Julian Assange’s theory of change, in his own words
Quantum mechanics and its modern evolution left me with a theory of change and how to properly understand how one thing causes another. My interest was then in reversing this thought process and adapting it to another realm. We have an end state that we want, and I looked at all the changes that are … Read more
When “culture” erases history
by Ryan on April 17, 2013. This post originally appeared on the blog Savage Minds and is reposted under CC-BY-NC. Sure, sometimes “culture” can tell us a lot about human behavior and differences. But there are also times when arguments based upon the concept of culture can obscure just as much as they reveal. Right now … Read more
What if Margaret Thatcher had never been?
via BBC News Privatisation, finance boom, manufacturing decline, home ownership, union laws. The UK changed hugely in the 1980s. But how much of that would have happened if Margaret Thatcher had never taken office, asks historian Dominic Sandbrook. In the summer of 1970, a week after their local MP had joined the cabinet for the … Read more
The temporalities of labour history
Notes from the Chapter 9 section “The Temporalities of Labor History”, Sewell WH, Jr (2005) Logics of History: Social theory and social transformation. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. p. 273 Temporality of any historical sequence is complex, i.e. ‘combination of many different social processes with varying temporalities’. Three types of temporality: Trends = ‘directional … Read more
Change and inconsistency
Extracted from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy The most general conception of change is simply difference or nonidentity in the features of things. Thus we speak of the change of temperature from place-to-place along a body, or the change in atmospheric pressures from place-to-place as recorded by isobars, or the change of height of the … Read more
Millikan: conventions are sustained by weight of precedent
Extract from entry “Convention“, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2011) …Ruth Millikan (2005) offers a radical alternative to the views surveyed so far. She draws inspiration not from economics or sociology but from biology. On her view, a convention is a pattern of behavior reproduced within a population due largely to weight of precedent. To say … Read more
Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation (review)
By Daniel Little via Project MUSE (and Savage Minds) Journal of Social History, Volume 41, Number 1, Fall 2007 pp. 181-182 | 10.1353/jsh.2007.0140 Logics of History is a fascinating and insightful book on historical thinking by an innovative historian. William Sewell has made important contributions to French social history. This book marks a return to … Read more
What is to be done?
By Keith Hart via P2P Foundation …[T]he absolute hegemony of mainstream economics has been damaged by the [global financial] crisis. It really isn’t feasible to argue any longer – although many economists still do – that the best guarantee of improved human well-being is to leave markets free of political intervention and social control. Surely … Read more
Disrupting transportation habitus
by Adonia via Savage Minds In his 1935 essay “Techniques of the Body,” Marcel Mauss characterized the body as our primary tool for experiencing the world; bodily practices shape what we think of as normal. The things we do over and over in our everyday lives have a lot to do with what we think … Read more
