This a traditional letter column.
You are encouraged to write a letter of comment on anything that you
find worthy of comment. It will (may) be published in this column along
with my reply. As editor I reserve the right to delete material;
however I will not alter the undeleted material. E-mail to me that solely
references the contents of this site will be assumed to be publishable
mail. All other e-mail is assumed to be private. And, of course, anything
marked not for publication is not for publication. Oh yes, letters of
appreciation for the scholarly resources provided by this site will be
handled very discreetly. This page contains the correspondence for
January 1998.
Index of contributors
Other Correspondence Pages
From: L. Hunter Cassells
Date: 12/30/97
Subj: A choice that cannot be made
“My will is that you choose.” Except God cannot divest Himself of
that power; He is the only one that has it, and even putting Himself
at your disposal, so to speak, is His choice, for which He alone is
accountable.
Whether I obey you or disobey, I choose, and the responsibility
is mine, mine alone, and never my commander’s.
Hmmm. This gets tricky. Your point as I take it is that choices
and the responsibility for those choices can never, in the nature of
things, be passed off to others. One way to look at it is that this
is not your choice – it is God’s choice. All you can do is offer God
advice. Very well, put it this way:
God says to you “I am contemplating one of two actions – eternal salvation
for you and eternal damnation for everyone else or else eternal salvation
for everyone else and eternal damnation for you. I demand of you your
opinion as to which of these two actions I should take.”
The natural thing to do is to refuse to make a choice. God being God,
however, can compel you to make a choice. You might refuse until the
moment of compulsion comes and your answer, so to speak, pops out by
itself. But this would not be a conscious choice. Can God compel you
to make a conscious choice? Not, I opine, under the ground rules of
Christianity.
You might build in a “default” choice. If the choice was made by my
walking through the left door or the right one, I might answer by
choosing to die in between and never pass either one; but if the
choice was made by staying put or leaving by (either) door, then the
choice is forced.
This is another variation of “Can God force you to make a choice?”
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From: Alfred Lehmberg
Date: 12/30/97
Subj: Great site!
At first blush our priorities seem to parallel. Enjoy, and agree with
many of your positions. Looking forward to keeping up with you — expect
my periodic visit to your site.
Explore the Alien View?
http://www.fortunecity.com/roswell/arecibo/46/
Thunk you, nice to hear from you and all that good stuff.
I took a look at your site – some interesting stuff there.
But I don’t have priorities – I have seniorities.
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From: LaVirg
Date: 12/22/97
Subj: Waiting for Godot?
I read your interpretations for Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and it seems to me
as if you understand even the most absurd. So, I have a question for
you……… Do you or can you find postmodern aspects of the play? You are
perhaps the only person who can help me with this, and since you know so
much…………………………………………….. If you write back,
I’d be much obliged.
Sincerely, Andrea ( the confused college student)
I’ll try to answer although if I were you I wouldn’t put any great stock
in my answer if you’re looking for a grade.
One of the problems with saying “postmodern aspects” is that postmodern and
postmodernism are labels that are used for a lot of different things.
Waiting For Godot is a quintessential example of the Theatre of The Absurd
which, in different forms, was quite popular after the world wars. In its
simplest form it says that life – the complex life of the culture that we
live in – doesn’t make sense. It holds a mirror up to that senselessness.
As such it was a natural reaction in the aftermath of the great wars. Our
cultures are supposed to make sense to us. That is, they provide ready
explanations for what we do within them and why we do them. More than that
they are expected to deliver – to take care of our needfuls including our
sense of security. Theatre of the Absurd is a trick – take an incomprehensible
element of life within the culture and strip everything else away.
It’s been a good while since I’ve seen a production of WFG so memory may
fail me but, as I recall it, it’s a pretty simple play in structure. You
two elements – the two citizens waiting for contact with a remote authority
and the master/servant who may be taken as symbols of the aristocratic
upper class/lower class. Puzo represents the past; the two main characters
are people in the modern incomprehensible state. As to who they are waiting
for, my little satire points out that different explanatory systems provide
different explanations. Each of them provides jargon and formulas of
explanation. I suppose you could say that the satire is a structuralist
analysis – it points to the common structure of how these different
explanatory systems have a common structure.
The terms used in post-modern circles for what I have called ‘explanatory
systems’ are grand narratives and meta-narratives. It is a very post-modern
thing to do to look at meta-narratives with a jaundiced eye. Meta-narratives
do two things that post-modernists point to. They substitute for the actual
an explanation of the actual. (Hence the emphasis on looking only at the text.)
They also are politicized. That is, a meta-narrative gives privelege to
certains concepts and modes of thinking; the priveleges within the meta-narrative
reflect the interests and values of the priveleged class that propounded the
meta-narrative.
Perhaps a post-modern way of looking at WFG is that it makes it evident that
the meta-narratives don’t explain what they purport to explain. The
incomprehensible remains incomprehensible after the explanation is over.
After the babblers are through babbling they are still waiting for Godot.
Another thought along these lines is that Derrida devotes attention to the
idea of the Messiah as the unplanned future that is to come.
I don’t know if this is of any help but it may give you a few thoughts to
play with.
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From: Henning Strandin
Date: 01/06/97
Subj: editorial dec 29
As always, it is a pleasure to visit your site. I thought I’d contribute
some semi-relevant thoughts on the web as an encyclopedia (it became
quite long, sorry about that).
That’s quite all right. I enjoy long letters, particularly
interesting ones such as yours. As a bonus they are material
for the ever-expanding web site that I don’t have to write.
I believe you are right in comparing the web to your other reference
literature. This is how I use the web much of the time. There is one
fundamental difference though. On the shelves of the web can not only be
found books and writings, but also human beings, with personal
experiences from professions, cultures, hobbies, you name it. This is in
my opinion what really makes the web an ‘encyclopedia humana’ (please
correct my latin, it is non-existent). The fact is, the recipe you were
looking for was out there somewhere, and you managed to get hold of
it. One might protest that Usenet, IRC and e-mail correspondence is not
part of the web as such. It isn’t. But hyper-links in ICQ, Usenet
archives on the web and HTML in e-mail etc, will soon make the
distinction irrelevant, I think.
Along these lines the web is part of what I will call experience
of the the third kind. Experience of the first kind is direct
experience – we walk, we talk, we interact directly with people.
Reading text and looking at pictures is experience of the second
kind. The medium is passive – we produce the sensory experience
in our imagination and thought. The electronic media is a new
kind of experience, experience of the third kind, which is still
developing and expanding. The media is active and not passive,
yet it is not the immediate experience of the first kind.
This encyclopedia can also be used for all kinds of not-so obvious
tasks. E.g., English is not my maternal language. I have an on-line
dictionary among my bookmarks, but it’s far from complete. When I need
to check the spelling of a more unusual word, I use Altavista. I make a
search for the word, if I get 50 hits, all in non-English speaking
countries, I conclude that it’s the wrong spelling, but a common enough
mistake. If I get 3000 hits with a large part from sites that end with
.edu, I can safely assume that it’s the right spelling. I can also
search for a whole phrase, to see what this phrase means, and even get
an idea of what kind of people use it and get it in a cultural context.
This encyclopedia is really like no other before it.
Hmmm. That’s an interesting trick that I hadn’t thought of.
I have a dictionary (the print and paper kind) immediately at
hand – it’s a bit handier than going to alta vista and doing a
search. On the other hand it isn’t the OED so that’s a trick
worth remembering. A friend introduced me to web bingo. The
game is to simply think of names that are likely to be used at
site names, e.g. http://www.foobar.com (which is real) or
http://www.fubar.com (which doesn’t exist). One turns up all sorts
of randomness this way. There is a nifty site that provides domain
lookup, , which will tell you if any domain name is available.
Finally, about the web being unreliable as a source. It’s impossible to
use the web for research without practicing good critical analysis of
the sources you find. You need to get multiple confirmations and make a
check-up on the authors if you can. I know it has taught me to be more
critical towards traditionally published writings too. This, I think, is
a Good Thing. So this is the one point were I don’t agree with you. I
don’t think the net will propagate pseudo-science, but maybe teach us to
be more critical in our approach to other people’s writings. After all,
getting multiple sources is often a matter of seconds on the web, while
at the library, it may take hours or days.
It’s sort of a mixed bag. One of the plusses is that a lot of
reliable sources such as the leading science journals are on-line.
This means that if I create a page on a subject I can link directly
to my references. On the other hand my page is not refereed. This
is a problem. The vast bulk of material on the web is not validated
by anybody except the web page author. A major aim of the enterprise
of science is to produce reliable knowledge of the world.
This is not a simple matter. There is an immense amount of cross checking
that goes into the knowledge claims of science. It is this process of
social verification of knowledge that gets diluted in the web. On
the other hand these things tend to be self correcting. Today we have
search engines which provide us with connectivity. We have various
sites that point out “cool” and “hot” sites. I wouldn’t be surprised
if we end up with web page review engines that rate reliability of
pages.
Pseudoscience is another matter entirely. Every crackpot can put up
a web page and many of them do. They can recruit and foster their
sundry causes. The loonier ones also provide great entertainment but
that is another matter.
That was all, thanks again for contributing such a massive amount of
original content to the web (that’s where the real work lies after all).
Kind words are always appreciated. Thanks for the thoughtful letter.
Sites with a large amount of original content are common enough but
they are relatively rare.
One of the neat things about the web is that you can get a look at what
other people have to say about themselves. The ordinary world of mass
media (books, movies, et cetera) doesn’t do that.
From: L. Hunter Cassells
Date: 1/7/98
Subj: A choice that cannot be made
(material from first letter)
God says to you “I am contemplating one of two actions – eternal salvation
for you and eternal damnation for everyone else or else eternal salvation
for everyone else and eternal damnation for you. I demand of you your
opinion as to which of these two actions I should take.”
“God, my honest opinion is that you need a long hot bath and a good
bottle of Scotch ale, and find yourself some new actions. You’re
God; you should be able to come up with something.”
The trouble is that that would make you comfortable. God in this
scenario isn’t interested in making you comfortable or making you
feel good. He wants to put you to the test to see what you do with a
really hard choice.
(material from first letter)
The natural thing to do is to refuse to make a choice. God being God,
however, can compel you to make a choice. You might refuse until the
moment of compulsion comes and your answer, so to speak, pops out by
itself. But this would not be a conscious choice. Can God compel you
to make a conscious choice? Not, I opine, under the ground rules of
Christianity.
My “default choice” mechanism wouldn’t amount to a truly
conscious choice, true.
But all this is weaseling, by playing games with the metaphor
in which the question is framed, rather than the point of the
question. How profoundly are you willing to screw other folks,
for how much gain; or, how much pain are you willing to endure
for the good of others? Stealing a pen from work costs my fellow
taxpayers an infinitesimally small amount, which may even be
offset by their fractional gain (my small pleasure in having a
pen at hand, contributing to my overall good humor, spread over
250 million folks). Stealing $50 billion by computer fraud
from a bank will specifically hurt specific people a whole lot
more than my tolerance level; I can’t think of any pleasure
that $50 billion would bring me, that would outweigh my
displeasure at the pain caused. OTOH, you don’t see me
sacrificing my life now trying to build a better world for
others. At the level of the eternal bliss/damnation question,
the choices are both so nearly equal, that I think my only
real option is to go mad. I’m reminded of another dog story:
dogs asked to choose between an oval and a circle for a treat
or a shock. The ovals were made successively more circular.
At some point (varying, as I recall, with the individual dogs),
being unable to choose and yet having to, they started to lose
it, barking and scrabbling and otherwise showing signs of
deep agitation.
You point about playing games with the metaphor is well taken.
The question takes the notion of self-interest vs self-sacrifice
to the limit. Here are some thoughts on that:
In evolutionary theory there are explanations for the evolution
of altruism. In the ordinary course of things evolution rewards
the selfish individual who looks out for number one. However
there are circumstances where there is selection for limited
forms of altruism. Parental care is the obvious one. Sacrifice
for relatives is another (your relatives share your genes).
Reciprocal altruism in social species is another.
The forms of altruism found in animals are all forms of indirect
self interest and are distinctly limited in scope. With humans,
however, atruism is culturally mediated and has a much wider
scope. The genes in the cultureless animal cannot conceive of
the common good nor can they plan for the future. Humans can.
It is culture that permits us to have these thoughts of extended
self-sacrifice; culture takes us into larger realms. The
question tests the boundaries of those realms.
A related question is what I call the question of the price.
Take an action which you would not ordinarily do for money.
The action depends on your personal predilictions. For the
sake of argument let the person being queried be heterosexual
and the action be a homosexual act. This is something that
one might do for nothing out of curiosity. However you are
not being asked to do it for nothing; you are being asked to name
a price for doing it. Would you do it for $10, $1000, $1000000,
or what? An interesting thing about this question is that
different prices have different meanings.
There is a limit to how much is paid for sexual favors as a straight
transaction – it is on the order of a few thousand dollars for an
evening. If your price is within that range you acting as a
prostitute selling your body for money. A high class prostitute,
perhaps, but you are in that ball park. Then there are a range
of prices which will make a real difference in your life but
will not make a radical difference. Thus a hundred thousand dollars
would let you buy many things; it would not be enough so that you
could stop working. Above that is an amount of money which is
enough so that you would never have to work again. Still further
up is an amount that would enable you to live in luxury for the
rest of your life. An even larger amount would give you resources
for political and social power.
What I am getting at here is that different prices have different
meanings. This applies also to considerations of self-interest
and self-sacrifice. (Your point, of course.)
Another thought is that the question raises the possibility of
self-sacrifice as an absolute. It occurs to me that this is not
a Christian idea but rather it is a pagan idea. Christ may have
died for us but he was conveniently resurrected. Prometheus,
on the other hand, suffers for us forever.
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From: Ruby Dunagan
Date: 1/9/98
Subj: Intrigued
I was intrigued by two things that you have: One – you intro on
building web pages and who they might attract. And the other- your
horseback riding!
My nephew has a small spread in Oklahoma and he has hosted different
people to ride and participate in the day to day stuff that goes on, so
it was suggested to him that he start a cowboy school. That link has
not got him very far, possibly because people are looking for a vacation
not a school. I wonder if you would exchange links with him when we get
him under another link in the browsers! That is, he lists your place
and you list his?
As you can tell my site is not exactly commercial. It is sort of dedicated
to the spirit of free personal journalism or something pretentious like
that. You will not find in it those annoying advertising banners with the
ticky tacky animated gif’s. Although, come to think on it I do have an
EFF token on my main page. Oh well, one shouldn’t take sacred principles
too seriously.
Be that as it may, sure. Little people helping little people and all that,
you know. I dunno as it will help him a great deal but I’m game. Send me
the URL when you get it up.
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From: Jim Belec
Date: 1/15/98
Subj: naked antelopes and watermelon seeds
Richard,
Not sure how I arrived at your cluttered mind-scape, I closed my search
pages soon after I began wandering about your place. I think I was
searching for idiot savant references, or mental calculations (math)
suitable for my son . . . or some such.
In any case, I have made a shortcut to your pages so I can return and do
the many topics you address (some) justice. Your humor suits me to a tee.
Good to hear from you; thanks for writing. Cluttered mind-scape is an
excellent characterization. Re justice for my topics: I can’t afford justice;
I want mercy!
Have fun rambling through the pages.
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From: Bob Oppenheimer
Date: 1/16/98
Subj: more humor
Hello Richard,
Here’s some new material. Well new for me at least. Your home page
re-organization looks good though I do miss the (signature) “this site best
viewed with a bottle of scotch”. After being barraged with “this site best
viewed with ….” it is a humorous difference.
[material snipped]
Thanks for the material. I don’t promise to use it but I might. I keep
files of stuff and pick something out every so often. It’s much appreciated
even if I don’t use it.
The “this site best viewed with a bottle of scotch” tag is still there.
Maybe I should move it up to the top and make it bigger.
Re the reorg: I decided that the old layout was too wordy and didn’t really
help people find their way around. Also I find it a lot more convenient.
The layout of the site is sort of a maze of twisty little passages but I
don’t want to make it too hard. Also I figured that at the rate I’ve been
adding material it makes sense to go to monthly table of contents and
correspondence, just as though it were an e-zine. Frankly I don’t know what
it is.
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From: ron clarkson
Date: 1/16/98
Subj: link
please link my page to you sight
www.kdi.com/~clarkson
Hi,
Why? Have you looked at my site? Where do you think that
a link to your site would belong?
[Ron continued]
hello richard
yes i have been to your sight. as far as where the
link should be, im not sure,. you can put them anywhere. i would
recommend putting it somewhere toward the bottom so it will not distract
in any way form your page i would like to link your page as well.
please send me the url again. if you need any help contact me.
Hi,
The word is “site” rather than “sight”. I don’t think you understood
what I was getting at: My web site literally has hundreds of pages
with pages covering a large number of topics. I certainly wouldn’t put
it on my main page but there are a lot of other pages where it might
be appropriate. Do not worry though. A link to your page will appear
in my correspondence pages. (Click
here to see his page. Why
I should have a link to it is a mystery to me.)
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From: mdr
Date: 1/18/98
Subj: dhmo
thanks for dhmo page. plan to use it as an introduction to the
chemistry part of a science class!
mdr
It’s an oldie, one of those things that has been kicking around
for years. There are several copies floating around on the net.
It’s a good object lesson, though.
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From: Miriam Coyne
Date: 1/24/98
Subj: loved the Godot in various modes…
I absolutely loved the Waiting for Godot in various modes! Your
“baffle-gab” interpretations were right on the money. You need to add
feminism. You could go off on the fact that women were not the dominant
force in the play and the play is obviously a conspiracy by the white male
dominanted society that rejects the power of women and their obvious
importance in the cycle of world events.
Oh my, yes, I should have done feminism. I don’t know as it should be a conspiracy
though – more on the order of “the phallocentric mindset of the patriarchy” with
the servant being a symbolic woman and Godot being the anti-goddess, the antithesis
of the Goddess. I will concoct something.
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