Plato's Republic undone

A fine and extensive thinking on how animality can undo the Republic:
"it is this sensitivity towards the instinct for freedom shared among all living beings, and among domestic animals in particular, which, more than anything else, Plato fears will ignite a revolution that will bring down the oligarchy of his ideal Republic." Essay title "Cannibals and Apes: Revolution in the Republic" is a conference paper by Richard Iveson delivered at The London Conference for Critical Thought at Birkbeck College, University of London. Richard, the revolution awaits your book Zoogenesis: Thinking Encounter With Animals.

Farmer eaten by his own pigs.

File under animality and inversions or Derrida "On eating well"
"US authorities are investigating how a US farmer was eaten by his own pigs....A relative later found Garner's dentures and pieces of his body in the pig enclosure, but most of his remains had been consumed."

Their time will come

Fear of the Animal Planet: the hidden history of animal resistance
Need I say more... read the rest of my blog.
And now back to my writing the revolution.

Octo-consciousness

When in Stroll through the World of Animals and Men Jakob von Uexkull wanders what a starfish sees or a sea urchin experience when a boat floats above him in the water, we enter into a strange world of animal phenomenology. Now according to Scientific America, neuro-scientists have "discovered" or "granted" consciousness to a realm of creatures include the octopus. Of course, the octopus knew this all along but either we were not listening (highly possible) or the cephalopod was not talkin'. The Cambridge Deceleration on Consciousness now puts things straight:

“The weight of evidence indicates that humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate consciousness,” the scientists wrote. “Non-human animals, including all mammals and birds, and many other creatures, including octopuses, also possess these neurological substrates.”

Rogue Monkey invades GOP convention city

A rogue macaques wandered 100 miles from a forest along the Silver River to create a spectacle and just a bit of chaos in Tampa just in time for the GOP National Convention there. Okay, actually he has been there three and a half years... waiting for his moment. As Vernon Yates, a wildlife specialist, said of the animal that roams from St. Petersburg to Tampa and around the bay area: "“It’s an amazing feat, when you think about his travels.” This critter has become known as "The Mystery Monkey of Tampa Bay" and has his own Facebook page. The animal's "the monkey’s lone-wolf, fugitive lifestyle" has inspired Floridians... the revolution will not be televised, brothers. 

Bees attack Hillary Clinton

What the Secretary of State does not realize is that the bees have their own state of affairs. While bees have often been used as allegorical animals for social organization, in this case the animal state is unhappy with humans. An eye witness in Malawi explains "“There was a slight panic as the bees winged across the airport. People could be seen running away to keep cover as the Secretary of State swiftly boarded her plane to avoid any stings.”

We are not alone in the universe... and we are not who we think we are

A nice interview with Jill Tarter on the search for alien life. It is a fine interview. A nice moment is when she looks at how we ourselves are not of this world:
"We are made out of stardust. The iron in the hemoglobin molecules in the blood in your right hand came from a star that blew up 8 billion years ago. The iron in your left hand came from another star. We are the laws of chemistry and physics as they have played out here on Earth and we are now learning that planets are as common as stars. Most stars, as it turns out now, will have planets."