Malcolm Quinn
@malrog.bsky.social
1.3K followers 890 following 5.5K posts
Professor of Cultural and Political History UAL, Honorary Professor Bentham Project UCL. Thinks about anti-aesthetics. Read a chapter of my academic work for free: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10096746/1/Bentham-and-the-Arts.pdf
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malrog.bsky.social
'If Bentham unsettles our faith in aesthetics while appropriating aesthetic forms, if he uses his knowledge of visual culture to compare Treasury officials to automata and has his portrait built in an anatomy theatre, which aspects of utilitarian thought are being developed?'

UCL Laws 24 July 2025
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
malrog.bsky.social
In @ftweekend.com, @simonkuper.bsky.social asks what happened to the future. The best parable atm is Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky's story 'Memories of the Future', about a man who builds a time machine in an authoritarian state, while running out of the time, money and resources to construct it.
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
drannaclark.bsky.social
Brera Madonna: early Renaissance altarpiece 1472, of faultless architectural proportion, with symbolic suspended egg; for donor Federico da Montefeltro,Duke of Urbino (kneeling) by Piero della Francesca, whose mastery of perspective drew on mathematics & geometry; died #OTD 1492.
Pinacoteca di Brera
malrog.bsky.social
I had a think about this, then I realised that it meant beginning with the attack on a civil rights march at Burntollet bridge in 1969 and ended with the funeral of Bobby Sands in 1981. That was quite enough.
drwilkinsonsci.bsky.social
What five events defined your childhood?
Mine, in order…

1. Lockerbie Bombing
2. Berlin Wall Falling
3. David Platt’s last minute winner v Belgium
4. 1997 General Election
5. 1999 Division One Play Off Final
domw.bsky.social
What five events defined your childhood?

Fall of the Berlin Wall
Italia 90 (marginally, over Mexico 86 and Euro 96)
Election of New Labour
1st Gulf War
Chernobyl
malrog.bsky.social
It makes me glad that Le Gavroche waved bye-bye when it did.
malrog.bsky.social
Well I do have to thank you for my manifestation on @bsky.app
malrog.bsky.social
The only sane way to look at my royalties is as a decent lunch for two.
malrog.bsky.social
I always like taking the stairs in our house.
A staircase carpeted in grey and brown stripes, with cream wallpaper in large black, brown and grey dots.
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
malrog.bsky.social
A comment I just made on how issues of bias and power over others can arise in PhD vivas reminded me of this rather quirky contribution:
Wittgenstein's Ph.D Viva—A Re-Creation | Philosophy | Cambridge Core
Wittgenstein's Ph.D Viva—A Re-Creation - Volume 74 Issue 4
www.cambridge.org
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
malrog.bsky.social
I delivered some PhD viva training today. My takeaway is that PhDs are social, and if you can’t name four or five people who really matter to you right now in your field of inquiry, tell me why they are relevant and what new things they will learn from your research, you are not ready for a viva.
malrog.bsky.social
In @ftweekend.com, @simonkuper.bsky.social asks what happened to the future. The best parable atm is Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky's story 'Memories of the Future', about a man who builds a time machine in an authoritarian state, while running out of the time, money and resources to construct it.
malrog.bsky.social
The Question Concerning Technology
malrog.bsky.social
‘Don’t Blame the Tools’ - an extract from my discussion of Babbage, De Prony, Marx and Heidegger in Blueprint 43, February 2003.
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
eicathomefinn.bsky.social
'One does not wish to dignify this kind of vandalism with a response and you have to wonder whether the Tories will give Badenoch even one election before booting her out.'
In praise of “rip-off” degrees | The Observer
Kemi Badenoch’s attack on the arts and humanities isn’t just culturally short-sighted, it’s economically illiterate
observer.co.uk
malrog.bsky.social
‘Thinking you’re Escoffier in Vivienne Westwood tartan pants’ @gracedent.bsky.social on ‘Punk Royale’ @theguardian.com
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
malrog.bsky.social
I watched the first episode of ‘House of Guinness’. Paddywhackery of the worst kind. I’ll probably watch the rest of it.
malrog.bsky.social
Haven’t seen anyone offer a stout defence of it so far.
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
malrog.bsky.social
‘You look like Sebastien Lecornu’. ‘I am Sebastien Lecornu’. ‘Well no wonder you look like him.’
taniel.bsky.social
UPDATE: The new Prime Minister that Macron just named is... Sebastien Lecornu.

Lecornu is the Prime Minister who Macron appointed in September, and who resigned on Monday because he couldn't form a government.

I don't know what to tell you—situation has been risible for a year.
Reposted by Malcolm Quinn
malrog.bsky.social
Like an actor who knows that he will never play Hamlet, I read this and realised that I am too old to be the Antichrist.
malrog.bsky.social
No mention of the poll tax, a tax on being alive. She was a disaster.
malrog.bsky.social
I watched the first episode of ‘House of Guinness’. Paddywhackery of the worst kind. I’ll probably watch the rest of it.
malrog.bsky.social
Haven’t seen anyone offer a stout defence of it so far.
malrog.bsky.social
I suppose anyone who is not left will do. So recycle.
malrog.bsky.social
‘You look like Sebastien Lecornu’. ‘I am Sebastien Lecornu’. ‘Well no wonder you look like him.’
taniel.bsky.social
UPDATE: The new Prime Minister that Macron just named is... Sebastien Lecornu.

Lecornu is the Prime Minister who Macron appointed in September, and who resigned on Monday because he couldn't form a government.

I don't know what to tell you—situation has been risible for a year.
malrog.bsky.social
Like an actor who knows that he will never play Hamlet, I read this and realised that I am too old to be the Antichrist.