Does anyone still bookmark sites? (I rarely do since I got Pinboard.in, worth every penny of the one-time fee. You can also set it up to automatically save the links you ‘favorite’ from Twitter.)
Either way, keep a hold of this link:
Princeton Theological Seminary’s Theological Commons
As some of you have noticed, when I post a public-domain book, I link to the read-in-browser version, hosted at the Internet Archive. Internet Archives worked with Princeton Theological Seminary to scan and host more than 33,000 items. (A recent fire at their scanning plant cost $600,000 in damage; give if you can.) You can read these at Internet Archive, but I think the search feature at the Theological Commons, and since I seek out theologial works, that improved experience — including searching within books — is a big help. (You then get forwarded to Internet Archive.) And there are plenty of interesting works there.
With due respect and recognition to my excellent teachers at the University of Georgia, the best education I got — certainly the most sustained and character-forming part of my education — was in my membership in the Demosthenian Literary Society, the University’s oldest student organization. Something like a mix between a fraternity and a debate club. Tomorrow is its 209th anniverary; tonight is its All Night Meeting, which also serves as its alumni reunion. I wish I could be there. I made some of my oldest and dearest friends while “cultivat[ing] a correct mode of speaking and qualify[ing] through practice to express our views in an effective manner.”
I mention the Society less to reminisce than to think of the kinds of experiences non-residential college students miss, and the thrust towards online-delivery education. I don’t disapprove of online delivery, because without it some people — more and more I bet — won’t get a post-secondary education at all. So I’m suggesting real-life and social supplementation like my own well-loved society. Not such an odd idea: workingmen’s, mechanics’ and ladies’ literary societies once peppered the country and were unrelated to colleges. They could be free-standing or related to another organization, like a church. A thought.
I had a longer post about the new New Yorker (“Groupthink“) article but accidentally deleted it! Just read it, especially the part about the Q factor.
I’m quickly running down a web-search hole following up on my last post about alternatives to college. I’ve been thinking about this subject since the 1980s and even considered an alternative-to-college, though much lower tuitions and a pieced-together scholarship package let me go to the University of Georgia at very little cost. But I graduated 20 years ago next month, and it’s far more expensive now.
Rather than opine about what I’ve found, I’ll just list the resources. Some are about learning alternatives; some are about service alternatives.
Personal and cultural reflections, plus the District of Columbia and some Esperanto