From: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org (loud-fans-digest) To: loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Subject: loud-fans-digest V1 #268 Reply-To: loud-fans@smoe.org Sender: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk loud-fans-digest Sunday, October 14 2001 Volume 01 : Number 268 Today's Subjects: ----------------- RE: [loud-fans] Book recs needed (no spiritual or philosophical content!) ["Ian Runeckles & Angela Bennett" ] Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) [Jer Fairall ] Re: [loud-fans] Book recs needed (no spiritual or philosophical content!) ["Andrew Hamlin" ] Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC ["Chris Murtland" ] Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC ["Chris Murtland" ] Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC ["Chris Murtland" ] Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC ["Chris Murtland" Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Book recs needed (no spiritual or philosophical content!) Stewart says: > And of course, any time crime fiction shows up on-list, I have to bring up > Donald E. Westlake and LAwrence Block, particularly their Dortmunder > (Westlake) and Rhodenbarr (Block) series. Personally I'd rate Block's Matt Scudder books above the Bernie books but I love both series(es?). Both are New York located but completely different in tone - the Bernie books are wonderful confections and, like Stewart's recommendation of Stout's Nero Wolfe, are all plotted in pretty much the same way but they are huge fun and I tend to pull one off the shelf if I'm feeling a bit out of sorts - the Scudder books are much darker but the characters who float in and out of the books are brilliantly realised and the dialogue marvellous. Yes they are mysteries but that doesn't really seem to be the point of the books... I've got a few books on the go at the moment - Robert Harris's ENIGMA because I just saw the movie (which sticks reasonably close to the book but goes a bit Buchan-esque at times) - a great page turner. Also CODEBREAKERS, accounts by the people who worked at Bletchley Park (where ENIGMA is set) during WWll on breaking the German Enigma cyphers. And, because I like rock books, Peter Doggett's ARE YOU READY FOR THE COUNTRY, an analysis of country-rock and its roots. I'll be looking out ofr those Bill Pronzini books now Sue, thanks! I've a compilation which he co-edited called HARD BOILED which is terrific. Ian ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 11:17:19 +0100 From: "richblath" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) - ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stewart Mason" To: Sent: Sunday, October 14, 2001 1:03 AM Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) > At 06:58 PM 10/13/01 -0400, Dana L Paoli wrote: > >I'm not going to annoy everyone by listing all the > >wonderful things we got, but among them was Sloan's "Smeared." I've > >never actually bought anything by them, 'cause they're not really my kind > >of thing these days, but Shari loves it, and I have to admit that it's > >sort of catchy. I know that I've seen them pop up frequently on this > >list, but if it's not a horrible thing to ask: does anyone have any > >words of advice about what's good by them. > > SMEARED is not very representative of Sloan at all -- later albums don't > have the distorto guitars all over them and they're much more overtly > poppy. As albums go, I think I like ONE CHORD TO ANOTHER and NAVY BLUES > the best, but while TWICE REMOVED (the direct follow-up to SMEARED and > their only other DGC release) is *really* inconsistent, it does have my > all-time favorite Sloan song, "People of the Sky." (Others claim that > TWICE REMOVED is the band's all-time pinnacle, so what do I know.) > > Stewart > And I'd be one of those too who see TWICE REMOVED as their finest hour - in my case because I reckon it's by far their most consistent and contains the joys of Coax Me and Worried Now among other great things. The other 2 you mentioned are pretty good, the opening salvo on ONE CHORD... being particularly fine. Richard ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 07:01:41 -0500 From: triggercut Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Book recs needed (no spiritual or philosophical content!) I've been on a "good" historical fiction bender lately. Don't know if anyone else has mentioned it yet, but last year's Pulitzer Prize winner, AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER AND KLAY by Loudlist fave Michael Chabon is wonderful. Once I finished it, a friend insisted I read CARTER BEATS THE DEVIL, by Bay-Area first time author Glen David Gold. If the Chabon book is wonderful, CBTD is wonderful beyond power of words to express such feelings. Gold's book is the story of a real person, Charles Carter (a/k/a "Carter The Great") who was famous in the first part of the 20th Century as an illusionist. Warren Harding, The Young Marx Brothers, and of course, Carter's early mentor, Houdini all get prominent cameos in this quirky, off-center yarn. You won't learn anything about the meaning of life from CBTD, but you will enjoy the hell out of it--it's one of those books that when you reluctantly put it down, you're grinning and shaking your head at the marvelous improbability and utter joy of it all. Another friend said that when he finished it he felt the same way he did when he left the theater after seeing RUSHMORE for the first time. Finally, I've just started Neal Stephenson's CRYPTONOMICON. I think I'm hooked here as well. A bit daunting if you're a math weenie (and I finished 7 years at the University of Missouri without completing an arithmetic class successfully) Stephenson's book is (apparently) the story of codebreakers in WWII juxtaposed against codebreakers in the same area of the world (Southeast Asia/Oceana) in modern times. The WWII codebreakers are military, the modern guys are computer wranglers. Very interesting, and the occasional math makes it sound romantic and intriguingly beautiful rather than inscrutably nerdy. Sort of seems like what you'd get if you crossed a more readable Pynchon novel with Robert Anton Wilson's Illuminati silliness. Our Scott would love it. Chris Murtland wrote: > > Assumption: Reading novels is valuable, if only because I find it "enjoyable" > > Being completely isolated from the Academy, and for that matter other people who like reading as much as I do, I sometimes find it hard to discover new (to me) writers that are worth reading. Here are some recent and not-so-recent discoveries that may illuminate my tastes. Please send a couple of names my way so I can discover more. > > * Umberto Eco. My most recent find (a couple of years ago). I quickly devoured his three novels and will probably read them again. Being a bit obsessive when I find something I like, I even jumped into "Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language," but novels are the best. > * Borges. > * Nabokov. I've read practically all of them, some several times. Vlad is pretty much my standard and baseline in this arena. > > Barth and Pynchon seem to always want to go on this list, but I just don't find them as enchanting as my top three. For lighter fare, I have enjoyed books by William Gibson and even (no need to start this one up again) Douglas Coupland. In fact, I find I have to even balance things (must hold on to a clear mind) by reading the standard vulgar (older sense) supermarket writers like Stephen King, Anne Rice, Michael Crichton, John Grisham, etc. But what I am looking for now are a few more I can add to the enchanters list. > > I promised to avoid spiritual and philosophical content, and I am trying really hard. But I must mention that a current book I'm in, "From Dawn to Decadence," by Jacques Barzun, is a fun read that illuminates how our recent discussions have played out in science, politics and culture for the past 500 years. I am not an historian, and I have seen that some folks elsewhere enjoy blasting Barzun for being less-than-modern and perhaps stodgy, but his work seems to me to be valid historical analysis without moving into the realm of judgement. > > C ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 10:06:25 -0400 From: "betsy way" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) >At 06:58 PM 10/13/01 -0400, Dana L Paoli wrote: > >I'm not going to annoy everyone by listing all the > >wonderful things we got, but among them was Sloan's "Smeared." > >.......list, but if it's not a horrible thing to ask: does anyone have >any > >words of advice about what's good by them. then Stewart: >SMEARED is not very representative of Sloan at all -- later albums don't >have the distorto guitars all over them and they're much more overtly >poppy. As albums go, I think I like ONE CHORD TO ANOTHER and NAVY BLUES >the best, but while TWICE REMOVED (the direct follow-up to SMEARED and >their only other DGC release) is *really* inconsistent, it does have my >all-time favorite Sloan song, "People of the Sky." (Others claim that >TWICE REMOVED is the band's all-time pinnacle, so what do I know.) I'd just like to say that I NEVER go to shows anymore, but whenever Sloan come to town, I'm the first to say I want to go. The early records (PEPPERMINT, SMEARED, TWICE REMOVED) are interesting, but are far off from what the group's evolved into. I would rank ONE CHORD... as my personal favorite, but if Doug were writing this, he'd vote for NAVY BLUES. I think that ONE CHORD.. is more consistant and poppier, though. A fan of guitar-oriented pop would probably not be unhappy with any their records. What is one of the most interesting things about Sloan, at least to me, is that all four members are capable songwriters and singers. And while some of their records may be inconsistant (TWICE REMOVED, BETWEEN THE BRIDGES), it must come from having too many cooks in the kitchen. The new record PRETTY TOGETHER comes out Tuesday, so there's one more thing to buy. Coax me, - --betsy PS - Thanks to Sue for recommending the book SECOND HAND. I very much enjoyed it, too. _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 08:11:36 -0600 From: Stewart Mason Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Book recs needed (no spiritual or philosophical content!) At 07:01 AM 10/14/01 -0500, triggercut wrote: >Finally, I've just started Neal Stephenson's CRYPTONOMICON. I think I'm >hooked here as well. A bit daunting if you're a math weenie (and I >finished 7 years at the University of Missouri without completing an >arithmetic class successfully) Stephenson's book is (apparently) the >story of codebreakers in WWII juxtaposed against codebreakers in the >same area of the world (Southeast Asia/Oceana) in modern times. The >WWII codebreakers are military, the modern guys are computer wranglers. >Very interesting, and the occasional math makes it sound romantic and >intriguingly beautiful rather than inscrutably nerdy. Sort of seems >like what you'd get if you crossed a more readable Pynchon novel with >Robert Anton Wilson's Illuminati silliness. Our Scott would love it. I was just going to mention CRYPTONOMICON when Ian mentioned that he's reading ENIGMA, because a good part of Stephenson's book is set at Bletchley Park, and features Alan Turing as a supporting character. I've never been a particular science fiction fan, because I've seen more piss-poor writing in that genre than any other, but I recommend Stephenson's two SF novels, SNOW CRASH and THE DIAMOND AGE, unreservedly. They're not so much science fiction as they are fiction that deals with science. (CRYPTONOMICON is straight historical fiction with no SF/fantasy elements at all.) His first two books, THE BIG U -- recently reissued in paperback, although I believe Stephenson has disowned it -- and ZODIAC are a novel about college life and a comic mystery/thriller mostly set in Allston-Brighton, current and former home of several LoudFans. Stewart, currently reading a book of interviews with modern composers and Lorrie Moore's SELF-HELP, a long-ago LoudFan recommendation ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 11:32:01 -0300 From: John F Butland Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Book recs needed (no spiritual or philosophical content!) & Sloan OK, here's my two-bits of fave authors. I'll offer my backing of Block, Westlake, and Stephenson, and offer up Neil Gaiman, too. But my newest must-read guy is Chrisptopher Moore. Below is a piece I wrote a while back for a feature on unjustly ingored things. You can check him out, including an excerpt from his forthcoming novel about a boyhood pal of Jesus's (which I guess makes the subject line a bit of a lie) at www.chrismoore.com. You'll also find a series of columns there where *he* recommends books from his reading pile, many of which are good fun. Christopher Moore - Moore's written five books. All deal with weird shit like cargo cults, ghosts, monsters, demons, vampires, and general all around bugfuck strangeness. He has an amazing ability to make old legends and myths like vampires and the old American Indian legends of the Coyote, seem perfectly logical in a modern context, blending the incredible with the mundane. And lest ye be afeared that it's some old D&D twerp-in-a-parka shit, rest assured that it's hip and above all funny, closer to authors like Tom Robbins, Carl Hiassen, Douglas Adams, or Kurt Vonnegut than Stephen King, Clive Barker, or neo-Goth Anne Rice crap. Every book will have you laughing out loud several times. Even interspecies sex will seem logical. None of the books have been filmed yet, though several have been optioned by the studios, including incredibly enough, Disney. It would take a director like the Coen brothers, Tim Burton, or maybe Spike Jonze, to do them justice. John Cusak would be great as C. Thomas Flood, the befuddled Indiana transplant and wannabe Kerouac who's working as a Safeway stock boy and who becomes the Renfieldian lover to the newly vampirated red-headed female insurance clerk in Blood Sucking Fiends. And Pamela Anderson would be perfect as the slightly addled, former B-movie queen who temporarily becomes the consort of an ancient, shape shifting, carnivorous sea monster after she nurses it back to health following an unfortunate attempt at mating with a propane truck in The Lust Lizard Of Melancholy Cove. Yep, Moore's a definite original. [John F. Butland] PS Sloan - Between The Bridges is their best IMO, and the double live is a good way to get a taste unless you're philospohically opposed to live LPs. best, jfb John F Butland O- butland@nbnet.nb.ca ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 10:38:36 -0400 (EDT) From: dmw Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, steve wrote: > Perhaps organic life naturally tends toward higher forms of organization. !!! well, if we look at the available historical record, it kind of looks that way, doesn't it... ...but why DOES organic life get this special exemption from the second law of thermodynamics? you're implying that some natural force might act on organic life in a way which is not consistent with the known natural forces -- fine, and well-supported by evidence (locally -- i stress again that we simply don't have the big picture) -- but what's the difference between faith in a "natural" principle that hasn't been identified/demonstrated/isolated/proven and faith in a "supernatural" principle? what is "supernature" anyway if not nature inadequately unerstood? roughly a hundred years ago, the strong and weak nuclear attractive forces were undreamt of. atoms were in many ways considered hypothetical particles (and while i'm not an expert on turn-of-the-century physics iirc plenty of respectable scientists believed atoms were only useful as abstract concepts with no basis in 'objective reality'...rather like negative numbers. oh, bad example. imaginary numbers? oops, foiled again.). quantum mechanics? not even. what annoys me about stephen hawking and his less-well popularized ilk is the underlying current of thought that we are close to understanding "everything," which strikes me as enormous hubris. post heisenberg and godel, in fact, i'm amazed that many scientists continue to think that "everything" is "knowable." ...an infinity of true but unprovable propositions, and by [whatever], that's the way i like it! - -- d., apparently playing God's advocate for a change ps is this list archived somewhere these days? where? i wanted to share steve matrix's fwd of tris mccall's essay on the nat'l anthem to someone, but i seem to have inadevertently deleted it. oops. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 09:31:13 -0700 (PDT) From: Jer Fairall Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) > does anyone have any words of advice about what's > good by them. My favorite Sloan records have been the recent ones--NAVY BLUES and BETWEEN THE BRIDGES--which found them wholeheartedly embracing the retro 70's-isms that they only hinted at on the earlier records. I haven't heard the new one, PRETTY TOGETHER, yet but if the single "If It Feels Good, Do It" seems to point in the same direction. And speaking of mid-90's DGC bands, I heard that Elastica recently called it quits. I thought that THE MENACE was a total mess but their debut is one of my favorites from that whole era. Damn. Jer np: Psychedelic Furs, TALK TALK TALK ===== Make a great connection at Yahoo! Personals. http://personals.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 10:15:18 -0700 From: "Andrew Hamlin" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Book recs needed (no spiritual or philosophical content!) >Pronzini fans should also check out a pair of books he wrote called GUN IN >CHEEK and SON OF A GUN IN CHEEK, which are about his fondness for what he >calls "alternative crime fiction," or books and stories so amateurishly >written, bizarrely plotted or just plain freakishly weird that they're in >some ways more interesting than some of the supposed classics of the genre. > (It's kinda like a genre fiction equivalent of Phil Milstein's MSR Madness >albums.) Haven't seen the Pronzini books, but allow me to reacquaint listers with the man who just might be the most confounding and bizarre mystery novelist of all time, in any language (and he was published in three): the late, well-nigh indescribable Harry Stephen Keeler. http://users.aol.com/bigsecrets/Keeler/index.html http://xavier.xu.edu:8000/~polt/keeler.html http://www.ramblehouse.bigstep.com/ Jumping around the room chanting "Diva Lee Roth" to Adam Ant's "Viva Le Rock," Andy "And Angus MacWhorter, left alone with his colourless ascetic furniture, and his diorama, stroked his chin in helpless futility." - --Harry Stephen Keeler ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 14:28:30 -0500 From: steve Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC On Sunday, October 14, 2001, at 09:38 AM, dmw wrote: > ...but why DOES organic life get this special exemption from the second > law of thermodynamics? Maybe because organic life forms are not closed systems? > you're implying that some natural force might act on organic life in a > way > which is not consistent with the known natural forces -- fine, and > well-supported by evidence (locally -- i stress again that we simply > don't > have the big picture) Not a force acting on organic life, a characteristic of organic life. > but what's the difference between faith in a "natural" principle that > hasn't been > identified/demonstrated/isolated/proven and faith in a "supernatural" > principle? what is "supernature" anyway if not nature inadequately > unerstood? No faith on my part. Just skylarking, as Mr. Partridge might say. Supernature would exist *outside* nature, so it couldn't be just an undiscovered natural law. - ----------- Stephen Bury is the pseudonym of Neil Stephenson and J. Frederick George. Practical Demonkeeping was optioned for a flim, I think by Disney, before it was ever published. No idea on the status, Coming Attractions doesn't even have it listed. - - Steve __________ PAGE SIX has learned that the fun-loving First Daughters attended wild parties two nights in a row last week - including a Beverly Hills bash where Jenna was photographed holding a drink. - New York Post ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 16:02:16 -0400 From: "Chris Murtland" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC > Maybe because organic life forms are not closed systems? How so? If I remove the hard drive from my computer, it will stop working. It's a complex system where each component is necessary for the overall functioning of the system, and each component is pretty much worthless outside the context of the system. Likewise, if I remove my heart, I will stop working. And, unless properly refrigerated, my heart is pretty much worthless after that (especially to me). Are organic life forms somehow exempt from natural laws, including the fearsome effects of entropy? ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 15:05:07 -0500 (CDT) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, dmw wrote: > On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, steve wrote: > > > Perhaps organic life naturally tends toward higher forms of organization. > > !!! > > well, if we look at the available historical record, it kind of looks that > way, doesn't it... > > ...but why DOES organic life get this special exemption from the second > law of thermodynamics? And who theorized this law? Why us organic life forms did, that's who! Our existence is unquestionable - more so than any law we've apparently derived from observation. So to theorize life and intelligence as exceptions to a law is a bit backwards: perhaps what we see as a law is itself an exception...but we can't see it. Elsewhere, you wonder what the difference is between an unproven "natural" law and an (unproven) supernatural prinicple. In the first case, one speculates that, given enough knowledge, whatever is under observation will conform to some sort of regularity or law (that is, be "natural"). As I understand "supernatural," that would be something not explainable by natural law. I suppose it's true that, from a limited perspective, something perfedctly natural and understandable (say, why an airplane flies), might seem to be supernatural. That doesn't make it so. So the difference in proposing unknown natural principles and proposing supernaturalism is that in the first case, you're anticipating that there will be explanations amenable to science, reason, etc. In the second, you're not: if we explain the supernatural with science and reason, it's no longer really supernatural. - --Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::I play the guitar. Sometimes I play the fool:: __John Lennon__ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 15:09:47 -0500 (CDT) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, Jer Fairall wrote: > And speaking of mid-90's DGC bands, I heard that > Elastica recently called it quits. I thought that THE > MENACE was a total mess but their debut is one of my > favorites from that whole era. Damn. That's because it was Wire's _Pink Flag_ in drag. - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::The dog-eared pages, the highlighted passages, the margin ::notations...this book has actually been read: it can't be a student's! __Jose Chung__ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 14:17:51 -0600 From: Stewart Mason Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) At 03:09 PM 10/14/01 -0500, Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey wrote: >On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, Jer Fairall wrote: > >> And speaking of mid-90's DGC bands, I heard that >> Elastica recently called it quits. I thought that THE >> MENACE was a total mess but their debut is one of my >> favorites from that whole era. Damn. > >That's because it was Wire's _Pink Flag_ in drag. No one's ever been able to suitably explain to me why, if "Connection" is nothing more than a bald-faced, shameless ripoff of "Three Girl Rhumba," it's also a much better song. My assumption has always been that it's because while the riff is obviously nicked from Wire, Elastica do much more with it than Colin and the boys did. S ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 16:16:46 -0400 From: "Chris Murtland" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC Then isn't it possible, if we allow that science currently cannot explain everything, that if it could, alternate ("supernatural") planes of existence are feasible, and that another entity ("God" or even "flying purple unicorns"), perhaps made up of energy or quark-dust or black holes or some undiscovered thing could also be inhabiting some other plane? In which case the supernatural isn't really supernatural, it's just the natural that we are unable to explain scientifically right now? > So the difference in proposing unknown natural principles and proposing > supernaturalism is that in the first case, you're anticipating that there > will be explanations amenable to science, reason, etc. In the second, > you're not: if we explain the supernatural with science and reason, it's > no longer really supernatural. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 15:28:34 -0500 (CDT) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, Stewart Mason wrote: > No one's ever been able to suitably explain to me why, if "Connection" is > nothing more than a bald-faced, shameless ripoff of "Three Girl Rhumba," > it's also a much better song. My assumption has always been that it's > because while the riff is obviously nicked from Wire, Elastica do much more > with it than Colin and the boys did. True - although "doing much more with it" was rather the opposite of what Wire was doing at the time. Actually, I like the first Elastica album well enough - what frustrates me is the way that band became another example of all-too-common phenomenon: release first album, gain success, be unable to release anything new for a thousand years. I suppose when bands released new stuff every six months (a couple singles here, an album a year), it may have been frustrating to keep up with - and was probably difficult for the band, maybe, and led to lots of filler - but I haven't exactly noticed a decline in filler. THe opposite, in fact: instead of messing around with Napster, RIAA ought to declare a ban on CDs longer than fifty minutes. I dunno - even though I appreciate craft, it seems that everyone wants to be Peter Freakin' Gabriel and spend eight months on one drum sound. (Okay...there may be other factors here - like I heard Frischmann was making more tracks in her arm than in the studio...) Funny how, looking through my music collection, I see no particular correlation between quality and having spent years in the studio. Not that I'm turning into one of the Ramones, but rock'n'roll shouldn't be that hard. Okay - I'd better go throw on _Tales from Topographic Oceans_ before I start thinking the best record ever made is Voot Warnings' "Dance Motherfucker Dance" (one chord, straight eighth notes, title only lyric...) Grumpily yrs, - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::This is America. People do whatever the fuck they feel like doing.... ::As a result, this country has one of the worst economies in the world. __Neal Stephenson, SNOW CRASH__ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 15:34:07 -0500 (CDT) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, Chris Murtland wrote: > Then isn't it possible, if we allow that science currently cannot > explain everything, that if it could, alternate ("supernatural") planes > of existence are feasible, and that another entity ("God" or even > "flying purple unicorns"), perhaps made up of energy or quark-dust or > black holes or some undiscovered thing could also be inhabiting some > other plane? In which case the supernatural isn't really supernatural, > it's just the natural that we are unable to explain scientifically right > now? Yes. But I think the issue arose from Mark talking about having a hard time not believing in God, given the evidence put before him. After some qualifications re the difference between faith and reason, we went into this whole reason thing - during which I said that, simply, I see no compelling reason to believe in the existence of God. Doesn't mean there could never be any such reason - just that nothing I'm aware of has convinced me. What you're talking about is, really, faith: that it's possible, for you desirable, for you even likely, that some hypothetical knowledge could bring God within purview of reason. (The "likely" part is another of stating that religious people generally believe their faith will be repaid after death - at which point, presumably, fiath will no longer be necessary, evidence being right in front of one's eyes - metaphorically speaking, depending on who your God be: Mighty Thunderer or Cosmic Muffin. Okay, gotta go - old National Lampoon jokes are a sign of the End Times.) - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::Some days, you just can't get rid of a bomb:: __Batman__ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 14:40:56 -0600 From: Stewart Mason Subject: Re: [loud-fans] smeared by sloan (ns) At 03:28 PM 10/14/01 -0500, Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey wrote: >> because while the riff is obviously nicked from Wire, Elastica do much more >> with it than Colin and the boys did. > >True - although "doing much more with it" was rather the opposite of what >Wire was doing at the time. Okay, point. >I dunno - even though I appreciate craft, it seems that everyone wants to >be Peter Freakin' Gabriel and spend eight months on one drum sound. >(Okay...there may be other factors here - like I heard Frischmann was >making more tracks in her arm than in the studio...) I think there were also lawsuits galore surrounding the band. This (and the usual drugs, sloth, and depleted store of decent songs) is usually more the case when a band takes forever to record a follow-up than any sort of audio perfectionism. Ever heard the second Stone Roses album? No way that took five years to record. Stewart NP: Strategies Against Architecture III: 1991-2001 (first Neubauten I've heard in probably 15 years, and I wouldn't be hearing it now if I weren't reviewing it, but I'm pleasantly surprised at the way they seem to have turned what had seemed to be a pretty limited palette into a surprisingly diverse compositional style) ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 17:07:44 -0400 From: "Chris Murtland" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC Okay, I'm with ya now. I am still interested in finding out, if humans created morals and ethics, why we would care to follow them. I want to avoid being in unpleasant situations, like prison, so I'd refrain from illegal behavior, but if morals are relative, it seems quite reasonable that I would try to psychologically undermine and otherwise make use of everyone else for my own benefit; in other words, embrace cynicism in the fullest. I could then meet protests of "that's not right" with "right is just an arbitrary social construct." Just curious if there is any humanist/rationalist explanation for why I shouldn't do that (and believe me, the desire to do so has crossed my mind more than once). > Yes. > > But I think the issue arose from Mark talking about having a hard time not > believing in God, given the evidence put before him. After some > qualifications re the difference between faith and reason, we went into > this whole reason thing - during which I said that, simply, I see no > compelling reason to believe in the existence of God. Doesn't mean there > could never be any such reason - just that nothing I'm aware of has > convinced me. > > What you're talking about is, really, faith: that it's possible, for you > desirable, for you even likely, that some hypothetical knowledge could > bring God within purview of reason. (The "likely" part is another of > stating that religious people generally believe their faith will be repaid > after death - at which point, presumably, fiath will no longer be > necessary, evidence being right in front of one's eyes - metaphorically > speaking, depending on who your God be: Mighty Thunderer or Cosmic Muffin. > Okay, gotta go - old National Lampoon jokes are a sign of the End Times.) ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 15:44:34 -0600 From: Stewart Mason Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC At 05:07 PM 10/14/01 -0400, Chris Murtland wrote: >I am still interested in finding out, if humans created morals and >ethics, why we would care to follow them. I want to avoid being in >unpleasant situations, like prison, so I'd refrain from illegal >behavior, but if morals are relative, it seems quite reasonable that >I would try to psychologically undermine and otherwise make use of >everyone else for my own benefit; in other words, embrace cynicism >in the fullest. I could then meet protests of "that's not right" with >"right is just an arbitrary social construct." Just curious if there >is any humanist/rationalist explanation for why I shouldn't do that >(and believe me, the desire to do so has crossed my mind more than >once). As far as this particular humanist is concerned, the recognition that "right is just an arbitrary social construct" doesn't mean in the least that you should therefore not do right. The overriding concept of humanism as I've understood it is basically "Don't be an asshole," or, more poetically, that good deeds are their own reward. You shouldn't do good in expectation of being rewarded in the afterlife, but because it's simply what you should do, for yourself and for society. This is a simple concept, but it eludes many people, like for instance my asshole brother, who has explained his born-again Christian views in terms of, when you get right down to it, a Get Out Of Jail Free card. (He would undoubtedly sputter mightily if he heard me put it in those terms, but that's exactly what it boils down to.) Apparently, this gives him license to be an adulterous, lying, self-righteous sack of shit with extremely shady business ethics. The way I figure it, one or the other of us is gonna be pretty damn surprised when we die, but I'm thinkin' it ain't me. S ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2001 18:22:43 -0400 From: "Chris Murtland" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: audio weenie / XTC In other words, "doing right" is a way to somehow feel better about myself psychologically, but that's about it. That may be a good enough reason, since it is generally more satisfying to feel positive things about myself rather than to feel negative things about myself. If this is the case, however, I wish everyone would just come out and say, "I am massaging my own ego." But I guess that's because I have some notion that "honesty is right," when that's just another culturally manufactured way to put band-aids on my ego. And maybe there is some merit to the idea that "being nice" is somehow beneficial to me as I try to stake my ground in the gene pool (some girls like the bad boys, though!). Sidebar: the fact that you are offended by your brother's behavior is the kind of human reaction that interests me. What is the source of this reaction to behavior we deem as "wrong"? I thought adultery, lying and pride were all things initially deemed as wrong by the early Jewish religion. I actually asked Scott about some of this (he seems interested in human mechanisms, too) in an interview I did in 1998 (that never saw the light of the day). I make no assertions about what his beliefs are, but at least in terms of how religion impacts culture in a sociological sense, his thoughts may be applicable. An excerpt: "Of course, I completely understand the difficulties of getting to where the great thinkers got. Even people like St. Augustine were typically these worldly skeptics until well into adulthood. Nowadays it's easier than ever to look at witch burnings and abortion clinic bombings and decide that Western religion is a bad idea that just won't go away, but all I can say is that if you pursue the matter, you'll come to see those things as a sad but predictable lapse back into the way things always used to be before there was such a thing as religions which allowed for the moral defense of an innocent who's persecuted by society at large. As lovely a portrait as Neil Young paints of South American Indians before the conquistadores came in 'Cortez the Killer,' there would be no walking up to an Aztec priest and saying 'wait, this woman is innocent, you can't sacrifice her.' Or, 'you can't invade this neighboring tribe, they're peaceful and harmless.' There is literally no way Aztecs could even understand what you were talking about. Granted, it's more objectionable when Cortez, a supposed Christian, comes marching in slaughtering, because there's personal hypocrisy we can point to. But realize that it is to Judeo-Christianity that we owe the very possibility of objecting to these things. And victimization is so deep a part of humanity that even institutions like the Catholic Church designed to prevent it are always going to backslide. Judaism and especially Christianity don't purport to have some magic, or some bureacratic machinery, ensuring their own freedom from corruption, any more than they would say 'man is incapable of sin' or 'priests don't have man's vulnerability to sin.'" Another excerpt that doesn't relate directly but may be good to hear amidst discussions that can often lead to tension among otherwise well-intentioned beings (although I have appreciated the calm tone used on this list): "T.S. Eliot in the epigraph to 'Burnt Norton' quoted Heraclitus, who was a very, very early Greek philosopher, and the translation was something like 'wisdom is common to everyone, but people all live as if they had their own private wisdom.' Boy, if you want the oldest, sturdiest piece of philosophical insight, you could do a lot worse than that." > As far as this particular humanist is concerned, the recognition that > "right is just an arbitrary social construct" doesn't mean in the least > that you should therefore not do right. The overriding concept of humanism > as I've understood it is basically "Don't be an asshole," or, more > poetically, that good deeds are their own reward. You shouldn't do good in > expectation of being rewarded in the afterlife, but because it's simply > what you should do, for yourself and for society. This is a simple > concept, but it eludes many people, like for instance my asshole brother, > who has explained his born-again Christian views in terms of, when you get > right down to it, a Get Out Of Jail Free card. (He would undoubtedly > sputter mightily if he heard me put it in those terms, but that's exactly > what it boils down to.) Apparently, this gives him license to be an > adulterous, lying, self-righteous sack of shit with extremely shady > business ethics. The way I figure it, one or the other of us is gonna be > pretty damn surprised when we die, but I'm thinkin' it ain't me. > > S ------------------------------ End of loud-fans-digest V1 #268 *******************************