A way of life

British higher education has developed an elaborate auditing culture that has led academics to devoting themselves to gaming the system, distorting their output – such as publishing essentially the same article in different venues, the devaluation of books, creating and attracting academic celebrities to boost RAE ratings. Perhaps the most debilitating consequence has been the shortening of time horizons of research, so that it becomes ever more superficial.

--Michael Burawoy.

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A very disappointing and almost fanatical post by Pierre (over at Nomadics).

"Where I am in total agreement with the magazine is that all organized religions, & more specifically the three monotheisms, need to be caricatured, attacked, shown up for the ideological con jobs  & strangleholds they are. The right to blaspheme is essential for our mental health."

The rant continues:

"To show that the emperor has no clothes is important: just think of the core regions where our world is going up in flames, or where someone is holding or selling the flamethrowers that do this job — & centrally present & involved in them you’ll find the 3 core religions,.."

Of course, no-one wants to face the uncomfortable fact that these rabid factions of lunatics are actually supported by state powers (Saudi, Pakistan Qatar). And the equally disturbing fact that "our world" has been going up in flames for some time and it's largely been a result of the violence inflicted by state powers (think: Colonialism; the Trenches; the Gulags, the Camps, the Bomb) is not really worth considering-unless you want a dose of reality.

Pascal: two extravagances: to exclude reason; to include only reason. 

There's something rather extreme and shrill in this (Gallic?) style of writing and thought. It's important to show religion up, to unveil it, to destroy the secrets of the Red Indian etc., etc... debunk everything, expose the whole curs-ed thing and the dupes that followed it as naive dimwits-and all the time one presumes that we, we moderns have escaped all this stupidity and superstition with the help of the light of Reason. 

The right to blaspheme is essential for our mental health. One is perfectly prepared to accept that if by "our" the author is referring to his own mental health then this may be a reasonable enough claim; but if by that word it is being maintained that all of us need this right then you have to indeed wonder about the arrogance and shallowness of the thought expressed in that statement.

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Fermor:

These men really lived as if each day were their last, at peace with the world, shriven, fortified by the sacraments...

a kind of personal, face-to-face intimacy, the very inkling of which since Donne, Herbert and Vaughan wrote their poetry, has drained away from life in England.

The Trappist abbeys are placed in flat landscapes because their monotony, like the repetitive dunes of the Thebaid, impels the mind to the contemplation of last things...

the unbroken cycle of contemplation, prayer and back-breaking toil..

a completely unintellectual simplicity.