<who is the strongest current chessplayer to face Kramnik in a match? thx in advance

easy-human kasparov; machine fritz

don't you think that Rybka's a stronger program than Fritz and Hydra the strongest chess computer?

Meanwhile, I don't actually have anything to say, but I vaguely feel I should try regardless. What the Xtians used to call a Daily Communicant, back when there were Xtians.

RDK did tell me that I'd like the Petrosian book. And I had hoped, perhaps foolishly, that it might be on a par with his one really good book, Nimzowitsch: a Reappraisal. But it doesn't come close, and it's marred by such Raymondoisms as:

<"I should also mention that we used our own brains for our comments and cannot blame a computer program - which we rarely employed - for any blunders which have persisted.">

[Does this even make sense? Surely it's the *absence* of said program which should be blamed for such errors? And such, sadly, there are.]

Do we live in a <Sabot> age?

If people have a <character set>, does that imply that they also have <subsets>? And would these <sets> follow the LAWS of mathematics?

The quote on top saying <Whatever you find in books, leave it there> is from a song called Sabotage, from John Cale's album Sabotage/Live.

<Read and destroy everything that you find in books Whatever you find in books, leave it there
There's a word for that - Sabotage.>

And I have it on good authority that Mr Cale is, or was, a book fiend - his practice being to zip through tomes about geopolitics, game theory, art and genetic engineering, and then give all the books away to charities or libraries, and start over.

I guess my own lifestyle is not dissimilar, apart from two big differences. I keep the books and eventually get buried in vast piles of paper. And I tend to remain stuck in input mode, aka pathological non-productivity.

Hey, at least I proofread my vapid outposings. Otherwise the last word in the previous paragraph would have been 'nob-productivity'.

Which might have been funny.

btw, I'll get back to retyping Entropanto for you when I find the original, which got displaced during my recent attempt at, uhhh, spring cleaning.

This was early 1990s, so the movie was probably Total Recall. I'm sure he was acting sanely, but it seemed strangely and uncharacteristically normal from the maker of such perversely uber-violent movies.

Five burritos to the first who comes up with where I took that word from...

Loved <the 4th Man> even though it was a distinctly misogynist (even Pauline) treatise in which both narratively and symbolically the murderous sexual power of "woman" is defeated by Catholicism. He keeps cutting to that damn spider- I got it the first time. Although I really loved the film anyways. Excellent acting, directing, and provocative ideas.

<Starship Troopers> and <Total Recall> are dreck-- Like <Greenaway> and <Schepisi> in Hollywood--

I blame lack of government funding.

Not even mouses.

Must <placate> any animal rights fanatics in here.

BTW are you aware that the very fine film scholar <Paul Coates> is in fact an "unwilling" animal rights activist because

A.His wife is one

and

B.He's "whipped."

I had the very good fortune to speak with Dr. Coates at a film colloquiam. He's brilliant, but a bit past eccentric...

<Mack is a <tetragram>>

Dam i'm so dum...

An <octagram> is in fact an OCTAGRAM!!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH

I love Australian film to bits.

Second Writer: (panic) Er... er...

Larry: Come on!

Second Writer: Splunge.

Larry: Did he say splunge?

First and Third Writers: Yes.

Larry: What does splunge mean?

Second Writer: It means ... it's a great-idea-but-possibly-not-and-I'm-not-being-indecisi- ve!

Larry: Good. Right . .. (to third writer) What do you think?

Third Writer: Er. Splunge?

Larry: OK...

First Writer: Yeah. Splunge for me too.

Larry: So all three of you think splunge, huh?

Writers: Yes!

<His wife is one> ...

What, an animal? Most wives (and husbands) are, I believe, with the exception of the Stepford variety. Why, most of my ancestors weren't even mammals...

<I don't countenance giving 'drugs' to experimental subjects...>

Dam' right, make 'em pay like everyone else.

I agree with those scare quotes, wiggle wiggle - the word 'drugs' should be expunged from the language forthwith, on the grounds of having forfeited all claim to meaning anything.

For example, a newspaper headline about "drugs" might refer to any of the following, inter alia:

- Big Pharma, and the financial implications of recent R+D, and whether governments are meddling with the market by imposing restrictions, etc.

- Various illegal recreational substances that may or may not be addictive and have a wide range of physiological and cognitive effects, and not much in common except illegality.

- Various legal substances, notably alcohol and nicotine, where somebody has noticed that they have something in common with the previous category.

- Performance-enhancing substances in sport, which are better seen as technologies - devices, like diet and training, for turning athletes into winning machines.

- Generic medicines and patents, especially the practice of pricing medicines out of the reach of African patients in order to recoup investment from richer countries.

And so on. The *word* 'Drugs' should be banned, not the chemicals.

btw, in prehistoric pre-Nickel days the first clutch of posts on this here forum were on this very same topic. In my self-righteous quest for Nickel-forum purity, I zapped 'em - saying we might get back to the topic sometime, but hey, not now, please...

Thank god my University posts all lectures online...