*Battle Angel Alita 2 Cyborg Movie based on novel by Yukito Kishiro Yes but no, is my hapless equivocation in answer to the huge, ongoing question academics are asking nowadays. ChatbotGPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) is creative but emotionless. The academic psychopath has always been admired. Perhaps academic criteria will have to change. Can I say how? No. But I can see a big problem heading for the academy. And the arts and humanities will suffer the most. Old Arts Building…
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Will you dominate? Comply? Defect? Matrix game choices depend on affordances. Affordance, simply, is context. How do you handle your affordance? What is your next move? Your decision on what to do – in conjunction with your age, health, and economy – excites an internal debate. What Weird Tit-for-Tat (dominate, comply, or defect) move will you make to deal with your affordance? Your consciousness, and the feelings, emotions, intelligence, and instincts you’re (mostly) aware of, quickly take in the complexity of…
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Homo sapiens are herding, mannerly animals. History texts, irrespective of inclusivity, are nothing but a collection of stereotypes. Humans categorize and then we characterize. Doing so is in our nature. Should we stop stereotyping “the other”? Sure. But can we stop? Does the stereotype offer us insight into power structures? Yay or Nay? Stereotyping: A method of categorizing. Adding a descriptive term to characterize a group. The much maligned stereotype helps us understand power structures, if we care to study it. But…
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November 2022 Question: Would proportional representation be good for Canada? YES or NO This column takes up the NO side, lauding the Senate of Canada. Ranked ballots are another issue. S. Minsos (PhD University of Alberta, BA Western) believes if you see something you like about Canada in Bill Browder’s Freezing Order, you might want to explore her theory: Culture Clubs: The Real Fate Of Societies. Homo sapiens are herding, mannerly animals. (The Magnitsky Act allows Canada to sanction foreign nationals “responsible for…
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Thinking outside the cultural box, a.k.a., the culture club. The Flammarion engraving, unknown artist, first appears in Camille Flammarion’s 1888 book L’atmosphère: météorologie populaire. Acknowledgments To publishers, and for the help of others throughout the publishing process – art, readings, editing, design, proofing, production, indexing, and book-club readings – the writer extends deep appreciation: Christi Belcourt, Faye Boer, Janine Brodie, Lesley Clarke, DELC, Jaclyn Draker, Murray Dorin (1954 – 2020), Gerry Dotto, Judy Dunlop, Stephen Gibb, Dianne Gillespie, Jennifer Gobeil,…
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Frances Anne Beechey Hopkins (1838–1919), Canoe Manned by Voyageurs Passing a Waterfall (1869). (LAC) CC0 In Hopkins’ painting Canadians will appreciate our home-grown paradoxes. There are French, Métis and Indigenous voyageurs, everyone showing healthy goodness and worthy effort, and then one spots two small English settlers, doing nothing much to help the cause as they voyage en route to their destination at Lachine (Hudson’s Bay Company). Edward Hopkins, the bearded gentleman, has a blanket over his knees. The little woman,…
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Canadian folkways lean on immigrants’ and Indigenous’ stories. The Women Review: “Sky Walker Tehawennihárhos: Charter is a complex, action-filled novel about the 1840s in Canada West [formerly Upper Canada, now Ontario]. …Leading us through the suspenseful plot, filled with humour and emotion, Minsos writes spare, clean prose. The late Mel Hurtig once said about her style, ‘Every word is right.’ In Minsos’ books we witness survival struggles, stereotypical biases and gender inequity. We follow the trail of shady land sharks and…
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