Magni Formica Laboris

Reading Patterns of World History: Since 1750. On p789 it is asked: Why did the industrial movement begin in Britain? Why not, say, in China in the Song or Ming period? Why in the eighteenth century? Why in such areas as textiles, iron, mining, and transport?" The sort of answer that does not seem acceptable to a historian, but which I nonetheless think should hold some weight, is that it comes down to the contributions of key players in the industrial period. I am certainly interested in pursuing this question by looking at how the stage was set. How, so many factors came together in just the right proportion in order to create a climate where the ideas of such key players were fostered instead of neglected. But I cannot draw my attention away from those key players and the way they lived. Perhaps my early foray with the history of science has led me to this, because there it seems very plausible indeed that breakthroughs in science, or natural philosophy as it was called at t...

Assuming the common starting point of solipsism that we all share, and hopefully lose at some point during childhood or adolescence, we can all now ask ourselves the question: at what point am I happy with my understanding of my relationships with others? To which we might respond: it's a never-ending battle. It's even what defines life, a constant struggle to live among other minds. Now if it's not a never-ending battle, perhaps it is literature that will take us to the end. Certainly we'd like to think we could do it without literature, but I think it's safe to say that literature would facilitate an understanding of relationship. But then there remains a question: how do we bridge the gap between what we learn from the text of the literature--what we observe from the safe vantage point as reader--and our own lives? Weinstein mentioned in one of his discussions that (I paraphrase) it's easier to judge characters in a novel than the characters in our own lives...