tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post5983640822749025769..comments2024-03-18T21:52:45.757-07:00Comments on CONTRARY BRIN: 300 (and more) flat-out evil liesDavid Brinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comBlogger53125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-83423328757642617362016-02-23T16:28:33.255-08:002016-02-23T16:28:33.255-08:00Hi, David Brin,
Sorry for the late note--2 years...Hi, David Brin, <br /><br />Sorry for the late note--2 years. I didn't know others had issues with the movie and book "300". I just finished reading a biography of Cyrus the Great who founded the dynasty from which Darius and Xerxes came. I am fascinated by the time of the first Persian Empire and just the outtakes of the movie "300" bother me as being historically inaccurate. For one thing, the Persian kings were significantly hairier, the statues and the reliefs showing them as having full heads of hair and beards, and would have balked at the idea of walking out in public naked save for chains. <br /><br />It has been a while since I have read about Thermopylae. Thank you for the article. I enjoyed it.<br /><br />Donna MAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-24662896954575425982015-09-15T05:10:58.942-07:002015-09-15T05:10:58.942-07:00Glory Season: one of my favorites. Would love to s...Glory Season: one of my favorites. Would love to see Miller's misogyny up against that!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00720230900498061270noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-73103721874537087762014-09-09T06:57:53.190-07:002014-09-09T06:57:53.190-07:00Too few people would get it, but wouldn't it b... Too few people would get it, but wouldn't it be fun if Apple's show began with an elderly David Bowman proclaiming "Something's coming, something wonderful!"Tim H.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-10662327685401416632014-09-08T18:41:08.936-07:002014-09-08T18:41:08.936-07:00We'll see if you think Tuesday 11 am turns out...We'll see if you think Tuesday 11 am turns out as banal as you thought it would be!David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-87490524535184982352014-09-08T18:05:26.894-07:002014-09-08T18:05:26.894-07:00Dr Brin:
I am back on to do a Reddit sub-AMA for ...Dr Brin:<br /><i><br />I am back on to do a Reddit sub-AMA for the futurology forum, about... the future! Tuesday (tomorrow) at 11 am Pacific...<br /></i><br /><br />I first read that as "about the future--Tuesday at 11 am." As if the talk would be <b>about</b> what might happen late Tuesday morning. I mean, sure, that <b>is</b> the future, but hardly worth the effort of speculating about.<br /><br />:)LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-55563244473661659852014-09-08T17:59:12.846-07:002014-09-08T17:59:12.846-07:00Tony Fisk:
I recall that 'A Bridge Too Far&#...Tony Fisk:<br /><i><br /> I recall that 'A Bridge Too Far' featured a red beret (Major 'Digby' Tatham-Water)with an umbrella (to show he was English). He also encouraged the use of bugles at Arnhem in case the radios were faulty (which they were). Clearly what inspired Miller's early character!<br /></i><br /><br />Most likely, no one here cares but me, but just for the record...<br /><br />The character from "Sgt Fury" who carried an umbrella in battle was created by Stan Lee (as were many Marvel characters) in the early 1960s. Frank Miller may have written a much later story with that character in it, but he had nothing to do with creating the character or the title in the first place.<br /><br />Now, if <b>Stan Lee</b> had been inspired by a movie, that wouldn't suprise me at all.LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-55072886154774833412014-09-08T16:53:29.681-07:002014-09-08T16:53:29.681-07:00All right, I am back on to do a Reddit sub-AMA for...All right, I am back on to do a Reddit sub-AMA for the futurology forum, about... the future! Tuesday (tomorrow) at 11 am Pacific, 2pm Eastern 18:00 UTC. There were communications problems but I will sign in and hope for the best.. AMA stands for "Ask Me Anything" and you can. Though "future" is the topic. Just two hours, this time! Not the a8hour marathon I did a few years ago for a scheduled Reddit main i/AMA.<br /><br />http://www.reddit.com/r/FuturologyDavid Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-69760469982139799832014-09-08T16:42:01.343-07:002014-09-08T16:42:01.343-07:00Robert yes, that is far more likely as a dystopia ...Robert yes, that is far more likely as a dystopia than 1984!<br /><br />Still notice the implied contempt of the artist: "I and my savvy readers are immune, of course."David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-74032665191506066122014-09-08T16:01:53.461-07:002014-09-08T16:01:53.461-07:00I thought Dr. Brin and the rest of you might find ...<a href="http://chaoslife.findchaos.com/dangerous-distraction" rel="nofollow">I thought Dr. Brin and the rest of you might find this comic amusing</a> - I love the Ray Bradbury quote and the other person being blithely unaware (and distracted by online media).<br /><br />Rob H.Acacia H.https://www.blogger.com/profile/07678539067303911329noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-80429206578913197942014-09-08T12:18:32.271-07:002014-09-08T12:18:32.271-07:00Well if you want to go deep on Movie Triva...
The...Well if you want to go deep on Movie Triva...<br /><br />The phrase "A Bridge too Far" was coined by General Frederick Browning, deputy commander of Operation Market Garden. He was married, rather unfaithfully, to Daphne du Maurier. She of course was the writer of the short story The Birds, later a Hitchcock thriller of the same name.<br />Ah, they knew how to make movies a generation or two back. Now the main genres appear to be:<br /><br />Glittery Vampires (Twilight etc)<br /><br />Sweaty violent men with overstuffed codpieces (see above)<br /><br />and black folks behaving in ways that would be grossly offensive if they were not in more or less all black movies which I guess sort of makes it ok somehow (Madea, etc)...<br /><br />TacitusTacitushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17007086196578740689noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-82868411205941184102014-09-08T01:55:36.351-07:002014-09-08T01:55:36.351-07:00Hatham-Carter!?!?
Bah! I meant Tatham-Water, of co...Hatham-Carter!?!?<br />Bah! I meant Tatham-Water, of course!Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-8780474928096637912014-09-08T01:54:00.246-07:002014-09-08T01:54:00.246-07:00...Just to line the ducks up.
Hatham-Carter is wh......Just to line the ducks up.<br /><br />Hatham-Carter is who the film character Maj. Carlyle is based on.<br />(Reading his wikipedia biography, I'm amazed he doesn't merit a film in his own right!)Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-47405227730728295932014-09-08T00:23:12.398-07:002014-09-08T00:23:12.398-07:00Hi, Tacitus2 en passent.
Speaking of invoked enti...Hi, Tacitus2 en passent.<br /><br />Speaking of invoked entities appearing, I recall that 'A Bridge Too Far' featured a red beret (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digby_Tatham-Warter" rel="nofollow">Major 'Digby' Tatham-Water</a>)with an umbrella (to show he was English). He also encouraged the use of bugles at Arnhem in case the radios were faulty (which they were). Clearly what inspired Miller's early character!<br />Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-62841657044159845812014-09-07T21:33:02.999-07:002014-09-07T21:33:02.999-07:00I hope you don't think ... I was just attempti...I hope you don't think ... I was just attempting to forestall the kinds of comments I have heard too often from otherwise normal hominids. The mention of the word "feminism" seems to cause an instant and precipitous rise in T levels. <br /><br />I came up with a very different scenario ages ago when my son was younger and easier to manage. Imagine a virus that specifically attacks spermatogonia, causing male infertility worldwide. It would have to be extremely virulent, and would no doubt cross species lines. In the panic that would ensue, doubtless huge sums would pour into genetic research, both to reverse the effects of the virus and to find an alternate way to reproduce if that fails. Given where we are now, I have little doubt that bright people with money and labs would be able to perfect either cloning (not a great idea) or ovum to ovum fusion (better) before the last batch of natural babies aged beyond fecundity.<br /><br />I wrote a story in which this happened, reducing the human population to just a few million before the technique was perfected. The result was that over the next few hundred years most of the environmental damage caused by industrial civilization was reversed, and the human population reduced its growth rate to sustainable levels. Since reproduction would be a choice requiring medical intervention, there we be no more "accidents" and unwanted children. No one has to die, and no one has to be reduced to servitude, as in this lady's vision.<br /><br />Another possibility would be for humans to get whatever mutation led to certain species of whiptail lizards being able to reproduce by parthenogenesis. I don't know if this is anything like Glory Season, as I have not had a chance to read that one. My list grows! Paul Shen-Brownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-65075214650585505922014-09-07T20:21:41.776-07:002014-09-07T20:21:41.776-07:00Paul no one said all feminists are like that! In ...Paul no one said all feminists are like that! In fact, of course they are at a loony fringe! It's just that this fringe has a patina or penumbra that is at least asking new questions and that mainstream feminism has been reticent to ask.<br /><br />Tacitus! (That's all I have to say about that ;-)David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-52969984241236697982014-09-07T20:04:54.842-07:002014-09-07T20:04:54.842-07:00It is a common notion that if you speak certain na...It is a common notion that if you speak certain names aloud that said entity will appear before you.<br /><br />Be careful, oh so careful what you wish for!<br /><br />Tacitus2<br />who has little or no interest in comic books or movies made from them.Tacitushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17007086196578740689noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-24852200871167881452014-09-07T19:56:28.914-07:002014-09-07T19:56:28.914-07:00I know from personal experience that not all femin...I know from personal experience that not all feminists are this extreme, or this looney, but when you hear this stuff it feeds into our cultures' already self-destructive anti-intellectual memes. It all operates off the assumption that males are pretty much slaves to their hormones, that they have no frontal lobes and therefore no self-control. Statistics on violence notwithstanding, it is pretty clear comparing rates of violence in the past versus today that simply by raising our standards we grow more myelin in our executive control centers.<br /><br />However, as long as Hollywood keeps turning silly comic books into blockbuster movies, the male-violence-as-nature memes remain strong. Silly overreactions like this should not be surprising.Paul Shen-Brownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-966145127565407562014-09-07T18:29:20.957-07:002014-09-07T18:29:20.957-07:00@Dr Brin,
Just going by the wording of the link: ...@Dr Brin,<br /><br />Just going by the wording of the link: <i>is-reducing-the-male-population-by-90-percent-the-solution-to-all-our-problems</i><br /><br />That's hardly new. I remember the idea popping up (retroactively, almost out of nowhere) as a motivation of the female vampire character in the third of Anne Rice's "Interview With a Vampire" novels. I'd have read that in the mid 1990s, and it didn't seem like the idea was original then.LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-54827322690128863712014-09-07T18:10:37.498-07:002014-09-07T18:10:37.498-07:00Aw heck... on a vaguely related tangent... have an...Aw heck... on a vaguely related tangent... have any of you seen these?<br /><br /><br />http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/797534/posts#comment<br />http://www.vice.com/en_au/read/is-reducing-the-male-population-by-90-percent-the-solution-to-all-our-problems<br /><br />At one level it is chilling of course. On another, it is finally opening up outside the box thinking ... as I did in Glory Season.<br /><br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-50432455675289295122014-09-07T18:10:36.967-07:002014-09-07T18:10:36.967-07:00Aw heck... on a vaguely related tangent... have an...Aw heck... on a vaguely related tangent... have any of you seen these?<br /><br /><br />http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/797534/posts#comment<br />http://www.vice.com/en_au/read/is-reducing-the-male-population-by-90-percent-the-solution-to-all-our-problems<br /><br />At one level it is chilling of course. On another, it is finally opening up outside the box thinking ... as I did in Glory Season.<br /><br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-16302807071756541252014-09-07T16:17:40.345-07:002014-09-07T16:17:40.345-07:00Dear Dr. Brin,
Viz. your comment: And those T Cel...Dear Dr. Brin,<br /><br />Viz. your comment: And those T Cells must be energetic - often propelled by egotistically oversimplifying impulses - in order to do this. The T Cell himself is almost never right! Not in the purist hero-palladin role he sees in a mirror! <br /><br />This reminded me of a show I heard about female whistle blowers. Not all of these T cells are high testosterone males, or even high testosterone females, but are motivated by a simple sense of human decency. <br /><br />An old Terry Pratchett novel once berated the makers of folksongs (in a low-tech fantasy world) as bearing a heavy burden they have often taken too lightly. Anyone who peddles memes in one way or another is influencing people around them, and the Law of Unintended Consequences is always around the corner. I suspect that the SoA meme has a very long history, but the volume with which it is being screamed today is reminiscent of reading Graves' "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." As the leadership grows more inept, the propaganda intensifies.<br /><br />A former student of mine used to hang out during lunch sometimes, and once she told me about a story she had written that all her friends were raving about, saying it should be a movie. She described the story, and at one point she said "and then the government came and killed her family, cause governments do that." I asked what reason the government would have for killing the main characters family, and asked her if she knew anyone whose family had been killed by the government. I got little response, except that she didn't visit during lunchtime as often after that. <br /><br />Frank Miller's memes are deeply rooted in our times. I'm glad there are people who recognize this and can tell the difference.Paul Shen-Brownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-8944967921394048942014-09-07T13:32:22.606-07:002014-09-07T13:32:22.606-07:00You have convinced me. I never intended to see th...You have convinced me. I never intended to see this, now I won't even rent it.Steven Lopatahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07194335368318791505noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-64192231208211826582014-09-07T12:45:39.180-07:002014-09-07T12:45:39.180-07:00Yeah, I miss Tacitus2, too.
Bah, locum, you are b...Yeah, I miss Tacitus2, too.<br /><br />Bah, locum, you are back to strawmanning. Your model of both Miller and me is wrongheaded in so many ways as to be beneath notice. Indeed, it is close to wrong in EVERY way.<br /><br />Paul S-B yes, one of my points is that “TCells” that attack perceived errors do not have to always be right, so long as they create conditions for exposure, transparency, argument, evidence testing and negotiated improvements. some degree of adversarial vigor is necessary, in order to over come natural, human institutional rigor. <br /><br />And those T Cells must be energetic - often propelled by egotistically oversimplifying impulses - in order to do this. The T Cell himself is almost never right! Not in the purist hero-palladin role he sees in a mirror! But he does his job by exposing citizens to a grating reminder to LOOK!<br /><br />Alas, this process easily metastacises. Why?<br /><br />You all have heard this: Suspicion of Authority (SoA) is the meme taught in every Hollywood film Ironically, most of us think we invented it. It is a wise social phenomenon... that easily transforms into something noxious and toxic... hatred of expertise. -- Yes, experts are not always right, and smart folks aren't always wise, and folks who know a lot (e.g. scientists) are sometimes wrong...<br /><br />...but when that metastacizes into "smart people are ALWAYS unwise" and "people who know the most about a topic are inherently obstinate conformists who conspire to repress originality"... then something very sick has happened and we get cults.<br /><br />And yes, the Right is afire with cults, deliberately fostered by cynical oligarchs. But the left has some as well. AND YES... climate denialism is one of the worst... but the vaxxers are definitely in this mold.David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-91667891993321978782014-09-07T12:11:39.134-07:002014-09-07T12:11:39.134-07:00BTW, Dr Brin, I love it when you occasionally like...BTW, Dr Brin, I love it when you occasionally like to the Miller "300" post or the Ayn Rand post (which the Miller one does have a link to). I always end up re-reading the comments sections as well, and relive a prolific time in my own life. Dang, I talked a lot back then! :)<br /><br />I also miss Tacitus2. Sigh.LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-21754311313304206002014-09-07T11:49:32.706-07:002014-09-07T11:49:32.706-07:00I also wanted to see an actually historically accu...I also wanted to see an actually historically accurate version of this. Was tremendously disappointed in the film which in my view wasn't even that good. The real twist I thought would make a great film was to have it run much longer (3hrs) and focus on the personalities of Xerxes and Thermestocles (arrogant tyrant vs cunning tricky Greek) and include the irony of the Athenians banishing Thermestocles and his ending up in Xerxes court.Burt Voorheeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18017419365285103828noreply@blogger.com