Andrushka

The point of this poem (and the subsequent "Ode to Spot") was to reinforce the difference between Man and Machine. And though Ode to Spot is something I'd expect from a third grader with an exceptional grasp of meter, this fragment seems rather poetic to me. I mean, I grok Data on this point. It is the problem of having too much information on a given subject; in humans, it is concurrent with specialization. Last semester one of my classmates was doing a project on anti-intellectualism in the public school where he teaches. He shared with us four videos of student interviews. In one of those videos, we saw a girl with a complete proto-academician attitude. She's the sort who sits on the front row [". . . the potential for mischief varies inversely with one's proximity to the authority figure!" (Martin, The Simpsons. Oct. 11, 1990)], she considers herself an intellectual, she worries about her GPA. Most of all, she was talkative, with a thoughtful and long-winded answer to every question. Quite a change from some of the sub-verbal boys previously interviewed. When she was asked about her future plans, she said, "I want to get my PhD" "Why?" "Because then I'll have something to say and people will listen." The room full of PhD and MA students erupted in laughter. It's really just the opposite and we all knew it. The more immersed we become in our discipline, the less capable we are of talking to anyone else. We have our own lexicons and theoretical paradigms we bring along to our interactions with others. While people in closely related disciplines might understand, even that is often a stretch because we might be using the same words to quite different effect. Student missionaries and exchange students have a similar problem upon their return. A large part of their life is divorced from the experience of those around them. That's why they gravitate together to talk about the life they lived in the other place. And it doesn't really matter if one went to Korea and the other to Ecuador; talking about their new otherness is therapeutic. And when it comes to talking to others, sometimes it's best to just censor what you know and want to share, and just focus on the moment.

So I did not explain why the sunset turned red And we watched the occurrence in silence instead.

On an unrelated subject, the abundance of military recruiting commercials annoys me to no end. It seems to me that we could save a lot of taxpayer money by just killing our young people at home. It would be nice if pacifists had as much funding to get our message out.