nameandnature

I assert that God is omnipotent, omniscient, but also all-Evil. How would you disprove this contention? : DebateAChristian: Someone takes Law’s Evil God Challenge over to /r/DebateAChristian, and makes a pretty good showing of it. Amusing for all the Thomists complaining that the poster doesn’t get it, without quite being able to say what it is OP doesn’t get.
(tags: theodicy stephen-law theology philosophy god good evil thomist aquinas)
Peter Loggins – On The Importance Of Learning Other Dances Aside From The Lindy Hop : Atilio Menéndez : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive: Loggins on how to dance at a real jazz club where most people are there to listen, and some history related to the old time ballrooms. Plus some advocacy for learning stuff other than lindy (maybe I should brush up my rusty ballroom skills).
(tags: ballroom dancing etiquette jazz lindy lindy-hop history)
Trevor Copp and Jeff Fox: Ballroom dance that breaks gender roles | TED Talk | TED.com: A couple of ballroom dancers who have developed various ways of switching lead/follow during the dance.
(tags: dance ballroom gender dancing waltz salsa)

Originally posted at Name and Nature. You can comment there. There are currently comments.

Infant male circumcision is genital mutilation | Martin Robbins | Science | guardian.co.uk: "Men should have the right to choose circumcision, not have the choice forced upon them. Infant circumcision without consent or immediate medical justification is an unjustified violation of basic human rights, that shares more in common with ancient coming-of-age rituals than responsible medical practice." Seems fair enough to me: the only reason we permit this is because of the common error of "respecting" religious opinions.
(tags: circumcision medicine surgery genital-mutilation religion science)
How Doctors Die « Zócalo Public Square: Doctors are better at making end of life choices for themselves than they are for their patients, as they're often hamstrung by patients, families and "the system".
(tags: death medicine health healthcare ethics dying doctors medical)
richardpowers.com: "Richard has been teaching contemporary and historic social dance for over thirty years. He leads workshops around the world and is currently a full-time instructor at Stanford University's Dance Division." Some interesting stuff on teaching, DJing and whatnot.
(tags: dance swing waltz dancing ballroom lindyhop stanford)
Open letter to Bell Pottinger | Bloggerheads: PR firm Bell Pottinger has been editing Wikipedia articles using fake accounts on behalf of their rather unsavoury clientele. When caught out, they responded that they'd done nothing illegal. Great public relations there, chaps.
(tags: astroturfing bellpottinger wikipedia lobbying uk news public-relations)

( Cut for waltz triggers )

I muck around with music a bit (I tend to sing for better keyboard players, although I did bash out tunes from Andrew Lloyd Webber for Dummies at the last singing party we had), and I also dance. I thought it'd be fun to try to get these two things together in my head, by working out how the music for ballroom dancing works. After a bit of Googling for pages written by people who know more than I do, here it is. Seeing as there are better musicians and better dancers than me reading this, they can correct me if I get it wrong.

Foxtrot

Foxtrot is in 4/4 time, between 112 and 120 beats per minute (according to these people). It's typically danced to Big Band music. The music emphasises beats 1 and 3. I think I can see that in A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square, where the accompaniment either hits more notes on the treble clef, or uses the bass line to keep that emphasis. In Bobby Darin's version, the brass is hitting those beats in the intro.

The steps are typically 1 beat or 2 beats long, and we call them "quick" and "slow", respectively (if I'm writing it down, I'll abbreviate to Q and S). The basic rhythm of the dance is slow-quick-quick, which means the first two steps hit the emphasised beats. Some figures in the dance vary the rhythm, but the "slow" step, if there is one, starts either on beat 1 or beat 3. Here are the Hiltons giving us something to aspire to, with music and the slows and quicks, starting about 1:25.

( Waltz, Quickstep, Tango, over )

Clive put endings on stuff, so I've added the three alemanas to the rumba and something called the Whirligig in tango to last week's stuff, including a link to another one of those instructive videos where the commentator is clearly a bit too into the lady.

This week ( More waltz from Clive, foxtrot from Bruce )

The dancing lessons have stared again. Hurrah.

( Rumba (of which I found a video, yay; sadly I look nothing like the guy in it, boo), tango, waltz, reflections on being Batman )

( Bruce's cha, PaulW's waltz )

T'other Paul W stepped into the breach for both Clive and Bruce this week, and jolly good he was too.

( Doing our bit for heteronormativity )

( That was a 2 shirt evening )

For the rest of you: I recently re-read Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, so I'll post about that soon.

( Contains explicit steps )

( Cut because I care )

Reggie's doing this, so I thought I would, mostly as an aid to my memory. ( You don't care about this if you're not a dancer )

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
	1	2	3	4	5	6
7	8	9	10	11	12	13
14	15	16	17	18	19	20
21	22	23	24	25	26	27
28	29	30	31

Entries tagged with waltz

Link blog: ballroom, dancing, theodicy, gender

Link blog: medicine, dance, lindyhop, genital-mutilation

Dancing: Pat pp Bruce: Waltz, Clive: Waltz

Music and dancing

Danceblog

Danceblog: the return

Danceblog: back again

Danceblog: PaulW-o-rama

Danceblog: always take two shirts into the lesson

Danceblog: paint the line

Danceblog: samba and and lines in waltz

Danceblog: leg over

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December 2025

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