take from them that beauty of danger.

I have heard that in some debating clubs there is a rule that the members may discuss anything except religion and politics.  I cannot imagine what they do discuss, but it is quite evident that they have ruled out the only two subjects which are either important of amusing.  The thing is a part of a certain modern tendency to avoid things because they lead to warmth, whereas, obviously, we ought, even in a social sense, to seek these things specially.  The warmth of discussion is a much a part of hospitality as the warmth of the fire.

It is not only possible to say a great deal in praise of play, it is really possible to say the highest things in praise to it.  It might reasonably be maintained that the true object of all human life is play.  Earth is a task garden; heaven is a playground.  To be at last in such secure innocence that one can juggle with the universe and the stars, to be so good that one can treat everything as a joke—that may be, perhaps, the real end and final holiday of human souls.  When we are really holy we may regard the Universe as a lark.

Friday, January 7, 2022

Good advice......................

 7.  Surf the craziness with the agility of someone who hates things being too dull.

-More tips for the good life here

fast enough...............................

 Many of the world’s problems, I have concluded, were not given to me to solve. . . .

There is however a partial solution to the botheration of modernity. It is to give up on progress, now that it has revealed itself as unmistakably demonic.

To do anything worthwhile, or well, requires time, and space. The progressives demand that we make everything smaller and faster, and quite unfixable: warp-speed interplanetary rocket rides, and little wee implants to control us.

But the world is large, and moving fast enough. By ignoring the experts, we can be happy.

-David Warren, as extracted from here

Thursday, January 6, 2022

Opening paragraphs..............................

 At ten o'clock of a rainswept morning in London's West End, a young woman in a baggy anorak, a woolen scarf pulled around her head, strode resolutely into the storm that was roaring down South Audley Street.  Her name was Lily and she was in a state of emotional anxiety which at moments turned to outrage.  With one mittened hand she shielded her eyes from the rain while she glowered at door numbers, and with the other steered a plastic-covered pushchair that contained Sam, her two-year-old son.  Some houses were so grand that they had no numbers at all.  Others had numbers but belonged to the wrong street.

-John Le CarrĂ©,  Silverview

On curiosity................

 Being curious is one of life’s most underappreciated qualities. It’s an admission that you don’t have it all figured out. It means you’re willing to listen and learn. Most importantly, it often differentiates the good from the great.

-Ted Lamade, from this blog post

thanks

The glory of being underestimated..............


Ted Lasso...................................The darts scene

 

“You know Rupert, guys have underestimated me my entire life. It used to really bother me, but then one day I was driving my little boy to school and saw a quote by Walt Whitman painted on a wall that said, ‘Be curious, not judgmental’. I liked that. See all those fellas who belittled me, none of them were curious. They thought they had everything figured out. So, they judged everything* and everyone*. And then I realized that their underestimating me had nothing to do with it…..because if they were curious, they would have asked questions. Questions like, ‘Have you played a lot of darts Ted?’ Which I would have answered, ‘Yes sir. Every Sunday afternoon at a sports bar with my father from age 10 until I was 16 until he passed away’.”

Checking in......................................

 ......................with Morgan Housel:

Historian Will Durant once said, “logic is an invention of man and may be ignored by the universe.” And it often is, which can drive you mad if you expect the world to work in rational ways. A common cause of everything from divisive arguments to bad forecasting is that it can be hard to distinguish what’s happening from what you think should be happening.

-full post here

Wednesday, January 5, 2022

Fifty years ago.................................

Allman Brothers Band........................Les Brers in A Minor

Within............................

      Where does intrinsic security come from?  It doesn't come from what other people think of us or how they treat us.  It doesn't come from the scripts they've handed us.  It doesn't come from our circumstances or out position.

     It comes from within.  It comes from accurate paradigms and correct principles deep in our own mind and heart.  It comes from inside-out congruence, from living a life of integrity in which our daily habits reflect our deepest values.

     I believe that a life of integrity is the most fundamental source of personal worth.  I do not agree with the popular success literature that says that self-esteem is primarily a matter of mind set, of attitude—that you can psych yourself into peace of mind.

     Peace of mind comes when your life is in harmony with true principles and values and in no other way.

-Stephen R. Covey,  The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People

a splendid torch...........................

 This is the true joy in life—that being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one.  That being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.   I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die.  For the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake.  Life is no brief candle to me. It's a sort of splendid torch which I have got to hold up or the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.” 


-attributed to George Bernard Shaw

Influence..........................

      If you want to make the world a better place, work on being trustworthy, and honor those who are trustworthy.  Be a good friend and surround yourself with worthy friends.  Don't gossip.  Resist the joke that might hurt someone's feelings even when it's clever.  And try not to laugh when your friend tells you that clever joke at someone's expense.  Being good is not just good for you and those around you, but because it helps others be good as well.  Set a good example, and by your loveliness you will not only be loved, but you may influence the world.

-Russ Roberts, How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life:  An Unexpected Guide To Human Nature And Happiness

Tuesday, January 4, 2022

Has anyone seen the Eclecticpundit.......................?

.....................................He seems to be missing.



Can I get an Amen..................................?

      To formulate any satisfactory modern ethic of human relationships, it will be essential to recognize the necessary limitations of men's power over the non-human environment, and the desirable limitation of their power over each other.

-Bertrand Russell

Monday, January 3, 2022

Sunday, January 2, 2022

Living well...........................

 















via

Opening paragraphs..................

 William Tyndale gave us our English Bible.  The sages assembled by King James to prepare the Authorized Version of 1611, so often praised for corporate inspiration, took over Tyndale's work.  Nine-tenths of the Authorized Version's New Testament is Tyndale's.  The same is true of the first half of the Old Testament, which is as far as he was able to get before he was executed outside of Brussels in 1536.

-David Daniell, from the Introduction to William Tyndale: A Biography

In the background.................................

Van Morrison........................................Moondance

100 years later, he had it about right.......

Turning and turning in the widening gyre   
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere   
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst   
Are full of passionate intensity.

-William Butler Yeats, The Second Coming, 1919

Checking in............................

...................with Bryan Caplan:

 6. Free markets are awesome because they give business incentives to do good stuff that sounds bad. Governments are awful because they give politicians incentives to do bad stuff that sounds good. Since the correlation between what IS good and what SOUNDS good is quite low, this is a huge deal.

7. This awesomeness and awfulness are the main reasons most people resent markets and smile upon government. Economists rationalize government as a response to market INefficiency, but the primary motive is actually to force markets to focus on how things sound instead of what works.

-whole post is here

via

Fifty years ago....................

Linda Ronstadt...................................Rescue Me