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Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

suntimes.com

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Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#151

Post by vidarh »

backprojection wrote: post #140
apas wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Aristotle said something very similar: It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

This one is much better and on the mark. Fitzgerald's quote needs a corollary, which appeals to intelectual honesty. If reason definitively tells you x, but you want to believe y, then you might be tempted to abuse Fitzgerald's quote.

Exactly. My first thought about the Fitzgerald quote is "that's how fundamentalist nutcases are able to function".

The ability to hold mutually contradictory ideas at the same time and continue to function is something we all do - it's a fundamental part of the human psyche. There's nothing special about it. It's just that we generally do it by compartmentalising the ideas to different parts of our lives.

Dealing with multiple contradictory ideas at the same time and knowing and accepting how they contradict, is very different.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#152

Post by objclxt »

jellicle wrote: post #96

Ebert was a great film critic, but oddly, no one here seems to be talking about his one gigantic blind spot, which is his enduring and impenetrable belief that video games are not art, could never be art, and have no artistic merit whatsoever. His half-hearted apology - "I still believe this, but I should never have said so." - is in no way a retraction or backdown from that belief. This is totally wrong. Movies are…

> This is totally wrong. Movies are a subset of video games.

That seems a little...subjective? There is certainly far more critical literature suggesting the opposite thing. Seems to me what you're saying is just as much an opinion as Ebert's.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#153

Post by arethuza »

michaelochurch wrote: post #108
gnosis wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a sad comment on society that Ebert is considered an intellectual.

This idea that new forms of media (film, TV) are innately anti-intellectual just because the classics were in writing is ridiculous. Don't get me wrong. Reading is important, the classics are important. But the idea that you have to focus in "old stuff" to be intellectual is absurd.

I'm sure there must have been a similar reaction when the works of Homer were first written down - I'm sure bards who relied on memory must have regarded writing as "anti-intellectual".

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#154

Post by bobwaycott »

apas wrote: post #94
tptacek wrote: post #13

Fitzgerald said "the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function." Ebert seemed to have a knack for thinking all the thoughts simultaneously, and then getting their product onto a page: http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/12/win_ben_steins_mind.... http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2013/03/how_i_am_a_roman_cat... One of t…

Well, Aristotle said something very similar: It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

Despite what the internet would have you believe, Aristotle never said such a thing. That quote may be a product of the Fitzgerald quote being mangled and misattributed, or of someone thinking they could say what Aristotle said better than Aristotle did.

The closest we get to such a statement is from Nichomachean Ethics 1094b23-25:

> "It is the mark of an educated mind to rest satisfied with the degree of precision which the nature of the subject admits and not to seek exactness where only an approximation is possible." -- Aristotle Actual

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#155

Post by bobwaycott »

JPKab wrote: post #43
tptacek wrote: post #13

Fitzgerald said "the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function." Ebert seemed to have a knack for thinking all the thoughts simultaneously, and then getting their product onto a page: http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/12/win_ben_steins_mind.... http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2013/03/how_i_am_a_roman_cat... One of t…

Wow. The Fitzgerald quote is amazing. Thanks for sharing. As a kid growing up in a poor, rural community, I wasn't exposed to much intellectual writing. The exception was the reprint in the local paper of Ebert's movie reviews, and of course seeing him on one of the two channels that came in on the antenna. When so many around me thought that being dissatisfied with the intellectual equivalent of McDonald's was eliti…

If you're interested, the quote comes from The Crack-Up, which "tells the story of Fitzgerald's sudden descent at age thirty-nine from a life of success and glamor to one of emptiness and despair, and his determined recovery."[1]

[1]: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16893.The_Crack_Up

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#156

Post by bobthedino »

I always loved Ebert's re-appraisal of The Big Lebowski in 2010:

"If a man has a roof over his head, fresh half-and-half for his White Russians, a little weed and his bowling buddies, what more, really, does he need?"

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20...

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#157

Post by apas »

bobwaycott wrote: post #154
apas wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Aristotle said something very similar: It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

Despite what the internet would have you believe, Aristotle never said such a thing. That quote may be a product of the Fitzgerald quote being mangled and misattributed, or of someone thinking they could say what Aristotle said better than Aristotle did. The closest we get to such a statement is from Nichomachean Ethics 1094b23-25 : > "It is the mark of an educated mind to rest satisfied with the degree of precision…

Well, this quote (the one I've shared) has indeed a fair amount of sources.

It's attributed to Metaphysics (http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2479557), Nichomachean Ethics -- as you said (http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/aristotleworks/a/121610-A...), and Wikiquote (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Aristotle). cmd+f (or ctrl) for 'educated' to find it in the last two links for it also appears slightly different from your version.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#158

Post by cafard »

apas wrote: post #157
bobwaycott wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Despite what the internet would have you believe, Aristotle never said such a thing. That quote may be a product of the Fitzgerald quote being mangled and misattributed, or of someone thinking they could say what Aristotle said better than Aristotle did. The closest we get to such a statement is from Nichomachean Ethics 1094b23-25 : > "It is the mark of an educated mind to rest satisfied with the degree of precision…

Well, this quote (the one I've shared) has indeed a fair amount of sources. It's attributed to Metaphysics ( http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2479557 ), Nichomachean Ethics -- as you said ( http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/aristotleworks/a/121610-A... ), and Wikiquote ( http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Aristotle ). cmd+f (or ctrl) for 'educated' to find it in the last two links for it also appears slightly differen…

One is at the disadvantage that translations will vary. But the Metaphysics themselves are not terribly long...

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#159

Post by cpher »

jmj42 wrote: post #65
3am wrote: post #54

I am maybe a little older than some of the readers here, pushing on the lower end of middle age, ie, I had to memorize phone numbers/rotary phone at home when I was very young, I had a Walkman, MTV had only one station and it played music, etc. Perhaps I could have said Gen-X and saved some time. Anyway, I remember Siskel and Ebert on television before there was much of an internet to speak of. Now if you look out ov…

...and get up to change the TV channel In 1990, I was in high school. We moved to a small town near Urbana, IL. I was impressed then, and continue to be today, that Ebert would return to Urbana, Ebert's home town, every year in April (health permitting) to headline Ebertfest. Ebertfest is a local film festival held to honor him. With Ebertfest only 2 weeks away, it will be truly sad knowing that the world has lost a…

I grew up just outside C-U and remember that very well. I think back in early 1997 he hosted a special screening of 2001: A Space Odyssey at the Virginia Theater. One of the actors was there (Keir Dullea, maybe?) and they had a "fireside chat" about the movie and a Q&A session. It was a great experience.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#160

Post by acuozzo »

xentronium wrote: post #112
KevinMS wrote: post #103

What can you say about a film reviewer that gives Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace 3.5 out of 4 stars? Useless. I don't get all this praise I'm reading here. Despite being witty, a national treasure, and whatever, he had one core job to do, and he was terrible at it.

I don't understand all the hate on the episode one. Except for Jar Jar Binks, the movie was quite entertaining, actually.

http://redlettermedia.com/plinkett/star-wars/star-wars-episo...
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