Meanwhile in Switzerland

I moved back to Geneva and as a token of appreciation to my home town read "Histoire Suisse" by G. Nappey, drawings by Mix&Remix.

Some people may remember Orson Welles´ cuckoo clock speech from The Third Man. In fact it could hardly been more wrong. Switzerland has never seen 400 years of uninterrupted peace, though of course actual invasions to Swiss territory have been rare.

Most recently Switzerland almost disappeared after several cantons declared themselves as French supported republics after the French Revolution. Moreover in the mid 1800´s, some cantons wanted to break away from the confederation, starting a short civil war.

Another interesting thing: Luftwaffe against Swiss Air Force during WWII, reported by A. Calder in his "Gods, Mongrels and Demons". Luftwaffe routinely violated the Swiss air space, both knowingly and by accident. The Swiss had bought Messersmith airplanes before the war and thus had the same planes as the Germans. However, the Swiss knew their terrain well and most often won against the Luftwaffe pilots.

Things we learned from Bill Bryson

Biologists strongly disagree with each other about the basic structure of the Linnean classification of plants and animals. (A Short History of Nearly Everything)

Without our moon, the climate of Earth could be too unstable to support life. A Short History of Nearly Everything mentioned this before it became a headline story on the BBC http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/science/madeforlife.shtml

The economic output of the US in the 1950´s was more then the rest of the world combined.
The productivity of U.S. industries doubled in the 1950´s. However, people preferred to work longer hours instead of enjoying their increased productivity. (The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid)

William Cavendish-Scott Bentinct had an estate called Welbeck Abbey in North Nottingshamshire. He was reclusive and rather eccentric and had long underground tunnels built around his mansion (Notes from Small Island).

In the east of U.S., there is an etnic group called Melungeons, whose origin is not known (The Lost Continent).

The founding fathers of the U.S. were absolutely not "democratic" in the modern sense of the world, and would abhor the opinion the masses. Moreover, T. Paine did not pay any attention to his personal hygiene, and B. Franklin was very keen on sleeping with as many women as possible (Made in America).

Kinds of minds

Daniel Dennett's Kinds of Minds is most definitely worth reading. It has several ideas of surprising insight, including the connection between mind and pain, and the division of minds to Darwinian, Skinnerian, Popperian and Gregorian, based on their capacity to learn, adapt, and manipulate their environment.

Another notion I have not seen anywhere else: our minds are very much "not in our minds": since we have learned to write, and to create an environment of symbols (traffic signs, manuals, warnings), we "externalise" symbols that we'd otherwise would need to keep in mind.

Chomsky and Foucault

Though every computer scientist knows Chomsky and I happened to write something about Foucault in another log entry, I never knew about their conversations documented in "The Chomsky-Foucault debate on human nature".

The discussion is not much of a debate, but the positions are clear enough. Foucault is suspicious of any notion of "human" or "nature", especially "human nature" and tends to see discourse and power behind these concepts. Chomsky, on the other hand, thinks that we as human beings are essentially capable of "fair play". Information about our surroundings, and about actions of other people, enable democratic control (of institutions). Chomsky laments that governments and corporations knowingly distort and hide information to keep control in their own hands. Elsewhere he has stated that post-structuralists (like Foucault) actually take part of this information hiding, by being unclear.

True enough, Foucault can be pretty obscure. But there is something in his writings to compensate it: think about Foucault's perspective of business discourse, academic discourse or even "common sense" discourse like journalism or blogs. Normally, we take these discourses for granted, but Foucault sees bare (though complicated) power structures. What this really means: what we call "experience" or "practice" is only half the story - behind it one finds discoursive constructions. But are these discoursive constructions too abstract? Do they mean anything to us as political and moral beings?

Very Short Introductions to Everything

My previous rant was about Short Introduction to 21st century Britain. I became hooked in this series of books some time ago. It was mainly because a book of fiction -- Murakami's Kafka on the Shore. There, a superb prostitute tells her client, a lorry driver, about Hegel. I realised I did not know so much about Hegel and picked up Hegel: A Very Short Introduction by P. Singer in the local bookstore. It was really interesting, I now see why Hegel took history seriously and how Marx commented him.

My next pick was Poststructuralism: A Very Short Introduction by C. Belsey. Well-written an understandable.. as much as poststructuralism can be.

From a nerdy perspective, it is somewhat easy to comment on the common theme of poststructuralist: that meanings are not based on word - object relation, but on differences in semiotic space. What a pity poststructuralists apparently did not read Frege, Peirce, Ogden or other researchers that do not assert a simple word - object relationship, but a triangle of symbol/concept/object.

Another simple observation: we have computers. Computers -- let's say routers -- have a language interface. If I enter 'route add default gw 192.168.61.0' in a router, it will actually route packets accordingly. Why would I need to refer to semiotic spaces when there is such a simple correspondence between datagrams in the network and the command that states their routes?

One could object to this saying that technology and its "artificial languages" are outside of the realm of poststructuralism. Somehow in the age of computers I don't think so. You can try to get your papers of books published, your salary paid and your rent or electricity bill paid without these artificial languages.

"Never better"

Morgan: Twentieth-Century Britain: A Very Short Introduction.

We all know something about 20th century Britain anyway: involvement in the 2 world wars, the Beatles, the decline of the Empire, Margaret Thatcher, punk rock, Falkland war, the New Labour, death of Princess Diana. But this book puts the stuff in perspective. Why, for instance, did British pop music become so influential in the 60's? Naturally because the talent of the musicians, but if the government did not invest in art schools, they could not have become musicians in the first place.

The phrase "you've naver had it better" was actually used as a political slogan in the boom year after the second world war. The author justifiably says the same about the last years of the century. After that?

Tall tales

Dana Faracos, Michael Pauls:
Tall Tales and Tittle-Tattle: From Around the World

Notable characters: Rimbaud and Verlaine,
St. Daniel the Stylite (pillar saint).