Once again Stan is ahead of the rest of us. You may be able to join this, but you just can't beat it.
Punk rock exists because of the false assumption that the Ramones can be imitated. . . . But the Ramones' loud-fast style masked a pop genius. Slow their tempos, and you've got Beach Boys melodies. Replace lyrics about sniffin' glue and eatin' refried beans, and you've got the Ronettes. Give everyone matching leather jackets, and you've got the punk rock Beatles. Just four lads from Queens who birthed thousands of bands, then blew each one away. Like sharks, they didn't evolve—they didn't need to.
-Mark Spitz remembers the Ramones in Spin Magazine's list of the 50 Greatest Bands. The Ramones were number 2
Monday, February 18, 2002
In the Tolkien, not the endocrinological or Snow White sense, Randy is a dwarf. Tolkien’s Dwarves were stout, taciturn, vaguely magical characters who spent a lot of time in the dark hammering out beautiful things, e.g. Rings of Power. Thinking of himself as a Dwarf who had hung up his war-ax for a while to go sojourning in the Shire, where he has surrounded by squabbling Hobbits (i.e., Charlene’s friends), had actually done a lot for Randy’s peace of mind over the years. He knew perfectly well that if he were stuck in academia these people, and the things they said, would seem momentous to him. But where he came from, nobody had been taking these people seriously for years.
-Cryptonomicon Neal Stephenson on a good strategy for dealing with high falutin’, post-modern babble academics
The more time one spends in higher education, the more one gets the sense that there's something vaguely (or blatantly) fraudulent about a system where knowledge and skills that are supposed to be practical in the real world are taught by people who rarely, if ever, venture out into the real world. Which is not to say that every teacher is like that, but what's the point of learning the law, which is supposed to be practiced, and which will be practiced by the overwhelming majority of law students, from someone who's never practiced? I think the Cryptonomicon offers some more wisdom on the issue of subject matter being taught by people who've never put it to work:
The words came out of Randy’s mouth before he had time to think better of it. "The Information Superhighway is just a f___ing metaphor! Give me a break!" he said.
There was a silence as everyone around the table winced in unison. Dinner had now, officially, crashed and burned. All they could do now was grab their ankles, put their heads between their knees, and wait for the wreckage to slide to a halt.
"That doesn’t tell me very much," Kivistik said. "Everything is a metaphor. The word ‘fork’ is a metaphor for this object." He held up a fork. "All discourse is built from metaphor."
"That’s no excuse for using bad metaphors," Randy said.
"Bad? Bad? Who decides what is bad?" Kivistik said, doing his killer impression of a heavy-lidded, mouth-breathing undergraduate. There was scattered tittering from people who were desperate to break the tension.
Randy could see where it was going. Kivistik had gone for the usual academician’s ace in the hole: everything is relative, it’s all just differing perspectives. People had already begun to resume there little side conversations, thinking that the conflict was over, when Randy gave them all a start with: "Who decides what’s bad? I do."
Even Dr. G. E. B. Kivistik was flustered. He wasn’t sure if Randy was joking. "Excuse me?"
Randy was in no great hurry to answer the question. He took the opportunity to sit back comfortably, stretch, and take a sip of his wine. He was feeling good. "It’s like this," he said. "I’ve read your book. I’ve seen you on TV. I’ve heard you tonight. I personally typed up a list of your credentials when I was preparing press materials for this conference. So I know that you’re not qualified to have an opinion about technical issues."
"Oh," Kivistik said in mock confusion, "I didn’t realize one had to have qualifications."
"I think it’s clear," Randy said, "that if you are ignorant of a particular subject, that your opinion is completely worthless. If I’m sick, I don’t ask a plumber for advice. I go to a doctor. Likewise, if I have questions about the Internet, I will seek opinions from people who know about it."
-Cryptonomicon Neal Stephenson, a lengthy but worthy passage on the dismantling of an academic blowhard
-Cryptonomicon Neal Stephenson on a good strategy for dealing with high falutin’, post-modern babble academics
The more time one spends in higher education, the more one gets the sense that there's something vaguely (or blatantly) fraudulent about a system where knowledge and skills that are supposed to be practical in the real world are taught by people who rarely, if ever, venture out into the real world. Which is not to say that every teacher is like that, but what's the point of learning the law, which is supposed to be practiced, and which will be practiced by the overwhelming majority of law students, from someone who's never practiced? I think the Cryptonomicon offers some more wisdom on the issue of subject matter being taught by people who've never put it to work:
The words came out of Randy’s mouth before he had time to think better of it. "The Information Superhighway is just a f___ing metaphor! Give me a break!" he said.
There was a silence as everyone around the table winced in unison. Dinner had now, officially, crashed and burned. All they could do now was grab their ankles, put their heads between their knees, and wait for the wreckage to slide to a halt.
"That doesn’t tell me very much," Kivistik said. "Everything is a metaphor. The word ‘fork’ is a metaphor for this object." He held up a fork. "All discourse is built from metaphor."
"That’s no excuse for using bad metaphors," Randy said.
"Bad? Bad? Who decides what is bad?" Kivistik said, doing his killer impression of a heavy-lidded, mouth-breathing undergraduate. There was scattered tittering from people who were desperate to break the tension.
Randy could see where it was going. Kivistik had gone for the usual academician’s ace in the hole: everything is relative, it’s all just differing perspectives. People had already begun to resume there little side conversations, thinking that the conflict was over, when Randy gave them all a start with: "Who decides what’s bad? I do."
Even Dr. G. E. B. Kivistik was flustered. He wasn’t sure if Randy was joking. "Excuse me?"
Randy was in no great hurry to answer the question. He took the opportunity to sit back comfortably, stretch, and take a sip of his wine. He was feeling good. "It’s like this," he said. "I’ve read your book. I’ve seen you on TV. I’ve heard you tonight. I personally typed up a list of your credentials when I was preparing press materials for this conference. So I know that you’re not qualified to have an opinion about technical issues."
"Oh," Kivistik said in mock confusion, "I didn’t realize one had to have qualifications."
"I think it’s clear," Randy said, "that if you are ignorant of a particular subject, that your opinion is completely worthless. If I’m sick, I don’t ask a plumber for advice. I go to a doctor. Likewise, if I have questions about the Internet, I will seek opinions from people who know about it."
-Cryptonomicon Neal Stephenson, a lengthy but worthy passage on the dismantling of an academic blowhard
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