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Shhh! The thinkers are sleeping (Quiet! Thinkers are sleeping) Frank Schirmacher (Frank Schirmacher) Sydney Morning Herald
European intellectuals have gone into hibernation. Most of them are not only terribly far from the problems of technological progress, but are also unable to master a new text editor. Meanwhile, a new round of technology will entail not just an improvement in living conditions, as some allow themselves to be mistaken, but a total change in the cultural and mental paradigm. Perhaps future generations will be as familiar with our ideas about time and space as we are with the culture of the Middle Ages. Not to mention artificial intelligence. So those who have natural products have something to think about, says the publisher of the largest German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine .
Quote: Immanuel Kant, Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche are nothing more than virus-infected versions of human consciousness... Philosophers have constantly used humanity to test their software.
Order a full translation of an article?Clone Jesus? (Clone Christ?) Robert Masterson (Robert Masterson) Alternet.org
Finally, modern technology will be at the service of theology. In the university city of Berkeley (California), an organization has appeared called the Second Coming Project (SCP - Second Coming Project ), whose members intend to clone Jesus Christ. The author of the article discusses the moral and theological perspectives of the “human clone” in turn with a representative of SCP, a Catholic priest, a microbiologist, and for some reason with a rabbi (who speaks more and more in parables).
Quote: What are these people saying? We have the necessary technology, they say; and DNA, they say, is also at our disposal; and the Bible, they say, gives direct instructions on this matter. So we can say with confidence that the time has come for the Second Coming. We have been waiting, they say, for 2000 years, so isn’t it time to get down to business ourselves and, with God’s help, that is, using the skills, intelligence, free will and technology given to us by the Lord, bring it to the end.
Order a full translation of an article?Sci-art: the illusion of fusion Steve Jones Daily Telegraph
Everyone says: the time has come for the merging of science and art (see, for example, issue 3: article by I. O. Wilson “Life in Art”). Nothing of the kind, a professor of genetics from the University of London is convinced. Attempts to synthesize two spheres of human activity are, for the most part, a straightforward interpretation of one of these spheres by means of the other. The author of the article came to this conclusion after visiting a large number of contemporary art exhibitions and installations. Maybe I wasn't looking in the right place.
Quote: Theophrastus once said: “Imitating Nature, Art sometimes produces very peculiar things.” Many of them appeared as a result of the supposed interaction of science and art. Strange as it may seem, real success can be achieved not through a violent, unnatural synthesis of two spheres of human activity, but in the case when the proper distance is maintained between science and art. On the other hand, the worst examples... are artists who dishonestly try to parody science without understanding its meaning, or scientists who seek to imitate artistic talent of which they are deprived.
Order a full translation of an article?Art Form for the Digital Age Henry Jenkins Technology Review
The English critical professor is given a fitting response by the American Jenkins, director of the Program for Comparative Media Studies at the Massachusetts Polytechnic Institute. The future of great art, he argues, lies in computer games. “How is it possible?!” some will exclaim. “Equate high art and despicable craft, with its commercial flavor, penchant for violence and eroticism?” Meanwhile, Jenkins notes, in the 1920s they said literally the same thing about the emerging cinematography.
Quotes: Computer games are increasingly influencing modern cinema: hence the frantic pace and multi-plot nature of the film “Run Lola Run”, the metaphorical role-playing game in the film “Being John Malkovich”, the inspiring charm of the fragility of the boundaries between reality and the virtual world in “The Matrix” .
Just as the salon art of the 1920s seemed sterile compared to the vitality and inventiveness of popular culture, modern attempts at creating interactive narratives through modernist hypertext or avant-garde art installations seem lifeless and pretentious next to the creativity that computer game designers brought to their craft.
Order a full translation of an article?Out of the mouth of babes and suckling, a firm grasp of the laws of physics Howard Jacobson Independent
Unborn babies have a more harmonious view of the world than adults, and understand the laws of the world better than many of us. In a word, almost all of them are born physicists. The author of the article shares his impressions of a conference of child psychologists in London, which he attended, and regrets his forever lost talents. In general, everything is like Peter Pan.
Quote: After birth, we all degrade... We are not able to realize the potential that we have at the embryonic stage. However, I personally know this well from my own experience. I swam pretty well in the womb, but now I’m terribly afraid of water. While in my mother's womb, I bounced back and forth without feeling nauseous at all, and entered our dangerous world like a real punk - head first. However, after that, as long as I can remember, I have always been an ardent supporter of a quiet lifestyle - I avoid noisy parties, country trips and air travel, I cannot stand gymnastics, walks before bed, and generally hate an active lifestyle.
Order a full translation of an article?Master of Reveries (Contemplator) Sven Birkerts (Sven Berkerts) The Atlantic
Why Proust and why now, asks a regular contributor to the American Atlantic magazine (see issue 5: article “Will we ever return to reality?”). And why not, given that our life is increasingly reminiscent of a race, post-Hemingway literature has finally weaned us off the delights of luxuriously decorated prose, and democracy knows no boundaries. It's time to remember the author, who became famous not only for the longest novels with abruptly completed phrases, but also for his legendary obsession with class and estate prejudices. Sven Birkets is convinced that in an era when the literary language reaches the public only through the mouths of "talking heads" on television, the master of literary dreams can find a new reader.
Quote: There are many reasons why his hour may strike again. Firstly, over time (this almost always happens with advanced creations) this block has lost its aura of inaccessibility. Let's consider this the "Everest syndrome": first one brave man goes on the assault, then the next... The most educated readers are generally familiar with the concept of the novel, but few have reached the end of "The Quest"... And second: we must admit that The fight for gay rights in recent decades has resulted in significant changes in our consciousness. Although the novel's Proustian narrator, Marcel, wears a heterosexual mask, evidence of the author's many preoccupations with young men is cleverly encoded into the novel's fictional fabric. The most famous example: the image of Albertine, Marcel's lover, is partly copied from the personality of Alfred Agostinelli, who was Proust's lover and chauffeur.
Order a full translation of an article?The Year of Writing about Proust Caleb Crain Lingua Franca
Sven Berkerts looked into the water. His colleague from Lingua Franca describes the various manifestations of love for Proust and the curious adventures of his admirers. Fans from the “Marcel Proust Support Group,” for example, set off in search of lost time on motorcycles, drink vodka and for some reason hack themselves with swords on the roofs of houses, apparently mistaking their idol for Tolkien. However, the figure of the great master inspires many for biographical and literary research. Reviewing the phenomenon of idol literature, Crane concludes that in our culture people are impressed by impressive length. But Proust's novel could have been even longer if publishers had published his notes in the margins.
Quote: For example, Alain de Botton. He read Proust and discovered that “In Search of Lost Time” is “a practical, applicable to all life situations story about how to stop wasting time and begin to appreciate life”... Botton avoided the trap of schoolboy Proustianism and wrote a lively, charming book "How Proust Can Change Your Life: Not a Novel." It all ended, firstly, with the fact that the largest newspapers around the world appreciated the book, including it in their reviews, and secondly, with the fact that Botton left his email address on the Amazon.com web page and a foreign woman wrote to him.. .who later became his girlfriend.
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