Archive for the ‘Words’ Category
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17
Jul
2010
For a soldier he leads a very fine life and he always is blessed with a charming young wife
Paul Brady’s legendary 1977 recording of the old Irish anti-recruitment song Arthur McBride:
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23
Jun
2010
Writing without reading
A curious case of a professional writer who awoke one morning to find his capacity to read crippled by a stroke. Animation and narration from Lev Yilmaz. You can watch the video here. For some reason the embedding seems to be a bit mucked-up.
18
Jun
2010
The biggest problem with Libertarian thinking
A member of reddit, quag7, contributes to a thread entitled “I am a registered Libertarian, but it seems the party has lost its way” in /r/Libertarian. Reposting here in full. Thanks to Hugh for bringing this to my attention:
For me, the biggest problem with libertarian thinking isn’t what its critics say: that is promotes some kind of immorality in its defense of self-interest in the context of capitalist economics.
Where I got off the bus is when I realized how terribly unsustainable libertarianism is, the naivete about how money corrupts, money being to power what matter is to energy. And lastly, the lack of consideration given to how unequal the playing field is, how much class does matter, and how libertarians seek to make a “clean break” from interventionist corporatism to capitalism without addressing the massive chain of abuse which has resulted into the polarization of the wealthy and the poor.
Unsustainability – most libertarians support the free market on the basis of rights and morality, not out of pure utilitarianism, but most tend to believe that a free market in a libertarian context would also provide the greatest opportunities to the greatest amount of people. I think this, too, is a matter of faith. So long as you allow the top few percent to own the vast majority of wealth, you will always have an underclass voting itself, amending the constitution, rioting, or revolting to get some of the upper or ruling class’s money. This is why Marxism refuses to go away in the Third World. Conservatives and classical liberals like to insinuate it has something to do with bankrupt political and economic ideals in an academic context (“Ivory tower Marxists”) but in reality the reason why socialism and communism continue to find purchase in the third world is because of crippling poverty, including things like landlessness, where you can inhabit a piece of land for generations, but someone just deeds it out from under you (a Zapatista complaint).
Labor movements, social welfare programs, guranteed minimum incomes — all of these proceed from human need, and I see no indication that the somewhat benign term “self interest” applies here, as much as “crass greed” does. Libertarians practically celebrate the concepts of wage slavery, sweatshops, and so forth, because – they say – that the people working in them would be “worse off yet” without them. Good luck, 5 years down the line, making that case while the peasants get restless. How anyone feels about the morality of who gets how much pie and who has to share, the reality is that humankind will only put up with so much before organizing, revolting, striking, or otherwise influencing the system such that it is more equitable for the poor – and more offensive to libertarians. No document will constrain that. Read the rest of this entry »
22
Apr
2010
a good day
A while back, I ordered a netbook to use primarily for “getting stuff done” while out-and-about, and also for writing blog entries on. What’s ironic is that since getting it, there has been what is most likely the longest period of neglect suffered by ventolin.org. Well, it’s at most a shame, as things have been very hectic lately…
However, I had a remarkable day when I went out to Blanchardstown to pick the new laptop up. On the bus was a pair of African women, who had the amusing and interesting habit of peppering their mile-a-minute speech in their own native language with very Irish interjections. One would start “It’s just, like,” before launching into a rapidly told story and ending with “d’ye know the way?” I eventually got off, found the depot, picked up my laptop and left, only to return a few seconds later when I realised I had no change for the bus. After planting a €5 note down on the counter and asking whether I could get change, the chap behind the counter refused, pulled out some loose change and insisted I simply take it.
Waiting at the bus stop now, I flagged down the first bus that came along and asked if he was driving into town. It turned out he wasn’t, but ordered me on-board anyway, saying he’d give me a free trip down to another bus stop which was serviced by many more buses than the previous one. I happily obliged, and thanks to the man’s kindness, spent maybe only a minute or two at the next bus stop before I was headed back home.
Home, where I opened the door to find a curious package in the hallway. A book, by Alan Watts – and despite there being no note I knew just who had sent it, given we’d both recently discovered the eachother’s interest in his work and ideas. A lovely surprise with a friendly nod-and-a-wink.
I’d started the day with the not-so-minor annoyance of having to trek quite a bit across the city in terrible weather, but with the help of others’ acts of kindness and goodwill, everything changed beyond recognition.
A good day!
5
Jan
2010
Rette deine Freiheit
At the moment in Germany, there is fierce opposition growing against plans by the CDU to implement internet censorship under the guise of attacking the spread of child pornography. A movement championed by the German Piratenpartei has dubbed ex-minister for family affairs Ursula von der Leyen “Zensursula”, a portmandeau of Zensur (Censor) and Ursula, and is referring to the CDU’s plans as Stasi 2.0, a nod to the brutal secret police which operated in former East Germany.
Not only is there to be a secret list of blocked websites, such as exists in Australia, but the government is pushing for more data to be collected from citizens and retained for a long period of time.
A video which caught my attention a while back was entitled Du bist Terrorist (You are a terrorist). With soft ambient music playing, and deceptively pleasantly designed imagery, the two-minute video parodies the Du bist Deutschland ad-campaign with a soft, reassuring voice informing you of what the German government has in store for you, in terms of heavier and more invasive surveillance — because You are a terrorist.
Earlier this week I found that the same people had created a new video in the same vein, entitled Rette deine Freiheit (Save your freedom). The video focuses much more on the coming internet censorship in Germany than just data retention and physical surveillance.
Since there was no English translation available, I decided to translate it and re-upload to Youtube. The result is below:
The translation is by no means perfect, but at least it’s something. There were a few tricky problems with it:
- Einfach wegschauen: Literally “simply look away”, the video describes this as the method tried-and-tested by members of families with a history of domestic abuse. I was going to translate it as “simply look the other way” in its first instance, since this is the closest phrase in English that pertains to such a situation. However, this doesn’t exactly capture the double-meaning employed in the video, since it implies wilful ignorance which isn’t quite applicable to what the government is doing, so I decided to settle on “simply block it out”. I’m not sure I’m happy with this, however. Suggestions?
- In the sentence, “In Prävention, Therapie und Personal investiert hätte dies vielen Opfern helfen können: Reinste Verschwendung”, the meaning that is sarcastically implied is that the money that could be invested in preventative measures, therapy and personelle is much better spent on building an internet block. I don’t think I captured this very well.
In any event, there’s likely to be an official translation soon (I just saw an “Englisch (bald verfügbar)” notice at the top of the official page now — perhaps my emailing asking for a transcript of the video got them in a rush) and these issues will cease to be.
One last thing — if you are interested in learning more about the situation in Germany regarding internet freedom and the child pornography scare, I’d not only urge you to visit the links above, but also this shocking, but morbidly fascinating account of one techie’s work in the murkiest of subcultures. Thankfully, he doesn’t go into detail about actual child abuse, but instead details exactly how child pornography rings work, using the internet and computers.
Put simply, it proves what anyone with a clue already knows: current proposals for internet censorship will have absolutely no impact whatsoever on paedophiles and child pornographers and will only serve to infringe the rights of normal, law-abiding internet users.
Thanks to Áine and Patricia for help with one or two minor parts of the translation.
7
Oct
2009
Die Stimme des Klaviers
Peter Ablinger, an Austrian composer currently residing in Berlin, has done something rather interesting: he made a recording of a child reading the Proclamation of the European Environmental Criminal Court, then invented a mechanical piano player capable of reading notes in a very high time resolution from a computer.
The computer performs a frequency analysis of the sound spectrum, aided by Ablinger himself, which is then fed into the piano player and out comes the child’s voice.
<object width=”490″ height=”344″><param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube.com/v/muCPjK4nGY4&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1″></param><param name=”allowFullScreen” value=”true”></param><param name=”allowScriptAccess” value=”always”></param><embed src=”http://www.youtube.com/v/muCPjK4nGY4&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1″ type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” allowfullscreen=”true” allowScriptAccess=”always” width=”425″ height=”344″></embed></object>
(Video in German with English subtitles)
While I wouldn’t have much hope for people trying to work out what the piano is “saying” without the aid of seeing the words as they’re heard, I think it’s a pretty interesting experiment. The auto-player in itself is something to be marvelled at. Neat!
1
Sep
2009
Ethnic Hungarians in Slovakia to be fined for speaking their own language
Daniel Tencer has posted his English translation of an article in Gazeta Wyborcza from Warsaw, Poland, which describes a new law which imposes a fine of five to ten thousand euros for publicly speaking Hungarian in Slovakia:
Ethnic Hungarians in Slovakia are planning to protest today in the city of Dunajska Streda against a law they say violates their basic human rights. Under a penalty of five to ten thousand Euros, as of today it will be a crime in Slovakia to use the Hungarian language in public places.
As the Hungarian weekly Heti Világgazdaság states, every Hungarian doctor in Slovakia will from now on be required to speak Slovakian with their patients, even ethnically Hungarian patients, even if neither party wishes it so.
[Explanatory note: There are 550,000 ethnic Hungarians living in Slovakia. They are there because after the Austro-Hungarian Empire collapsed in World War I, the Allied Powers drew the borders of Hungary in such a way as to marginalize the Hungarian nation. A full 3.3 million Hungarians were left out of Hungary, and have been living as minorities in Slovakia, Romania, etc. for the past ninety years.]
The protest marks the culmination of several nightmarish weeks in Hungarian-Slovak relations, during which time the Slovak government refused entry to the Hungarian prime minister, and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences declared the new Slovak language law a violation of fundamental human rights.
It’s always a thorny issue when governments get involved in mandating and prescribing the use of language in their respective societies, but it’s surprised me that such an incredibly racist law brought in in Eastern Europe has gone almost completely unnoticed in the news media — especially when one considers the background to the Hungarians’ presence in Slovakia.
Edit: Ah. Literally minutes after I clicked “Publish” (I didn’t know my blog was that closely watched! ;) ), a story about this appeared in the third most prominant position on the BBC News website.
9
Aug
2009
The Language Log
I first came across this blog a week or two ago, and have so far thoroughly enjoyed the vast majority of articles I’ve read there. It’s updated frequently (certainly more frequently than this derelict blog has been in the past while) and is now enjoying a secure place in my RSS reader. Here, I’ll link to a few articles that are worthy of mention:
The first article I read, entitled “Fucking shut the fuck up” is a serious analysis of the syntax of one of Van Morrison’s on-stage outbursts. Short, readable and interesting – even a few of the comments are good – it’s a must-read.
The next is an article on timing and silence in spoken discourse (summary from John Gumperz , “Contextualization and Ideology in Intercultural Communication”):
Conversations are often punctuated with relatively long pauses and silences. In informal gatherings, Indian people may sit or stand quietly, without speaking. If addressed, they may look away and remain silent for a relatively long time (at least from the perspective of mainstream Americans) before responding. When a person is asked a question and she has no new information to provide, nothing new to say, she is likely to give no answer. In all such cases, American Indians themselves interpret the silence as a sign of respect, a positive indication, showing that the other’s remarks or questions are being given full consideration that is their due.
The blog post is essentially a series of quotations from the literature such as this, comparing the differences in implied meaning of silence in Native American and Anglo cultures.
The final post is a link to an article from Ben Zimmer that’s appeared in this week’s New York Times’ On Language column. It describes the transformation of the word “fail” from verb to noun, due to it becoming an internet meme:
Time was, fail was simply a verb that denoted being unsuccessful or falling short of expectations. It made occasional forays into nounhood, in fixed expressions like without fail and no-fail. That all started to change in certain online subcultures about six years ago. In July 2003, a contributor to Urbandictionary.com noted that fail could be used as an interjection “when one disapproves of something,” giving the example: “You actually bought that? FAIL.” This punchy stand-alone fail most likely originated as a shortened form of “You fail” or, more fully, “You fail it,” the taunting “game over” message in the late-’90s Japanese video game Blazing Star, notorious for its fractured English.
In a few years’ time, the use of fail as an interjection caught on to such an extent that particularly egregious objects of ridicule required an even stronger barb: major fail, überfail, massive fail or, most popular of all, epic fail. The intensifying adjectives hinted that fail was becoming a new kind of noun: not simply a synonym for failure but, rather, a derisive label to slap on a miscue that is eminently mockable in its stupidity or wrongheadedness. Online cynics deploy fail as a countable noun (“That’s such a fail!”) and also as a mass noun that treats failure as an abstract quality: the offending party is often said to be full of fail or made of fail.
13
Jun
2009
The idea behind reCAPTCHA
An entertaining talk from Luis von Ahn, the guy behind CAPTCHAs, about the reinvention of the idea in a way to benefit mankind. Some pretty incredible statistics throughout, especially towards the end.
16
May
2009
Berlin as an outsider
6 months ago, there was a great article written in the Irish Times’ magazine by Louise East, who, in her own words:
…with another London winter looming and my lease running out, I decided I needed a change. Within days, I had arranged a sublet on a cheap apartment in Berlin and found a friend gracious enough to give my boxes basement space.
After this article, which is definitely worth the read if you haven’t come across it before, there wasn’t a peep out of her, and I’d become suspicious that she’d perhaps fallen prey to Berlin’s wilder side and been checked into a mental institution. Thankfully, that was just my imagination running riot, and she’s back today with another article:
Six months on, I’m in the throes of a full-blown crush and like all newly besotted people, I’m kind of insufferable. On a bad day, I’ll argue that Berlin is woven from a blend of cashmere and unicorn milk known to solve nine out of 10 Middle Eastern crises and eliminate e-mail spam.
Apparently, the shower in her profoundly beautiful apartment was going on the blink. She writes of the German work ethic:
… Ten minutes later, a plumber phoned and told me he was terribly sorry, but it would not be possible for him to attend to my situation until perhaps 3pm. At that point, it was noon.
And of the unique reaction to the world-wide downturn that Berlin has taken:
A recent article in Der Spiegel online confirmed what I guessed already; the recession is not hitting Berlin in the same way it is affecting the rest of the world. With jobs not there to be lost, and consumerism already scaled back, Berlin appears to be practically immune to the black panic gripping the rest of the world.
Or, as one gallery owner quoted in the Der Spiegel piece puts it: “Berlin is now the only place in the world you can go where everyone isn’t depressed. In this evolutionary cycle, they’re perfectly adapted for survival.”
Clearly, much credit must go to the quality of Berlin’s social services (high) and its price of living (low) but increasingly, I wonder whether some tiny, seemingly trivial differences may, in fact, be the opposable thumbs of city evolution.
Thanks to John for bringing this new article to my attention!
