As a Core student, one of the first things we learn is that finding the perfect place to snuggle up with The Republic, Dante’s Divine Comedy, or even the latest chapters from your Physical Science textbook. The perfect spot could be anywhere: the cozy beanbag in your dorm room, a secret spot in Mugar that doesn’t have too much traffic, or whatever place you know and will never tell.
But of course, as nice as any place on campus can be, these beautiful spots will put it to shame. In this list that has been circling the internet, some of the most beautiful libraries of universities, private homes, and even some shops open up our imaginations to where we could be, rather than sitting above the noisy campus tours trying to read the last few chapters before class. Here’s the list in its entirety taken from this page.
So what’s your favorite place to read? Is it somewhere from home or have you already found somewhere here in Boston to make you feel like home? Let us know!
To anyone who ever aspires to one day be a published author, the question of how to become a writer is never far from the mind. The reason could be because the label is rather insubstantial. Unlike becoming a doctor, where the boundaries are set so clearly that even your name changes from Mr/Ms to Dr just so everyone can be extremely clear, every writer must decide for themselves. The act of being a writer (writing) is completely intrinsically motivated, and the distinction between a person who writes (everybody to a certain extent) and a writer is so fine, we aren't sure if it could even be defined.
Brian Doyle did not let the intangible nature of this distinction stop him from distinguishing what, for him, defines this step:
But in almost every class I am asked how I became a writer, and after I make my usual joke about it being a benign neurosis, as my late friend George Higgins once told me, I usually talk about my dad. My dad was a newspaperman, and still is, at age 92, a man of great grace and patience and dignity, and he taught me immensely valuable lessons. If you wish to be a writer, write, he would say. There are people who talk about writing and then there are people who sit down and type. Writing is fast typing. Also you must read like you are starving for ink. Read widely. Read everything.
As someone aspiring to become a writer myself, I have always loved reading what authors consider to be the defining traits of the profession. Brian Doyle's advice is not only simple to grasp, unlike the often intangible definitions writers give themselves, but also rings incredibly true for me. To read the rest of this article, click the link here
But regardless of whether there is an actual distinction or not, it is an interesting question to ponder. What do you think defines writing and distinguishes writers? Let us know in the comments!
Relating to CC102's study of Confucius, and Prof. Wiebke Denecke's lecture on Confucian China, is the Zhuangzi, a compilation of wisdom teachings much like the Dao De Jing. After scrupulous analysis of Herbert A. Giles's 1889 translation, Oscar Wilde comes to the following conclusion in his review:
It is clear that Chuang Tzu is a very dangerous writer, and the publication of this book in English, two thousand years after his death, is obviously premature, and may cause a great deal of pain to many thoroughly respectable and industrious persons. It may be true that the ideal of self-culture and self-development, which is the aim of his scheme of life, and the basis of his scheme of philosophy, is an ideal somewhat needed by an age like ours, in which most people are so anxious to educate their neighbors that they actually have no time left to educate themselves. But would it be wise to say so? It seems to me that if we once admitted the force of any one of Chuang Tzu's destructive criticisms we should have to put some check on our national habit of self-glorification; and the only thing that ever consoles man from the stupid things he does is the praise he always gives himself for doing them.
Those interested in reading Wilde's full response can find it here.
Giant Hubble Mosaic of the Crab Nebula (hubblesite.org)
Prof. Stevens, who teaches natural sciences in the Core, has created a Core Science Twitter account, @BUCoreScience. Visit it to find the latest fascinating scientific news, CC105/CC106 class announcements, and more!
Ecology and the environment are important topics in CC105 and CC106, so the Core is delighted to share that the Boston mayoral candidates are discussing a whole range of plans to boost recycling, curb emissions, and adapt to sea levels!
Here is an extract from a relevant article for the Boston Globe:
In hopes of improving air quality, City Councilor Michael Ross wants to authorize Boston’s parking enforcement officers to issue tickets to drivers violating antiidling laws and City Councilor Rob Consalvo would require diesel-fueled municipal vehicles to mix in biodiesel.
However, an article by Michael Graziano for Aeon Magazine makes some interesting claims. Here is an extract:
Many thinkers have approached consciousness from a first-person vantage point, the kind of philosophical perspective according to which other people’s minds seem essentially unknowable. And yet... we spend a lot of mental energy attributing consciousness to other things. We can’t help it, and the fact that we can't help it ought to tell us something about what consciousness is and what it might be used for. If we evolved to recognise it in others – and to mistakenly attribute it to puppets, characters in stories, and cartoons on a screen — then, despite appearances, it really can’t be sealed up within the privacy of our own heads.
Lately, the problem of consciousness has begun to catch on in neuroscience. How does a brain generate consciousness? In the computer age, it is not hard to imagine how a computing machine might construct, store and spit out the information that ‘I am alive, I am a person, I have memories, the wind is cold, the grass is green,’ and so on. But how does a brain become aware of those propositions? The philosopher David Chalmers has claimed that the first question, how a brain computes information about itself and the surrounding world, is the ‘easy’ problem of consciousness. The second question, how a brain becomes aware of all that computed stuff, is the ‘hard’ problem.
I believe that the easy and the hard problems have gotten switched around. The sheer scale and complexity of the brain’s vast computations makes the easy problem monumentally hard to figure out. How the brain attributes the property of awareness to itself is, by contrast, much easier. If nothing else, it would appear to be a more limited set of computations. In my laboratory at Princeton University, we are working on a specific theory of awareness and its basis in the brain. Our theory explains both the apparent awareness that we can attribute to a puppet and the direct, first-person perspective that we have on our own experience. And the easiest way to introduce it is to travel about half a billion years back in time...
While "creativity" is difficult to define, it seems fairly certain that something of the sort exists. We know little of its origins, but can observe the environments in which it thrives. Here is John Cleese's take on it:
Cleese successfully outlines "the 5 factors that you can arrange to make your lives more creative". Here are the bits that resonate most with the Core:
While you’re being creative, nothing is wrong. There’s no such thing as a mistake, and any drivel may lead to the breakthrough.
The very essence of playfulness is an openness to anything that may happen, the feeling that whatever happens, it’s okay… you’re either free to play, or you’re not.
If you want creative workers, give them enough time to play.
Scientific American released a related article in 2011 titled 'The Unleashed Mind: Why Creative People Are Eccentric'. Here is a preview:
People who are highly creative often have odd thoughts and behaviors—and vice versa.
Both creativity and eccentricity may be the result of genetic variations that increase cognitive disinhibition—the brain’s failure to filter out extraneous information.
When unfiltered information reaches conscious awareness in the brains of people who are highly intelligent and can process this information without being overwhelmed, it may lead to exceptional insights and sensations.
Whatever "creativity" really is, it has an important role in human evolution. Stay creative!
Nothing's better than subtle humor. Whether it be an obscure reference, an inside joke, or something that takes a couple minutes on wikipedia before anyone can laugh, getting something that takes a minute creates endless satisfaction. To those avid redditors out there, this post is nothing new. Two months ago, StickleyMan asked reddit "what's the most intellectual joke you know", and it turns out a sight not particularly known for its ability to strain the brain, turned out an astonishing amount of hilariously intellectual jokes that range from the completely incomprehensible to the more commonly recognized. Katy and Will's post attempt to help explain some of the best of these jokes:
From user phattmatt: “Jean-Paul Sartre is sitting at a French cafe, revising his draft of Being and Nothingness. He says to the waitress, "I'd like a cup of coffee, please, with no cream." The waitress replies, "I'm sorry, Monsieur, but we're out of cream. How about with no milk?”
Why it’s funny: Because Sartre believes that an absence of something is still something. Plus, coffee with no milk tastes a lot worse than coffee with no cream.
From user Watch_Closely: “It’s hard to explain puns to kleptomaniacs because they always take things literally.”
Why it’s funny: Because kleptomaniacs always take things, literally. As another Reddit user put it: “I don’t get it, but I’m stealing this one.”
Some of my favorite were missed by this article though including "What do you get when you cross a joke with a rhetorical question?" by user mwalshe89. This post is an excellent way to get the best condensed (find the link here) but if you have a little more time go through the original post. Most of threads contain explanations and if not, a little googling might lead you to learn something you didn't know before.
Are there any jokes they missed here? Let us know!
In case you, like a few of us, didn't manage to find the time to hit a movie theater up this summer (or perhaps need a little convincing to give Baz Lurhmann another shot), here's a review of The Great Gatsby that made me want to give the movie a try:
But that’s Luhrmann in a nutshell. He strives for excess. He exhausts your senses. He does no less in Gatsby. However, for a story like Gatsby, one set in an excessive era and filled with excessive people, a story that ultimately condemns both – well, Luhrmann found his masterpiece.
Technology's powers are increasing, and as they do, movies become more and more dramatic. We, as humans, love to stretch to the limit whatever is within our reach. The trick is to reign that back, as Fitzgerald reminds us constantly. You can read the rest of the review here
The Core Blog is a hub for information and media related to the CAS Core Curriculum at Boston University. It will be updated regularly, with photo galleries, interviews, links to related reading online, news of events or activities, and other kinds of content that help connect our Core people—prospective, current, and former students—with each other.
You can stop by here once a week to scroll through the posts, or make this your homepage in order to keep your finger on the pulse of the Core. Either way, we hope you find this to be a pleasant way to strengthen your connection with the great people, the great books, and the great questions we encounter in the Core.
