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< Earlier Kibitzing · PAGE 366 OF 963 ·
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Jun-03-08
 | | jessicafischerqueen: But, for how long? |
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Jun-03-08
 | | OhioChessFan: <Orangutans, bonobos, a gibbon or two.>
Did you know an interesting (or not, which is sometimes better) fact about bonobos? They are one of the few species, along with dolphins and humans, to engage in recreational sexual activities. That might not be true, twould be ironic if it were an old wive's tale, so here's one I am sure is true. Bonobos are frugivorous. That sort of sounds like a word <dd> would invent. |
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| Jun-04-08 | | achieve: <jessicafischerqueen: But, for how long?> We'll have to wait and see.
It's June 4th now...
I hope that's cleared things uppabit, oh Queen of existentialist humour. |
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Jun-04-08
| | jessicafischerqueen: <Elvis> yes, you are in fact correct, if we can believe <Jane Goodal>. You are incorrect about Dolphins, however-- they mate in the same manner as Cheetahs, and there is nothing "recreational" about it. A group of brothers targets and repeatedly rapes a female. The accidental evolutionary "logic" behind this is that at least one of the brothers will put his genes into the future. On a sunnier note, <Goodall et al> have also witnessed <bonobo> serial killing. The Chimp serial killer was eventually driven from the group. An interesting question is- at what point in the sociobiological evolution of animals does it make sense to begin discussing "morality" or "ethics"? At present, Cheetahs don't even get speeding tickets, let along get charged with gang rape. However, this does not mean that Cheetahs will never develop a system of "Law and Order" similar to the popular TV series <Law and Order>... You may be thinking of Dolphins and recreational sex because they don't follow a strict "mating period" deriving from a once a year estrus. You may be correct, though. IE- if the Dolphin brothers "enjoyed" thier off-season antics, perhaps one could term their effective, albeit savage, reproductive strategies, to be a form of "recreation". Savage, of course, only from our viewpoint as animals with the conceit that we are "something more." We aren't, of course.
Unless we "choose to be."
I don't care for Dolphins myself. They have an inflated sense of self-importance because they make all of those "clicking sounds", and because they have successfully convinced the human Press that they sometimes "rescue" drowning people. They don't. They are more likely to film the incident and post in on <YouTube>. Regards, Mrs. Unnaturalist.
PS you were right about my "pun." It was indeed unintentional. |
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Jun-04-08
| | jessicafischerqueen: <Niels>
heh... it was <YOU> who invented the existential catch phrase that is currently sweeping <CG.com>... But, for |
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| Jun-04-08 | | achieve: <Jess> heh - yes, I was accidentally inspired by: "Isn't that something?"
CC was the one that had me (and you) laughing for months with that little sentence... in context of course - but it then starts working fine as a "stand-alone" phrase. (Mine was unintentional, too - which is probably the only way it works/originates) |
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| Jun-04-08 | | achieve: Speaking of... Did you see the film <Lucky Number Slevin>? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0425210/ I found some of the dialogues extremely funny, also by some brilliant cutting/editing... Though it seems that a small minority of viewers, going by the message boards, feel the same way about the existential comedy that is there... Maybe I'm overly sensitive to that type of humor... It may well stem from my many days in hospital and forced immobility, when a kid suddenly starts looking differently at what happens around him. Few directors/writers manage to touch that specific tragi-comedic nerve with me... Never mind me - I'm trying to "analyse" what makes me laugh... There's no accounting for taste anyway. |
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| Jun-04-08 | | achieve: Postscript:
Script writer <Jason Smilovic> -- [on] The Origin of Lucky Number Slevin: “The original script I had written was about a guy who was just incredibly unlucky. I was kind of intrigued by exploring the theme of luck and the idea of despite someone’s intentions or capability or talents or whatever, that the <middle finger of God> was kind of directed right at them perpetually. And ultimately that grew into this story that it is now.” THAT's IT!! - that's what intrigued me, touched me and made me laugh! But to be able to convey that to the Big Screen is what is so damn difficult and rarely seen in mainstream Hollywood... (Josh Hartnett, Morgan Freeman and Ben Kingsley starred in this movie) |
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Jun-04-08
| | OhioChessFan: <(Mine was unintentional, too - which is probably the only way it works/originates) > I'm sure it's naught. |
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Jun-04-08
 | | Domdaniel: <Ohio> - <Bonobos are frugivorous. > As long as they're not *frogivorous* I don't mind what they eat, or copulate with. Though I would naturally frown at any combination of the two activities, in whichever order. It means 'fruit-eating', doesn't it? But if that's the case, how come 'frugal' doesn't mean 'fruity'? Hmm ... I guess I'd better look it up now ... |
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Jun-04-08
| | Domdaniel: <Trig> Welcome aboard. An *hour* a day with Jess? I wish ...
Alas, our timezone situation makes it difficult ... but anyway I'd need more than 23 hours to recover afterwards, so it isn't practicable. Unless rich countries start buying time from the third world, kinda like carbon credits. - You're not really using that afternoon, are you? How much do you want for it? And you, sir, think of the extra dollars to be had if you pawn the middle of the night ... it can be redeemed later, of course, when we're done with it. And then everyone has to work an 80-minute hour to catch up... we could even use hyperbolic time ... plus, of course, chess clocks running on these principles. Correspondence or e-mail games between, say, Sweden and Surinam might be difficult. "Call my broker!"
"Certainly, sir. Stock ... or pawn?" |
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Jun-04-08
| | Domdaniel: <Niels> Exclams, mijnheer? Or 'screamers' as we call them in the trade. The very idea makes me shudder. Would *you* use a punctuation mark that sounds like a Verhoeven or Cronenberg film? Well, actually, I probably would. But maybe chessplayers are inured to them because they habitually read "!!" as "brilliancy" rather than "hyperbolic splurge". When I temporarily broke (ie, melted) the i-key on my keyboard last week, one 'helpful' suggestion was to "wr!te th!ngs w!th exclamat!on marks !nstead of eyes" and do a global change afterwards. Luckily, I found a better way. |
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Jun-04-08
| | Domdaniel: <Deffi> That was a cunning stunt you used back there. The Eye is watching. |
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Jun-04-08
| | Domdaniel: <Jess> - <cheetah evolution> Evolutionary logic is often less accidental than it looks. If those cheetahs weren't brothers then they might eye one another more suspiciously, unsheathe their claws, and fight to the death over raping rights (as non-fraternal humans sometimes do). As a result, the lady cheetahs might well go unraped, and where would cheetahmanity be then? |
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| Jun-05-08 | | achieve: <Dom><Would *you* use a punctuation mark that sounds like a Verhoeven or Cronenberg film?> No, I suppose not, at least regarding the ´Verhoeven Sound´, of whom I never was a big fan, until recently. But eye *would* try and look for ways to express my occasional excitement, a thunderous laugh, a whisper, a smile - on the written page. So sometimes I bang the exclam key, out of desperation. <Luckily, I found a better way.> hehe - did you "un-melt it?" Have a stern talk with it? Replace it? Question, questions, Weledelgeleerde heer.
BTW - just checked... my keyboard is manufactured by a company called TRUST, ironically... Isn´t that something?
PS. That keyboard was ´donated´ to me.... OMIGOSH!!
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| Jun-05-08 | | mack: I should probably put you all out of your mystery. A few days ago I posted the following passage, asking for the asterikees to be identified, as well as the author: <'Yesterday, after playing chess, ****** said: “You know, when ****** comes, we really ought to work out a new game with him. A game in which the moves do not always stay the same, where the function of a piece changes after it was stood on the same square for a while it should either become stronger or weaker. As it is the game doesn’t develop, it stays the same for too long."'> The first ****** is Bertolt Brecht. He's cropped up in Frogspawn before, viz: <'I have a large garden at my disposal, in peace and quiet, and my desk in front of a window with a clear view of the sound. The small ships that sail past therefore represent my only distraction, apart from the daily chess interlude with Brecht.' - Walter Benjamin> It's Walter the Softy writing again here, and we already know that ****** no.2 is Karl Korsch. Which brings us to the tiebreaker, eg why Brecht's idea is bollocks. It's bollocks because in many ways, what he's saying - that it would be nice if the functions of the various pieces would change here and there during a game - is already sort of true of chess anyway. Of course, there's no such rule that a knight can miraculously move in the shape of the obsolete Greek letter Stigma (Ϛ) after a certain amount of time, or whatever. But the abilities and reach of every piece in any one position will be defined by the four key components of chess: time, space, material and pawn structure. The functions of pieces may not, strictly speaking, change, but that supposedly 'square' board on which they lie is in a constant state of flux. A raking Rat bishop on g7 can do different things to one miserably hemmed in on e7. And what's more, Brecht's proposal rather reeks of wishing to take short cuts. Chess is what it is, and it's far from static. This is so very, very important. You can only revolt with what you've got, Bert, and if the raw essentials aren't necessarily to your liking then you might find the experience of trying to creating art with them mind-expanding. |
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Jun-05-08
| | Domdaniel: <mack> You win the Frogspawn Deconstruction Dance Award for expressing so pungently what it's all about. Apart, of course, from the stuff about Brecht, which is just arty-lefty ballcocks. How did Walter the Softy escape from Dennis the Menace? Through the Arcades? And what's *wrong* with short cuts?
"You can only revolt with what you've got". Hmm. That sorta puts the kibosh on Alex Trocchi's Sigma [sic] Project and his Invisible Insurrection of a Million Minds. There's only one mind anyway. I'm not sure who owns it. |
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Jun-05-08
| | Domdaniel: <Niels> Re the Daliesque melting key problem: I prised 'I' off, found the contact underneath was still OK, and then swapped it with a never-used function key. I've read that Dali used to prise his I off too ... |
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Jun-05-08
| | Domdaniel: Chess Tournament time tomorrow -- yes, yet another weekender already, my first with a minus rating. The fightback starts here... Thanks to everyone for helpful advice. No, really, I mean it. Just wish I'd followed more of it sooner. |
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Jun-05-08
| | Domdaniel: <Jess> -- <Dolphins ... have successfully convinced the human Press that they sometimes "rescue" drowning people.
They don't.>
You're right, of course. I was thinking of Dolph Lundgren. |
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| Jun-05-08 | | Red October: <Lucky Number Slevin> funny how so many great scripts lose it in the title |
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| Jun-05-08 | | achieve: There's a world to win.
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| Jun-05-08 | | mack: Did I really write 'put you all out of your mystery'? I quite like it. It's not the most embarrassing typo ever. |
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Jun-05-08
| | Domdaniel: <mack> Wasn't Spooner credited with "Sir, you have tasted two whole worms, you have hissed all your mystery lectures and been caught fighting a liar in the quad " ... ? Here's to more Mystery Lectures. And the queer old dean, of course. |
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Jun-06-08
| | jessicafischerqueen: Go Geddim <Dom>...
I lost today so I"m throwing furniature around.
On the other hand, here is a 7-part Documentary:
<A Game of Chess by Marcel Duchamp> French with English subtitles.
In 7 parts- all 7 parts are on the <youtube> playlist at this URL: http://www.youtube.com/profile_vide... |
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