José Ortega y Gasset (May 9, 1883 – October 18, 1955), Man and Crisis (1962), p. 94.
Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are.
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José Ortega y Gasset
Author: Redactor
Something big may be about to happen.
Trump impeachment? Financial collapse? War with Iran? — each is all-too-likely, none desirable. But I am referring to space.
In The Economist, May 14th, we read of Jeff Bezos’s itch to live off-planet.
The article is “Amazon’s boss reckons that humanity needs an HQ2,” which tells us that on “May 9th the founder and boss of Amazon, who also runs Blue Origin, a private rocketry firm, unveiled plans for a lunar lander. ‘Blue Moon,’ as it is called, is just one phase of a bold plan to establish large off-world settlements.”
And then comes the obvious literary-cultural reference: “It is a vision ripped directly from 20th-century science fiction.”
Can we dismiss it as space opera, though? A number of major figures, not least of whom is Elon Musk (whose Space X has often been mentioned here), are talking seriously about near-term orbital, lunar, and Martian habitation.
It is hard to wrap my head around an imminent private space colony project. It has always been something for the indefinite future, not something I expected to see.
There remain scoffers, of course (and they may well be right), as well as more paranoid speculations — are the higher-ups, the most insidery of insiders, tipping their hand to a “breakaway civilization” event, perhaps to avoid worldwide catastrophe?
“People now have more information” than in the past, wrote Thomas M. Disch in The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered the World (1998), “and they are smarter, overall, as a consequence — even in those ways they choose to be dumb.”
I am keeping an open mind on whether Bezos’s proposed lunar colony is dumb or genius.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
N.B. The government is also jumping on board the Moon bandwagon, with the president floating a similar-to-Bezos schedule.
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Virginia for Independence
On May 15, 1776, the Virginia Convention instructed its Continental Congress delegation to propose a resolution of independence from Great Britain, paving the way for the United States’ Declaration of Independence.
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Thomas M. Disch
People now have more information, and they are smarter, overall, as a consequence — even in those ways they choose to be dumb.
Thomas M. Disch, The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered the World (1998), p. 226.
Illiteracy, innumeracy, low standards, grade inflation — signs of a general failure of education, sure, and of public schooling in particular. But for the worst failing, look no further than Harvard University.
The Ivy League school just caved to a student mob.
“Harvard said on Saturday that a law professor who has represented Harvey Weinstein would not continue as faculty dean of an undergraduate house after his term ends on June 30,” explains Kate Taylor at the New York Times, “bowing to months of pressure from students.”
The lawyer in question, Professor Ronald S. Sullivan, Jr., has served with his wife, law school lecturer Stephanie Robinson, at one of Harvard’s residential houses for undergraduate students.
Now, the African-American couple has not been fired from faculty. Just as deans. No great tragedy, if the official Harvard statement be true — that there were multiple reasons for not renewing their contracts.
But the context: pressure from students who expressed horror — “trauma-inducing”! — at Sullivan’s legal defense of the former Mirimax mogul accused of numerous sex crimes.
We expect lawyers to defend even the worst criminals. Everyone is entitled to a legal defense. It’s sad that not only do some students fail to accept this but also that this crimson-colored college plays along with their uncivilized complaint. Harvard has, in effect, denied one legal foundation of a free society.
Remember that the “common school movement” for government schools was started to inculcate republican values. Horace Mann’s great big excuse for government control and taxpayer funding of schools was to promote civilized American liberties.
Schools, generally, have failed. And Harvard has just accepted their worst failure as the new passing grade.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Constitution, huzzah?
On May 14, 1787, delegates convened a Constitutional Convention, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to write a new Constitution for the United States. George Washington presided over the convention.
On the same day a century later, Lysander Spooner — author of an infamous pamphlet titled “No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority” — died.
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Lysander Spooner
Unless this clear distinction between vices and crimes be made and recognized by the laws, there can be on earth no such thing as individual right, liberty, or property; no such things as the right of one man to the control of his own person and property, and the corresponding and co-equal rights of another man to the control of his own person and property.
Lysander Spooner, “Vices Are Not Crimes,” anonymously in Prohibition a Failure: Or, the True Solution of the Temperance Question (1875), by Dio Lewis.
“Baseball is life,” say fans, meaning not merely that “the rest is just details,” but also that there are broader lessons to be gleaned from the game.
Yesterday, on Mother’s Day, I told my mom how big a fan of hers I am, and the two of us Detroit Tigers fans mulled over the latest brouhaha. A man in the cheap seats caught the homerun ball hit by Albert Pujols . . . and wouldn’t “give it back.”
That hit and resulting run gave the Los Angeles Angels and former St. Louis Cardinals slugger his 2,000th lifetime “run batted in,” or RBI, putting him in a very exclusive club: fifth on the all-time RBI list.*
Law student Ely Hydes, who caught it, claims stadium security and team representatives descended, pressuring him to give them the ball in exchange for, say, a picture with Pujols and some autographed swag. Hydes, a Tigers fan, wanted to think about it, however. He left.
The Twitterverse erupted.
The charge?
Selfishness — for not turning over a baseball “that would mean so much more” to Pujols.
At EconLog, David Henderson was having none of it: “[E]ven to suggest that Hydes, a law student in debt, is immoral for not giving some of his wealth to a very wealthy man, is breathtaking.” That baseball is likely worth at least $25,000 and could fetch more.
Asked by reporters, Pujols was clear: “[Hydes] has the right to keep it. The ball went in the stands, so I would never fight anybody to give anything back.”
“Pujols’s attitude is admirable,” notes Henderson. “He defended a stranger’s property rights.”
As diehard Tigers fans, Mom and I still take issue. The Angels won that game 13-0. Following tradition, Hydes should have thrown the opposing team’s homerun back onto the field.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* Almost emblematic of our national pastime, there is disagreement over whether Pujols moved into third or fifth place. Major League Baseball says third, because RBIs weren’t officially counted until 1920. Babe Ruth batted in over 200 runs prior to that, and the Chicago Colts’ poor Cap Anson retired after the 1897 season. Thankfully, Baseball-Reference calculated those previously unaccounted for RBIs. Here’s the all-time list:
- Hank Aaron (2,297)
- Babe Ruth (2,214)
- Alex Rodriguez (2,086)
- Cap Anson (2,075)
- Albert Pujols (2,000)
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Brazilian slavery
On May 13, 1888, Brazil abolished slavery with the passage of the Lei Áurea (“Golden Law”).
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Charles Reade
Sow a thought, and you reap an act; Sow an act, and you reap a habit; Sow a habit, and you reap a character; Sow a character, and you reap a destiny.