Friday September 30, 2005
Bang. Splat.

(See previous entry.)

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Click for larger version.


-- Source: The Nation online,
Robert Scheer column of Feb. 3, 2004
containing movie ad of Sept. 30, 2005

"This place ain't doing me any good.
I'm in the wrong town,
I should be in Hollywood."

-- Dylan, "Things Have Changed"

Posted 9/30/2005 at 11:28 AM

Thursday September 29, 2005
Bang Splat

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From Forever Dylan, USA Today, 5/17/01:

"'He's still a great songwriter,' Aimee Mann says. The sentiments in 'Things Have Changed,' from last year's 'Wonder Boys' soundtrack, are 'brutal, relevant, and literally spine-tingling.'"

"Statistical Control: A new division of the U.S. Air Force that came into existence in 1942. Statistical Control Officers were trained at Harvard Business School and then assigned to every Air Force command where [they] worked to apply standardized procedures to statistical reporting and analysis. They served to organize the movement of men, planes, and materiel, as well as provide statistical analysis of bombing missions. This data was used by Air Force commanders... as an essential factor in planning and the quantitative measure of achievement. Robert McNamara was one the original faculty members of the Statistical Control School at Harvard...."

-- "The Fog of War" Glossary

From today's Harvard Crimson:

Former House Master Dead at 89

"Andrews discovered Harvard while studying at the Army Air Force’s Statistical Control School, which was held at HBS and taught by HBS faculty.

Having completed his Air Force service in 1946, Andrews joined a multidisciplinary teaching group at HBS to develop a new course called Administrative Practices."


"All the truth in the world
adds up to one big lie."

-- Dylan, "Things Have Changed"

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To St. Michael on his day (9/29)
in the spirit of St. Cecilia's Eve (11/21):

And Hennessey Tennessee tootles the flute,
And the music is somethin' grand;
A credit to old Ireland is McNamara's band.

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Click on picture for details.

Posted 9/29/2005 at 6:00 AM

Wednesday September 28, 2005
Mathematical Narrative,
continued:

There is a pleasantly discursive treatment
of Pontius Pilate's unanswered question
"What is truth?"

-- H. S. M. Coxeter, introduction to
Richard J. Trudeau's
The Non-Euclidean Revolution

"People have always longed for truths about the world -- not logical truths, for all their utility; or even probable truths, without which daily life would be impossible; but informative, certain truths, the only 'truths' strictly worthy of the name. Such truths I will call 'diamonds'; they are highly desirable but hard to find....The happy metaphor is Morris Kline's in Mathematics in Western Culture (Oxford, 1953), p. 430."

-- Richard J. Trudeau,
   The Non-Euclidean Revolution,
   Birkhauser Boston,
   1987, pages 114 and 117

"A new epistemology is emerging to replace the Diamond Theory of truth. I will call it the 'Story Theory' of truth: There are no diamonds. People make up stories about what they experience. Stories that catch on are called 'true.' The Story Theory of truth is itself a story that is catching on. It is being told and retold, with increasing frequency, by thinkers of many stripes.... My own viewpoint is the Story Theory.... I concluded long ago that each enterprise contains only stories (which the scientists call 'models of reality'). I had started by hunting diamonds; I did find dazzlingly beautiful jewels, but always of human manufacture."

  -- Richard J. Trudeau,
     The Non-Euclidean Revolution,
     Birkhauser Boston,
     1987, pages 256 and 259

An example of
the story theory of truth:

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cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

Actress Gwyneth Paltrow ("Proof") was apparently born on either Sept. 27, 1972, or Sept. 28, 1972.   Google searches yield  "about 193" results for the 27th and "about 610" for the 28th.

Those who believe in the "story theory" of truth may therefore want to wish her a happy birthday today.  Those who do not may prefer the contents of yesterday's entry, from Paltrow's other birthday.

Posted 9/28/2005 at 4:26 AM

Tuesday September 27, 2005
Mathematical Narrative

Gwyneth Paltrow is said to be 33 today.

Mathematics

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cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.
Narrative

The image “http://www.log24.com/log/pix05B/050925-Proof1.jpg” 
cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

Recommended reading
for Harvard's president:


The image “http://www.log24.com/log/pix05B/050925-Truth.jpg” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

Truth: A Guide
,
by Simon Blackburn


Recommended reading
for Gwyneth Paltrow:


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On Bullshit
,
by Harry G. Frankfurt


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Blackburn


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Frankfurt


Posted 9/27/2005 at 6:23 AM

1 Comments
:-)
Posted 10/3/2005 at 6:1 PM by Margita

Sunday September 25, 2005
Hint

Yesterday was
F. Scott Fitzgerald's birthday.
(See previous entry.)

"There is a place for a hint
somewhere of a big agent
to complete the picture."

-- Notes for an unfinished novel,
The Last Tycoon
   
Doonesbury today:

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The image “http://www.log24.com/log/pix05B/050925-Cross.gif” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

Related material:

The Crimson Passion

Posted 9/25/2005 at 9:15 AM

2 Comments
Ah.  Yes.
Bet I'd beat you in Dominoes.
Posted 9/25/2005 at 11:59 PM by BlueCollarGoddess
Very likely you would. And you seem to have beaten me already in finding an associative link between this post and dominoes.
Posted 9/26/2005 at 7:34 AM by m759

Saturday September 24, 2005
Parable

From this week's New Yorker
and from Eight is a Gate:

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May 20, 2004, 7 AM:

Parable: "A comparison or analogy. The word is simply a transliteration of the Greek word: parabolé (literally: 'what is thrown beside' or 'juxtaposed')...."

-- A Synoptic
   Gospels Primer


A thought dated (mistakenly)
May 20, 2004,
11:11 PM:

Life changes fast.

-- Joan Didion,
  After Life

Related material:

Key,
Number 61,
Chorus from "The Rock".

Posted 9/24/2005 at 11:02 PM

Thursday September 22, 2005
For Serge Lang

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"Get the aggressively mediocre Yale Daily News obituary here ('he is remembered for his significant academic contributions'?? give me a break...)" -- Tom

So far, the Yale Daily News obit is the only one showing up on a Google News search.  Probably the New York Times will get around to Lang eventually.  In the meantime, here's what an online newspaper and some blogs have to say.

The New Haven Independent

Obituary for Serge Lang

Weblog Entries on
Serge Lang's Death


Peter Woit's weblog

New AIDS Review


Locana

Weapon of Class Instruction

Dingodonkey

Abiola Lapite

Moebius Stripper

Simon's Rock College's Journal

Update of Sept. 24, 2004, 9:25 PM:
The New York Times now has an obituary.

Posted 9/22/2005 at 11:01 PM

Wednesday September 21, 2005
Google News this afternoon:

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Posted 9/21/2005 at 12:53 PM

Monday September 19, 2005
The Randomness

In yesterday's New York Times, science writer George Johnson quoted a Buddhist:

"Though he professes to accept evolutionary theory, he recoils at one of its most basic tenets: that the mutations that provide the raw material for natural selection occur at random. Look deeply enough, he suggests, and the randomness will turn out to be complexity in disguise-- 'hidden causality,' the Buddha's smile. There you have it, Eastern religion's version of intelligent design."

-- "The Universe in a Single Atom": Reason and Faith

God's Sermon:
The Randomness
Sunday
NY lottery
9/18/05
Sunday
PA lottery
9/18/05
Midday:  748Midday:  999
Evening: 000Evening: 709

Gamblers, religious zealots, and the insane may interpret the above as utterances of Lady Luck, God, or The Conspiracy.

A Buddhist interpretation for the New York Times:

748 is the address of
the New Orleans Zen Temple, and
000 is of course a symbol of Nirvana.

A Christian interpretation for the home state of Grace Kelly:

999 = "fullness,"
709 = 7/09 = "multitude,"
with "fullness" and "multitude"
as in the Log24 entry of
St. Luke's Day, 2004.

See also the previous entry,
Barging In.

Update of 7:11 PM EDT:
Barging In, Part II is on
Turner Movie Classics at 8 PM EDT.

Posted 9/19/2005 at 2:00 PM

Sunday September 18, 2005
Barging In

"It's been a brutal season
in the culture wars...."
-- George Johnson in
today's New York Times


"Some fearless outside referee
had to barge in and try to
    adjudicate the culture wars...."
-- Frank Rich in
today's New York Times


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On this date 100 years ago,
Greta Garbo was born.

For Frank Rich,
who wrote a review
 of a new novel,
On Beauty

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For George Johnson,
who wrote...

  "Look deeply enough,
he suggests,
and the randomness
 will turn out to be 
complexity in disguise -
'hidden causality,'
the Buddha's smile. 
   There you have it...."

See
previous
entry.
 


Posted 9/18/2005 at 2:45 AM

2 Comments
I don't come around here often enough. Each time I do, there's so much to see and absorb. Today, a couple of blasts from my past -- Garbo, whose birthday I share, and the Geneva wheel which I remember from the big old projectors with carbide-tip lights.

Now, I have a row of tabs to go through, reading some of the links I found on this page.
Posted 9/18/2005 at 7:46 PM by SuSu
It's a good thing Kathy doesn't come by here very often.  Yes.  A good thing.
Posted 9/19/2005 at 10:21 AM by BlueCollarGoddess

Saturday September 17, 2005
Time Fold,
continued


From Matt Glaser, Satchmo, the Philosopher:

"... the luminosity and perpetual freshness of Armstrong's music. These qualities, as well as his essentially abstract ability to affect our perception of time, link him with the other artistic and scientific revolutionaries of the first half of the 20th century. Recently I had a very public fantasy (in Ken Burns's Jazz) in which Werner Heisenberg attends a Louis Armstrong concert in Copenhagen, in 1933. Did I go too far? Actually, I didn't go far enough."

Part of Serge Lang's legacy:
the dates of his birth and death--
May 19 and Sept. 12.

That Log24 entries connect both these dates to Louis Armstrong is, of course, purely coincidental.

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Why is this 
man smiling?

Posted 9/17/2005 at 1:06 PM

1 Comments
hell yeah
Posted 10/3/2005 at 6:13 PM by Margita

Saturday September 17, 2005
From www.ams.org:

Serge Lang, 1927-2005

"Serge Lang passed away on September 12 at the age of 78. Lang was a professor at Yale University from 1972 to 2005. He received his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1951 under the direction of Emil Artin. Lang was awarded the Frank Nelson Cole Prize in Algebra in 1960 and the Leroy P. Steele Prize for Mathematical Exposition in 1999. He was well known for his mathematics texts and was a member of the National Academy of Sciences. [Item posted 9/15/05]"

From a review of one of Lang's books, Challenges:

"Again and again, Lang has caught powerful academics and journalists at evasions, stonewalling, and intimidation. It's cost him considerable time, effort, and money; it's also made him a lot of enemies.  It should be mentioned here that Professor Lang is also a productive researcher in mathematics and a prolific author of books of mathematics. I literally don't know how he does it. He must have absolutely no life outside his office.

OK, sure, Lang is a crank. He's also a national treasure. His commitment to the ethic of honesty and plain speaking should be an example to us all."

Serge Lang,
May 19, 1927 -
September 12, 2005

Posted 9/17/2005 at 1:09 AM

Thursday September 15, 2005
Square Wheel,
  continued

For director Robert Wise,
who died yesterday on
The Feast of The Holy Cross:

  The Maltese Cross

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From Cabaret
Mechanical Theatre


See also
Sept. 8, 2002,
Sept. 12, 2002,
and Time Fold.

Posted 9/15/2005 at 12:00 PM

Thursday September 15, 2005
Multimedia

"... the quality of life as of death
and of light as of darkness is one..."

-- Robinson Jeffers


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(See previous two entries
and Dante, Paradiso, 25.054.)

Posted 9/15/2005 at 2:45 AM

Wednesday September 14, 2005
Lutheran Rhythm, continued:

Square-Wheel Rhythm

(See previous entry.)

"This is a sane and sensible interpretation, deeply musicianly and devoid of eccentricity. Her attitude, rather like Toscanini’s, is to accept the text com’ e scritto (for example, she adopts the 'square-wheel' rhythm of the E minor Gigue) and then to make legitimate adjustments...."

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-- Lionel Salter, review of
  Angela Hewitt playing
    Bach's partitas, in particular: 

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Bach's "square-wheel" rhythm

(Gigue from Partita No. 6
in E Minor, BWV 830)

Posted 9/14/2005 at 11:59 PM

Wednesday September 14, 2005
Holy Cross Day
  
The Cross and the Wheel:

"... the quality of life as of death
and of light as of darkness is one,
one beauty, the rhythm of that Wheel,
and who can behold it is happy
and will praise it to the people."

-- Robinson Jeffers,
   "Point Pinos and Point Lobos,"
   quoted at the end of
   The Cosmic Code by Heinz Pagels,
   Simon & Schuster, 1982

See also
Sept. 14, 2004,
and
Cross-Referenced.

Posted 9/14/2005 at 4:04 PM

Tuesday September 13, 2005
Lutheran Rhythm,
continued:

Death on 9/11

Al Casey Dies at 89;
Early Jazz Guitarist


By THE NEW YORK TIMES
Published: Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2005

Al Casey, a guitarist whose playful acoustic rhythms and solos were a defining feature of Fats Waller's band in the 1930's and 1940's, died on Sunday [9/11] in Manhattan. He was 89....

Mr. Casey played and recorded with Louis Armstrong in 1944 when both were recognized as leading jazz musicians in the Esquire magazine readers' poll....

A 90th birthday celebration for Mr. Casey, scheduled for Thursday evening at St. Peter's Church, 54th Street and Lexington Avenue, will now be his musical memorial service, open to the public.

That's St. Peter's Lutheran Church.

See also the previous entry.

Posted 9/13/2005 at 3:00 AM

Monday September 12, 2005
Final arrangements, continued:

Justice at Heaven's Gate

"Gate --- Early term for a Jazz musician.
Armstrong is the original Swing Jazz player that's why they call used to call him 'Gate.'"
-- All About Jazz

"Armstrong is also frequently cited as the main source or popularizer of words like scat, gate (a greeting among jazz musicians that became a popular WWII term for a buddy or pal)²

² The term apparently goes back to Louis’s own adolescent nickname, 'Gatemouth.'"
-- Jazz Institute of Chicago

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Posted 9/12/2005 at 2:29 PM

Saturday September 10, 2005

x


I need a photo-opportunity.
I want a shot at redemption.
Don't want to end up a cartoon
In a cartoon graveyard.
— Paul Simon

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Related material:

Nine Gates to the
Temple of Poetry

and
Law Day 2001:
The Devil and Wallace Stevens

Posted 9/10/2005 at 8:23 PM

2 Comments

"In the inherited garden, a second-hand
Vertumnus creates an equilibrium."

Or Not.

Posted 9/12/2005 at 10:44 AM by BlueCollarGoddess
Posted 9/12/2005 at 10:45 AM by BlueCollarGoddess

Saturday September 10, 2005
Rhythm of the Saints, continued:

"When asked which words in the English language are the most difficult to define precisely, a lexicographer would surely mention funky."

-- Answers.com

Lutheran Rhythm, continued:

Funk, Wagnalls, and Company*

"Founded by Isaac Kaufmann Funk, a Lutheran minister who in 1876 began editing and publishing two magazines, The Homiletic Review and The Voice, the latter for the Prohibition Party. Unfortunately, neither magazine paid its way. The following year he teamed with [one of his classmates at Wittenberg College] A.W. Wagnalls, a lawyer and accountant, who got Funk on sounder financial footing.  They began by publishing pamphlets and booklets for the clergy, mostly commentaries on the Bible."

-- Major American Publishers and Wikipedia

* Company: "The Grateful Dead"-- "a name chosen at random from a dictionary-- some claim it was a Funk & Wagnalls, others an Oxford Dictionary-- by Jerry Garcia"

-- Wikipedia

Posted 9/10/2005 at 3:00 PM

Saturday September 10, 2005
Rhythm of the Saints

(Background: the two previous entries.)

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Alicia Keys and Paul Simon
on last night's Katrina telethon

Related material:

Readings for St. Patrick's Day,
Log24.net, March 17, 2005,
featuring
Conrad's Under Western Eyes.

Reading for the Saints of 9/11,
New York Times of Sunday, 9/11, 2005:
"The True Classic of Terrorism,"
 Conrad's Under Western Eyes.

And for some comic relief,
Harvard's President on St. Patrick's Day:

Professor Matory is "a renowned expert on Brazil and on the Yoruba civilization of West Africa, which is world famous for its religious complexity and artistic creativity. He is equally noted for his study of such Latin American religions as Haitian 'Vodu,' Brazilian Candomblé, and Cuban Santería...."

The image “http://www.log24.com/log/pix05/050317-Summers2.jpg” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

Play that funky music, white boy.

Posted 9/10/2005 at 4:11 AM

Saturday September 10, 2005
Photo Finish

Why is this man smiling?

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R. W. Funk


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From today's New York Times:
Robert W. Funk,
 founder of the Jesus Seminar...
died on Sept. 3...

From the First Amendment Center:
Chief Justice William Rehnquist
died on Sept. 3...

For the answer to the above question,
see the previous entry--
Lutheran Rhythm--
and Funk's Hier Stehe Ich.

Posted 9/10/2005 at 2:00 AM

Sunday September 4, 2005
Lutheran Rhythm

"A family of musicians took shelter for the night
In the little harbor church of St. Cecilia"
-- Paul Simon, Rhythm of the Saints

"The canonized go on."
-- Philip Roth in
today's New York Times,
"Why Is This Man Smiling?"

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St. William
Rehnquist


toys.jpg (17640 bytes)
The Toys,
famed for their rendition
of Bach's Minuet in G

"Have the ensemble clap the rhythm of the first four treble clef bars of Bach's Minuet in G, and then play it with correct pitches or in a unison single pitch. Next, have them clap the bass clef rhythm and play it either in unison or with correct pitches. Finally, have one group play the treble part while the other group claps the bass part, and then reverse roles as above."
-- Kirsten Allen Foutz, Engaging Rhythms 

Posted 9/4/2005 at 2:00 PM

1 Comments
Wow! Music ed!
Posted 9/5/2005 at 6:29 AM by Margita

Friday September 2, 2005
For Your
Listening Pleasure


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"Raw blues straight from Hell"


Posted 9/2/2005 at 3:57 PM

Friday September 2, 2005
Soap

Faith
Faith is an island in the setting sun
But proof, yes
Proof is the bottom line for everyone
-- Paul Simon, "Proof"

This morning's bottom line:
From Polya-Burnside Counting (pdf),
from today's New York Times,
and from "related topics" in
article on Symmetry in Wikipedia:

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The image “http://www.log24.com/log/pix05B/050902-Burnside.jpg” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.
 
  R. L. Burnside

     Burnside's lemma --

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Raise your weary wings
against the rain, my baby
Wash your tangled curls
with gambler's soap
-- Paul Simon, "Proof"  

Lottery numbers for
Pennsylvania, Sept. 1, 2005:

"Proof is the bottom line for everyone"--
Day = 120

"Faith is an island in the setting sun"--
Evening = 511

See also
Giving the Devil His Due.

Posted 9/2/2005 at 9:57 AM