"The right brain is happier when the left is keeping score"
Errant thoughts and musings
with full sentences, some punctuation, and no jokes
.... moral intelligence is the gold
.... radical but difficult
.... reconsidering Old Testament morality
.... the civilised way of enforcement
.... no such thing as true freedom
.... more than a base animal
.... nothingness is the default
.... has too much value been accorded to language?
.... the "will to power" needs to be held in check
.... more political than philosophical
.... religion proffers the impossible
.... philosophy and the nonsense people talk
.... the natural state is ignorance
.... a world within a world
.... humans are a seething mass of feeling
.... religious beliefs: as toxic as they are nutritious
.... having respect for how actions impact on feelings
.... can the beast be reigned in?
.... what you do is more important than what you are
.... there is no external moral authority
.... causation is in the mind
.... successful artists are part of an elite
.... in the 18th Century it was host to the brightest minds
.... Kilmarnock values
.... peace for our time [*] 2012
.... a matter of faith
.... independence: an unlikely proposition [*] 2014
.... deplorables and their folly [*] 2016
.... no redress for the Dowlers [*] 2011
.... bad reactions to bad events [*] 2012
.... watching an episode I was pleasantly surprised [*] 2010
.... portrait of a bad banker [*] 2009
.... tribute to a legend [*] 2011
.... in an enlightened world skin colour wouldn't matter much [*] 2008
.... was Michael Jackson an abuser after all? [*] 2019
.... not synonymous with independence
.... tedious and impossible to take part in
.... the backbone of human society
.... insights from Anthony Storr
.... zero flair for speculation
.... it's no longer cool to be cool
.... the UK red-tops are an appalling scourge [*] 2011
.... the snake-brain has no respect for morality
.... a travesty of justice Italian style [*] 2011
.... female sexuality easily gets reduced to something immoral
.... the good and the bad are different species
.... moronic, regressive, sexist and anti-intellectual [*] 2012
.... against the competitive society
.... heckled for pointing to our hypocrisy [*] 2007
.... humans don't like that nature finally gets the better of them [*] 2007
.... Wojtyla left the Catholic Church in a worse state [*] 2005
.... when young men kissed the sky
.... artist as casualty [*] 2011
.... a tribute to George Michael [*] 2017
.... respects to Bowie [*] 2016
.... Lennon's song is far from trite
.... the talkers bring little insight
.... I was privileged to record some of the greats
.... supporting a system that is being consigned to history [*] 2009
.... new developments and vested interests [*] 2012
.... The Blue Nile and taking forever
.... recordings have become music’s primary aspect
.... sound for snobs [*] 2012
.... copyright wars: against the conservative view [*] 2011
.... the unthinkable crime of fixing intonation
.... the case for the studio guy
.... a defining cultural change
.... art and commerce are necessarily tied
.... there is no such thing as quality
.... new tech meets old habits
.... Shadows & Light is a gem
.... music producers are artists too
.... a little too condescending maybe
.... there was an inclusiveness to Ellington, unlike rap
.... young artists: pay them rather than commercialise them
.... was Alvin Toffler right enough?
.... too much art is not necessarily a good thing
.... criticising the critic
.... relationships are key
.... against tastemaker spin
.... against those who think they know
.... Reading and Watchfield 1975
.... remarks on musical snobbery
.... very few musicians ever got on it
.... an incredible instrument but not easy to master
.... a deep divide
.... some research on the social influence of taste
.... context is the greater part of music
.... authenticity in music is a myth
.... a historical perspective from Edward Kealey
P H I L O S O P H Y
Infatuation Still
An Old Fool
R E L A T I O N S H I P S
.... the options are so conventional [*] 2012
.... slavish adherence to it is a costly business [*] 2013
.... following a Twitter queen [*] 2009
.... radical thinking on relationships from Judith Stacey [*] 2011
.... relationship vs partnership
.... a new lexicon for talking about sex would be good
.... the need for better rhetoric
.... how liberated are modern women?
.... the need for change
.... the smallest amount can have far reaching effects
.... bridging is so much harder than bonding
.... normal in many communities
.... writing about sex
.... man's inhumanity to man
.... questioning the social in social networks
.... a throw of the dice [*] 2011
.... the days of the traditional family are numbered
.... the karma of stealing beauty
.... men and women are a mystery each to the other sexually
.... is bonding no more than a primal drive?
.... key to a meaningful life
.... the love of lust, of sex, and the objectification of women
C O M M E N T A R Y
M U S I C
.... our similarities hugely out-number our differences
.... instinctively bureaucratic, predatory and competitive
.... the optimum society would be ruthless when it had to be
.... Knox and Sollecito re-convicted [*] 2014
.... expediency before patriotism
.... sage advice from a brilliant essayist
.... not conducive to intellectual health
.... seems banks have all kinds of cushions, no less the tax-payer
.... deficit reduction is more about ideology than prudence [*] 2011
.... bemoaning the move from talk to text
.... they should keep score and not participate in the game
.... facing down old ways
.... the need for enlightened values
.... hearts vs heads
.... remarks from the excellent Vivian Gornick
.... a tribute to two outstanding men of action
.... his remarks on not belonging
.... the shared hopes of several generations came together [*] 1997
.... the new dawn [*] 1997
.... Scotland had promised so much and delivered so little
.... on failed idealism
.... I was alone and I liked it
.... surviving as a studio guy
.... from Arran to Dawson's Creek
.... a personal imperative
.... there were few zipless fucks
.... I never wanted to settle
.... good times
.... a watershed year
.... unhappy, unappreciated and unthanked
.... well maybe a little
.... living the autonomous life
.... Janis Ian and being lucky at that age
.... personal hates, all of them people related
.... I've played many parts
.... I'm more porous than opaque
.... privileged yet dissatisfied
.... being unsuited
.... remarks on my father
.... a tribute to their generosity
.... against monogamy
.... Enlightenment values above "wha's like us"
.... I like to think of myself as a free spirit
.... endurance and the long haul
.... he existed on some other plane and was only partial
.... the need for symmetry between inner and outer lives
.... being imbued with a base melancholy
.... as a teenager I had prescient attitudes
.... can the Internet create genuine community?
.... it offered the elements essential to my existence
.... never had I been as charmed by a place
P E R S O N A L
M O R E C O M M E N T A R Y
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[*] = responding to a contemporary event
