Further Miscellany
I love the idea that a university would create and publish its own calendar/diary for its members, and, though I have no connection whatever to Cambridge University, I share Mary Beard’s sadness that the little book will cease publication.
Why Soviet Poland banned Anne of Green Gables.
We just can’t quite get over crop circles, can we?
What machine learning is good for.
Remarkable story from the Spectator:
This entire perplexing place, known as Karahan Tepe (pronounced Kah-rah-hann Tepp-ay), which is now emerging from the dusty Plains of Harran, in eastern Turkey, is astoundingly ancient. Put it another way: it is estimated to be 11-13,000 years old. This number is so large it is hard to take in. For comparison the Great Pyramid at Giza is 4,500 years old. Stonehenge is 5,000 years old. The Cairn de Barnenez tomb-complex in Brittany, perhaps the oldest standing structure in Europe, could be up to 7,000 years old.
Virtually all that we can now see of Karahan Tepe has been skilfully unearthed the last two years.... And although there is much more to summon from the grave, what it is already teaching us is mind stretching. Taken together with its age, complexity, sophistication, and its deep, resonant mysteriousness, and its many sister sites now being unearthed across the Harran Plains – collectively known as the Tas Tepeler, or the ‘stone hills’ – these carved, ochre-red rocks, so silent, brooding, and watchful in the hard whirring breezes of the semi-desert, constitute what might just be the greatest archaeological revelation in the history of humankind.
I’ve written about a few things:
- Recent critiques of the pastor Tim Keller -- people keep talking about Kellerism (there’s no such thing) and Kellerites (ditto), and I keep thinking: Really? That’s what you’re worried about?
- Being bloggy
- The Life We’re Looking For and the Angel of History
- My brain on shuffle
There’s other stuff too, including some cool images and the lamentations of an Arsenal supporter. Please take a look around.