I’m at a workshop in Taiwan and “Journey to the West” is coming up in conversation a lot.
Is anyone in North America working on 西遊記? Seems like after Anthony Yu, people avoided the topic? I’m probably just ignorant of the field *apologies*
Call for Contributions to a Sourcebook for Histories of Weather & Weathering teleskopos.wordpress.com/2026/02/05/c...
Full details linked and here teleskopos.wordpress.com/wp-content/u...
It will be edited by me, @lottaleiwo.bsky.social and Tamara Culkins. Please share! #histSTM #envhist 🗃️📜
Whoa
Statement from Michael and Susan Pretti Parents of Alex Jeffrey Pretti “We are heartbroken but also very angry. Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital. Alex wanted to make a difference in this world. Unfortunately, he will not be with us to see his impact. I do not throw around the ‘hero’ term lightly. However, his last thought and act was to protect a woman. The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting. Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He had his phone in his right hand and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down, all while being pepper sprayed. Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man. Thank you.
Kare 11 local news just read, in full, this statement from Michael and Susan Pretti, the parents of Alex Pretti.
"Please get the truth out about our son."
Job Opportunity! We're looking for a Graduate Trainee Archivist.
#archives
www.trin.cam.ac.uk/vacancies/gr...
We've got ISSUES. Literally.
We scraped >100k special issues & over 1 million articles to bring you a PISS-poor paper. We quantify just how many excess papers are published by guest editors abusing special issues to boost their CVs. How bad is it & what can we do?
arxiv.org/abs/2601.07563
A 🧵 1/n
This is a silly response to your great quip about digital Buddhist studies. No cap.
But, now I am rereading Hamar and others on the origins or protohistory of the Avatamsaka.
I believe you are referring to the 佛說八樓體用經, discovered with the Tangut cache at Khara-Khoto. Some refer to it as 華嚴禪 and others as a “Dhāranī Sutra”—neither is entirely accurate. I’ve read it is likely a Chinese composition containing fragments of proto-Buddhāvataṃsaka texts from C. Asia.
CBETA on floor eight. Seen in the lobby of 法鼓德貴學苑.
CBETA is a place on floor eight.
Kierkegaard:
Welcoming 2026 in Taipei
祝福馬年吉祥，諸事順遂，
祈國泰民安
I think it is always meritorious to want to eat not-meat.
And of course being a monastic (who is ostensibly less attached to Michelin star vegan leftovers) is morally superior than being a layperson (who loved the eggplant and rice noodles).
Once everyone is a vegetarian, then ... #expedientmeans
In one sense, the vegetarian food in Taiwan is so good, that it isn’t a hardship to eat it. Michelin star vegan leftovers for breakfast? Yes please.
In another sense, there are so many non-vegetarian foods one would have to give up!
Yomama is a Christmas movie
Would you think this image might have been created in a photography studio?
UNDER THE RIVER Under the river of the world, the world. And beneath that palace, a palace—just the same. From the quarry ledge, children dive over and over into blue sky: it always greets them the same, laughter, then towels, and going home with watery ears. It sings to them then for hours, hushing the rest— family, dinnerware, tires spinning by, all stilled. Open-winged for those moments between world and world, the rooms leading one to the next, each linoleum floor marble-cool, the ceilings stencilled with water lilies, stars.
all stilled.
Jane Hirshfield
Book for sale in Hong Kong
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Ebook
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Someone selling hardcover
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It’s been nice to hear from colleagues and friends.
One of the strange parts of this experience is noting the world slowly move on, get back to normal. Our world is frozen. Campus is a crime scene. Offices inaccessible. And the grief. The grief.
It’s good to not feel alone.
Very rarely does a post warrant all caps, but: SEARCHABLE INTERIM MANUSCRIPTS CATALOGUE. At long last! searcharchives.bl.uk
“[Prof. Friendberg] learned what happened from a teaching assistant who led the session. … Friedberg visited Rhode Island Hospital, where she said she spoke with her teaching assistant, who had traveled there to support several of their injured students.”
“Rachel Friedberg said the mass shooting happened in a review session for the final exam of her Principles of Economics course.” Yeah, this the biggest class at Brown. Between 400 and 500 students. At least 80% of the class are freshmen. These are kids in their first semester of college.
"Friedberg visited Rhode Island Hospital on Saturday night, where she said she spoke with her teaching assistant, who had traveled there to support several of their injured students." Wow, the TA was present at the shooting and then went with students in the class to hospital to support.
Everyone in Religious Studies checked in as safe.
If student reporting at BDH holds up, it sounds like it was a section of the big freshman econ course, folks gathered for a review session before the final.
So so sad.
I am safe. All my grad students are safe.
IN SEARCH OF REVELRY Drunk, I seek revelry. I want to be sad, but who has the time? Now I understand the books of the Ancients and believe them all: “There are no good points.” Last night I fell drunk next to a pine and asked it, “How drunk am I?” Suspecting the pine wanted to pick me up, I shoved it and said, “Go!”
I want to be sad, but who has the time?
Xin Qiji, tr. Jon Hansen
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"ChatGPT is Bullshit" has now been viewed one million times!
@hikemix.bsky.social
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
#PhilTech #PhilSky #ChatGPT #Bullshit
Rots on Vietnam whale worship:
“how it is possible that residents of an island choking in plastic engage in ritualized littering. Why do animists who worship deities residing in nature pollute the very environment that they—according to the academic theory, at least—should perceive as sacred?”
