[lbo-talk] Open letters from Stefano Kourkoulakos andLeo Panitch

[Carrol Cox]

I've worn out several copies of the Dunciad, including the Twiickenham
edition of it, so I ought to remember quite a bit from it. But in all of
these readings I never focused on one line here, " Now to pure space lifts
her ecstatic stare." That is of some historical interest: In 1740 Newton's
positing of abstract space still wasn't "common sense." That is, apparently
it was still common to 'measure' space by its contents, rather than the
contents by space.

Carrol

-----Original Message-----
From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org]
On Behalf Of Dennis Claxton
Sent: Thursday, November 04, 2010 11:13 AM
To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org; lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Open letters from Stefano Kourkoulakos andLeo
Panitch

At 08:52 AM 11/4/2010, Carrol Cox wrote:


>There are some lines in the Dunciad which unfortunately I can't remember
>correctly, but something about "running around the circle, call it square,"
>that perhaps apply to efforts to 'solve' the transformation problem.

Good memory.  Here it is:

Mad Mathesis alone was unconfin'd,
Too mad for mere material chains to bind,
Now to pure space lifts her ecstatic stare,
Now running round the circle finds it square.  

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