Orange Crate Art

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Politics as infotainment

I turned on the television to watch a few minutes of the Republican debate and heard the voice of hard-hitting journalist Wolf Blitzer: “Stay tuned to find out why each man on this stage thinks his wife would be the best First Lady.”

That was enough.

“Fine-grained choices”

From Google’s Privacy Principles:

From Google’s new Privacy Policy:

So much for “fine-grained choices.” The choice now, as we used to say in Brooklyn: Like it or lump it.

Logic and porridge

When I teach ancient works, I like to point out that logical coherence is not always the point. For instance: if it’s the tenth year of the war, why is King Priam only now asking Helen to identify the various Achaeans laying siege to Troy? I think there’s only one good answer to such a question: “It’s a story.” For the purposes of the story, it makes sense to have Priam ask about these things, tenth year or no tenth year: his questions and comments let us understand his attitude toward “the enemy” (quite different from those that hold in our world). And in Iliad 3, it really is as if the war is just beginning, tenth year or no tenth year: single combat between Menelaus and Paris — now they think of it? — might settle the Helen question, until Athena breaks the armies’ truce and battle begins in 4.

When I raise or respond to this kind of logical question, I invoke the story of Goldilocks and the three bears. How can one bowl of porridge be too hot, one too cold, and one just right? Well, it’s a story. I am now happy (I think) to see that I am not the first person to have wondered about the temperature differences. Physicist Chad Orzel addressed the question in a 2009 blog post: The Faulty Thermodynamics of Children’s Stories (Uncertain Principles: Physics, Politics, Pop Culture). And there’s a 2007 novel that investigates the question (and many more questions), Jasper Fforde’s The Fourth Bear.

[Reader, have you read Jasper Fforde?]

Still drifting

Richard Arum and Jospia Roksa have been following the students of Academically Adrift into life after college. The general conclusion, as summarized by the Chronicle of Higher Education: “College graduates who showed paltry gains in critical thinking and little academic engagement while in college have a harder time than their more accomplished peers as they start their careers.” No surprise there, only a strong reminder: a credential alone is not enough.

Related reading
Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses (my review)

Apple and China, continued

From the latest New York Times report on Apple in China:

“We’re trying really hard to make things better,” said one former Apple executive. “But most people would still be really disturbed if they saw where their iPhone comes from.”

The details are horrific.

In a related story, a nationwide Times survey found that owners of Apple products are largely unaware of where those products are manufactured. Only eighteen percent knew (or thought?) that Apple products are made abroad.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

I envy Mary Richards

I have been watching The Mary Tyler Moore Show on Me-TV, and I must confess: I envy Mary Richards. Not her hair. Nor her cozy little part-of-a-house apartment. Nor her architectural-salvage M.

I envy Mary Richards the simplicity of her technology. The sum total: A table-top telephone. A Sony portable television, reception adjusted by built-in antenna. A Sony stereo system: a receiver/radio/turntable unit and two small speakers. A portable manual typewriter.

Mary never had to figure out how to get an old-phone ringtone into a cellphone. Her ring came with the phone, loud and clear. Mary never had to reprogram her television after getting a new cable box. She watched what was already “on” and reprogrammed by changing the channel. Mary did not have to buy a ground loop isolator to fix a problem with a humming turntable, only to find that the device failed to fix the problem. Her turntable was grounded. Mary did not to have to uninstall the software package that came with her HP printer and download a simpler and better package from Apple. She used Wite-Out.

Of course, Mary never made it past 1977.

Jokes for Murray Slaughter to insert in the above paragraphs:

“Cellphone? Sounds like something you’d use in prison.”

“Cable box? Sounds like what Marie uses for storing sweaters.”

“A humming turntable? Doesn’t it know the words?”

“Download? Sounds like what Lou’s gonna do to Ted in about ten seconds.”

*

March 2, 2022: Now that I’m watching the complete run, I know that Mary’s life in technology became more complicated. In the sixth-season episode “Ted’s Tax Refund” (November 29, 1975), Mary gets a new stereo system (components!), follows the set-up instructions, and has sound in only one speaker — Gladys Knight, but no Pips. Murray’s instructions fail — no sound at all, then just a weird noise. Lou hooks everything up.

[In my youth, I had the same all-in-one Sony system that Mary had in the show’s first give seasons, the HP-138. Here’s one on eBay. The simplest way to remove a turntable hum might be to get an extension cord and run all components to the same outlet. And Elaine got it out of me: I do kinda envy Mary her apartment.]

Infinite Jest and Liberal Arts

Josh Radnor directs and stars with Elizabeth Olson in the new film Liberal Arts:

“The screenplay is salted with a love of literature, and David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest plays a key role. “That book really messes you up,” Radnor said. “But read it.”

Sundance Film Festival: Josh Radnor’s wry and touching Liberal Arts a major hit (77 Square)

Related reading
All David Foster Wallace posts (via Pinboard)

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

The Last Mountain

[Click for a larger view.]

The mother of all environmental problems is the climate-change issue. It is very real; it is happening today; and at the core of the problem is coal.

Gus Speth, former dean, Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, quoted in The Last Mountain

*

The epicenter of the climate-change battle in the United States is Appalachian coal, and the epicenter of the battle around Appalachian coal is Coal River Mountain.

Allen Hershkowitz, Senior Scientist, Natural Resources Defense Council, also quoted in The Last Mountain

The documentary The Last Mountain (dir. Bill Haney, 2011) tells the story of West Virginians’ fight against mountaintop removal mining, a technology with catastrophic consequences for the environment and human health. In this film, the line between what’s wrong and what’s right is clear. Greed, corporate lobbying, and utter disregard for the well-being of West Virginia’s people are amply on display. (Meet Don Blankenship.) But there’s hope too, in the promise of wind power and in the efforts of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and a host of dedicated citizens and environmental activists. Among them: Susan Bird, Maria Gunnoe, Jennifer Hall-Massey, Lorelei Scarbro, David Aaron Smith, Bo Webb, and Ed Wiley. Their names are as important to note as those of the better-known figures. Watch Ed Wiley stand up to West Virginia’s then-governor Joe Manchin: we should all have such courage.

Read more
The Last Mountain (the film’s website)

[This film serves as a nice reminder that giving money to the candidate, not the party, can be a smarter choice. That a contribution to the Democratic National Committee might help the likes of Joe Manchin makes me cringe.]