Rebecca Vitsmun: I'm Actually An Atheist

Do you remember that devastating tornado this past Spring in Moore, Oklahoma and the VERY awkward CNN interview where Wolf Blitzer asked the woman who had survived the tornado but lost her house, "You've got to thank the lord, don't you?" And she replied, "I'm actually an atheist"... Well this video is a very moving interview with her months after the tornado and the Wolf Blitzer interview that went viral and changed her life.

What I didn't realize at the time of the original CNN interview is that up until that point she was in the closet as an atheist to her family, her extended family and many of her friends. So her decision to say, "I'm actually an atheist" on national television meant that now all of those people knew about her lack of belief in god, divine intervention, the afterlife, etc... And in a place as conservative and religious as Oklahoma (my entire extended family lives in Oklahoma, so I know), that is a truly brave thing to do given the potential fallout of relationships with friends and family.

Drinks With Christopher Hitchens

I found this conversation entirely entertaining.

Stephen Fry: What I Wish I'd Known When I Was 18

I thought this was a really thought provoking interview worth sharing. I found myself at least a few times thinking, "Yeah, that's some advice I should be listening to even now."
STEPHEN FRY: WHAT I WISH I'D KNOWN WHEN I WAS 18 from Peter Samuelson on Vimeo.

Barry Mcgee Interview

I introduced my beginning Drawing students to the San Fransisco artist, Barry McGee, and then one of them, in turn, introduced me to this great San Fransisco art website called www.fecalface.com that has an interview with Barry McGee while he is installing a large scale exhibition at the San Fransisco Museum of Modern Art.
Barry McGee Feature from The Creative Lives on Vimeo.

Thanks to Matt Bradley for the link.

John Cage about silence

Daniel Dennett- Consciousness Explained

I've been reading Daniel Dennett's groundbreaking book from 1992 called Consciousness Explained. It has been a fairly dense read for someone like myself with an art background, but Dennett does go to great pains to make it very accessible for non-scientists. I was happy so see this short You Tube clip on a few of the subjects addressed in the book.

Dennett describes the fragmentary nature or consciousness -- the modularity of our brains manifests as attention to aspects of input and process. Other videos of Dennett discussing consciousness: ...  

Christopher Hitchens in Conversation: The Only Subject is Love

Writer Christopher Hitchens and Dr. Laurie Patton, Emory Professor of early Indian religions, discuss freedom of expression and Hitchen's friendship with Salman Rushdie. Themes of love and hate weave through stories of Rushdie's time under the fatwa, self-censorship, blasphemy, and writing by committee.

Christopher Hitchens participated in 'The Only Subject is Love' Symposium in honor of the opening of his friend Salman Rushdie's archive at Emory University on February 26, 2010.
http://www.emory.edu/rushdie