HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,sci.philosophy.meta
Subject: Re: About Truth (was re: Paglia (was: Cross-Writing))
Date: 21 Jan 93 06:20:51 GMT
Organization: The Phallogocentric Cabal

In article <1993Jan20.155810.6350@eff.org> 
mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin) writes:

>In article <1993Jan19.125706.19546@husc3.harvard.edu>
>zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:

MZ:
>>To recapitulate: we are talking about "it" being a physical theory,
>>not about "[t]he theory that the moon is made of green cheese".  Hone
>>your reading skills, shyster.

MG:
>But I insist on talking about the word "about" as I used it, not as you
>wish I had used it (presumably in some etiolated philosophical fashion).

Counselor, I assure you that I have absolutely no counterfactual
wishes regarding any aspect of your behavior.  To repeat: insofar as
neither concept falls within the purview of theoretical physics, the
said discipline can be said to be about the fundamental truth with
exactly the same degree of validity as it can be said to be about the
moon being made of green cheese.

MZ:
>>And to remind you once again: the elided part of my previous article
>>contains a refutation of your ludicrous claim that a physical theory
>>can be said to be about fundamental truth.

MG:
>I found your refutation unconvincing. But if you think readers here have
>been cheated of your reasoning, feel free to repost it and hold a vote.

I see no reason to cater to the shortcomings of your, or anyone else's
intellect by belaboring the obvious, just as I saw no reason to give the
lie to your ludicrous misinterpretation of Proust by quoting the famous
philippic against the ignoble and dishonorable ways of "the third sex"
from the beginning of _Sodome et Gomorrhe_.  My malign spirit is fully
content with puncturing your foppish pretension, leaving the thankless
task of mopping up the ensuing mess of pulsating intestine and excrement
to the ever-present vultures.

MZ:
>>As for your ignorance
>>being evedent only to me, it certainly is not so, -- surely you
>>remember Fido calling your bluff first.

MG:
>I don't take Fido's and your positions to be equivalent.  I doubt Fido
>gives a damn whether I'm relying on some Tarski notions or not.

Fido and I agree on this point, just enough to refute your blithering
statement.  Still, the claims of truth have no merit for distinguished
public figures of your exalted caliber.  Carry on.

>--Mike

>-- 
>Mike Godwin,    |"I'm waiting for the one-man revolution
>mnemonic@eff.org| The only one that's coming."
>(617) 864-0665  |                           
>EFF, Cambridge  |                   --Robert Frost 

cordially,
mikhail zeleny@husc.harvard.edu
"Le cul des femmes est monotone comme l'esprit des hommes."
From: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Pigs is Pigs
Date: 22 Jan 93 15:02:35 GMT
Reply-To: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
In-reply-to: twain@milton.u.washington.edu (Barbara Hlavin)

In article <1jn583INNdtv@shelley.u.washington.edu>, twain@milton (Barbara Hlavin) writes:
>>I only remember that the author was someone I had never heard of.

>OK: how about Ellis Parker Butler? 

I never heard of him--that must be the one!
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin)
Subject: Re: Remedial Math (was Re: Marilyn (was: Paglia)
Originator: mnemonic@eff.org
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 17:25:33 GMT

In article <30579@castle.ed.ac.uk> jeremy@castle.ed.ac.uk (Jeremy Henderson) writes:

>I'm afraid I must confess to being a geowotsit, but speaking personally I
>don't think I would have enjoyed Pynchon so much without some inkling
>of what he was alluding to from a scientific point of view.

I agree. Some basics of thermodynamics and information theory are pretty
useful in appreciating Pynchon.


--Mike


-- 
Mike Godwin,    |"I'm waiting for the one-man revolution
mnemonic@eff.org| The only one that's coming."
(617) 864-0665  |                           
EFF, Cambridge  |                   --Robert Frost 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: mtaranto@panix.com (Mark Taranto)
Subject: Re: Buried Treasure -or- So, whaddaya use for bookmarks?
Organization: The Inner Clique
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 05:43:44 GMT


spb0457@rigel.tamu.edu (SubGenius) asks what we have stuck inside our books.
A quick review shows the following:


	Bookmarks from bookstores.

	Monthly train commutation passes.

	Train schedules.

	Airline tickets.

	Business cards (mine and others).

	Pressed flowers (which I gave to my first wife, in a book which
	I got in the divorce settlement).

	Comics cut from newspapers.

	A ticket to the Long Room at Trinity College Dublin
	(where The Book Of Kells is on display).

	Those obnoxious cards that fall out of magazines.

	Blue books from tests I took in college.

	A letter from the director of graduate studies for the
	Mathematics Department at the University of Minnesota
	telling me that I could not schedule oral exams until
	my plan B project was completed.  I never completed it.

	Attempted proofs of Fermat's last theorem -- from when
	I took Number Theory.

	Report cards.

	Two checks for $1,000,000.00

	My mother's diamond.

	Mimeographed copies of tests that I gave to my
	remedial mathematics class at the U of MN --
	including a word problem where students had to 
	compute the age of Mortimer and Ophelia, from 
	information given.

	96 column punch cards.



Mark
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 17:00:04 CST
From: <U19807@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: "Harlan Ellison's Watching" by Harlan Ellison

In article <leo.727693316@draconis>, leo@cp.tn.tudelft.nl (Leo Breebaart) says:

>Anyway, I have a question for the Harlan experts out there: in the book,
>Harlan mentions working on a major Hollywood movie screenplay, but he is
>so embarrassed about what eventually became of it that he doesn't even
>want to tell us the name of that movie. But of course I'm just dying
>to know which movie he's talking about. Does anybody know?

It'd probably be "The Oscar". Judging by the amount of times he both brings
up and disparages the movie in his nonfiction pieces, it must be (for want
of a more polite term) a particularly hideous piece of shit. On the other
hand,since he's had to _review_ some real clinkers since then,he's probably
gotten over the self-deprecation stage by now.

      ** Chris Krolczyk,esq.  * DISCLAIMER: My opinions are in **
      ** Maniac-at-Large      * no way endorsed by the Univer- **
      ** U19807@UICVM.BITNET  * sity of Illinois at Chicago.   **
      ** u19807@uicvm.uic.edu * So much for frivolous lawsuits.**
From: mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Heather's Ford
Date: 21 Jan 93 17:10:30 GMT
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Originator: mnemonic@eff.org

In article <C16L76.Krx@news.iastate.edu> s1mbm@isuvax.iastate.edu writes:
>Heather, there is indeed a lot of perniciously turgid criticism floating,
>now, like unflushable turds in the commode of our psychic washroom.  But
>time itself has always, it seems to me, pretty much taken care of bad
>criticism, softening it up so that it might float away upon the cleansing
>sewers of non-redemption.


Block that metaphor!


--Mike



-- 
Mike Godwin,    |"I'm waiting for the one-man revolution
mnemonic@eff.org| The only one that's coming."
(617) 864-0665  |                           
EFF, Cambridge  |                   --Robert Frost 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: kasprj@vccsouth19.its.rpi.edu (Jim Kasprzak)
Subject: Depressing reading (was Re: Books we're too righteous to censor-- but would like to)
Reply-To: kasprj@rpi.edu
Organization: The Big Wedge 
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1993 22:15:53 GMT

In article <ABL.93Jan23160046@cybill.inesc.pt>, abl@cybill.inesc.pt (Antonio Leal) writes:
|> 
|> (If you're shooting for "depressing", I'd suggest that K. Vonnegut,
|> Thomas Disch, J.G. Ballard, W. Burroughs, Martin Amis, etc. make much
|> better targets.  Hell has no bile like an optimist disappointed.)

 Only being really familiar with Vonnegut and Disch, I can't say that I
find their writing depressing as such. Coldly realistic, yes. But to me,
a depressing book is one that gives the message "give up, all is hopeless".
Maybe some people would say that Vonnegut falls into this category, but
I've always been able to find a small ray of hope shining through the 
clouds of gloom that tend to envelop the conclusions of his novels. Perhaps
you can't win with Vonnegut, but you can sometimes break even and if all 
else fails, you can quit the game by going insane. 
------------------------------------------------------------------
     __  Live from Capitaland, heart of the Empire State...
 ___/  | Jim Kasprzak, computer operator @ RPI, Troy, NY, USA
/____ *|          he who refuses to do nonsense  
     \_|          is doomed to talk arithmetic.
      ====  e-mail: kasprj@rpi.edu or kasprzak@mts.rpi.edu 
 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: wismith@amelia.nas.nasa.gov (William R. Smith)
Subject: Maugham (was Re: Substance over Style)
Organization: NAS, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 93 16:10:51 GMT

Mark Taranto writes:

	Maugham does have a style.  He gives substance, and he does
	give wonderful descriptions.  The overall effect is wonderful.  What I
	should have said is that his prose style is often clumsy.  It sometimes 
	seemed that on nearly every page there was some sentence which had a
	horrendous structure; run-on sentences that joined unrelated, rather 
	than related thoughts by semi-colons much as I have done with this 
	sentence -- as a treat for you..  But the overall effect of the book 
	is wonderful.
	


Once I chomp through the many books I got for Christman, I'll have
to have another go at Maugham.  I'd been thinking about reading another
set of short stories by him anyway.  I think somebody published them in
three volumes and I've only read one.  I'll be especially watchful for
his run-on sentences.

Does this mean there is hope for us aspiring writers (that, which) have trouble
knowing "that" from "which"?




William Sburgfort Smith
From: wwhitman@nevada.edu (MICHAEL WISE)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Book-title modesty
Date: 27 Jan 93 18:18:09 GMT
Article-I.D.: nevada.1993Jan27.181809.22902
Organization: University of Nevada System Computing Services

In article <sph0301.160.727977722@utsph.sph.uth.tmc.edu> sph0301@utsph.sph.uth.tmc.edu writes:
>In article <1993Jan22.132129.46644@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
>It occurred to me the other day that I feel compelled, when carrying a
>>book in public, to conceal the title, usually by carrying it with the
>>front cover toward my body.  Observation bears out my hunch that many
>>others do the same, at least if the book they're carrying falls into
>>the category of Good Literature (which much narrows the database of my
>>observation).
>
Library of America editions are beautiful, cloth-bound books with black
dustcovers and the author's name in calligraphy on the cover. They are
printed in a clear typeface that jumps off the page at you, and they
sit open on a table (great for reading while eating). Each edition contains
several works by the author, so they are a true value. I own almost the
full set. However, I have discovered that the fine paper and the black
cover throw people off. They think I'm reading the BIBLE! What a shock 
it must be when a devout Christian looks over my shoulder and sees Whitman's
sensual verse instead of Judges 10:6!


(Faulkner's _Absalom, Absalom_ is currently on display.)

Library of America has published two volumes of Faulkner; the second
contains Absalom! Absalom!


___________________________________________________________________________
Michael Wise 	(wwhitman@nevada.edu)	UNLV English

"Now I want you to tell me just one thing more. Why do you hate the South?"
"I dont hate it," Quentin said quickly, at once, immediately; "I dont
hate it," he said. I dont hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, 
the iron New England dark: I dont. I dont. I dont hate it! I dont hate it!
				--William Faulkner, Absalom! Absalom!
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: ggm@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (George Michaelson)
Subject: Re: Read 'em and weep: Depressing novels
Organization: Prentice Centre, University of Queensland
Date: Fri, 29 Jan 1993 05:03:48 GMT

"A Scots Quair" by Lewis Crassic Gibbon.

	WW1 Scots Peasant woman is ground down by the accumulated effects
	of poverty, male violence and the system. Stanford Professors will
	love tearing into the overt Trotskyist slant of this three-parter.

	I love this book. Definately worth weeping over.

"Voyage to Arcturis" by David Lindsay.

	Life, The Universe, and growing wierd sexual organs on purple
	planet of depression. Summoning up the strength to finish this
	book is hard, mainly because its also fucking badly written.

	Lindsay was definately depressed. I think he may have offed
	himself afterwards.

	This book won the Skoob Bookshops "most remaindered sci-fi" prize.
	getting rid of the stock was a perpetual bummer, exceeded only by
	surplus copies of "Future Shock" by Alvin Toffler. The best thing
	you can say about that one is the use of OCR fonts on the hardback
	cover. Definately Dated, also surely on the hitlist of the McMuffin.

"New Grub Street" by George Gissing.
	
	How to succeed in publishing without dying inside. Answer: you can't.

"Ragged Trousered Philanthropists" By Robert Tressel.

	These guys are fucked. if the bosses don't get them, the pub
	doesn't get them, debt doesn't get them, then paint-fumes induced
	TB gets them. Moral: be born rich. 


Any Forward to a Rumanian Scientific Journal Pre-1990. 

	The slobbering over said countries august leaders scientific
	prowess is gruesome.  Coupled to adverts for bulk industrial-
	grade salt for export. (This on a journal for cybernetical
	research) The effect is enough to cloud a whole day.

"Level 7"	By (can't remember)

	Read while working in the same bookshop Jack worked in between
	cups of coffee. Story of a mythical 7-layer deep bunker in the
	USSR where the inmates slowly drown in their own shit as the AC
	and sewage pack in under the strontium load.  Only for hard-core 
	anti-nuke propaganda Freaks, probably also required reading for
	Our Resident Professor at the Breakfast Table.

I nominate "Nuit et Bruillard" for the film version of this thread. Also
a book by Elie Wiesel I have on the deathcamps which I have owned for over 5
years but cannot bring myself to read. Just looking at the cover makes me
wobbly.

-George
--
                         George Michaelson
G.Michaelson@cc.uq.oz.au The Prentice Centre      | There's no  market for
                         University of Queensland | hippos in Philadelphia
Phone: +61 7 365 4079    QLD Australia 4072       |          -Bertold Brecht
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: fi@grebyn.com (Fiona Webster)
Subject: Re: Censorship
Organization: Grebyn Timesharing
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 15:23:04 GMT

John McCarthy writes:
>Trumbo's _Johnny Got His Gun_ is one of the most powerful of anti-war
>novels.  It is about a soldier who becomes a basket case.

This may not seem relevant to much, but for those who have a narrow
view of MTV as a place for vidiots who don't read books, it's worth
noting that the heavy-metal band Metallica cut a song based on this
book/movie, and that the video was very compelling, including footage
from the film.  I happened to catch an interview with the lead singer
of Metallica, who said he'd been very impressed by the Trumbo's *book*.

					--this from someone who doesn't
					  have cable, and isn't a
					  Metallica fan,

							Fiona
From: crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu (Lauren L. Crawford)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Read 'em and weep: Depressing novels (was books be don't censor)
Date: 27 Jan 93 20:37:34 GMT
Organization: University of Pennsylvania

My votes for depressing books:


_The Beans of Egypt, Maine_ (which is still a major achievement)

Anything by Doris Lessing

_The Bell Jar_ (sort of a given, I guess)

"Crayola, a poem" by Joyce Carol Oates (depressing because she gets to
    read it in public without getting booed off the podium)

_Them_ by Joyce Carol Oates

Anything by Joyce Carol Oates

_A Confederacy of Dunces_  (no wonder this guy killed himself)






-- 
I can identify with steelworkers.  I can identify with workers that have
had a difficult time.      -- Former Vice-President Danforth Quayle
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lauren Crawford  //  crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu
From: bh419@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Ted B Samsel)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Novels about writers
Date: 26 Jan 1993 11:35:53 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu


Larry McMurtry's ALL MY FRIENDS ARE GOING TO BE STRANGERS has
Danny Deck, the minor regional author, as protagonist.
-- 
Ted....
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: tdlg9831@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Tracey Dianne Layng)
Subject: Re: Buried Treasure -or- So, whaddaya use for bookmarks?
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 15:54:12 GMT

In my library, the ever present kleenex is my favorite bookmark. I imagine I
would be able to fill an entire empty box if I ever cleaned them all out of my
books. I also have used bandaids still in the wrapper, string from a cat toy, 
recipe cards, drawings from my nephews, grocery lists, and once even a real
bookmark (which the cats pulled out and played with because it had yarn at the
top).

Tracey
UIUC
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: nickles@sage.cc.purdue.edu (John A. Nickles)
Subject: Re: "Harlan Ellison's Watching" by Harlan Ellison
Organization: Purdue University Computing Center
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 23:30:19 GMT

In article <sterbenc-220193131639@150.130.23.185> sterbenc@ivhs.mot.com (Joe Sterbenc) writes:



>
>BTW, go rent "The Terminator" and watch the very end of the credits:
>
>		"A SPECIAL THANKS TO THE WORKS OF HARLAN ELLISON"
>
>I believe there was a lawsuit involved.
>


Somewhere in WATCHING, Ellison admits that Terminator is actually a pretty
good film, but legalities prevent him from saying more. He then concludes:

"By all means go see Terminator and forget all about Soldier [ the Harlan
Ellison story on Outer Limits that bears a certain resemblence to Terminator]
And disregard any similarities to "Demon with a Glass Hand" and "I Have
No Mouth And I Must Scream. Also do not think of a green cow."

{The name of the certain resemblence it bears is "identical"}

John A. Nickles
Standard Disclaimer: I didn't steal from Purdue or Harlan Ellison

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: kate@cactus.org (Katherine M. Catmull)
Subject: Re: Okay, so Texas law-makers are stupid
Organization: Capital Area Central Texas UNIX Society, Austin, Tx
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 15:53:09 GMT

In article <1jhl7dINNk1h@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> bh419@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Ted B Samsel) writes:
>
>Dan'l DanehyOakes sez:
>...how does this make them different from lawmakers anywhere else?
>
>Danny..read Molly Ivins..then you'll KNOW...
>-- 
>Ted....


What you'll find is that they differ not in depth of stupidity but 
in colorful and imaginative variety of stupidities.

Kate, who works with them & knows


-- 
- - - - - - - -
kate@cactus.org
Be the voice of night and Florida in my ear.
From: crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu (Lauren L. Crawford)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Most-anthologized English-language poem
Date: 25 Jan 93 15:42:58 GMT
Organization: University of Pennsylvania

In article <C1DCJo.C2E@ccu.umanitoba.ca> feld@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Michael Feld) writes:

>"400 poetry anthologies were fed into a computer and voila -- the 500
>most anthologized English poems rose to the top.  A revealing snapshot
>of one aspect of Wesern civ, even including a list of the poems in
>order of popularity. (... is Number 1.)"

>Can you guess?  I couldn't; but the winner is neither trivial nor
>inappropriate.


White Christmas?



-- 
I can identify with steelworkers.  I can identify with workers that have
had a difficult time.      -- Former Vice-President Danforth Quayle
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lauren Crawford  //  crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu
Xref: sparky rec.arts.books:26341 talk.politics.soviet:10736 soc.culture.soviet:12418 soc.culture.jewish:26125
From: render@massive (Hal Render)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,alt.president.clinton
Subject: Re: Maya Angelou inaugural poem
Date: 27 Jan 93 02:14:31 GMT
Organization: University of Colorado at Colorado Springs
NNTP-Posting-Host: massive.uccs.edu
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]

Gerald Olchowy (golchowy@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca) wrote:
: Angelou also makes one huge politically incorrect faux pas in her
: poem using the term "Eskimo" for the Inuit...which is akin to using
: the N-word for African Americans...shame on her.  
: 

Perhaps she has not talked about the Inuit before and has not had occasion
to be instructed on the new term.   Perhaps you could of sent her a letter
explaining the preferred terminology before criticizing her.  Respect for 
another person often means that you resist criticizing a person for a fault
of which they are not aware.

--
hal render
univ. of colorado at colorado-springs
render@massive.uccs.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: wwhitman@nevada.edu (MICHAEL WISE)
Subject: Re: Poet Laureate
Organization: University of Nevada System Computing Services
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 18:41:40 GMT

In article <C1C0F5.1y8@panix.com> mtaranto@panix.com (Mark Taranto) writes:
>
>sanjiva@ecrc.de (Sanjiva Prasad) writes:
>
>> I forget now, does the US have something like a "poet laureate"?  If yes,
>> who is it now?  Or does every Prez get to nominate one?
>
>Yes.  It is a two year position, formerly called "Poetry Consultant to the
>Library of Congress."  I don't know who appoints the laureate, but don't
>think it is the president.  I attended some readings at The Library of
>Congress in the early 80's, when Maxine Kumin was poetry consultant.
>
>One needn't be a US citizen, as Stephen Spender has served in the role.
>
>In the mid 80s, the title was changed to Poet Laureate.  I'm not sure who
>the current Laureate is -- but Richard Wilbur was the first to have that
>title.
>

Joseph Brodsky is the current Poet Laureate. The times they are a changin'.
No longer is the Poet Laureate expected to write occasional verse for 
coronations and such (an inauguration poem would have been Brodsky's job
in Tennyson's England). The post is also considered honorable--those who
remember Byron's opening shot at Bob Southey in Don Juan will realise that
taking the job was the nineteenth century equivalent of selling out to the
establishment.

___________________________________________________________________________
Michael Wise 	(wwhitman@nevada.edu)	UNLV English

"Now I want you to tell me just one thing more. Why do you hate the South?"
"I dont hate it," Quentin said quickly, at once, immediately; "I dont
hate it," he said. I dont hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, 
the iron New England dark: I dont. I dont. I dont hate it! I dont hate it!
				--William Faulkner, Absalom! Absalom!