North Gare
9 news.
Respecting the mysterious 
[Copying here a comment I just posted to a piece by Mark Lawson on the Guardian website, which seems to me a perfect example - as the first commenter testily notes - of the borderline ignorance of the scientific model among even the best and brightest of those whose intellectual centres of gravity are in the humanities.] Echoing a couple of other commenters: this is a really woolly-headed mangling of a number of issues. ...it has always seemed vital to me that those who reject the sacred continue to respect the mysteries of how and why we are here. The idea of 'respecting' a mystery can mean several things, just as the very idea of a 'mystery' means different things to different people. If 'respecting' a mystery means blindly assuming that there is a mystery in the first place, then even this can be a serious mistake. For example, a believer in homeopathy might profess to respect the 'mystery' of how it works, since no plausible scientific explanation exists. The problem with that is that homeopathy very clearly doesn't work. Properly controlled double-blind studies show nothing other than the placebo effect. But if one took as axiomatic that it does work, and then retained sufficient 'respect' for the 'mystery' of how it works, one might resist - or even suppress - the truth that it doesn't work. 'Respect' for a mystery can very easily obscure the fact that there's nothing mysterious at all going on. This has clearly been true of the 'mystery' of the origin of species. Evolution by natural selection removes any such mystery. Nevertheless, the simple-minded, aesthetic, emotional or dogmatic appeal of the 'mystery' is the foundation for anti-scientific nonsense such as 'intelligent design'. If, on the other hand, something genuinely is a mystery - 'first cause', for example - it's reasonable to propose that the most 'respectful' position to take is the most conservative one: that is, to fill the gap with nothing which isn't consistent with what we do know, and otherwise to claim nothing. In that respect, it seems to me that good science is entirely consistent with the idea of respecting such mysteries. Rather than a self-satisfied pleasure in the gap that a 'mystery' represents - a kind of aesthetic which values ignorance - science approaches such gaps in knowledge as challenges to be overcome. But until and unless they are overcome, its claims are appropriately modest, and gaps aren't in the meantime filled with wishful thinking.North Gare, 2008-09-29 03:28:59
[Copying here a comment I just posted to a piece by Mark Lawson on the Guardian website, which seems to me a perfect example - as the first commenter testily notes - of the borderline ignorance of the scientific model among even the best and brightest of those whose intellectual centres of gravity are in the humanities.] Echoing a couple of other commenters: this is a really woolly-headed mangling of a number of issues. ...it has always seemed vital to me that those who reject the sacred continue to respect the mysteries of how and why we are here. The idea of 'respecting' a mystery can mean several things, just as the very idea of a 'mystery' means different things to different people. If 'respecting' a mystery means blindly assuming that there is a mystery in the first place, then even this can be a serious mistake. For example, a believer in homeopathy might profess to respect the 'mystery' of how it works, since no plausible scientific explanation exists. The problem with that is that homeopathy very clearly doesn't work. Properly controlled double-blind studies show nothing other than the placebo effect. But if one took as axiomatic that it does work, and then retained sufficient 'respect' for the 'mystery' of how it works, one might resist - or even suppress - the truth that it doesn't work. 'Respect' for a mystery can very easily obscure the fact that there's nothing mysterious at all going on. This has clearly been true of the 'mystery' of the origin of species. Evolution by natural selection removes any such mystery. Nevertheless, the simple-minded, aesthetic, emotional or dogmatic appeal of the 'mystery' is the foundation for anti-scientific nonsense such as 'intelligent design'. If, on the other hand, something genuinely is a mystery - 'first cause', for example - it's reasonable to propose that the most 'respectful' position to take is the most conservative one: that is, to fill the gap with nothing which isn't consistent with what we do know, and otherwise to claim nothing. In that respect, it seems to me that good science is entirely consistent with the idea of respecting such mysteries. Rather than a self-satisfied pleasure in the gap that a 'mystery' represents - a kind of aesthetic which values ignorance - science approaches such gaps in knowledge as challenges to be overcome. But until and unless they are overcome, its claims are appropriately modest, and gaps aren't in the meantime filled with wishful thinking.North Gare, 2008-09-29 03:28:59
Just Not As Bright
To Vons, a few nights ago, to buy some old-fashioned incandescent filament light bulbs, because the batch of long-life fluorescent bulbs we got at Costco a few months ago lend our living room the snug, inviting glare of a car parts warehouse. Standing, slightly baffled, in front of the display, it took me a few moments to figure out that I couldn't see any 100 watt bulbs, and a few moments more to figure out why. General Electric, at any rate, doesn't seem to supply them to Vons any more; they've been replaced by a 'reduced wattage', 'energy saving' alternative. Good for them. Pictured is the packaging. The copy takes a little unpacking. Note the prominent '95' at the top right, to which the eye is drawn, and then note that it's only '95' - that the fact that this is actually the wattage is gently elided. It might almost simply be some sort of internal code number for the bulb type. Perhaps less charitably, sandwiched between 'ENERGY' and 'SAVING' there's an implication that this might be the extent of the energy saving; that what we're being offered here is a bulb which saves us 95 somethings - probably a whopping 95% - compared to some other product. (It borrows ad-speak from the conceptual flip which results in products touted as '95% fat free', or somesuch, to represent the fact that they're 5% unreconstructed, unequivocal fat.) The reinforcing smaller-print below adds to the bamboozlement: Provides 1610 lumens, nearly the same light as 100 watt GE Soft White bulb providing 1690 lumens 'Nearly the same' is a very nice touch. It suggests that the bulb we're looking at is the end product of a dedicated research effort to match the output of a 100 watt incandescent bulb, despite the massive energy saving of something connected to the number 95. The narrative here is pretty simple: it's an attempt to borrow some of the zeitgeisty love for energy-saving products in general, and long-life, low-energy bulbs in particular. More than that, it's more or less an attempt to imply that these are those long-life, low-energy bulbs we've heard so much about; that we're looking at sparkling new eco-friendly, thrifty technology, which nevertheless keeps our homes 'nearly the same' brightness. It's not hard to imagine the rationale: they've got huge investment in incandescent technology, which also keeps turnover nice and high, since the bulbs, you know, burn out. At worst, Ms Consumer sees a product which does practically the same job as before; at best, incandescent masquerades as eco-bulb for a while, and Ms Consumer misses the fact that this doesn't use less energy because it's fancy new technology, or because greater efficiency is squeezed out. It uses less energy because it's just not as bright. There's a metaphor there, I think. This is why I could never be a successful salesperson. I couldn't bring myself to this level of bamboozlement and bandwagon-jumping. It's not honesty that would stop me; it's embarrassment. I'd be embarrassed to stoop to such mangling of clear thought, just as I'd be embarrassed to try to puff a product that was borrowed wholesale from another. This is where you end up when your job is to make money, rather than to make a thing you believe in, or to have a genuinely new idea. A small postscript. At the checkout, always a place of minor annoyance for me, gazing hopelessly at the uninviting American chocolate ('Oprah Magazine: Because you owe it to yourself to be the best narcissist you can be!'), sat a copy of - and I really wish this wasn't true - The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Last Days. Hoping for an Onion-esque spoof, or at least a measure of detached irony, I was disappointed. It's exactly what it claims to be: a 'Biblical' guide to armageddon and the rapture, complete with charts and timelines. The people it's aimed at? Just not as bright.North Gare, 2008-09-22 03:28:31
To Vons, a few nights ago, to buy some old-fashioned incandescent filament light bulbs, because the batch of long-life fluorescent bulbs we got at Costco a few months ago lend our living room the snug, inviting glare of a car parts warehouse. Standing, slightly baffled, in front of the display, it took me a few moments to figure out that I couldn't see any 100 watt bulbs, and a few moments more to figure out why. General Electric, at any rate, doesn't seem to supply them to Vons any more; they've been replaced by a 'reduced wattage', 'energy saving' alternative. Good for them. Pictured is the packaging. The copy takes a little unpacking. Note the prominent '95' at the top right, to which the eye is drawn, and then note that it's only '95' - that the fact that this is actually the wattage is gently elided. It might almost simply be some sort of internal code number for the bulb type. Perhaps less charitably, sandwiched between 'ENERGY' and 'SAVING' there's an implication that this might be the extent of the energy saving; that what we're being offered here is a bulb which saves us 95 somethings - probably a whopping 95% - compared to some other product. (It borrows ad-speak from the conceptual flip which results in products touted as '95% fat free', or somesuch, to represent the fact that they're 5% unreconstructed, unequivocal fat.) The reinforcing smaller-print below adds to the bamboozlement: Provides 1610 lumens, nearly the same light as 100 watt GE Soft White bulb providing 1690 lumens 'Nearly the same' is a very nice touch. It suggests that the bulb we're looking at is the end product of a dedicated research effort to match the output of a 100 watt incandescent bulb, despite the massive energy saving of something connected to the number 95. The narrative here is pretty simple: it's an attempt to borrow some of the zeitgeisty love for energy-saving products in general, and long-life, low-energy bulbs in particular. More than that, it's more or less an attempt to imply that these are those long-life, low-energy bulbs we've heard so much about; that we're looking at sparkling new eco-friendly, thrifty technology, which nevertheless keeps our homes 'nearly the same' brightness. It's not hard to imagine the rationale: they've got huge investment in incandescent technology, which also keeps turnover nice and high, since the bulbs, you know, burn out. At worst, Ms Consumer sees a product which does practically the same job as before; at best, incandescent masquerades as eco-bulb for a while, and Ms Consumer misses the fact that this doesn't use less energy because it's fancy new technology, or because greater efficiency is squeezed out. It uses less energy because it's just not as bright. There's a metaphor there, I think. This is why I could never be a successful salesperson. I couldn't bring myself to this level of bamboozlement and bandwagon-jumping. It's not honesty that would stop me; it's embarrassment. I'd be embarrassed to stoop to such mangling of clear thought, just as I'd be embarrassed to try to puff a product that was borrowed wholesale from another. This is where you end up when your job is to make money, rather than to make a thing you believe in, or to have a genuinely new idea. A small postscript. At the checkout, always a place of minor annoyance for me, gazing hopelessly at the uninviting American chocolate ('Oprah Magazine: Because you owe it to yourself to be the best narcissist you can be!'), sat a copy of - and I really wish this wasn't true - The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Last Days. Hoping for an Onion-esque spoof, or at least a measure of detached irony, I was disappointed. It's exactly what it claims to be: a 'Biblical' guide to armageddon and the rapture, complete with charts and timelines. The people it's aimed at? Just not as bright.North Gare, 2008-09-22 03:28:31
Vonnegut: I hope it's fun being dead
I find that I don't actually know what 'R.I.P.' means. It's splashed everywhere today before or after Kurt Vonnegut's name - along with enough lazily glib trottings-out of 'So it goes' to dull the senses. But what do people actually mean when they say 'Rest in Peace', other than that it's the appropriate part of the clunky Lego construction set that constitutes an idiolect for most people? Vonnegut is dead. He's not 'resting'. He's dead. He's not 'in peace'. He has ceased to exist. We really don't seem to be able to stop ourselves clinging linguistically - even if not cognitively, though the two usually go together - to some wishfully cosy image of death. The dead are 'sleeping', or 'resting'; they've 'passed', or 'crossed over', with the implicit or explicit suggestion that there's something cool on the other side, so we shouldn't feel too bad. We cling to some notion that they in some way feel better for having died. This is all well and good - comfort objects have their uses after all, and who might need comfort more than the bereaved - but it stands out in extremely sharp contrast when the subject is someone who was as acidly dismissive of cheap sentimentality, and who clearly did not believe that death was anything other than the end. To mark someone's death with language that they themselves would have regarded as nonsensical strikes me as at best a bit silly, and at worst unthinkingly disrespectful - in the same sense (if not degree) as conducting a religious funeral for someone openly atheistic. Cling to your own comfort as much as you like, but consider with eyes wide open how the subject would react. The suicide last month of comedian Richard Jeni was the occasion of a bizarre juxtaposition amongst the tributes. Elayne Boosler's piece at the Huffington Post, Remembering Comedian Richard Jeni, interpolates a number of Jeni's lines, the first of which is: On religious wars, "You're basically killing each other to see who's got the better imaginary friend." Now, that's not especially funny, but it would seem to unambiguously set out Jeni's feelings concerning theism. A post later the same day at the Huffington Post by Martin Lewis, Richard Jeni - RIP [of course], refers and links to Boosler's 'beautiful eulogy', then concludes with the line: Rest In Peace Richard... Make God laugh. Pause a moment to take in the layers of inappropriateness there. Lewis could be saying a number of things: that he himself hopes that something Jeni found ridiculous is in fact true; that he doesn't think that Jeni actually believed what he openly professed; that Jeni would thank him for words which contradict his own beliefs; or, perhaps most likely, that - despite explicitly linking to Boosler's piece - espousal of theism in the face of death is such a strong default position that Jeni's own words went in one of Lewis's ears and out the other, and a safe triteness kicked in. It's hard to argue that Lewis isn't wishing Jeni well, but the method is a slap in the face. The situation here is that religiosity in the context of death is pretty much never seen as inappropriate, even when its subject was overtly non-religious. The subtext is something like: 'I want to wish you well, but in order to do that it's necessary for me to assume out loud that you were mistaken.' A few years ago, in the final months of a friend's battle against cancer, I found myself wanting to shore up her own theism - not that it really needed much shoring up. I wasn't in the position of being able to say that I hoped I was wrong - nor would she have believed me if I had said that. What I could (and did) say, however, was that it didn't matter what I believed, and of course that's exactly true. The important matter, at that time, seemed to be to respect her feelings. It was, pretty much literally, the least I could do. To soften (but not disregard) my own views like that was my business, and in my control. In contrast, hopes that Vonnegut 'rest in peace', and that Jeni 'make God laugh', seem at best to presumptuously soften their views, and, at worst, to deny them altogether. The apparent feeling that this is least inappropriate immediately after their deaths seems to me entirely backward. An atheist's eulogy for a theist would not be considered remotely well-meaning which ended: Rest in peace. Oh, that god you've believed in all these years? I hope you were wrong. North Gare, 2007-04-16 03:33:07
I find that I don't actually know what 'R.I.P.' means. It's splashed everywhere today before or after Kurt Vonnegut's name - along with enough lazily glib trottings-out of 'So it goes' to dull the senses. But what do people actually mean when they say 'Rest in Peace', other than that it's the appropriate part of the clunky Lego construction set that constitutes an idiolect for most people? Vonnegut is dead. He's not 'resting'. He's dead. He's not 'in peace'. He has ceased to exist. We really don't seem to be able to stop ourselves clinging linguistically - even if not cognitively, though the two usually go together - to some wishfully cosy image of death. The dead are 'sleeping', or 'resting'; they've 'passed', or 'crossed over', with the implicit or explicit suggestion that there's something cool on the other side, so we shouldn't feel too bad. We cling to some notion that they in some way feel better for having died. This is all well and good - comfort objects have their uses after all, and who might need comfort more than the bereaved - but it stands out in extremely sharp contrast when the subject is someone who was as acidly dismissive of cheap sentimentality, and who clearly did not believe that death was anything other than the end. To mark someone's death with language that they themselves would have regarded as nonsensical strikes me as at best a bit silly, and at worst unthinkingly disrespectful - in the same sense (if not degree) as conducting a religious funeral for someone openly atheistic. Cling to your own comfort as much as you like, but consider with eyes wide open how the subject would react. The suicide last month of comedian Richard Jeni was the occasion of a bizarre juxtaposition amongst the tributes. Elayne Boosler's piece at the Huffington Post, Remembering Comedian Richard Jeni, interpolates a number of Jeni's lines, the first of which is: On religious wars, "You're basically killing each other to see who's got the better imaginary friend." Now, that's not especially funny, but it would seem to unambiguously set out Jeni's feelings concerning theism. A post later the same day at the Huffington Post by Martin Lewis, Richard Jeni - RIP [of course], refers and links to Boosler's 'beautiful eulogy', then concludes with the line: Rest In Peace Richard... Make God laugh. Pause a moment to take in the layers of inappropriateness there. Lewis could be saying a number of things: that he himself hopes that something Jeni found ridiculous is in fact true; that he doesn't think that Jeni actually believed what he openly professed; that Jeni would thank him for words which contradict his own beliefs; or, perhaps most likely, that - despite explicitly linking to Boosler's piece - espousal of theism in the face of death is such a strong default position that Jeni's own words went in one of Lewis's ears and out the other, and a safe triteness kicked in. It's hard to argue that Lewis isn't wishing Jeni well, but the method is a slap in the face. The situation here is that religiosity in the context of death is pretty much never seen as inappropriate, even when its subject was overtly non-religious. The subtext is something like: 'I want to wish you well, but in order to do that it's necessary for me to assume out loud that you were mistaken.' A few years ago, in the final months of a friend's battle against cancer, I found myself wanting to shore up her own theism - not that it really needed much shoring up. I wasn't in the position of being able to say that I hoped I was wrong - nor would she have believed me if I had said that. What I could (and did) say, however, was that it didn't matter what I believed, and of course that's exactly true. The important matter, at that time, seemed to be to respect her feelings. It was, pretty much literally, the least I could do. To soften (but not disregard) my own views like that was my business, and in my control. In contrast, hopes that Vonnegut 'rest in peace', and that Jeni 'make God laugh', seem at best to presumptuously soften their views, and, at worst, to deny them altogether. The apparent feeling that this is least inappropriate immediately after their deaths seems to me entirely backward. An atheist's eulogy for a theist would not be considered remotely well-meaning which ended: Rest in peace. Oh, that god you've believed in all these years? I hope you were wrong. North Gare, 2007-04-16 03:33:07
Resolving without ending
Some thoughts about Children of Men (and some spoilers, so caveat lector), which I eventually saw today - though the lateness of things didn't seem to hurt: the cinema was virtually empty and the print was more than fine. I came out - after listening to Jarvis Cocker singing about cunts still running the world (must have missed that one at the Oscars; Jarvis is several gangly steps ahead of even the pimp's lament) - musing about the final scene, and how its simple sense of resolution seems not to fit the rest of the narrative. It echoes the incongruously sunny postscript rescue of 28 Days Later - though in that case the sunniness is somewhat mitigated by the several alternative endings on the DVD: it's clear they didn't really know how to end the thing, so the chosen ending doesn't come with more than a tentative stamp of approval. The problem with Children's final scene isn't that it presents a simple resolution, exactly. It's rather more that the neatness doesn't add anything to what's come before - except on a rather superficial level - and in not adding anything it serves to subtract. The boat's arrival - and the rescue and sense of hope it strongly implies - isn't a deus ex machina, because we've spent the majority of the film knowingly working towards it, but so far as the narrative is concerned it's just as empty. The emptiness derives mostly, I think, from the scene's poor fit with the film's essence, which is its examination of society collapsed into martial law, extreme stratification, persecution, paranoia. That the collapse was engendered by universal infertility isn't important. This is made all-but-explicit by the screenplay's refusal to go into details: the infertility just happens, with no apparent cause; the new pregnancy after so many years also just happens; there's no real investigation of exactly how lives have been changed in a world without children. The baby is a kind of double Macguffin: it (or rather its absence) is an easy motivation for dystopia; it's also, in the more traditional Hitchcock sense, the object everyone in the story desires, for their own reasons - it motivates action. But the conspicuous lack of filling-in of back-story and causal machinery, which pushes the social commentary to the foreground, makes the semi-mythical existence of the Human Project more or less irrelevant. By the time Theo, Kee and child are waiting in the boat at the buoy, the narrative's work is done - unless it were then intending to extend its social commentary to the location of the Human Project itself. But that doesn't happen. It's a rescue uncomplicated by anything other than Theo's cheaply-written death. That the Human Project is believed to exist is important; that it actually exists is not. Echoing Hitchcock in another way, the surface level of the narrative takes the form of an extended chase sequence, complete with crosses and double-crosses. Theo and Kee are handcuffed together as securely as Robert Donat and Madeleine Carroll, first by the poorly-motivated 'transit papers' which require them to travel together, and then by the baby itself. But even this more genre-friendly reading of the narrative struggles to make friends with the easy rescue of the final scene. At the buoy, the narrative has collapsed to two alternative branches: the boat comes; or the boat doesn't come. As a viewer, it's quite clear to us that these are the only possibilities: rescue; or death. And, once this situation has been reached, the narrative adds nothing by simply choosing between them, except to achieve a redundantly superficial resolution. The processing of possibilities in the viewer's head is not enriched by cashing-out one fully-mapped branch rather than another. There's a very good analogue: the climax of The Italian Job might have been a last-minute expedient pushed in against the writer's wishes in the absence of any better ideas, but it works astonishingly well. It's memorable not simply because of the novelty of the lack of resolution at the moment of a literal cliffhanger, but also because it dares - albeit unintentionally - to resist exactly that cashing-out of fully-mapped branches. It presents essentially the same two possible branches: the crooks rescue themselves (and are heroes); or they plunge to their deaths. Show the film to someone who doesn't know what's coming, and they might groan as the credits roll, but they'll always remember it. Cash-out either of The Italian Job's two remaining branches, and the film is significantly diminished. Since an attentive viewer is capable of imagining the crooks righting the bus and speeding away home, but also the terrible plunge - and, importantly, since an attentive viewer is unable not to imagine both of those things - choosing between them adds nothing that's not been played out already in their head. It becomes a resolution with no resonance whatsoever. Retain both possibilities, however, and an irresistible calculus is triggered: the viewer tries to perform resolution himself, by projecting forward what's been seen. Cheekily, The Italian Job's final line explicitly encourages this process: Charlie Croker: Hang on, lads; I've got a great idea. Leave Theo (alive) and Kee in the boat, conclude with an exchange such as: Kee: So, what happens now? Theo: We wait. and then cut to black. What would happen, other than general whining about lack of resolution? The Human Project would remain perhaps-mythical, and the same irresistible calculus would be triggered. This is not, of course, to deny the power of resolution in a narrative. But it's worth asking this question of narratives such as those of Children of Men and The Italian Job: What difference does it make? What difference does it make if one of the two explicit branches is chosen over the other? The characters are not real people, so it matters nothing to them. And yet, we often fall carelessly into talking about characters as if their lives do project somehow beyond the stories they inhabit. Discussions ensue about what exactly Charlie Croker's 'great idea' is. But of course we don't know that any such idea exists; all the narrative tells us is that he says those words. People talk about whether they think the crooks 'do', or 'don't' get the bus from the cliff-edge, as if the film is merely a small window on another fully-functional world. Character motivations are examined as if they are intrinsic to the characters themselves, rather than tools for the author to use in order to choreograph the plot. Rather than wondering whether Theo and Kee 'do' or 'don't' get rescued by the boat, the only level on which it makes sense to talk about resolution in this case is that of its effect on the viewer. What difference does it make to the viewer if they get rescued or not? I'd like to argue for a third case, in which a narrative such as those in Children of Men and The Italian Job, which reduces to a simple choice between two mapped-out alternatives, resolves perfectly well without needing to choose. Leaving Theo and Kee in the boat in the fog, and leaving the bus on the cliff-edge, is a form of resolution. The narrative has completed its work, and that's the best place to stop.North Gare, 2007-03-19 04:34:59
Some thoughts about Children of Men (and some spoilers, so caveat lector), which I eventually saw today - though the lateness of things didn't seem to hurt: the cinema was virtually empty and the print was more than fine. I came out - after listening to Jarvis Cocker singing about cunts still running the world (must have missed that one at the Oscars; Jarvis is several gangly steps ahead of even the pimp's lament) - musing about the final scene, and how its simple sense of resolution seems not to fit the rest of the narrative. It echoes the incongruously sunny postscript rescue of 28 Days Later - though in that case the sunniness is somewhat mitigated by the several alternative endings on the DVD: it's clear they didn't really know how to end the thing, so the chosen ending doesn't come with more than a tentative stamp of approval. The problem with Children's final scene isn't that it presents a simple resolution, exactly. It's rather more that the neatness doesn't add anything to what's come before - except on a rather superficial level - and in not adding anything it serves to subtract. The boat's arrival - and the rescue and sense of hope it strongly implies - isn't a deus ex machina, because we've spent the majority of the film knowingly working towards it, but so far as the narrative is concerned it's just as empty. The emptiness derives mostly, I think, from the scene's poor fit with the film's essence, which is its examination of society collapsed into martial law, extreme stratification, persecution, paranoia. That the collapse was engendered by universal infertility isn't important. This is made all-but-explicit by the screenplay's refusal to go into details: the infertility just happens, with no apparent cause; the new pregnancy after so many years also just happens; there's no real investigation of exactly how lives have been changed in a world without children. The baby is a kind of double Macguffin: it (or rather its absence) is an easy motivation for dystopia; it's also, in the more traditional Hitchcock sense, the object everyone in the story desires, for their own reasons - it motivates action. But the conspicuous lack of filling-in of back-story and causal machinery, which pushes the social commentary to the foreground, makes the semi-mythical existence of the Human Project more or less irrelevant. By the time Theo, Kee and child are waiting in the boat at the buoy, the narrative's work is done - unless it were then intending to extend its social commentary to the location of the Human Project itself. But that doesn't happen. It's a rescue uncomplicated by anything other than Theo's cheaply-written death. That the Human Project is believed to exist is important; that it actually exists is not. Echoing Hitchcock in another way, the surface level of the narrative takes the form of an extended chase sequence, complete with crosses and double-crosses. Theo and Kee are handcuffed together as securely as Robert Donat and Madeleine Carroll, first by the poorly-motivated 'transit papers' which require them to travel together, and then by the baby itself. But even this more genre-friendly reading of the narrative struggles to make friends with the easy rescue of the final scene. At the buoy, the narrative has collapsed to two alternative branches: the boat comes; or the boat doesn't come. As a viewer, it's quite clear to us that these are the only possibilities: rescue; or death. And, once this situation has been reached, the narrative adds nothing by simply choosing between them, except to achieve a redundantly superficial resolution. The processing of possibilities in the viewer's head is not enriched by cashing-out one fully-mapped branch rather than another. There's a very good analogue: the climax of The Italian Job might have been a last-minute expedient pushed in against the writer's wishes in the absence of any better ideas, but it works astonishingly well. It's memorable not simply because of the novelty of the lack of resolution at the moment of a literal cliffhanger, but also because it dares - albeit unintentionally - to resist exactly that cashing-out of fully-mapped branches. It presents essentially the same two possible branches: the crooks rescue themselves (and are heroes); or they plunge to their deaths. Show the film to someone who doesn't know what's coming, and they might groan as the credits roll, but they'll always remember it. Cash-out either of The Italian Job's two remaining branches, and the film is significantly diminished. Since an attentive viewer is capable of imagining the crooks righting the bus and speeding away home, but also the terrible plunge - and, importantly, since an attentive viewer is unable not to imagine both of those things - choosing between them adds nothing that's not been played out already in their head. It becomes a resolution with no resonance whatsoever. Retain both possibilities, however, and an irresistible calculus is triggered: the viewer tries to perform resolution himself, by projecting forward what's been seen. Cheekily, The Italian Job's final line explicitly encourages this process: Charlie Croker: Hang on, lads; I've got a great idea. Leave Theo (alive) and Kee in the boat, conclude with an exchange such as: Kee: So, what happens now? Theo: We wait. and then cut to black. What would happen, other than general whining about lack of resolution? The Human Project would remain perhaps-mythical, and the same irresistible calculus would be triggered. This is not, of course, to deny the power of resolution in a narrative. But it's worth asking this question of narratives such as those of Children of Men and The Italian Job: What difference does it make? What difference does it make if one of the two explicit branches is chosen over the other? The characters are not real people, so it matters nothing to them. And yet, we often fall carelessly into talking about characters as if their lives do project somehow beyond the stories they inhabit. Discussions ensue about what exactly Charlie Croker's 'great idea' is. But of course we don't know that any such idea exists; all the narrative tells us is that he says those words. People talk about whether they think the crooks 'do', or 'don't' get the bus from the cliff-edge, as if the film is merely a small window on another fully-functional world. Character motivations are examined as if they are intrinsic to the characters themselves, rather than tools for the author to use in order to choreograph the plot. Rather than wondering whether Theo and Kee 'do' or 'don't' get rescued by the boat, the only level on which it makes sense to talk about resolution in this case is that of its effect on the viewer. What difference does it make to the viewer if they get rescued or not? I'd like to argue for a third case, in which a narrative such as those in Children of Men and The Italian Job, which reduces to a simple choice between two mapped-out alternatives, resolves perfectly well without needing to choose. Leaving Theo and Kee in the boat in the fog, and leaving the bus on the cliff-edge, is a form of resolution. The narrative has completed its work, and that's the best place to stop.North Gare, 2007-03-19 04:34:59
Not in Teesside any more
Walking along Wilshire in Santa Monica, iPod earphones quite conspicuously in ears, almost as if I might be listening to music. Waiting at light to cross 7th Street. Man: [Looking at me, mouth opening and closing as he says something. Clearly no clue I can't hear him.] Me: [Takes off earphones, an expression of mild annoyance.] I didn't hear a word of that. Man: You're very lucky. Me: How? Man: I can see your aura. Me: I'm sorry, I don't have an aura. Man: Oh, okay. Me: [Puts music back on. Stomps away towards the 7/11.] North Gare, 2007-02-12 04:32:39
Walking along Wilshire in Santa Monica, iPod earphones quite conspicuously in ears, almost as if I might be listening to music. Waiting at light to cross 7th Street. Man: [Looking at me, mouth opening and closing as he says something. Clearly no clue I can't hear him.] Me: [Takes off earphones, an expression of mild annoyance.] I didn't hear a word of that. Man: You're very lucky. Me: How? Man: I can see your aura. Me: I'm sorry, I don't have an aura. Man: Oh, okay. Me: [Puts music back on. Stomps away towards the 7/11.] North Gare, 2007-02-12 04:32:39
Le Téléphone de M. Jobs
In one of my lives I sometimes review short stories. Something I've become aware that I do is this: when I think something's no good, or just okay, I'll squeeze out as much positive as I can, so long as it's honest; when something's good - especially if it's written by someone I know has lots of talent, I'll tend to focus on what I don't like about it, and ignore most of the good stuff. The outcome is that a review of something wonderful might appear to be way more down than a review on something barely okay. It's as if the former tries to pull from above, whilst the latter tries to push from below. There's some factoring in of the author's feelings, of course - I tend to assume (probably wrongly) the better a writer is, the more able they are to deal with criticism. But I think it's something else too, and I have a feeling it might be a more general tendency of the brain, as it reaches for a sort of parsimony. By identifying what's good about something, we locate it relative to a nothingness; we measure the distance it rises above that. On the other hand, by identifying what's not good about something, we locate it relative to what we perceive, in context, to be perfection; we measure the distance it falls below that. Quite apart from personal feelings we might have about whatever the thing is, and whatever emotional reaction we might have to it and its creator, I think we might, as a quite unconscious strategy, navigate our reviews - whether they end up being written, or remain our own musings - according to whichever is nearest: nothingness or perfection. I reckon it's as instinctive as the manner in which we search for appropriate physical reference points when we're giving driving directions, say. Of course, the difference here is that physical reference points don't come with the impression of a value judgement, but I think that's probably irrelevant to the process. We're just locating something relative to something else that happens to be a convenient reference. Anyway, I was reminded of this while reading David Pogue's perceptive piece summarising the post-euphoric griping following the Jobs iPhone keynote: (My favorite sarcastic comment, which was a response to these responses, which were in response to my last blog entry: "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but can you use it underwater? And can you recharge it using solar power? And does it have an optical scanner that detects your eyeball movements so that you merely have to look at a name in your contacts list and blink in order to choose and call him? Apple, you have a long way to go...") It seems to me that the most salient feature of the reporting of the iPhone keynote, and the object itself, was the extent to which the reference point relative to which responses and reactions were being plotted, was very clearly perfection. More than any of the specific praise or criticism, that fact speaks to the quality of the work Apple has done. (It was also hard not to see in the post-euphoric grumblings a sort of post-orgasmic downer; the wistful regret of the morning after a lustful one night stand. Un petit mort.) But the thing's a phone, all the same, which tempers my own lust. No matter how swoony the object, it's still something which I've little or no use for. Or, at least, it's being marketed as a phone, which, on reflection, strikes me as understandable but unusually timid for Apple. On its release, the iPod was essentially a single use machine: it played music - even podcasting (by definition) came later. And yet the name says nothing of music. It speaks of its purpose to contain, to seed, but doesn't reveal what. That quite naturally prefigured and encompassed the device's use for dozens of other tasks. Perhaps it's my own lack of interest in the phoniness of the phone, but it seems to me that the iPhone does quite enough other than that to merit a name that's just as enigmatic and malleable. With some ontological strangeness, 'iPod' is just one of the four major categories of function within 'iPhone'. Another is 'Phone'. It's a little like the old techie gag: 'Q: What do you get when you cross IBM with [insert subject de jour]? A: IBM', the new version being something like: Q: What do you get when you cross a phone, a music player, a photo viewer, a web browser, an e-mail client, a camera, a calendar, and an address book? A: A phone. Such is the dominance of the phone functionality in our societies. 'iPod' begat 'podcasting', both the term and the concept. What, despite its revolutionary squishing of just as many new ideas and techniques into its sleek box, could 'iPhone' beget? Not much. Aside from avoiding the pointless squabbling with Cisco, a more distinctive and forward-looking name could have carved out new territory for the thing - or at least shone a bit more brightly in the direction the thing is going. Because it's not going to be too long before the phone functionality is far less distinct from all the other digital communications around it. One more thing. The post-orgasmic downer gave rise to the usual somewhat snide references to the Apple/Jobs 'reality distortion field' - as if the distortion from reality wasn't perfectly consensual the night before. But there's a moment in the keynote which is so unguarded it's positively gauche. Jobs welcomes the Google CEO to the (vast) Moscone stage, turns, then bounces across to him on the balls of his feet, pitched over like a forward-slash. Put a pipe in his mouth and shorten his jeans by a few inches and it could be Le Téléphone de Monsieur Hulot.North Gare, 2007-01-29 04:26:57
In one of my lives I sometimes review short stories. Something I've become aware that I do is this: when I think something's no good, or just okay, I'll squeeze out as much positive as I can, so long as it's honest; when something's good - especially if it's written by someone I know has lots of talent, I'll tend to focus on what I don't like about it, and ignore most of the good stuff. The outcome is that a review of something wonderful might appear to be way more down than a review on something barely okay. It's as if the former tries to pull from above, whilst the latter tries to push from below. There's some factoring in of the author's feelings, of course - I tend to assume (probably wrongly) the better a writer is, the more able they are to deal with criticism. But I think it's something else too, and I have a feeling it might be a more general tendency of the brain, as it reaches for a sort of parsimony. By identifying what's good about something, we locate it relative to a nothingness; we measure the distance it rises above that. On the other hand, by identifying what's not good about something, we locate it relative to what we perceive, in context, to be perfection; we measure the distance it falls below that. Quite apart from personal feelings we might have about whatever the thing is, and whatever emotional reaction we might have to it and its creator, I think we might, as a quite unconscious strategy, navigate our reviews - whether they end up being written, or remain our own musings - according to whichever is nearest: nothingness or perfection. I reckon it's as instinctive as the manner in which we search for appropriate physical reference points when we're giving driving directions, say. Of course, the difference here is that physical reference points don't come with the impression of a value judgement, but I think that's probably irrelevant to the process. We're just locating something relative to something else that happens to be a convenient reference. Anyway, I was reminded of this while reading David Pogue's perceptive piece summarising the post-euphoric griping following the Jobs iPhone keynote: (My favorite sarcastic comment, which was a response to these responses, which were in response to my last blog entry: "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but can you use it underwater? And can you recharge it using solar power? And does it have an optical scanner that detects your eyeball movements so that you merely have to look at a name in your contacts list and blink in order to choose and call him? Apple, you have a long way to go...") It seems to me that the most salient feature of the reporting of the iPhone keynote, and the object itself, was the extent to which the reference point relative to which responses and reactions were being plotted, was very clearly perfection. More than any of the specific praise or criticism, that fact speaks to the quality of the work Apple has done. (It was also hard not to see in the post-euphoric grumblings a sort of post-orgasmic downer; the wistful regret of the morning after a lustful one night stand. Un petit mort.) But the thing's a phone, all the same, which tempers my own lust. No matter how swoony the object, it's still something which I've little or no use for. Or, at least, it's being marketed as a phone, which, on reflection, strikes me as understandable but unusually timid for Apple. On its release, the iPod was essentially a single use machine: it played music - even podcasting (by definition) came later. And yet the name says nothing of music. It speaks of its purpose to contain, to seed, but doesn't reveal what. That quite naturally prefigured and encompassed the device's use for dozens of other tasks. Perhaps it's my own lack of interest in the phoniness of the phone, but it seems to me that the iPhone does quite enough other than that to merit a name that's just as enigmatic and malleable. With some ontological strangeness, 'iPod' is just one of the four major categories of function within 'iPhone'. Another is 'Phone'. It's a little like the old techie gag: 'Q: What do you get when you cross IBM with [insert subject de jour]? A: IBM', the new version being something like: Q: What do you get when you cross a phone, a music player, a photo viewer, a web browser, an e-mail client, a camera, a calendar, and an address book? A: A phone. Such is the dominance of the phone functionality in our societies. 'iPod' begat 'podcasting', both the term and the concept. What, despite its revolutionary squishing of just as many new ideas and techniques into its sleek box, could 'iPhone' beget? Not much. Aside from avoiding the pointless squabbling with Cisco, a more distinctive and forward-looking name could have carved out new territory for the thing - or at least shone a bit more brightly in the direction the thing is going. Because it's not going to be too long before the phone functionality is far less distinct from all the other digital communications around it. One more thing. The post-orgasmic downer gave rise to the usual somewhat snide references to the Apple/Jobs 'reality distortion field' - as if the distortion from reality wasn't perfectly consensual the night before. But there's a moment in the keynote which is so unguarded it's positively gauche. Jobs welcomes the Google CEO to the (vast) Moscone stage, turns, then bounces across to him on the balls of his feet, pitched over like a forward-slash. Put a pipe in his mouth and shorten his jeans by a few inches and it could be Le Téléphone de Monsieur Hulot.North Gare, 2007-01-29 04:26:57
Because every film critic is a frustrated stand-up
Peter Bradshaw in the Guardian. Made me laugh. On the big screen, Daniel Craig has shown himself fully capable of taking on a British icon: a man of cool, cruel determination, mesmerising sex appeal and a fatally destructive way with women. But that's enough about his performance as Ted Hughes. North Gare, 2006-12-04 04:33:36
Peter Bradshaw in the Guardian. Made me laugh. On the big screen, Daniel Craig has shown himself fully capable of taking on a British icon: a man of cool, cruel determination, mesmerising sex appeal and a fatally destructive way with women. But that's enough about his performance as Ted Hughes. North Gare, 2006-12-04 04:33:36
Mild Realistic Violence
[Following up Annie's rant about parents and video games.] I have a slightly different, and maybe more liberal, take. I completely agree that parents have absolutely no right to complain about what their kids are watching/playing, if they haven't taken some responsibility for that. However, I think often when responsibility is ostensibly taken, it's only of an extremely superficial and often narrow-minded kind. I remember browsing in a Borders a while ago, and listening to negotiations between a mother and son about what game she'd allow him to buy. Said negotiations took the form of the kid bringing one game after another to her, whereupon she'd give only the most cursory glance to the rating stuff on the back and then reject them one by one. 'No, this one has violence in it,' she'd say over and over. She made absolutely no effort to understand the nature of the game itself. There are (at least) two problems here. The first is that you just can't reduce games - just as you can't reduce films, books, etc. - to those farcical summaries that appear on the backs of the boxes: 'Mild Realistic Violence', 'Animated Blood and Gore'. They're ridiculous. And unfortunately, parents who don't want to spend any time actually finding out what these games are like, lazily make judgments using these simplistic metrics. It's not merely that they don't have time; I suspect it's mostly that they see no value whatsover in games. They'd spend time finding out about books for their kids, but to them games are at best harmless, so they're primarily concerned with damage control. The second problem - which is exacerbated by the fact that parents do fall back so much on puritanical capsule summaries of games - is that descriptions and ratings of games are often very much skewed too old. The Grand Theft Auto games are fine for mid-teens, yet have a rating of 18. That's beyond both the age of consent and the age at which young people can drive real cars in almost all US states. Shadow of the Colossus is a game of great beauty and its 'violence' is of a stylised, fairytale nature, yet it's rated for 13 and up. Personally I reckon kids are far more capable of finding games (and films, and books and such) that are appropriate for them than they're given credit for. From my perspective, I think many parents have an antipathy towards games which comes from equal parts ignorance of the genre, and dismissal of the genre. If they do want to police their kids' gaming, then I think they do the kids a huge disservice if they don't take the time to find out what the games are actually like - by reading reviews, and by playing the games with their kids - rather than jerking their knees at the mere mention of 'Mild Realistic Violence'.North Gare, 2006-12-04 04:33:36
[Following up Annie's rant about parents and video games.] I have a slightly different, and maybe more liberal, take. I completely agree that parents have absolutely no right to complain about what their kids are watching/playing, if they haven't taken some responsibility for that. However, I think often when responsibility is ostensibly taken, it's only of an extremely superficial and often narrow-minded kind. I remember browsing in a Borders a while ago, and listening to negotiations between a mother and son about what game she'd allow him to buy. Said negotiations took the form of the kid bringing one game after another to her, whereupon she'd give only the most cursory glance to the rating stuff on the back and then reject them one by one. 'No, this one has violence in it,' she'd say over and over. She made absolutely no effort to understand the nature of the game itself. There are (at least) two problems here. The first is that you just can't reduce games - just as you can't reduce films, books, etc. - to those farcical summaries that appear on the backs of the boxes: 'Mild Realistic Violence', 'Animated Blood and Gore'. They're ridiculous. And unfortunately, parents who don't want to spend any time actually finding out what these games are like, lazily make judgments using these simplistic metrics. It's not merely that they don't have time; I suspect it's mostly that they see no value whatsover in games. They'd spend time finding out about books for their kids, but to them games are at best harmless, so they're primarily concerned with damage control. The second problem - which is exacerbated by the fact that parents do fall back so much on puritanical capsule summaries of games - is that descriptions and ratings of games are often very much skewed too old. The Grand Theft Auto games are fine for mid-teens, yet have a rating of 18. That's beyond both the age of consent and the age at which young people can drive real cars in almost all US states. Shadow of the Colossus is a game of great beauty and its 'violence' is of a stylised, fairytale nature, yet it's rated for 13 and up. Personally I reckon kids are far more capable of finding games (and films, and books and such) that are appropriate for them than they're given credit for. From my perspective, I think many parents have an antipathy towards games which comes from equal parts ignorance of the genre, and dismissal of the genre. If they do want to police their kids' gaming, then I think they do the kids a huge disservice if they don't take the time to find out what the games are actually like - by reading reviews, and by playing the games with their kids - rather than jerking their knees at the mere mention of 'Mild Realistic Violence'.North Gare, 2006-12-04 04:33:36
Doctor Dawkins
My thoughts on the new Dawkins coming soon when I get a bit of time, but I couldn't not refer to this fantastic clip on onegoodmove; to explain it would preempt its charm. It's short, so go take a look. Incidentally, is it just me, or does Dawkins look more and more these days like he'd make a fantastic Doctor Who? He's always had the irascible pedantry of William Hartnell, but has latterly added a rakish Pertwee-ish charm. The longer hair doesn't hurt. It's probably no coincidence that his wife has some Who history herself. After Eccleston and Tennant, some authentic Received Pronunciation might be a nice change.North Gare, 2006-12-04 04:33:36
My thoughts on the new Dawkins coming soon when I get a bit of time, but I couldn't not refer to this fantastic clip on onegoodmove; to explain it would preempt its charm. It's short, so go take a look. Incidentally, is it just me, or does Dawkins look more and more these days like he'd make a fantastic Doctor Who? He's always had the irascible pedantry of William Hartnell, but has latterly added a rakish Pertwee-ish charm. The longer hair doesn't hurt. It's probably no coincidence that his wife has some Who history herself. After Eccleston and Tennant, some authentic Received Pronunciation might be a nice change.North Gare, 2006-12-04 04:33:36