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@seanbala@mas.to cover
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

seanbala

@[email protected]

Former #ReligiousStudies student in #Chicago. Interested in #religion, #philosophy, #ethics, #culture, #environment, #ecology, and #community. Currently working in #HigherEd.

Other Tags: #Episcopal #Episcopalian #Ecotheology #Books #Folklore #Travel #Fantasy #History #Solarpunk #ScienceFiction #SFF #Bookstadon #Bookmaking #Musicals #Theater #India

Love exploring new cultures, interesting ideas, and meeting new people!

"If only I may grow - simple, firmer, kinder, warmer." Dag Hammarskjold

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CultureDesk , to random
@CultureDesk@flipboard.social avatar

More than one billion animals are kept as pets around the world. But bioethicist Jessica Pierce says that might not be great for our furry, feathered and scaly friends. In this story for @time, she discusses the potential harms of pet ownership, including whether it's ok to buy and sell animals and use them for our own gratification, the anguish of captivity, and the climate impacts of pet-keeping. She also posits a new way forward, in which human-animal ties are mutual and freely chosen. It's a very thought-provoking article; tell us in the comments what you think.

https://flip.it/bDgviO

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@CultureDesk @time Thank you for sharing this. I have been thinking a lot about this lately. I've studied more about Jain and Buddhist philosophy over the years and they present a wider and more nuanced conception of suffering than Western philosophy often does. When combined with environmental ethics, there are deep questions about suffering inherent in so many of our complex systems. Perhaps this will be something the future might condemn us for?

@philosophy

seanbala , to bookstodon
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

At the store and came across a pretty discounted hardcover copy of "Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver. It is worth purchasing a physical copy? I usually try to stick to library books and purchase books I really like, but the library wait list is long and the price is tempting.

About to travel and was looking for something good to read.

@books @bookstodon

bunvoyage17 , to bookstodon
@bunvoyage17@mastodon.social avatar

We wanted to have a quiet afternoon and so we went to go to Kapej Coffee on the Brown Line. It is one of our favorite places in with some of the best in the city. In fact, the owner was roasting coffee fresh in a little alcove off the counter.

@dohappybelove made a and @seanbala started “The Lost Cause” by @pluralistic - a wonderful Sunday!

@coffee @bookstodon

A man lounging in an armchair reading a book, with a coffee cup and a takeaway beverage on the table next to him, in a cozy room with plants and decorative items on a fireplace mantel.
A hand holding a sketchbook with a watercolor painting of a colorful balcony in front of an actual fireplace, alongside art supplies and an iced coffee on a table.
A book titled “The Lost Cause" next to a white coffee mug with the word "Kapej Coffee" written on it on calligraphy. The setting is a a cafe with a plant and window in the background.

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@FullyAutomatedRPG @bunvoyage17 @dohappybelove @pluralistic @coffee @bookstodon

Thanks - I'll take a look!

seanbala , to bookstodon
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

Was out today and had unexpected free time but no book!

I opened my @omnivore app on my tablet and read the short story "The Mausoleum's Children" by @aliettedb in @UncannyMagazine. It was so good!! I'm so glad I discovered both the story and the magazine here. Moral of the story - do your best to always have something good to read!

https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/the-mausoleums-children/

@bookstodon

seanbala , to bookstodon
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

Found this way deep in my YouTube "Watch Later" collection. It's a really nice guide to getting started with Charles Dickens including a recommended order for select books from Robert Douglas-Fairhurst.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aryB10D04jw

Might add these to my 2024 Reading List!

@bookstodon

seanbala , to bookstodon
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

Listening to the English audiobook of "A Man Called Ove" by Fredrik Backman narrated by J.K. Simmons. While I enjoyed Tom Hanks in the English film adaptation, Simmons would have made a truly FANTASTIC Ove / Otto. I don't normally do audiobooks (I have a book group that I really need to finish the book for) but this one has been nice.

@bookstodon

Zeb_Larson , to random
@Zeb_Larson@zirk.us avatar

One of the most tired genres of academic posting is complaining about your students. A lot of it is mean-spirited (how dare these kids not treat my exact passion with the seriousness I did!), but a lot of it is also just fucking lazy. Congrats, as a trained expert in your field you managed to nitpick a freshman to death, or discovered that they (gasp) skipped a reading.

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@Zeb_Larson Have you ever heard the idea that the people campaign for political offices are not the people that you want running those offices? The idea is that the skills you need to campaign are not necessarily the ones you need to govern. I sometimes feel the same way about academia - the skills you need to get through a PhD select for many who shouldn't be in a classroom. Or, the people who can do research are not the ones you want teaching young people.

@academicchatter

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@Zeb_Larson @academicchatter That is not to say that I'm not sympathetic to those problems that come from teaching. I used to teach university courses and I loved so much of it. But I remember encountering that archetype of academics who were brilliant with research but loathed students with a burning passion.

ml , to academicchatter
@ml@ecoevo.social avatar

Most of Plant Science Twitter seems to be on Bluesky. What are your favorite Fediverse accounts (institutional and/or personal) for keeping up with academic botanical news? @plantscience @academicchatter

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@ml @plantscience @academicchatter @PlantTeaching @jennifermach @ELS @botanyone @AnnBot @bomengidsnl One thing to keep an eye out for - I think that Mastodon will be launching Groups soon. It is on their roadmap and that might eventually make organizing via topic a bit easier! I hope that is correct @MastodonEngineering?

1/2

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@ml @plantscience @academicchatter @PlantTeaching @jennifermach @ELS @botanyone @AnnBot @bomengidsnl @MastodonEngineering I noticed in an analysis of my inactive accounts many inactive academic ones seem to have shifted over to BlueSky. A bit sad but maybe they will come back someday, or maybe someone the ActivityPub + BlueSky Bridge will finally launch and then you can continue to follow them here!

2/2

DejahEntendu , to bookstodon
@DejahEntendu@dice.camp avatar

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari

I feel like he spent too much time working at being cutesy and not enough at internal consistency. It was an amusing book, however. Taken as a light historical fiction about the run-up to modern life, it's good enough.

One example of the issues with the book follows:
He sets up the straw man of biological essentialism, then knocks it down with social consctructs.

1/
@bookstodon

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@DejahEntendu @bookstodon Thanks for posting. I used to teach the book to my undergraduates for a course on big ideas. I think my problem with the book is that he is nuanced when convenient and paints in broad brush strokes when convenient. For me, the one that sticks in my teeth is his views on religion, which is simplistic and lacks any sense that religions are wide umbrellas with MANY different features. @religion

Full disclosure: my academic background is comparative religions.

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@DejahEntendu @bookstodon @religion It is good text to introduce students to thinking on broader time scales and about big ideas, but one needs to use it as a jumping off point rather than a destination.

1dalm , to random
@1dalm@deacon.social avatar

In an alternate history timeline, do you think the industrial revolution happens without the Protestant movement?

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@1dalm One of the more thought provoking books I have read over the past few years is "The Years of Rice and Salt" by Kim Stanley Robinson. Its central premise is that if Europe was wiped out by the Black Death, history would have unfolded roughly in the same manner but in different places. So the Renaissance happened in Samarkand and the Industrial Revolution took place in South India in Travancore. So yes, I think it would have happened.

1/2

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@1dalm In a non-fiction example, in Amitav Ghosh's "The Great Derangement" the author points out that many of the compontents of fossil fuel consumption like the use of oil and coal are actually much older than we think and were used heavily in places like Burma and China. So the point is that things could have gone differently with different circumstances.

2/2

@bookstodon

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@1dalm I can see what you are saying about Chinese printing. But movable type could have come out of India, where the letters for most of the alphabets are phonetic. And there have been constant religious reform movements in India. For example you would have the Bhakti movement in 15th / 16th century India, along with Sikhism. And there were plenty of philosophical movements within Indian philosophy that could have led to an Enlightenment-like movement.

1/3

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@1dalm I do get that the printing press and mass media did take place in a centuries long process of societal breakdown partially brought about by the Black Death, the rise of a middle class, and by the Age of Discovery. And in many ways, India and China had social problems that would have made social mobility very difficult. But there are other factors. For example, India was akin to Renaissance Italy - lots of small states in constant low-level warfare.

2/3

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@1dalm So, it might not have happened. But it might have happened in a different way. And that is the premise that Robinson explores in "The Years of Rice and Salt."

3/3

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@1dalm You are right - this is the original question! The interesting thing about "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" is the question of whether its religious foundation is essential. On one hand, capitalism has started in Europe but on the other hand, it has taken root everywhere with or without a foundation of Protestantism. Is it a general social mechanism that could have arisen without a specific religious context?

@religion @philosophy

1/2

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@1dalm @religion @philosophy My feeling is that it could have arisen. But I am curious to think about it a bit more.

Thanks for a nice, thought provoking conversation. Infinitely more interesting than work today.

2/2

seanbala , to bookstodon
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

Craft Project! I have a beloved Kobo Libra H2O. It has a proprietary case covered in a blue fake leather that began to flake. I took it off and for a while went with the cloth underneath. But that was beginning to fray and so I decided to fix it with my ninja bookmaking skills. Probably should have used a thinner cloth for the magnet but it looks beautiful!

@bookstodon

A red ebook cover opened up on its back with a vintage pattern laid flat on a cutting mat with grid lines.
A dirty closed fabric-covered ereader case on a textured fabric surface.
An open fabric ereader cover.

arielkroon , to academicchatter
@arielkroon@wandering.shop avatar

Pretty excited that the Solarpunk Conference Journal is out! I have a paper in it called "Disrupting the present in a positive way: Solarpunk and learning from the past". I'm so happy to see it out, and amongst such fantastic company!

Click the link below to give it a read:

https://hcommons.org/deposits/item/hc:62961/

@academicchatter

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@arielkroon @academicchatter Added to my reads for the weekend - congrats to both you and @xtinadlr!

nik , to bookstodon
@nik@mstdn.games avatar

You ever get the feeling that you just can’t read fast enough? I’m usually happy to mosey along, but this book I’m reading right now—Weyward, by Emilia Hart—is so interesting I just want to devour it, inhale it, consume aaaaall of it at once.

https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/f332e5b5-48c5-4d55-b8b4-75b94ff1c90b

Sorry I gotta get back to my book; it’s too good. 👋🏽

@bookstodon

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@nik @bookstodon ADDED to Bookwyrm - thanks!

seanbala , to bookstodon
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

Maybe a question for the hive -mind of !

@bookstodon

(Trying out quote posts on @IceCubesApp for the first time - hope it works!)

From: @Pheebsdw
https://wandering.shop/@Pheebsdw/111495903637658170

Pheebsdw , to random
@Pheebsdw@wandering.shop avatar

Question: what books are really effective at body language or the different little beats in long stretches of dialogue? My current novel is dialogue-heavy, and I'm looking for more examples of how other writers make these scenes memorable.

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@Pheebsdw

Maybe a question for the hive -mind of !

@bookstodon

seanbala , to histodons
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

This was a truly masterful collection from @FediFollows

Thanks for all your hard work and making me hopeful about Mastodon and the wider Fediverse!

https://social.growyourown.services/@FediFollows/111450074338729847

@histodons

LincolnRamirez , to bookstodon
@LincolnRamirez@mstdn.social avatar

I loved A Wizard of Earthsea, will the second in the series - The Tombs of Atuan live up to expectations?

@bookstodon

https://conversationsaboutbooks5.wordpress.com/2023/10/27/the-tombs-of-atuan-ursula-k-le-guin/

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@LincolnRamirez @bookstodon

Hope you enjoy the series! Honestly, Atuan was probably my favorite of the series but I know I'm in a minority. Overall, I LOVED all the books and I wish I had read them as a kid.

MichaelEMann , to random
@MichaelEMann@fediscience.org avatar

"Climate Doomism Disregards the Science -- Climate change is a highway, not a cliff, and we can still take the exit ramp" | Excerpt from , courtesy of @apsphysics: https://aps.org/publications/apsnews/202310/backpage.cfm

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@MichaelEMann @apsphysics

Thanks for sharing!

It feels like Doomism is more philosophy than science, rooted in a view of humanity as driven only by greed and baser impulses. We can't and won't stop because humanity is so warped, corporations so powerful, and societies so weak. It implies that human nature is inherently incapable saving itself.


seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@chidi_anagonye @MichaelEMann

It could be encouraged by those interested in slowing things down but I think that is from deeper in our societal and collective minds. I heard a podcast once from NPR's Throughline arguing modern Western thought can be broken down into whether you follow Hobbes or Rousseau's view of human nature: are humans naturally selfish and need strict authority or are we naturally cooperative and need complete freedom?

@philosophy

seanbala , to histodons
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

I read Guha's biography of Verrier Elwin years ago. Elwin was a British anthropologist who chose to become Indian (the first European after 1947) and who worked to lift up the Indigenous peoples of the Northeast. Highly recommended.

I'm saddened but not surprised that he would be caught up in the latest problems in the Northeast. When you can fix the present, you blame the past.

https://scroll.in/article/1054940/ramachandra-guha-a-fact-check-for-assam-cm-as-he-blames-a-long-dead-scholar-for-north-east-problems

@histodons @bookstodon @mastindia @anthropology

seanbala , to random
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

Some pages for - on

@BuddhismNow - online magazine

@ReadingFaithfully_org - online posts from tradition

@obu - AMAZING comprehensive FREE online courses on a variety of topics. I'm doing one on the words of the and I am loving it.

@zenartcenter - and

@dharma - Buddhist Resources

And some groups:

@dhamma

@buddhism

Please share any groups or people to follow in the comments!

seanbala OP ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@TheDailyBurble @BuddhismNow @ReadingFaithfully_org @obu @zenartcenter @dharma @dhamma @buddhism

I can understand your concern. Many Buddhist schools are aware of the perception and imbalance. There are inequalities, as there are in many religions. People much more familiar with Buddhism than I can speak to this but I would note a a couple of things:

1/n

seanbala OP ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@TheDailyBurble @BuddhismNow @ReadingFaithfully_org @obu @zenartcenter @dharma @dhamma @buddhism

In , special attention has been given to reviving female monasteries, and female monastics in exile have been receiving Geshe status (like a super PhD indicating the highest level of learning) the first time in millennia. This is a project very close to the the Dalai Lama's vision for the future of Tibetan Buddhism.

2/n

seanbala OP ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@TheDailyBurble @BuddhismNow @ReadingFaithfully_org @obu @zenartcenter @dharma @dhamma @buddhism

Especially in the West, I think you see many communities led by female priests, and there are many gender-friendly zendos. One of my favorites is Domyo Burke who hosts the Zen Studies Podcast:

https://zenstudiespodcast.com

I'm not a Buddhist but I've learned so much from her.

3/n

seanbala OP ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@TheDailyBurble @BuddhismNow @ReadingFaithfully_org @obu @zenartcenter @dharma @dhamma @buddhism

And as @zenartcenter has noted, there are female Bodhisattvas within the tradition.

This is not to say that there are not problems. But I've always thought religious communities are so diverse. Consider - you can have hardcore Christian nationalists in the US and you can have radical peace churches like the Quakers, Mennonites, and Amish within the same tradition.

4/n

seanbala OP ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@TheDailyBurble @BuddhismNow @ReadingFaithfully_org @obu @zenartcenter @dharma @dhamma @buddhism

The key is to not see religious traditions as monolithic and to understand that there are many traditions operating simultaneously within the larger umbrella and which can become more important in certain places, times, societies, and contexts.

@religion

5/5

BBCRD , (edited ) to random
@BBCRD@social.bbc avatar

Modern TVs have dimming features that can adjust backlight power in specific parts of the screen, sometimes even at the individual pixel level.

We wanted to see whether adapting BBC content could make use of these features and reduce energy consumption.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/blog/2023-08-sustainability-energy-saving-radio-tv-led-graphics

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@BBCRD Seriously interesting! Great work. A really creative solution to save energy.

liminalfiction , to random
@liminalfiction@mastodon.otherworldsink.com avatar

What's your fave period in the past for alt history or historical fantasy? Why? Authors?

@bookstodon

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@liminalfiction

Oh goodness, one of my favorite genres! I love "The Years of Rice and Salt" by Kim Stanley Robinson. The story looks at a world where Europe is destroyed by the Black Death. What makes it so fascinating is that Robinson shows how world history would have unfolded in roughly the same fashion with some new locations or focuses. For example, a Renaissance takes place in Samarkand and many cities in our North America are in the same place.

@bookstadon

1/

BBCRD , to random
@BBCRD@social.bbc avatar

hello, world

seanbala ,
@seanbala@mas.to avatar

@BBCRD WELCOME ! So happy that you are here. Looking really forward to having your voice here in the .

My humble wish is to see the BBC World Service here. The World Service is a true public service giving the whole world good, solid international coverage.

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