I (heart) America
The problem with America is not that we are a country of buffoons, rather, our buffoons make for the best of our television and, hence, we are cursed (and blessed) to carry their reputation with us, always.
This is not my problem, however. Mine is explaining two things to every African I meet: that I am not Jackie Chan and that, no, I don’t know how to fly.
As for Europeans, how do you explain to them that in some ways WE ARE EXACTLY LIKE THEM:
Twilight
I just saw Twilight three times. Why, might you ask, would I devote so much time to a movie so fantastically bad, with acting so poor I’m sending Robert Pattinson (right now) a single dollar so he can buy a clue, when I have so little time as it is? Well… work. I wanted to know how Summit pulled this caper off, why it got so lucky (Twilight did massive box office).
Now I know.
Twilight tries to be neither slick nor smooth. It’s awkward and angsty and clumsy all at the same time — the epitome of high school. This is how people relate to the movie, pimples and all. Most people think it takes lots to impress teenagers, that you need fantastic special effects and incredible graphics. Not true. Apparently, all you really need is to tell a story that they can relate to — and they will, no matter how fantastically bad.
Calling Out Chanequa
The Harvard Crimson reports Chanequa N. Campbell ’09 is being barred from graduating because of her alleged involvement with the recent shooting at Kirkland. This is bullshit. Her involvement, it seems, is based upon evidence pointing to her (and another, Brittany J. Smith ’09) as the means to which the victim, Justin Cosby, was able to get into the dorm. The problem is that all kinds of non-Harvard people sneak into the houses. You can’t use that as a basis for kicking someone out — what if you need 25 pizzas delivered? I sure as hell ain’t going to carry all that into the dining hall myself (that’s the DELIVERY guy’s job).
Moreover, crime, in America, is judged by a jury of one’s peers.
So let’s say Chanequa is exonerated in the end. She’ll get her diploma and (probably) a very nice apology letter, as well as a lifetime of these never-ending e-mails and letters from the Alumni Association asking for money. And let’s say she’s not, and this emboldens Harvard to continue judging without balanced review. Either way, something substantial is lost.
Bottom line: believe it or not, people invest a lot to go to Harvard. There are sleepless nights and impossible loans and all those goddamn tourists with their goddamn cameras. The transaction is not one-sided. Harvard does indeed brighten the lives of her graduates, but Harvard sometimes forgets that her reputation is burnished by these very same lives. We bet on you, Harvard. Would it be too much to ask that you, perhaps, at times, go out on a limb and bet on us?
Where I’ve Been
So, I’ve spent the last 28 hours hitchhiking from London to Luton, then to Luton airport, where I slept on a very uncomfortable blue padded chair for five hours before having a Whopper. Afterward, we all tried unsuccessfully to get to Leicester — but are now back in London, on the way to Sheffield.
If it sounds confusing, it’s because I’m involved in one of the most poorly-planned TV productions ever. (And, though I’m fine with the cold and the rain and the exhaustion, I would really like Mr. Producer to involve more hookers in the show.)
Too much time…
Maybe because it was Towel Day yesterday, or maybe because I’m about to flunk out of my Master’s program at UCL, but today Little Homey and Big Mo and I are going to try to make it to Manchester — with our thumbs. We’re hitchhiking, which is probably a bad idea, but hey — Little Homey’s got a girl in Sheffield he’d like to see, and I’m all about making things like that happen.
At the very least, it’ll give me time to catch up on some David Foster Wallace.
Neuroscience and War
The New Scientist examines the use of neuroscience in developing better soldiers.
If a soldier is struggling, a digital “buddy” might step in and warn them about nearby threats, or advise comrades to zap them with an electromagnet to increase their alertness. If the whole unit is falling apart, biosensors could warn central commanders to send in a replacement team.
I have a problem with the far-term (10-20 years) goal of in-vehicle transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS; “zap them with an electromagnet”). It just hasn’t been studied enough to know if there are any significant long-term effects associated with TMS. Putting troops at risk unnecessarily reveals the problem here: you have too many non-military, experimental scientists working together. There needs to be more overlap. The scientists need to know what it’s like to be a soldier, with a pregnant wife at home, wondering if all that brain zapping is going to give him Alzheimer’s. (And why couldn’t you just do it pharmacologically? Seems easier to carry adenosine-blocking pills than a TMS.)
Moreover, I think the approach is all wrong. American soldiers are at the top of the food chain. If you work to improve their current capabilities, you’re struggling for single-digit yields. Nothing you do is going to make, for example, a 10% difference in performance. I think a superior goal would be to improve our intelligence-gathering using neuroscience; namely, truth detection (for interrogation). Improving non-combat intelligence will lead to amazingly-better battlefield outcomes with what we currently have. More importantly, we can then fight insurgency on our terms, not theirs: good truth detection should lead to fast and efficient capture of enemy commanders (like Osama Bin Laden). And isn’t that the whole point?
Ultra-lux White-Glove Real Estate Ads
This has taken a while, presumably because I’m recuperating from exams (but really because I’m a lazy fuck), but the NY Times featured Valerie Haboush, RE ad writer to the elite, recently.
The Dirtiest Law
Recently, I posted a note at Jason Kottke’s blog about a situation he got caught up in at the playground. What happened, according to Kottke, was this: some kid came up to his child and slapped him, twice, unprovoked. Kottke, in response, grabs the kid and tries to talk to him, but then his mother comes up and asks, threateningly, if he was planning to hit her child.
My response was that Kottke failed as a parent because he didn’t protect his kid right away. Worse, still, was that he grabbed the other kid — that can be construed as assault. I basically said he should’ve pushed the other kid away right away and secured his own child before confronting the mother. THIS IS THE RIGHT THING TO DO, legally. No person has a right to judge the parenting skills of another person. We have laws, determined by the community, to do that.
Some douche-bag, in response, says I’m wrong. He says we should all teach children the right thing to do. Right, dumbass. Let that filthy Cornell grad next door teach your kid how to pick up warts in the public shower. Or maybe Ginger girl, who recently wore a skirt so short that when she bent over in front of me in the laundry room I was able to see what she had for lunch — maybe she can teach your child how to bite off toenails at the dinner table.
The problem is not that most people are bad parents, the problem is that most people are of average intelligence and, as a consequence, cannot see the fine details apparent to only the most intelligent of us. What if the mother decided to call the police and plea, “this man grabbed my child like he was going to rip his arm off! Officer, please help us, I’m so scared. He won’t leave us alone!” What Kottke doesn’t seem to understand is that police officers and judges base decisions on how you tell your story — not truth, per se — and his story put him in a lot of danger.
The general rule is that everyone should know all laws: ignorance is not a viable defense. Yet, most people — average common folk — have no idea about law. And that is just sad.
Don’t take my word for it. I’ve long discouraged friends from investing in Britain. Why? Because English law favors “equality” among partners in the event of a divorce. That means, your wife can cheat on you then sue you for half, even though your pre-nup says otherwise.
Hilariously, English divorce lawyer Raymond Tooth alludes to this in today’s New York Times.
For years, just the word that London’s premier divorce lawyer, Raymond Tooth, was calling was enough to spread fear and loathing among a certain class of wealthy British men. It meant that no fortune, no matter how large and protected, was likely to remain intact.
Now don’t get me wrong: I don’t believe in pre-nups. Commitment, to me, is absolute: you commit what you commit. If you commit your life to someone, you commit your entire life — including the money. (If you’re afraid to do this then you clearly don’t date enough.) But this is different. You entered into an agreement, you made a deal, and English law says it’s O.K. to back out of it. There is something dishonourable about that, something dirty, like grime on a shower wall — hard to see, but definitely there.
Ali G and Noam Chomsky
Noam Chomsky laid the foundation for modern linguistics. Seems fitting that Ali G would try to fit a word in edgewise.
Kirkland is straight hood
What kept me astonished — flabbergasted — during my years living in Cambridge was the obvious targeting of Harvard students. Here you have a population of skinny, socially-inept kids who, for the most part, are from bourgeois homes couched in “typical” (read: bourgeois) American neighborhoods, the kind of people that are taught to give up money and not resist; in other words, perfect victims. It is not difficult to predict how easily, then, they can be victimized — and they often are, leaving one to wonder if HUPD does anything more than put out warnings.
Anyway — The Crimson reports that someone was shot at Kirkland house. This does not surprise me, given that just about anyone can walk into the houses. Hilariously, it wasn’t even a Harvard student.
Note: I always wanted to cart five or six large chemical barrels (empty, of course), marked “EXPLOSIVE” into Emerson and the Science Center — just to see how easily it could be done. Alas, this is a prank likely destined to be carried out by some poor, hapless Yalie.
J.J. Abrams’ Magic Box
I recently had the displeasure of watching the new X-Men movie (or, actually, the new Wolverine movie).
Bryan Singer, who had made the first couple of X-Men movies, had the brilliant idea of focusing on the characters, the idea being that these mutants were actually people, real people, who were just trying to find their place in the world. His successors, however, disagreed and fucked up an otherwise wonderful franchise with some very un-special effects.
Don’t get me wrong: I love good special effects (and yes, I’m on line for Transformers). But flash should never supplant substance. Story first. Always.
J.J. Abrams talks about this very thing at TED. He talks about, surprisingly, childhood memories at Tannen’s magic shop on 25th street and how a Tannen’s Mystery Box shaped his creative perspective on film-making.
Abrams’ premise is this: with the Tannen’s Box, $15 buys you $50 worth of magic, only you don’t know what is inside. He’s never opened the box, because, presumably, the box itself is magical: it represents infinite possibility. It’s as if Abrams’ is saying, “why open the box when my conception of it is so massive?” Or, more generally: when you wake up in the morning, life is a blank slate — What incredible thing are you going to do — right now — to live up to the value of one entire day of your life?
Abrams’, through his Mystery Box, reveals layered, abstruse intelligence — indicative of his directing style (i.e., using character depth to generate mystery, which generates more depth), and, you know what? I’ve never watched Lost and never cared for Alias, but Mr. J.J. Abrams, my name is James, and I’m your biggest fan.
Exactly.
MoMA’s new short reveals everything right about the art world today. Savor it, then, because much of everything else is wrong.
Natalie Portman, Between Two Ferns
Natalie Portman on Zach Galifianakis’ show, Between Two Ferns. This is, in a word, sublime.
Damn Europeans
This is classically European. If you understand the awkward sensibility of this ad, I believe you’ll understand what it’s like to live in Europe (specifically the west).
Meeting Goliath
When I was an undergrad, I knew I wasn’t the smartest or fastest or best student. What I did know was that I trained with a world-champion Thai boxer and he taught me to be tough; tough enough to stay up all day and all night, studying.
Malcolm Gladwell explores this concept, of using effort to supplant weakness in skill, in his latest New Yorker article.
“And it happened as the Philistine arose and was drawing near David that David hastened and ran out from the lines toward the Philistine,” the Bible says. “And he reached his hand into the pouch and took from there a stone and slung it and struck the Philistine in his forehead.” The second sentence—the slingshot part—is what made David famous. But the first sentence matters just as much. David broke the rhythm of the encounter. He speeded it up. “The sudden astonishment when David sprints forward must have frozen Goliath, making him a better target,” the poet and critic Robert Pinsky writes in “The Life of David.” Pinsky calls David a “point guard ready to flick the basketball here or there.” David pressed. That’s what Davids do when they want to beat Goliaths.
What Gladwell is getting at is that you, as an underdog, cannot play by the rules of Goliath — doing so only ensures your loss. What you must do, instead, is exploit weaknesses — lapses in logic — within the context and apply effort in those instances (”look for strengths where things are naturally weak”). Wonderfully, Gladwell describes Rick Pitino’s (yes, the coach) use of frame control to dominate stronger teams.
Pitino trains his players to look for what he calls the “rush state” in their opponents—that moment when the player with the ball is shaken out of his tempo…
In effect, Gladwell is talking about intelligence. Why, then, does this sound so fresh and new? Because there is a dearth of intelligence in our world.
Another Death at Harvard
The Harvard Crimson reports the death of sophmore Kathlene Joo ‘11 as the fourth undergrad to pass this year. FOUR? Does that not seem disproportionate?
Some commentary on the Crimson’s website suggests neuroenhancing drugs may have been at play. If so, shame on Study Council and the UC (and, really, HUPD) for not doing more to address the issue.
UPDATE (May 8, 2009): The Crimson did not make an error; there are are indeed four: Joo, Peter Cai, and Clarel Antoine and M.J. Friedman. (Thanks J.A.P.C.K.)
The Multi-tasking Myth
John Tierney, writing for the NY Times, discusses focused attention and cognitive overload.
“It takes a lot of your prefrontal brain power to force yourself not to process a strong input like a television commercial,” said Dr. Desimone, the director of the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at M.I.T. “If you’re trying to read a book at the same time, you may not have the resources left to focus on the words.”
Conclusion? Multitasking is a myth:
“Multitasking is a myth,” Ms. Gallagher [author of Rapt] said. “You cannot do two things at once. The mechanism of attention is selection: it’s either this or it’s that.” She points to calculations that the typical person’s brain can process 173 billion bits of information over the course of a lifetime.
“People don’t understand that attention is a finite resource, like money,” she said. “Do you want to invest your cognitive cash on endless Twittering or Net surfing or couch potatoing? You’re constantly making choices, and your choices determine your experience, just as William James said.”
No. . . Really?
An internal evaluation of the World Bank’s AIDS projects around the world reports they are not performing well.
Seven of 10 AIDS projects that the bank financed around the world — and 8 of 10 in Africa — had unsatisfactory outcomes, according to the evaluation, released Thursday.
The projects were typically too complex for the weak or inexperienced bureaucracies carrying them out, researchers found. And coordinating the plethora of donors, nonprofit groups and government agencies involved made delivering results very difficult.
Funny. In Africa, the World Bank and Global Fund are what government officials use to finance their nice homes and cars. All the expats living there know that. Maybe, then, you should’ve hired someone with relevant experience before doling the money out. (And yes, maybe the governments involved are incompetent — but it’s your show, so it’s your responsibility.)
Executioner’s Song
An executioner in Saudi Arabia tells his tales.
“If the heart is compassionate, the hand fails.”