Below I present her last uploaded picture - that was on February 25, 2015 (less than 2 months before her passing), followed by her two book recommendations (a few months after my visit to Romania, when we discussed at length about her views on Twin Peaks). Of course every such `archaeology' is incomplete - human beings are of course incredibly complex.
10 years ago (December 22, 2010) our beloved sheltie Nana died. She will never be forgotten - her concentrated personhood will accompany our humanity, our love, our dreams and our memories forever.
© Mihai Caragiu
Every life counts until they are born...
Heard it stated by Chris Cuomo (Prime Time, December 16 )
"Alice Coltrane (née McLeod, August 27, 1937 – January 12, 2007), also known by her adopted Sanskrit name Turiyasangitananda or Turiya Alice Coltrane, was an American jazz musician and composer, and in her later years a swamini. One of the few harpists in the history of jazz, she recorded many albums as a bandleader, beginning in the late 1960s and early 1970s for Impulse! and other major record labels. She was married to jazz saxophonist and composer John Coltrane, with whom she performed in 1966–67." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Coltrane)
An interesting dynamics encompasses the agitprop routine of Adrian Papahagi, a Romanian right-wing influencer waving a doctoral degree (certainly the degree is an asset in his PR strategy).
The strategy is simple: alternate sticks and carrots.
The `sticks' are pieces of lame, yucky right-wing apologetics, like trump and bannon BS stuff. The `carrots' are `cultural' pieces, periodically inserted to sweeten the `show' (feeding them art, history, religion and the `wonder' of `good old religious times', you know, as opposed to how bad it is now 😒 with sexo-marxism taking over the world).
The immediate impression is of that of a con-man attempting to play a dual confidence trick on the audience: on one side the constant attempt to convince them that he is an accomplished academic (may not really be the case, but it works well on some types with a BS-alert organ anesthetized when they hear about prestige claims). On the other hand, inoculating the right-wing propaganda, at appropriate moments (and in controlled amounts - following the model of slow boiling the frog's water), in the approving brains of the participants (some unsuspecting and otherwise of good faith) in the show.
Ultimately it's the impression (between sad and grotesque) of a lipstick on a pig technique to disseminate right wing ideological cliches to Romania, by coupling them with 'feel-good' cultural additives.
In fairness, Papahagi is not the only Romanian right-winger playing this game. There are worse nutcases - such as the so-called "Prof. Dr." Mihail Neamtu or the "self-employed Dr." Ovidiu Hurduzeu shamelessly spreading QAnon nonsensical propaganda (the difference may be due to context: for now Papahagi is employed by an university, while Neamtu and Hurduzeu are not).
Via @BillKristol :
"If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.”—David Frum
Preiau un post al lui Dan Ungureanu pe FB:
”Mai catolic decît papa”Am trăit s-o văd și pe asta.Papa Francisc declară că nu se opune uniunilor civile între homosexuali. Pe situl înliniedreaptă, Anca Cernea explică :1) a zis și el așa, într-o doară.2) papa Francisc e un intrus neomarxist.3) papa Francisc nu înțelege ce-i cu catolicismul și cu creștinismul.4) ea, Anca Cernea, l-a mai avertizat părintește, dar el nu și nu.
Acum 3 ani plasasem un comentariu pe pagina 1-dimensionalilor de dreapta, e amuzant ca-i acum in capul listei "most helpful" :-)
This Led Zeppelin piece is like an elaborated mathematical paper (that you feel absolutely worth reading - reason which gives you strength to continue), and so when it reaches the conclusion (that can be continuously anticipated, though), there is that feeling of peace, contentment and growth - like yes, now everything connects - that does it - sort of feeling.
The Atlantic discusses the "new American religion" known as QAnon. It's a very interesting cover story in an elite magazine. I think we can go further, though: what is here and now deemed as a
"real-time participatory conspiracy theory" (QAnon) is only a special form (maybe
extreme and certainly ugly, but fundamentally not different
from an analytical point of view) of social unfolding of religious phenomena as real-time participatory fantasies (inherently fact-free or
fact-shy, especially in their emergence stage). We are witnessing interesting things, albeit a little sad and probably dangerous as well.
A favorite pastime in the high school years: keep wandering along the remote railways and other similarly semi-deserted places in the city. On one hand it was probably the sensation of discovery and adventure because simply put, I was not familiar with the area, so it was sort of wow, that's something new, which way I go now - a state of mind that lasted for hours. On another hand, these long walks presented me the opportunity to became a witness to bits and pieces of the forgotten or abandoned life's puzzle, in the littering thrown around from the trains or by the residents of the communist era housing units. As an added bonus, there were wonderful poppy flowers everywhere. So in a sense there was a great deal diversity along the way. But the most essential thing was that, during each one of those long walks, a sense of undetermined awakening (albeit slow) developed in me - so that everything ended with a promise to come back.
`Out of nowhere, the mind comes forth'I rediscovered this a few minutes ago... and I suddenly realized that it describes not only the essence/nature of meditation, but the essence/root of mathematical discovery as well.
The Diamond Sutra
`Rise, by contrast, incorporated jazz, pop, and pan-ethnic world music textures in an unpredictable melange. At the center of it all are Shankar's sitar expertise and traditional Indian roots.' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rise_(Anoushka_Shankar_album)
The Self’s Infinity
I have become what before Time I was.
A secret touch has quieted thought and sense:
All things by the agent Mind created pass
Into a void and mute magnificence.
My life is a silence grasped by timeless hands;
The world is drowned in an immortal gaze.
Naked my spirit from its vestures stands;
I am alone with my own self for space.
My heart is a centre of infinity,
My body a dot in the soul’s vast expanse.
All being’s huge abyss wakes under me,
Once screened in a gigantic Ignorance.
A momentless immensity pure and bare,
I stretch to an eternal everywhere.
Peter Roquette
The Riemann Hypothesis in Characteristic p in Historical Perspective
I though of a self-assessment in the Schrodinger cat form, where the dead/alive cat gets pair gets replaced by a believer/agnostic pair (as Toma Caragiu was, and with high probability, Carmen as well).
Now I am moving more towards an agnostic/atheist pair (with a mindfulness added flavor), and an increased awareness that the reality under the "believer" category (whatever that is, if any) is very different from what most people usually believe or expect without questioning.
In fact this represents rather well the substance and philosophical tone of my discussions with Carmen in the Summer of 2013, in Ploiesti. It was very interesting, and at some moment will be back with an account.
Since her passing, some concerted effort was made to "benevolently" forge her image as somebody totally committed to the orthodox dogma in the highest sense (which was far from the truth), going as far as burying her (who did not believe in the usual "mandatory sacraments") in a monastery. Knowing her, that's a gross cultural appropriation at a minimum.There is a lot to discover about Carmen, since she was a complex figure (in no case 1D). In any case, approximating reality after the fact is hard.
