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Monday, June 03, 2002 |
Gould Books I've Read
I was poking around in my database of books I've read, and ran a query to find the Stephen Jay Gould books I've read, and when I read them:
| Feb 13 1989 |
An Urchin in the Storm |
| Feb 14 1989 |
Time's Arrow, Time's Cycle |
| Mar 5 1989 |
The Panda's Thumb |
| Mar 9 1989 |
Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes |
| Feb 15 1990 |
Ever Since Darwin |
| Jan 26 1991 |
The Flamingo's Smile |
| Apr 15 1992 |
Bully for Brontosaurus |
| Jun 29 1993 |
Eight Little Piggies |
You can see that during 1989, I read a bunch of them right at the same time; that's a pattern of mine. I will often read a bunch of books by the same author at round the same time. I haven't always been totally accurate in my data entry, but I would have sworn I've read Gould since 1993.
10:31:52 PM Permalink
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Weird Sunset. If you're in the States, there'll be a partial solar eclipse visible at sunset on June 10th. From the photos on NASA Science headlines sight, it should be lovely.
If you're on a line southwest of Dallas, the eclipse will be at it's maxium at sunset. [More Like This WebLog]
10:11:32 PM Permalink
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Princess Leia is a Terrorist
I'd forgotten about this excellent article in Salon on the Star Wars universe by David Brin, till I saw a link to it on Confessions of a Mozillan.
Just what bill of goods are we being sold, between the frames?
- Elites have an inherent right to arbitrary rule; common citizens needn't be consulted. They may only choose which elite to follow.
- "Good" elites should act on their subjective whims, without evidence, argument or accountability.
- Any amount of sin can be forgiven if you are important enough.
- True leaders are born. It's genetic. The right to rule is inherited.
- Justified human emotions can turn a good person evil.
That is just the beginning of a long list of "moral" lessons relentlessly pushed by "Star Wars." Lessons that starkly differentiate this saga from others that seem superficially similar, like "Star Trek."
Brin brings to the table the point of view of someone who has created some serious, ambitious science fiction, a point of view that's been missing in all the Star Wars movies since The Empire Strikes Back (which had Leigh Brackett going for it). When I was watching the movie, it felt to me like Lucas was playing without a net. Not only on from the logic point of view (once you've violated one physical law, it's an easy slippery slope to ignore all the others). But the really dopey philosophy is of a piece of the sloppiness of storytelling.
In other words a royal figure or demigod, anointed by fate. (Like a billionaire moviemaker?)
Despots are despots, benevolent or not, and should all be overthrown.
10:07:08 PM Permalink
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Beryl Pfizer. "I write down everything I want to remember. That way, instead of spending a lot of time trying to remember what it is I wrote down, I spend the time looking for the paper I wrote it down on." [Jake's Radio 'Blog]
3:19:55 PM Permalink
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We're Even More Related Than It Appears
A few posts earlier, I mentioned a book review in The Atlantic that talked about how closely the races really are to one another. It seems that's even understated. Now they have a piece contending that all those of European descent are have a common ancestor who lived only about 600 years ago!
This constant churning of people makes it possible to apply [statistician Joseph of Harvard] Chang's analysis to the world as a whole. For example, almost everyone in the New World must be descended from English royalty—even people of predominantly African or Native American ancestry, because of the long history of intermarriage in the Americas. Similarly, everyone of European ancestry must descend from Muhammad. The line of descent for which records exist is through the daughter of the Emir of Seville, who is reported to have converted from Islam to Catholicism in about 1200. But many other, unrecorded descents must also exist.
As discussed in the article, but oddly not linked to, Mark Humphrys has a site, Royal Descents of FamousPeople which documents how, for example, Humphrey Bogart, H.P. Lovecraft, Audrey Hepburn, and Brooke Shields are descended from Edward III, and P.G. Wodehouse from Henry VII.
1:18:55 PM Permalink
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© Copyright 2004 Steve Michel.
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