Pedro Lilienfeld

Incongruities Galore The vast majority takes for granted that we all are citizens of a specific country — usually but not exclusively the one where we were born. This reality also implies that we have the right to possess a passport that attests to that citizenship and with which we can travel to other countries.…

The following is a letter I sent to The New Yorker magazine commenting on the referenced article. It did not get published. Rivka Galchen in Sound Affects (Oct. 17, 2022) mentions that “sound engineering is ancient” and cites the examples of Hagia Sophia and Chichén Itzá. I would like to point out that the architecture…

I have come across a striking dichotomy about what we learn about Ancient Greece’s greatness and accomplishments. That subject is usually treated in a lopsided manner. In school, in books, magazine articles, etc. we hear about the stupendous manifestations of that civilization’s architectural, sculptural, literary, philosophical, military, political and overall cultural achievements. Most frequently an…

After living for well over half a century in this land of exceptionalisms I have made some observations that have left me puzzled if not bewildered. I want to share some of these American idiosyncrasies with you. Units of Measurement We all know the centuries-old resistance of the US to adopt the metric system –…

Herein I describe our experiences during our trip to the Greek island of Syros in the company of Paul and Mary (names changed for anonymity), in July 2015. Don’t misunderstand me. I like Paul with all his idiosyncratic warts. We first met him and his wife Mary on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts in…

I penned this short essay towards the end of 1999 amidst the anxieties of the impending Y2000 transition Our Western frenzy about the upcoming millennium should be tempered by the realization that: a) the timing of this momentous occasion is simply a quirk of the decimal counting system that we have chosen to adopt, and…

Humanity’s accepted taxonomic classification is as follows: Kingdom: Animalia, Phylum: Chordata, Class: Mammalia, Order: Primates, Family: Hominidae, Genus: Homo, Species: Homo sapiens, Subspecies: Homo sapiens sapiens. Why double sapiens? Because we are the modern subspecies of the species that includes homo sapiens neanderthalensis. Not surprisingly it is we, ourselves, who have labelled us as such.…

I am writing, gathering and organizing this collection of essays based on my writings over many years. This undertaking was started shortly before my ninetieth birth-year and I expect to continue it until the end. I was inspired to embark in this endeavor by an example that I will not try to emulate: the two…