new dispensation

third verse, same as the first.

you know how sometimes you're lying under the rubble of some collapsed building (that just totally for no good reason collapsed right the fuck on top of you without any warning (piece of crap!)), and at first your legs hurt so much - what with your knees and ankles being crushed and all - that you don't feel much else, but then they go numb at which point you start to realise that the real issue is the large concrete slab that is not just pinning you down (and you had sort of comforted yourself that it was also, silverliningly, serving as a shield, protecting you from random debris showers) but, uh-oh, el Slabbo is unstable, slowly working its way lower; every few hundred breaths, on an exhalation, it drops a millimeter, and when you inhale, the volume of air you can pull in is less.  you might say that you've had an inspiration - that your respiration is leading to your expiration (oh no don't laugh.  don't even chuckle.  oh and don't sob either.  just ... just think, and if you must breathe, do it gently).  and you know how the blood that was running into your left eye has dried and the crusty sensation down in that inside corner is not so pleasant, and you're getting quite thirsty, and worried about what might be happening to your numb legs, and worried that pretty soon you are going to start crying, and the problem is that then you won't be able to think very clearly, while those weepy-flavored neurochemicals go swirling around in there, which wouldn't be a problem, normally, except that this is, presumably, it.  this is it.  this.  oh for crying out loud.  don't laugh. it's not funny.

what are you talking about?

well, to put it another way, i went to see a godard film with mom.  pierrot le fou.  the godard influence on tarantino is patent.  yet tarantino did pulp fiction in the American Idiom.  vincent is right: they got the same shit over there that we got over here, but there, it's a little different. 

or maybe a lot different.  say what you will about the french, but i mean will you look at this?  the french logician jean-yves girard ends his book of lectures on proof-theory, the blind spot, with this:

Envoi: the price of dreams

 

That’s it, these lectures stop abruptly in the middle of a ford. One will thence not find here the definition of truth, nor the necessary connection between the finite and hyperfinite approaches, not to speak [of] the rules of iconoclast logic.  These developments are still at the stage of draft.

 

When I was young, logic made me dream; but the production of my dear colleagues makes me no longer dream, whether it is:

 

• Foundations in prestressed concrete, à la Tarski: measuring the relative strength of formal systems can be a technical tour de force. But in the same way, let us attach a small wheel to the painted sky that revolves -- as everybody knows -- around Earth, and heroic computations can be foreseen: the Tarski of many years ago was called Ptolemæus.

 

• Or fiddlings in all directions; thence those paraconsistants, who “solved” the question of consistency, i.e., of the existence of a law: in their world, it is forbidden to spit on the floor, period; but you can perfectly incite others to do so, or even piss in the soup. Here the magic reduces to the use of recondite languages, to the abuse of formalism, a formal iron curtain protecting paltry buffooneries.

 

All these people are petits bourgeois; mean, petty even in their transgressions: those of the accountant who makes off with the cash and flees with the parson’s maid.

 

I realise, while finishing this book, the discomfort of my position: it is that of somebody who really loves logic, insofar [as] it promises -- should promise -- an original opening on the world. Indeed, this discomfort is the price of dreams.

who ends a book on proof-theory with that?  i'll tell you who, a frenchman is who.  and roland omnes, and well what about grothendieck?  i mean really.

what are you blathering about?

the new dispensation, that's what.  it has nothing to do with mad french geniuses, nor with being buried alive.  (well, it may have something to do with death, because really, what doesn't?)  moral of the story = NO MORE SCREWING AROUND

meta-moral = i owe so many emails to people.  it's incomprehensible.

para-meta-moral = the blind spot is a hole in your vision that you don't even realise is there because your brain fills it in with a plausible fabrication. "They have no soul and they don’t know that they have no soul." -georg kreisel speaking about certain americans

the stupid ridiculous senselessness of it all

if the universe were a person, it would be a psychopath.

two weeks ago, a close friend of my parents died, after a long decline.  she was in her 80s.

a week ago, my aunt's beloved best friend, a real gentleman, died after a somewhat more abrupt confluence of health problems.  he was in his 80s.

Yesterday, one of my favorite students died.  She had been battling cancer for a while, but seemed to be winning.  Then suddenly she was very sick, and then gone in a couple days.  Shannon was special.  She was that marvelous combination of mature and childlike that seems so improbable until you encounter it.  Then, it seems so natural that it becomes baffling that all people aren't like that.  So funny, so silly, right up until the moment it's time to be serious -- then a switch is flipped, and she was all business.  I coached her in soccer for a couple seasons, and taught her algebra.  But I didn't really have much to teach her.  She already knew how to be the person she wanted to be.  We were like colleagues.  She was like an adult among children.  She tried so hard.  Not in order to win (as good as she was, even she couldn't carry the entire Bad News Bears on her back), but because she wanted to try so hard.  Once, she let her passion get the better of her momentarily, slid in hard on a tackle, and got a red card.  She was devastated.  Came off the field sobbing, tears of shame streaming down her cheeks (like a child - caring so much - among feckless adults).  It is beautiful to behold a person who tries so hard, and cares so much.  She was beautiful.  I haven't seen her in six years, but I still hear her voice.  "Hi Mr. Sides."  Goodbye, Shannon Hayes.

TMT - the FAQ

A: when i was in high school i came up with an invention called the 10-minute tunnel

A: it connects any two points and it takes ten minutes to walk between them no matter how far away they are

A: even if they're just down the block, still ten minutes

A: but you'd mostly use it for long distances

A: it's still in development stage though

B: what’s inside the tunnel? psychedelic swirly colors?

B: pure pure blackness?

A: it's hard to describe in human language

B: if i run as fast as i can, does it still take ten minutes?

A: yup

B: can two people go through?

A: of course

B: so what happens if one runs and the other walks?

A: ten minutes for each one

B: they come out the same exit, or different exits?

A: same exit

B: does the walker see the runner getting far ahead, or does he just run without moving ahead?

A: he gets farther ahead

B: when you get near ten minutes, do you see a light at the end?

A: nope

A: you just suddenly emerge at your chosen destination, shivering and wet

B: wet with sweat, or some other liquid?

A: well there's probably some sweat in there, but mostly interdimensional fluid

B: does sound work in the tunnel? if you go in with a friend, can you talk for the ten minutes?

A: as long as they don't get too far away. there's an air pocket around you so you can breathe, so sound can travel through that, but it doesn't fill the entire tunnel

B: if someone comes through going the other way, do you see them?

A: they're unidirectional

B: when you come out, are you shivering from fear or cold or interdimensional mind-strain?

A: mind-strain

A: well it's more like physical shock

B: if you are unconscious lying on a hospital gurney and your friend pushes you through, do you still suffer from the shock/strain?

A: yeah, your body still experienced interdimensional trauma, so it's reacting

B: is there cumulative damage?

A: probably. there haven't been any long term studies yet

B: or does one build up a tolerance?

B: i prefer things where my body builds up a tolerance

A: well you can be in the first trials if you want

A: i love that you're doing this, by the way

B: if i tie a rope to another person and walk in and the other person waits 9 minutes and then follows me in, what happens?

A: have you read house of leaves?

A: it's probably something like that

A: well the truth is we don't really know what will happen because we haven't run any experiments

B: ah. i forgot

A: but i'm guessing if you try to mess with it like that, somebody's going to die

****************************************************************

question: is it obvious which one is me?  A or B?  what i love is that if i didn't know, i don't think i could say.

****************************************************************

Moviement News

i am interested in mass movements.  how do they start?  what forces converge to turn simmering discontent into a wave of energy that can truly threaten to topple the prevailing order?

last week i watched an interesting documentary called The Weather Underground.  it centers on a group that started out as pacifist anti-war protesters who gradually became ever more radicalised until they finally started planting bombs and ended up on the fbi's most-wanted list.  (one of the leaders was bill ayers: you may remember that obama had to deal with some 'guilt-by-association' controversy since he and ayers moved in some of the same chicago social justice circles)

anyway, once the vietnam war ended, the entire movement fell apart.  this indicates two bad possibilities:

1) a mass movement can only be sustained as long as there is a rapacious villain committing unending atrocities.  people cannot be lemmingified if the villain is only committing the occasional manslaughter (US in iraq), or if the villain is just sort of perpetuating class differences and income inequality ('globalisers'), or is not really human at all but more like a consequence of the prevailing lifestyle (global warming).  you can get big crowds to come out and peacefully demonstrate in the designated location for the designated time period, and then go home, but they won't DO anything.

2) a mass movement can only be sustained as long as the people in the movement are directly threatened by the villain.  in the case of the vietnam war, the threat was the draft.  at the end of the film the interviewees are asked for thoughts on why the movement petered out, and the end of the draft was cited as a possible reason.

i thought a guy named david gilbert was the coolest, most gentle, articulate, thoughtful person in the film.  you can watch a 30-minute interview with him here. he also happens to be the only one still in prison.  for life.

back in asheville.

the good: i met up with three people i knew from the internet (1 westbound, 2 eastbound), and all three of them were super-cool in person.  smart, radical, funny.  yay internet.

also, i built some stone steps this summer.  if anyone out there wants some, i'll totally come build you some. 

my new CV:

the bad: i hardly got any studying done all summer.  horrible.  i was essentially without internet access, so your guess is as good as mine where the time went. 

also, i failed to meet up with the one internet friend i REALLY planned to meet.  bummer!

is that really all i have to say about the last 2.5 months?  yeah, i guess so.  that seems bad, too.

i'll never understand why people kill themselves, but sometimes i understand why people cut themselves

back when the "25 random things about me" meme swept across facebook, one thought that occurred to me was posting a collection of the best quotes from emails or letters or conversations that other people have addressed to you.  there is a big problem explaining oneself in one's own words (the fb idea).  better, i think, to use the words of others, when they are to be shared with others.  i don't have time right now to explain why, exactly.  difficult to put into words.  the danger of cliche or pretension or affect is greatly reduced.

1. from my aural memory, the sentence that shines the brightest was when the first love of my life said, near the end, "Rob, you exhaust me."

2. one of my favorite email quotes from the past few years is:  "There's a paradox that I feel from you. You're wealthy in time, and in resources, and certainly in intelligence, and in education. But you feel that pinch, that impending something, that winged chariot hurrying near. I'll be so glad to see you liberate yourself from that. You're worrying yourself for no reason."

3. and then, just last week, this gem: "Don’t take this personally, but being in love with you taught me not to have high expectations and always be prepared for the worst and never to demand anything." oh, what a treasure.  what a gift.  LOL!  the best thing about it is that i DON'T take it personally.  i'm loling in the library reading it again.  that's the best part, that she could understand me well enough to actually believe that she could say that to me and expect me not to take it personally.  and i didn't!  smiles all around.

(n.b., for people who know me in real life and want to know who wrote that, i'll just say that it's no one you know.  really.  who said it is not important.)