Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
12/11/09 -- Vol. 28, No. 24, Whole Number 1575
C3PO: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
R2D2: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
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Topics:
Potato Paradox (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Casio and the Fabulous Logarithm (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
FANTASTIC MR. FOX (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
BRIGHT STAR (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
The MT VOID and Mt. Holz (letters of comment by Dan Kimmel,
Jerry Ryan, Rob Mitchell, and Rick Koehler)
Steeplechases (letter of comment by Kathy Robinson)
Motel of the Mysteries (letters of comment by David vun
Kannon and Kip Williams)
This Week's Reading (THE MANUAL OF DETECTION) (book comments
by Evelyn C. Leeper)
==================================================================
TOPIC: Potato Paradox (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Context is everything. Chanukah is coming up and people will be
trying to make their very best recipe for latkes. If people
thought about it they would realize that the ideal latkes are
indistinguishable from the mediocre hash browns they half-finish at
Burger King. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Casio and the Fabulous Logarithm (comments by Mark R.
Leeper)
(This is a fairly interesting result. If you do not remember the
basic rules for manipulating logarithms, just gloss over those
parts.)
Back in the early days of electronic calculators I had an
inexpensive Casio. It was very limited by today's standards. It
told the time, it had alarms, and it had a calculator. It also
would figure the number of days between two dates. I actually
found it had an unadvertised feature. It would figure you
biorhythms for a given date. Just give it your birth date and take
a square root and it would return with the three biorhythm values
for the date. I will not go into biorhythms here. It was a sort
of silly superstition that was popular in the 1970s that suggested
that some days were more dangerous than others. The Japanese
actually improved their safety statistics by telling people there
were specific days to be particularly careful. Of course, if you
just chose "dangerous" days at random and were careful those days
you would be safer.
The calculator was a very basic one. It added, subtracted,
multiplied, divided, took square roots, and would square numbers.
It also would remember a single number. The instructions said it
would also roughly do exponents.
They gave the following process. Type the base; hit the square
root key twelve times; subtract 1; multiply by the exponent; add 1;
and square the number twelve times.
Okay, I tried it. Suppose I wanted to take 4.7 to the power 3.9.
I start with 4.7 and take its square root twelve times and get
1.0003778943.
I subtract 1 and, of course, get 0.0003778943.
I multiply by 3.9 and get 0.0014737876.
I add one to get 1.0014737876.
I square that twelve times and I get 416.6264883.
So what is the real value? I get that it is 418.00516295.
That is off by about 0.33%. That is less than a third of a
percent. Not so great by the standards of today's calculators, but
not bad as a seat-of-the-pants estimate.
But the first thing that strikes me is that the process is a lot
like taking a logarithm of the base, multiplying by the exponent,
and then taking the anti-logarithm. That would give you a more
exact answer, of course. The function I am using is not a
logarithm. But for the process to work it must be a lot like a
logarithm. But the question is what logarithm is it like? What is
the base of the logarithm it is like? Let us say it is the log
with base B and get an estimate what B is.
We have x^((1/2)^12) - 1 roughly equal to log to the base B of x
which is equal to log(x)/log(B). Let us make things easy on
ourselves and let x. We could choose a different x, but it
would not give us a very different B.
10^((1/2)^12) - 1 = 1/log(B)
1/(10^((1/2)^12) - 1) = log(B)
10^(1/(10^((1/2)^12) - 1)) = B
This looks like a complicated expression, but it is not hard to
plug into a calculator... a modern calculator. It is ten raised to
the power (1/(10^((1/2)^12) - 1)). That exponent is about
1778.3702447. It is a one with 1778 zeroes.
I just recently wrote an article saying that no number the human
mind can conceive of is a large number. However compared to
numbers we actually deal with on a daily basis, it is comparatively
large. It is 1779 digits long. For those interested it starts
234,555,... and goes on for 1773 more digits.
So Casio was saying that rather than put on their calculator an
exponent they have you do your work with this rather fabulous
logarithm. Luckily the square root key does it all for you. Who
knew you were dragging around such huge numbers when playing with
the square root key?
Now I know right now that there are some of you asking doesn't this
nerd have anything better to do. But I am gambling that a few of
you out there are saying "Wow!" [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: FANTASTIC MR. FOX (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Wes Anderson brings us a thoroughly delightful animated
film. With wit, grace, and charm we get the story of a fox trying
to evade three nasty farmers who are trying to kill him. But the
animal characters are written very human and at the same time very
funny, and they are made real by an all-star cast of familiar
voices. Add a bunch of clever film references and we get a lot of
film for the price of a ticket. Rating: low +3 (-4 to +4) or 8/10
I cannot say that I am terribly fond of the Wes Anderson comedies,
films he both writes and directs. His quirky and disjointed sense
of humor is selective in its appeal and it rarely selects me.
BOTTLE ROCKET and THE ROYAL TANENBAUMS have their moments, but
RUSHMORE, THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU, and THE DARJEELING
LIMITED just seem disjointed and misaimed. His characters do not
seem to be real people, but more writing exercises. I expected
little from his animated film FANTASTIC MR. FOX. Ironically
animated film is just the sub-medium to make his writing sing.
Perhaps real people do not talk in the Anderson style, but animated
animals are not real people and you expect them to be a little
quirky. It works well.
FANTASTIC MR. FOX is a film in which even the errors work in its
favor. For example, the animation seems to be done in stop-motion
with fur-covered models. In KING KONG the models were covered with
real fur and it showed in the animation. As the models were
repositioned the fur was accidentally re-arranged. That was
considered a mistake for KING KONG, which was supposed to be
happening in the real world. The foxes and other animals in
FANTASTIC MR. FOX do not have seemed real, perhaps. Instead they
come off a little like charming dolls, and that works for the film
better than it would have if they were photo-realistic. This is a
world that is about at the same level of reality as THE WIND IN THE
WILLOWS or perhaps Pogo. Further Anderson's film is made more
winning by taking a step backward in technology by being three-
dimensional models built on armatures. The characters have an
organic feel to them; they seem tactile or even pettable. They are
not made up of vectors in a computer; they feel like there is
something touchable and solid in front of the viewer. I will not
talk down Pixar, the animation studio that makes so many good
films, but FANTASTIC MR. FOX shows the tactile feel that is missing
in their films. It is the same phenomenon that makes the fans
prefer Ray Harryhausen's creations to purely CGI effects.
Mr. Fox (voiced by George Clooney) and Mrs. Fox (Meryl Streep) are
happily married. Okay, hold it right there. This is not a film
about young 20-somethings. In fox years they are probably 40-
somethings. This is a film aimed at adults as much as it is at
children and the whole spectrum should find this film rewarding.
It is not clear that younger viewers will get some of the allusions
like the opening with "The Ballad of Davy Crocket" or a sound
effect borrowed from THE MAN IN THE WHITE SUIT or a line borrowed
from REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE. But everybody should appreciate the
characters. And the film has its share of serious issues and of
laugh out loud moments.
Mr. Fox is (incredibly) suave like a George Clooney or a Cary
Grant. Mrs. Fox is warm and wise and even when the couple has a
falling out, you can feel the love these characters have for each
other. Perhaps it required good actors to bring that off with
foxes. I frequently ask why have highly paid stars doing voices in
animated films when the producers could be giving talented unknowns
a shot. But this film needed good actors, and the acting talent
was there in Clooney and Streep and about eight other familiar
actors. I will not list the lot of them because that would spoil
the fun of reading the closing credits.
Okay, the plot. This is an adaptation of the book by Roald Dahl.
It is the story of a turf war between Mr. Fox and three nasty
farmers who are trying to rid their land of the chicken-stealing
fox. Mr. Fox is actually no longer a chicken-thief and now writes
for a newspaper, but the farmers have long memories and do not
forgive. The story is a battle of wits between the three farmers
and Mr. Fox. Frankly the story could have been stronger, but the
viewer cares more for the characters and style more than the plot.
"Wit, grace, and charm" is a lyric for one of the songs in the
film, but it could have been describing the film itself. Told with
its breezy style, this could be the most charming film of the year.
I rate FANTASTIC MR. FOX a low +3 on the -4 to +4 scale or 8/10.
Film Credits: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0432283/
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1197696-fantastic_mr_fox/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: BRIGHT STAR (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Director and writer Jane Campion gives us the story of the
ill-fated love of Fanny Brawne for the impoverished poet John
Keats, one of England's greatest. Were it not for the tragic tone
the story, set in the early 1800s, it would fit nicely into Jane
Austen territory. We have a story of love doomed by poverty.
Keats has the dilemma of having neither the time nor money to have
a relationship with Brawne, as he is trying desperately to be a
great poet. BRIGHT STAR bogs down in the middle and only moves
again when things become even worse for Keats. Rating: high +1 (-4
to +4) or 6/10
One of my more controversial film reviews was that of Jane
Campion's THE PIANO, a film well-liked and highly rated by the
critics, but which I found to be no more than an over-wrought soap
opera. Years later I was still getting mail from people who also
did not like the film. I think that Campion's talent has improved
over the years, but I am still not keen on her choice of story.
And like that film she is still telling tragic tales of the great
and under-appreciated destroyed by convention.
BRIGHT STAR is the story of a doomed romance. Fanny Brawne (played
by Abbie Cornish) is attracted to John Keats (Ben Whishaw), her
neighbor and her mother's tenant who is an aspiring poet. She is,
however, frustrated that Keats does not reciprocate her interests.
Keats is mired in the depths of poverty, and he is practicing for a
profession, poet, that pays very little and that pay goes only to a
very select few. The poet has enough to do to stay alive and, in
spite of his romantic profession, cannot himself give in to
romance. Keats slowly relents and reveals some affection for
Brawne, but only in the most stifled manner. Nor does he feel he
can bridge the difference of social class between his and Brawne's.
The main characters of this film form an unconventional triangle,
though not exactly a love triangle. Keats has affection for
Brawne, but he also has loyalty to his mentor, one Charles Brown
(Paul Schneider), a crude and rude vulgarian and a co-tenant of
Brawne's mother. Brown and Brawne detest each other almost
immediately and Brown baits and patronizes Brawne. They both vie
for Keats's time and attention.
The first twenty minutes of BRIGHT STAR are enjoyable in a sort of
Jane Austen-y sort of manner. We have a view of early 19th century
life filmed darkly and coldly by Greig Fraser. Eventually Brawne
wins Keats over so that he does show his affection, but he still is
not solvent enough to give her much hope. It is a stalemate and
the film remains stuck in this impasse for most of the rest of the
film. Things happen, but the plot takes its time in progressing.
We see a great deal of Keats sitting around and thinking about
poetry and talking to his mentor, but the film really gives us very
little insight into the poet himself or his craft. We are told his
poetry is special, but we do not know how it gets that way.
Campion does not know how Keats gets his inspiration and is not
willing to speculate for the viewer. He apparently just sits in
concentration and makes it up. We get a little better impression
of the fashion-conscious Brawne. Her interest in Keats comes
naturally, but she has to force herself to be interested in poetry
and it seems only because she knows a poet. Most frustrating is
Charles Brown, who hardly seems to be of a poetic nature at all and
who taunts Brawne. Like the Billy Zane character in TITANIC, he
has almost no lines in the script not intended to make him seem
more detestable. Each time he speaks we like him less. When we
first see him he is smoking a cigar, a cliché for selfish,
inconsiderate male. And he lives up to that assessment in his
every scene. He is written less as a character than as a slow-
motion natural disaster. Campion is good as a filmmaker, but her
stories have a touch of polemic. She is a better director than a
writer.
This is a worthwhile story told with lukewarm emotion. The doomed
love comes off as less a tragedy than a pity. The background makes
this story more interesting than the foreground does. I rate
BRIGHT STAR a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale or 6/10.
Film Credits: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0810784/
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/bright_star/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: The MT VOID and Mt. Holz (letters of comment by Dan Kimmel,
Jerry Ryan, Rob Mitchell, and Rick Koehler)
In response to Mark's comments on the history of the MT VOID in the
11/04/09 issue ("We were in the science fiction club at the
University of Massachusetts from before school started freshman
year until we graduated. The last six months I was the president of
the club. Evelyn preferred to be the club librarian and did about
six times the work anyone else in the club did."), Dan Kimmel
writes:
This explains *so* much. [From] your coming to a panel with a list
of appropriate films to Evelyn studiously taking notes in the
audience, it seems you were a perfect match right from the start.
:-) [-dk]
Regarding the use of LZ rather than LC for Lincroft, Jerry Ryan
writes:
Those of us that used to work in Liberty Corner always assumed that
Lincroft was LZ because we were LC. I believe Lincroft may have
existed first, though, so it is a bit of a mystery. I was one of
the first tenants in Liberty Corner and I think we moved there in
late 1986 or early 1987, however I think it had been on the drawing
board for a long while, maybe even pre-divestiture. Maybe they put
dubs on the "LC" location code? Do you know when Lincroft was
built?
By the way neither LC or LZ are buildings that are part of the Bell
System or any of its descendants. I believe that LC was emptied out
and sold, and all the AT&T people there are now Lucent people in
Murray Hill (MH). Avaya collapsed all NJ locations into Basking
Ridge. I believe LZ is empty, or almost empty, and about to be
sold. Holmdel is empty and Lucent is trying to sell it.
Were you guys ever connected up with Red Hill or the Crawford Hill
labs building? And why was Red Hill known as HR? [-gwr]
Rob Mitchell and Rich Koehler also reminded us of Liberty Corner.
[When I said we never found out why they didn't call Lincroft LC,
that was the "exclusive we." You apparently did know. Actually I
may have known at one point and should have used the "exclusive I."
--mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Steeplechases (letter of comment by Kathy Robinson)
In response to Mark's comments on banning steeplechases in the
12/04/09 issue of the MT VOID, Kathy Robinson writes:
The problem with the steeplechase ban is not so much the actual
banning of steeplechase races (truly, if the horse doesn't want to
do it, you can't make him do it--personal experience tells me
this). The problem is with a minority legislating morality. It is
a slippery slope and sooner or later, not only will flat racing be
banned, but ownership of animals will eventually be legislated
away.... I don't know whether HSUS (Humane Society of the United
States) and PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) had
anything to do with the Australia ban but in the United States they
have a very well thought out plan to make all animal interactions
with people go away and they are starting by pushing legislations
that seem to be for the animals but will lend themselves down the
line to draconian revisions abridging or eliminating people's
rights. I watched a HSUS commercial last night begging for money
by showing sad pictures of abused animals ... the truth is that HSUS
does not run or fund a single shelter, and all the money they
receive goes to administration and PAC contributions to push their
brand of legislation. They are hand in hand with PETA which placed
less than 3% of the animals surrendered to it and killed the rest
.
I could go on, but that's the gist of it... [-kr]
Mark responds:
I will have to take your word that you cannot make a horse do
something that the horse does not want to do. I take it you do not
believe that that quality might not vary from horse to horse. But
even accepting that I believe you might be able to make a horse
want to do something that is, in fact, dangerous for the horse
and/or the rider.
You know I cannot think of one piece of legislation that is not
somebody's "slippery slope." Any piece of good legislation can be
exaggerated by the opposition into being the first step of a
nightmare conspiracy. Some years ago I saw Arizona vote down what
I considered to be a good piece of legislation to ban leg-hold
trapping. The argument given was that this was just the first step
by extremists who would have rats running in the hallways of
schools. I have seen far a lot of propositions voted down due to
scare tactics from the opposition. I have never seen a "slippery
slope" issue turn into a bad trend that became a juggernaut that
could not be stopped. The proper answer to a "slippery slope"
argument is that generally the voting populace will get involved at
some point and vote against a trend that is getting out of hand.
But you are correct that where steeplechase races are banned,
people might start looking at whether other horse racing is cruel
or dangerous to animals. I do not see that concern as a bad thing.
I have to admit my personal bias here. Whenever the issue of
animal welfare vs. the interests of a sport, I personally will be
on the side of animal welfare. So no, I cannot be sure that flat
racing would not be banned eventually. But I think I can assure
you that the ban on steeplechases will not mutate into a ban on all
animal ownership. I think we have to look at the ban on
steeplechases for itself and not what we fear it will become.
-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Motel of the Mysteries (letters of comment by David vun
Kannon and Kip Williams)
In response to Evelyn's comments on MOTEL OF THE MYSTERIES in the
12/04/09 issue of the MT VOID, David vun Kannon writes:
I think Evelyn Leeper and Gary Westfahl have missed the point of
Macaulay's book.
David Macaulay first became famous for a series of books about
architecture and the construction of buildings in the pre-modern
era that were illustrated with beautiful line drawings--e.g.
CATHEDRAL and PYRAMID. He is also responsible for the incredibly
informative and funny "The Way Things Work". In "Unbuilding", he
changes his traditional format to show how skyscrapers work by
taking one down rather than building one up. (The one taken down
is the Empire State Building.) All of his books have a fictional
narrative framework, a certain gentle humor and are intended for
bright children and adults. All highly recommended.
MOTEL OF THE MYSTERIES is badly misclassified as science fiction by
Westfahl merely because it chooses to mix up Macaulay's formula yet
again to keep the author and reader from getting bored. Motel is a
gentle education in the methods of archaeology. Being set 1000
years in the future does not make it science fiction.
Archaeology and SF is an interesting topic, for example
"Omnilingual" by H. Beam Piper. Similar issues are raised in part
V of FOUNDATION AND EARTH by Isaac Asimov. [-dvk]
And Kip Williams writes:
"The Weans" is available as a broadcast from the CBS Radio Project
(I'm probably muffing the name, but I'm anxious to knock off and go
to bed, having finally bullied my system into showing me newsgroups
again) at archive.org. I heard it about 36 years ago, and was able
to resist the temptation to listen to the ponderous whimsy of it
again when I discovered it there. [-kw]
==================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
THE MANUAL OF DETECTION by Jedediah Berry (ISBN-13
978-1-59420-211-7) is described as Borgesian, but is more
Kafka-esque in its portrayal of the Agency as the all-seeing,
never-sleeping watchdog of society. But there is also a heavy
layer of noir, the question of what is reality and what is dream,
and a use of carnivals--one carnival owner is named Caligari, and
there are similarities to Ray Bradbury's carnivals as well. If I
had to pick the strongest similarity, though, it would be to Alex
Proyer's film DARK CITY, even to the significance of the beach.
Berry's protagonist is a clerk in the Agency, and the case names he
has chosen for his files--the Oldest Murdered Man, the Three Deaths
of Colonel Baker, and the Man Who Stole November 12th--give the
reader a feel for the strangeness, while also evoking the
traditional detective story. (The name "The Three Deaths of
Colonel Baker" sounds like something from Arthur Conan Doyle, but
the explanation is more Agatha Christie.) And Berry's character
names are always notable, perhaps too much so. From the detective
Charles Unwin, to his predecessor Travis T. Sivart (a palindrome
*and* a pun), to his secretary Emily Doppel, to Hoffman and
Caligari and all the rest of them, Berry has tried to make his
characters' names meaningful, but there are times that he seems to
be pushing too hard. Still, the novel is captivating, and almost
hypnotic at times, and so I recommend it. [-ecl]
==================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
Although to penetrate into the intimate mysteries
of nature and thence to learn the true causes of
phenomena is not allowed to us, nevertheless it
can happen that a certain fictive hypothesis may
suffice for explaining many phenomena.
-- Leonhard Euler, 1748