Misc. Links!

Couple of quick links to things I'm reading and enjoying.

1) This article(fn1) on the rise and fall of Culture11 is interesting thus far. It makes me wish I'd paid more attention to Culture11 when it was around(fn2). The opening few paragraphs also make me want to read more Tom Wolfe(fn3). I leave you with just this one quote from James Poulos, who was apparently the Political Editor for Culture11:

"The right has a lot to learn from people who are completely outside of it," he explained later. If they did that, they "might actually win some latecomers, people who have lived unhappy or unsatisfying lives. And if they show up at the door of the right and say, ‘Gosh, my super-transgressive life is sort of unrewarding, maybe I’ve exhausted this mine of self-indulgence and personal freedom and saying ‘fuck the man,’ and the right is completely disinterested in engaging those people, I think they’re missing out."

I feel that this expresses something significant about the approach to conservatism that I and many of my friends take. If I ever sit down and think constructively about my philosophy, understanding those elements will certainly be a part of it.(fn4)

2) That quote put me in mind of this excellent speech (the link is to the transcript) delivered by Charles Murray at the recent AEI something or other. I'll let him lay out the topic:

"I have two points to make. First, I will argue that the European model is fundamentally flawed because, despite its material successes, it is not suited to the way that human beings flourish--it does not conduce to Aristotelian happiness. Second, I will argue that twenty-first-century science will prove me right.

I haven't finished reading it through, just yet, but I find it intriguing. More the first bit than the second.(fn5)

fn1: Which I came across from the link in this post on the excellent Marginal Revolutions blog. Seriously, it's excellent, you should check it out.

fn2: I did find my way over there quite a bit, but not in any organized kind of way.

fn3: As does, interestingly, reading Tom Wolfe. Oh for more time...

fn4: Which is not at all to say that any of us have lived -- or even wanted to live -- "super-transgressive" lives, just that I have a respect for people who do but also a kind of distrust of the mindset that says we should throw out civilization b/c I want to grow beyond it. If you throw it out, how will you be able to justify your journey as going "beyond"? In other words, without standards, how can you boldly disregard standards? I'm going on too long, but it's something that I wrestle with from time to time. (fn6)

fn5: Came across the Murray speech on The Corner, National Review's blog that is usually fairly lively and interesting.

fn6:The phrase I always remember when thinking along these lines is "if you see through everything, you don't see everything, you see nothing." Kind of the zen way of pointing out that life without rules isn't ultimate freedom, it's ultimately meaningless.