Krupps & Felt

I've been thinking about House of Leaves lately. I've read a whole lot of Internet things that say it's a load of pretentious hackery, which is, of course, all it takes to take the wind out of everyone else's sails. What I think is that the material devoted to the emotional motivation of the main character falls pretty flat (to the extent, I guess, that it necessitated the writing of a whole 'nother book), but that the rest of it is a truly nasty and extremely virulent little meme. I recommend it to all of you who are patient.

Mer rented Garden State and I just watched it. It's alright -- self-indulgent, wears a bit thin in the last act, but it's fairly genuine otherwise, it seems like. All those Jersey rich-kids reminded me of my friends from Wesleyan, none of whom read this.

Apparently Devil-Lynn got me this DVD for Christmas. Thanks, guy! (Does a 'blog "thank you" mean I don't have to write a note?)

Here are some tidbits from a story from Edge (as featured on /.) where they ask 120 experts from various fields about things they believe but cannot prove. Inneresting! Tor Nørretranders preaches to the choir:

It is important to have faith, but not necessarily in God. Faith is important far outside the realm of religion: having faith in other people, in oneself, in the world, in the existence of truth, justice and beauty. There is a continuum of faith, from the basic everyday trust in others to the grand devotion to divine entities.

Carlo Rovelli appeals to people who don't know anything about physics, like me:

I think that the notions of space and time will turn out to be useful only within some approximation. They are similar to a notion like "the surface of the water" which looses meaning when we describe the dynamics of the individual atoms forming water and air: if we look at very small scale, there isn't really any actual surface down there. I am convinced space and time are like the surface of the water: convenient macroscopic approximations, flimsy but illusory and insufficient screens that our mind uses to organize reality.

Chris Anderson gets plain mean:

The Intelligent Design movement has opened my eyes. I realize that although I believe that evolution explains why the living world is the way it is, I can't actually prove it. At least not to the satisfaction of the ID folk, who seem to require that every example of extraordinary complexity and clever plumbing in nature be fully traced back (not just traceable back) along an evolutionary tree to prove that it wasn't directed by an invisible hand. If the scientific community won't do that, then the arguments goes that they must accept a large red "theory" stamp placed on the evolution textbooks and that alternative theories, such as "guided" evolution and creationism, be taught alongside.

So, by this standard, virtually everything I believe in must now fall under the shadow of unproveability. Most importantly, this includes the belief that democracy, capitalism and other market-driven systems (including evolution!) are better than their alternatives. Indeed, I suppose I should now refer to them as the "theory of democracy" and the "theory of capitalism", to join the theory of evolution, and accept the teaching of living Marxism and fascism as alternatives in high schools.

I'm getting pretty sick of having to go to work -- especially when I make some critical breakthrough in something I'm working on and look at the clock and it's time to brush my teef and get on the subway before I have time to finish implementing it. I want to go on vacation again. Anyone want to sponsor me, Damian Conway-style? Right, didn't think so.

A funny Jerkcity, something of a rarity.