(Actually, given the visual rhyme between truck and tortoise, I guess the reptile could think he was made in the image of the truck… Must. Stop. Now..)

All this logic chopping disappears for me in the presence of a baby. I just go, “Derrr. wow.. I’ve gone all gooey again..”

Can I propose an extension to that group questioning rule? All important human discussion should be carried out in the presence of children. If you can still concentrate, the idea is robust.

On a serious note, maybe Rushkoff should play a bit with Freud, on the grounds that the Big F. takes the discussion away from the properties of systems to the nature of the human psyche.

The trouble with two or four thousand year old religious debates is that you have to read sooo…. much. And I guess you always find out there is nothing new on the altar, not even a different analogy, or tools to think with. Who first thunk of the atom again?

You ain’t kidding! You could make a game out of it – Rushkoff Jeopardy. What social phenomenon do you suppose he’s talking about here?

“I can’t help but think the trend is also fueled, at least in part, by our increasingly confused relationship with technology and media. … As we grow increasingly dependent on video and computer simulations for the imagery in our fantasy lives, we may begin to aspire towards that which the machine can recreate, rather than that we can create ourselves.”

Give up?

Still, it sounds like a cool book, one that I’d add to my reading list but for the fact that I still haven’t gotten around to Exit Strategy.

– S

Things I love about Adam (a continuing series):

#12,475 : You can remember a conversation we had over lunch, more than fifteen years ago, about L.A. Law.

#12,476 : You would uncomplainingly listen to me discuss episodes of L.A. Law.

#12,477 : “You start ranting about the Talmud on “LA Law”, and people gonna change the channel to “Night Court.”

#12,478 : “God is energy”: Groovy. It did occur to me, though, that one could flip the heat/cold good/evil analogy: What if there’s no such thing as good/God in the universe, just the presence or absence of evil?

More importantly, your post reminds me of a sunny late-1980s lunchtime during which you and I spent kicking dirt on one of the many baseball diamonds in the park beside the high school. You were telling me about an “LA Law” episode you had seen the previous night, where a guy, engaged to a Jew, was considering converting to Judaism. He asks his Lawyer, “What’s it like, to be a Jew?” It was something about the _delivery_ of the line that totally cracked you up, and the fact that it cracked you up in turn cracked me up, too. How did the Lawyer respond? I can’t remember, but it probably wouldn’t have been as heavy as Rushkoff. You start ranting about the Talmud on “LA Law”, and people gonna change the channel to “Night Court.”

Oh yeah, the whole “cold is merely an absence of heat” analogy [I guess the Physics degree wasn't a total waste of time] totally influenced the way I grew to think about evil, or rather the absence of good. Further direct application of this thought allowed “God is energy” to spin in my mind for years…

And now I return you to dorky posts about rock stars from outer space.

I keep forgetting they don’t exactly teach mystical judaism in schools.

Mm-hm.

That’s all I got.

The one time I have ever been to temple on a high holiday with M, we got there during the ‘fund raising’ section of the service. Lots of people donating a specific amount of money.. (chaim? $7? I forget). It was very strange and informal to me, someone who is ‘used to’ (in the sense I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve been to Mass) the pomp and circumstance of Catholicism. But I admit I am fascinated by this give and take with the rabbi on his sermon you write about. I may have to go to temple with M & her family sometime. That sounds fascinating.

When you write for academic journals, are you able to preserve your wit and light tone? Or will your fellow patriot-scholars not allow such cheek?