30 April 2009
Nuts to that
Thanks to The Conscience Pudding I have discovered (at the opposite end of the spectrum from Rushdie's The enchantress of Florence, yesterday) the delightfully paranoid joys of Scaredy Squirrel.
29 April 2009
Out of the lull
I recently mentioned Salman Rushdie as an example of an author where I encountered superb examples of first and was, as a result, carried through others which moved me less or not at all.
(I've just reread that sentence, and am uneasily aware of its shortcomings. But, time is short and I can't immediately see how to overhaul it ... so, let it stand. Anyroad, to return to the point...)[1]
I have for some time been in a Rushdie lull, with a couple of books sitting unread on the shelf. Then, recently, I was loaned The enchantress of Florence. It was in mint condition (its owner is a careful reader) and, feeling that I should return it quickly before I damaged it, I dived in.
My Rushdie lull is, as a result, over. In The enchantress of Venice, Rushdie dazzlingly demonstrates his Scheherezade like ability to hypnotise through sheer complex story telling power.
Wonderful.
- Salman Rushdie, The enchantress of Florence. 2008, London: Jonathan Cape. 9780224061636 (hbk) and 9780224082433 (pbk.)
- This footnote is mainly to annoy Unreal Nature (which recently not only used a footnote of its own but did so from the post title), but also to acknowledge that the para to which it is linked (a) should probably have been placed in a footnote and (b) demonstrates the opinion of both Ray Girvan and Julie Heyward that footnotes can indicate lack of organisation on the part of the writer (the writer, here, of course, being me).
26 April 2009
A haphazard way to move through life and treasure...
When Ray Girvan (JSBlog) asks to borrow a book, you can be sure that it will come back with interest – in both senses of that word. His request for Queenmagic, kingmagic will be no exception, but in the short term has itself set me trundling along other lines of thought. Thinking about Ian Watson in particular and, in general, what forms our perception of an author.
The first Watson book I read was God's world, an ideas novel with interstellar travel powered by love, poised somewhere between fantasy and science fiction . That's a difficult triple point to occupy without falling into either tedium or derision, but (to my mind, anyway) he succeeded: God's world struck me as fresh, potent and stimulating.
I was in the middle of a long tramp through East African mountain scenery at the time, and there were no other books to follow it (a fellow traveller let me read this one before using it as toilet paper), so there was ample empty time in which to study it in my mind and appreciate how remarkable it was. As soon as I again had access to libraries and bookshops, a year or so later, I randomly picked up those Watson novels and short story collections which came first to hand. Chekov's journey, Slow birds, Miracle visitors, Deathhunter ... all brilliant.
I was lucky in the chance sequence which presented itself to me. All of those shaped my perception of him and his fiction. When I found The book of the stars and The book of being less satisfying than their predecessor The book of the river, that was OK – every author is allowed fluctuation.
Queenmagic, kingmagic was, in chronological publication terms though not in my order of reading, to be the last novel before Watson turned to a different style. With Evil Water, The Power and The fire worm, he switched to using schlock horror as his vehicle.
Not that those books were any less well envisioned, constructed or written; they were just not ... me. I've never been a horror fan, and (I'm a devout physical coward) least of all physical horror. At that particular time I was also inclined to feel that there are enough real horrors in the world without inventing any. Nevertheless, having built up a high opinion over so many books, I went on reading – those three and another before I gave up. I put him aside and didn't return for a couple of years.
If chance had led me to The power, for example, first or even second, I would probably have put him aside and never returned at all – which would have been a great loss. Even if The book of being had been the first I read, though it was SF and not horror, I would probably have shrugged and not bothered to go further.
Iain Banks us another example; so is Salman Rushdie; in each case, I was lucky in the first couple of examples and that carried me through those which I felt less impressive. Ditto Joanne Harris – Five Quarters of the orange drew me in, where Evil seed or Holy fools certainly would not have done.
It seems a haphazard way to move through life and treasure, but there you go.
Of course, even if an author knew in advance which books would grab me and which would not, other readers would react differently. I was deeply impressed by Under heaven's bridge, written by Watson in transatlantic collaboration with Michael Bishop; other people whose opinion I respect were completely unmoved by it.
Coming back to Queenmagic, kingmagic, I agree with Ray's comment that it goes into fast forward towards the end. There is a feeling that Watson has worked through the ideas now and is impatient to be finished ... though I personally liked the Go section, finding it the most evocative of the whole book, which I suppose only goes to show that every reader is different. The central ideas, though, always Watson's driving force, are fascinating. And the mapping of fictional physics variants onto game play is an effective frame, which Ray (judging by his post title and closing line) apparently intends exploring further; I'm looking forward to that in anticipation. (Update, 2307Z on Monday 27 April 2009: Ray's post has, since I wrote that, been extensively expanded.)
Calligraffiti
Talking of scribbling, and with the Crimes of passion show in mind ... Today's Independent on Sunday "New Review" supplement has an interview with calligraphic graffiti artist Mohammed Ali.
Alas, the IoS print it in smallish white type over heavily textured orange and yellow wall, which makes it extremely difficult to read. And I've searched in vain for it on the Independent's web site.
I find Ali's (and others') use of Arabic letter forms as graffiti material extraordinarily beautiful ... as are the small Arabic and Urdu tags to be seen in many cities.
If you're near a copy of the IoS, and have a supply of Migraleve to hand read it (page 49 – Living). If not, take a look at some of the work at AerosolArabic.
25 April 2009
A wandering scribbler, I...
Another one for fellow peripatetic geeks.
I'm in the process of promoting the palmOne LifeDrive machine which has, for the past three years, been my "extension handheld" to "primary device" position.
That probably sounds very strange to most people: upgrading to a product released four years ago, discontinued for more than two years? But I've always rated reliability above street cred or the cutting edge, in essential equipment, and four years is long enough for the LifeDrive to have proven itself. Two years ago, after all, I readopted the even older Psion 5 as a portable writing machine.
In those two years I have lost and replaced the Psion. And there's the problem. Replacement has to be by increasingly unreliable second hand machines already well used by previous owners; the usable life of each replacement is, on average, going to be less than the last. I mourn the loss of pocketable machines with proper keyboards, but can't do anything about it. I recently heard that Clarissa Vincent, a friend who has loyally stuck to Psion machines despite a frightening replacement rate (she lives on a boat, and her computers knock around the seven seas) has also finally abandoned them and shifted to a tablet handheld (also, as it happens, a LifeDrive).
Also in those two years the connected, low cost and low power consumption "web book" has proliferated. It's no longer necessary to carry an A4 notebook to get realistic working time, and I never again expect to do so routinely; at places where I frequently work for longish periods, I now keep a spare one in a locked drawer. An A5 web book will still not last all day (nor will the A4 laptop), and is not as portable as a Psion, but it will give two or three hours between recharges and fits easily in the same space as a large paperback novel. I now carry an Asus EEE PC and its small, lightweight charger, plugging it in whenever I am near a power supply for a few minutes.
The LifeDrive is a delight to write on (with either a stylus or a folding BlueTooth keyboard), unlike the T3 which it is replacing. It also takes the same MMC/SD storage card as the Asus (and my main laptop at home), so my work in progress can reside on one of those to move back and forth between the three machines. Since the LifeDrive (especially if the MicroDrive hard disk is replaced with a 4 gigabyte Compact Flash card) does last all day on a single charge, work can continue uninterrupted as long as periodic power access is available.
Between stations on the subway, in a supermarket queue, walking across a mountainside or a field, work begun on the Asus during a journey can continue on the LifeDrive ... then shift back again when sitting down for ten minutes or so. And from either, finished work can be emailed out (or, as in this case, posted to a blog) at any time – both have built in WiFi and will connect to a cellphone too.
Prolonged field usage remains a problem. Unlike the Psion, neither machine (this is a universal trend in current devices) allow battery replacement. I still have ten year old Handspring Visors in use for that reason: slow, and unconnected, but they keep working forever as long as batteries (one pair of AAs a month) are available.
23 April 2009
Chrome vs Firefox
A constant trickle of correspondence asks me about Google's Chrome browser.
I was sure that I had written something about it in here, last September when it was released; but, having combed through the archive, it would seem not. I found a set of email discussions with friends, where I said "Unless I find something horrible (unlikely) it will, of course, stay on my machine as yet another browser to be aware of, alongside Opera, Safari, et al. Whether I will love it, whether it will replace Firefox in my affections, only time will tell; I certainly feel favourably towards it thus far".
After that it sat around for quite a long time, being used when I thought of it but forgotten for much of the time. That wasn't the best way to get to know it; so eventually I set it as my default browser for a while.
- Its strengths are its rapid load and close down, its speed and responsiveness in use, its and its efficient use (and release) of memory.
- Its weaknesses are minimal easy access to controls (particularly cookie management and history clearance) and fairly blunt range of extended function.
For some time now, I've settled into what seems likely to be the long term pattern. Chrome is confirmed as the default browser, more than powerful enough for most routine use but light on its feet, servicing perhaps 90% of my browser time.. Windows open and close instantly, providing information and making hardly any demands on system performance. When something more than routine is needed, however, a manually started Firefox remains the research window manager of choice; slow run up and occasional restarts of the system are a price worth paying for its richness, flexibility and depth.
One day, no doubt, one browser will offer both aspects: Spartan efficiency and extensibility. In the meantime, the two programs are here to stay in tandem.
21 April 2009
Beauty is skin deep
“These lenses have a surface coating,” said my partner, waving her spectacles at me, “and it’s a nightmare because it comes off. Stick that in your article!” So I did (stick it in my article, that is), because it served to bring together and focus several different skeins of thought. Surface coating is one of the oldest human technologies, but still at the cutting edge and a prime consumer of scientific computing. Biomimetic or nanoscale, from reduction of optical reflections in lens systems to protection of components in orbit, taking in paper manufacture and dental treatment in between it is crucial to almost every area of endeavour. How might we make an optical surface coating less likely to come off? The obvious answer is improved adhesion, but to strengthen it or make it self-healing would be alternative approaches. After a detour through various mesoscale approaches it seems fairly certain that the answer, whatever it is, will lie in nanotechnology.
The archetypal adhesive surface coating is a protective layer of paint, pitch or varnish, first recorded in Genesis 6:14. Noah’s account lacks computational detail, but requirements for precision have certainly tightened since Cennini[1] specified, some time around the end of the 14th century CE: ‘take one pound, or two, or three, or four, of linseed oil, and put it into a new casserole...’ [more]
20 April 2009
After looking...
Following the visit to Crimes of passion ("Lesson in looking"), Dan experiments with paint sprays...(Click photo to enlarge)
19 April 2009
A rose is a rose...
This one started life as an email, responding to distress of US friends over Obama's decision, a few days back along, not to prosecute torturers for actions committed in the past under legal advice. If the title seems strange, it was taken from the email subject line used by the first friend to comment: "Seems so clear that torture is torture, ... and immoral behavior still immoral."
I'm not naming any of those friends. Better to be paranoid than careless.
Nobody is more evangelically opposed to torture than I. But, while disappointed that torturers will go unpunished in this case, I'm not surprised – and, overall, encouraged by Obama's decisions.
I never believed that a new president could make much difference. I was pleased by the election of Obama, but thought all the unrealistic hope piled upon him would break his back. Now I have to revise my opinion slightly ... he is doing more than I thought possible, even if it is only a tiny amount.
While I would very much like to see past torturers brought to book, there is something much more important to me: ensuring that future torturers are prevented from plying their sickening trade. If I have to choose between those two aims, I have no hesitation in trading away the first to buy the second ... and that seems to be what Obama has done. In order to get out into the open the information which he needs in order to at least tackle the future, he has given a partial amnesty to the past. I say "partial" because his words leave carefully open the possibility of pursuing those who ordered or justified torture by others.
This is not a new idea and, quite apart from immediate practical politics, it has a long term value. South Africa's bloodless transition from apartheid horror to democratic state, however shaky, was made possible by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission which uncovered and recognised abuses while firmly looking to a future without them rather than revenge for them.
Its creation was the result of a thorough review of previous mechanisms worldwide, taking into account their shortcomings and best practices. Also, the views and expectations of the South African civil society were taken into consideration, thereby conveying a sense of ownership. It was designed to initiate a process of reconciliation in order to unify the country after decades of racial and ethnic segregation. It considered that “the telling of the truth about gross human rights violations, as viewed from the different perspectives, facilitates the process of understanding our [South Africa’s] divided pasts, whilst the public acknowledgement of untold suffering and injustice helps to restore the dignity of victims and afford perpetrators the opportunity to come to terms with their own past.” The coming to terms with the past was seen as fundamental to promotion of national reconciliation and for building a new South Africa.[1]
One of the most dangerous fallacies around in the US today, particularly amongst Democrats and other liberals, is the idea that the evils to be confronted originated within the previous eight years. They did not. In particular, torture by the CIA or its collaborators abroad goes back to the very beginning of the organisation. People were being tortured in the interests of US foreign policy, often on a much larger scale, under every administration before Bush. The only thing that changed under Bush was public perception of and attitude to that fact. The public under Bush suddenly became willing to recognise what was being done in their name, and feel uncomfortable about it. As another friend commented, "And we became just as guilty once we knew what was going on and did little more than sit around with our mouths hanging open."[2]
Pretending that it was all down to Bush, or to the Neocons, or whoever, allows the underpinning obscenity to continue comfortably unchanged. What matters is to accept that the rot is there, forget about pinning blame for the past, and change the future.
To try and go after past torturers, however much I want to see it, would be an unachievably huge task. Obama is not, despite the apparent belief of his followers and detractors, either god or devil ; he is one human being who, apparently, seriously intends to try and make a contribution to turning around the huge inertia of a superpower. He is dealing in the art of the possible to maximise what he can do in the short period while he has his hands on the levers of power. If he can bring about an irreversible reduction in the amount of torture which happens in the future, we will have more for which to thank him than if he stages a series of retrospective show trials.
- Paavani Reddy, "Truth and Reconciliation Commissions: Instruments for Ending Impunity and Building Lasting Peace", in United Nations Chronicle, 2004, issue 4 (April), p.19.
- My usual disclaimer: I am not under any illusion that the US is alone in this; most liberal democracies play dirty behind the scenes on the foreign policy stage. The US is simply the biggest and most powerful liberal democracy – and the present subject.
Lost in a good boo (2)
Nine days ago (Lost in a good boo) I floated a game from the BBC Radio 4 comedy Cabin Pressure: books which sound more interesting with the last letter knocked off.
I got quite a few takers, both in comments and by email, so I've decided to pull them all together here (see list below). I've homogenised the style as far as was easy to do, but otherwise left them more or less as sent, and to save space have listed contributors at the bottom with initials only against each title. As soon as I've posted this, I'll tidy up by removing the comments from the original post.
Dirk Dusharme sent some with a variation, removing two letters instead of one. I have left those in the original comment. Ray Girvan ("Poor Pothecary") also pointed me to a similar, but more sophisticated, exercise posed in The Guardian by David Barnett three days before, which I also recommend – including Ray's own suggestions (search for Ray78). Comparing dates, I suspect that Barnett was also prompted by the same episode of Cabin Pressure, though he doesn't say so.
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17 April 2009
A lesson in looking
This is a bit late ... it should have been posted three days ago. It's also unusual for me to post a set of images in here, but...
On Tuesday I visited the Crimes of Passion show again; this time with Dan, age 9. As I said once before, also in connection with Dan, experiencing something with a child is a good way to learn new ways of seeing it – and this was no exception. I learnt from him new ways to see the exhibition itself and, even more impotant, saw him in a new way.
For three and a half hours, interrupted only to consult the catalogue, make comments or point out and explain things to me, he looked. It was an education; few students have that intensity of attention.
13 April 2009
Somewhere, over the rainbow...
Thinking through my fingers touches (in "What people earn") on an issue of natural justice which also exercises me. I emphasise natural justice. Like TTMF, I have no suggestions for how it can be brought about, apart from an appeal to everyone's sense of priorities – but that doesn't make the issue any less vital.
It has always (well ... since I was about fifteen or so) seemed appalling to me that one person can earn a thousand times what another earns, while the second is below the poverty line. In a healthy world (ha!) there would be a much closer ratio and a bottom limit. For example (and only for example; I'm not nailing my colours to this particular mast): a minimum income which allows a decent life, a mean (average) income of seven times the minimum and a maximum of seven times the mean would give a total range in the UK currently of £20k-£1m.
I personally think that such a range would still be too great for natural justice. My own idea of a healthy society would have a much closer set of ratios – maybe a mean of twice the minimum and a maximum of three times the mean.
Note that I am not talking about the same thing as TTMF here. TTMF invites us to reassess the relative value we place on different occupations, and to connect that with the respect we feel for them. I've something to say on that, as well.
We take it as a given, without much thought, that such differentials are natural ... but, going back to first principles: why?
One particular institution pays me dramatically more per hour worked than the administrative staff who make it possible for me to carry out the functions for which I am paid. Where is the justice in that? If either I or they are off sick, my function equally grinds to a halt - clearly we are both equally necessary.
Answers in support of this setup commonly make reference to market forces ... but that doesn't really hold water. I was once told, during a run of this argument, that "we have to recognise the investment in education and training which a profession requires – if you pay a brain surgeon the same as a sewage worker, why would anyone bother to train as a brain surgeon?" To which I have to ask: if I were a brain surgeon, and a sewage worker's wage was raised to match mine, would I immediately choose to go down the sewers? Of course, I would not.
People take many things into account, apart from remuneration, when they choose their work. I know people who have taken a large cut in pay for the convenience of working just around the corner from where they live, or for a job which involves a high social contact element. I know doctors and lawyers who work for little or nothing in swamps, deprived urban areas, or other contexts where they find job satisfaction rewards to be high.
Carole, the administrative colleague who most closely supports my work in the institution mentioned above, was recently involved in a staff restructuring exercise. Her biggest fear was not a drop in salary, but being put in an isolated office where she would be paid more but see nobody. If she were paid the same as I, neither of us would be attracted by the other's work; we would simply be more fairly recompensed for our equally essential contributions.
I said at the beginning that I have no suggestions for how greater equity can be brought about. And so I don't, in the real world. In an imaginary world, however, I like the following idea. Anyone earning below the designated minimum annual living wage would pay no income tax. Above that income level, tax would start at a very small figure (0.001%, perhaps) and be applied only to the first "annual income currency unit" (dollar, euro, pound, whatever - hereafter, "AICU") above that bar. From there on, every subsequent extra AICU would be taxed at a slightly higher level on a continuous, smooth, exponentially rising rate until the millionth AICU, for example, might be taxed at 99.99%. This would still allow the entrepreneurial drive to operate: those whose impetus is earning money will be stimulated by the challenge of differentiating themselves in that rarefied upper range, just as athletes compete to drive up a record by fractions of a second. I'm willing to bet that many entrepreneurs would be as attracted to a competition for maximum contribution to social good as to compensation for meaningless levels of personal reward (if you doubt this, look at the phenomenon of social entrepreneurs such as John Bird).
The extra tax income would by law be ploughed back into benefits from which everyone benefits equally, and which ensure that there can be no such thing as poverty.
But that's in a fantasy world. Apart from anything else, it would require a complete absence of fiscal jurisdiction boundaries. And from the moment it came into existence, human nature would undermine my idealistic vision of it. I find it a very agreeable and appealing fantasy, though.
10 April 2009
Lost in a good boo
I have a weakness for silly comedy; and it doesn't come much sillier than BBC Radio 4's Cabin Pressure. Set in the tiny world of a one plane charter airline, one of its running themes is the silly (that word again) games played by the aircrew to pass the time.
In the final episode of the current series (and here I come to the point of this post), their silly game was called "Books which sound more interesting with the final letter knocked off". So, for example, scattered through the half hour we were offered:
- John Steinbeck, Of mice and me
- Jerome K Jerome, Three men in a boa
- Thomas Hardy, Far from the madding crow
- Anthony Powell, A dance to the music of Tim
- Dan Brown, The da Vinci cod
You get the idea...
Knowing that I have a number of book lovers with excellent senses of humour among my visitors, I thought I would invite them ... you ... to play the game.
To set the ball rolling, here (with deleted letter in square brackets) are three contributions of my own:
- Margaret Atwood, Life before Ma [n]
- William Faulkner, The sound and the fur [y]
...and, perhaps less convincing...
- Anita Diament, The red ten [t]
Any takers?
06 April 2009
Dancing at the edge of the world
Copied (with apologies for the "Growlery green"), because I would like to have said it myself, from the photo.net thread which I mentioned yesterday:
I find it interesting that so many adults are so uncomfortable playing with conceptual ideas.
You can ask a group of kindergarteners to think about almost anything -- say for example, "Are you a snail or a kangaroo?" and they'll have a field day "trying on" the two sides of the question and thinking about which one they are more like; in what ways and why -- and, I think -- learning from this imaginary exercise.
What you will almost never find is any one of the children saying, "I'm a human being. Therefore, I am neither a snail nor a kangaroo."
Correct. But that wasn't the point.[1]
Long, long ago, I had a conversation with Ray Girvan about how frightened most people are of looking at themselves, their motivations, their natures, their place in their world, their mechanisms. I use the word "frightened" deliberately: fear, I think, is behind the reluctance to play with conceptual ideas. If we admit the existence of conceptual ideas other than the one we're comfortable with, to which we have nailed our lives, where will it end – and how will we get back?
I find this the most difficult part of teaching philosophy to students ... by late adolescence, so many of them have already discovered who they choose to be, and learned the fear of playing "what if?"
It's great, this feeling of being secure,
But I always thought there'd be more
... ... ...
Sometimes I'll slip away
I'll pretend that it all
Can go another way
... ... ...
I'll pretend life and dream that I
Can save the day.[2]
Artists (writers of popular song lyrics included), I think, are the "jesters" which society tolerates because most people want someone else to take the risks of conceptual play on their behalf. Only to a certain extent, of course: Picasso went further than most people really want their surrogate play to venture.
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Julie Heyward, Are you pursuing answers or establishing questions? Apr 06, 2009; 04:15
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Melanie Safka, "Save the night" on Please love me. 1973 [lyrics ©1971], New York: Buddah. BDS5132/2318090
- Post title ripped off from Ursula K Le Guin, Dancing at the edge of the world : thoughts on words, women, places. 1989, New York: Grove Press. 080211105X
04 April 2009
The lost continent of good intentions
Julie Heyward, of Unreal Nature fame, today reappeared (after a long absence) where I originally encountered her: on Photo.net's "Philosophy of Photography" discussion forum.
After some initial excitement, I dropped out of that forum when I discovered that only a half a dozen of its participants (of which Julie H was the most incisive) were actually interested in the philosophy of photography ... but I've kept a notification alert running, and so was called back by the welcome reappearance of Julie's name on a new post.
I won't waste time or space by duplicating any of the resulting discussion thread. Julie asked readers whether they sought to pose questions or provide answers through their images. If you are interested in the discussion, you can find it here.
My reason for mentioning the matter here is that She Who Must Be Obeyed used the occasion to remind me en passant of my failings as a respondent. "Felix, I will be waiting, impatiently for your conclusions. I hope this is the accelerated pupation schedule, not the one where I'm still waiting six months later (there are quite a few still in the oven – don't think I've forgotten about them)."
Like most people, of course, I had hoped that my failings had been forgotten. I am guiltily aware of the many, many unwritten replies which I have never gotten around to writing, and was working on editing them out of my own memory on the naïve ostrich principle that nobody else would then remember them either. Now that my pathetic strategy has been held up unavoidably before me, I shall just have to brass it out.
There are many people I just cannot keep up with. Dr C is one of them. Ray Girvan, over at JSBlog, is another. My "pending" tray is overflowing with responses to both of them which I shall never find the time to make. Undisputed queen of the bunch, however, is Julie Heyward who seems to live in a different universe from me: a parallel universe of 3600minute hours, 168 hour days, 24 day weeks and 365 week years, where one can read seventeen books and a hundred or so journals simultaneously with making the toast for breakfast, write several blog posts, go for a long hike, and all without disrupting the main business of generating art images of astonishing quality and quantity.
There are people who think I am prolific; they just haven't encountered Ms Heyward.
So, I admit it: I have many times said "more on this later", meaning it genuinely at the time, only to lose track of the issue in the onward avalanche. No, they will never emerge ... like King Alfred's cakes, they will remain in the oven until some child hauls out the charred cinders of my inadequacy... I'm sorry, mea culpa.
As it happens, this fits well with a post on memory, on which I'm sporadically working. More on that later (ho ho).
02 April 2009
Mirror Project, RIP.
Sadly, the Mirror Project seems to have gone off web for good. Last sighted almost sixteen months ago – the link is to the last Internet Archive record.
I'm sorry. I miss it. It was a wonderful place to go. I've spent the last or so year hoping that it would resurface (my browser, for a long time, reported connection difficulties rather than site absence) but...
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