It seems that my first book, Claiming Sacred Ground, which came out ten years ago, is circulating for free online as a PDF. (I just downloaded it myself to see if it’s the real thing; it is. Do a PDF search for it if you want it.)
I don’t mind people downloading it — it’s a good way to look at it before deciding if you want to spend money for a hard copy. The hardcover is pricy — or was when it came out. But it’s also attractive and nice to hold in one’s hands, and you can now find it cheap. (Ask me if you want one for under ten bucks.)
Tim Morton makes the useful point that E/Z’s notion of the “noosphere”
can only be functional if it discriminates between some kinds of thing such as cognizing with neurons versus other kinds of thing such as cognizing with plant hormones, or resting on a table, or spanning a river.
Differences are starting to emerge in our group reading of Integral Ecology, with Tim Morton taking a grumpy stance from the back of the car while others are measured but generally more positive in their assessments. Tim’s main criticism seems to be the Object-Oriented Ontological one that E/Z’s categories “map perfectly onto normal everyday human prejudices,” and specifically prejudices against non-sentient beings. Tim writes:
This continues from the previous post, where I discussed chapter 3 of Integral Ecology. Together these posts make up my summary overviews for Week 3 of the reading group. What follows is less a summary than a response to chapter 4, but I think it covers most of the key concepts in the chapter.
The Integral Ecology reading group moves here this week, picking up the baton from Adam and Sam at Knowledge Ecology. (And see Michael’s summary at Archive Fire.)
This week we’re focusing on chapters 3 (“A Developing Kosmos”) and 4 (“Developing Interiors”). Following a short summative preamble, this post examines Chapter 3. Its follow-up will examine Chapter 4.
A new book by Tim Ingold is always good news, especially one that — like his 2000 collection Perception of the Environment — brings together several years’ worth of work into one volume. Ingold describes Being Alive: Essays on Movement, Knowledge and Description as “in many ways” a “sequel” to that earlier book, and it’s interesting to examine the territory he’s traversed since then.
Graham Haynes’s band touring under the name Bitches Brew Revisited, after the famous album by Miles Davis that turned 40 last year, opened the Burlington jazz festival last week.
Cave of Forgotten Dreams is probably not an essential Werner Herzog film, and I sympathize with those (like Bill Benzon) who’d much rather just see the pictures and do without Herzog’s prattling on or the “banshee muzak,” as Bill calls it. In both the prattling and especially the banshee muzak (which is pretty good, for banshees, and for muzak) it’s very much of a piece with Herzog’s sci-fi-ish and underwater scenes like those in Wild Blue Yonder and Encounters at the End of the World. In its stylized interviews with quirky scientists it’s also consistent with Encounters, though perhaps more sober.
The Chronicle of Higher Ed has a good article by Tom Lutz on the state of declining education in this country.
While the University of California system is being hit particularly hard, the trends are the same at public institutions everywhere, including here at the University of Vermont (class sizes increasing, faculty positions not being replaced, positions being cut, etc.).
The Integral Ecology reading group schedule has been announced, with Michael at Archive Fire leading the charge (with the announcement; Adam at Knowledge Ecology with the actual hosting).
