Month: October 2006

Video: Claudio Véliz at the Anglosphere Institute

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Now you can watch Professor Claudio Véliz’s brilliant talk on “The Optional Descent of the English Speaking World,” which he gave at the inaugural event of Jim Bennett’s Anglosphere Institute. The lecture was hosted by the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC.

Professor Véliz discusses the reasons for the global success of English culture and institutions, including meta-parallels between England and Ancient Athens.

Click here to watch the video.The lecture runs about 49 minutes and is followed by another 35 minutes of Q&A that are also very much worth watching. (There is a gap of approximately ten seconds at around 38:25.)

Unfortunately, the last few minutes of the lecture, in which Professor Véliz discusses the importance of cultural self-confidence to the survival of English civilization in its current struggle with radical Islam, were not recorded. However, a complete audio recording and written transcript of his talk may eventually be made available.

You may need to raise the volume on your speakers to get best audio quality.

Odds & Ends From the Week

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I realize not everyone believes the wisdom of the world is captured in country western lyrics. Nonetheless, Instapundit links to DaveShearon who sees that current hit reinforcing Winston Churchill’s rugged & tenacious vision.

If you’re going through hell

Keep on going, Don’t slow down

If you’re scared, don’t show it

You might get out.

Before the devil even knows you’re there.

This may be optimism, but its steely optimism, arising from a relatively tragic but activist point of view. Of course, that’s the difference between optimism & sentimentality – toughness, energy & some irony.

This was the tone of Bush’s press conference this week. Permeated with a sense of the grim times ahead, his position doesn’t seem that dramatically different from earlier remarks. Still, some see this as the beginning of the end of the denial they believe he has been laboring under. It certainly put front & center an acknowledgement of mistakes & problems. It seemed no less resolute, however.

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The NYT and Astronomy

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Often, and especially before elections, the act of interpreting MSM news articles takes on the feel of one of those scientific investigations where the investigator tries to gain information about an invisible celestial body by observing its effect on visible stars and planets.

It’s the End of the World as We Know It, and I Feel Fine

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Things were grim when I was growing up in the 1960’s. Natural resources were being depleted at an alarming rate, DDT was causing mass extinctions, pollution was destroying the ecosystem, and the time when the planet’s petroleum supply would run out was in sight. All the experts agreed that we were doomed in 50 years. I had maybe five decades in front of me to live a relatively normal life before things fell apart. After that, the natural resources that humanity depended on to survive would be completely gone.

So how do we fare now that 40 years have passed?

According to the WWF, things are grim. Our end times are in sight. We have maybe 45 years before the natural resources that humanity depends on for survival are completely gone.

I find myself unable to work up any sense of urgency. I wonder why this is so?