tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post2868156377370488199..comments2024-03-29T15:45:04.867+05:30Comments on Jabberwock: Muscular fish, invisible gorillas, and an anti-establishment Bengali writerJabberwockhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10210195396120573794noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-86755889578033916202011-03-24T21:43:18.571+05:302011-03-24T21:43:18.571+05:30I’m a super-dooper-jumbo-loser, yet, I’m quite the...I’m a super-dooper-jumbo-loser, yet, I’m quite the savvy, sardonic satire with avant-garde, cooDAYtah, bay-bee; I’m a post-mortem cynic who’s seen Heaven Above and I’m verrry adept at hired-gun-diplomacy; I’m the vehicle of wretched, rowdy, and anti-establishmentarian truth. Pleased to make your acquaintance, girl. Won’t you join me Upstairs, Miss Gorgeous Babe, where I shall kiss your adorable feet which brought U.S. here? For an endless plethora of wonderFULL volumes of procrastination and love in the Great Beyond? PS NOW? I’m on big, bad Janet’s list of bloody terrorists even though I’m a head-injured-wetard. Rise above, America. Think summore past the impotent world government; don’t do the suicidal, whorizontal reality; don’t get played like a HAARP: control, conform, walking ‘the Wall’ to our demise. STOP BEING LEMMINGS!-blessed holy socks, the non-perishable-zealothttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00241446130197185049noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-67224314675695814222010-12-24T15:04:47.459+05:302010-12-24T15:04:47.459+05:30Also, nobody likes your bloody violin music. ACH.Also, nobody likes your bloody violin music. ACH.yes it's me againnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-68048779821961548952010-12-24T15:02:53.294+05:302010-12-24T15:02:53.294+05:30You guys are dead!You guys are dead!Adolf P. Hitlernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-11544254296597865302010-12-22T15:48:32.407+05:302010-12-22T15:48:32.407+05:30Very interesting posst with three very interesting...Very interesting posst with three very interesting books.<br /><br />A note on the invisible gorillas - In the video, it seems that we are deliberately asked to count the passes of the white team, so that the Gorilla suit guy is camoflouged by the black team and appears to be a member of the black team. Also the during the thumping scene, he is partially guarded by a white team dude.<br /><br />Still a very interesting take on what we percieve to be reality.Sidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-84346221446339505012010-12-22T14:49:49.916+05:302010-12-22T14:49:49.916+05:30Glad you liked it. It's a touching tale, and a...Glad you liked it. It's a touching tale, and an amazingly well constructed story. As a kid, I remember studying the map of the USA closely just to find the fictional Bayport, the place where the Hardys lived, only to never find it. Love the ending of the story.one-handed backhandnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-22175197967284590202010-12-22T12:11:10.777+05:302010-12-22T12:11:10.777+05:30one-handed backhand: just reread the Hardy Boys pi...one-handed backhand: just reread the Hardy Boys piece - brilliant. (<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/05/AR2005120501092.html" rel="nofollow">Here's</a> the link.) Had first read it years ago but didn't remember that it was by Weingarten.Jabberwockhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10210195396120573794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-32247558034733102082010-12-22T11:07:25.209+05:302010-12-22T11:07:25.209+05:30Gene, if that is indeed you, a pleasure. The Great...Gene, if that is indeed you, a pleasure. The Great Zucchini and The Hardy Boys, the final chapter, are two of my favourite narratives. I agree with your point. The story expressly raises that question and then settles for, thankfully, the better alternative. <br />Jai, have been a long-time reader of your blog, and like your writing, though more on cinema than books. I guess, when talking about books, you can kind digress too much from the book at hand to other so called 'larger' questions. One exception was your review of Sea of Poppies, which maybe because of its prose, focused more on the story and the writing style. All the best for your JBDY book, hope to pick up a copy soon.one-handed backhandnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-85178108430150196532010-12-22T01:11:53.538+05:302010-12-22T01:11:53.538+05:30Nice bit of irony in Gene Weingarten's comment...Nice bit of irony in Gene Weingarten's comment (if he is the one who wrote it). <br /><br />The comment suggests that the authors of The Invisible Gorilla only read internet summaries of his work and consequently misrepresented it (or that they deliberately distorted it for their book). And he does that based on an internet summary of their work, and he admits to not having read their book! Tsk tsk. :-)<br /><br />For what it's worth, we did read the article quite carefully. It was a beautifully written piece, and a really clever idea. For what it's worth, the discussion in our book was focused on the sorts of conclusions that can be drawn from the study and how the result might be interpreted in light of the scientific evidence for inattentional blindness. <br /><br />Mr. Weingarten: I'd love to correspond directly rather than through blog comments. If the comment was from you, please feel free to drop me a line: dan@theinvisiblegorilla.com<br /><br />--Dan SimonsAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-74295645848450515472010-12-21T17:29:35.301+05:302010-12-21T17:29:35.301+05:30Gene: just in case that really is you (one tends t...Gene: just in case that really is you (one tends to be sceptical given the increasingly creative nature of Internet trolling these days!), this is a real pleasure. I loved your "Fatal Distraction" feature - it's one of the best, most challenging pieces of long-form journalism I've read.<br /><br />Point taken about the Bell piece. I must confess that I read it hurriedly when it first appeared, and I was more interested in the actual experiment - and your description of it - than in the conclusion. I don't have the Simons-Chabris book with me at the moment, but as soon as I can I'll quote more from the relevant passages.Jabberwockhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10210195396120573794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8204542.post-26984122627611364792010-12-21T16:38:52.745+05:302010-12-21T16:38:52.745+05:30The Pulitzer Prize people may well have been duped...The Pulitzer Prize people may well have been duped, but not for the reasons the authors seem to suggest. <br /><br />I concede that I may not be as good a writer as a Pulitzer Prize warrants, but my story did not say, or even imply, that the commuters' failure to appreciate Joshua Bell was because they lacked aesthetic sophistication; in fact, the story explicitly raised that possibility and explicitly discarded it. Instead, the story wondered if the commuters' failure to notice the violinist was a failure of priorities: Have our lives become so hectic, so driven by schedule and deadline, that we are unable to notice something of profound beauty right in front of our eyes? (And, by implication: How many other worthwhile things are we missing?)<br /><br />The central issue in this story was summarized in a line from a poem by W.H. Davies: "What is this life, if, full of care / We have no time to stand and stare?"<br /><br />I have not yet read this book, and am trusting your summary of it. Based on your summary, though, I wonder if the authors read the original story, or were merely making assumptions from the many incomplete internet descriptions of it? If they did read it, and deliberately misinterpreted it for the sake of their book, tsk tsk. Oddly enough, it sounds as though interpreting the story correctly would have SUPPORTED their point. <br /><br />-- Gene WeingartenGene Weingartennoreply@blogger.com