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C and I had booked a dinner at a place called the Pine Creek Cookhouse. A friend had told me it’s a thing to do here, as it’s up in the hills and can only be accessed by cross country skis or by sleigh — you drive to a certain point, after which you must switch to a more humble form of transport. It’s dark as we head up the mountain road and we notice that there aren’t many other cars headed this way. And the snow and wind starts to increase the higher we go. Hmmm.
A few miles further and the road is completely white — it twists and turns in the dark along what looks like a river created canyon on our right. The wind occasionally blows the snow from the surrounding fields and hills obscuring the road, and then we have to drive slower, as it’s hard, almost impossible, to see. After a few more miles we spot a small pickup tilted at a 45º angle into the snow bank on the ravine side of the road. A few more feet and it would have tumbled down. I stop and suggest that Cindy walk over and see if anyone is in there and if they need a ride or help. She returns trembling, and with a slight quiver in her voice says, “The truck seems empty…let’s turn around and get out of here.”
The road here is too narrow to turn around, so I continue slowly up the mountain. The blowing snow increases and we see either a couple of grey foxes or small wolves crossing in front of our headlights, but there is still no safe place to do a U-turn. By now C is really panicking, and I agree that if this weather continues, it could be really unsafe to drive back down after a meal and some wine.
Eventually I see a road branching off on the left and I use that area to turn around. We head back down and before we even reach the abandoned truck we see another vehicle — an SUV — dangling over the edge in a very similar way, it’s hazard lights flashing. I get out this time, but no one is in the car. So we drive on down.
When we reach the valley floor the clouds have lightened and the snow has stopped, but we both reason that given the weather pattern here thus far, the snow could begin to fall again in a minute — so tonight might not be the best night for cross country skiing to a fancy restaurant.
C is more of a skier than I am — I’ve only tried it twice — but this seems the ideal place for it. We decide to rent couple pairs of cross-country skies and some booties for the week. First, we attempt the trail that passes right behind our guest-house. I panic whenever we approached a descent, and I fall into the deep snow about four or five times, but we make it around the course.
Over the course of the week, we venture out on various trails about three or four more times, an hour or so at a stretch. On the very last day, during a few hours of sunshine, I begin to get the hang of it. I can glide along like I am skating or rollerblading, and it’s a nice workout and pretty exhilarating. Maybe it was the little grooves carved into these prepped trails that kept me on track, or maybe it was just my increased confidence — but at any rate, I get it, finally.
A recent issue of New Scientist magazine (8 December 2007) included an article in which two scientists, Tony Martin and Vera da Silva, claim that behaviors they identified in Amazon River dolphins are clear examples of dolphins having culture. What kind of behavior is it? Square dancing? Art exhibits? Pottery?
It seems some males in a few populations of dolphins carry objects — bits of weed, a stick, a lump of clay. The carriers turn out to be among the guys most successful in mating and in prompting aggression within their group. So, the “wearing” of these cool accessories must make you somewhat sexier than the other less dressed up guys. Or they are offered as “gifts" to the gals. Females and the kids don’t carry this stuff, which they claim rules out the rationale that the carrying is simply a form of play — if that were the case everyone would join in.
Lest we think that it’s only the boys who have culture, Geoffrey Miller proposes that this kind of sexually selective behavior requires that the object of affection — the females mostly — be culturally literate in order to determine whose weeds are the coolest, most sophisticated, and the sexiest. No good getting all dressed up if no one notices. I would assume that some fine distinctions have evolved as well — that a clump of weeds say, carried a certain way identifies the dolphin as one of the cutting edge weedies as distinct from the tired stick clique.
The phenomenon has been spotted amongst geographically separate groups of dolphins. And they’re not sure if the behavior is ancestral (taught by elders or by the previous generation), or if it has evolved independently over and over in different areas, the way humans scattered across the globe sometimes develop similar buildings, rituals and behaviors. Either way, these guys claim it can be considered culture. Previously, scientists had only allowed chimps and humans into that club, but now maybe the rabble will be storming the velvet ropes.
What is culture? In the NS article it’s described as a complex skill (or behavior) that is spread and maintained by social learning rather than being a genetically fostered behavior, or one that the local environment might simply encourage. This description defines by exclusion: culture isn’t the making of things or a certain set of behaviors, but depends on how those behaviors are learned and transmitted. You could have the best table manners in the world, but if they’re merely instinctual, then you’re not cultured. Others define culture as using things or behaviors symbolically — and by that definition these dolphins seem to qualify too. When applied to people, this umbrella definition of symbolic behavior includes codes and prescribed manners of dress, language, religion, rituals, etiquette, morality, cuisine, and on and on. Inevitably, some of those products of culture in dolphins will be invisible to us; we won’t be able to know their religion, if they have one — not now anyway.
Using the definition put forth in NS — the one that excludes genetic environmentally prompted behaviors — would be, I think, to claim that to a large extent people don’t have culture either. I would say this is the case because our culture is maybe less learned than we’d like to think. I tend to agree with Miller and some others that what we call culture is essentially a very complicated and elaborate form of sexual display, some of which is learned and some of which is emergent, that is, strongly encouraged through genetic selection. This is different than a peacock’s tail display, which is sexual, but not a behavior — the peacock is born with his fancy outfit, whereas the dolphins, like people, have to do a little work to look their best.
I suspect these cultural and symbolic behaviors are mostly emergent in both people as well as dolphins and chimps. Maybe there aren’t specific genes that specify witty raconteur, financial dealmaker or rock star (though maybe there are?), but instead genes that encourage those types of display to evolve and emerge during one’s lifetime. Propensities for behavior are passed on genetically in people, just as they are in animals. These behaviors are not as clear-cut as instinctual behaviors — there’s more learning and skill mastering involved. But DNA might play a larger role than we would like to think, and our distance and segregation from our animal pals might not be as great as we presume. Moreover, our cultural manifestations might be parallel from society to society, with more similarities across geographically disparate peoples than we’d like to think too.
So, if this is true, then people don’t have nearly as much of what they define as culture as is commonly held. We have truckloads of what we call cultural behaviors, but if we only count the ones that are exclusively and entirely learned, there might not be too many left. If we subtracted all the parallel behaviors across human cultures on the basis of genetic influence then what are we left with?
In the past, another way of excluding members from the culture club was tool use — for a long time it was assumed that only humans used or fashioned tools. Then chimps were seen carefully choosing thin sticks and fashioning them into tools for extracting delicious honey ants. After that, more and more examples of animal tool use were spotted and acknowledged. Even in dolphins, it turns out. In an inlet called Useless Loop (Useless Loop!!), dolphins pluck specifically shaped sea sponges and use them as protective gear when probing the ocean floor. Some of the scientists who have spotted the sponging behaviors claim it is learned socially — the dolphins teach their kids how to sponge — which qualifies this kind of tool use as a form of culture.
PNAS/Photos by Janet Mann
Liz Hawkins, a scientist in New South Whales, Australia, also claims to have identified two hundred distinct dolphin whistles so far, all of which are contextual, qualifying them as comprising a language. The scientists don’t know what they all mean yet. “Bob’s got a nice wad of weeds there” might be one sentence.
If we broaden the definition a little bit we can still call ourselves and our societies cultured, but we might have to admit some new members.
This town was named after a minor Dostoyevsky character and now it is known primarily for the Marfa Lights — strange aurora borealis like phenomena on that occur on the edge of town — and the permanent installation of a lot of work by minimalist sculptor Donald Judd.
I’d never been to this area, so when my friends Terry and Jo Harvey Allen announced that they’d be having their biennial wedding anniversary blowout here it seemed like a great opportunity to see them — and all the singer-songwriter and artist friends of theirs who will arrive. It’s also a chance to see the spectacular landscapes around here. Here is a view from Big Bend National Park:
I flew into Midland-Odessa, the twinned oil towns about 160 miles north of Marfa. I’d never seen them and anticipated viewing some oil field culture residue….lots full of drilling equipment in disarray, metal building manufacturers, “Bush Country” T-shirts, bobbing oil pumps scattered across
the landscape and flatness. Lots of flatness:
I stopped at the Odessa Meteor Crater, a 600 foot wide, 20 foot deep depression just 5 miles off the highway. I was underwhelmed, but I guess when the landscape is as featureless as it is around here a 20-foot depression is a big deal.
Past Pecos the landscape began to change — dramatic igneous formations stuck up here and there, hills appeared on both sides of the road with remnants of lava forming spiny ridges along their tops. Here were prehistoric seas, swamps, jungles and volcanoes.
Marfa is in a dry flat area in between these outcroppings that you reach after winding through various hills and canyons. In some ways it is a typical small Texan town with a beautiful old central courthouse, a train track running through the middle, grain and cattle loading facilities…but that’s where the ordinariness ends. The main street here is lined with super contemporary Spartan-looking art galleries and the offices of at least 3 art foundations. There is a “good” restaurant with white tablecloths and a tasteful bookstore and coffee and wine bar wedged in between the post office, the barbershop and the NPR station offices.
My hotel — El Paisano — was where the cast of the film Giant stayed. I did not get the James Dean room or the Liz Taylor room. The lobby has 4 gift and tchotchke stores and a room with memorabilia of the famous film shoot. This month another film is shooting nearby. A period film directed by PT Anderson (Boogie Nights, Magnolia) starring Daniel Day Lewis and others. I run into the soundman that worked with me on True Stories many years ago in Dallas and is now working on that film.
It was during the prep for True Stories that I met Jo Harvey and Terry. They were recommended to me by Joan Tewkesbury, screenwriter of Nashville and a number of other films. I had approached Joan out of the blue for advice and thoughts, which she willingly gave. I knew I wanted my film to wear its narrative very lightly, and I saw Nashville (and some other Altman films) as very successful examples of this.
She said I HAD to see Jo Harvey’s performance work and listen to Terry’s music, which I did. We became friends and over many get-togethers in Santa Fe and elsewhere I got to know some of the Allens’ circle of friends — many of whom are also artists or singer-songwriters. Their New Year’s Eve parties would often end, as is common for Texas musicians (and Brazilian ones too) with a guitar being passed around and everyone who wrote or sang taking a turn and singing a song, often until late into the wee hours. (This tradition was continued here around the Thunderbird hotel fireplace, where most of the others stayed.)
It took me a bit to get used to this homey approach to music and performance. New Yorkers are sadly more “professional” in their attitude towards their art. We usually perform for money under controlled circumstances. We see ourselves as artistes whose performances are as controlled as we can manage them. (More on control later.) The camaraderie amongst musicians does exists up here in NY, but can you imagine a house party where Madonna picks up a guitar after dinner and serenades the drunken guests with a new song, and then passes the guitar to David Bowie? Not likely, I imagine, though who knows? But amongst Texans it’s the normal course of events. When I fist encountered and participated in these campfire sings I realized the meaning and resonance of these things goes deeper — to some extent this is a way of resisting the century-old trend of produced and commodified entertainment and culture.
We tend to see our culture and entertainment as something made by “others”, by “professionals”, which we then buy, attend, consume or purchase. It has been removed from us, our own culture. It’s made by those with distant professionals with the requisite levels of skill. craft and polish. When it was discovered that there was money to be made in marketing and packaging what was once locally produced and amateur popular music (and everything else) it slowly was insinuated that it was weird and uncool to make it at home with your friends — how unprofessional! It became considered strange and unlikely to create your own entertainment and to leave the TV off (as well as being unprofitable.) But in quite a few places this never took hold — Texas, Brazil, and Spain I can personally vouch for as examples of cultures where this process of creation and performance continued being transparent and public (well, amongst friends.)
A slightly more organized version of this would be presented this Friday and Saturday nights at a local bar here that is either called Ray’s or Joe’s depending on who you talk to. All the wedding anniversary hangers-on and stray visitors to town were invited, and the small cover charge went to a local clinic. (17K raised — enough to keep them afloat for the next year.) Terry did tell me to bring a guitar, so I was prepared. Again I felt a little the odd man out amongst the Texas singer songwriter royalty — Joe Ely, Guy Clarke, Will Sexton, Nora George, Ryan Bingham, Terry, Colin Gilmore, Bukka Allen, Butch Hancock and some others I didn’t know — some of whom sang later around the fire — but having joined this circle a number of times on various New Year’s eves and at other small benefits we can join on each other’s songs with something like comfort and ease.
Part of the attraction here is the local scenery — the landscape is big, harsh, desolate and spacious. The locals didn’t seem very interested, but some of us were determined to visit Big Bend National Park, which is only a couple of hours’ drive away. The Rio Grande cuts a swath through an area of mixed geology — more igneous extrusions, limestone uplifts with canyons cut through, sandstone formations, geologic folding and bending. (The Midland Odessa area is known locally as the Permian Basin, so geological terms are not as academic here as in many other places — geology will tell if there is oil underground or water for your cattle — it is destiny around here.)
A few of us head out at 7:30 and when we arrive there’s no one in the park — a big 8 entries today according to the gate lady — who seems sad when we drive on. We go for a bike ride from Castolon to Santa Elena canyon mouth and back.
It’s getting hot by the time we head back. Mike, from whom we hired the bikes in Terlingua, tells us of the changes since the border has been tightened up by Homeland Security and the recent wave of immigration paranoia. (That’s Mexico on the left wall of the canyon.) In many places the river is a lot wider and shallower than this, so it’s often no big deal to cross it. Global warming and drought — and water siphoned off for irrigation — have affected the river level — the river is almost pathetic at times. In the recent past it was usual for folks to cross the river for lunch in the town of Santa Elena (8km downriver from the canyon) or other little Mexican towns that had sprung up across the river up to sell gifts, supplies and lunches. For the most part that has ended due to increased “security” and the towns are now mostly dead. In many cases roads from both sides converged on opposite shores of the river — there being no auto bridge — and little bits of commerce were made. Now these roads are surreal outposts — like viewing stations at the former Berlin Wall — where people can look at the other side but can’t meet. (Apparently, there are some little settlements at the end of some dirt roads outside the park where one can still walk across on a rickety bridge to Mexico — I guess the Border Patrol conveniently ignores some spots — a mountain inside Big Bend state park is called Contrabando Mountain, which maybe admits more than many might like.)
500 National Guard troops are due in this area soon, a presence that will be strange and tense for many who live and work around here. There are Border Patrol stops on the 2 roads north out of the park — we were stopped and they looked at my Green Card. I noticed that they had employed a former Mexican immigrant to help stop further Mexicans from entering. Mike said that someone recently spotted a back SUV with official looking guys hanging down where the river spills out of the canyon into some cottonwoods and floodplain. It was discovered they were doing a feasibility study for the wall that now exists on the western portion of the U.S./Mexico border. Imagine a massive wall slicing through the scenery.
A photo of the wall from Ron Moak’s hiking blog:
and some of his thoughts:
Some 2650 winding trail miles to the north stands the Canadian border. Unlike this place, the Canadian border is ten yard wide clear cut that undulates its way across endless ridges along the 45th parallel. No walls, no patrols, no motion detectors and most important no fear. Just a friendly sign welcoming hikers to Canada. Why aren't there walls to keep those hokey loving Canadians out? Is it because, for the most part, they talk, look, act and think like us?
We head up to Chisos basin, which is pretty spectacular.
This is not the basin — this is the return road — the basin looks more like Zion National Park — because of its higher altitude the basin is cooler and greener.
Back to Marfa.
Los Arrayanes
Diego, Sebastian, Colo and I head out to hike the length of the peninsula on which the grove of myrtle trees stands at the far end. It’s a 12.5 km hike to the tip of the peninsula, so we leave enough time for a 5-hour round trip.
The path leads through mainly virgin forest and it is well marked. The forest is occasionally striking in that way that chaotic virgin forests can be — weirdly shaped trees, massive fallen trunks, huge ancient grandfather trees with scars and wounds from the local llau llao fungus and lightening. The full panoramic vision of chaotic creation and death. At one point one of the guys makes a comment that the tangle of angles and curves and shapes seems architectural — “gothico, art deco, neo-classico”.
Finally, 3 hours later, we reach the little grove of myrtle trees. Not so architectural.
They’re nice, but a little underwhelming. Rumored to be the visual inspiration for the forest in “Bambi” — in truth they were not.
There’s a dock nearby and a little launch pulls in filled with tourists. We hitch a ride back to the car park, which saves us what would be a boring return hike — no one is complaining. One of the launch pilots tells us that he flew to Buenos Aires when I first played here — 1992 (maybe?) — it was the Rei Momo tour with the large Latin band. The sonar on the boat displays the surprising depth of the lake. About 50 yards from shore the water is already 200 meters deep. No one has measured the depth at the deepest points.
Dog Eat Dog
Early morning by the cabin we watch a group of maybe 6 dogs that have gathered by the lakeside. A black doggie, an outsider possibly attempting to join the group or wanting to be taken seriously, barks at all the others, fairly aggressively, while a large Labrador repeatedly mounts a sad looking female with a hound-like face, eventually succeeding in the task, after which the two are locked together for a few minutes. Ouch. None of the others seem to pay much attention to this. Barking blackie is shooed off by the others repeatedly, returning again and again. A twin of the Lab fucker barks, demanding to chase sticks thrown in the water, ignoring all the fucking and barking and growling around him. The lovers have unlocked and the others pass by and smell the sad gal’s pussy, but make no attempt to mount her. The lovers lick their privates…possibly to ease the pain of being stuck together.
Finally fed up with the outsiders’ aggressive non-stop growling and barking, a muscular member of the group takes the case in hand, and, grabbing the outsider by the red collar while they are both knee-deep in the water, he attempts to semi-drown obnoxious blackie. Or at least that’s what it looks like he’s trying to do. Others join in — one chomping down on the poor dog’s leg. A violent scrum — the outsider could be drowned as the others thrash about and hold him down — but no — after a minute or two of violence they all let go of him and there is no blood despite all the showing of teeth and even biting. They seem satisfied that he should now know his place. It seems they intentionally didn’t hurt him. It was all for show, to show him they weren’t going to put up with his aggressiveness and threats. Outsider stands up, still knee-deep in water, dripping, slightly stunned, not moving. He doesn’t run away. He slowly saunters up the bank to the protection of some bushes. A minute or so later here he comes again for more; the never-ending challenge.
One dog pisses on another’s face. No reaction. The hierarchies here must be well worked out.
On my way to work I sometimes pass by a little dog park at 23rd St. and 11th Ave. It’s a triangle of man-made hillocks and humps. The dogs brought there by their owners usually pick a hump to occupy and there they are — one dog on top of each mound, kings of their own hills. Everybody’s happy. Everyone’s a king.
I imagine if there were only one mound there would be fights — a constant and nasty struggle to see who would be top dog — but as there are quite a few options available here every dog can be king, at least for a little while.
Watching the dogs it sure seems we haven’t “advanced” much from the territorial and hierarchical struggles that those dogs so obviously act out. The smart thing about dogs is that their posturing is often just that — blackie wasn’t really hurt, no blood was shed. Actual violence is a real last resort. We push to see where the boundaries lie as well, but sometimes when acted out on a national or global scale, with tanks and explosives, it’s a little too easy to fire off a few rounds or zap the target knowing there will probably be no (immediate) repercussions.
Paraguay
Diego informs me of the band’s recent gig in Paraguay. He says it appears to be — at least in Asuncion and Ciudad del Este — a whole state based on contraband — the CD stores are fully stocked with pirate versions. 95% of the CDs are bootleg.
There are streets of huge mansions and surprising luxury cars. You’d think the contraband industry would somehow be incompatible with traditional music, but he says there is quite a lot there. Well, maybe compared to Argentina.
…
In the morning I bike out to Tierra Santa (Holy Land) in hopes of some photo opportunities. It’s a theme park out past the BA domestic airport that advertises “a day in Jerusalem in Buenos Aires”. It’s closed, but I can see “Calvary” and the three crosses from the outside:
To reach “Jerusalem” I ride along the promenade that borders the riverbank. The river is so wide one can’t see the opposite shore. Fishermen lean on the railing. Along here (and also along the border of the Parque Ecologico) are kiosks that grill meats for truck drivers and others who want a quick lunch. 
Bags of charcoal supply the heat to grill blood sausages, steaks, hamburgers and various other cuts that sizzle during the early afternoons. The word Choripan is a conjunction of chorizo (a cut of beef) and pan (bread)…there’s another offering called Vaciopan, which literally means empty sandwich — but it also is a cut off the cow.
The slang here is many-layered and inventive. There’s even a genre of slang created by pronouncing words backwards. Sometimes this is compounded and complicated even further when a euphemism for something — a word for marijuana or one’s wife, for example — is pronounced backwards, adding yet another layer of obscurity to the in-crowd language.
I stop at MALBA, the modern art museum, to have lunch with Amelia and her daughter. There’s a Roy Lichtenstein show at the moment, which hardly seems fitting for a museum of arte Latino Americano.
Heavy traffic to the airport. United Airlines bumps me from the flight for being 5 mins late. We buy a ticket on American. They lose my bike, but promise there is another flight arriving soon (the bike arrives at my place later — whew.)
Rules of Empire
• Empires love classification
• “Ancient Hatreds” often turn out to be byproducts of colonial structures
• Maintaining an Empire is a huge financial drain on that empire
• Globalization spreads imperial employment practices and patterns
• Empires promise peace but beget war
• Imperial borders are inherently unstable, as they do not exist by consent.
Saw Al Gore on a Wired Magazine-sponsored panel discussion at Town Hall last week. He was good, though not as thought-provoking as James Hansen, a scientist on the same panel. Gore timed this appearance to coincide with the film on global warming made around his slide talk called An Inconvenient Truth. I saw the film last night and it is devastating — and incontrovertible. At Town Hall Gore mainly speechified — his comments were like live excerpts from the filmed slide presentation — but although some spontaneity was lost what he has to say was real, important, and he’s justifiably passionate about it. In the movie, for some reason, there was more emotion in his voice. Maybe it was the editing and the juxtaposition of the background images. Sometimes what you see changes what your hear, and vice versa. But regardless of who was saying this, or how, it needs to be heard.
The movie theater (Sunshine) was packed, there was applause at the end of the movie and Paramount asked those leaving to fill out a card — which to me implies a possible wider release. It is something everyone in this country should see. Gore mostly avoids political harping, so even Republicans might give a listen, although I overheard the man behind me as I was exiting say to his companion “propaganda”.
Propaganda it may be, but it’s reality based propaganda at least. I think Gore presents the facts in an orderly and understandable way, interspersed with moments of pure and personal emotion — well, if you can extrapolate from scientific facts to obvious personal and social consequences then it is indeed deeply emotional. And the images — even the graphs and diagrams — tap some potent buttons, as they should.
It was not all doom and gloom — the ending presents a ray of hope, but hope only if there is the political will to implement change. (Which scientist Hansen pointed out was indeed the case with fluorocarbons — the ozone hole problem is being turned around! So it can be done) I won’t go into details on all of it, it’s all on their website — but all the usual criticisms — “green policies will wreck the economy” (gee, Bush has been doing pretty good at wrecking the economy without being green at all!) — “it’s just a “theory” — “it’s a normal cyclical event”…are all dealt with.
Props to my friends at Wired for supporting this — Chris Anderson proposed a branding — “neo-green” — which, even if the wording changes, seems viable — it leaves behind the images of spaced out hippies, kooks and freaks and replaces them with possible remedies that are economically sound and technically hip. Re-branding green makes everyone who denies that global warming is human induced and is going to be devastating seem like a bunch of losers headed for the human landfill.
Example: Here is Florida (green part) after a 6 meter rise in water level (Greenland ice sheet slips off, as it seems to be doing frighteningly quickly). Maybe that Miami real estate wasn’t such a good idea?
Of course, by the time this happens all kinds of other shit will be going down, so the refugees from South Beach will be a minor issue. This could happen within our lifetime.
I hope this movie triggers some serious thought and action on this issue, otherwise…I have just finished the Jared Diamond book, Collapse, and, yes, it could happen here.
Eve, below, might still be around after a global collapse, though her batteries would have run down. Nice eye contact, Eve.
May 15, 2006—She can hold a conversation, make eye contact [uh huh], and express joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness. These school-age tots seem to be making friends with EveR-1, a female android that made her debut this month in South Korea. The robot was built by Baeg Moon-hong, a senior researcher with the Division for Applied Robot Technology at the Korea Institute of Industrial Technology (KITECH). Fifteen motors underneath her silicon skin allow her to express a limited range of emotions, and a 400-word vocabulary enables her to hold a simple conversation.
The android weighs 110 pounds (50 kilograms) and would stand 5 feet, 3 inches (160 centimeters) tall—if she could stand. EveR-1 can move her arms and hands, but her lower half is immobile.
KITECH scientists are now working on EveR-2, which they say will have improved vision, a wider range of facial expressions, and the ability to stand and move all four limbs.
The recent leak from inside AT&T says that the Bush “secret security” arm known as the NSA have access to all AT&T customers’ phone connections — not just logs of who called whom, but they can tap anyone, anytime. The other large service providers no doubt caved in to NSA pressure as well, so pretty much no one is safe from the prying ears of the Bush Crewe. (Being illegal, will the phone companies at some point be indicted? It’s illegal to open personal mail, isn’t it?) Will be interesting if the “small government” Republicans roll over for this one in the name of national security. One also wonders how many more illegal taps and activities these folks can get away with by pressing the buttons “terrorists are coming to get you” “homeland security” and “it’s for your own good”.
Given the track record of the Bush bunch they will most likely be very unsuccessful at what they have branded homeland security and will use this access as a way of intimidating and destroying political and ideological opponents. It’s too easy to resist. It’s like handing someone a gun and saying don’t use it. George, it will be remembered, failed at every business he was handed — including an oil company! Why almost half the country thought a failure as a businessman could magically learn to run a nation is beyond me. Thinking from the gut, I guess, as Steve Colbert put it.
Alternatively, I would suggest that if our leaders are allowed to pry into our lives we should have the same access to theirs. There is nothing, except sheer power, that says they are more trustworthy than we are. If anything we know that closeness to power makes them candidates for untrustworthiness. If the FBI is allowed to indiscriminately read a Senator's mail and correspondence then that Senator should be allowed to access the intimate and personal Whitehouse and FBI correspondence.
Sexy Evolution
“Are we still evolving?” asks a recent article in New Scientist. A touchy question, for a positive answer implies that some of us are more “evolved” than others. Uh oh. We’d like to believe in the myth that we were all created equal, but if there isn’t enough evidence to prove that we are not now there soon will be. The intent of that inspirational adage, I believe, was that we are equal in the eyes of the law. Our opportunities and rights are equal. Not that we all have the same hair color or are equally blessed with skills or abilities.
Now those who may be more “evolved” than others — carrying genes that make them better suited for the geography and society in which they live — but they may only be “better” in the sense of being more suited to a particular place and situation. In this sense evolution is relative, up to a point. In an odd environment something altogether freaky is more suited, more evolved, but clearly that creature may not be of much use anywhere else. A fish out of water is a dead fish.
It is still considered evolution if the species as a whole becomes stupider. Evolved does not mean “better”, there are no value judgments attached, we add and presume those ourselves.
Among recent evidence for continuing evolution are the Ashkenazi Jews. It seems that possibly as a result of being banned from many labor and work opportunities over the last 1000 years, this mainly Eastern European gene pool has evolved a higher than average intelligence (12-15 points higher than average). The blowback from repression is the creation of a super race. Poetic justice of a twisted sort.
Other evidence:
Gene CCR5-Δ32 a gene found in certain parts of Africa affords some protection against HIV.
Gene DRD4 is the dopamine receptor gene. It has become more common in the last few thousand years. It is positively selected for, so it will probably become even more common as time goes by. It is also associated with attention deficit disorder and hyperactivity. Why humans should evolve FAVORING those conditions is still a mystery. My guess is that those conditions are the flip side of a genetic coin whose face side offers a more obvious suitability and advantage and, being linked on the same gene, you unfortunately get the bad along with the good. Aren’t the dopamine receptors also somehow related to the pleasure centers of the brain?
This could also be like the schizophrenia/creativity link mentioned in an earlier posting, or the genius-geek/autism link. A taste of Fugue gives a nice buzz, but too much and it’s your last meal.
Speaking of pleasure, some (Geoffrey Miller) propose that sexual rather than natural selection is the new driving force in evolution, in humans at least. Natural selection is about simple survival — the mere possibility of being physically able to pass on your genes. Now, Miller suggests, we are much pickier about whom we mate with. All creatures are somewhat picky — doing their best when making a choice to determine the odds of siring successful offspring. Courtship displays are often viewed as elaborate demonstrations of health, commitment and suitability. “Choose me!”
But now, Miller suggests, we have evolved to a whole new plateau. The social and even online connections and interactions among people and populations mean that a person can choose from a shop with a wider and deeper selection. People tend to connect with others who are like them, physically, mentally, financially — and the global and local mixing and interconnecting of recent centuries facilitates (and encourages?) extreme pickiness. People now CHOOSE how they will evolve — if the mating dance can be called a choice. It shifts human evolution into turbo drive rather than stopping it, as had been suggested would happen when it seemed we and our children would all more or less have an equal chance of “surviving”.
Recent research and discoveries connecting chemistry and love:
• Yes, Always. Prairie voles are monogamous and meadow voles are not. However, by injecting meadow voles with a virus that “carries” the prairie vole gene to the meadow vole’s brain, the meadow vole becomes monogamous. Ladies, take note.
But vice versa — if prairie voles are given drugs that block their vasopressin receptors they become as promiscuous as their meadow cousins. Dudes!
• Trust Me. Oxytocin is a chemical intimately related to emotions and sex. Its levels rise after orgasm in women, during arousal in men (note the timing difference) and the levels rise even from touching and massage (Kevin Costner, read on.) Oxytocin also boosts trust. Given a whiff of oxytocin spray, hypothetical “investors” would hand over all their money to anonymous “trustees” with no guarantee of return. Kenneth Lay, please hand over your aerosol can.
• Bad Judgment. Left on our own we tend to select partners who have a set of genes known as the MHC complex that are dissimilar to our own. Pairing these different gene sets produces healthier offspring. It is thought we do this by scent. (Here’s to sensory abilities we didn’t know we had.) However, women on the pill tend to select men whose MHC is the same as their own. Something gets blocked or short-circuited. They make what is not necessarily the best choice…but, they won’t have a child anyway, so it all evens out.
• It’s Dope. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter whose levels rise when we fall in love. The levels also rise when we snort coke or pop amphetamines…or exercise. (That’s why the long bike ride I took the other day was such fun! And that’s why jocks are, well, jocks.) This does not answer the question “does dopamine ‘cause’ love?...or is it just a by-product?”
• Chocolate. The neurotransmitter phenylethylamine (PEA) is also known as the “love” molecule. It induces “excitement and apprehension” according to the magazine New Scientist. Sounds like a roller coaster ride if you ask me, and maybe that’s not a coincidence. PEA is also found in chocolate and its levels also rise when you exercise. So, when I jog am I getting a little bit of that loved up feeling and is that good or bad for my personal life? The ancient Maya valued chocolate (cocoa pods) possibly more than gold.
To be honest, the prospect of oxytocin sprays and chocolate flavored PEA drops is frightening (and tempting). It’s hard enough out there without chemicals clouding the issue even more. And what happens when some scam artists and white-collar crooks get a hold of this stuff — if they haven’t already? I see a counter-development of substances that can tell if your “friend” is using, spraying, or not. Sort of a Breathalyzer test for love potions.
A neat summary of recent advances in evolutionary theory and embryology is in the recent The New York Review Of Books. The writers point out that Hox genes, recognized not so long ago, direct the growth and development of an organism by acting as a series of switches and growth guides. Many of these newly discovered genetic agents were noticed by studying embryonic development, as the big puzzle in evolution is now how exactly can simple genes dictate the growth of and evolve into such complex organs like eyes and hands.
Well, it seems the “simple” genes don’t exactly dictate all of that, that it happens in development, gradually, where the Hox genes act as switches that allow some genes to be expressed and others to remain silent. They do this piecemeal, as an organism grows, so all the information doesn’t have to be stored in one massive genetic file, it’s like a series of trap doors that get opened when the right triggers are activated. Therefore the Hox genes “direct” the development of each specific organ and evolutionary changes and mutations don’t therefore have to happen in the whole gene, which would increase the risk of catastrophe (a dead freak) but instead mutations can happen within the confines of the Hox “instruction manuals” for specific organs. In fact, many organs’ developments are self-regulated. The complex network of blood vessels or nerves, for example, is not mapped out in advance. An algorithm is set in motion and the network then more or less creates itself, reacting to its environment. So, the instruction manual does NOT have to be as big and as complex as the thing it describes. And instruction such as “keep the river on your right” eliminates that need for an elaborate map.
This reminds me that yesterday Jane, who is working on the video elements of Here Lies Love, found the film that Marcos’ mistress Dovie Beams was brought to Manila to star in many years ago. We all assumed that Imelda, discovering Marcos’ affair, squashed the film shoot back in the 70s before it was even done. The film was to be a dramatization of Marcos’ supposed exploits and his affair with a Filipina resistance fighter during WWII. Heroism and romance — with the Filipina warrior gal to be played by an American B movie actress! Jane discovered on the web that a print of this film exists in Germany — or it was released in Germany in the late 80s and the print is floating around somewhere.
Here’s the network analogy:
Previously to Jane’s German discovery, on the IMDB database, only two films featuring Beams as an actress ever showed up. Now, although she never entered this new information into their database, this third film pops up as well. The web has “noticed” a new connection, a new path through the jungle, and has incorporated it into itself, where relevant. No one did anything; the web did it by itself. Or so it seems.
So, it seems that the Hox genes allow for a more and more complex organism than the number of genes should be able generate by themselves. Previously it was thought that complex organisms like us should have many many more genes than simple life forms — and that evolution happened when these new genes gradually got added to the sequence by accident. But it now seems that the difference in the number of genes between lower life forms and us is nowhere near as large as it “should” be. The Hox genes offer an explanation of sorts as to how this is technically possible — the series of switches and triggers are a system in which less can be made to do more. Ingenious.
The Hox gene and regular gene combination raises questions.
Isn’t it odd that, to some extent, the genes present in even the lowliest bacteria contain much of what is necessary to make vastly larger and more complex creatures? Quantitatively there is not that much less information even in lowly lifeforms. Does this mean there is a lot of redundant unused information in the genes of a simple organism? What is the “extra” information doing there? Why would any organism have stuff it doesn’t use? How could anything like that possibly evolve? Creationists probably have a ready answer here.
Darwinists claim the opposite — that this common genetic base or framework proves that we all came from the same place. That to have needed real genetic additions evolution would have happened even more slowly than it did. So, in their opinion, this system was the way it had to happen. At least in the time scale we observe. And the genius of the design is that it uses simple building blocks but makes the absolute most out of them. One can make a simple brick, or a skyscraper, but the ingredients are identical.
What that says to me then is that most life on Earth is, genetically speaking, one organism. I don’t mean this metaphorically, I mean it literally. The various shapes and forms that life takes are ways that it, the uber organism, has found to occupy every available niche — but it is the always the same genetic framework that is being propagated everywhere, more or less. Darwin would claim that a lineage exists from one primeval single celled creature to almost all the world’s bacteria, sloths, ants and people. There may be other primeval things that offer radically different genetic frameworks, but this one genetic model has prevailed, and did so well that it pretty much took over the planet. (I wonder if some viruses are the seeds of alternate genetic design possibilities, as yet unrealized?)
So, to an alien species from another galaxy, all life on earth might appear almost as one organism, vast and shape shifting. Where we see difference they would see similarity. To them it would appear as if this one organism had not only flourished, but was so spread out across the planet and that the Earth itself might be seen as one seething being — an organism (of which we are just a part) filling every available nook and cranny. A creature that even created an environment conducive to itself. Oxygen, an atmosphere, soil — all, to some extent, made by life. The One that is All has a relationship with its host rock that is symbiotic.
Went for another surfing bout yesterday. Last time was about a year ago in Perth. Mauro was the organizer, naturally. He's the most avid surfer. We had to drive south, to the bottom of the peninsula, about an hour away, where the actual sea was. Lovely beach, if a bit windy, and I could get up on the board as far as my knees and steer with them — and be hands free!
Saw llamas, parrots, kangaroos and some ibis as we drove back north.
Stopped at McLaren Vale winery area for an early dinner on the way back and fell out when I got back to the hotel.
More Aussie cuisine: • Hundreds and thousands — (also known as freckles) — Tiny candy sprinkles.
• Spiders — ice cream in a soda.
• Capsicum — red or yellow peppers (not the hot ones.)
Here are some local election posters — Keep those bastards honest, Kate!:
Nice piece in 3 Quarks Daily on Trapped In The Closet. I’m jealous. It’s a lovely musing that begins with observations of this surprising pop phenomena and segues into thoughts about how our brains organize our thoughts and how we tell stories — with some words I’ve never heard before. “…if it's true that it all comes down to syntax, then you could also say that human thought can be divided into two basic categories, paratactic and hypotactic. They are the two most elemental ways of putting thought together.”
Ganda cooked over 100 dumplings for everyone last night in her room after the show. Dana’s mom dropped off cupcakes that spelled “Here Lies Love”.
I went by the museum and took some pictures of their lovely dioramas — but was stopped for using a tripod. But I managed to get a few off before I had to put it away.
Tonight is the last show…until when?
Giant animals that used to live in Australia:
In Pleistocene times, giant "megafauna" inhabited Australia. These animals mysteriously disappeared in Australia about 15,000 years ago, including: • The great rhinoceros-like Diprotodon, the giant kangaroo standing 3 metres (10 feet) high
• A giant marsupial wombat
• Megalania, a goanna 6 metres (12 feet) long
• Quinkana, a land crocodile 3 metres long
• Wonambi, a python 7 metres long
• The flightless birds, Genyornis (giant emu) and Dromornis, which matched the great Moa in size
Here they are seen in a kind of Antipodean garden of paradise.
Aboriginal stories which have been recorded throughout Australia indicate clearly that the animals were a part of the environment of early man on this continent, remembered with both fear and awe for generations.
The oral tradition goes back that far…15, 000 years! It makes written history seem — well, not worth the papyrus it’s written on.
Tonight’s show was the last one here. It was probably the best played one we’ve done. Really beginning to lock and rock on many tunes. Kind of sad to be putting the performances on hiatus for a while, but we’ll see. Got lots to think about — how the narrative can be transmitted without my talking bits — which are fun but kill the momentum, etc. etc.
Had a pot luck late lunch in Graham’s room…almost everyone brought food or cooked food in the hotel kitchenettes and we had loads of leftovers that we ate after the show.
Here to meet with the McSweeney’s folks about our long-discussed plan to do a book of the “tree” drawings. As often happens, in two separate meetings we got sorted what had been languishing for at least a year, with various e-mails going back and forth. It’s going to be called Arboretum, appropriately, and will be simple looking, though making things look simple and straightforward is never as easy as it seems.
826 Valencia was buzzing — there were writing classes in progress, people milling about the pirate supply store up front and the tiny back office that amazingly manages Believer, McSweeney’s and now Wholphin (the DVD magazine) was filled with activity and the desks were overflowing.
This bunch has good ideas — their comments and suggestions are spot on — we plan on the book hitting stores and other outlets Aug–Sept this year.
It was raining, but the next day the weather cleared up and this city sparkled with that crystalline Northern California light that makes everything pop out with hard edges. The folding bikes came in handy, though due to the X-mas plane traffic Continental charged for overweight coming here and a surprise “bike charge” ($80!) returning. This has never ever happened to me before. I think the X-mas spirit vaccine didn’t take on the airline check-in folks — they’re probably totally overworked this season. (The “bike charge” must have been meant for people who don’t have folding bikes; the airlines sometimes add a charge for wrapping a whole bike in cardboard, understandably. But these were in suitcases, so the rule was inappropriately applied. Ahem.)
There’s lot to see between meetings — Robert Adams’ sad but chaotic and beautiful photos of clear-cutting and Kiki Smith’s retrospective at SF MoMA and two lovely pieces by British artist Cornelia Parker at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. One piece was made of the remains of a church struck by lighting, the other of a church burned by arson.
Here’s a picture:
And a short interview: BF: Obviously with Cold Dark Matter: The Exploded View, you actually blew up a building which was probably scarier for everybody but you. What was the motivation for that?
CP: I had done the piece with the steamroller-Thirty Pieces of Silver-and the piece with the train running over coins — Matter and What it Means. I was thinking of different ways of killing something off. I think the explosion was another clichéd cartoon death. At the time I was living in a house that was due to be knocked down for a motorway in a few months time, but it kept getting postponed for another six months and so on for almost ten years. I think because of living for such a long time with this constant threat of demolition that is where the steamroller and explosion ideas came from. But it wasn't a home I blew up; it was just a garden shed, a surrogate. It's another British institution, the garden shed.
BF: It feels more like J.G. Ballard than T.S. Eliot somehow, doesn't it? It has more of that kind of wit.
CP: I think it came from all kinds of places. It's a modern condition: the threat of bomb scares, and the fear it symbolizes. From seeing explosions on the news and all the time in films you sort of think you know what they are, but really your firsthand knowledge of it is very limited. I realized I'd never walked through the detritus of a bombed-out building.
BF: It's almost like you believe things are animated. Or that they're potentially animated. That they're sitting there still but if you do something to them then they're going to be animated.
CP: I like the life/death resurrection bit, which is very Catholic, something dies, but it's resurrected in another form.
Then there are the restaurants. Admittedly a foodie thing to do — but this seems to be the place that has become a center for food tourism — the produce is so fresh and it’s served in mostly casual unpretentious settings and mixed in imaginative combinations — it’s a gut-busting, wallet-thinning kind of place for a visitor. The Slanted Door, Delphina, Foreign Cinema, Luna Park, Blue Plate, San Juan Taqueria, El Farolito Taqueria, Blowfish Sushi, Greens, Zuni and Liberty Café. Most of these are in or near the Mission district, which was convenient to the hotel and to 826 Valencia, but there are many many more. Every one a winner. Not always cheap — for being in a sometimes-funky neighborhood some of these mission joints have uptown gourmet prices, but the food quality and relaxed vibes are better than many fussy uptown hoity-toity places.
Saturday is a day off so we take a bike ride with Dave Eggers in the Marin headlands. Load the bikes onto a MetroMuni bus, all of which have bike racks up front, and head across the bridge. After a little rain it turns into one of those gorgeous days that are such clichés to describe, so I won’t. There are bike trails all over the headlands and around western Marin, much of which has been left as National Forest, so there are hawks and vultures and mountain lions and seals.
With the brisk air and the mist it reminded me of the bleak but beautiful Scottish highlands, though the rain drizzles less often here.
Dream: Jerusalem Mobile
…a dream at night of a woman with very short salt and pepper hair whom I meet and we chat briefly in a field as we walk together…then we part…but I obsessively must see her again…I end up in Jerusalem, where I need to be according to some itinerary, and where I hope to find her…but at the border where I am detained a fire breaks out in one of the buildings where we’re being questioned…along with the crowd of Hasidic and other men (noticeably more relaxed and friendly than their NY counterparts) I rush out of the burning room, down some outdoor stairs, we’re all jostled and smooshed, and ominously I hear a crunch. I am wearing a yarmulke. I rush out, in the lead, through the immigration gate, followed by the others. Smoke and flames billow behind, I am clutching my (unstamped) passport…the guard waves me and rest quickly through…we pour into the streets.
I reach for my mobile to call this woman, only to find it has been crushed, and as I try to hold its pieces together to find her number it slowly crumbles and nasty chemicals leak onto my hands, Chinese characters appear briefly on the screen…all I want is the last number I dialed, which was hers, but the phone is disintegrating in my hands. I imagine I will lose the love of my life. A feeling of desperation.
I save the SIM chip and some other parts and determine that maybe if I buy a new phone and insert my memory chip then I will be able to call her, as I have her number in there — and she lives here.
…
Had dinner with another ex-Talking Head, Jerry Harrison and his wife Carol, who are just back from the massive Consumer Electronics show in Vegas. Jerry won a whole bunch of awards for his and ET’s surround sound mixes of the Talking Heads re-releases, so he’s suddenly a tech expert in that area as well as being a successful record producer. He therefore gets invited to these kinds of confabs and we discussed the news reports about the IT companies jostling for positions in the upcoming convergence of TV with the Internet.
Some reports imply the creation of a two-tiered internet — one fast enough for TV streaming and the other like what we have. Naturally the high speed one would be proprietary — you’d have to pay to get on in — so the Internet would only be partly free, and just as Apple used to offer free viewing of music videos but now charges, little by little the corporations will find ways to lock up and charge for the world wide web.
Jerry says there are lots of fiber optic cables laid down that are unused, or not used to anywhere near their capacity. And that the dot com crash hurt the backers of this infrastructure more than it did anyone else, as they never even got their stuff truly up and running. Now might be the second chance.
Last night I watched a part of a nature documentary (The Trials Of Life) that featured leaf-cutter ants. Their behavior is, to me, pretty bizarre. They carry the huge leaf bits that they have gnawed off for considerable distances, then clean them and take them into their nest, where smaller ants take the bits into the larder. The leaf bits are inoculated with a specific mold, allowed to ferment. And the spore balls are what is eaten. The leaves themselves are inedible.
Anyway, the ant specialization was the impressive part. The littlest ants, members of the same colony, are the size of grains of sand — they never ever leave the underground area tunnels. Neither, of course, does the queen, who in this case is as big as a mouse! Other ants’ sole job is to keep her clean. Others’ sole job is to catch the eggs when they ooze out of her backside and to gently take them to the nursery:
Soldier ants with huge jaws protect the colony, biting any intruder on the surface, locking their jaws and hanging on even if their bodies are separated from their heads. As with all ants, each one’s function and body and will in life is determined by what they are fed as grubs — their makeup and job is then fixed, and cannot ever be changed.
Then after watching the documentary I had the following dream:
I’m in a place with some business people. Sort of a furnished apartment, seventies style carpet and sofa. Big picture window. Unknown to my host, or at least unknown to him during our previous encounter, some of his visitors — a group who mysteriously keep to themselves and seem very single-minded — have invented a kind of “dry water”.
This is apparently a sensitive subject and a big secret, and though I can’t describe what it is, it is obviously something very special. I somehow get wind of its existence, or suss it out somehow. I tell my host of my discovery, though he doesn’t believe me. Ah, but he believes me now, now that the true nature of the visitors is becoming apparent.
These visitors also have with them some docile humanoids. Also businesslike in appearance. Given a command, these “zombies” attempt to commit suicide in sometimes preposterous ways. Awkwardly sawing at their own arms near the shoulder with a huge saw, their bodies awkwardly contorted, trying to both hold the saw and reach high up the arm. There is no blood and these serious though bizarre attempts never seem to amount to anything. But they are taken at face value and seem very serious. We are all very impressed.
For some reason this makes these compliant humanoids (they don’t speak or act on their own) feel sort of dangerous, even though we have only witnessed them attempting to harm themselves — but the message is clear.
Later, I try to sabotage the visitors by surreptitiously pulling on some sort of levers that are in the partially curtained-off bar nook of the residence(?) where we all are. The levers are near the ceiling and at first they don’t see me pulling them, one by one, as I foil their latest demonstration, but eventually they can tell that something is amiss, they look around, and they catch me — the game is up. Bad.
Is it more interesting to look at a river than a highway? (A highway with cars passing on it, I mean.) Is a colorful paint spill on a sidewalk as beautiful as a sunset?
People enjoy contemplating rivers. I bike along the Hudson almost every day. The constant motion always stays more or less the same. Is that what it is — a visual metaphor (as are many other things)? And is the headlong never-ending flow of water over rocks, around piers or by the shore, constantly changing and varying but structurally the same — is that some sort of metaphor for a bigger picture? Is that why we like it and find it so mesmerizing to look at? Is the water us? Is it life, flowing eternal but never the same?
Why shouldn’t a highway be perceived more or less the same way? The never-ending flow of cars, often fairly evenly spaced, has a similar constant variation, more or less like a river, and it remains more or less one thing, like a river. Small eddies and ripples of traffic occur, sometimes a fleet of trucks appears, like a large boat or flood of debris, but most of the time the flow of traffic is constant in its variation. So aren’t they more or less the same?
Is it a cultural prejudice? Over the millennium have we grown accustomed to gazing at rivers and viewing the works of man as impressive, but not as moving and beautiful as a river? Do we see the works of man as suspect, impure? Highways, in particular, are seen as practical devices to get us from one place to another in vehicles of one sort or another. And while some interchanges and triple-layered overpasses might be majestic and even aesthetically lovely, gazing at traffic going by an ordinary stretch is seen as the pastime of a psychopath.
Likewise, I sense there were moments in the history of fine art when painters asked themselves — why should the chosen object that I am painting be considered more interesting than the background? Objectively speaking it is all a rich colorful mosaic that is falling on our retinas, and shouldn’t I therefore give equal weight to all of it? (Here science may have had a part — leading aesthetic reasoning into a curious place.) Aren’t the curtains as interesting as the person whose portrait I am painting? Isn’t the sky as interesting as the street? Isn’t a chair as interesting as a face?
So painters like van Gogh and Cezanne pulled the background up to the foreground until they were all more or less equal. Somehow they managed to still give primacy to the sunflowers, the bowl or the fruit, but never mind.
Follow this line of reasoning and eventually you end up asking yourself questions like the one I asked myself at the beginning of this. Isn’t a Brillo box or a newspaper clipping or a can of beer therefore as beautiful and interesting as a mountain vista or a person’s face? Plus, these commonplace subjects would have the added interest of being drawn from our immediate surroundings — the new world we inhabit but traditionally prefer to ignore in the fine arts. They therefore actually are about our life, our surroundings, our man-made environment. It’s all equal. The highway becomes the river.
Truth be told, I intuitively feel that staring slack jawed at a river is indeed more enthralling and uplifting than watching cars pass — though my reasoning tells me it shouldn’t be. Here is where my reasoning has, for now anyway, reached it’s limits. I have to admit the obvious to myself — that rivers are entrancing to look at. Highways, somewhat less so. While our retinas may indeed scientifically receive a “flat” “objective” mosaic of light and color and shape, our brains filter this raw data and make of it foreground and background (it’s not just parallax that does this) and, more importantly, our brains make separate objects —some of which are more important to us than others. We “think” visually this way. It is not a matter of “naming” each object — it’s not about words or language — although metaphorically maybe that is what it is — but of perceptually managing the material, sorting it out, making a kind of visual symbolic language out of it.
Thinking in pictures, as with music, bypasses the logical filters in the brain and the emotional buttons are within easier reach.
Psycho-genetically, for example, we have evolved to be able to spot minute changes and aspects in a human (and even an animal) face. The look of a face has immediate and important implications for us — it is anything but an objective field of light and color. (Though it is always that too.) It can be life-threatening or life-changing. The features tell us if that person is a threat, if they are sexually propositioning us, cowering before us or merely sleeping. We take other clues from the surroundings, the posture and the dress — clues regarding class, sex, position, status and social group.
We find dealing with all this moving, repulsive, attractive, seductive, and beautiful.So we see a narrative, not just images. The images have meaning, potential, possible history, implication.
Technically, sight occurs in the processing of the visual stimulus, not just in the eye. The eye “sees” nothing. Only after the data has been filtered, processed, turned right side up and scrutinized, have we finally “seen” anything. Even pure color isn’t “seen” unless it is identified and compared with previous similar colors. Sight and vision take place using a confluence of organs — it is almost neither here nor there, but a result of a system, a network, not a machine.
So, in my opinion, the “objective” point of view —that all is visually equal — which inspired much of 20th century Western art — Impressionism, Cubism, Modernism, abstract expressionism — was perhaps a huge inhuman detour, going off course as a result of the vast influence of science and logic. We literally “lost the plot,” as the British like to say. We ignored our human impulses and instincts and left all narrative behind — a presumed relic of a less enlightened age.
There was and is a certain perverse pleasure in perceiving pure pixels — in ways that might be closer to objectivity. Like funhouse mirrors, hallucinogenic drugs and the skewing of perception caused by illness, the “objective” viewpoint is a nice place to visit, but maybe it’s not the place that regularly and emotionally moves us, that drives our car and gets us where we need to go.
Saw Grizzly Man, Herzog’s new documentary about Timothy Treadwell, a surfer dude who decides to live with the bears in Alaska and documented it all on video — until he and his girlfriend got eaten.
From the first scene the movie is amazing. Treadwell is a nut the likes of which Herzog has always been drawn to… a loner who sets an impossible task for himself. A person with a vision who will defy death to realize it. I recently saw another of his docs about an Englishman who decides to fly a homemade hot air balloon over the Guyana jungle. His previous attempt had ended in the death of a cameraman, but, ever determined, the loopy Brit soldiers on — and succeeds.
What’s also similar about the Brit and the surfer dude is that they both play to the camera — they’re both always “on”, playing as being someone. In the Englishman’s case he adopts the persona of a BBC presenter, loudly and simply explaining things to the invisible viewer. Treadwell in turn adopts the persona of something similar to Steve Irwin, the hyper Aussie Crocodile “Hunter”. He’s got his cool shades and bandana and he’s constantly jumping in front of his video camera, whispering to the imaginary audience, while a massive grizzly forages immediately behind him. He names them all, and is constantly telling them he loves them.
This, to Herzog, points to the true subject of the doc — the skewed view that people have of nature. Treadwell, according to one Alaskan, seemed to think the bears were like people in bear costumes. Like a child he sees them as cute, lovable and therefore if he can “be” like one of them, they will accept him, and he probably believes, love him back. He goes on about how dangerous they are, but seems to feel he, with his willingness to join them, is somehow and exception.
Herzog believes Treadwell and others idealize nature, or more likely turn to nature when civilization becomes difficult or too much to deal with. They’re escaping into a vision of nature that doesn’t exist, in his opinion. Herzog believes that nature is indifferent, cruel, violent and chaotic… and sometimes beautiful. These somewhat New Age folks seem to feel that they have some spiritual kinship and connection with animals and thus with forces of nature (at one point Treadwell summons rain)… a connection civilized people have lost.
In the end what seems like a hungry and unfamiliar bear eats Treadwell and his girlfriend, effectively making Herzog’s argument for him.
I also think the movie has another subject — the desire of some of these nutters to recreate themselves as television personalities. It doesn’t seem isolated — even the coroner in the grizzly movie seems to adopt a TV-inspired persona. He becomes a sort of nightmare version of Mr. Rogers, smiling a crooked smile and gently explaining in detail exactly how the bear dismembered Treadwell and the woman.
I wonder if there is afloat a strange notion that if one is adrift, lost, floundering in life, one can simply take on the persona of some imaginary TV personality and problem solved. You’ve found the escape hatch! It leads into the tube! (or flat screen, these days.) It also seems that the virtual world of TV is as real as the real world for these people — the “spirit world” is visible, and there are lots of channels too! Sometimes it seems that this mythical world validates the real world for many people — things are good and important depending on how much they conform to the TV reality.
From the first scene I thought I could have been watching Owen Wilson playing this guy — it was too perfect to be real. Now I think that it’s a mobius world — Treadwell is playing a character that is possibly inspired by a character Owen Wilson played in a movie, which was probably based on someone like Treadwell.
My head hurts.
Saw Rize, the David LaChapelle documentary, which has amazing footage, and the whole image of ghetto clowns furiously dancing is a beautifully insane metaphor in search of a connection. (He does begin with L.A. riot footage, implying that L.A. willfully ignores its black communities, and that this fierce dancing is partly the result.) But the doc is a bit shapeless — though the dancing was wonderfully edited, I thought — there were about 4 endings too many. Out of the clown dancing emerged a splinter group — Krumpers. And the ending should probably have been the big showdown between the Clowns and the Krumpers. It’s amazing, unifying and all that. But then would we have missed the footage of someone saying they are krumping for Christ? Maybe.
Watching nature documentaries with Malu.
The lyrebird of Australia imitates other birds — and other sounds as well. It puts on a real performance, clearing a space in the bush and then stringing all its accomplishments together in a 5-minute extravaganza, ending with, in this footage, the sounds of a camera shutter, a car alarm, loggers’ footsteps and finally the sound of the loggers’ chainsaws cutting through a tree — these last were perfect, impeccable mimicry, like recordings! “Rationality will not save us” — Robert McNamara
Kristin arranged that a primo surf photographer give some of our group surfing lessons on Manley beach. I couldn't go, I had interviews and meetings, but was jealous of those who did, as I've never been surfing in my life.
I did catch Bill Henson's retrospective at the Museum of NSW, across the park. I liked the photo collages in one room that seemed to imply some sort of tribal urbanism — groups of naked youths among foliage with the lights of a city in the background. Most of the photos are dark and moody, as is the exhibition installation — the lights are low and I think the walls are dark too, which made for a nice semi-creepy mysterioso vibe. I almost feel that the lighting and atmosphere are as important as the actual pictures... which is not a criticism.
Wildlife:
In the park as I walked back I saw the hundreds of massive bats that cling to the branches of the park's trees. Occasionally one would flex its massive wings. They swarm over the park at sunset, dispersing over the city.
Near the little park ponds were ibises — weird birds with long black beaks:
In Brisbane there was recently a "wet" — a period of rain — which resulted in an infestation of jellyfish and echidnas — a marsupial (well, related to the duckbilled platypus) that has spikes like a hedgehog.
The local dogs are also reportedly getting addicted to licking cane toads, the skins of which are poisonous, but a little taste gets a dog high. Some unfortunate dogs overdo it and end up in violent spasms, but most learn to regulate their toad poison — after a dose wears off they return for more.
Did a show in Auckland last night, our first after a sizable break. I was pretty nervous, even tough we rehearsed all afternoon. It went fine.
As I did in Australia 2 years ago I decided to get to NZ a few days before the tour started in order to do some sightseeing. Having read the guidebooks and talked to friends it was decided that in the time available a trip to the Wai-O-Tapu and Rotorua thermal area and then a drive down to Tongariro to do a hike (known as a tramp here) called the Tongariro Crossing — because it goes up one side of the mountain, skirts a crater or 2, then comes down the far side. You have to therefore arrange to be picked up on the far side, which we did. I sent out e-mails describing the trek to band & crew offering a class trip and there were a lot of takers — Jennifer (merch), George (stage), Kris (production), Tracy (violin), Ames (viola) and Graham (drums) all went for it. Leigh (violin) and Sara (cello) opted to return after the thermal area day in order to catch KD Lang’s show.
The strings arrived in Auckland after me. We went to Kelly Tarlton’s Underwater World and Antarctic Encounter in the afternoon. It’s a relatively old aquarium that lies mostly under the Auckland coast highway — the part that is really surprising is the Antarctic Sno Cat ride. It's a cheesy version of a Disney theme park ride though an indoor snowy habitat with real penguins, preceded by a sort of simulated arctic "white out" experience in which the Sno Cat on rails pushes through some car wash flaps and then goes through a revolving white lumpy tunnel (suitably disorienting but nothing like white out)… the whole ride ends in a room where a plaster seal looms at the Sno Cat and a plaster Orca with a screaming seal in its mouth rises mechanically from a pond.
The next day when the others arrived we all drove out past Hobbiton (odd hillock lick mounds dot the sheep meadows) to Rotorua where the landscape is dotted with thermal vents and bubbling mud. Even the golf course is pockmarked with holes with steam coming out. What happens if your ball goes in there?
The entire area smells like sulfur — the town, the golf course, the motel, everywhere. Driving down the highways you look over at the side of the road and there’s steam coming out of the ground.
Of the many geothermal choices we opted for the Wai O Tapu thermal wonderland, which sounds awfully cheesy again by the name, but was actually a lovely hike around hot weird lime green lakes and bubbling mud pits. Everything in the park belongs to the devil — the devil’s ink pots, the devil’s paint box, the devil’s wastebasket. The devil has the coolest stuff.
We stay at a little motel with mineral tubs on the back porch of every room. We wake up to the smell of sulfur. We were warned not to bathe with jewelry, as it would tarnish, but it didn't matter, as the very air tarnished people's silver rings and bracelets.
The next day the hiking group drove south to Tongariro, a national park with a couple of dormant volcanoes, to do the tramp. It's supposed to get colder as one reaches elevation, so we bring jackets and sweaters. And rain ponchos.
The hike is supposed to take between 6–8 hours, depending on your speed and how many breaks you take. After the first hour or so of gentle ascent through a lava flow the climb steepens. All birdsong has ceased. There aren't even any flies or bugs around. The silence is something unusual, something we rarely hear, or don’t hear. It's a long slog up a lava ridge. We pass some Dutch backpackers with collapsible walking sticks and all the pro gear who seem to be stopping every hundred meters or so to rest and light up more Marlboro Reds.
When we finally gain the top of the ridge one path splits off to climb Mt N, which doubled as Mt Doom in LotR. We can't see it... it's shrouded in clouds this morning. In fact, this whole area doubled for Mordor. We're at cloud level now. As we walk on past or into the south crater it's like we're suddenly nowhere. All around us is a lunar landscape with cloud and fog eliminating all bearings or sense of direction. We're ecstatic.
It's wonderful. Everyone is excited, jabbering, energized. After crossing this plain on nothing we climb up another ridge until we reach the rim of the red crater. More sulfur smell and more steam coming out of the ground. The very earth is warm, almost hot, to the touch. The volcano is dormant, O.K., but looking into this red smoking abyss is still pretty freaky.
From here we slide down a ridge to another plain where there are brilliant azure lakes. Of course there's steam coming out of the ground everywhere.
From there we cross a truly otherworldly valley that takes us to the far ridge that will take us down the far side of the mountain.
Down is a long slog, and it has begun to rain. We pass waterfalls, more steamy goodness and we eventually descend into a lush ferny rainforest that leads to the pickup spot. It's been 6 ½ hours. We have a meal at the hotel and a hot soak and collapse in bed.
The next morning Jennifer suggests that we stop on the way back to Auckland at Raglan Beach which is not far out of our way. It's a surfer beach and its spectacular-tree covered volcanic mountains and cliffs surround a massive wide beach where a handful of surfers and swimmers are in the water. There are no commercial vendors except a kiosk renting boards and wetsuits... and the everpresent (in this area) lifesaving club. For that matter the whole of NZ seems relatively free of commercial intrusion into its landscape — there are almost no billboards on the highways — none except the occasional safe driving advisory (To: funeral, From: driving while tired) ...this, for someone used to the U.S. onslaught of signage, is incredible. The farms, fields and pastures pass by as the road twists and turns... it's relaxing, beautiful.
An article in the local paper even proclaims New Zealand as maybe the most tolerant and progressive country on Earth. A bit self-congratulatory, maybe, but they claim the standards of living for all, including the Maori, are improving. Education, medical, standard of living, all going up. Amazing. Especially when compared to other places with indigenous and/or immigrant populations — Australia and the U.S., for example — where the native people are mostly isolated, cut off, alienated and sad. NZ proves it doesn't have to be that way— the Maori are maybe not totally integrated, and maybe don't want to be, but they are everywhere — in shops, businesses and services — at least so much more than in the U.S. or Australia.
I pick up a book by an early 20th century Anglo artist and Maori portraitist named Goldie (yup, his name is Goldie?) They are formal portraits of elders, heroes and chieftains… done in a super realistic style, featuring extreme and beautiful details of the cloaks and facial tattoos. When I saw some at the Auckland art museum they had captions that gave short paragraph histories of the paintings’ subjects — why this chieftain was important, why this woman was regarded as a hero. Sadly, this information is not on the facing pages of the catalog I got, but maybe it’s hidden in the text somewhere.
Not surprisingly his work is controversial. Some Maori are honored that their ancestors should be commemorated in this way while others find the possible marketing of their people as exotica offensive. It's an unresolvable dilemma, at least at present — maybe someday when relations are not quite as out of whack these paintings can be seen in a clearer light.
In New Zealand dog food is marketed as large liverwurst like sausages in the cooler sections of the grocery shops.
Took a lovely hike up around Rincon de la Vieja, a volcano in the north with an area on its lower slopes with bubbling mud pots and hot sulfur pools. Lots of iguanas around, too.
We decided to take a trail that let to a hot spring in the jungle — a few kilometers away according to the markers. A dip in a secluded hot spring sounded wonderful, and the day was early. But this "enchanted" forest, as they referred to it, was on a mountainside, mainly uphill, repetitive, and after a couple of hours and no sign of a hot spring we decided to turn back. The forest was indeed lovely — lots of twisted trees, some covered in palomatos vines (tree killer vines that eventually take over their host trees, which is left as a hollow center.)
Back near the boiling mud we came upon a coati crossing the trail — there was a noise in the bush and soon there were more of them, all rushing away from the source of a hooting in the forest over on the right. Soon there were at least 30 of them, surrounding but almost ignoring us, leaping out of the bush and crossing the trial. In a minute they were gone and we could see that the hooting was coming from a group of howler monkeys with white faces high up in a distant tree.
Naturally, I was curious about the music here. The Costa Rican radio played mainly stuff from surrounding areas — some good stuff — Carlos Vives, Juan Louis Guerra, and lots of dopey cumbias (well, the lyrics are dopey.) Not much local stuff. We saw a live cumbia band in Liberia’s town square on New Year's Eve and the horns were so out of tune it seemed like it had to be a prank, or some kind of biological aberration — as if they couldn't physically hear how out of tune they were. It was painful, and loud too. No one was dancing. Maybe they would later. It seemed to be more an evening to parade and be seen.
So we went off the square to eat at a restaurant which had a large video screen playing Animal Planet. The show that was on featured cheetahs and leopards making kills. The next program was about the good dog catchers in NYC — they are a division of the ASPCA — who rescue abused and abandoned pets. It was sad and a gruesome subject, and a bizarre accompaniment to a meal.
Why hasn't Costa Rica produced more of its own music, art, literature? As maybe the most stable nation in the region one wonders once again if there is any truth to the adage that creativity is born out of repression, strife and suffering. Nicaragua, to the immediate north, produced its own music — I remember a lot of Nueva Trova coming out of there, naturally enough — it being the "protest music" of that generation. Nicaragua also produced famous poets and writers, and of course was also the site of a revolution and a bloody endless war, partly funded and extended by the U.S. (Oliver North, Bush 1, Iran-Contra.)
Panama, to the immediate south, boasts Ruben Blades as a musical, and sometimes political, son. Panama was created and "run" by the U.S. as a vehicle to protect the all-important canal, a strategic waterway that had to be controlled at all costs. Repressive and corrupt regimes were installed (Noriega was ousted when he stood up to the U.S.) and the appropriate people were paid off, and the canal remains secure. Hardly a forward thinking place, though, compared to Costa Rica.
Costa Rica famously abandoned their army many years ago — adding to the funds that could be channeled to education and social services — there is, it seems to me, less abject poverty than in their neighboring countries. And the tourism is, for the most part, small-scale, reasonable. There are few if any mega beach strips such as in Vedado, Cancun or Acapulco. Tourism has permeated the country, but it's not a lot of hulking behemoth hotels, at least. There are a few exclusive resorts tucked away here and there, but they don't dominate the landscape.
So, the country is a model in the region — but what about the arts? Does there have to be suffering and pain to produce art and music? Does one personally have to experience pain to feel driven to drive it out by creative means? Isn't this such a cliché that it's laughable?
I often wonder, though, if this is true personally as well. Hope not. Do we have to be unhappy, fucked up, out of balance, to be forced to deal with our demons through creative outlets? Isn't that an old idea?
Maybe it has something to do with history and geography. There were no big Spanish colonial cities in Costa Rica, and there was no node in the slave trade here, as far as I know. So the mixing or African, European and indigenous cultures never really happened here in the way it did in, say, Cuba or the Caribbean coastal towns of Cartajena or in Salvador do Bahia. The place didn’t have the massive Mesoamerican civilizations, either — there are no pyramids, temples and cities buried in the Costa Rican jungles. Those civilizations end to the north and south of the isthmus — it is as if the land bridge between continents that is Panama and Costa Rica formed after the big cultures were established.
 Here is a frog on glass. It looks like it's been cut in half, but it's not. Those are its sucker toes — the little whitish blobs tucked under its blobby body.
Other frogs, called glass frogs in English, were tiny and semi translucent (no photo). They are so delicate that the guide said "they could be killed by a raindrop." This seems an exaggeration, but the frogs do shelter on the underside of leaves or the place where leaves join a branch, so who knows? And we think our lives are precarious.
Near Arenal Volcano there are two hot springs visible from the road. One has tour busses parked out front and a massive walled edifice. It is obviously connected with the luxury Tabacon lodge up the road. Through a gap in the wall one can see swimming pools. The other is down in a hollow and seems to be avoided by the tour groups — it's for the locals. It costs about 1/5 what the upscale one charges. We went there at night and though it doesn't have the rumored bar at the side of the hot pool we snuck in some beers. The upscale area also has a view of the volcano — and when it erupts, which it does regularly, they say one can see hot lava pouring from the summit as one relaxes with a drink.
The downscale springs are marvelously unsupervised, especially at night. The hot water cascades over little waterfalls and slippery jagged rocks — one woman slipped and really hurt herself. Further down there are rough concrete and rock artificial pools that Costa Rican families gravitate to.
Having watched the Tico dudes prove their manhood by disappearing under a waterfall of hot spring water in one area we did the same. You crouch, clamber in, grab onto some wet rocks and the waterfall goes over your head. Surprisingly you can breathe. It was like a sauna that was incredibly noisy.
Went to Costa Rica for an eco holiday (as it is referred to) with Tracy. That means a lot of hiking and some snorkeling, but not much culture. In the past I would go to places like Brasil, Cuba or Andalusia for the culture and music — but having just amassed many boxes of CDs after a year touring I suggested maybe a respite from that might be in order. In the picture below I am on one of the zip line canopy tours. It's a fun ride, not scary at all, though one doesn't really see much of the canopy, and it’s chilly and it’s very wet. It isn't called a rainforest for nothing.
[pic by Tracy Seeger]
I am looking with all my might. It's hard to see anything. It's drizzling, and to someone unaccustomed to it the forest is chaotic. We look this way and that, occasionally a weird plant or an animal or insect becomes apparent, separates itself out from the green mess, but mostly not. Most of them are so well camouflaged that it all blends together. When one thing does become apparent it's almost like a semantic distinction — the outlines of its body shape are hazy and indistinct, looking away and glancing back the thing might be once again impossible to see. Like words their outlines and meaning change from minute to minute.
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