Word: logics
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...LOEB'S production of Lulu is the perfect portrayal of a nightmare. The stage is draped in red. Characters float in and out and die while piano rags tinkle soothingly in the background. As in all nightmares, there is no interior logic, just a disembodied series of sketches that provoke mingled horror and impatience at their very disjointedness. For all the melodrama, stabbings, shootings, spurting of blood and impassioned speeches, the play leaves one fundamentally cold. And Frank Wedekind probably wanted it that...
Both Naipaul brothers see Africa through Conrad's eyes--as a ruined land where logic is an anomaly and men become corrupted. But for V.S. Naipaul, the entire world is a senseless, despondent morass. For Shiva, civilization and Mistah Kurtz are only dead in Africa...
...argument is simplest if it turns on TV purely as entertainment, with no intent larger than diversion. On that basis, the laissez-faire system of the ratings possesses absolute logic: the people decide, voting with their channel selectors. What works as diversion will presumably be highest rated and therefore most successful. But there is a fallacy here: a laissez-faire principle of rule by ratings would be admirable if a wide variety of choices existed. Too many network shows are devoted almost entirely to exploring new dimensions of imbecility. That seems an old and boringly elitist criticism...
Quine is an internationally known philosopher whose pioneering works on mathematical logic helped establish the study of logic and language as central to philosophy. In his works he regards language as a logical system that can be adjusted, and he criticizes the distinction between analytic and synthetic philosophy because it rests on an unacceptably obscure and imprecise notion of meaning. Quine has served on the Harvard faculty since 1936, four years after he received his Ph.D. here. His books include A System of Logistic (1934), Mathematical Logic (1940) and Word and Object (1960). Born in Akron, Ohio, Quine will...
...questions raised about the nuclear power industry by the Three Mile Island accident only reinforce that logic. Yet Americans have not sifted through the questions of their priorities. They want energy without risk. They may be a long time in settling the question of what price they are willing to pay for their power. Americans historically have believed that they can have it both ways - indeed, every way. Their success was erected upon a profligate exuberance...