Slashdot Mirror

An algorithm is of mild interest, yet Van Gogh's Starry Night, a landscape, is far more interesting than his Starry Night Over the Rhone, a painting that includes a man and a woman walking arm-in-arm by the river.

An algorithm is of mild interest, yet Van Gogh's Starry Night, a landscape, is far more interesting than his Starry Night Over the Rhone, a painting that includes a man and a woman walking arm-in-arm by the river.

If a good is significantly rare, or the need for that good is significantly high, then the transaction cannot be described as voluntary. If the transaction is not voluntary, your reasoning falls apart.

Gimme a break. I've had my eye on an original Van Gough for years now. It is significantly rare, so by your definition my attempt to purchase it is not voluntary. After all, the cost of canvas and paint should make it less than $100. Anything more is gouging! Maybe if I stamp my feet and picket the gallery, then maybe I'll get my way. Better yet, I'll get a law passed outlawing the practice of letting the market decide the price!

Now really.. if we can't sort things into categories, what are we going to do? Hell, even Magic is science.

I think the mechanism here isn't the oversimplified, neo-Freudian "competitive edge among young men to fight for glory and gain the attention of women." That would imply that only men lose their creative edge when their priorities shift.

A broader look at the subject would show a parallel with a more modern topic: anti-depression medications. There are plenty of examples of highly creative people -- geniuses in their fields -- whose creativity would likely have been quashed if they'd had access to a good Selective Seratonin Reuptake Inhibitor. Poet Emily Dickinson and artist Vincent Van Gogh come to mind, but I'm sure there are many others.

The problem, as I see it, isn't that having a family takes something away from a would-be genius... any more than an appropriate dosage of Prozac does. What both do, ideally, is give the person a sense of contentment, a feeling that things are the way they should be.

Creativity, in the end, often requires adversity to bring it out. Remove the adversity, and the creativity (or "genius") may seem to be extinguished. But as the examples in this discussion show -- Bach, Hawking, et al -- it is possible to achieve both genius and happiness. It just doesn't happen very often.

You can't fool us, that's really one of van Gogh's sunflower paintings.

In the same line as this quote, it's interesting to note the Dutch produced such painters as Van Gogh and Rembrandt and M.C. Escher

Albeit the dutch also had plenty of wars, conflicts, and even pirates, both in the true, historical sense and in the modern sense of the word.

So, in context, were the patent laws a major factor in each countries development?

Actually, the article is more about "White House," although "Starry Night" is mentioned in passing. The original link is the correct one, of "White House."

http://www.vangoghgallery.com/painting/p_0612.htm

Since there is no reference to the actual painting in the article, an image can be found here at vangoghgallery.com.

http://www.vangoghgallery.com/painting/p_0766.htm

Scott Ruttencutter

Since there is no reference to the actual painting in the article, an image can be found here at vangoghgallery.com.

http://www.vangoghgallery.com/painting/p_0766.htm

Scott Ruttencutter

Since there is no reference to the actual painting in the article, an image can be found here at vangoghgallery.com.

http://www.vangoghgallery.com/painting/p_0766.htm

Scott Ruttencutter

For those too lazy to use google, the painting in question can be found here.