I'm underemployed, recurringly housebound with insanely painful now-sporadic (when I have meds) gout, an enlarged heart, and other health problems, particularly including lifelong recurring severe clinical depression. See here for a major crisis. I'm also sometimes available to some degree as a paid writer or researcher. This is a previous update on my situation & this -- and this from December 19th, 2005 update.
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Sanely free of McCarthyite calling anyone a "traitor" since 2001!
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"The brain is wider than the sky, For, put them side by side,
The one the other will include With ease, and you beside"
-- Emily Dickinson
"We will pursue peace as if there is no terrorism and fight terrorism as if there is no peace."
-- Yitzhak Rabin
"I have thought it my duty to exhibit things as they are, not as they ought to be."
-- Alexander Hamilton
"The stakes are too high for government to be a spectator sport."
-- Barbara Jordan
"Under democracy, one party always devotes its chief energies to
trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule --
and both commonly succeed, and are right."
-- H. L. Mencken
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."
-- William Pitt
"The only completely consistent people are the dead."
-- Aldous Huxley
"I have had my solutions for a long time; but I do not yet know how I am to arrive at them."
-- Karl F. Gauss
"Whatever evils either reason or declamation have imputed to extensive empire,
the power of Rome was attended with some beneficial consequences to mankind;
and the same freedom of intercourse which extended the vices, diffused likewise
the improvements of social life."
-- Edward Gibbon
"Augustus was sensible that mankind is governed by names; nor was he deceived in his
expectation, that the senate and people would submit to slavery, provided they were
respectfully assured that they still enjoyed their ancient freedom."
-- Edward Gibbon
"There exists in human nature a strong propensity to depreciate the advantages, and to magnify
the evils, of the present times."
-- Edward Gibbon
"Our youth now loves luxuries. They have bad manners, contempt for authority.
They show disrespect for elders and they
love to chatter instead of exercise.
Children are now tyrants, not the servants, of their households. They
no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents,
chatter before company, gobble up their food, and tyrannize
their teachers."
-- Socrates
"Before impugning an opponent's motives, even when they legitimately may be impugned, answer his arguments."
-- Sidney Hook
"Idealism, alas, does not protect one from ignorance, dogmatism, and foolishness."
-- Sidney Hook
"Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted."
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson
"We take, and must continue to take, morally hazardous actions to preserve our civilization.
We must exercise our power. But we ought neither to believe that a nation is capable of perfect
disinterestedness in its exercise, nor become complacent about particular degrees of interest
and passion which corrupt the justice by which the exercise of power is legitimized."
-- Reinhold Niebuhr
"Faced with the choice of all the land without a Jewish state or a Jewish state without all the
land, we chose a Jewish state without all the land."
-- David Ben-Gurion
"...the proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him
an incapacity of being called to offices of trust and emolument, unless he profess or renounce this
or that religious opinion, is depriving him injuriously of those privileges and advantages
to which, in common with his fellow citizens, he has a natural right; that it tends also
to corrupt the principles of that very religion it is meant to encourage, by bribing,
with a monopoly of worldly honours and emoluments, those who will externally profess
and conform to it; that though indeed these are criminals who do not withstand such
temptation, yet neither are those innocent who lay the bait in their way; that the
opinions of men are not the object of civil government, nor under its jurisdiction;
that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of opinion
and to restrain the profession or propagation of principles on supposition of their
ill tendency is a dangerous fallacy, which at once destroys all religious liberty,
because he being of course judge of that tendency will make his opinions the rule of
judgment, and approve or condemn the sentiments of others only as they shall square
with or differ from his own; that it is time enough for the rightful purposes of civil
government for its officers to interfere when principles break out into overt acts
against peace and good order; and finally, that truth is great and will prevail if
left to herself; that she is the proper and sufficient antagonist to error, and has
nothing to fear from the conflict unless by human interposition disarmed of her
natural weapons, free argument and debate; errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is
permitted freely to contradict them.
-- Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, Thomas Jefferson
"We don't live just by ideas. Ideas are part of the mixture of customs and practices,
intuitions and instincts that make human life a conscious activity susceptible to
improvement or debasement. A radical idea may be healthy as a provocation;
a temperate idea may be stultifying. It depends on the circumstances. One of the most
tiresome arguments against ideas is that their "tendency" is to some dire condition --
to totalitarianism, or to moral relativism, or to a war of all against all."
-- Louis Menand
"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis."
-- Dante Alighieri
"He too serves a certain purpose who only stands and cheers."
-- Henry B. Adams
"The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the
poor to beg in the streets, steal bread, or sleep under a bridge."
-- Anatole France
"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle."
-- Edmund Burke
"Education does not mean that we have become certified experts in business or mining or botany or journalism or epistemology;
it means that through the absorption of the moral, intellectual, and esthetic inheritance of the race we have come to
understand and control ourselves as well as the external world; that we have chosen the best as our associates both in spirit
and the flesh; that we have learned to add courtesy to culture, wisdom to knowledge, and forgiveness to understanding."
-- Will Durant
"Glimpses do ye seem to see of that mortally intolerable truth; that all deep, earnest thinking is
but the intrepid effort of the soul to keep the open independence of her sea; while the wildest
winds of heaven and earth conspire to cast her on the treacherous, slavish shore?"
-- Herman Melville
"The most important political office is that of the private citizen."
-- Louis D. Brandeis
"If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable."
-- Louis D. Brandeis
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both."
-- Louis D. Brandeis
"It is an error to suppose that books have no influence; it is a slow influence, like flowing water carving out a canyon,
but it tells more and more with every year; and no one can pass an hour a day in the society of sages and heroes without
being lifted up a notch or two by the company he has kept."
-- Will Durant
"When you write, you’re trying to transpose what you’re thinking into something that is less like an annoying drone and more like a piece of music."
-- Louis Menand
"Sex is a continuum."
-- Gore Vidal
"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should
make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibit the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state."
-- Thomas Jefferson, letter to the Baptists of Danbury, Connecticut, 1802.
"The sum of our religion is peace and unanimity, but these can scarcely stand unless we define as little as possible,
and in many things leave one free to follow his own judgment, because there is great obscurity in many matters, and
man suffers from this almost congenital disease that he will not give in when once a controversy is started, and
after he is heated he regards as absolutely true that which he began to sponsor quite casually...."
-- Desiderius Erasmus
"Are we to have a censor whose imprimatur shall say what books may be sold, and what we may buy? And who is thus to dogmatize religious opinions for our citizens? Whose foot is to be the measure to which ours are all to be cut or stretched? Is a priest to be our inquisitor, or shall a layman, simple as ourselves, set up his reason as the rule of what we are to read, and what we must disbelieve?"
-- Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to N. G. Dufief, Philadelphia bookseller, 1814
"We are told that it is only people's objective actions that matter, and their subjective feelings are of no importance. Thus pacifists, by obstructing the war effort,
are 'objectively' aiding the Nazis; and therefore the fact that they may be personally hostile to Fascism is irrelevant. I have been guilty of saying this myself more than once. The same argument is applied to Trotskyism. Trotskyists are often credited, at any rate by Communists, with being active and conscious agents of Hitler; but when you point out the many and obvious reasons why this is unlikely to be true,
the 'objectively' line of talk is brought forward again. To criticize the Soviet Union helps Hitler: therefore 'Trotskyism is Fascism'. And when this has been established, the accusation of conscious treachery is usually repeated.
This is not only dishonest; it also carries a severe penalty with it. If you disregard people's motives, it becomes much harder to foresee their actions."
-- George Orwell, "As I Please," Tribune, 8 December 1944
"Wouldn't this be a great world if insecurity and desperation made us more attractive? If 'needy' were a turn-on?"
-- "Aaron Altman," Broadcast News
"The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand."
-- Lewis Thomas
"To be ignorant of what happened before you were born is to be ever a child. For what is man's lifetime unless the memory of past events is woven with those of earlier times?"
-- Cicero
"Reputation is what other people know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself."
-- Lois McMaster Bujold, A Civil Campaign
"Remember, Robin: evil is a pretty bad thing."
-- Batman
"Being evil is not a full-time job."
-- James Lileks
Gary Farber is now a licensed Double Super-Secret Master Pundit.
He does not always refer to himself in the third person.
Did he mention he was presently single?
The lutefisk is dead. Donate via the donation button on the top left
or I'll shoot this gefilte fish.
No, really, I seriously need the help at present. And I hate asking.
Current Total # of Donations Since Blog Began: 587
Subscribers to date at $5/month: 29 sign-ups; 15 cancellations; Total= 14
Supporter subscribers to date at $25/month: 6 sign-ups; 2 cancellation; Total= 4
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And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
Farber's First Fundamental of Blogging:
If your idea of making an insightful point is to make fun of people's
names, or refer to them by rilly clever labels such as "The Big Me" or "The Shrub,"
chances are high that I'm not reading your blog. The same applies if you refer
to a group of people by disparaging terms such as "the Donks" or "the pals." (Note: I have to say I don't give that much of a damn any more.)
Farber's Second Fundamental of Blogging:
The more interested you are in scoring a "point" for a political "team," a "side," than in exploring the validity or value of an idea, the less interested I am in what you're saying.
(Note: Partially suspended for the Duration.)
Farber's Third Fundamental of Blogging:
If you see a link on another blog, and use it, credit the blog.
Some places I go:
[weblogs, sites, and columns]
People I've known and still miss include Isaac Asimov, rich brown, Charles Burbee, F. M. "Buzz" Busby, Terry Carr, A. Vincent Clarke, George Alec Effinger,
Bill & Sherry Fesselmeyer, George Flynn, John Milo "Mike" Ford. John Foyster, Jay Haldeman, Chuch Harris, Mike Hinge, Lee Hoffman, Terry Hughes, Damon Knight, Ross Pavlac, Bruce Pelz, Elmer Perdue, Tom Perry,
Larry Propp, Bill Rotsler, Art Saha, Bob Shaw, Martin Smith, Harry Stubbs, Bob Tucker, Reed Waller, Harry Warner, Jr., Jack Williamson, Walter A. Willis, Susan Wood, Kate Worley, and Roger Zelazny.
It's just a start.
And She of whom I must write someday.
You Like Me, You Really Like Me
...Darn: I saw that Gary had commented on this thread, and thought: oh. my. god. Perfect storm. Unstoppable cannonball, immovable object.
-- Hilzoy
Where would the blogosphere be without the Guardian? Guardian fish-barreling is now a venerable tradition. Yet even within this tradition, I don't believe there has ever been a more extensive and thorough essay than this one, from Gary Farber's fine blog. Gary appears to have examined every single thing that Guardian/Observer columnist Mary Ridell has ever written. He ties it all together, reaches inevitable conclusion. An archive can be a weapon.
-- Dr. Frank
Isn't Gary a cracking blogger, apropos of nothing in particular?
-- Alison Scott
I usually read you and Patrick several times a day, and I always get something from them. You've got great links, intellectually honest commentary, and a sense of humor. What's not to like?
-- Ted Barlow
...writer[s] I find myself checking out repeatedly when I'm in the mood to play follow-the-links. They're not all people I agree with all the time, or even most of the time, but I've found them all to be thoughtful writers, and that's the important thing, or should be.
-- Tom Tomorrow
Amygdala - So much stuff it reminds Unqualified Offerings that UO sometimes thinks of Gary Farber as "the liberal Instapundit." -- Jim Henley
I look at it almost every day. I can't follow all the links, but I read most of your pieces. The blog format really seems to suit you. It also suits me; I am not a news junkie, so having smart people like you ferret out the interesting stuff and leave it where I can find it is wonderful.
-- Lydia Nickerson
Gary is certainly a non-idiotarian 'liberal'...
-- Perry deHaviland
...the thoughtful and highly intelligent Gary Farber... My first reaction was that I definitely need to appease Gary Farber of Amygdala, one of the geniuses of our age.
-- Brad deLong
My friend Gary Farber at Amygdala is the sort of liberal for whom I happily give three cheers. [...] Damned incisive blogging....
-- Midwest Conservative Journal
If I ever start a paper, Clueless writes the foreign affairs column, Layne handles the city beat, Welch has the roving-reporter job, Tom Tomorrow runs the comic section (which carries Treacher, of course). MediaMinded runs the slots - that's the type of editor I want as the last line of defense. InstantMan runs the edit page - and you can forget about your Ivins and Wills and Friedmans and Teepens on the edit page - it's all Blair, VodkaP, C. Johnson, Aspara, Farber, Galt, and a dozen other worthies, with Justin 'I am smoking in such a provocative fashion' Raimondo tossed in for balance and comic relief.
Who wouldn't buy that paper? Who wouldn't want to read it? Who wouldn't climb over their mother to be in it?
-- James Lileks
Gary is a perceptive, intelligent, nice guy. Some of the stuff he comes up with is insightful, witty, and stimulating. And sometimes he manages to make me groan.
-- Charlie Stross
One of my issues with many poli-blogs is the dickhead tone so many bloggers affect to express their sense of righteous indignation. Gary Farber's thoughtful leftie takes on the world stand in sharp contrast with the usual rhetorical bullying. Plus, he likes "Pogo," which clearly attests to his unassaultable good taste.
-- oakhaus.com
Gary Farber is a principled liberal....
-- Bill Quick, The Daily Pundit
I read Amygdala...with regularity, as do all sensible websurfers.
-- Jim Henley, Unqualified Offerings
Okay, he is annoying, but he still posts a lot of good stuff.
-- Avedon Carol, The Sideshow
The only trouble with reading Amygdala is that it makes me feel like such a slacker. That Man Farber's a linking, posting, commenting machine, I tell you!
-- John Robinson, Sore Eyes
Jaysus. I saw him do something like this before, on a thread about Israel. It was pretty brutal. It's like watching one of those old WWF wrestlers grab an opponent's
face and grind away until the guy starts crying. I mean that in a nice & admiring way, you know.
-- Fontana Labs, Unfogged
We read you Gary Farber! We read you all the time! Its just that we are lazy with our blogroll. We are so very very lazy. We are always the last ones to the party but we always have snazzy bow ties.
-- Fafnir, Fafblog!
Gary Farber you are a genius of mad scientist proportions. I will bet there are like huge brains growin in jars all over your house.
-- Fafnir, Fafblog!
Gary Farber is the hardest working man in show blog business. He's like a young Gene Hackman blogging with his hair on fire, or something.
-- Belle Waring, John & Belle Have A Blog
I bow before the shrillitudinousness of Gary Farber, who has been blogging like a fiend.
-- Ted Barlow, Crooked Timber
Gary Farber only has two blogging modes: not at all, and 20 billion interesting posts a day [...] someone on the interweb whose opinions I can trust....
-- Belle Waring, John & Belle Have A Blog
Gary Farber! Jeez, the guy is practically a blogging legend, and I'm always surprised at the breadth of what he writes about.
-- PZ Meyers, Pharyngula
Gary Farber takes me to task, in a way befitting the gentleman he is.
-- Stephen Green, Vodkapundit
A while ago he told us about alltägsgeschichte: the history of everyday life. What he doesn't answer is the question why does German always sound like a sneeze?
OF ALL THE BLOG-WATCHERS, clearly this one is the most important, the most elegantly conceived, the most perceptive in its choice of blogs, the most delicious in its expression. Have I mentioned that QuasiPundit is excellent, and Punditwatch indispensible, and From Left Field a superb view?
Never, of course, would I engage in blogrolling. Heaven forfend.
BACK AND FORTH keeps going talk about the idea of returning to the '67 borders in return for full peace. There are huge problems on both sides, including the fact that "peace" can change in a week. On the other hand, the notion that that these are indefensible borders simply because they can be reached by artillery is nonsense in the missile age, not to mention the hybrid artillery-missile age. The biggest problem is credibility. Salami tactics, or willingness to stop savaging each other, and make a genuine settlement? You decide, but, then, most folks already have.
Me, I think it depends upon whom you talk to, and who winds up in control, here and there. Or, rather, there and there and there and there.
"Twenty-two acknowledged concubines and a library of 62,000 volumes attested the variety of his inclinations, and from the productions which he left behind him, it appears that the former as well as the latter were designed for use rather than ostentation."
I first read Gibbon when I was eight, and fell in love, and every few years return to him. I'm terribly fond, in general, of the rolling cadences of writers of the 19th and 18th centuries. Pray try the Gibbon-O-Matic!
"Another damned, thick, square, book! Always scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh! Mr. Gibbon?" (William Henry, Duke of Gloucester, upon receiving the second volume from the author, 1781)
ULP: Eyes wide. Here's a page -- an actual offical page of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice -- a shame they don't have several other categories, isn't it? -- that, well, makes you think only in Texas. It's the page listing the requested final meals of those who left Death Row. (A thoughtful footnote mentions "The final meal requested may not reflect the actual final meal served.")
Not only can one pick up tasty treat tips, it never occurred to me I'd ever find a page that has a link Return to Death Row Page.
These people favor cholesterol. Don't they know that's bad for their health?
There are all sorts of odd notes. One inmate's request was for "Justice, Equality, World Peace." Hard to swallow that. Another asked for "God's saving grace, love, truth, peace and freedom." Also a bit indigestible. Several asked for a smoke, and it is noted that "(cigarettes prohibited by policy)." Which creeps me out. They're legal, still, right? Y'know, call me a liberal, but I think it's okay if a murderer gets a last smoke before he's offed.
I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that.
One of my guidelines in life is
You probably got it all figured out, Corey. If you start out depressed everything's kind of a pleasant surprise.
COLLEAGUES HONORDanny Pearl. I'm not going to collect the set; there will be so many, and rightfully so. I just bow my head. He had, in his pictures, a lovely smile. And he died in service to his nation, and in service of seeking the truth, which is a service to our nation, as much as any of our brave soldiers' mission, and I honor that, and his volunteering.
2/22/2002 05:10:00 AM |permanent link| | Main Page |
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MY IDEA: We haul them up three thousand feet, douse them in jet fuel, light them, drop them, drop endless tons of steel and other material on them as they incinerate, and that's too kind for the profiteers.
ANNALS OF TASTE: EBay Is Asked to Remove Trade Center Items
The Bloomberg administration demanded yesterday...
Note switch from headline.
...that eBay, the Internet auction company, remove World Trade Center memorabilia from its Web site, calling some of the items for sale "blatant attempts to profit from mass murder" and "nauseating."
Hey, anyone want to buy these chunks of hair, and gold teeth from Auschwitz? Great memorabilia! Conversation pieces!
I'm reminded of the article before I was blogging which carried an account of a fellow encountering someone else near the WTC area during the day after, noting the latter guy carrying some stuff. When first guy asked what second guy was doing, and was told that second guy was carrying off some souvenirs to sell, he testified, and I paraphrase from memory, "I'm afraid I became so upset, I punched him in the nose."
I have this terribly unorthodox notion that there are other values than profit uber alles. No, I don't want a law passed to enforce my prejudices here. I'm just noting that there are other values than profit.
Tangentially, I'd like to see extreme social opproprium directed at anyone using red, white, and blue, and particularly imagery modeled on the American flag, for commercial use. I particularly direct this at tv networks using such in their logos, but also at any advertiser doing this. It's not patriotism. It's attempting to gain viewers and buyers, and profit from pseudo-patriotism, to attempt to suggest that "if you're really patriotic, you'll watch/buy us," and I think it's nauseating.
Patriotism isn't demonstrated through displaying a set of colors, nor can one claim it for one's self through waving a banner, seeking to be appreciated. That's the opposite of the idea of self-sacrifice in the cause of freedom. It makes me want to vomit. And then do the 3000 feet routine.
ANTERIOR CINGULATE is another alternative possible name for this blog.
Brain imaging experiments are beginning to show that when a person gets an unexpected reward — the equivalent of a huge shot of delicious apple juice — more dopamine reaches the anterior cingulate. When a person expects a reward and does not get it, less dopamine reaches the region. And when a person expects a reward and gets it, the anterior cingulate is silent.
SUPERMAN FOR IRANIAN SUPREME LEADER: Joe Klein has a LETTER FROM TEHRAN at The New Yorker's website that probably won't be up much longer. Here's a bit from the beginning, starting with a quote from one of the participants in the sympathy demonstration on September 11th, speaking three months later:
"Do you want to know what I was really worried about?" she said, pausing for ironic effect. "Woody Allen. I didn't want him to die. I wanted to know that he was all right. I love his films."
But wasn't she pleased by President Khatami's statement? "Khatami! I don't believe in Khatami. I believe in Superman." She shrugged and raised her eyebrows. "At least in the world of Superman there is a certain logic. There are rules. There is no logic in the world of Khatami. He's just part of an irrational system. At the top of the system is the Supreme Leader." This is actually a constitutional office, occupied by the chief religious figure in the country. Its first, and most memorable, occupant was Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini; since Khomeini's death, in 1989, the office has been held, less notably, by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. "But nobody believes in the Supreme Leader," she went on. "Everybody believes in Khatami. Everybody votes for Khatami, who has none of the power. Nobody votes for the conservatives, but they have all of the power. So I like the fantasy of Superman better than the fantasy of Khatami."
There's Red Khatami, see, and Blue Khamenei. I'm not sure where the Legion of Super-Pets fits in, though. Perhaps Col. Khadfy is Beppo the Super-monkey.
A more serious quote:
"Iran is a kaleidoscope," says Kenneth Pollack, who is the deputy director of national-security studies for the Council on Foreign Relations and who was a director for Persian Gulf affairs at the National Security Council during the Clinton Administration. "There are fourteen dozen different positions on each issue, and it is very difficult to say with any certainty which of the insiders support which position. [...] It's not impossible that some of them were sending a message to Khatami as well as to us with the Karine A."
After the success of The Best-Loved Poems of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Caroline Kennedy is editing two more books, a sign the Kennedy name is even more popular in publishing than in politics. Profiles in Courage for Our Time [and] The Patriot's Handbook: Poems, Songs and Speeches Every American Should Know.
SHEDDING LIGHT: I have a dreadful tendency to assume that anyone who reads me is reading Patrick Nielsen Hayden's extraordinarily fine Electrolite blog, because Patrick and I go back with each other to when we were newts, and tend to be about 90% in agreement with each other on almost everything, and for me he's simply there.
An unfortunate result of that, I've realized, is that I almost never link to specific items in his blog, and it occurs to me that this is unfair and silly, since my presumption is surely not wholly true. Not to mention that he is brilliant, insightful, one of the smartest people I've ever known, an extraordinary editor, and can write rings, curlicues, and Art Deco designs around me, and most of the planet.
So let me note his sagecomments about the Indiana students' objection to the Thomas Hart Benton mural which includes, intending to depict a horrible thing educationally, members of the KKK burning a cross.
As well, his comments and link about contemporary slavery in Mauritania. Below, his comments about zero-tolerance in schools.
Then just keep reading down to the bottom, and as you have time, read all his archives. You won't regret it.
IRANIAN VISIONS: Bruce Sterling also linked to this, and it's a fascinating, well-written, glimpse into the point-of-view of a sophisticated Iranian woman of 28, who has lived in America, on a visit back to Tehran, at a party, enjoying and disenjoying the treats, the flirting, the opium, and the culture. Very immersive. Go read it.
The entire publication, The Iranian, is interesting.
FEAR OF THE FUTURE: Bruce Sterling thinks this essay by Judith Berman, from the New York Review of Science Fiction is one of the most important pieces of sf criticism of the past decade. It's a valid-sounding point, and I don't think I have a sweeping enough view of the field at present to strongly agree or disagree with how valid it is or isn't. The critique boils down to this point:
We have a field that is increasingly fearful of the present, looking ever more wistfully toward the past.
Perhaps so. I'd observe that the field has some other ongoing problems, perhaps largest of which is the way what once was science fiction has become part of normal cultural life; I'm not simply referring to technology, but to a cultural change in which the entire sf outlook of neophilia and being technology-positive, formerly a small ghetto, has been subsumed into a vastly larger geek culture, itself part of the majority culture, in which sf tropes and outlook are diluted and subsumed, absorbed into advertising, and every-day news of cloning, nanotechnology, and endless more koolness, while simultaneously, the larger world has come to identify "science fiction" not with the cutting edge work, but with mass-media action/adventure tv/movie "sci-fi," so that where people who might once have identified themselves specifically as "science fiction people" now largely view themselves as part of geekdom, nerdom, the online world.
Why look to the world of science fiction for what people used to, when the world around us is now that world? But this is merely a continuation of a trend I was writing about over twenty years ago, and which many others have written about, so I'm not really saying anything new.
And this is not to say there aren't tons of great sf presently and recently coming out, mind.
Berman also says that
The phenomenon of sf nostalgia is particularly odd in comparison with, say, the social sciences. [...]Too much nostalgia poisons vitality and creativity in any field. But sf should be especially allergic to nostalgia.
True enough. However, this also fights against the only partially true observation of Peter Graham's that "the Golden Age of science fiction is twelve." It speaks nothing against the maturity, grace, and brilliance of the upper crust of contemporary sf that few of its practioners did not first fall in love with the field near that age.
2/21/2002 07:24:00 PM |permanent link| | Main Page |
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HEAVY BREATHING IN KANDAHAR: From Japan Today we learn about the new craze sweeping the town: satellite tv porn!
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — In a darkened room at the back of a teashop in dusty downtown Kandahar, 23-year-old Latif stands mouth agape, giggling nervously, staring at the first pair of breasts he can remember seeing.
CAN YOU BE MORE SPECIFIC? A futurologist's timeline predictions of what technology will bring us, in multiple categories, over the next 40 years, in PDF form. Rather silly, really, particularly as the predictions come in three or four word phrases, leaving them, as a rule, more than a little vague. For instance, "orgasm by e-mail" in 2010. I imagine there are some having those right now. Similarly "multimedia patient records" for the same year. Etc. Still, amusing, and you have to admire the impudence. I rather prefer Terry Bisson's "Today In History" though.
2/21/2002 05:40:00 PM |permanent link| | Main Page |
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ISRAEL'S SUPREME COURT has ruled that those who undergo Reform or Conservative conversions are Jews. For the first time.
This is of huge importance to Jews in various ways. Most Jews in Israel are, of course, secular and non-religious. But those who are religious are divided amongst the mildly religious, with a bow towards Orthodox tradition, and then the modern Orthodox, and the stricter, and then we start dividing into various sectarian groups, most of whom are usually called by the others, the "ultra-Orthodox," though they are not fond of the label. The latter, though a distinct minority, do have political power out of proportion with their numbers, due to their tendency to vote as blocs in several political parties, of which the Israeli Knesset is divided into many.
In any case, the number of Jews following Reform and Conservative practices in Israel is small, but in the rest of the world, they are the overwhelming majority of Jews, particularly in America. The ultra-Orthodox response to this decision, naturally, is that it is heresy, and the Supreme Court has no authority in such matters. Given that Israel is a parliamentry democracy, not a theocracy, my own response is that they are entitled to whatever view of "who is a Jew" they like, as am I, and as are the secular authorities of the Israeli state, including the Supreme Court.
"Israel is the state of the Jewish people," Judge Barak wrote. "There are different streams in Judaism active in Israel and abroad.
"Every stream acts according to its own views. Every Jew in Israel — like every person who is not Jewish — is entitled to freedom of religion, conscience and organization. Our basic concepts grant every individual the freedom to decide whether he will belong to one stream or another."
SURVIVOR STORIES: The Guardian/Observer has stories from people who survived the WTC. First-person accounts, worth reading, if you can take it.
(I've been trying to figure out makes the difference between people who react so strongly to what happened, and those who don't, because it isn't just proximity to what happened; anyone with opinions, I'd like to hear them.)
