Subject:
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Re: John Leo's opinion of "The West Wing"
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Wed, 2 Oct 2002 19:01:03 GMT
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Viewed:
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625 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, David Koudys writes:
> If I were to pose the hypothesis--"If I were to let go of a hammer, the
> hammer would fall. I do not have to watch the hammer fall to see that this
> is true."--what does it matter *where* this hypothesis came from? This line
> (paraphrased to be sure) was stated in Star Trek back in '67--Does that
> matter?(I'm sure Spock phrased it better, oh well.)
A minor digression...
You *do* need to make further observations to determine if it's true that
the hammer would fall. Either you would need to make your deduction based
on your witnessing of the descent of the hammer from your hand to the
ground/floor/whatever, or you would base your conclusion on prior
observations under similar circumstances, or else you would form your
conclusion based on observations of the environment: "I left the hammer
hanging by this thin thread, and now it's on the floor. Between the former
hanging point and the current resting point, there's a hammer-shaped hole in
the sheet of paper I'd put in the hammer's likely falling-path, and there is
a chip out of the corner of this table, the shape and size of which is
consistent with prior observations of the behavior of falling hammers re:
interposed objects."
See? The hypothesis, as written, is flawed. If Spock drops the hammer
while he's floating out to see V'Ger, the hammer *won't* fall. If Spock is
falling out of an airplane and he drops a hammer, it won't fall relative to
him. If Spock drops the hammer, but he drops it while standing on some kind
of Star Trek techno-babble hammer-levitating device, the hammer won't fall.
So the hypothesis is flawed, and the fact that people will accept it
unquestioningly is symptomatic of the greater problem.
> As I say, to *initiate* a conversation can only be a good thing--resting
> your entire arguement on what happened during a show is ludicrous--not only
> are you then putting all your proverbial 'eggs in one basket', but it's a
> show, not a holy writ.
Still, the problem is that, for many people, tv *IS* a holy writ of
information. In reality, one should view tv and newspapers and magazines
and books and advertisements and conversations through the lens of critical
thought, rather than accepting whole-cloth the claims put forth by any of
those media.
> Well, Frasier Crane may be hypothetical, but Dr. Laura is quite real
Martin Sheen is a real person, too (though I'm not sure about Rob Lowe),
but he plays a fictitious person on tv. We're entering the realm of
literary criticism here, but I'm willing if you are...
When I write an account of my ill-starred bus trip to Austin, TX, the "me"
in the story is a fictional character, even if "I" "really" had the
experiences that are recounted on the page. If Ann Jillian portrays herself
in a made-for-tv movie about breast cancer, she's playing the fictional
character of Ann Jillian who is based on the real person of Ann Jillian.
When John Malkovitch appeared in "Being John Malkovitch" (a fine film, by
the way), he was portraying a very fictionalized version of himself.
Sometimes the fictionalization is more obvious, sometimes less so.
Since you're a pop culture junkie, perhaps you saw the dark comedy "The
Last Supper" a few years back in which a group of left-leaning friends
invited a series of (to them) unsavory characters to dinner and
systematically murdered and buried them in a tomato patch. In the film Ron
Perlman portrayed a Limbaugh-esque character whom the main characters
targeted for tomato-ization. But when they met him, he turned out to be
friendly, thoughtful, and reasonable. And he told them that his tv persona
was a fictional version of himself.
So obviously Laura Schlessinger is a real person, but the on-air Dr. Laura
is a character (she has no formal schooling in psychology, by the bye, and
her rampant homophobia is well-documented).
> too much happens in life, and the audience would
> be bored out of their trees if we tried to make a show showing 'real life'
> (at least mine--LEGO, EQ, 'cputer repair--real fun here, let me tell you).
In "Six Walks in the Fictional Woods," Umberto Eco writes of an author who
once sat for 48 hours at a bus station to transcribe "everything" that
occurred during that time in that place. When he was done, I believe he'd
penned four or five paragraphs. So it might be argued that very little
actually happens that's worth recounting.
You might also be interested in the book "Infinity and the Mind," though
the author's name escapes me. It explores some cool philosophical
implications of infinity and also discusses the impossibility of programming
a computer with infinite (ie: perfect) aesthetic guidelines, resulting in
something very like what you mention above.
Of course, the problem is not about fiction's failure to re-create life
with 100% fidelity; that has never been fiction's role. The problem is that
some people substitute fiction for reality when searching for wisdom,
guidance, and understanding. Fiction is a shallow well for such waters and
is often muddy and too quickly emptied.
> When folks don't like what someone else is saying, and try to diminish the
> efforts of those who critique what may be wrong with the system by using
> clear examples, I find to be especially vulgar.
I'm not sure if that's directed at me--such is the problem of text-based
communication.
I think you're referring to the "yeah, but" principle, in which specific
anecdotal examples are cited as if they are full refutations of broad and
complex issues. And that's not always incorrect, either; if a claim is
disproven by one refutation, then that's sufficient. If the claim is more
general, like "some people generally formulate their opinions based on a
broad range of factors," then of course it's harder to refute with one or
two examples.
Am I missing your point here? Could you clarify?
> > all too often [the entertainment machine is] cited as if it were some
> > authoritative sourceon matters of ethics, politics, and science.
> Not authoritative, just a good start.
As long as we bear that in mind, we're okay.
> > > "More and more we are expecting less and less from each other. It's time to
> > > start working against that"
> > So you're saying that the bar is raised by the regurgitation of trite
> > homilies?
>
> Who defined it as 'trite'? Is it? Look at the society around you--what
> Sorkin said is obviously a quick sound bite, but just by your very sentence
> in response, you just proved the 'truth' of the 'trite homilie'--we have
> come to expect less and less from one another--we diminish those views that
> are not ours. What if John Leo said it? Would it still be as trite?
Every bit as trite, and perhaps moreso. Likewise if Ghandi or Einstein
had said it. It's trite because it's a fortune-cookie slogan on par with
"Just Say No to Drugs."
A good term to describe that sort of trite phrase is "phatic," but the
mere use of "phatic" carries the risk of labeling its user as a hopeless
intellectual posturor!
Dave!
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: John Leo's opinion of "The West Wing"
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| (...) <snip> intellectual posturor! (...) This is what I meant by Spock phrasing it better--he said something like 'on a planet with positive gravity'--it's ST:TOS--when was the last time I caught one of those episodes? ;) I don't have to witness (...) (22 years ago, 2-Oct-02, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: John Leo's opinion of "The West Wing"
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| (...) If I were to pose the hypothesis--"If I were to let go of a hammer, the hammer would fall. I do not have to watch the hammer fall to see that this is true."--what does it matter *where* this hypothesis came from? This line (paraphrased to be (...) (22 years ago, 2-Oct-02, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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