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26 votes
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Israeli proposal to move early Christian mosaic to US Museum of the Bible sparks controversy
17 votes -
Anyone interested practicing Stoicism?
I've just been interested recently and I'm curious what people have to say.
23 votes -
Newly published transcripts show the work of early radio broadcaster Walter Benjamin and the details he observed about his time
7 votes -
Ludwig Wittgenstein in the classroom - his thoughts about teaching the student who responds in unexpected ways
7 votes -
What are your favourite research papers?
I've been diving into Derek Parfit's thought-provoking "Why Anything? Why This?" and exploring Weber's fascinating "Sociology of Religion." It's ignited my curiosity about which research papers or...
I've been diving into Derek Parfit's thought-provoking "Why Anything? Why This?" and exploring Weber's fascinating "Sociology of Religion." It's ignited my curiosity about which research papers or articles have really resonated with you? I'm excited to broaden my reading horizons and discover some impactful reads!
14 votes -
What's a word from another language that you wish was a thing in English?
I think Sitzpinkler from german is really cool. It literally means "sunday emptiness", and refers to a feeling of emptiness/boredom on a sunday afternoon. Edit: I meant sitzprinkler lol
66 votes -
Rome’s libraries were shrines to knowledge – and imperial power
15 votes -
Historian finds evidence for use of y'all in London from 1600s
69 votes -
How an English exile ended up at the court of Genghis Khan's grandson
16 votes -
Teaching myself calculus at sixty-five
24 votes -
It's a Baltic problem – objects are vanishing from historic wrecks as sport divers and criminal gangs loot well-preserved sunken ships
10 votes -
SS Baychimo: The unsinkable Arctic ghost ship
7 votes -
Denmark is considering banning protests involving burning the Quran or other religious texts over security and diplomatic concerns – Sweden looking to follow suit
18 votes -
Icono: A universal language that shows what it says
25 votes -
The history of the Comstock Act, the 150 year old law conservatives in the US are banking on to ban abortion
31 votes -
The post-WWI migrations that built Yugoslavia and Türkiye have left a painful legacy
13 votes -
Mini: The minimal language
43 votes -
On successor states and websites
16 votes -
The psychedelic drug that conquered Europe
11 votes -
Archeologists uncover ruins believed to be Roman Emperor Nero's theatre near Vatican
13 votes -
True size of a Spartan army - The real source of its strength
9 votes -
When did people stop being drunk all the time?
32 votes -
What's the difference between medieval inns, taverns, and alehouses?
13 votes -
Non-revolutionary anarchism
Edit: I'm just gonna list the recommendations I found interesting for my future reference Proudhon - One of the first anarchists. Wrote a lot about mutualism and tried to come up with mechanisms...
Edit: I'm just gonna list the recommendations I found interesting for my future reference
Proudhon - One of the first anarchists. Wrote a lot about mutualism and tried to come up with mechanisms to share resources based on usufruct
The Dispossessed -Describes an alternate society. Supposedly written more like an anthropological study than a narrative
No God's, No Masters - Written by David Graber, who also wrote the 3 Problems with the Revolution
The Dawn of Everything - Talks about the organization structures of early societies
Participatory Economics - Talks about economic organization without compulsion
Walkaway - Recommended when I mentioned stealth anarchism
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I'm gonna be honest, I'm pretty sick of all the existing forms of politics. Conservatives, liberals, progressives, libertarians, I dont feel like I jive with any of them.
The closest thing I've found to a philosophy I can get behind is anarchism, but I'm not really a fan of revolutionary anarchism either. I'm interested in just discussion of the constructive aspects of it. Like how the alternative vision of the world they advocate for works in practice, and what different options there are for implementation.
I find it hard to really get into, because whenever I try to read up on any kind of political philosophy I run into the people who are trying to evangelize and it just really turns me off to the whole thing.
Does anyone have some good reading recommendations that skip past trying to recruit people, and just is a good discussion?
43 votes -
Hunting for the Lizard People: On the dangerous conspiracy theories that led to the Nashville bombing
10 votes -
What were those mysterious craft? (1979)
7 votes -
The Kennedy Assassination: Inside the book depository
11 votes -
Regarding the eviction of the self-organized refugee camp in Lavrio, Greece. How Türkiye's war on Kurds and the European Union’s War on migrants intersect
8 votes -
How to Roman Republic 101, Part I: SPQR
19 votes -
The erasure of Islam from the poetry of Rumi
30 votes -
Looking for sources related to "The Repetitive Nature of Human Tribulations"
Hello everyone :) I write as a hobby and have had an article in my drafts for a long, long time. In essence, I'd like to discuss the "repetitive nature of human tribulations/suffering/life", that...
Hello everyone :)
I write as a hobby and have had an article in my drafts for a long, long time. In essence, I'd like to discuss the "repetitive nature of human tribulations/suffering/life", that is, the fact that regardless of superficial characteristics we all are confronted with extremely similar circumstances throughout our lives.
Whether it's 10 years into our lives or 40, there's joy, heartbreak, loss, a need to belong, some desire for freedom, a need for a purpose, lack of direction, obsession with a newly found direction, etc.
I'd love to come across poets, philosophers, psychologists, etc who have touched upon this subject: we are not defined by our circumstances, as they are, in very broad strokes, largely the same, but by how we are able to adapt and reinvent ourselves amidst those same circumstances.
Looking forward for your answers :)
Thanks!
7 votes -
The Marian reforms weren't a thing
15 votes -
"Abraham Lincoln" street in Nogales, Sonora
15 votes -
Researchers have decoded more than half of the characters in the so-called Kushan script by comparing them with inscriptions in a known ancient language called Bactrian
13 votes -
Sweden: Muslim protester says he never wanted to burn Torah
16 votes -
Why Oppenheimer deserves his own movie
14 votes -
Iraq tells Sweden it will cut ties if Quran burned again
23 votes -
Scenes from a fallen empire: Abandoned Russian bases dot Mongolia’s border
16 votes -
Strongly influenced by Quakers 175 years ago, the Seneca Falls Convention kicked off the fight for women’s suffrage in the USA
15 votes -
Medieval Myth Busting - Arrows vs Armour 2, using historically accurate reproductions from time of the Battle of Agincourt (1415)
ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - FULL MEDIEVAL ARMOUR TESTED Other extra videos in the series: ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - ARMOUR PLATE TESTS ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - MAIL TESTS ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - ARROWHEAD MATERIAL...
ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - FULL MEDIEVAL ARMOUR TESTED
Other extra videos in the series:
ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - ARMOUR PLATE TESTS
ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - MAIL TESTS
ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - ARROWHEAD MATERIAL TESTSAnd they have also created a website for the project now too:
https://todtodeschini.com/youtube-projects/arrows-v-armour-2/Previous series of tests from a few years ago:
https://tild.es/h3u6 votes -
The lost patients of Washington state's abandoned psychiatric hospital
21 votes -
Manmade horrors beyond our comprehension
14 votes -
Tuna chewing: Why some say "chube" and some say "toob"
19 votes -
Ocomtún: A long-lost Maya city that was just discovered
16 votes -
Duolingo alternatives for learning Ukrainian
Hello! Привіт! Pryvit! I started learning Ukrainian on Duolingo in February 2022 following Russia's attacks. It was my first time attempting to learn a language for 10+ years and it just clicked....
Hello! Привіт! Pryvit!
I started learning Ukrainian on Duolingo in February 2022 following Russia's attacks. It was my first time attempting to learn a language for 10+ years and it just clicked. I grew to love the language, became entranced with the culture, and had desires to keep learning. Prior to Duolingo's redesign, I had a year+ streak and made it fairly far in the course.
The redesign has absolutely killed that passion. Maybe it's just the Ukrainian course, but it felt like I was going in circles and not really progressing as I once had. I've shelved my learning for a few months, but I really desire an alternative to Duolingo. Unfortunately, there's not many options that offer Ukrainian and I want to ensure I am learning the language as intended. I've read into how Russian influences have attempted to modify the language and I desire to learn the form that Ukrainian's would use.
I'm not quite at a level to learn from books or more static resources, and would prefer the interactivity of an app to help get me to that comfort level again. I've tried Pimsleur and wasn't as much of a fan of their format that reminded me of language tapes. One of the things I enjoyed with Duolingo was the verbal parts of it that helped with my pronunciation, and Pimsleur didn't appear to offer that.
Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated! I have seen old posts referring to a SubStack and other resources, but at this time I need a refresher before I feel comfortable diving into those. I would love to incorporate learning a little bit of Ukrainian everyday again! Слава Україні!
19 votes -
Learn a foreign language before it’s too late
25 votes -
Why has Enlightenment, the Scientific and later the Industrial Revolution started out in the "Western" world?
Before all else, I want to point out that this is a sensible topic and it is easy to go off the well-meaning path — my motives are strictly curiosity and I believe this site can actually have a...
Before all else, I want to point out that this is a sensible topic and it is easy to go off the well-meaning path — my motives are strictly curiosity and I believe this site can actually have a fruitful discussion around it. I would also like to mention that I have a quite limited, and very Europe/West-centric history knowledge, so please acknowledge my bias/ignorance. I don’t even know enough about the Western part, let alone enough to compare it with other cultures’ respective systems at the time.
I have talked about this topic numerous times with friends and while we had some theories why it might have started there, none of them were particularly convincing. Nonetheless, here are a few reasons we could come up with (of course it is multi-faceted), please expand/argue about them if you feel, or write new ones as well (I try to be brief here, partially due to hitting the edges of my knowledge in many cases, but also to not bias people to any particular topic):
Religion, Philosophy
Christianity is/was the predominant religion of the region. Plenty of important discoveries/inventions came from monks “learning about God through the natural world”, and many branches of Christianity believed in sharing not only their religion, but knowledge as well - Jesuits being particularly famous for teaching, and collecting vast amounts of knowledge. (Obviously, the Catholic Church had plenty of wrongdoings as well, and was not opposed to keeping people in the dark)
Another notable religion which deserves a mention in this topic is Jewish. I am unfortunately even less knowledgeable about it, but the number of Jewish scientists and discoveries is staggeringly high. From what I gathered, they have a strong culture of arguments/discussions regarding the Torah, and blind acceptance is not the way (as opposed to the Bible), which might have some relevance.
The Arab world had an important relationship with Europe, but from this perspective it may not be as important.
With that said, I really can’t argue whether these are significantly different than, say, Eastern religions. Maybe the Abrahamic three are a bit more individualistic, which might have a bigger relevance here in the direction Western philosophy has gone.
Economic system
I know even less about this topic. One important point I do know a bit about is the question of loans, which were forbidden by the Christian Church (for a while) and Islam, but not for Jews (so loans could be obtained in Europe). Not sure if there is a difference between different parts of the world here that is of relevance.
Capitalism itself is also a result of these philosophical ideas, so there might be more to this financial aspect.
Society, societal norms
A prominent theory might be the existence of universities. While different kinds of school systems have existed earlier - to my ignorant knowledge - Europe was ahead in terms of education. This is quite self-explanatory, accumulating smart people and ideas together greatly improves their “productivity”.
Colonialism
Self-explanatory, but if this is the answer, I would also like to extend the question to why the Western world was the first at that at such an extent? That also required technological innovation and a motivation for it. Though it itself has plenty possible explanations like good geographic location.
Climate, geography
Europe has a generally mild climate, well-fit for efficient agriculture and animal husbandry. It also has numerous rivers. It is not the Biblical garden where you have fruits all year long, so you do have to rely on your own work to survive winters, but it is definitely not the desert neither. But that is not a convincing answer either, because plenty of regions are similar, and early scientific advancements come from the more desert-y Arab word, with perhaps harsher conditions.
Europe is also well-connected to other regions.War, Politics
I quite liked this answer one of my friends came up with (within our circles that is) — due to many, small political entities being so close to each other, there were lots of conflicts, many of which resulted in wars — which are significant drivers of “innovation” even today. Pardon my ignorance, but other regions were mostly ruled by huge empires, that later fall apart and were conquered again, or small settlements with little outside contact. This necessitated less novelty in those conquests.
But even non-war conflicts themselves could have had positive effects, the aristocracy of Europe had strong connections with shared events - besides the more “romantic”/formal aspects, it was also a hub for many intellectuals from different countries to engage in deep discussions. Add to it that most research/discovery/philosophy came initially from people of aristocratic backgrounds.
I could write many more, but I am afraid that would have even less substance. I would be very interested in your input on this, what unique context allowed this intellectual growth that resulted in many aspects of our modern lives we take for granted?
45 votes -
A very interesting video on the phonetics of English regional accents, spoken by a polyglot in the accents
22 votes -
The art of translation
29 votes