{"id":54040,"date":"2017-02-18T22:24:17","date_gmt":"2017-02-18T22:24:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=54040"},"modified":"2017-02-18T22:24:17","modified_gmt":"2017-02-18T22:24:17","slug":"a-couple-or-so-couples","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=54040","title":{"rendered":"A couple or so couples"},"content":{"rendered":"

[ by Charles Cameron<\/strong> — gathering these things the way an obsessed squirrel gathers nuts ]
\n.<\/p>\n

I’d say there’s nothing more thought-provocative than running across an unexpected parallelism or opposition — and the closer the parallel the better. Once thought has been provoked, though that’s just the starting point — it needs to run its course with the appropriate caution and rigor. Here, then, are some parallelisms I’ve run into recently, for your provocation.<\/p>\n

**<\/p>\n

The Dilletante’s Winterings<\/strong>, Michael McFaul\u2019s easy, broken parallel<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Michael McFaul, the former US ambassador to Russia, has a blog on the site of Ekho Moskvy, the independent radio station based in Moscow. Commenting on the appointment of Steve Bannon to the National Security Council, he wrote:<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the equivalent of Putin appointing Alexander Dugin to the [Russian] Security Council and telling generals Bortnikov [head of the FSB] and Gerasimov [head of the general staff] to only attend when they are needed.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

**<\/p>\n

Craig Whiteside<\/strong> (2016) The Islamic State and the Return of RevolutionaryWarfare<\/a>, Small Wars & Insurgencies, 27:5, 743-776, DOI: 10.1080\/09592318.2016.1208287:<\/p>\n

This paper starts by comparing the Islamic State to the Vietnamese communists in a revolutionary warfare framework..<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I didn’t find a single-sentence assertion of this parallelism, not am I expert in revolutionary warfare — but manynof our readers here on Zenpundit are, so I’ll leave the critical appraisal of this proposition to you-all..<\/p>\n

**<\/p>\n

Defense One<\/strong>, So, American Mass Shooters and Islamic Terrorists Do Have Something in Common<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Like radical Islamic groups, white supremacist and other right-wing terrorist groups offer people (especially men) who feel isolated and disempowered a chance to feel important and welcome. It\u2019s the same psychological phenomenon, different culture war. And thus the KKK gains new recruits along with ISIL.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

**<\/p>\n

And for good measure… not, you understand, that I understand it —<\/p>\n

Metod Saniga<\/strong>, Algebraic Geometry: a Tool for Resolving the Enigma of Time?<\/a> <\/p>\n

An illustrative example of such a temporal dimension is provided by a specific linear, single-parametric set (so-called pencil) of conics in the projective plane. This set of conics is found to nicely reproduce the experienced arrow of time when the projective plane is affinized; it simply suffices to postulate that each proper conic of the pencil stands for a single temporal event, and relate three distinct kinds of (proper) affine conic, viz. a hyperbola, a parabola and an ellipse, with the three different kinds of temporal event, viz. the past, present and future, respectively..<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Time, as St Augustine<\/strong> noted, makes sense — until you try to figure out what sense it makes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[ by Charles Cameron — gathering these things the way an obsessed squirrel gathers nuts ] . I’d say there’s nothing more thought-provocative than running across an unexpected parallelism or opposition — and the closer the parallel the better. Once thought has been provoked, though that’s just the starting point — it needs to run […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1457,526,21,627,1078,1047,1216,655,88,91,1,227,229],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54040","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bannon","category-charles-cameron","category-creativity","category-doublequotes","category-is","category-isis","category-kkk-and-the-like","category-mathematics","category-putin","category-russia","category-uncategorized","category-vietnam","category-vietnam-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54040"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54040\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54063,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54040\/revisions\/54063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}