Saturday, August 2, 2014

These zoo enrichment guidelines fail to impress

There have been lots of idea the past few decades: most of them amount to painting cement green. Making cages larger. And then there is the plan to to hide their food, so they can have the primordial experience of hunting for their meal. For some, the only zoo experience that could count as enriching would be eating a zoo-keeper. 

Thursday, July 31, 2014

Just an example of ordinary academic chatter

Quote-
The Tolkien problem. Hobbits and dragons dominate the popular imagination. The result: We've lost sight of actual medieval history?.
End quote of a blurb at http://www.aldaily.com/

This summary of somebody's thesis, on which we base a few thoughts:
That actual medieval history was long gone before Tolkien brandished his pen. Certainly it was long gone when someone coined the word medieval.

That words must obscure, they render the vast squirming and glory of a moment into something manageable by thinkers, speakers, talkers. 

That Tolkien probably knew this as well as anyone of his adorable ilk.. 

Cite the source or cite your ignorance

The bigger the font the more ordinary the thought