WESTERN PHILOSOPHY – EXISTENTIALISM: “Albert Camus” / The School of Life ☮
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Category Archives: Writing
CONSERVATISM: “Live Babies Plus Conservatism Equals Dead Soldiers” / George Carlin ☮
WESTERN PHILOSOPHY – ANCIENT: “Plato’s Ship of State Metaphor” / Plato ☮
INTERVIEW: “Intellectual Noam Chomsky Endorses Bernie Sanders for President” / Abby Martin ☮
ABRAHAMIC RELIGIOUS DOGMA: “This is What Happens When you Read Violent Passages From the Bible and Tell People it’s the Quran” / Atheist Shoes ☮
LITERARY HISTORY: “No, Oscar Wilde Probably Didn’t Die of Syphilis” / PBS NewsHour / Dr. Howard Markel ☮
Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900)
Irish Writer, Poet, Classicist, Spokesman for Aestheticism, and Atheist.
Known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress, and glittering conversation.
Oscar Wilde uttered his last words in Room 16 of the Hôtel d’Alsace in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, Paris. The wittiest man of his epoch was said to have quipped, “My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One or the other of us must go.”
True or false, the great playwright, poet, novelist and essayist went first. Oscar Wilde drew his last, labored breath on Nov. 30, 1900. He was only 46 years old.
Ever since that moment, literary scholars, doctors and Wilde fans have argued about the precise cause of his death.
WESTERN PHILOSOPHY: “On Skepticism” / Denis Diderot ☮
IN REMEMBRANCE: “Here’s What Kurt Vonnegut Can Teach You About Life” / HuffPost Arts & Culture / Maddie Crum ☮
1990 file photo of author Kurt Vonnegut visiting at the Beverly Hills Hotel, promoting his new book tha deals with the environment. (Photo by Al Seib/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
“There’s only one rule that I know of,
babies —
God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”
Kurt Vonnegut, the beloved novelist we have to thank for Slaughterhouse-Five and Cat’s Cradle would have turned [93] today. Aside from his terrific and inventive page-turners, Vonnegut is often remembered for his outspokenness about both political and moral issues, as well as the importance of art. He advocated humanism both in interviews and in his books. It makes sense, then, that many of his novels contain quotable advice on how to live well.
Here’s some of the best advice gleaned from his novels, essays, and interviews:
INTERVIEW: “Lawrence Krauss: Was There a ‘Beginning’ of the Universe?” / David Pakman ☮
U.S. TRADE POLICY: “The Blockbuster Disaster of the TPP Now Revealed . . .” / The Big Picture RT / Thom Hartmann ☮
Always Question Authority 