Adam Blatner
Words and Images from the Mind of Adam Blatner
March, 2011
Pondering the Cosmos
So the Cosmos says to me, Hey, Adam, thanks for pondering me. Says I, “Well, ol’ Cosmos, sir, your cosmos-ness—by the way, what is the proper term of respectful address?— I have not yet come to many conclusions. Cosmos: Don’t worry about it, just call me Cosmos. First name basis, kid, that’s us. So what […]
Posted in Foolin Around, Uncategorized, Wisdom-ing, Zordak's Journal | No Comments »
Hope and Reality: Bridging the Gulf
The Theme for the 2011 conference of the American Society for Group Psychotherapy and Psychodrama, held from April 28 – May 2, is “Bridging the gulf between hope and reality: Putting our ideals into action.” The theme also relates to the fact that the conference is being held in Clearwater, a suburb to the west […]
Posted in Psychodrama, Wisdom-ing | No Comments »
Challenging the “War on Drugs”
Building on a Lecture by Adam Blatner, M.D.to Senior University Georgetown‘s Summer Program, June 9, 2004, posted on website November 18, 2004) For over sixty years, and with some significant escalation beginning in the late 1960s, local, state, and federal efforts to arrest and imprison those found to possess even small amounts of illicit drugs has […]
Posted in Current Events, History | No Comments »
Scriptology: Further Considerations
The last few weeks I’ve been caught up in other projects and I realized I hadn’t been posting much. One of my projects soon to be posted on my website is a lecture series with many illustrations about scriptology—the lore of alphabets and writing systems. My point, summarizing, is that the field represents a truly […]
Posted in My Favorite Things, Scriptology | 1 Comment »
The Breadth of Being-ness
On my website I’ve posted a more lengthy paper about how it would be better for us to imagine that our sense of self expand beyond the boundaries of our brain and body to include not only close relationships, but our participation in wider social networks. (Some of you may know that my career and […]
Posted in Psychodrama, Psychological Literacy, Psychotherapy and Psychiatry | No Comments »
The Lore of Scriptology: Summary & Reflections (Lecture 6a, Part 2)
Previous articles from this lecture include: Scriptology: The Lore of Alphabets and Writing Systems Introduction and Overview (Lecture 1) The main point I want to make is that writing is a tool, an invention that transcends any particular field—truly inter-disciplinary. Gelb called this “Grammatology” but a postmodernist philosopher, Jacques Derrida, has also used that term […]
Posted in Scriptology | No Comments »
Scriptology: The Lore of Alphabets and Writing Systems Introduction and Overview (Lecture 1)
(This is the first part of the first lecture—an introductory overview. See also: Very Early History of Writing The Early History of Writing Mid-History of Writing Further Developments (Typography, Calligraphy, etc.) Invented Writing Systems Codes and Playing with Alphabets Summary and Further Considerations Note also, written several years earlier, an overall introduction to Scriptology elsewhere on my website, […]
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Jnana Yoga as Spiritual Practice
Jnana Yoga is the activity of using study, contemplation, thinking, and dialoguing about the spiritual foundations of our life. As I understand it, it should be recognized as a type of spiritual practice. I think this works for me, at least. My wife and I read together at bedtime—we take turns: one of us flosses […]
Posted in Autobiographical | No Comments »
Premature Closure: Some Thoughts
In a book I’ve recently begun to read, Exploring Happiness: from Aristotle to Brain Science, by Sissela Bok (2010, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press), I was struck by the author’s use of the idea of premature closure. That term is also used by Erik H. Erikson as a pitfall of adolescence. It means that […]
Posted in Essays and Papers, Follies, Psychological Literacy | No Comments »
Roman Numerals??
In the Newsweek of 2/14/11, that issue under the table of contents says, Volume CLVII, No. 7. I was struck by the idea that this re-modeled up-to-date newsmagazine was still using Roman Numerals. I wonder what their rationale is? I mean, Roman numeration didn’t even know about the value of the zero! (The zero in […]
Posted in Current Events, Scriptology | No Comments »