Psybertron Asks

Zen, Art and Motorcycles – a 40 year search for quality. A film by Lee Glover to be released in HD video summer / fall 2009.

Henry Gurr looking good in the promotional clip on-line at the above link.

Thanks to Euan Semple for the link to this Independent interview with John Gray, plugging his latest book “Gray’s Anatomy”.

I find the fact that he “predicted” the recent financial crisis utterly irrelevant, but the pragmatic political view of philosophy without fundamental isms and ideologies is refreshing. Interestingly, I was just reading a piece from 2006 by Matt Kundert in defense of isms. No-one likes to be pigeonholed within an ism, but like any classification it serves a purpose, which has nothing to do with being in any sense fundamental nor even clearly delineated or defined.

Interesting post from Ben Goertzel. Nihilism gets a bum rap. Discerning parody from reality – if something subtle or hard to understand is parodied on the basis of a simplistic view, then the simplistic view sticks. Time for a new name rather than flogging a dead horse by trying to rehabilitate the original name.

Not sure I’d agree that Dostoevsky ultimately relied on god or an “absolute” faith. Definitely a faith in a moral compass – a direction towards progressive good – once we are cast adrift from the idea of absolute objective truths.

Only one post in three weeks. Mentioned I’d enjoyed a weekend in Austin, TX, then spent the whole of the following week in Vegas (well Henderson, NV actually) at a conference – worst place on the planet IMHO, anyway …

Spent one day in New York on the trip home. My first, so I just spent the day walking the streets orienting myself. Starting early morning at Penn Station, Madison Square Garden, up the Empire State, Broadway, Columbus Circle, Central Park, Times Square, Greenwich Village, Hudson River, World Trade Center site, Brooklyn Bridge, The Bridge Cafe, Wall Steet, Battery Park, Staten Island Ferry, and the subway back up to Penn Station, and home to Oslo via Newark.

I was sick for a day or two on the return home, which was a shame because we had vistors this past week. After a few days of rain in Oslo, we drove over to Bergen for a couple of days. Bright clear warm weather worked out fine to see Hardangervidda and Hardangerfjord on the way over and Sognefjord on the way back – many of the lakes still substantially frozen, but lots of meltwater already swelling the many waterfalls. A good break.

Managed to complete Don Quixote (Smollett’s 1760’s translation of Cervantes 1610’s original) Volume 2 in the process. [Previously here.] The thousand pages of slapstick and masqued anecdotes amuses to the end, returning home to die. The knight was often misguided but his aim always true, the whole thrust being to question which is reality and which madness. Sancho Panza gets it; when logic fails, the question is “What is good?”

“Senor, a large river separated two districts of one and the same lordship–will your worship please to pay attention, for the case is an important and a rather knotty one? Well then, on this river there was a bridge, and at one end of it a gallows, and a sort of tribunal, where four judges commonly sat to administer the law which the lord of river, bridge and the lordship had enacted, and which was to this effect, ‘If anyone crosses by this bridge from one side to the other he shall declare on oath where he is going to and with what object; and if he swears truly, he shall be allowed to pass, but if falsely, he shall be put to death for it by hanging on the gallows erected there, without any remission.’ Though the law and its severe penalty were known, many persons crossed, but in their declarations it was easy to see at once they were telling the truth, and the judges let them pass free. It happened, however, that one man, when they came to take his declaration, swore and said that by the oath he took he was going to die upon that gallows that stood there, and nothing else. The judges held a consultation over the oath, and they said, ‘If we let this man pass free he has sworn falsely, and by the law he ought to die; but if we hang him, as he swore he was going to die on that gallows, and therefore swore the truth, by the same law he ought to go free.’ It is asked of your worship, senor governor, what are the judges to do with this man? For they are still in doubt and perplexity; and having heard of your worship’s acute and exalted intellect, they have sent me to entreat your worship on their behalf to give your opinion on this very intricate and puzzling case.”

[ …. ]

“Look here, my good sir,” said Sancho; “either I’m a numskull or else there is the same reason for this passenger dying as for his living and passing over the bridge; for if the truth saves him the falsehood equally condemns him; and that being the case it is my opinion you should say to the gentlemen who sent you to me that as the arguments for condemning him and for absolving him are exactly balanced, they should let him pass freely, as it is always more praiseworthy to do good than to do evil; this I would give signed with my name if I knew how to sign; and what I have said in this case is not out of my own head, but one of the many precepts my master Don Quixote gave me the night before I left to become governor of this island, that came into my mind, and it was this, that when there was any doubt about the justice of a case I should lean to mercy; and it is God’s will that I should recollect it now, for it fits this case as if it was made for it.”

“That is true,” said the majordomo; “and I maintain that Lycurgus himself, who gave laws to the Lacedemonians, could not have pronounced a better decision than the great Panza has given; let the morning’s audience close with this, and I will see that the senor governor has dinner entirely to his liking.”

(PS This quoted text actually from John Ormsby’s 1880’s text in the Project Gutenberg edition.)

Had a weekend free between business in Houston last week and conference in Vegas this week, so I spent Friday & Saturday on my first visit to Austin, TX.

The SXSW festival was a couple of weeks ago, so I had no idea what to expect from Austin. I’d noticed Todd Snider supporting Yonder Mountain String Band at Stubbs BBQ, so I had a reason to drive up to Austin anyway (even though Todd was also playing Houston House of Blues on the Saturday). Have to say as support, Todd’s set was too brief, but good to see the Stubbs place – a little outdoor “festival” site. Too many in the audience who seemed to know Todd’s songs (Todd has serious fans), singing, whoopin & hollering in recognition at the choruses and riffs, but talking loudly through his verses. YMSB were just not to my taste … trading mandolin and banjo licks … clever, but ….

It turns out Austin is a real bluesy town – live music bars over several blocks downtown, all year round, and particularly lively this weekend with the Urban Music Festival in town … rap on every corner, surreal number of uniformed black biker groups cruisin on their choppers amongst the pimped sound systems on wheels …. with hundreds of Austin’s finest taking their meal-breaks in the bars too. Made for a great atmosphere in the spring warmth … did I mention the meadow flowers lining route 290 on the drive up … beautiful ?

Anyway, blues … Canadian Jo Hell at Latitude 30 – stunning range, technique and an entertainer. Swamp Sauce at Friends with Dave K on guitar (and the tiniest practice amp at full volume) and Jeff Clark on harp and vocals (the latter so reminded me of Graham Parker) great sounds and energy.

The Urban Music Festival after show party (recommended by the latter), at Antone’s (now there’s a place), with Bavu Blakes in front of a real strong band …. rappers not usually to my taste, but done with wit and I enjoyed him/them, supporting Gary Clark Jr. Another great young blues guitarist – heavy too, doubly heavy with Eric Zapata on the very loud and very different rhythm guitar – good job the two obviously get on. Good and loud.

Anyway, judging by the number of live music bars, as many as Nashville and Memphis put together it seemed, looks like my kinda place. I mean I really like Nashville; as well as the obvious lower-Broad venues catering to the C&W tourists, it actually has plenty of real music too, but Austin was kinda like Nashville without the cheese. Good looking place too, the mix of modern high-rise corporate statements and old stone / warehouse blocks, and a little Chicago-style “gothic” high-rise too. By way of variety, after watching the bats (and the water-fowl / pond-life) at sundown under the Congress Bridge, and sunset on the state capitol, I treated myself to a meal at Trulucks Crab House, complete with cocktail pianist. Good food and good service, courtesy of Pedro.

Not had chance to read and digest this yet, but I suspect it will prove interesting. The word has been “meta” (in information management) since just before the turn of the millenium. Metametaphysics.

As well as the obvious move in the meta direction towards abstraction as generalization as the basis for … whatever … I can’t help thinking Hostader’s “Tabletop” arms race for ever more creative metaphors will be at the root of this. There is of course a Chalmers / Hofstadter historical connection too.

Twice on one day. The Tabletop came to mind when I was reading (previous post) about the failure of models to “represent” reality, whilst modelling is clearly “part of the process of” reality. A new way of thinking. The way of reality? Sorry, just thinking out loud.

(And another interesting post from Chalmers on the extended mind.)

Interesting post from Johnnie Moore. I know how he feels.

Roads

via Rivets

This is neat too. And the cables, and the trick bowling … and …

A new series of three essays and one poem from Alan Rayner, each describing his transfigural, inclusional “new way of thinking” … one which emphasizes neighbourhood over self & other, natural inclusion over natural selection, co-creation over winning & losing, love over conflict … using many of Alan’s established metaphors and quotations.

This quote from Wordsworth recurs “in Nature everything is distinct, yet nothing defined into absolute, independent, singleness.” I often use “we murder to dissect” from Table’s Turn’d, but Alan’s quote is from this Wordsworth passage:

Having had the good fortune to be born and reared in a mountainous Country, from my very childhood I have felt the falsehood that pervades the volumes imposed upon the World under the name of Ossian. From what I saw with my own eyes, I knew that the imagery was spurious. In nature every thing is distinct, yet nothing defined into absolute independent singleness. In Macpherson’s work it is exactly the reverse; every thing (that is not stolen) is in this manner defined, insulated, dislocated, deadened–yet nothing distinct. It will always be so when words are substituted for things.

When words are substituted for things. Every word is a gravestone.

I mentioned  starting to read Gibbon only a few weeks ago, a “couple of years” after picking it up from the bookshelf at my parent’s home, and just noticed it was more like 4 years ago I first posted this.

Anyway still reading it slowly, to and from work mainly. It is indeed the language that makes it so readable, and the antiquity that means there is no need to hurry … we already know how it all ends.

Anyway, in the latest installment (Ch 22 & 23) our subject is the emperor Julian (351 to 353 AD), a wise head on young shoulders who sounds like he’d be right at home in the recent fundamentalist God vs Science debates, a direct reaction to the original Constantine / Constantius / Constans formal Roman adoption and enforcement of Christian theism.

A devout and sincere attachment for the gods of Athens and Rome constituted the ruling passion of Julian; the powers of an enlightened understanding were betrayed and corrupted by the influence of superstitious prejudice; and the phantoms which existed only in the mind of the emperor had a real and pernicious effect on the government of the empire. 

The crowd of sophists, who were attracted by the taste and liberality of their royal pupil, had formed a strict alliance between the learning and the religion of Greece; and the poems of Homer, instead of being admired as the original productions of human genius, were seriously ascribed to the heavenly inspiration of Apollo and the muses. The deities of Olympus, as they are painted by the immortal bard, imprint themselves on the minds which are the least addicted to superstitious credulity. Our familiar knowledge of their names and characters, their forms and attributes, seems to bestow on those airy beings a real and substantial existence; and the pleasing enchantment produces an imperfect and momentary assent of the imagination to those fables, which are the most repugnant to our reason and experience. In the age of Julian, every circumstance contributed to prolong and fortify the illusion; the magnificent temples of Greece and Asia; the works of those artists who had expressed, in painting or in sculpture, the divine conceptions of the poet; the pomp of festivals and sacrifices; the successful arts of divination; the popular traditions of oracles and prodigies; and the ancient practice of two thousand years. The weakness of polytheism was, in some measure, excused by the moderation of its claims; and the devotion of the Pagans was not incompatible with the most licentious scepticism. Instead of an indivisible and regular system, which occupies the whole extent of the believing mind, the mythology of the Greeks was composed of a thousand loose and flexible parts, and the servant of the gods was at liberty to define the degree and measure of his religious faith. The creed which Julian adopted for his own use was of the largest dimensions; and, by strange contradiction, he disdained the salutary yoke of the gospel, whilst he made a voluntary offering of his reason on the altars of Jupiter and Apollo. One of the orations of Julian is consecrated to the honor of Cybele, the mother of the gods, who required from her effeminate priests the bloody sacrifice, so rashly performed by the madness of the Phrygian boy. The pious emperor condescends to relate, without a blush, and without a smile, the voyage of the goddess from the shores of Pergamus to the mouth of the Tyber, and the stupendous miracle, which convinced the senate and people of Rome that the lump of clay, which their ambassadors had transported over the seas, was endowed with life, and sentiment, and divine power. For the truth of this prodigy he appeals to the public monuments of the city; and censures, with some acrimony, the sickly and affected taste of those men, who impertinently derided the sacred traditions of their ancestors.

But the devout philosopher, who sincerely embraced, and warmly encouraged, the superstition of the people, reserved for himself the privilege of a liberal interpretation; and silently withdrew from the foot of the altars into the sanctuary of the temple. The extravagance of the Grecian mythology proclaimed, with a clear and audible voice, that the pious inquirer, instead of being scandalized or satisfied with the literal sense, should diligently explore the occult wisdom, which had been disguised, by the prudence of antiquity, under the mask of folly and of fable. The philosophers of the Platonic school, Plotinus, Porphyry, and the divine Iamblichus, were admired as the most skilful masters of this allegorical science, which labored to soften and harmonize the deformed features of Paganism. Julian himself, who was directed in the mysterious pursuit by Ædesius, the venerable successor of Iamblichus, aspired to the possession of a treasure, which he esteemed, if we may credit his solemn asseverations, far above the empire of the world. It was indeed a treasure, which derived its value only from opinion; and every artist who flattered himself that he had extracted the precious ore from the surrounding dross, claimed an equal right of stamping the name and figure the most agreeable to his peculiar fancy. The fable of Atys and Cybele had been already explained by Porphyry; but his labors served only to animate the pious industry of Julian, who invented and published his own allegory of that ancient and mystic tale. This freedom of interpretation, which might gratify the pride of the Platonists, exposed the vanity of their art. Without a tedious detail, the modern reader could not form a just idea of the strange allusions, the forced etymologies, the solemn trifling, and the impenetrable obscurity of these sages, who professed to reveal the system of the universe. As the traditions of Pagan mythology were variously related, the sacred interpreters were at liberty to select the most convenient circumstances; and as they translated an arbitrary cipher, they could extract from any fable any sense which was adapted to their favorite system of religion and philosophy. 

The theological system of Julian appears to have contained the sublime and important principles of natural religion. The invariable order of the sun, moon, and stars, was hastily admitted by Julian, as a proof of their eternal duration; and their eternity was a sufficient evidence that they were the workmanship, not of an inferior deity, but of the Omnipotent King. In the system of Platonists, the visible was a type of the invisible world. The celestial bodies, as they were informed by a divine spirit, might be considered as the objects the most worthy of religious worship. The Sun, whose genial influence pervades and sustains the universe, justly claimed the adoration of mankind, as the bright representative of the Logos, the lively, the rational, the beneficent image of the intellectual Father.

In every age, the absence of genuine inspiration is supplied by the strong illusions of enthusiasm, and the mimic arts of imposture. If, in the time of Julian, these arts had been practised only by the pagan priests, for the support of an expiring cause, some indulgence might perhaps be allowed to the interest and habits of the sacerdotal character. But it may appear a subject of surprise and scandal, that the philosophers themselves should have contributed to abuse the superstitious credulity of mankind, and that the Grecian mysteries should have been supported by the magic or theurgy of the modern Platonists. They arrogantly pretended to control the order of nature, to explore the secrets of futurity, to command the service of the inferior dæmons, to enjoy the view and conversation of the superior gods, and by disengaging the soul from her material bands, to reunite that immortal particle with the Infinite and Divine Spirit.

Well I never: “… the occult wisdom, which had been disguised, by the prudence of antiquity, under the mask of folly and of fable”. Dear prudence. (All other emphasis in Gibbon’s original.)