Dear Wedge: someone posted a link to your newsletter today entitled "My Vegan Challenge to Oprah." My curiosity was piqued and I clicked the link. I was disappointed to see, however, that you had already removed the "offending" article, presumably caving to pressure from vegans. How sad that you chose to censor yourself rather than to invite a vigorous debate.
It would have been far better to leave the article and invite another scientist to dispute Ms. Turner's claims. Closing down the discussion before it had even begun is a triumph of orthodoxy over knowledge.
update: luckily, the article can now be found elsewhere.
update 2: I just got a response from the Wedge. It was a kindly note, but it sounds like their vegan customers are quite outraged by the article. Ahh, the intractability of beliefs. That will actually be my next blog topic, by way of a book review.
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Two Minutes Short Of Being Smart
I think it probable that most folks experience it from time to time, but dammat if it doesn't happen to me weekly, or even daily: the perfect reply, comment, witticism, retort, rebuttal, observation, or wisecrack always occurs to me two minutes after it would have been useful.
What's to be done about such a thing?
What's to be done about such a thing?
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
10,000 Burpees: Day 54
Five thousand four hundred burpees! More than halfway to the end of the challenge. In order to push myself harder, I now publish some of my personal fitness goals...
- 100 burpees in 8 minutes.
- 5k in 21 minutes.
- 20 pull-ups in a row.
- Dunk a basketball.
- 10 double-unders in a row.
Dare to dream! By the end of my 10,000 burpee challenge, I hope to have accomplished #1. I should take some benchmarks on the other goals soon, so I can determine how far I need to go to achieve those numbers. Number 5 will take some doing - I've only ever done one double under ever. But this burpee challenge is the most interesting thing I have going on right now, and my self-expectations are climbing.
Monday, May 2, 2011
Osama bin Laden Is Dead
So he is dead. Good riddance. Personally, I would rather have seen him arrested, tried, convicted, and imprisoned. But given how much we have compromised our own justice system upon the altar of security, it may not have been a very meaningful trial.
It remains to be seen whether this so-called 'significant achievement' in the war on terror will alter U.S. foreign policy or military operations. I have my doubts.
In the meantime, let us recall that Osama bin Laden did not consider himself a wicked or evil man. He was utterly convinced of his own righteousness. In that light, one can see that unquestioned beliefs and absolutism are poisonous to humanity. Eschew belief and shun certainty; rather, seek knowledge and embrace uncertainty.
May the victims of this terror war rest in peace, and may their survivors find the strength and hope and healing to carry on.
Update: this essay captures much of my ambivalence about the occasion of OBL's death.
It remains to be seen whether this so-called 'significant achievement' in the war on terror will alter U.S. foreign policy or military operations. I have my doubts.
In the meantime, let us recall that Osama bin Laden did not consider himself a wicked or evil man. He was utterly convinced of his own righteousness. In that light, one can see that unquestioned beliefs and absolutism are poisonous to humanity. Eschew belief and shun certainty; rather, seek knowledge and embrace uncertainty.
May the victims of this terror war rest in peace, and may their survivors find the strength and hope and healing to carry on.
Update: this essay captures much of my ambivalence about the occasion of OBL's death.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
10,000 Burpees: Day 26
Just past the one-quarter completed mark on my personal burpee challenge. The soreness is long gone, but doing them still takes my wind in a big way.
Today, instead of doing them in sets of 10 or 20 throughout the day, I did one set of 100 burpees to see if I might improve upon my personal record of 13 minutes and 13 seconds.
Result: 12 minutes and 37 seconds. Not as much improvement as I had hoped, but still a personal best. I'll take it! Perhaps I need to incorporate some other mode of training, however, if I want to achieve my ultimate goal of 100 burpees in eight minutes.
By the way, I am not alone in admiring the raw power of the burpee! Coincidentally, shortly after I began my 10,000 burpee quest, the New York Times published an article in which several physiologists and exercise scientists were hard pressed to top the burpee as the king of exercises. Awesome.
Result: 12 minutes and 37 seconds. Not as much improvement as I had hoped, but still a personal best. I'll take it! Perhaps I need to incorporate some other mode of training, however, if I want to achieve my ultimate goal of 100 burpees in eight minutes.
By the way, I am not alone in admiring the raw power of the burpee! Coincidentally, shortly after I began my 10,000 burpee quest, the New York Times published an article in which several physiologists and exercise scientists were hard pressed to top the burpee as the king of exercises. Awesome.
death
death is our lifelong companionIn loving memory of Margaret Carr, 1949-2011.
who greets us at our birth
treat him as your dearest friend
while you walk the earth
do not fear his icy touch
despair will help you not
trust that life will end one day
ere then do as you ought
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Birth of a (Porno) Nation
The public sphere has changed in the last thirty-five years. I don't have any hard data at my fingertips to support this broad assertion. In fact, what makes me say this may surprise you: a fleeting scene in a lurid and rather inconsequential documentary - Inside Deep Throat - about the infamous 1972 porn film. In the scene, the original playboy Hugh Hefner is quietly humbled by feminist and activist Susan Brownmiller during a nationally televised discussion on pornography. These days, it is difficult for me to imagine bitter rivals having a civilized discussion about such a complicated issue on television or anywhere else; the airwaves are instead filled with shrill voices talking over one another, unwilling to bend or to concede a point. The 1970s were truly a remarkable time.
Remarkable indeed. I said just now that the documentary was inconsequential, but only because it was a box office failure and (to my knowledge) has not been widely seen or discussed. The film's subject material, however - pornography, censorship, and the American culture wars - is as essential as any social history. The film that spawned this documentary deserves some thoughtful review in its context, and Inside Deep Throat attempts just that.
Deep Throat was the first movie made about blowjobs. It was made for $25,000 over a weekend in Florida, and went on to earn more than $600 million - perhaps the most profitable movie ever made. Moreover, a cursory bit of research shows that the only 70s films grossing more than Deep Throat are Star Wars, Jaws, The Exorcist, The Sting, The Godfather, and Grease. Pretty heady company. This statistic alone should make social historians and film critics take notice. With those numbers, can one really have a meaningful discussion about 1970s cinema and culture without mentioning this blockbuster porno?
Inside Deep Throat follows the stories of the principle actors and filmmakers during the film's notorious heyday. Though it is difficult to imagine now, forty years ago, sex was not only counter-culture but almost subversive. Blue movies were financed by seedy gray-market forces, often with ties to organized crime. Actors were attracted to the industry not for the money, but more often because they were self-described rebels experimenting with new freedoms and definitions of morality. Late in the movie, the documentary even visits with the agents and prosecutors who sought to ban the film. Deep Throat benefited from the enormous drive to censor it, and it rode this wave of censorship. It is probably not much of an exaggeration to assert (as the documentary does) that Deep Throat almost single-handedly ushered in the adult movie industry as we know it today.
I don't know if I can say much more about this film - it is better discussed among people who have seen it, rather than written about unilaterally. It is definitely worth a look. Watch it as a double feature with This Film Is Not Yet Rated, a movie about the appallingly secretive MPAA and the fawning self-censorship of Hollywood.
Inside Deep Throat follows the stories of the principle actors and filmmakers during the film's notorious heyday. Though it is difficult to imagine now, forty years ago, sex was not only counter-culture but almost subversive. Blue movies were financed by seedy gray-market forces, often with ties to organized crime. Actors were attracted to the industry not for the money, but more often because they were self-described rebels experimenting with new freedoms and definitions of morality. Late in the movie, the documentary even visits with the agents and prosecutors who sought to ban the film. Deep Throat benefited from the enormous drive to censor it, and it rode this wave of censorship. It is probably not much of an exaggeration to assert (as the documentary does) that Deep Throat almost single-handedly ushered in the adult movie industry as we know it today.
I don't know if I can say much more about this film - it is better discussed among people who have seen it, rather than written about unilaterally. It is definitely worth a look. Watch it as a double feature with This Film Is Not Yet Rated, a movie about the appallingly secretive MPAA and the fawning self-censorship of Hollywood.
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