THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
05/22/09 -- Vol. 27, No. 47, Whole Number 1546
El Honcho Grande: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
La Honcha Bonita: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
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Topics:
Science Fiction Discussion Groups
Acknowledgement (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Not Another Missing Link!!! (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Grades and Wiggle Room (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
This Week's Reading (THE RED TENT) (book comments
by Evelyn C. Leeper)
==================================================================
TOPIC: Science Fiction Discussion Groups
May 28: THE WAY THE FUTURE WAS by Frederik Pohl, Old Bridge (NJ)
Public Library, 7:00PM
"I can safely recommend Frederik Pohl's THE WAY THE FUTURE WAS to
everyone with an interest in the history of science fiction and
science fiction fandom. Pohl tells with a great eye to relevant
detail about being a pulp editor, a fan, and an author and agent.
The photos are great: especially the photo of Pohl with Gene
Roddenberry and an actress in a kind of Star Trek swimsuit had me
cracking up. The non-SF, autobiographical detail is also
interesting." [P. Jorgenson]
June 11: THIS ISLAND EARTH by Raymond F. Jones, Middletown (NJ)
Public Library, original film at 5:30PM, discussion of film
and story after film
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TOPIC: Acknowledgement (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
This week's MT Void is brought to you by the Pre-Owned-Humvee
Owners Exchange. Buy a used Humvee today. Petroleum is getting
scarce. Be sure *you* get *your* share. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Not Another Missing Link!!! (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
There is bad news on the science front. Norwegian scientists have
found a fossil of a monkey they have called a "missing link". They
have dubbed it "Ida". I wish scientists would quit finding these
so-called "missing links." It only encourages the Creationists. Now
instead of one missing link we have two, one on either side of Ida.
So we have a net gain of one link that is missing. The sad
mathematical fact is that the more of the evolution tree that is
filled in the more missing links there are going to be.
Read about Ida: http://tinyurl.com/ida-nat-geo
[-mrl]
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TOPIC: Grades and Wiggle Room (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
There is an old "Peanuts" cartoon in which Charlie Brown is
standing on the baseball mound asking, "How can we keep losing if
we are so sincere?"
I help kids with mathematics in my spare time. I get some odd
questions. But one stuck with me. A girl asked whether coming to
my class shouldn't improve her grade. Of course it should. I was
there to teach her what she did not get in class. Understanding
the mathematics should get her a better grade. But no, she meant
more directly. Shouldn't the teacher give her extra points because
she gives up her spare time to come and learn mathematics? No, he
should only improve her grade if she does better on her tests and
homework. I think she wanted me to say that because she spent her
Saturdays learning mathematics that I thought the teacher should
automatically give her a higher grade. I have a very specific
answer for just such a question. The answer is "No." This is
really asking me if I think effort and sincerity should be part of
a student's grade. All I can say is that effort is great, but that
is not what she is being graded on in class. She is being graded
on what she knows about the subject matter and how well she can
demonstrate that she knows it.
I don't think students should be graded on effort; they should be
graded on results. It is one of the sadder results of the "No
Child Left Behind" philosophy that schools really need some way to
pass children whose achievement does not measure up. If the
student in seventh grade has worked really hard and still cannot
multiply eight by five without counting on his fingers and/or
guessing, that child really should be left behind. Even if the
child is putting in a Herculean effort, if he cannot multiply
better than that, he should not be passed on to the eighth grade.
In fact, he should never have gotten into the seventh grade in the
first place.
This all fits into the issue of grade inflation. Back when I was a
graduate student at Stanford the undergraduates hated getting
teaching assistants for courses. Not that they taught any worse
than the regular professors. In fact, frequently they were more
creative teachers. But teaching assistants were told that they had
to issue grades in a 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 distribution. A third of the
students got A, a third got B, and a third got C. The professors
would often give grades in a distribution of two-thirds of the
students got A and one-third got B. But the students would come to
me complaining that B is really a bad grade. I think since that
time grade inflation has only been getting worse.
Students who skip classes and do poorly on tests try to convince
the teachers they worked really hard and deserve better grades for
the extra work. And some teachers cave in and give these students
special breaks. And something new is becoming a factor these days.
Parents are entering the fray arguing for their children's cause.
To some parents it is not fair that some people breeze through a
course and get and A. Other students have to work very hard and
can barely get a B. The parents argue that how hard the student
struggles with the material is as important as measurable results
like test grades. Also bad grades are bad for the student's self-
esteem. (The whole self-esteem issue should be a separate entire
editorial, but to make a long story short, I do not believe there
is a necessarily correlation between self-esteem and future
success. A student should not hate himself, but it is a bad idea
to let the student lie to himself about just how good his
performance has been.)
The practice of parents arguing for their children sets a bad
example for the student. It makes it look like the right thing to
do in a situation like this is not to buckle down and study harder,
but to get better arguers on his side. It sends a message that
arguing well can be as important and valuable as knowing the
material. Mathematics is very exacting, and I think the assignment
of grades should be just as exacting. There should be very little
teacher discretion in a mathematics grade. Everybody's grade
should be generated the same way. The less "wiggle room" the
better.
That said, I do want to give the students who come to my classes an
advantage over their classmates. I am working hard to give them
the opportunity to actually understand the mathematics better than
their fellow students do. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
A few weeks ago I was in the minority in my opinion of Cory
Doctorow's LITTLE BROTHER, and now I find myself in that position
with THE RED TENT by Anita Diamant (ISBN-13 978-0-312-19551-9,
ISBN-10 0-312-19551-9). The only reason I read this book was
because it was chosen for our book discussion group.
Let me start by giving some of the reasons other people gave for
disliking it and explaining why they are not my reasons:
Many have said it was not "Christian", which strikes me as besides
the point (especially given that Diamant is Jewish). People also
say it was advertised as "Christian fiction", which is like
claiming Shakespeare is an American author. (After I read the
dozenth or so description of this book about the daughter of Jacob
and Leah, with its events taking place around 1800 B.C.E., as being
"Christian fiction", I was ready to heave the book at the next
person who said that.)
More generally, people have also said it was "blasphemous," or
tried to destroy or belittle their faith. Whether that is true or
not, an author is not obliged to write books supporting people's
faith.
There was also the complaint that it was "disgusting" in its
emphasis on blood, birthing, and sex. I would contend that those
aspects seemed overdone to me, but I'm not sure that "disgusting"
is a fair description.
No, my complaints are as follows:
First, Diamant supposedly bases her story on the Biblical account
in Genesis. But she assumes that (almost) everything in that one
existing account is a lie. If she's going to do that, she should
just make up fictional characters. Other authors have written
"responses" to stories, but they relied on the original stories
being at worst mis-interpretations, not outright lies. (Examples
would be Gregory Maguire's WICKED and others, or Stephen Baxter's
THE TIME SHIPS.) Among other things, Diamant changes the genealogy
around, assigning children to different parents and creating twins
where none existed before. She also ignores all oral tradition
(midrash) on Dinah (and everyone else involved). Most, but not
all, of her changes seem to be aimed at attacking almost all the
men in the story.
As one reviewer said (rather charitably, I thought), "Diamant
penned an interesting tale, but she never let the Genesis account
get in the way of her story."
It is similar to THE DA VINCI CODE in this regard, though the
latter is even more clearly contrary to fact, given that it
contradicts facts in much more recent and better-documented
history. But it can be argued that both contradict their sources
and by doing so, offend their readers.
Diamant also seems to misunderstand the religious dynamic of the
time. The (pagan) wives would have been more accepting of their
husbands' god (El); it is the (monotheistic) husbands would
violently object to the gods (and goddesses) that their wives
worshipped.
I am not an expert on the Bronze Age, but many who are say that
Diamant's portrayal of it is completely inaccurate. (So it is
definitely troubling to see reader's comments that say, "I must
admit that this book was interesting as I did learn a few things
about the traditions back in those days.") One example of
inaccuracy is the mention of the Valley of the Kings--the first
royal burial in that area was not until about three hundred years
after this story takes place.
I do know something about menstrual cycles, and while the cycles of
women *in the same house* may actually synchronize, they have
nothing to do with the lunar cycle, do not always occur with the
new moon, do not occur simultaneously for all women in the entire
region (world?), and do not last the same length of time for all.
Even if they did, that time would hardly be what appears to be the
equivalent of a spa vacation. First of all, while all the women
are lying around doing nothing, who is cooking and baking and
drawing water? Since it can't be the men, but it must be someone,
the only possibility I can think of is that there are a whole bunch
of female slaves who don't get to share all this "sisterhood is
powerful" monthly session.
And there is the rather obvious problem that all the men in the
story are brutes. (The rare exceptions are not very realistic
either.)
Someone wrote, "Not a surprise that one reviewer compared this book
to [THE] MISTS OF AVALON--both books insert contemporary neo-pagan
beliefs and sensibilities into stories set in earlier times, and
both books delight advocates of women-centric neo-pagan
spirituality."
And finally, and most importantly to me, nothing much happens. In
the Biblical version, the events that occur are important because
they are the will of God, and are the basis of the formation of his
"chosen people." But THE RED TENT denies this basis, placing the
people in a mundane situation with no special position, and no real
evidence of a God guiding them, so what happens has no real import.
That Esau sold his birthright to Jacob is important in the Bible is
important because Jacob will become the ancestor of Israel. In THE
RED TENT, Esau and Jacob are just two illiterate shepherds
struggling for power in their immediate family. Having removed all
historical reason for caring what happens to these people, Diamant
has not replaced that with anything. (And had she changed the
names of the people in this story to lose all Biblical reference,
then I doubt anyone would read it.)
What I find most surprising is that this book is on high school
reading lists. It clearly offends many religious people, the
history (and biology) is bad, and nothing interesting happens.
[-ecl]
==================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
Intelligence is characterized by a natural
incomprehension of life.
-- Henri Bergson, 1907