HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: zeleny@husc9.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Liberals, Little Girls, and Boolean Logic
Date: 13 Aug 92 19:22:24 GMT
Organization: The Phallogocentric Cabal

In article <4484@news.duke.edu> 
bigham@acpub.duke.edu (Scott Bigham) writes:

>From the Holy Book of <1992Aug12.131957.14662@husc3.harvard.edu>
>  as spake by zeleny@husc8.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny) :

>>In article <11689@optilink.UUCP> 
>>cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes:

>[much deleted]

>Cramer versus the Z-man!  This oughta be interesting!  Bets, anyone?

Whether he chooses pen or pistol, keyboard or cutlass, Mr Cramer has
all the chances of a fart against a hurricane.

>						-sbigham
>-- 
>Scott Bigham                   | "This is our path; to fight or die."
>bigham@hercules.acpub.duke.edu | "That's what we're paid for, so let's
>                               |     do it with some _style_!"
>                               |                Dr. Who, "Battlefield"

cordially,
mikhail zeleny@husc.harvard.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: msmorris@watsci.waterloo.edu (Mike Morris)
Subject: Re: The Literary Canon
Organization: University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 00:10:24 GMT

                           Thursday, the 13th of August, 1992

I said:
  Of course, these professors are competent
  at one thing: Thomas Hardy. If they train doctoral students,
  they are likely to train them in Hardy. If they vote at faculty meetings
  for whom to hire, they're likely to favor somebody who is an expert
  in Hardy.

Mike Godwin responded:
  This doesn't match my experience as a graduate student. Few if any
  specialists of this sort are "competent" in only "one thing," and
  none insist on training their students in precisely the same field,
  and, if anything, they're relatively *unlikely* to favor somebody who
  duplicates their own field -- for obvious reasons, if you stop and
  think about it.

No joke, I may well be wrong. I was abstracting from what I've seen
in physics, where fights over whom to hire seem to leave scars
in departments for lifetimes. And it's clear that the
relativists want to hire a relativity theorist to talk to, the
astronomers want to hire another astronomer, the surface physicists
want to hire a surface physicist, and so on. And everybody thinks
what the other fellow is working on isn't worth doing.

I'm willing to bow to better experience about this, but I wonder if
I haven't gotten it *almost* right, in the sense that an expert on Hardy
might set his student to work on Wilfrid Owen or Arnold Bennett rather
than James Baldwin or Thomas Pynchon, that there will be a sociologically
natural, not sinister, resistance to the canonization of the new?

Even a polymetis like Guy Davenport seems to have a couple of nuclei
from which his interests radiate. Or even one nucleus---all of it
might come from Pound.

                   Mike Morris
           (msmorris@watsci.uwaterloo.ca)
From: crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu (Lauren L. Crawford)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: REQUEST: "KILL your TV" bumperstickers
Date: 18 Aug 92 19:34:17 GMT
Organization: University of Pennsylvania

About that subject line.  Didn't Wendy O'Williams sing (if you could
call it that) a song by that title?  And perform it onstage with 
a chainsaw?  


-- 
Lauren Crawford  //  crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu
"Happy campers you are, happy campers you have been, and as far as I'm
concerned, happy campers you will always be."
                  --J. Danforth Quayle in American Samoa
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: fscll@acad3.alaska.edu (Christopher Lee Lott -- One foot in the grave and the other slipping)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: The Literary Canon
Date: 14 Aug 92 21:53:03 GMT
Organization: University of Alaska Fairbanks

Just some random comments on the "Canon"...

It is amazing how similar the arguments regarding the canon, and what shoul
dbe included/excluded, whether it should be dropped, etc, are to discussions
I hear about music all of the time. In music the central question is why is
this considered good and why should we listen to it (or why do people continue
to listen to the 'junk' when there are so many classics)-- but the
explanations all end up sounding the same.

There is one simple fact of the "canon" and that is that the canon is a purely
academic invention. It stems from the formula  Xnumber of hours in school
divided by y number of books = z number of books that can be covered. Thatis
the framework folks. The canon is merely a way of trying to decide WHAT to
study and teach in that time. In that way it is very convenient. As for
personal readership, I am all for inventing our own canons, but when it comes
to an education, when later classes rely on earlier class development, then
there has to be some framework.

Which brings us up to the central argument which Terrance Herath has been so
vigorously debating: what to include? What to exclude?  The fact is, for
everything we Include, something gets pushed out the other side. This is fine,
and I am all for some changes, but we have to be careful. I have argued this
with some confirmed bash-the-cannon-and-put-in-a-new-one people to no avail--
subjectivity is the name of the game.

Terrance, I would recommend contacting E. Ethelbert Miller and discussing this
with him-- not that it would be to change your mind, butI think you would find
his insights very useful to you as you create your own canon.
 I met him and talked with him
when he visited here, last I hear he was at Howard University-- butI am sure
you have probably heard of him.

Mark Taranto-- I want to know why you would avoid Alice Walker regardless of
what she had to say in an interview. This doesn't make her books any less
engaging. I have often wondered this baout people who like a band, and then
stop liking it when they see an interview. I think the work stands apart...
perhaps I am wrong.

I am not going to forward any answers or attempts at answers because I don't
have them, but I do think there is far more worthwhile lit out ther ethan we
can EVER study, and when it comes to ranking in importance we are on pretty
unsteady ground. I would hate to see new inclusions at the cost of other good
writers, especially if it comes down to "losing a few white writers to get
someone else in" because this is no better than the natural exclusion of other
cultures that we have had happening for far too long... 

chris
poet and pauper
From: msaleski@tegra.COM (Mark Saleski)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: REQUEST: "KILL your TV" bumperstickers
Date: 18 Aug 92 15:46:28 GMT
Organization: Tegra, Inc., Billerica, MA
In-reply-to: sullivana@gtephx.UUCP's message of 18 Aug 92 02:08:16 GMT

In article <1992Aug18.020816.1208@gtephx.UUCP> sullivana@gtephx.UUCP (Anne Sullivan) writes:

  > 
  >    Lori Cole writes:
  >    > Mark Taranto writes:
  >    > 
  >    > >   Is this his real name . . . Why do parents do this to their children?
  >    >     I've met a Candy Mann, a Stormy Webber, and a Candy Caine.  None were
  >    >     strippers.
  >    > 
  >    > Ah, but I went through school with April N. (no middle name, just an
  >    > initial) Paris.
  >    > 
  >    I graded the Calculus papers of one Rocky Mountain.  My younger sister
  >    was in school with his brothers--Cliff and Smokey.  
  > 
  >    Anne Sullivan
  > 

     I've got a cousin named Brandi Alexander.
-- 
 Mark Saleski                                               msaleski@tegra.com
"Unfortunately, life contains an unavoidable element of unpredictability"
        -David Lynch "The Angriest Dog in the World"

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: robinc@bnr.ca (Robin Collins)
Subject: Re: Asimov and the decay of SF
Organization: Bell-Northern Research Ltd., Ottawa, Canada
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 92 16:49:56 GMT

In article <1992Aug12.211359.9760@sco.com> evanh@sco.COM (Evan Hunt) writes:
>
>Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian) writes:
>>Ron Nadel objects to Ursula LeGuin's science fiction on the grounds that it's
>>too expository, pedantic, etc. Chacun a son gout, but the lady knows exactly
>                                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^


It means "each to his own (taste)".

Frank.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: djdaneh@pbhyc.PacBell.COM (Dan'l DanehyOakes)
Subject: Re: Asimov and the decay of SF
Reply-To: djdaneh@PacBell.COM (Dan'l DanehyOakes)
Organization: Pacific * Bell, San Ramon, CA
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 20:46:49 GMT

In article <1992Aug12.211359.9760@sco.com> evanh@sco.COM (Evan Hunt) writes:

>Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian) writes:

>>Chacun a son gout
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>Excuse me, but could someone explain the meaning of this phrase?

It's Lower Motoslybnian, and means "If you disagree with me, I hope you
get the gout."

(Note that this is a common curse in Lower Motoslybnia, and is known as
"getting one's gout.")


		My baby is a Martian,
		What can I do?
		I'm in love with a giant insect,
		I got them Exoskeletal Blues
			-- Visual Purple

Dan'l Danehy-Oakes, Net.Roach
My opinions do NOT represent Pacific Bell,
Professional Development, or anyone else.
But I'm willing to share.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: The nature of enlightenment
From: zeleny@husc8.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny)
Date: 12 Aug 92 18:44:56 EDT
Organization: The Phallogocentric Cabal

In article <JMC.92Aug11214111@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>In article <1992Aug12.000057.14648@husc3.harvard.edu> zeleny@husc9.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny) writes:
>
>>In article <JMC.92Aug11165357@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> 
>>jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:

JMC:
>>>Alas I can't continue the argument about logic further, because
>>>I don't have the original examples of Cramer's alleged reasoning.

MZ:
>>Aha! this must account for your failure to adduce some examples of the
>>same Cramer's alleged reasoning (as distinct from alleged reasoning of
>>Cramer), with which you recently claimed to "mostly agree".  How nice
>>of you to give your buddy a nearly unqualified _carte blanche_ of most
>>authoritative support!  One could only wonder about your reasons...

JMC:
>My reasons!  My reasons!  Tell them about my reasons - provided
>I also get to look at them.  Wonderful r.a.b.!  I can get free
>psychotherapy in five minutes per day.

Alas, I am obligated to decline: unfortunately, the cardinal tenets of my
strict Homo Sovieticus upbringing pretty much preclude any form of public
speculation.  However I am still very anxious to get some examples of your
alleged agreement with Cramer's alleged reasoning.  Perhaps a quid pro quo
could be arranged.

>--
>John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
>*
>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
>

cordially,
mikhail zeleny@husc.harvard.edu
who will be in Paris thirteen days from today!
"Nous donnons la mort, nous saurons la subir."
From: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Anybody Else Read History?
Date: 14 Aug 92 13:41:55 GMT
Reply-To: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin)
Organization: COMANDOS Project, Glesga Yoonie

rauchway@leland.Stanford.EDU (Eric Andrew Rauchway) wrote:
> If Clark or anyone else is interested particularly in character-oriented
> history, I suggest that he and they steer clear of the cutting-edge
> of historical scholarship, which is more concerned with relating the 
> story of classes, races, genders, ethnicities, &c., and, while often
> wonderfully written and meticulously researched, tends to be devoid of 
> recognizable literary characters as such.

One notable exception: Carlo Ginzburg's "The Cheese and the Worms: the
cosmos of a sixteenth-century miller", which attempts to reconstruct the
intellectual world of a man burned by the Inquisition for heresy.  Ginzburg
does it honestly, so no words are ever put into Domenico Scandella's mouth.
This leaves him as a mysteriously ambiguous personality; there are few
fictional characters described in a similar way.  And the documents say
even less about his circle of acquaintances.

What works of fiction are there that dispense with characters? - here I'm
thinking of parallels to one of the books Eric may have in mind, Piero
Camporesi's "Bread of Dreams: food and fantasy in early modern Europe",
which is written with overpowering force but is mostly about the nameless
poor of Renaissance Italy; nobody took down the names of people found dead
of hunger by the roadside after trying to survive on doveshit and grass, or
recorded the personal idiosyncrasies of the victims of dancing manias.
Some of Beckett's later writings, and Stapledon's "Last and First Men", and
what else?

-- 
--  Jack Campin    room G092, Computing Science Department, Glasgow University,
17 Lilybank Gardens, Glasgow G12 8RZ, Scotland   TEL: 041 339 8855 x6854 (work)
INTERNET: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk or via nsfnet-relay.ac.uk    FAX: 041 330 4913
BANG!net: via mcsun and uknet     BITNET: via UKACRL    UUCP: jack@glasgow.uucp
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: mtaranto@shearson.com (Mark Taranto)
Subject: Amis & Son (was Re: _Time's Arrow_, by Martin Amis
Organization: Yale CS Mail/News Gateway
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 14:34:09 GMT


Paul Roberts writes:

> I wonder what Kingsley Amis thinks of his son's work? I somehow don't
> imagine him liking the style very much, I don't imagine him saying so,
> either. Did anyone ever hear of either of them comenting on the other's
> style?

I imagine that Kingsley Amis likes his son's style, and I also imagine
that if he didn't, he would not hesitate to say so.

The two authors have a lot in common, besides the obvious.  There is
an undercurrent of anger running through the books that I've read, by both.

I'd like to hear why Paul thinks that they wouldn't like each others works.


Mark


Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: mtaranto@shearson.com (Mark Taranto)
Subject: Re: The Literary Canon
Organization: Yale CS Mail/News Gateway
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 01:20:14 GMT


fscll@acad3.alaska.edu (Christopher Lee Lott) writes:

> Mark Taranto-- I want to know why you would avoid Alice Walker
> regardless of what she had to say in an interview. This doesn't
> make her books any less engaging. I have often wondered this
> baout people who like a band, and then stop liking it when they
> see an interview. I think the work stands apart...
> perhaps I am wrong.

Christopher must be confusing me with someone else.  I have never
mentioned Alice Walker.


Mark

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: msmorris@watsci.waterloo.edu (Mike Morris)
Subject: Re: Some Canonical Lists
Organization: University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 12:56:45 GMT

                               Monday, the 17th of August, 1992

Roger Squires writes:
        Oh, but I'm not asking for a list solely based on Mr. Heath's
        limited experience.  There probably already exist such
        experienced scholars with their associated lists which Mr.
        Heath or whoever may know of via secondary works.  I see no
        reason why I should have to wait ten years for Mr. Heath to
        finish reading these hypothetical 1000 books just to get a
        silly list out of him.

I agree that there is a silly component to these lists and
list-making. I will reiterate that I think it would be
interesting to see what kind of a list Terrance might make now.
But, my only reason for responding to you was that I feel
that Anthony Burgess saying which modern novels he thinks
are the best *weighs* more than, say, the opinion-poll
character of the UWM Select 100 List. Expertise counts.
And, since that point is important to what I'd like to argue
with Matt and Tom (i.e. that objectivity in aesthetic judgment
is possible), I shamelessly tried to make it again.

(Agreed that such expertise already exists for African-American
literature. My assumption could be wrong is that Terrance himself has much
more expertise on the topic than I do. I also assume---could be wrong---
that he is in his early 20s and could not have read widely
enough to give me the kind of book I'd really like. In other
words, I was also putting in a request, making another suggestion
like the biography idea, for something that would
be neat to see come out of a career of scholarship.)

                       Mike Morris
               (msmorris@watsci.uwaterloo.ca)

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: tmaddox@netcom.com (Tom Maddox)
Subject: Re: Liberals, Little Girls, and Boolean Logic
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 92 06:33:56 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 

In article <1992Aug13.152226.14700@husc3.harvard.edu> zeleny@husc9.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny) writes:
>>Cramer versus the Z-man!  This oughta be interesting!  Bets, anyone?

>Whether he chooses pen or pistol, keyboard or cutlass, Mr Cramer has
>all the chances of a fart against a hurricane.

	A very bad smell against a bunch of hot air blowing very strongly--
what does it matter who triumphs?


-- 
				Tom Maddox
		    	    tmaddox@netcom.com
		   "I swear I never heard the first shot"
                Wm. Gibson, "Agrippa:  a book of the dead"
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: markw@cltr.uq.oz.au (Mark White)
Subject: Re: Great Endings.
Keywords: n
Organization: Centre for Language Teaching and Research, Uni of Queensland, AUSTRALIA.
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 01:36:00 GMT

paulchem@tigger.cs.Colorado.EDU (Icarus) writes:

>1] Among the great endings that I have found are :

One of my favourite book endings has been "Presumed Innocent" by Scott
Turow.  When the narrator/central character Rust Sabitch finds the
steel bar, and just states out of the blue "and last year it was used
to kill....." it made me read and re-read the page several times.

A fantastic twist, at the end of a great story.
--
Mark White                                        | 
National Centre for Studies in Travel and Tourism | EMail: markw@cltr.uq.oz.au
James Cook University of North Queensland         | Fax:   +61 7 371 8485
P.O. Box 705 Indooroopilly QLD 4068  AUSTRALIA    | Phone: +61 7 870 9212
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,alt.folklore.urban,rec.arts.sf.misc
From: pcm@cs.brown.edu (Peter C. McCluskey)
Subject: Re: Agnostics and Athiests
Organization: The Church of the Scientifically Testable God
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 22:22:19 GMT

In article <q43mh1#@lynx.unm.edu>, jfreter@triton.unm.edu (The Myth) writes:
|> This principle says (paraphrased) that due to the wave nature of particles,
|> the exact position *AND* momentum of a particle are indeterminate.  A particle
|> exists as a set of "interference patterns" in space and can have several
|> velocities and positions at once.  An omniscient god would know exactly where
|> that particle is and where it is going.  This can't be because the particle
|> doesn't exist as a single point.  It exists as a "blurring" of space.

Since it doesn't exist as a single point, how can you say that an omniscient god
would know the attributes of this single point?
Let's try translating your claim into QM terminology. I think you are trying to say
that would know the "true" eigenvalue of the particle's state vector. In order to
justify your position, you would need to demonstrate that the eigenvalue that you
say god would single out has something special about it (i.e. discredit the many
worlds interpretation which says that all the eigenvalues are real).
-- 
         hardcore signature virus: "As a juror in a Trial by Jury, 
         you have the right, power and duty to acquit the defendant 
                 if you judge the law itself to be unjust."
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,rec.humor,alt.folklore.urban,rec.arts.sf.misc
From: st890270@pip.cc.brandeis.edu (LUCIFER)
Subject: Re: Agnostics and Athiests
Reply-To: st890270@pip.cc.brandeis.edu
Organization: Brandeis University
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 19:29:30 GMT

tsuanian@cc.curtin.edu.au writes
> (motivation of god to create people)

two things. the heaven & hell concept is a new-fangled Christian idea, and we
Jews still consider it a little cockeyed ]:{)

as to why create people: nobody ever claimed god is immune to boredom.
(or maybe, he has his reasons, but they are beyond our imagining. After all,
can you actually imagine omnipotence?)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: rsquires@cyclops.eece.unm.edu (Roger Squires)
Subject: Re: Some Canonical Lists
Date: Sun, 16 Aug 92 05:51:06 GMT
Organization: University of New Mexico, Albuquerque


	I hereby bestow an Olympic Medal for Typing to Mr. Morris
	for these lists.  I consult the _How To Read A Book_
	list often, but these other lists look great as well, and I for
	one will use them to guide my reading in future.  I'm proud
	to say that I score higher than he on almost all the lists
	(sorry, couldn't resist :^) ), but though my have read list is
	also heavily biased towards ancient writers, I have read nothing
	in the original language, as Mr. Morris has. (*sigh*.  Though
	I hope to learn Latin, at least)

	The only list I have quarrels with is the List #9:
	
List 9: ``The UWM Bookstore's Select 100 as of April, 1989''
63. _Monkey Wrench Gang_, Abbey

	This is *not* Abbey's best.  _Desert Solitaire_ beats
	it all to hell.  There are also a couple other novels of
	his that are comparable to MWG.

_The Tao of Physics_, _The Dancing Wu-Li Masters_, Ayn Rand, and
Jeremy Rifkin can well wait til I've read everything else).

	Agree on the first two.  These are two of a crop of
	late 70s/early 80s Gee-Whiz-New-Physics-In-Lite-Of-Eastern-Phil
	books.  One of them was better than the other, but it's
	been years -- I think it was Capra's.


It would be neat to see such books as _100 of the Best African-American Books_

	I second this!  Could Mr. Heath, et al, work on such a
	list and post it to the net?  Please!

Or _100 Masterworks of Science Fiction_.

	I posted a request for such a list on rec.arts.sf.written
	some months ago.  I got a good response, and made some
	headway on producing such a list.  Also, when I wish to
	read new SF, I consult a fairly comprehensive guide to
	SF that is in library reference section, which has classics
	listed with an asterisk by them (I can't recall the name
	right now -- Barron?), and there is a list of Hugo winners available
	via FTP (the addr is in the r.a.s.w FAQ).  I'll send you
	the list I have made up of *my* all-time favorites (about 50 books).

20th C Latin American literature

	Another great idea.  I'll bet several people here could
	make such a list.

The end. (exhausted sigh)

	Good work.

                 Mike Morris
              (msmorris@watsci.uwaterloo.ca)

Roger Squires
rsquires@cyclops.eece.unm.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: jw2b@galen.med.Virginia.EDU (Sara J. Wagner)
Subject: Re: Swiss Family Robinson mixup
Organization: University of Virginia
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 20:52:25 GMT

In article <w2_nmda.dani@netcom.com> dani@netcom.com (Dani Zweig) writes:
>When I was about ten, I read "The Swiss Family Robinson", and I
>remember a section in which the family is under attack by Malay
>pirates, and defends itself by releasing logs.  These logs allow
>a tiger which was previously trapped in a pit to escape.

I don't remember this scene, but I own two copies of The Swiss Family
Robinson which have wildly different plots.  The one I think of as the
"real" one (because that's what I read as a kid), has the family stay
on the one island, no pirates, and rescuing Jenny.  The other starts
off the same, but along the way a ship stops off long enough to take
the first part of the diary back to Europe (but can't find its way
back), the mother gets kidnapped by Malays and taken to another
island, the rest of the family goes in hot pursuit, and (without
revealing details) another mother and child (neither of them named
Jenny) are rescued and contact is reestablished with Europe).  I
always wondered how many versions there were to the story and why.

--
Jane Wagner, Computer Systems and Publications Assistant
The Claude Moore Health Sciences Library| INTERNET: jw2b@virginia.edu
Box 234, UVA Health Sciences Center	| PHONE:    804-924-0188
Charlottesville, VA  22908 		| BITNET:   jw2b@virginia.bitnet
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books