THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
03/06/09 -- Vol. 27, No. 36, Whole Number 1535
El Honcho Grande: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
La Honcha Bonita: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
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Topics:
Brideshead Revisited (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Math Question (puzzle by Mark R. Leeper)
Project Steve (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
FORBIDDEN LIE$ (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
HEARTS AND MINDS (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
SLUMDOG Rundown (film comments by Lax Madapaty)
This Week's Reading (THE ENEMY STARS, Kali, Jorge Luis Borges
and other Hispanic authors, and Kafka)
(book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
Answer to Math Question (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
==================================================================
TOPIC: Brideshead Revisited (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
I was watching watching BRIDESHEAD REVISITED, a story that says the
super-rich lead lives of abject misery. I think that is the sort
of feel-good film we need in these trying economic times. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Math Question (puzzle by Mark R. Leeper)
Here's a deceptively simple math problem you can figure out in your
head without paper or a calculator. Let P be the 100th prime
number. Assuming the calendar does not change what day of the week
will it be P^10 days from now. The answer will be at the end of
this VOID. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Project Steve (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
I would like to congratulate The National Center for Science
Education's Project Steve on reaching its 1000th Steve. As someone
with a mathematical bent, I think it is a really great idea.
Project Steve is sort of an answer to Creationists who claim that
there are actually many eminent scientists who reject evolution as
a theory for the biological history of species. Many? Perhaps.
But then there are a myriad of scientists to choose from. The
scientists who reject evolution are really still just a small
fringe of the scientific community, even if a list of their names
may appear long.
The Creationists publish lists of scientists who reject evolution.
Then the evolutionists counter by pointing out that there are a lot
more scientists who believe that the Theory of Evolution is
substantially correct. They may publish their own list, which is
not a difficult thing to do because the strong tide of scientific
opinion in is favor of evolution. Far more scientists believe in
evolution than reject it. However, there are enough Creationist
and Intelligent Design scientists to fill their lists. It is hard
for people outside the scientific community to recognize that even
a long list in a Creationist-sponsored ad may still be a very small
percentage of good scientists. So this situation sits in a
standoff and some of the public is misinformed.
To resolve the argument, or at least make it a little less
cumbersome, Project Steve publishes a list of now a thousand
scientists who accept evolution as the best explanation of the
origin of species. And every one of the scientists is named Steve.
Or at least each has a name that is a variant of Steve like
Stephanie, Stefan, Estaban, Stephen, etc. At first brush this
seems like an odd thing to do. Who really cares the name of the
scientist who has opinions on one side of the argument or the
other? In actual fact nobody cares. But the fact that so many
names can be collected with the name Steve is a show of strength.
Only about one percent of the population has a name that is a
variant of Steve. It is an arbitrary way to sample the population
of scientists. For every scientist who believes in evolution whose
name is Steve, there are probably about 99 scientists who believe,
but whose name is not Steve. Being able to list 1000 scientists
named Steve who believe in evolution is much the same thing, with a
little statistical error, as being able to name 100,000 scientists
of any name who accept evolution as the best explanation. This is
not just countering the Creationist lists; it is beating them with
class. It is a real show of strength.
There is some risk in saying that it is the same as finding 100,000
scientists who believe, of course. It is an example of
mathematical sampling. People who are already pre-disposed to
reject scientific opinion are just as likely to reject statistical
theory. They are likely to conclude that there are just whole
bunches of people named Steve who believe in evolution, but the
Jeffs and Freds and Toms and Dicks and Harrys support Creationism.
It is not true that there is nothing to that argument. There is
just almost nothing. It is true that they chose the name Steve to
honor a well-known advocate of evolution, Stephen J. Gould. There
is no way to rule out the possibility that Steves everywhere saw a
successful Steve who advocated evolution and out of Steve-
Chauvinism they all flocked to courses in evolution in school and
became sympathetic to that theory. I read one Creationist's
response that science is not a popularity contest and this is like
the kindergarten class voting if the class guinea pig is male or a
female. But whose opinion is better in scientific matters than the
scientific community? I do admit the 1000th Steve seems like less
than a random choice. He is botanist Steve Darwin of the
University of Tulane. He does not think he is any relation to
Charles.
It has taken six years to assemble 1000 names after Eugenie Scott--
the executive director of the National Center for Science
Education--initiated the project in 2003. But I want to thank
Steves everywhere for the contribution that this group is making.
I heard of it at the Scientific American podcast:
http://tinyurl.com/steve1000
The actual announcement is at The National Center for Science
Education's website:
http://ncseweb.org/news/2009/02/steve-darwin-is-steve-1000-004308
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: SLUMDOG Rundown (film comments by Lax Madapaty)
Member Lax Madapaty (who actually has some knowledge of India, by
an odd coincidence) responds to my comments that much of SLUMDOG
MILLIONAIRE stretches the credulity. (There are some minor plot
spoilers.):
-- Superstar of films landing in a slum in his helicopter-
unlikely to happen
-- Autographs for kids covered with excrement--highly unlikely
-- Forcing children into beggary by mutilation--goes on all the
time, esp. in Bombay
-- Chai walla getting on the show, esp. sneaking at a call
center--highly unlikely (these are highly secured
environments for obvious reasons)
-- Answering the 1st question--entirely believable. Everyone
knows Bachchan
-- 2nd one--maybe
-- 3rd on--increasingly unlikely
-- Having an incident in one's life to relate to for *every*
question--impossible
-- Teaching in English medium at a slum school--unlikely
-- Teaching 3 musketeers in English at a slum school--highly
unlikely
-- Sleazy host teasing a participant so repeatedly on the show
live--unlikely
-- Handing him off to cops to torture and get the truth out-
highly unlikely. The press would be all over the police station
and it would grab incredible national attention.
-- The love triangle--the stuff Bollywood films are famous for;
mildly amusing
-- The scene where our hero hands over a hundred-dollar bill to the
begger boy he runs into randomly after years--unbelievable
Where do I end this string of unlikely events? It takes away a lot
from the film. This is a fantasy film of the highest order, and I
refuse to give it much respect. The score is terribly composed, at
times cacophonic and fully undeserving of an Oscar award. "Jai Ho"
is a great song though, a fitting ending to a fantasy film. [-lm]
==================================================================
TOPIC: FORBIDDEN LIE$ (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Norma Khouri became an international celebrity telling the
story of her friend when she was living in Jordan. The friend,
Dalia, was a Muslim who fell in love with a Christian and then was
murdered by her own father and brother in an honor killing. But in
all probability none of this ever happened. Norma Khouri is
(probably) a con artist supreme. Documentary writer/director Anna
Broinowski investigates Khouri's stories and her background and
finds a bizarre story that grows ever more complex in Khouri's
telling. This is a film that would make a great double feature
with Lasse Hallstrom's THE HOAX. Rating: high +2 (-4 to +4) or
8/10
Norma Khouri's story is a tragedy. As a Muslim growing up in Amman
Jordan, Norma's best friend was Dalia. Neither Norma nor Dalia
wanted the life that had been pre-ordained for them by their
families. They wanted careers, not just to be married off to men
they did not choose and probably would not love. As one of the few
careers that were open to them, they opened a beauty shop. After
that Dalia did find herself falling in love. But the man was not
one who would have been approved by her family. In fact the man
was not even a Muslim. He was a Christian soldier. Dalia knew
that if her father found out about the relationship it could go
very bad for her. Her father believed that he was the guardian of
virtue for his family. Dalia's love for a Christian would make her
father very angry, and he would undoubtedly believe that it would
destroy the honor of the family. So Dalia kept her love a secret
from her family. One day Norma went to see Dalia only to find that
Dalia was dead. Dalia's family had found out about Dalia's love
and murdered her with knives. When Norma saw her dead friend
laying in the morgue, Norma decided she no longer could live with
her family and could no longer even live in Jordan. She fled for
her life and wrote the story of the incident in book form.
That is Norma Khouri's story. She submitted it to an Australian
publisher who released it widely. The book known as FORBIDDEN LOVE
or HONOR LOST became a bestseller in several languages and several
countries. Norma Khouri's story took great courage to bring to the
world the story of Muslim honor killings. Or perhaps a better word
would be that it took great "chutzpah." The story was (probably)
totally fabricated by Khouri. Khouri had a history as a confidence
trickster and though she denied the truth for a long time, the book
is likely a total fabrication.
Writer/director Anna Broinowski delves into the life of Khouri,
taking her camera to Australia, England, Chicago, and Amman. As
Broinowski investigates she finds more and more contradictions in
Khouri's version of the truth. And each time an inconsistency is
found, with a straight face Khouri adds more to the story and makes
it more complex. Each contradiction is patched with a new story
tailor-made to win the sympathies of the listener. Soon the
investigation turns up a story involving an elderly neighbor whom
Khouri (probably) conned out of half a million dollars. Khouri
claims that she was forced to steal that money and the story goes
off in the direction of rape and incest. Yet she has a talent to
tell her stories with a straight and attractive face that makes you
momentarily want to believe her. By the end of the film Khouri's
story is nothing like it started out.
FORBIDDEN LIE$ is amusing and frustrating. But it is undeniably
entertaining and one gets a certain amazement at the creativity of
Khouri's mind under pressure--much the same quality that Clifford
Irving has in THE HOAX. I rate FORBIDDEN LIE$ a high +2 on the -4
to +4 scale or 8/10.
Film Credits: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0790808/
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/forbidden_lies/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: HEARTS AND MINDS (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: This is a film that is more than an evening's
entertainment. It qualifies as a genuine historical document.
Famous people have been inspired by it. Famous people have
condemned it. But nobody doubts that it is an effective piece of
filmmaking. Rating: high +2 (-4 to +4) or 8/10
A military is a machine. In wartime it is set in motion against an
enemy. If it is functioning as intended the people who are doing
the fighting are not making the moral decisions. They are
following their procedures, collecting intelligence in a manner
they have been told to follow, and they are killing in the manner
they have been trained and ordered to follow. Commanders and non-
military personnel far from the fighting generally make the major
moral decisions.
HEARTS AND MINDS is a powerful documentary that was made by Peter
Davis in 1974 to examine the Vietnam War in its last days. It is
a potent film with many images that stick in the mind; some the
viewer might prefer to forget. The film is being revived and re-
released thirty-five years after it was made. The idea is that the
same standards the film uses to evaluate the Vietnam War can be
applied to wars in the Middle East. It would be foolish to say
that the current war in Iraq is a repeat of the Vietnam War in a
new setting. But certainly there are similarities in the two wars
as striking that are as the differences.
It is probably true that every war the United States has ever
fought has had fighting men who simply were not happy with what was
going on. But the Vietnam War was something new for the United
States. What made this war different from previous wars was
advances in technology. In World War II soldiers groused in their
foxholes, but almost none could send their complaints home to a
wide audience. Technology was just not in a state that made it
easy for the fighting man to express himself. The loudest voices
commenting on the US participation in World War II were the US
Government and Hollywood. And both had almost identical messages
that this war was going to be the last war and the one that would
set the world straight. The message was that the fighting men were
doing the right thing to fight that war. And frankly I myself do
not doubt that that message was substantially true.
By the time that the Vietnam War came along, the individual
soldier's opinion was much more important. Any soldier might find
his words on the 6:00 news being broadcast across the nation. The
war was poorly run and probably with assumption and principles that
were faulty. It is a little shocking to see Gen. William
Westmoreland, one of the moral decision-makers of the war saying,
"The Oriental doesn't put the same high price on life as does a
Westerner. Life is plentiful. Life is cheap in the Orient." But
the opinions of the front line soldiers and the men who were
actually fighting the war became important as they never had been
in any previous war.
HEARTS AND MINDS examines the opinions of the people involved in
the Vietnam War. As a bit of a polemic it concentrates mostly on
people who were opposed to the American policy. Certainly the
people against the war are shown in a much more favorable light
than those who supported it. At the time of the original release
of HEARTS AND MINDS in 1974 it was very strong stuff. There were
few other documentaries that presented the contrarian view. This
was then a unique and powerful film. Releasing it today, when the
liberal documentary is in what will probably be considered its
Golden Age, cannot help but deflate the film's impact. There were
many effective documentaries made in the last two or three years.
But director Peter Davis's hard-hitting style is still effective.
This remains one of the best documentaries about the liberal
reaction to the Vietnam War. The similarities of current conflicts
to the Vietnam War will still be striking. But it cannot hope to
have the strength and the individuality that it had 35 years ago.
Contrasts between the Southeast Asia war and the Middle East wars
cut against the film. But the classic films never really lose
their power for the people who saw them in their first run or who
remember the historical context of that time.
Davis start with selections from World War II films showing how
public opinion was orchestrated, thought perhaps no more than other
countries other countries manipulated their own people. The United
States left that victory with a belief they could be a force that
would control the future... for the good motives, of course. Davis
takes us to a short history of Vietnam under the French after WWII
and how when they gave up the United States took their place.
Davis then interviews allies, soldiers, commanders, Viet Cong, and
civilians caught in the middle. A bomber pilot tells how he just
gets the plane to near where the bombing is to take place and then
turn it over to the computer to actually drop the bombs. The film
goes on for almost two hours showing many aspects of the war, but
few really favorable to US side.
HEARTS AND MINDS won the Academy Award for Best Documentary of
1974. A co-producer, Bert Schneider, accepted the award and read a
telegram saying "Greetings of Friendship to all American People."
It was from the Viet Cong delegation to the Paris Peace Accords.
Later in the awards ceremony Frank Sinatra presented a disclaimer
he had co-authored with Bob Hope saying "We are not responsible for
any political references made on the program, and we are sorry that
they had to take place this evening." Michael Moore calls the film
the one movie that inspired him to become a filmmaker and calls it
the best documentary he has ever seen.
Even after three and a half decades this film still will be
controversial and still has a real impact. I rate HEARTS AND MINDS
a high +2 on the -4 to +4 scale or 8/10.
Film Credits: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0071604/
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/hearts_and_minds/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
The science fiction group chose THE ENEMY STARS by Poul Anderson
(ISBN-13 978-0-671-65339-2, ISBN-10 0-671-65339-3) for this month's
book. This was not so much for any great fascination with the book
as with chance. People had been saying they wanted to read a Poul
Anderson book, but there was no one novel that the library system
had more than one or two copies of. However, when we went to a
half-price sale at a local used bookstore, we found a whole *stack*
of THE ENEMY STARS. What's more, we found them on the back porch,
where books are normally six for a dollar. But these were half-
price, so we picked up a half-dozen copies for fifty cents total,
and handed them out to the group members.
And it is certainly true that if we had to pick an Anderson to
read, this would not have been it, in spite of the fact that this
*was* nominated for a Hugo (under the title WE HAVE FED OUR SEA).
First of all, there are certainly more well-regarded books by
Anderson. For example, Anderson had six other Hugo-nominated
books: THE HIGH CRUSADE, TAU ZERO, THERE WILL BE TIME, THE PEOPLE
OF THE WIND, FIRE TIME, and THE BOAT OF A MILLION YEARS. Of these,
THE HIGH CRUSADE and TAU ZERO are certainly better novels. But the
sad fact is that even those are not widely available.
Anyway, while the basic plot of THE ENEMY STARS--starship breaks
their faster-than-light matter transmitter and has to repair it--it
seems to me that it is dragged out too much. (And one could
quibble about the idea that four guys could rebuild a FTL
transmitter practically from scratch, but that's the Campbellian
tradition.) There's a subplot of one character's family problems,
and a lot of not-very-subtle chacterization, which the group seemed
to agree was more to let Anderson present various philosophies
rather than do character studies. On the whole, I cannot really
recommend it.
In writing about Kali, Carlos McReynolds says, "I rather think
there's some similarities between the sort of spiritual reality
that Kali implies and some of Lovecraft's fiction. Quoting Kinsley
in Tantric Visions of the Divine Feminine: 'There is an insistence
in Hinduism that the world as it appears to us is a show, that
there remains hidden from our normal view an aspect of reality that
is... shockingly different from our ego-centered way of
apprehending it. The Mahavidyas... are awakeners, visions of the
divine that challenge comfortable and comforting fantasies about
the way things are in the world.' Based on that quote, I'd say the
biggest distinction between the above and the sort of truth
presented in Lovecraft's fiction is that the Tantrica believes that
it's ultimately positive to see reality as it is, whereas nothing
good ever comes in an HPL story from learning the truth. But
ultimately, whether you're gazing on Kali or Cthulhu, I would
argue, you're going to get a big batch of truth that is going to
unsettle you."
In an essay on Jorge Luis Borges ("The Literature of Exhaustion"),
John Barth wrote, "Not long ago, incidentally, in a footnote to a
scholarly edition of Sir Thomas Browne (THE URN BURIAL, I believe
it was), I came upon a perfect Borges datum, reminiscent of Tlön's
self-realization: the actual case of a book called THE THREE
IMPOSTORS, alluded to in Browne's RELIGIO MEDICI among other
places. THE THREE IMPOSTORS is a non-existent blasphemous treatise
against Moses, Christ, and Mohammed, which in the seventeenth
century was widely held to exist, or to have once existed.
Commentators attributed it variously to Boccaccio, Pietro Aretino,
Giordano Bruno, and Tommaso Campanella, and though no one, Browne
included, had ever seen a copy of it, it was frequently cited,
refuted, railed against, and generally discussed as if everyone had
read it--until, sure enought, in the *eighteenth* century a
spurious work appeared with a forged date of 1598 and the title DE
TRIBUS IMPOSTORIBUS. It's a wonder that Borges doesn't mention
this work, as he seems to have read absolutely everything,
including all books that don't exist, and Browne is a particular
favorite of his. In fact, the narrator of 'Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis
Tertius' declares at the end: '... English and French and mere
Spanish will disppear from the globe. The world will be Tlön. I
pay no attention to all this and go on revising, in the still days
at the Adrogué hotel, an uncertain Quevedian translation (which I
do not intend to publish) of Browne's URN BURIAL."
Whether this is the first example of a fictitious book deceiving
people, I don't know, but it seems to be the precursor of "The
Necronomicon of the mad Arab Abdul Alhazred"; "A Perfect Vacuum",
"One Human Minute", and others (referenced by Stanislaw Lem); and
any number of books by Herbert Quain referenced by Borges.
And of course the aside, "including all books that don't exist,"
hearkens back to "The Library of Babel", which contains not just
all books but all possible books. In the universe of the Library,
there *are* no books that don't exist.
Along these same lines, Barth wrote, "Borges' favorite third-
century heretical sect is the Histriones--I think and hope he
invented them--who believe that repetition is impossible in history
and therefore live viciously in order to purge the future of the
vices they commit: in other words, to exhaust the possibilities of
the world in order to bring its end nearer."
Googling indicates that Barth's hope has been realized: the heresy
of the Histriones is indeed a Borgesian invention (to be found in
the story "The Theologians").
I have to say that of late I have found myself trapped in my own
"Garden of the Forking Paths" or Borgesian labyrinth. I started
out to write about the topology of the Library of Babel. As I was
writing it, I found a new book about the mathematical ideas in "The
Library of Babel". The bibliography of that sent me to the local
college library for four books of essays on Borges. Comments in
various of *these* essays sent me to other Borges stories, various
Borges essays, and stories of Franz Kafka. At the same time, my
comments on Leopoldo Lugones and Horacio Quiroga have led other
people to suggest other works by these authors as well as other
authors such as Santiago Dabove. The one thing that saves me is
that these latter are mostly unavailable except in editions from
Spain that cost three times as much for shipping as for the actual
book.
So if you're wondering why this column seems to be mutating into a
series on Hispanic authors, that's why.
And regarding Kafka's story "An Everyday Confusion", Margaret
Boegeman writes, "No one says 'How strange!' or 'How could this
happen, that a journey which takes only ten minutes one day, takes
ten hours the next, and but an instant to return?' The facts are
given them; no one questions them." [in "From Amhoretz to Exegete:
The Swerve from Kafka by Borges"] Clearly Boegeman has never dealt
with American freeways. [-ecl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Answer to Math Question (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Assuming the calendar does not change then whatever day of the week
it is today it will be from now on. [-mrl]
==================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
Nine-tenths of the people were created so
you would want to be with the other tenth.
-- Horace Walpole