Words I Wish I’d Written: A Serious Mummy Problem

Last updated on: December 23, 2014 at 5:35 pm By willduquette

Here’s something you didn’t know about the Incas: Because the royal mummies were not considered dead, their successors obviously could not inherit their wealth. Each Inka’s panaqa retained all of his possessions forever, including his palaces, residences, and shrines; all of his remaining clothes, eating utensils, fingernail parings, and hair clippings; and the tribute from the land he had conquered. In consequence, as Pedro Pizarro realized, “the greater part of the people, treasure, expenses, and vices [in Tawantinsuyu] were under... Read more

Watchman For Daybreak Watch

Last updated on: December 23, 2014 at 5:36 pm By willduquette

After a couple three weeks in which I didn’t work on Watchman for Daybreak at all, I got some time to think about it yesterday. I’d been away from it for two reasons: it was a busy few weeks, and then I had a plot problem I had to get worked out. I need the main character to do something awful—but either it simply wasn’t something he’d do, or if was something he’d do, then he wasn’t the character I... Read more

Review: Scholastic Metaphysics, by Ed Feser

Last updated on: June 8, 2014 at 5:01 pm By willduquette

Prof. Ed Feser’s latest book is Scholastic Metaphysics: A Contemporary Introduction. I think enough of Prof. Feser that I pre-ordered it a couple of months before publication; and when it arrived I began reading it on my lunch break and other odd moments. I find that that’s the right approach for books of philosophy; I can’t take it all in at once, I need time to ponder and let things settle. First, some background. Scholastic philosophy is the philosophy of... Read more

CT 4.1: The Immobility of God

Last updated on: December 23, 2014 at 5:37 pm By willduquette

We’re blogging through St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae, sometimes called his Shorter Summa. Find the previous posts here. In Chapter 3, Thomas showed that there must be a “First Mover”, something that stands at the head of all per se causal chains, where the word “move” means any kind of change, not just motion from place to place. Here he goes on to show that this First Mover is also an Unmoved Mover, that is, an unchanged changer. We clearly... Read more

The Mystery of Trust

Last updated on: December 23, 2014 at 5:36 pm By willduquette

And yet God continues to trust us. He trusts us with the Body and Blood of His Son at every mass, that we will receive the sacrament worthily. He trusts us to minister to the poor, the sick, and the imprisoned, to be His hands and arms and legs and voice in the world. He, the Almighty God, relies on us in our weakness and sin to get His work done in the world. My latest for CatholicMom.com. Read more

Lumen Fidei: Mirroring God

Last updated on: December 23, 2014 at 5:38 pm By willduquette

In paragraph 35 of Lumen Fidei I find this interesting comment. Pope Francis is saying that the light of faith in Christ illuminates the path of all men who seek Him with a sincere heart. He says, speaking of the star that appeared to the Magi, The star is a sign of God’s patience with our eyes which need to grow accustomed to his brightness. Religous man is a wayfarer; he must be ready to let himself be led, to... Read more

Tools for Learning Clojure, Part II: Leiningen

Last updated on: June 5, 2014 at 7:55 pm By willduquette

In part I, I talked about Clojure and the need for a convenient “REPL”: a piece of software that lets you type input at the language engine and see its responses. And I found one in an usual place: a build tool for Clojure applications and libraries. Bear with me; this is all relevant. For a working software engineer, some kind of build tool is essential. There are lots of repetitive actions involved in making a piece of software ready... Read more

Mark Knopfler, Southbound Again

Last updated on: June 5, 2014 at 7:17 pm By willduquette

I was a sophomore in high school when Dire Straits made it big with “Sultans of Swing”. It was popular, it was part of the background, it was OK, I was only mildly impressed. Later, one of my brothers gave me a copy of their third album, Making Movies, and I liked it; and as I started trying to grow my collection I eventually picked up the rest of their albums as well. I got to know all of their... Read more

Elizabeth House: How Charity is Done

Last updated on: June 4, 2014 at 7:08 pm By willduquette

In the last couple of days I’ve seen lots of stories about a “Home” for unwed mothers in Tuam, Ireland that operated from 1926 to 1961. I use scare quotes around the word “Home” on purpose, as you’ll understand if you follow the various links above. What struck me was that the horrors of the “Home” in Tuam were ultimately due to charity gone horribly wrong. The goal, to support unmarried mothers and their babies, is a good one. Treating... Read more

Tools for Learning Clojure

Last updated on: June 5, 2014 at 7:58 pm By willduquette

As I wrote on Saturday, I’m learning to program in Clojure; and being a tool user at heart I immediately went looking for the right tools for the job. Here’s what I wanted: A REPL at which to experiment with Clojure code, with good command-line editing and command history. An editor in which to edit Clojure code, integrated with the REPL. An easy way to build a stand-alone application in Clojure. A solution that works on both Mac and Windows.... Read more