Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to linger,
Danyl has clearly and consistently stated that he believes his own education was a waste of money.
Which would be reason in itself to doubt his good faith. He appears to be a useful scientist, and his blog is often brilliant in ways that would be difficult to achieve without a decent education. He just behaves oddly when he comes here.
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to Emma Hart,
We need another word for a “troll” who actually believes what they’re saying.
How long has the internet been going and we still don't have this?
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I saw Jen's tweet about this this morning and thought, that's a crazy way to signal a tsunami alert. As she said, who wants to wait five minutes to find out whether it's a tsunami?
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to Danyl Mclauchlan,
Anyway, I’ve made my points and short of any new arguments, I think we’ve covered the subject. I get that people are defensive about the premise, because ...
Danyl, you do realise you do this all the time here?
You make a provocative statement, behave as if the subsequent discussion is some sort of unusual response that only proves your point, then declare the debate over.
Which would be fine if you didn't insist on being such a dick about it. A little respect and good faith would probably serve you better.
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to BenWilson,
And you’re ironically the very person Danyl is describing, the self taught savant. Fantastic when it happens, but aren’t you rather unusual?
You would not be the first person to make such an observation.
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to BenWilson,
Actually, Danyl, I didn’t read a lot of books at all. What I did mostly was engage in dialectic, much like what we are doing right here. It is something that you can only learn by doing it, and that’s not going to happen on the bus unless you’re on a bus full of philosophers who are prepared to give you their time on it.
Good point. I learned to argue by ... arguing with people.
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Hard News: Media7: Doing it for the Kids, in reply to linger,
(Actually, to be fair to Craig: Russell’s post does seem to support a judgement about the Minister’s response only on the basis of the resulting newspaper headlines . I assume you’d agree Craig is perfectly entitled to engage with the content of the original post rather than focussing solely on the commentariat.)
It was a reasonable criticism. But my point was more that I was fascinated by the way that the framing of the story, via the headlines, was so violent. It was ironic.
It may or may not have been fair in this case, but Tolley has earned herself a reputation as a bully. She's arrogant and, judging what I've heard out of her office, a terrible manager. So I'm not inclined towards sympathy for her. I think she's the worst Education minister in many years.
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to giovanni tiso,
…Russell Brown, Giovanni Tiso…
Eh, sorry, what? I might have swooned there for a minute.
I'd have mentioned you too, but I was afraid you'd fall and hit your head.
Something we've danced around at various times is the quality of writing summoned by critical studies. As an inexpert reader, I frequently find it unbearable -- and the idea of deliberate obscurantism somewhat offensive. But you write beautifully.
For the Great New Zealand Argument book (copies still available!), I think whatI brought to it was a journalistic eye. I read quite a number of Auckland University Winter Lectures and Sinclair's 'The Historian as Prophet' stood clear of nearly everything else. It is lucid, relevant and, yes, prophetical. By contrast, Allen Curnow's poetic economy was nowhere to be found in his lectures.
As I've noted before, I'm a fan of A.R.D Fairburn -- he wrote a lot of tosh, but even then it was brilliantly-expressed tosh. It fascinates me that he was brought into the faculty at Auckland University without having done the conventional study. Those responsible presumably recognised that he could still be a valuable contributor.
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to giovanni tiso,
I had less use for offerings that endlessly cited Foucault and Gramsci,
Shit, if I was allowed to only ever cite two people, those would be my two. Have you been through my drawers again?
Fair enough. I actually had to go back and look up the book, Speaking Truth to Power: Public Intellectuals Rethink New Zealand.
Three authors dwelt on Derrida's 1999 visit to Auckland, which I found about as helpful as an examination of New Zealand music via the Beatles' tour.
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Hard News: Limping Onwards, in reply to Jolisa,
… Te Rangi Hîroa, Elsie Locke, Ranginui Walker, Marilyn Waring, Denis Dutton, Michael King, Jane Kelsey …
Just been driving around thinking of more names. Thought of Marilyn -- and also of Roger Horrocks, whose dabblings I have found of great use.