Breaking Bad, like The Wire, is damn fine TV. But, where the
Wire tried to show us everything that’s wrong with modern America, by showing
us everything that’s wrong with modern America, Breaking Bad goes exactly the
other way. In its protagonist, Walter
White, we find the contradictions of modern America distilled down to a single
man: he does all the wrong things for the right reasons. When he finds out he’s
sick, he argues convincingly that he does not want to be well because being
well felt to him like sickness and sickness feels like being alive.
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
What I do (using only the 1000 most common words)
This has been doing the rounds - http://splasho.com/upgoer5/ - explain difficult things using only the ten hundred most common words. So this is what I do (not that complex really, but hey)
I look at the world, carefully.
I want to know which bits are hot and which are cold, where the rain falls and where it is dry, where the wind rushes and where it is still. These things can make the lives of people better or worse, so it is important to understand them. It is also interesting because I want to know about how the world works.
The world is always changing. It changes every day and each month is different. But if we look very carefully we find that it changes every year, every ten years, every hundred years. No matter how we look, no matter when we look, the world seems to be changing. If we want to know how the world now is different from how it once was - if it is different - we need to look with great care.
Some people think that we are changing the world. They think that sooner or later, changes in the air from all the things we have burned will make the world much hotter. When we burn things the air gets hot, but that is not why they think the world will get hotter. You will have to ask one of the people who believes this to find out why. It is a very interesting story and although the world is very, very big, the story has in it some of the very smallest things we know about.
The changes in the world could be big and these changes could make the lives of people better or worse. It is quite hard to say for sure, but some people believe that for very many people it will be worse. Others believe that the changes will be small, or they will not be bad for very many people. Because of this we would like to get a better idea of what will happen.
The big problem is that the world is all joined up. If you change one small part, other parts change too. It is not possible for one person to think about all the ways the world is joined up.
To understand the world people build small worlds inside computers because computers can think about many more things than people can and they can do it much faster. However, the worlds inside computers are very small and they are not exactly like the real world. It is possible that important things are missing from the small worlds.
One way to check if the small worlds have all the important things is to look at what has already happened. If we look at what happened in the small computer worlds and what happened in the real world and they are nearly the same then we start to think that the small worlds in the computers might be able to tell us what will happen in the next years and tens of years and hundreds of years.
But this is only a start. People are very good at saying why something has happened. Some people and some computers are very good at this and they are so good that even other people think that this person knows things that haven't happened yet. Sometimes they do and sometimes they do not. The only way to tell for sure is to ask the person to write down something that has not happened yet. Then you can look at the world and see if it does what they said it would.
That too is only a start. Understanding happens slowly and it happens by looking often and carefully at the world.
So that's what I do. I look at the world, carefully.
I look at the world, carefully.
I want to know which bits are hot and which are cold, where the rain falls and where it is dry, where the wind rushes and where it is still. These things can make the lives of people better or worse, so it is important to understand them. It is also interesting because I want to know about how the world works.
The world is always changing. It changes every day and each month is different. But if we look very carefully we find that it changes every year, every ten years, every hundred years. No matter how we look, no matter when we look, the world seems to be changing. If we want to know how the world now is different from how it once was - if it is different - we need to look with great care.
Some people think that we are changing the world. They think that sooner or later, changes in the air from all the things we have burned will make the world much hotter. When we burn things the air gets hot, but that is not why they think the world will get hotter. You will have to ask one of the people who believes this to find out why. It is a very interesting story and although the world is very, very big, the story has in it some of the very smallest things we know about.
The changes in the world could be big and these changes could make the lives of people better or worse. It is quite hard to say for sure, but some people believe that for very many people it will be worse. Others believe that the changes will be small, or they will not be bad for very many people. Because of this we would like to get a better idea of what will happen.
The big problem is that the world is all joined up. If you change one small part, other parts change too. It is not possible for one person to think about all the ways the world is joined up.
To understand the world people build small worlds inside computers because computers can think about many more things than people can and they can do it much faster. However, the worlds inside computers are very small and they are not exactly like the real world. It is possible that important things are missing from the small worlds.
One way to check if the small worlds have all the important things is to look at what has already happened. If we look at what happened in the small computer worlds and what happened in the real world and they are nearly the same then we start to think that the small worlds in the computers might be able to tell us what will happen in the next years and tens of years and hundreds of years.
But this is only a start. People are very good at saying why something has happened. Some people and some computers are very good at this and they are so good that even other people think that this person knows things that haven't happened yet. Sometimes they do and sometimes they do not. The only way to tell for sure is to ask the person to write down something that has not happened yet. Then you can look at the world and see if it does what they said it would.
That too is only a start. Understanding happens slowly and it happens by looking often and carefully at the world.
So that's what I do. I look at the world, carefully.
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