site banner
bolido_sentimental  1yr ago (text post)   3347 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 25, 2022

Merry Christmas, everyone!

4
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Merry Christmas, everyone. So, what are you reading?

I'm starting Balaji Srinivasan's The Network State. From skimming it, it looks like it touches on lots of contemporary things.

Finished Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy. Enthralling despite the brutal subject matter, it had this kind of meditative cinematic quality. Probably half the allusions and references were over my head, but the stark account of events cut with poetic landscape paintings hit the spot. Days later I'm still turning over some of the chapters in my head.

Finished that a few months back. Fantastic, fantastic book.

One thing that I didn't realize before actually picking it up was how much time he spends on the landscape descriptions.

It's probably 40-50% of the book, and while I didn't know most of the plants and geological formations he described it was still totally gripping and reminiscent of the best kind of Romantic-era writing.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats