WORK
“Poet’s Work”
Grandfather
advised me:
Learn a trade
I learned
to sit at desk
and condense
No layoff
from this
condensery
—Lorine Niedecker
—from Selected Poems
WORD(S)
zetetic /zə-TET-ik/. noun or adjective. Investigation, inquiry or one engaged in same. A seeker. Adjective: proceeding by such investigation or inquiry. Also, a follower of the ancient Greek skeptic school of Pyrrhonism. From Greek zetetikos (to seek, inquire).
“His seneschal was surveying the zeteticist team monitoring the Chapel usurper party for stray noetic radiations. Boring and incomprehensible.” (Iain M. Banks, from Feersum Endjinn)
“The Zetetic system still lives in lectures and books; as it ought to do, for there is no way of teaching a truth comparable to opposition.” (Augustus de Morgan, from A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II)
“My only originality lies in applying this zetetic attitude outside the hardest of the hard sciences, physics, to softer sciences and then to non-sciences like politics, ideology, jury verdicts and, of course, conspiracy theory.” (Robert Anton Wilson, from High Times)
WEB
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I’m not promoting (or disparaging) the store, but there are some fantastic photos of vintage postcards here for the browsing → “old postcards / Alte Ansichtskarten”
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DIGITAL ETHEREAL: A Creative Exploration of Wireless Spectres
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More than 2100 years later and we’re still discovering Sappho. It’s curious that the title on the page—but nowhere otherwise visible is “How Gay Was Sappho?” → “Girl, Interrupted: Who was Sappho?”
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The first teaser/trailer for Mr. Holmes, starring Ian McKellan as Sherlock, retired and looking back at his life. Yes, please. → ►Mr. Holmes.
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Today in 1781, the planet Uranus—butt of (and in) so many jokes—is discovered.
REPRISES/RESPONSES/REJOINDERS/RIPOSTES
- Reader B. writes, regarding ‘resipiscence’: “Boy, does that ever sound like one of the coinages I get so much flak for.” — Innovation has a price tag!
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