European Aesthetics and People

Perseid Meteors Over Stonehenge Photo Credit: Josh Dury https://www.joshduryphoto-media.com/

Awe-Inspiring Sights Neuschwanstein Castle, Germany #AweInspiringSights

I just learned about this short film yesterday. I thought this was pretty cool ! In my humble opinion, the silver lining in Nolan’s Odyssey is that it will inspire millions of young people to explore ancient mythology (Greek/Norse) for themselves, and maybe create stuff like this. 🙏🏻

Orpheus and Eurydice — an excerpt from a short film by Lesley Keen Music by Lyell Cresswell 1984 It is a retelling of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, in the style of a Greek vase. When his wife Eurydice dies, Orpheus descends into Hell and by charming the gods of the Underworld with his singing wins Eurydice back, only to lose her again at the threshold of the Overworld by looking back at her. Full video: https://youtu.be/ZBdYYJz8DCA?si=FovWSGXgx-lu0mIw

The Chariots of Fire are Returning (2 of 2) — featured is a montage from the movie Chariots of Fire with the epic theme music by Vangelis, 1981.

The Chariots of Fire are Returning (1 of 2) — Josh Kerr, of Scotland, setting the world record 1600m run of 3.42.66 in London recently. — Lachlan Kennedy, of Australia, running a 9.85 in the 100 meters in Australia recently, making him the fastest Caucasian ever recorded in that event.

Laocoön and His Sons (2 of 2) It is the work of three Greek sculptors from the island of Rhodes, Agesander, Athenodoros, and Polydorus, and dates to the Hellenistic period, making it well over two thousand years old. Buried for more than a thousand years, it was dug out of a Roman vineyard in 1506, and Michelangelo rushed across Rome to see it the day it was found. It has been called the single greatest depiction of human suffering in the history of art, but it endures because of what it is really about: the man who sees the truth, says it out loud, and is destroyed for being right while the crowd watches. It is one of the oldest patterns there is, and it has never stopped repeating. There is nothing new under the sun. Source: https://x.com/jameslucasit/status/2077810535056220471

Laocoön and His Sons (1 of 2) When the Greek army vanished and left a giant wooden horse outside the city gates, all of Troy celebrated. Only Laocoön refused to believe it. He warned his people the horse was a trick. In Virgil's telling, he spoke a line that has outlasted almost everything else about Troy: "I fear the Greeks, even when they bring gifts." He was right. The horse was packed with soldiers, and Troy was hours from destruction. This sculpture shows what he got for it. Two enormous sea serpents rise out of the sea and coil around him and his young sons, dragging all three down together. The father's whole body is knotted in the struggle, every muscle straining, his face locked in a scream. The gods wanted Troy to fall, and Laocoön was in the way. The Trojans watched him die in agony and drew exactly the wrong conclusion: they decided the gods were punishing him for attacking a holy gift. So they pulled the horse inside their own walls, and that night, Troy burned...

“The taming of words is more difficult than the taming of tigers.” — Halina Poświatowska

Being There In his later thought, Heidegger reverts to using the term ‘human being’ (Mensch) as the name for “the entity that we are”. ‘Da-sein’, usually hyphenated in his later works, is reserved as a name for “the place” within which a historical community of people takes a stand in its form of life. Da-sein, in other words, is “the locality dwelt in by mortals”.

The Bitter End of Western Metaphysics: Heidegger on Nietzsche, Part Five (Conclusion) By Collin Cleary Source: https://counter-currents.com/2026/07/heidegger-on-nietzsche-part-five/

The Bitter End of Western Metaphysics: Heidegger on Nietzsche, Part Four By Collin Cleary Source: https://counter-currents.com/2026/06/heidegger-on-nietzsche-part-four/

The Bitter End of Western Metaphysics: Heidegger on Nietzsche, Part Three By Collin Cleary Source: https://counter-currents.com/2026/06/heidegger-on-nietzsche-part-three/

The Bitter End of Western Metaphysics: Heidegger on Nietzsche, Part Two By Collin Cleary Source: https://counter-currents.com/2026/06/heidegger-on-nietzsche-part-two/

The Bitter End of Western Metaphysics: Heidegger on Nietzsche, Part One By Collin Cleary Source: https://counter-currents.com/2026/05/heidegger-on-nietzsche-part-one/

Last Words to the World (2 of 2) I’ve read Hitler’s own words in Mein Kampf, and even his last words to the world — “the poisoner of all nations, International Jewry”. I haven’t forgotten. I always keep his last words in the back of my mind whenever I’m studying something that has to do with the Jews or Jewish interests, whenever I see them on TV, whenever I’m reading about them in the news… even when I first heard about Trump going to war with Iran. I understand. But we can be sure of this one thing. For better or for worse, whether his memory helps us or hurts us, there’s no denying that he was the most influential and most consequential, and indeed the greatest figure of the 20th century.

Last Words to the World (1 of 2) “Above all I enjoin the leaders of the nation and their followers to scrupulous observance of the laws of race, and to merciless resistance to the universal poisoner of all peoples, international Jewry.” — Adolf Hitler, from his Political Testament Berlin, April 29, 1945, 4:00 a.m. Sources: https://www.theneworder.net/my-political-testament2.html https://ihr.org/other/hitlertestament-html

White Power! White Boy Summer Josh Kerr’s 3: 42.66 mile, breaking a world record that had stood for 27 years! July 18, 2026 London Stadium, London, Great Britain Josh Kerr of Scotland has officially set a new world record in the 1-mile run with a blistering 3: 42.66, taking down the previous world record of 3: 43.13 set in 1999.

The Oldest Chess Game Ever Recorded Valencia, 1475 — Castellví vs. Vinyoles. This game is widely regarded as the oldest recorded game played under the modern rules of chess, especially because it featured the powerful modern queen and bishop moves. It appeared in the Catalan poem Scachs d’Amor (“Chess of Love”), written around 1475 in Valencia. Source: https://x.com/xxchessmaster/status/2053449268673827111