The best free cultural & educational media on the web
The best free cultural & educational media on the web
≡ Category: Philosophy | ≅ 6 Comments
On Monday, we told you where you can download Free Courses from Top Philosophers (Foucault, Searle, Russell and the rest). As the day went along, our list grew thanks to reader suggestions, and we also discovered another promising resource — a podcast called “The History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps,” created by Peter Adamson, Professor of Ancient and [...]
≡ Category: Film, Sci Fi | ≅ 2 Comments
It’s perhaps hard to imagine now, but Ridley Scott’s classic sci-fi film, Blade Runner, saw some hard days when it was first released in 1982. Preview screenings went badly. Crowds flocked instead to see Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster, ET. The film lost money. And critics gave the film mixed reviews. Case in point, Siskel & Ebert’s [...]
≡ Category: Film | ≅ 2 Comments
2010 saw the release of a restored version of Metropolis, the classic German expressionist, sci-fi film directed by Fritz Lang. The restoration started two years earlier, in 2008, when a long sought-after copy of the 1927 film was found in the archives of the Museo del Cine in Buenos Aires, and it contained 30 minutes of previously unseen [...]
≡ Category: Art | ≅ 2 Comments
Way back in 1963, Jerry Gretzinger began making a map of his imaginary world. And now, almost 50 years later, the Map weaves together more than 2,000 panels, and covers more than 1,600 square feet of surface area (see photo here). What started as a simple doodle took on an amazing life of its own. [...]
≡ Category: Books, Google, Literature | ≅ 2 Comments
Earlier this month Jennifer Egan, the newly-minted Pulitzer Prize winner, paid a visit to Google to talk about A Visit from the Goon Squad, her experimental novel that won the Pulitzer, among many other awards. That’s the ostensible focus. But the conversation moves quickly into other areas that will interest writers and readers alike — how [...]
≡ Category: Comedy, Religion | ≅ Leave a Comment
Not long after the devastating tsunami of 2004, Brian Keith Dalton began working on a skit that morphed into Mr. Deity, a satirical look at our Creator and his everyday struggle to manage his new creation. The first episode (above) aired on iTunes and the web in early 2007, and straightaway, we encounter Mr. Deity and his sidekick Larry bumbling their way [...]
≡ Category: Philosophy | ≅ 15 Comments
You can download hundreds of Free Courses from Great Universities. (Perhaps you already knew that.) And that includes courses by some of the biggest minds teaching in philosophy. (Is that old news too? Or some welcomed good news?) So we’re starting the week by giving you a rundown of some notable mentions. John Searle began [...]
≡ Category: Music | ≅ Leave a Comment
The Velvet Underground first released “Sweet Jane” in 1970, and a cool version it was. But, soon enough, Lou Reed launched his solo career, put out a live version of “Sweet Jane” on Rock n Roll Animal (1974), and made the song his own. That same year, Reed performed another funk-laden version in Paris, with [...]
≡ Category: Random, Religion, Science | ≅ 17 Comments
“Should evolution be taught in schools?” That was the question actually put to participants in the Miss USA pageant held this past June. In response, MacKenzie Fegan and her friends had some fun with the whole line of thinking, shooting their own mock video in reply. Enjoy, and do know that we heart Miss Vermont… via [...]
≡ Category: Books, Literature, Music | ≅ 1 Comment
Michael Schur, the co-creator of NBC’s Parks and Recreation, has had a long-running fascination with David Foster Wallace’s sprawling magnum opus, Infinite Jest. So when his favorite band, The Decemberists, asked him to shoot a video for their new track “Calamity Song,” he knew the creative direction he wanted to take. And so here it [...]
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