The importance of bilingualism

Hat tip Ryan Sliwoski.

“Everything but sex; everything but divorce”

At National Review Online, David French makes an insightful comment on why the American church differs so little morally from the larger society.

But why are we doing so much worse now? I tend to think it’s a logical result of the “everything but” culture that’s overrun much of the church. In other words, “We Christians live just like you, but without the sin.”

Push button to add drama

Hilarious! Hat tip to Jonah Goldberg at National Review Online.

Gandhi’s dead and I don’t feel too good either

I just finished a dark little alternate history story by Harry Turtledove, “The Last Article.” The British lose WW II after Dunkirk, and the Nazis eventually conquer British India. Gandhi tries nonviolent resistance on the Germans. The German military governor has Gandhi shot and heads to lunch.

The writer’s point? The British were decent people, the Nazis not so much.

Camelot resurrected

Recently I bought Unafraid: A Novel of the Possible by Jeff Golden. It starts with a counterfactual premise: What if John Kennedy had survived his assassination attempt?

Since I enjoy both alternate-world fiction and counterfactual history, I bought the book without reading any reviews beforehand. I’ll know better next time.

***SPOILERS BELOW THE FOLD***

Encyclopedia Brittanica, R.I.P.

The last copies ever of the Encyclopedia Brittanica have been printed. The subscription-only digital edition still exists, but the traditional hard copies will soon be a thing of the past.

 

The photo shows a 1768 first edition.

 

Up close and personal with a tsunami

Amazing footage from the tsunami that hit Japan just over a year ago. It comes from the dashcam of a delivery vehicle.

Hat tip to Jonah Goldberg of National Review Online.

How to make an atheist

“Nothing produces atheists like despicable religious people. They do far more harm to religious faith than all the atheist writers and activists in the world put together.”

The quotation comes from Dennis Prager, an observant Jew writing about Muslims in Iran, but it applies broadly.

 

Reading, reading

I’ve been reading some interesting (to me) stuff recently, including:

• “Envisioning a Post-Campus America,” by Megan McArdle in the Atlantic. She speculates on the shape higher education might take once the online model comes completely . . . er, online.
• A long blog post by Walter Russell Mead at The American Interest called “Beyond Blue Part Four: Better Living in the 21st Century.” Mead compares the transition from an agricultural to an industrial economy with the current change away from industry. He predicts a surge in service industries, including higher wages.
• March Upcountry, a military science fiction novel by David Weber and John Ringo, free from Baen in its electronic edition.  The book is a sci-fi treatment of Anabasis, written in the fourth century BC by the Greek soldier and historian Xenophon. Even the title comes from Xenophon because “march upcountry” is what ἀνάβασις means.

Heinlein and Haldeman meet Jesus

Here’s a book review I posted on Amazon:

Knox’s Irregulars tells the story of Randal Knox, a corporal and fire team leader in the New Genevan Defense Force, who finds himself trapped behind enemy lines with a handful of survivors of a disastrous battle. The enemy, the Abkhenazi, have overrun the New Genevan line and now threaten to destroy the whole army.