Great hosting, admirable composure. On the whole (90%+) I agreed more with you Liza. I loved the idea you had of open dialogue on literature by people of differing views. After watching your guest, I worry about the standards of history education in the USA. Looking forward to future shows.
This is my favorite Pens 🖊️ & Poison ☠️ interview so far! So insightful! I had a question for you Liza, how did you manage to get a brand icon like Mr. Clean 🧼 on your show? 😉
Yan is very interesting to listen to, but I think you need to keep a rolled-up newspaper handy for when he gets up on the furniture.
That aside, the discussion was full of ideas, at least some of which align with or are tangential to some of my own. Yan's mention that, in the absence of objective criteria of merit, self-selection allows the humanities to wander in lockstep into territories far from the roots of literature or history is a nice counterpoint to my own take on the proliferation of literary theories (which I have mentioned before in other comments and won't rehearse again here).
It struck me as I was listening that this is quite analogous to the case of sexual selection in the theory of evolution. Say, for instance, that at some time, quite randomly, a slight preference occurs among certain birds for larger tail-feathers in the male. Then these males have a slight edge, for no real reason having to do with any practical use of such feathers. Then of course in the next few generations, it becomes established that even among females who do not prefer large tails, males with larger tails become indirectly a more attractive mate because their male offspring will inherit the larger tail and have an advantage.
They have an advantage because they have an advantage; it is quite circular and has absolutely no objective utility, only the self-created utility of its own self-fulfilling prophecy of success. After some time, you have peacocks, which (while humans may find them beautiful) are at a great disadvantage in every practical way, except for the overridingly important advantage that they are successful because they match the lockstep definition of success.
Evolutionary theory applies to any system that exhibits generational replacement with competition. I think the analogy with, what was it, "gremlin studies"? is pretty obvious. If evolution is any guide, this situation is extremely difficult to walk back, even in the face of impending extinction. (There's my happy thought for the day.)
By the way, I never listen to podcasts, because I strongly prefer reading. This is in fact the very first podcast every to penetrate my virgin ears (let's not take that image too literally), because I thought that it would be truly worth hearing. I was right.
Very interesting Ms. Libes. Keep going.
Great hosting, admirable composure. On the whole (90%+) I agreed more with you Liza. I loved the idea you had of open dialogue on literature by people of differing views. After watching your guest, I worry about the standards of history education in the USA. Looking forward to future shows.
This is my favorite Pens 🖊️ & Poison ☠️ interview so far! So insightful! I had a question for you Liza, how did you manage to get a brand icon like Mr. Clean 🧼 on your show? 😉
Yan took this as a major compliment.
Yan is very interesting to listen to, but I think you need to keep a rolled-up newspaper handy for when he gets up on the furniture.
That aside, the discussion was full of ideas, at least some of which align with or are tangential to some of my own. Yan's mention that, in the absence of objective criteria of merit, self-selection allows the humanities to wander in lockstep into territories far from the roots of literature or history is a nice counterpoint to my own take on the proliferation of literary theories (which I have mentioned before in other comments and won't rehearse again here).
It struck me as I was listening that this is quite analogous to the case of sexual selection in the theory of evolution. Say, for instance, that at some time, quite randomly, a slight preference occurs among certain birds for larger tail-feathers in the male. Then these males have a slight edge, for no real reason having to do with any practical use of such feathers. Then of course in the next few generations, it becomes established that even among females who do not prefer large tails, males with larger tails become indirectly a more attractive mate because their male offspring will inherit the larger tail and have an advantage.
They have an advantage because they have an advantage; it is quite circular and has absolutely no objective utility, only the self-created utility of its own self-fulfilling prophecy of success. After some time, you have peacocks, which (while humans may find them beautiful) are at a great disadvantage in every practical way, except for the overridingly important advantage that they are successful because they match the lockstep definition of success.
Evolutionary theory applies to any system that exhibits generational replacement with competition. I think the analogy with, what was it, "gremlin studies"? is pretty obvious. If evolution is any guide, this situation is extremely difficult to walk back, even in the face of impending extinction. (There's my happy thought for the day.)
By the way, I never listen to podcasts, because I strongly prefer reading. This is in fact the very first podcast every to penetrate my virgin ears (let's not take that image too literally), because I thought that it would be truly worth hearing. I was right.