Matt Colquhoun's Blog, page 72

Fidelity to Truth and the Suspension of Politics from Philosophy

Below is a conversation had on Twitter following my previous post, “Cancel Culture and the Betrayal of Truth”, that I think is worthy pinning here for posterity as it was an opportunity to clarify some things.

The underlying (and perhaps implicit) point of the previous post was that the disarticulation of philosophy from politics doesn’t help anyone, but it is often now seen as the “rationalist” and “realist” position to take. This is a poor foundation to build on, in my experience. In fact, ...

Egress in EntropyMag

James Baxter has written a really thoughtful review of my book Egress for Entropy magazine.

I really enjoyed reading this one and I’m grateful to see someone find the benefits in the book’s slippery meanderings. It is true that they might make the book more challenging than readers of Fisher might be used to, but such was (and is) the nature of our reality. Many thanks to James for penning it.

Here’s an extract below. You can read it in full here.

For Colquhoun, himself a prolific blog...

Cancel Culture and the Betrayal of Truth

Cancel culture is back but, of course, it never really went away. And yet, the recent flurry of controversies surrounding a new narrative no one can get enough of — JK Rowling and the Succession of Statements — makes it feel like the debate around its existence has resurfaced in the popular media with a vengeance.

I have complicated feelings around cancel culture, personally — partly because it is often so scatterbrained in its approach, precisely because it is not the magically unified move...

Under Brighton Pier (2014)

The first of what will hopefully be a few archival recordings, put up on Bandcamp just for fun and posterity. There are too many unfinished projects lingering on my hard drive, started at some point over the last five years — this is one of them.

In 2014, I made a collage of field recordings from a trip to the beach. Stood underneath Brighton pier, I was minding my own business, recording the sound of the shingle being dragged over itself by the tide — my favourite sound in the world,...

The Rotten Western (Part 2)

Spoilers for The Last of Us Part 2 from the very start. You have been warned.

← Part One

After the shock of Joel’s horrific death subsides, Ellie and Dina plan their trip to Seattle, where they hope to avenge Joel by hunting down the members of the Washington Liberation Front who are responsible for his demise. What Joel did to deserve such a death is, for the moment, unclear. “Joel pissed off a lot of people,” Ellie admits.

Before heading out, they visit Joel’s house to take o...

XG on Acid Horizon

I had a really great time chatting to Craig, Matt and Will of the Acid Horizon podcast last week. We talked about my recent book Egress, a new editorial project coming out on Repeater Books soon, and a lot of stuff in between.

Thanks a lot to Acid Horizon for having me. You can check out an hour of our conversation above — you can also listen on Soundcloud and on Apple — but we spoke for much longer than that…

For the rest, sign up to the Acid Horizon Patreon here.

RIP Morricone

News is circulating today that master composer Ennio Morricone has passed away. Synonymous with the sound of the Western, lest we forget two of his most unassuming contributions to cinematic sound:

RIP.

A Realism that is Still Speculative: The Blogosphere After Badiou

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about Alain Badiou’s 2012 book Philosophy for Militants.

Over the last two weeks, I’ve found myself wondering repeatedly about the extent to which philosophy needs to play catch up again, just as Badiou demands it must in much of his post-2007 writings. After all the complexity of Being & Event, it seems (perhaps under the influence of his good friend Žižek) that he realised the broader consequences of his philosophy warrant a more accessible form of present...

On the Outskirts of Sheffield

The Rotten Western (Part 1)

Below are some preliminary thoughts on The Last of Us Part 2 that I’d like to add to as I keep going with my current first play-through of what is already an incredible game. It should go without saying that this post comes with a big spoiler warning: come back later if you haven’t played it yet.

This post is also part of an ongoing project I’ve mentioned a few times in recent years and which I’m (still) very slowly building behind the scenes: a book I’m calling Frontier Psychiatry. More on ...