Some Heroes • Hacker News Board

Re: Some Heroes

#41

Post by yters » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 10:52 AM UTC

wanorris wrote: post #16

lux wrote: post #11

From my limited understanding of art interpretation, in earlier times art was seen somewhat as an attempt to understand or mimic the world around them in order to understand it better. Now we tend to value creativity as a more important quality, but in doing so we sacrifice a degree of sincerity or even nobility that curiosity and mimicry have. All of these heroes share a creative quality, but in a more classical sen…

I've heard it argued pretty convincingly that the birth of photography is the root cause of the death of mimesis in art.

In what way? Was mimesis about modeling physical appearance or understanding the underlying principles? I can see how photography is a shortcut for the former, but it seems worse for the latter.

Re: Some Heroes

#42

Post by yters » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 10:55 AM UTC

mattmaroon wrote: post #21

"Robert Morris has a very unusual quality: he's never wrong." I was only ever wrong once. I thought that I had been mistaken about something 5 years earlier, but it turned out I hadn't. I was wrong about having been wrong.

I'm never wrong too, but that's just because I either make trivial, all encompassing, or unfalsifiable claims. It sounds good though:)

Re: Some Heroes

#43

Post by yters » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 11:20 AM UTC

In regards to the Newton comment, I need to find a solution to the 2nd law of thermodynamics, otherwise there is no such thing as a significant answer!

Re: Some Heroes

#44

Post by yters » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 11:21 AM UTC

rglovejoy wrote: post #35

I like P.G. Wodehouse's stories; I'm quite a bit less impressed with his activities during World War 2. Wodehouse was in France when the Germans invaded in 1940. He was interned as an enemy alien by the Nazis for a year. The Germans were able to persuade him to make some light-hearted radio broadcasts intended for American (but not British) consumption, in exchange for his release from internment. Many Britons (inclu…

Do you mean he made Nazi propaganda?

Re: Some Heroes

#45

Post by iamelgringo » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 11:24 AM UTC

Thanks, Paul. It was a heartfelt essay and fun to read.

Re: Some Heroes

#46

Post by revorad » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 12:38 PM UTC

"I've never cried like I cried at his funeral."

My favourite sentence in the essay. Made me aware of a dimension I didn't associate pg with.

Re: Some Heroes

#47

Post by llimllib » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 1:09 PM UTC

Alex3917 wrote: post #19

wanorris wrote: post #18

> To do really great things, you have to seek out questions people didn't even realize were questions. ... You only get one life. Why not do something huge? This one really got me thinking. While tackling big questions is certainly admirable, it implies that greatness ought to be a goal one has in life. As I get older (I'm now married with 2 kids), I've become more and more convinced that it's more important in life…

From what I hear, most modern asian religions scholars believe the Tao was a satire.

Which would only make me like it more...

Re: Some Heroes

#48

Post by pg » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 2:33 PM UTC

rglovejoy wrote: post #35

I like P.G. Wodehouse's stories; I'm quite a bit less impressed with his activities during World War 2. Wodehouse was in France when the Germans invaded in 1940. He was interned as an enemy alien by the Nazis for a year. The Germans were able to persuade him to make some light-hearted radio broadcasts intended for American (but not British) consumption, in exchange for his release from internment. Many Britons (inclu…

You should just link directly to the Wikipedia article you paraphrased:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._G._Wodehouse

Though you do seem to have invented one part: that the broadcasts were in exchange for his release.

As usual, Wikipedia is not the last word in accuracy in such matters. Most of the British literary world seems to have been on his side. The leader of the opposition was not A. A. Milne, but a now-forgotten journalist (I've literally forgotten his name) who made a crusade of it as a form of proto-linkbait. And Wodehouse hadn't lived in England before the war, either. He moved to the US in his twenties.

Re: Some Heroes

#49

Post by pg » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 2:53 PM UTC

mynameishere wrote: post #40

pg wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q...

Ugh. Monroeville. Come for the Sam's Club. Stay for the Popeye's.

Yeah, the place was a kind of worst-case scenario for strip development. In my time the big draw was Monroeville Mall, the biggest in the country at the time of its construction (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monroeville_Mall).

The one good part, for a kid, was that a lot of the land was too hilly to build on, and was left as forest.

Re: Some Heroes

#50

Post by danohuiginn » Sat, Apr 05, 2008, 3:04 PM UTC

Alex3917 wrote: post #2

"I used to read a lot of novels when I was younger. I can't read most anymore, because they don't have enough information in them." This is a good one to add to the list of things not to say on a first date. And if it does somehow come up, at least have enough sense not to follow it with "I also don't read biographies/memoirs because I consider them fiction." /Don't ask

You think? Sounds pretty good to me - provided you're able to listen to your date explaining why s/he _does_ like novels, and to convey something of the joy you get from reading non-fiction.

But then I have a fairly naive concept of a date as a (potential) meeting of minds, rather than a PR exercise.