"In normal times, the Fed can bolster aggregate demand by reducing interest rates. Lower interest rates encourage households and companies to borrow and spend. They also bolster equity values and, by encouraging international capital to look elsewhere, reduce the value of the dollar in foreign-exchange markets. Spending on consumption, investment and net exports all increase. But these are not normal times. The Fed has already cut the federal funds rate to 1 percent, close to its lower bound of zero. Some fear that our central bank is almost out of ammunition..." - Anthony Citrano
"The good news is that Mr. French, a young British journalist, is certainly unafraid to face unpleasant facts about his subject. But the better news about “The World Is What It Is” is this: it’s one of the sprightliest, most gripping, most intellectually curious and, well, funniest biographies of a living writer (Mr. Naipaul is 76) to come along in years." - Ňicķ
via Bookmarklet
"Corpoetics is a collection of 'found' poetry from the websites of well-known brands and corporations. I visited various company websites, found the closest thing to a Corporate Overview, and then set about rearranging the words into poetry. You can read a few extracts here.
Copies are available for £5 plus p&p. All proceeds go to the National Literacy Trust, an independent charity dedicated to changing lives through literacy." KPMG //
I am strong. /
I am vibrant. /
I am committed to a vision. //
I am tremendous. /
I am quality. /
I will lead people to excellence. //
I am delighted. /
I am respected. /
I am very greatly valued. //
What am I? /
I am the best. // - Jason Wehmhoener
via Bookmarklet
"In some ways, Goebel’s method of characterization is hyper-efficient; We can judge characters in a split second based on their pop culture preferences. Goebel also uses the technique to show which characters we should empathize with and which we should see as purveyors of mainstream dreck.
The technique works well in the book and made me wonder if it could be applied to everyday life. I asked the three questions to some of my best friends, and saw if their responses were congruent with how I would characterize them." - Anika Malone
via Bookmarklet
Heh. This is great. Me: 1. Baraka 2. STNG 3. Yeah Yeah Yeahs ... (though all of them kind of morph over the years) - Ňicķ
I've seen myself doing the opposite: believing that I'd really hit it off with certain people I've met online because of their "list," or wondering why I can't stand someone I know personally when their favorite band is the Shins or something like that. For the record, 1. Casablanca, 2. The West Wing, 3. Pink Floyd. - Mark Trapp
Naked Lunch or Bladerunner? That's a tough one. West Wing or House? Band is a really tough one, but I guess I'll go with Future Sound of London. - Jason Wehmhoener
Ah, I was thinking Casablanca too Mark (and Empire Strikes Back... same caliber basically ;-)... all of these are a tough call really. Jason, FSoL... I used to listen to them. They still making music? - Ňicķ
Shpongle is quite nice too. Any music with layers of digital & analog instruments with complex rhythm and harmony, almost fractal-like in form. Violin and flute are extremely versatile instruments and can sound decidedly non-western. Drumming of any kind, especially middle-eastern or indian. I think Goebel's method is pretty silly because if you are someone that really loves music, you're more likely to have expansive tastes and less likely to be able to "choose". - Jason Wehmhoener
fascinating, comprehensive, and actually kinda moving. totally worth the hour. makes youtube seem like some kind of everyman community movement for the 21st century. - Ňicķ
Yeah, this was good. Long, but worth watching if you haven't seen it. - Tanath
From the page: We are pleased to announce the release of our Young Mad Scientist's First Alphabet Blocks. These lovely blocks contain many carefully engraved illustrations of the equipment, training, and activities that a budding mad scientist will require, combined with a clever alphabetic introduction to the concept depicted. - Donna Mugavero
via Bookmarklet
"Kenneth Burke considered great imaginative writing “equipment for living,” and for Saul Bellow poetic and philosophical words were a “poor boy’s arsenal.” Kafka declared that literature “breaks up the frozen sea inside us.” (What a mess that would make.)" - Ňicķ
via Bookmarklet
"He didn’t have to try to translate his perceptions into language; he understood that he must see in language, and he saw with the supreme, paradoxically unformed, fluid ego of an adolescent." - Ňicķ
via Bookmarklet
"so little has been tried
Art's perpetually new beginning means that anything is possible and that there is an inexhaustible amount for artists to do. "[Our] capacities have never been measured," Thoreau writes in Walden, "nor are we to judge of what [one] can do by any precedents, so little has been tried . . . It matters not what the clocks say or the attitudes and labors of men. Morning is when I am awake and there is a dawn in me."
-- Charles Bernstein A Poetics" - Donna Mugavero
via Bookmarklet
Well, what is art without an audience? (it's just a bunch scribbles no one reads, which then do nothing) - Ňicķ
But if you don't make art because that's what you have to do when you get up in the morning, if you don't make art because you're compelled to do it and can't imagine otherwise— doesn't that mean the existence of an audience is secondary? - Donna Mugavero
An audience can be one or one hundred million. Is one better than the other? A sketchbook is a visual journal. It lacks an audience. Is it art? - Jason Wehmhoener
Sometimes the thing the artist makes is not as important as what making it does to the artist. - Jason Wehmhoener
Art is a form of communication. Perhaps it need only communicate with the artist himself, but then there is not much ambition in communicating with yourself. - Ňicķ
I'd love to make a joke here about how I often talk to myself... but this is better: Simone de Beauvoir said she wrote "to explain myself to myself". Just wanted to throw that into the mix. - Donna Mugavero
There can be plenty of ambition in communicating with oneself. The auto-didactic urge can produce exponential results as the feedback loop of synergetic self-improvement kicks in. Most of the output of any artist you're likely to see in a museum is never witnessed outside the studio. It's all about training the eye, the hand, and the mind. - Jason Wehmhoener
Beautifully put, Jason. Whenever I have the chance to read or view something about the process of an artist I admire, it's usually fascinating. - Donna Mugavero
But Jason, counter point to that is perhaps the self-indulgence and erratic judgments of the artist working alone without external input reworking ideas that are dead ends.. There are probably a million eccentrics who work diligently in isolation to produce crap. Going to a museum and seeing some art is probably the last and final step of some long public journey those artists have made, but you only see the result and so extrapolate a beautiful supposition of the genius autodidact artist living in pristine isolation. I think that's a fantasy. - Ňicķ
A comforting and wonderful fantasy, like the sage pondering the universe on the mountaintop, but a fantasy none the less. - Ňicķ
So, what's reality? Nadine has made some money selling her silk work at craft fairs, and it's true, she had to sell most of what she made in order to make an actual profit (and most of her colleagues at the fairs find it impossible to do the same). But having seen that path I know that you can find yourself doing the same thing over and over, to make another chunk of change. Is it art anymore? To find the new path (the new line, the new product, whatever) she also has to spend time experimenting. - Jason Wehmhoener
That means reams of silk used, with only a small portion of it leading to an idea that can be repeated and sold, and then only by selling a lot of that thing does the cost of that experimentation get recouped. The business of art is tricky, and I agree that it's necessary for completing the cycle, but don't discount the drastic importance of "going boldly where no man has gone before" (at least, no man you personally know of) or at least, to that place new to yourself. - Jason Wehmhoener
As a somewhat relevant aside, how far did you get into my book? - Ňicķ
Yep. It's very personal. It feels a bit voyeurish to read it. - Jason Wehmhoener
I think I'm just used to authors being "remote". They're as fictional in a way as the characters they write. You're someone I have in my address book, so it feels different. - Jason Wehmhoener
Yeah, that's a common sentiment. Especially because I use 1st person a lot. But it's still largely fictional. No single story in there is straight from life, but plenty are cobbled together from true events.... But that's why I start it off with a sci-fi story also in 1st person... so the reader will know that just because its written from the narrator's point of view, that does not make it automatically about me. - Ňicķ
The other comment people make is that it is generally dark and kind of depressing, which thematically I can't really argue with. I wanted to make stories that I felt were very honest emotionally, and for a fair chunk of my 20s I was pretty disillusioned and depressed. - Ňicķ
That's good to know. I once thought there was a phase of my life that would be interesting to write about, but how wrong would it be to expose my friends in such detail? I was never so good at mixing it up for a new story... - Jason Wehmhoener
Well, the artists I admire always really laid it on the line, so I felt like I couldn't do anything but that (though you're right about the friend thing... two girls who would probably recognize themselves in there have not read it... as far as I know). And, hey, thanks a lot for actually buying one!! It's selling pretty slowly (and I'm not even trying to make any profit on it, selling it at cost). I hope you pass it on to someone who might like it when you're done! - Ňicķ
I think that such short form is always going to be a bit of a tough sell? - Jason Wehmhoener
True. Short stories are not in demand these days. I have written two novels, but didn't really like either of them.... Now I'm working on two more. ;-) - Ňicķ
As for the darkness: isn't that typical of 20s? - Jason Wehmhoener
I should write. I can put together a sentence. No excuse really, just purely pusillanimous of me. - Jason Wehmhoener
I think it might be typical of the 20s, at least these days. A lot of my friends went through similar things. Hard to be idealistic about the world right now... (especially if you're a liberal and environmentalist). - Ňicķ
Yeah, you should write, for sure. Post some stuff. I'd read it! Though it's no picnic and the industry is in stagnation, so it's also very hard to be professional (at least in fiction). - Ňicķ
I'd be happy if I could write a journal, let alone be professional. I'm really that timid. And yet I write for work every day (boring tedious work related things, but still English). - Jason Wehmhoener
"Esther was the wildest of them all with her black curly hair cropped short, her brown face, and when her mother saw her come home for lunch she said, “Hélène, you look like a gypsy!” That pleased her father and so he said her name in Spanish, “Estrellita, little star.”" - Jason Wehmhoener
via Bookmarklet
From the page: Research into the mysterious green glow of a jellyfish earned three scientists this year's Nobel Prize for Chemistry, the Nobel Foundation announced Wednesday. - Donna Mugavero
via Bookmarklet
So off you go, infants of the brain/
with a wave and some bits of fatherly advice:/
stay out as late as you like,/
don’t bother to call or write,/
and talk to as many strangers as you can. - Jason Wehmhoener
"Valleywag picked up a FriendFeed discussion between a few of us yesterday regarding the bailout bill within which Scoble blames 'people like [me]' for the coming 'breadlines'. It rings a little hollow considering where I’ve been on all this and where he’s been (i.e. nowhere), but it brings a much more important issue to the fore..." - Anthony Citrano
From the page: For those BABloggees in the Big Apple area, James "The Amazing" Randi will be giving a presentation called "I Doubt That!" on October 10, 2008 at 7:00 p.m. The location is the Caspary Auditorium at Rockefeller University (1230 York Avenue (66th St.) New York City). The talk is free and open to the public, and it’s hosted by the New York City Skeptics. - Donna Mugavero
via Bookmarklet
From Seed Magazine: "Why is something beautiful? [...] But Plato had a fanciful answer made to argue for a universal truth: In his world of forms, he claimed there existed a perfect Form of Beauty, which was imperfectly manifested in what we call beautiful. Despite the allure of Plato's metaphorical claim, students of aesthetics have struggled to substantiate it. Evolutionary psychologists have argued that there exist quantifiable, describable, universal aspects to the human capacity for appreciating beautiful forms, perhaps originating in our ancestors' experience on African savannas or in the need to find suitable mates. [...] However, recent work by several researchers at University College London — including the establishment of the first major grant-driven research program for the neurobiological investigation of aesthetics, or neuroaesthetics — has made the first steps toward a unified biocultural theory of art." - Mark Trapp
via Bookmarklet
In the 1920s neurologist Heinrich Klüver documented the hallucinations he experienced while under the influence of mescaline, using four categories: grids, zigzags, spirals, and curves. Noting their similarity to the hallucinations experienced in various conditions, such as migraine, sensory deprivation, and the hypnagogic state that occurs in the transition from wakefulness to sleep, he named them "form constants." - Jason Wehmhoener
It seems logical to figure that beauty in design must come from our understanding of beauty in nature... and so it would follow that evaluating beauty is based on some survival mechanism. Like, is fresh fruit more "beautiful" than rotten fruit? That would help us decide what to eat. But also, isn't a Tiger somehow beautiful? And yet in the original Savannah we needed to fear them. So beauty shows us perhaps some kind of "highly effective symmetry" or something along that line... power and finesse, both.... - Ňicķ
I think I might be using the word beauty here when maybe I mean something that resembles "higher order" or "natural order", a state of divine symmetry that is often interpreted as beautiful. ya? It would seem that fresh fruit would have more "order" (greater degree of symmetry) than rotting fruit, and the lines of a tiger would certainly appear to be highly ordered, something to be wary of if your own body can't boast similar lines (and of course, it can't). - Jason Wehmhoener
Oof, that's a little beyond my math skills (only got to the third quarter of calc in college). But yes there must some fundamental principles of order working in the universe... but i'm not sure if that's all we mean by beauty. Is there any survival benefit or necessary symmetry in finding a particularly crimson sunset beautiful? What's the difference between that and regular sunset? It seems some things are beautiful to us simply because they're rare (or vast or spectacular). Plus, complexity can be just as beautiful as simplicity..... - Ňicķ
...So perhaps it's something more innate. Like does everything beautiful also inspire awe? A profound emotional reaction? And is that reaction only produced when something is not merely symmetrical, but also meaningful? Does beauty require meaning? - Ňicķ
I never made it to calc at all ;-) I think it's a problem of trying to use one word for many things, like "love". I love my girlfriend, my dog, and my mom, all very much. Not the same thing at all! But you have a point, a particular shade of sunset has little to do with geometry, and can be incredibly beautiful. Does it have meaning? I suppose it's a reminder of the fleeting nature of our own lives, making it precious in its ephemeral rarity. It's like asking if our lives have meaning. - Jason Wehmhoener
Well, regardless of empirical meaning, our lives have meaning to us. ;-) - Ňicķ
"The Ulam spiral, or prime spiral (in other languages also called the Ulam cloth) is a simple method of graphing the prime numbers that reveals a pattern. It was discovered by the mathematician Stanisław Ulam in 1963, while doodling on scratch paper at a scientific meeting. " (found while surfing off Jason's esoteric math links: http://friendfeed.com/e/35d86d...) - Ňicķ
via Bookmarklet
[Reposting my comment from the original post in case anyone wants to talk about it].... Quite astounding how relevant this is, forty years on. And it's interesting to wonder if we're in a less free or more free society today. Propaganda seems just as present as ever. And when he talks about man "loving his slavery" (at about 1/3 in) it seems terribly prescient for a workaholic modern America. That people may even be happy, but they are happy "in a way that they oughtn't to be happy"... That's quite a bold statement, since happiness seems like such a... - Ňicķ
... universal and noble value in modern America. Every day Oprah is educating us on how to achieve it. But the American way of life, just as with all wealthy minorities throughout history, is based on the cheap labor of lower classes, unproportional (to our population size) commodity and energy use, and a constant need for progress and moral certainty. It's like the modern tyranny of success. We are happy in our own slavery, having goals we don't fully understand. - Ňicķ
"Even with a current account deficit that, starved of domestic savings, requires $2 billion a day in foreign financing, economic policymakers are fixated on propping up credit and giving the participants in the housing bubble second chances. In order to do so, they are stripping the hides off of net savers." - Anthony Citrano
I suppose those of us that like to save money should be looking into oil and/or gold. For some reason the thought doesn't appeal to me (maybe it's because I know zilch about commodities?) - Jason Wehmhoener
@Jason - it's a good hedge for a slice of your savings; problem is there is so little reflection of fundamentals in the short term markets. Longer term it's OK though. If you want an even better hedge I'd say buy baskets of strong foreign currencies. - Anthony Citrano
