THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
12/02/11 -- Vol. 30, No. 23, Whole Number 1678
Ollie: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
Stan: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
All material is copyrighted by author unless otherwise noted.
All comments sent will be assumed authorized for inclusion
unless otherwise noted.
To subscribe, send mail to mtvoid-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
To unsubscribe, send mail to mtvoid-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
The latest issue is at http://www.leepers.us/mtvoid/latest.htm.
An index with links to the issues of the MT VOID since 1986 is at
http://leepers.us/mtvoid/back_issues.htm.
Topics:
Science Fiction (and Other) Discussion Groups (NJ)
The Law
Math in the Movies (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Answer to Last Week's Puzzle (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Inconstant Constant (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
THE LAST CIRCUS (BALADA TRISTE DE TROMPETA) (film review
by Mark R. Leeper)
J. EDGAR (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
FORCE OF NATURE: THE DAVID SUZUKI MOVIE (film review
by Mark R. Leeper)
This Week's Reading (WHO IS MARK TWAIN?) (book comments
by Evelyn C. Leeper)
==================================================================
TOPIC: Science Fiction (and Other) Discussion Groups (NJ)
December 8: HOGFATHER by Terry Pratchett, Middletown (NJ) Public
Library, film at 5:30PM, discussion after film
December 22: THE HIDDEN LIFE OF DOGS by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas,
Old Bridge (NJ) Public Library, 7PM
January 5, 2012: SELECTED STORIES OF THEODORE STURGEON,
Old Bridge (NJ) Public Library, 7PM
January 12: SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES by Ray Bradbury,
Middletown (NJ) Public Library, film at 5:30PM, discussion
after film
March 22: EXPEDITION TO EARTH by Sir Arthur C. Clarke, Old Bridge
(NJ) Public Library, 7PM
May 24: OF MEN AND MONSTERS by William Tenn, Old Bridge (NJ) Public
Library, 7PM
July 19: SCHILD'S LADDER by Greg Egan, Old Bridge (NJ) Public
Library, 7PM
September 27: CYBERIAD by Stanislaw Lem, Old Bridge (NJ) Public
Library, 7PM
November 15: TRIGGERS by Robert J. Sawyer (tentative), Old Bridge
(NJ) Public Library, 7PM
==================================================================
TOPIC: The Law
What is the Law?
Four basic forces. That is the Law.
Are we not men of science?
What is the Law?
No faster than C. That is the Law.
Are we not men of science?
What is the Law?
Constants are constant. That is the Law.
Are we not men of science?
Universe accelerating outward!
Neutrinos faster than light
Fine Structure Constant changes.
Law no more.
[If you don't get the reference, don't worry about it. -mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Math in the Movies (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Oliver Knill of the Department of Mathematics of Harvard University
has collected 154 clips from feature films of scenes that have
mathematical content:
http://www.math.harvard.edu/~knill/mathmovies/index.html
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Answer to Last Week's Puzzle (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
This was the puzzle I posed:
"I discovered an interesting property about 47."
"4, 7, 11, 18, 29, 47"
"If we split up the 4 and the 7 of 47 and treat the two resulting
digits as the first two members of an integer sequence in which
each subsequent number is the sum of the two numbers to its left
(i.e. like the Fibonacci sequence), it comes back to 47. Find all
integers from 10 to 99 that have the same property."
The answer is 19, 14, 28, 47, 75, and 61.
You can find the n-th member of a Fibonacci-extended sequence in
terms of the first two members. Specifically let us look at A, B,
(A+B), (A+2B),... The n-th term is A*f(n-1) + B*f(n). So we set
this equal to 10A+B. This means that
(f(n)-1)*B = (10-f(n-1))*A
Then it is just a matter of finding A and B in proper proportion.
For example if we let n=5 we get that 4Bz. That will work if we
let A=4 and B=7. So 47 has the property. We then just look at the
cases n = 1, 2, ... and all possibilities drop out.
This is very similar to Dan Cox's correct solution, but I will
publish my solution because it is more compact. Pete Rubinstein
used an Excel spreadsheet of his own devising. Once we cleared up
what the puzzle really was, also Tom Russell. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Inconstant Constant (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
The scientific method is to make observations of natural phenomena
and build a model that seems to fit those observations. After that
the model is published, it becomes open season for trying to find
fault with the model based on others' observations. Many models
fall. Some stand the test of time and become standard
understandings for how the universe works. And some times very old
models get shot down. Newtonian physics was discovered to have
flaws after standing invulnerable for centuries.
Last month two very old models were called into question. One made
world headlines, and one did not. The one you were more likely to
have heard about was an experiment that at least superficially gave
evidence that neutrinos had been accelerated from speeds beneath
the speed of light to above the speed of light. In theory that
should take an infinite amount of energy. As soon as an
observation involves the speed of light it get attention because it
has the power of science fiction behind it. People know that it is
not supposed to be possible to exceed the speed of light, but the
Starship Enterprise does it all the time in science fiction. There
was a lot of attention given to this result. The last I heard
other investigators seem to be getting the same effect. There is
still a great deal of skepticism from the upper echelons of
physicists. I won't argue that here.
The other discovery did not have so much science fictional
excitement behind it, at least on the surface. But if this
observation does prove to be true it will show we know models of
the universe we use are as much oversimplifications as Newtonian
physics was. And that can be fairly mind-blowing also.
There are four basic forces to the universe and a fifth that is
conjectured. Those are the weak and the strong nuclear forces,
gravity, and electromagnetism. The fifth force, hard to account
for, seems to be pushing galaxies apart and accelerating matter
outward. At least light from the most distant light sources seems
more red-shifted than we can account for. But it is the electro-
magnetic force that is causing the trouble right now.
You can write an equation to describe the force of electro-
magnetism. You put in the various factors that control the charge
and get the Coulomb constant times the square of the charge in
always a certain ratio less than the Planck constant times the
speed of light. (This will not be on the test, by the way.) You
get a value for the ratio like 137.035999074, at least in theory.
This number--well, its reciprocal actually--is called the fine-
structure constant. And you should get that same value anytime you
run the experiment. Well ... sort of. It turns out that when you
look in space that seems only near true. The value of the fine-
structure constant varies depending on the direction you look in
deep space. In the direction of right ascension it varies by one
part in one hundred thousand from its value if you look in the
opposite direction. There was some discussion in the first decade
of this century that the fine-structure constant might change deep
in space. It might not be so constant a constant. A team headed
by John Webb of the University of New South Wales, finds
measurements also seem to indicate that the fine-structure constant
is dependent on distance and direction. He published his result
October 31, 2011:
http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v107/i19/e191101
So what does this mean? No big deal. That variation is only one
part in 100,000. You will never notice the difference. Right?
Well ... no. It is like chaos theory. A tiny difference can lead
to very big differences. Our corner of the universe may be a
"Goldilocks Zone". In astronomy that name refers to a region where
things are just right. Tip them a little bit one way and things
change very drastically. Tip them the other way and things can go
very wrong in a different way. We evolved in a corner of the
universe were conditions were just so. With some amazingly tiny
variations life would not have evolved here. Now the religious
among us might say that God set the universe up just perfect for
human life. I would say more likely we evolved to fit the
environment that was here by chance. We have no idea what effect
changing the fine-structure constant might have. It may be large
portions of the universe where the constant is just a bit different
are inimical to any life as we know it.
Of course, we have no immediate plans to travel to these places,
but if the fine-structure constant is indeed inconstant it must
mean that in physics we are only describing the very limited
conditions that we can observe or deduce. Isaac Newton had
absolutely no way of knowing he was describing only the physics of
very slow moving objects and there was a lot more to physics that
he could not observe. We, like Newton, are only writing physics to
fit the extremely limited conditions that we can observe very
easily and very locally. Some of these conditions we are assuming
are the same all over the universe. Maybe if we get all over the
universe we can find out things are very different. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: THE LAST CIRCUS (BALADA TRISTE DE TROMPETA) (film review by
Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: This is a sensational surreal horror/comedy fairy tale co-
written and directed by Basque auteur Alex de la Iglesia (THE
OXFORD MURDERS). It has to be the weirdest and one of the funniest
films I have seen in quite a while. As time goes on, everything in
THE LAST CIRCUS becomes more grotesque and dreamlike. Manic and
dark and surreal but fun all the way, Iglesia's story seems like a
high intensity version of a Guillermo del Toro film crossed with a
Quentin Tarantino film. It is breathtaking, beautiful, and weird.
Rating: +3 (-4 to +4) or 9/10
In 1937 in Madrid a small circus soldiers on trying to make a
living with the Spanish Civil War going on around it. The clown
who until then only been delighting children with his jokes is
drafted into the Republican army and in minutes is facing the
Fascists. He is not even allowed to change out of his clown
costume because he is to be the enemy's strangest nightmare, a
clown with a machete. Though captured by the Fascists he becomes a
local legend. Along the way the clown sees the ugly face of human
brutality. When his son Javier finds him months later the son says
he wants to be a clown like his father. His father just tells him
that after all that has happened he must be a sad clown, not a
happy one like he had been. Flash forward to 1973 and Javier joins
a circus but finds even in peacetime he cannot escape from
brutality. The head clown, Sergio, has a sadistic relationship
with a beautiful acrobat, Natalia. Javier wants to rescue Natalia,
but he is no match for Sergio. Strange plot twists and strange
visuals lie ahead for him as the war of the clowns begins.
What an amazing film THE LAST CIRCUS is! You can tell immediately
from the spellbinding montage under the titles that you are in the
hands of a consummate filmmaker. Basque co-writer and director
Alex de la Iglesia keeps changing settings and dragging us from a
circus, to the streets of battle of the Spanish Civil war, back to
a new circus, over the streets of Madrid, and on and on. The
viewer knows only that wherever the film goes, he wants to follow.
What starts as an account of a civil war tragedy transforms to a
melodrama set in a foundering circus and on to a forest with a
clown who has become a feral animal, to crime film, to a battle of
monster against monster, on and on, surprising the viewer.
Iglesia's fertile imagination seems to know no bounds. His film
constantly is metamorphosing. He joins the visual imagination like
that of Jean-Pierre Jeunet to melodrama turned up to Grand Guignol.
Without ever lecturing to the viewer the film becomes a parable on
the subject of inhumanity as the happy clown and the sad clown
battle each other to the death.
In the early more rational parts of the story the style is
relatively normal with some exaggeration. When Sergio hits people
they slide across the floor in the manner of the 1960s Batman.
Mixed with this cartoonish fighting is strong violence--some we see
and some we do not see.
It is hard to imagine how this film could be more frantic or
bizarre in any way. The pace is fast and the combination of styles
is unique. This film really took me by surprise. It is a totally
unique film. I rate THE LAST CIRCUS (BALADA TRISTE DE TROMPETA) a
+3 on the -4 to +4 scale or 9/10.
This film has graphic sex and even more graphic violence. For
those who subscribe to Netflix Streaming the film is currently
scheduled be available from now through November 17, 2014. The
Spanish title, BALADA TRISTE DE TROMPETA, literally means "Sad
Trumpet Ballad". Apparently that is the title of a song well
known in Spain, but which would be unknown in the United States.
It would not capture the feel of the film. Nor does THE LAST
CIRCUS for that matter. I am not sure you can capture the feel of
this film in a title.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1572491/
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/balada_triste_de_trompeta/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: J. EDGAR (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: J. EDGAR is a bleak, grim, and even unpleasant biography
of one of the most powerful and controversial American men of the
20th century, J. Edgar Hoover. Clint Eastwood produces and directs
the film with Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role. Unusual to
Eastwood, the narrative becomes muddled and confused. Even the
film noir lighting and the sepia tint just do not seem to work
here. Worst of all the film does not really give a convincing and
three-dimensional portrait of the life of Hoover. Rating: low +1
(-4 to +4) or 5/10
It has been suggested that Clint Eastwood's two most recent films,
INVICTUS and HEREAFTER, have been distinctly less successful than
his earlier efforts and that he probably needs a money-making film
to restore his reputation. In spite of that he has produced and
directed J. EDGAR, a somber and nearly humorless view of a somber
and humorless man, J. Edgar Hoover, the first Director of the
United States Federal Bureau of Investigation. This may not be the
film his backers were hoping it would be.
When we first hear Hoover's voice, before we even see him, he is
accusing the Southern Christian Leadership Conference of having
Communist ties and ranting against Communism as being "a disease."
And as bad as that sounds today, the real Hoover might not have
minded and probably would have stood by those words.
The film begins with Hoover commissioning a biography of himself to
be typed in his own office and which is to give the public his side
of the story of his life. As the film proceeds, it jumps backward
and forward in time, sometimes being hard to keep straight. More
confusing is that the film also jumps into Hoover's fantasies. The
story of Hoover's life, basically his remembrances, is told in
frequent flashback starting with the terrorist bombing of Mitchell
Palmer, a former head of the FBI whom Hoover much admired. He
tells the story about how he came to power and of some of the major
cases, particularly the Lindbergh kidnapping case. We are led to
believe that this will be the story from Hoover's perspective, but
it also shows him having a gay (a particularly inappropriate
euphemism) relationship with his assistant and partner. The film
has led us to believe that this is at least from Hoover's
perspective and what he wants in his biography. But it is unlikely
that Hoover would be admitting to being gay and an occasional
transvestite, even if it were true.
Leonardo DiCaprio gives Eastwood a strong performance and as far
as I can tell authentic to Hoover, but Hoover was so secretive that
we will never know. Ironically DiCaprio on the screen may look as
little like J. Edgar Hoover as he would without makeup. This is
particularly true in the scenes with the older Hoover. Makeup
effects of aging are bad on DiCaprio and are even more pasty on
actor Armie Hammer (playing Clyde Tolson), who looks almost like he
is wearing a mask. Dame Judi Dench is acceptable as Hoover's
mother, strong in many ways that her son only pretended to be. But
willful mother is not one of Dench's more interesting
characterizations. Surprisingly, Naomi Watts is along as Hoover's
private secretary. Her character is there for most of Hoover's
career, but her main contribution to the film is to submit to aging
makeup. Her loyal secretary character takes a long time to develop
any conscience at all and by the time she does it seem just a
perfunctory way of making her Hoover's voice of reason. Even
uncomfortable with some of Hoover's tactics, she is loyal to Hoover
to the end and actually beyond. It is nice to see Stephen Root
along as a strange little expert in wood. Root is probably this
generation's Peter Lorre. Christopher Shyer's Richard Nixon looks
so little like the original that it is hard to pick up that is who
he is supposed to be.
Eastwood has the colors muted and almost all the indoor shots are
film in near darkness with heavy shadow. This gives the film a
claustrophobic feel with characters half in darkness so that you
cannot tell where they end and the background begins. Eastwood
provides the original jazz score, but there are definitely
sequences in which the jazz music feels out of place and from the
wrong era. The film tries to make compelling a character who
actually complains the country is being overrun by "degenerates and
radicals," who wages a war against them, and who by his own
standards should have considered himself both. This film is a
disappointment and I rate J. EDGAR a low +1 on the -4 to +4 scale
or 5/10.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1616195/
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/j_edgar/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: FORCE OF NATURE: THE DAVID SUZUKI MOVIE (film review by Mark
R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: David Suzuki has been a political activist, a scientist, a
college professor, a television spokesman for science, and the
latter part of his life he has been an environmentalist and a
conservationist. At 75 he is retiring from much of his work and
this documentary shows parts of his farewell lecture. He covers a
broad spectrum of topics dear to him. He includes his past during
WWII, when the Canadian government interned him for his Japanese
roots. But the endeavor closest to his heart is preventing the
world from committing environmental suicide. Intercut with the
lecture is documentary coverage of his past and present. The film
is a little diffuse to be fully effective. While his arguments
will be familiar to many there is no question of the importance of
his message. Rating: high +1 (-4 to +4) or 6/10
First, who is David Suzuki? I knew when I saw his face I had seen
it before. He was probably one of the scientists explaining
something about science on an episode perhaps of NOVA. I knew he
was a respected voice in popular science. Suzuki was born in
Vancouver, British Columbia, and he hosted a Canadian science
magazine program "The Nature of Things" which was not unlike our
"Scientific American Frontiers". Suzuki is a very eloquent man
with a gift for explaining science in terms that are easy to
understand. A recurrent theme in the program was environmentalism
and the need for conservation. He since has become an activist and
a potent voice in the environmentalist movement as well as a
communicator of the dangers of overpopulation. "We're in a giant
car heading towards a brick wall," he says, "and everyone's arguing
over where they're going to sit."
Director Sturla Gunnarsson covers Dr. Suzuki's last lecture, but
also puts in documentary material around it. The lecture includes
Suzuki's background, the political issues that have molded his
life, his career as a scientist and educator, his television
program, and finally his work as an environmental activist. As
Suzuki explains that in his youth Japanese were rare in Canada. He
talks about how even living in Canada the attack on the United
States at Pearl Harbor was a defining influence in his life. Like
the United States, Canada had internment camps for Japanese in
spite of their being citizens. His college education was at
Amherst College in Massachusetts and University of Chicago. He
taught as a professor at the University of Alberta and later the
University of British Columbia.
FORCE OF NATURE: THE DAVID SUZUKI MOVIE is an exploration of
Suzuki's provocative ideas. Late in his life his focus has shifted
from new scientific research, which he now sees as adding to a fund
of knowledge that others might adapt and abuse. Now his focus is
preserving the natural world so it is not destroyed for our
descendents. To him humans do not live outside of nature and visit
it; we humans are part of nature. His points go in several
different directions. Humanity has become a major force of nature.
He says that right now humans are driving species out of existence
faster than any time in the last sixty-five million years. And
pollution is part of the cause. He says each of us carries in our
bodies several pounds of plastic picked up from the environment.
And we are depleting our resources at increasing rates. But in
this message he is both figuratively and occasionally literally a
voice in the wilderness.
In total what we have is a complex portrait of a man ill-used by
humanity in his youth and in this elder years still dedicated to
convincing humanity to save itself. I rate FORCE OF NATURE: THE
DAVID SUZUKI MOVIE a high +1 (on the -4 to +4 scale) or 6/10.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1722514/
What others are saying: http://goo.gl/0bUob
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
WHO IS MARK TWAIN? by Mark Twain (ISBN 978-0-06-173500-4) is a
collection of previously unpublished works (as of 2009) by Mark
Twain. Well, mostly previously unpublished--three appeared in
small press publications (two of which I have, so I had seen them
before), and several have been quoted at least in part elsewhere.
In particular, I am sure I have read parts of "The Missionary in
World-Politics" before:
"We regard as a base creature the man who deserts his flag and
turns against his country, either when his country is in the right
or when she is in the wrong. We hold in detestation the person who
tries to beguile him to do it. We say loyalty is not a matter of
argument but of feeling--its seat is in the heart, not the brain.
I do not know why we respect missionaries. Perhaps it is because
they have not intruded here from Turkey or China or Polynesia to
break our hearts by sapping away our children's faith and winning
them to the worship of alien gods. We have lacked the opportunity
to find out how a parent feels to see his child deriding and
blaspheming the religion of its ancestors. We have lacked the
opportunity of hearing a foreign missionary who has been forced
upon us against our will lauding his own saints and gods and saying
harsh things about ours. If, some time or other, we shall have
these experiences, it will probably go hard with the missionary."
Twain goes on in this vein, reminding one of Ted Chiang's "Hell Is
the Absence of God" in his depiction of how the convert is expected
to accept that his unbaptized children who have died are in Hell
and he is supposed to abandon them there. [-ecl]
[Twain is right that most of us have lacked the opportunity of
hearing foreign missionaries. The ones that come to my door are
homegrown Jehovah's Witnesses. The ones who on New York City
streets put tracts in my hand are domestic variety members of Jews
for Jesus. --mrl]
==================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
The usual approach of science of constructing a
mathematical model cannot answer the questions of
why there should be a universe for the model to
describe. Why does the universe go to all the
bother of existing?
--Stephen Hawking