In the past 6 days, I've used 13.3 MB. Last month I used a total of 88.747 MB
Sounds like you and I have the same bandwidth habits. I have a 200MB plan I have never come close to going over. Why would you pay for something you aren't using? Why wouldn't you reduce your data plan?
If you're allergic to the vaccines, just imagine the reaction to what vaccines protect against.
Allergies can be overcome... I used to be violently allergic to cats... oddly enough, after repeated exposure and much suffering, the allergy went away. On the otherhand, I used to be able to eat and loved shell fish and garlic... something has changed because they now make me violently ill.
Clearly a huge chunk of rock/pop is three-chord-trick blues-derivative in 4-4, but even if that's 95%, the remaining 5% is significant.
Thanks for making my point and countering your own. Can we reduce or describe classical compositions in the same manner? Probably not. Classical compositions reach a complexity that is simply not describable nor reducible the way modern pop/rock is.
I don't really want to single out Hendrix, except as an *example* of someone using more complex chordal structures than yer Bachs and Mozarts
You are deluding yourself. Hendrix's chordal structures are no different than any other blues artists' chordal structures. Blues is merely a simplification of Jazz. His structures are NOT complex by any stretch of the imagination... (root, 3rd, 5th, or root, minor 3rd, 5th... a diminshed 7th now and again... and precious little else).ÂThe man played blues guitar, maybe a some of his work could be described as fusion (Major chords using a jazz progression, rather than Major7, minor7 jazz chords). A six string guitar is a very simple instrument, compared to, say, a piano or an orchestra. The guitar is actually quite limited... because of its construction, most songs will be composed in the major keys of G, D, E, or A, or their relative minors. ÂWhere Hendrix excelled is NOT in the progressions or the chords he used... but in the discovering of original pop melodies and the characteristically live expression of his music, his performance, his pentatonic improvisation. To suggest that Hendrix's music is more complex or richer than Bach's is patently ridiculous, on its face.
And (in your followup) you don't know a single rock/pop song that's not in 4/4 you've simply not looked. *Loads* in 12/8, quite a few in 3/4. Rock songs in 5/4 are rare, but they do exist (easiest example: "Money" by Pink Floyd).
12/8? I don't think so. Perhaps I exaggerated a bit... but a counter-example doesn't make your point. So the majority is 4/4, with a minimum of songs in 3/4, and 5/4. And that's it. 3 signatures. But my point is made once you agreed that the vast majority is 4/4. Being that there are some counter-examples of pop songs in the other two signatures does not support the argument that modern pop/rock is richer or more musically complex than classical.Â
Further, your infatuation with Radiohead likely has more to do with production than composition... Personally, I feel I can reduce Radiohead to its core: what makes Radiohead original is the drummer. And even moreso... the drummers obsession with constantly banging the cymbals. Take away Radiohead's drummer, and you no longer have a stadium band, but a lounge act. Most don't realize that in modern pop/rock music, you don't need a good singer, or a technically superior guitarist to get national. But if your drummer (and bassist, as part of the rhythm section) sucks, you're going no where... ever. Radiohead has a fine rhythm section, and a producer that has no fear of high end frequencies. From my perspective, IMHO, Radiohead's "sound" is merely the evolution or resurgence of the popularity of the "sound" of Liverpool/Manchester movements, like Oasis and Blur... and further, those horsemen of the apocolypse, the destroyers of the natural evolution of popular music in the Western world... of course I am refering to those motherless, godless sons of bitches, The Beatles. Without the Beatles, there is no Stone Roses, Mighty Mighty Lemondrops, Oasis, Blur, Verve, nor Radiohead.
Some rock and hip-hop is vastly more rhythmically, emotionally and tonally sophisticated than any of the popular Bach, Mozart, Handel, Beethoven era works. The post-Kid-A Radiohead albums would have many people scurrying back to The Magic Flute for something less emotionally and technically challenging. Jimi Hendrix throws more sophisticated chords into a single song than you'll hear in the whole of Don Giovanni.
Clearly, you haven't been listening closely enough. Of the entire catalog of rock/pop, close to 90% of it is in the Major keys of G, D, E, or A (pretty much in that order) and 100% uses progressions based on fifths, and exclusively with either ionian modes or a pentatonic scale, and rhythmically is always between 100bpm and 120bpm or multiples or derivitives of tempos in Moderato. In fact, I believe it is quite possible to reduce every single rock/pop song since to either one of David Bowie's offerings or that of Creedence Clearwater Revival. Thus, not more sophisticated, complex nor muscially richer than the classical compositions. Just try reducing Beethoven's works to that of Mozart's, or Mozart's to Bach's... certainly related, but not reducible.
btw, Hendrix is merely an exceptional blues guitar player. The Blues technically is reducable to one of two modes of Jazz, thus Jazz will be richer and more sophisticated than Blues, and you mention no Jazz artists.
And to suggest Kid Rock is a composer... is absurd. He's an entertainer and a businessman, recently a philanthropist... but I have serious doubts he will even achieve any footnote in history (no offense, Kid... you are loved).
Maybe I have a dirty mind, but when I watched cable/broadcast TV, every single advertisement that has a child in I found could be considered soft pornography. I find it particularly obvious and offensive when children are used in the "Got Milk?" campaign. Child pornography, in a soft form (no nudity) is really mainstream in the US right now... and I'm not sure who is to blame... ad executives, directors, parents... I just don't know.
I'm sure there are going to be others that disagree that can't see it. But its there... it absolutely is everywhere... and I would expect it is also in most programming that has child actors. I suppose if it isn't explicit, then its perfectly fine with censors because many will not even notice. But I imagine these images, that are seemingly innocuously depicting children being children, stuffing something into their mouths, are like pinups for pedophiles.
Suffice to say, I grew tired of getting angry at every commercial, and removed my TV last year. Ironically enough, using tpb to watch programs I want to see actually forces less (no) soft child porn into my bleeding eyes.
Hey networks and advertisers, I'm talking to you: Stop pimping out images of children depicting adult choreography. No one wants to see it.
Just FYI... Apple never fired Steve Jobs nor was he asked to leave, nor did the power at the time there want him to leave Apple. He was reorganized to an area of reponsibility where he couldn't do as much damage to the company... what Steve perceived this as, personal insult, caused him to leave. Also, Hell, whether it exists or not, is a proper name and should be capitalized.
The "hard labour" thing is true but it's not like they're smashing rocks in chain gangs - the prison I'm near they build and repair boats.
Do not for a second underestimate the wretched misery of boat construction and repair. If you only knew of the forbidden rock smashing chain gang fantasies of those pitiful sons of bitches...
To be absolutely, brutally honest, I feel silly believing anything these days. But I appreciate our time together. You know I've been trolling, and you've left me hooks and inspired me and let me take the alleged high road of moral superiority... sometimes an entertaining vantage... and someday maybe I can return the favor. My appetite for this is also satisfied, so I genuinely thank you and wish you luck, and now return to my native lurking layer. Long live/.
And even when Tolkien was creating his own languages, one can see that they do not vary typologically to any great extent.
Sure they did. There's the simple rune replacement of the Hobbit, leading to the more advanced dwarvish rune language in LotR. His cirth alphabet was pretty easy for me to pick up, but his elvish alphabets though confounding to me, are very beautiful. The Quenya and Feanorian styles he invented are like looking at the art of calligraphy, and I could never quite grasp the vocabulary and grammar that used them. He developed a history for the languages he created, and you can see the evolution of those languages (even though that is fiction our minds create for consistency, Tolkien didn't spell out the languages evolution).
Besides the languages he created, Tolkien was academically knowledgeable about the Old English, Middle English, Ancient Gaelic, the old Norse languages, and some ancient Germanic languages. And he knew modern languages as well: Finnish, Flemish, German, and other Germanic languages. Beyond that, Tolkien, although admitedly gallophobic, could also speak and read French. I am unaware if he had any interest in the other Romantic languages, Italian, Spanish, etc, or Oriental languages, but I'm pretty sure he knew Latin, Greek, Sanscrit and Aramaic... but the point is he certainly was not merely concerned with the only the ancient language of the texts he studied and taught. Tolkien was a true polyglot, and likely could learn a new language unknown to him in a day. He indeed was also a linguist, though not formally. The man knew language. that much is clear.
Well, I would argue that Tolkien's contribution to "literature" was to put the epic-scale world-creation fantasy genre onto the map.
I like a good argument. I would argue Homer did that already, and whomever wrote Gilgamesh and Beowulf.
I would also argue that he contributed nothing more than that. I, personally, hated his writing style. As others have said--dry, and poor story telling.
Except that he did contribute a bit more. The world he created isn't in a vacuum, but is allegorical in several ways, (WWII, Christianity, others). Also, I think, even if his sentences were rambling, the story is built within our imaginations. If you think Tolkien is a poor story teller, I think its possible you may have an imaginiation deficit.
(Terrible analogy time). The LotR is like a coconut. You have to labor through the tough outer husk to get to the meat and milk inside, which only becomes wonderful once consumed.
My landlord provided service through Comcast until recently...because Comcast cut off our service. I have been working on setting up a wireless connection to the nearby university campus (I work there, so that helps), at which point my landlord agree to cut the rent in exchange for my use of that connection (as it turns out, this is a hard thing to do -- I am working on an agreement with some neighbors to put a repeater on their roof).
First of all, your narrative is attrocious. You must work at Yale or something. But the salient details here are that you no longer have access to comcast at home... but if you can stretch your employeers network, for some unknown reason, your landlord will cut you a break on rent. Why? What would it matter to your landlord if you provided yourself access to the internet, and it had nothing to do with him? Obviously, your landlord isn't just handing out breaks on rent. You intend to give him something for the break on rent. Hmm... I wonder what it could be? Perhaps... unauthorized access to the university network? For him and all his tenants? Also, it matters not if all the other tenants are students and employees of the university. Check your terms of use carefully and you will see you alone have your access, and you can not share that access... period, regardless of anothers right to the network, they do not have a right to the network through your access.
I really do not see much point...
Nice backpeddling. I believe the trouble is not that I didn't bother to read your posts... but that you did not bother to think about whether you should do what you are planning. You see free cookies and you want to eats them and share them with anyone that wants them... you do not care who cookies belong to or what cookies cost is to those that produced them... you just see what you want, and rationalize your criminal, psychological egoist behavior.
But you will be rudely welcomed to this world, because here there are no free cookies, and there is no free lunch. Its pay to play.
I am the plastic Lorax, I speak for the plastic trees. I speak for the plastic trees, for the plastic trees have no plastic tongues, And I'm asking you, sir, at the plastic top of my plastic lungs -- What's that plastic THING you've made out of my plastic Truffula tuft?
You remind me of the parable of Colombus going into a bar and being given grief for discovering new lands. "Anyone could have done that... its obvious" say the patrons. And Colombus then proceeds to challenge anyone there to stand an egg on end. The patrons try as they may, the egg always rolls to its side and never stands straight. "It's impossible" they say. "Not impossible!" says Colombus, as he smashes the bottom of the egg to force it to stand on end, "merely not obvious." And then, of course, the patrons say "well, anyone could have done that." And Colombus responds "but no one did." (I probably messed this up... I can't tell a story to save my life... slashdot, please correct as necessary, kthx)
You are clearly intending to take something of value, something that is not free, something that costs actual money, that doesn't belong to you for your own personal gain
Something I already have access to and for which my access is not restricted by location or time. ÂThere is nothing in any agreement or law that says I have to be physically on university property to use their wireless connection.
I guarantee that your granted access does not extend to your landlord and his other tenants.
Theft
Theft of what? ÂI already have access to the university wireless network and I am allowed to use it whenever I want. How is using it from my house theft?
Are you being intentionally daft? We're not discussing you legally using the access you have a right to, we're discussing your leveraging that access for financial gain by bartering that access with your landlord against breaks on rent. Your landlord has no right to access the network, nor do the other tenants. And you have no right to trade access to the network for a break on rent. This is clearly theft. Moreso, there are laws against providing access to any network to those that have no legitimate access. In essance, its the same thing as the cable pirates: one person pays for cable access, and hooks up all his neighbors to his cable for free. Its stealing, whether you live in a fascist state or a communist one or any idealogy in between. But the difference is, the extra bandwidth you will allow your neighbors to use will actually cost the university money. Bandwidth isn't free.
Now... consider that every IT staffer is doing the same thing as you. Doesn't work.
What gave you the idea that I am an IT staffer?
Why would it be a problem if other people did this? I really want to know -- what would be wrong with people connecting to a network they are free to connect to at any time, if they happen to do so from their house? I really want to hear your logic begin this statement -- why would it be a problem if the IT staff were connecting from their own homes?
Ah, you are being intentionally daft. This is not the argument. The argument is not "people that are allowed access are allowed access." The argument is that you intend to take your access, and share your access with untold, unaccounted others that may or may not have legitimate access to the network. Your landlord certainly has no claim to the network.
stop trying to leverage your employer's resources for your own personal gain.
Right, I should not use resources that I am entitled to use.
Are you thick? YOU are entitled to use the resource. You are entitled to the resource... you are NOT entitled to lease, sell or trade the resource however twisted your fallicious rationalizations are.
ÂÂMaybe you do not understand this, but I am under the same network usage agreement as the thousands of people who live on this campus and use the network as their primary Internet connection. ÂEmployees of this university routinely log on to banks' websites, social network sites, youtube, and a variety of other not-work-related systems using the school's connection -- nobody is breaking any rules by doing so.
Â
Ah, so you wish to continue with this newly introduced strawman fallacy. First you say you want to share the access you have with others that clearly have no right to access, and you support this argument by saying lots of people have access, so why shouldn't you give access to those that have no right to access the network? Your logic is nonexistent.
Moreover, there are plenty of university employees who use university resources for their hobbies. ÂMost of t
And the Sillmarillion is almost unreadable the first time.
The first chapter is insane... the music of creation... a cool idea, movements, countermovements, melody, harmony, cacophany... and I think it is probably Tolkien's best prose. Beyond that, the wheels sort of come off the beauty of the prose of the first chapter in exchange for the story he is retelling.
He was most certain not an expert on how "the language" worked
I'd have to strongly disagree with you there, and stand with the academic experts on the subject. Tolkien most certainly was not only an expert on how "the language" worked, he is arguably the greatest expert on how all languages work. Forget his day job, the man was really a philologist.
He was a historical linguist. That doesn't necessarily make him good at accessible writing, just like someone who studies music theory doesn't necessarily write popular music.
Right, but what Tolkien's mastery of philology allowed him to do that you nearly never ever see in any other author's work is not only create entire new alphabets and languages that never existed before, but play on the meanings of words and names, allowing for a massive amount of interpretability. His work truly boggles the mind once you begin to see that he must have intended it... and considering the density of it, I can forgive the sometimes boxy clumsiness of his rambling descriptions.
The Nobel judges were rank amateur hacks in comparision
Probably true. But English wasn't Tolkien's favorite language. He preferred Finnish. Perhaps he should have written LotR in Finnish rather than English, and the beauty of the language itself would have given him the edge to win the Nobel.
The whole series is definitely what I would call epic, much more than Tolkien IMHO.
Herbert and Tolkien do seem to draw a lot of comparisons. Personally I think Herbert was better at prose, but the Dune saga doesn't have nearly the same amount of interpretability. Dune is a great adaptation of a messiah story. Tolkien's work is far richer (again, interpretation-wise, not stylistically).
The Silmarillion was written as a mythological history for England
Have you ever stopped to think how weird it would be if Tolkien had tried to pull a L Ron Hubbard Scientology move and turn the LOTR into a "real religion"?
I stopped to think about it, and it was weird, let me tell you.
Not sure I agree with the GP's claim, however, if you are not aware that Tolkien was devoutly Catholic, you should be. In its simplest, most basic metaphorical interpretation, LotR has always clearly been Christian allegory. Ain't THAT a kick in the pants? LotR is a real religion: Christianity! And further than this, researchers know Tolkien borrowed and adapted a lot of Finnish mythology (like Gandalf). And we know mythology is really just old religion. So, bang... you were right twice and thought you were just weird.
And you found the other Nobel Price winners much more readable;-) ?
Ever read Camus? Even in the worst possible translations from the French I find his works to be filled with incredibly beautiful prose. Every one of the man's sentences is a masterpiece. And Camus was a little upset at winning the Nobel, as he saw it as a lifetime achievement award, and he was still young when he received it (ok, well... middleyoungish, 44, and was killed 2 years later in a car crash).
Tolkien's work of course is quite wonderful from the big picture vantage point. He created an entire world (though borrowed much from Finnish mythology), and a world of allegory and metaphor that has such depth to its texture, the interpretations are manifold, unlike Camus who was a very focused and disciplined writer. However, at the molecular level, so to speak, Tolkien is sort of clumbsy with his prose. A few of his poems do stand out as folky perfection, such as the One Ring poem, and the Silmarillion is quite lovely, but, again, its in the broad strokes and metaphorical interpretation of major themes where Tolkien really excelled. You kind of have to live a life or two before you can fully appreciate Tolkien's genius... but even considering this, I'd have to agree with the assessment of low quality prose. Regradless, Tolkien is God.
at which point my landlord agree to cut the rent in exchange for my use of that connection
You are clearly intending to take something of value, something that is not free, something that costs actual money, that doesn't belong to you for your own personal gain. Am I correct in assuming you have no intention of compensating your employer for this? And if your employer asked for compensation, you'd just not do it?
Theft (that is, taking something that isn't yours and not paying for it) is illegal, and, yes, immoral.
Let me make it chrystal clear to you. IF you believe you have this right, then what makes you different from every other IT staffer? So take it to the universal, if it is right for you, then it is right for EVERYONE. Now... consider that every IT staffer is doing the same thing as you. Doesn't work. It only works FOR YOU. This is called psychological egoism and its really not all that far from sociopathic behavior.
I'd have fired you for even asking. Do your damn job, and stop trying to leverage your employer's resources for your own personal gain.
Slashdot Mirror
In the past 6 days, I've used 13.3 MB. Last month I used a total of 88.747 MB
Sounds like you and I have the same bandwidth habits. I have a 200MB plan I have never come close to going over. Why would you pay for something you aren't using? Why wouldn't you reduce your data plan?
If you're allergic to the vaccines, just imagine the reaction to what vaccines protect against.
Allergies can be overcome... I used to be violently allergic to cats... oddly enough, after repeated exposure and much suffering, the allergy went away. On the otherhand, I used to be able to eat and loved shell fish and garlic... something has changed because they now make me violently ill.
Clearly a huge chunk of rock/pop is three-chord-trick blues-derivative in 4-4, but even if that's 95%, the remaining 5% is significant.
Thanks for making my point and countering your own. Can we reduce or describe classical compositions in the same manner? Probably not. Classical compositions reach a complexity that is simply not describable nor reducible the way modern pop/rock is.
I don't really want to single out Hendrix, except as an *example* of someone using more complex chordal structures than yer Bachs and Mozarts
You are deluding yourself. Hendrix's chordal structures are no different than any other blues artists' chordal structures. Blues is merely a simplification of Jazz. His structures are NOT complex by any stretch of the imagination... (root, 3rd, 5th, or root, minor 3rd, 5th... a diminshed 7th now and again... and precious little else).ÂThe man played blues guitar, maybe a some of his work could be described as fusion (Major chords using a jazz progression, rather than Major7, minor7 jazz chords). A six string guitar is a very simple instrument, compared to, say, a piano or an orchestra. The guitar is actually quite limited... because of its construction, most songs will be composed in the major keys of G, D, E, or A, or their relative minors. ÂWhere Hendrix excelled is NOT in the progressions or the chords he used... but in the discovering of original pop melodies and the characteristically live expression of his music, his performance, his pentatonic improvisation. To suggest that Hendrix's music is more complex or richer than Bach's is patently ridiculous, on its face.
And (in your followup) you don't know a single rock/pop song that's not in 4/4 you've simply not looked. *Loads* in 12/8, quite a few in 3/4. Rock songs in 5/4 are rare, but they do exist (easiest example: "Money" by Pink Floyd).
12/8? I don't think so. Perhaps I exaggerated a bit... but a counter-example doesn't make your point. So the majority is 4/4, with a minimum of songs in 3/4, and 5/4. And that's it. 3 signatures. But my point is made once you agreed that the vast majority is 4/4. Being that there are some counter-examples of pop songs in the other two signatures does not support the argument that modern pop/rock is richer or more musically complex than classical.Â
Further, your infatuation with Radiohead likely has more to do with production than composition... Personally, I feel I can reduce Radiohead to its core: what makes Radiohead original is the drummer. And even moreso... the drummers obsession with constantly banging the cymbals. Take away Radiohead's drummer, and you no longer have a stadium band, but a lounge act. Most don't realize that in modern pop/rock music, you don't need a good singer, or a technically superior guitarist to get national. But if your drummer (and bassist, as part of the rhythm section) sucks, you're going no where... ever. Radiohead has a fine rhythm section, and a producer that has no fear of high end frequencies. From my perspective, IMHO, Radiohead's "sound" is merely the evolution or resurgence of the popularity of the "sound" of Liverpool/Manchester movements, like Oasis and Blur... and further, those horsemen of the apocolypse, the destroyers of the natural evolution of popular music in the Western world... of course I am refering to those motherless, godless sons of bitches, The Beatles. Without the Beatles, there is no Stone Roses, Mighty Mighty Lemondrops, Oasis, Blur, Verve, nor Radiohead.
I forgot to mention signature... I don't know of any rock/pop song that isn't 4 beats per measure (4/4).
Some rock and hip-hop is vastly more rhythmically, emotionally and tonally sophisticated than any of the popular Bach, Mozart, Handel, Beethoven era works. The post-Kid-A Radiohead albums would have many people scurrying back to The Magic Flute for something less emotionally and technically challenging. Jimi Hendrix throws more sophisticated chords into a single song than you'll hear in the whole of Don Giovanni.
Clearly, you haven't been listening closely enough. Of the entire catalog of rock/pop, close to 90% of it is in the Major keys of G, D, E, or A (pretty much in that order) and 100% uses progressions based on fifths, and exclusively with either ionian modes or a pentatonic scale, and rhythmically is always between 100bpm and 120bpm or multiples or derivitives of tempos in Moderato. In fact, I believe it is quite possible to reduce every single rock/pop song since to either one of David Bowie's offerings or that of Creedence Clearwater Revival. Thus, not more sophisticated, complex nor muscially richer than the classical compositions. Just try reducing Beethoven's works to that of Mozart's, or Mozart's to Bach's... certainly related, but not reducible.
btw, Hendrix is merely an exceptional blues guitar player. The Blues technically is reducable to one of two modes of Jazz, thus Jazz will be richer and more sophisticated than Blues, and you mention no Jazz artists.
And to suggest Kid Rock is a composer... is absurd. He's an entertainer and a businessman, recently a philanthropist... but I have serious doubts he will even achieve any footnote in history (no offense, Kid... you are loved).
Maybe I have a dirty mind, but when I watched cable/broadcast TV, every single advertisement that has a child in I found could be considered soft pornography. I find it particularly obvious and offensive when children are used in the "Got Milk?" campaign. Child pornography, in a soft form (no nudity) is really mainstream in the US right now... and I'm not sure who is to blame... ad executives, directors, parents... I just don't know.
I'm sure there are going to be others that disagree that can't see it. But its there... it absolutely is everywhere... and I would expect it is also in most programming that has child actors. I suppose if it isn't explicit, then its perfectly fine with censors because many will not even notice. But I imagine these images, that are seemingly innocuously depicting children being children, stuffing something into their mouths, are like pinups for pedophiles.
Suffice to say, I grew tired of getting angry at every commercial, and removed my TV last year. Ironically enough, using tpb to watch programs I want to see actually forces less (no) soft child porn into my bleeding eyes.
Hey networks and advertisers, I'm talking to you: Stop pimping out images of children depicting adult choreography. No one wants to see it.
Why do you think they fired him from Apple?
Just FYI... Apple never fired Steve Jobs nor was he asked to leave, nor did the power at the time there want him to leave Apple. He was reorganized to an area of reponsibility where he couldn't do as much damage to the company... what Steve perceived this as, personal insult, caused him to leave. Also, Hell, whether it exists or not, is a proper name and should be capitalized.
therefore is squarely aimed at people that heard about FreeBSD but have never tried it
(minor) pedant rant:
... an empty set.
Everyone who has ever loaded a web page has tried FreeBSD.
Everyone who has ever heard about FreeBSD has loaded a web page.
ergo
This distribution is squarely aimed at
The "hard labour" thing is true but it's not like they're smashing rocks in chain gangs - the prison I'm near they build and repair boats.
Do not for a second underestimate the wretched misery of boat construction and repair. If you only knew of the forbidden rock smashing chain gang fantasies of those pitiful sons of bitches...
To be absolutely, brutally honest, I feel silly believing anything these days. But I appreciate our time together. You know I've been trolling, and you've left me hooks and inspired me and let me take the alleged high road of moral superiority... sometimes an entertaining vantage... and someday maybe I can return the favor. My appetite for this is also satisfied, so I genuinely thank you and wish you luck, and now return to my native lurking layer. Long live /.
Oblig.
Well they tell you: never hit a man with a closed fist. But it is, on occasion, hilarious.
And even when Tolkien was creating his own languages, one can see that they do not vary typologically to any great extent.
Sure they did. There's the simple rune replacement of the Hobbit, leading to the more advanced dwarvish rune language in LotR. His cirth alphabet was pretty easy for me to pick up, but his elvish alphabets though confounding to me, are very beautiful. The Quenya and Feanorian styles he invented are like looking at the art of calligraphy, and I could never quite grasp the vocabulary and grammar that used them. He developed a history for the languages he created, and you can see the evolution of those languages (even though that is fiction our minds create for consistency, Tolkien didn't spell out the languages evolution).
Besides the languages he created, Tolkien was academically knowledgeable about the Old English, Middle English, Ancient Gaelic, the old Norse languages, and some ancient Germanic languages. And he knew modern languages as well: Finnish, Flemish, German, and other Germanic languages. Beyond that, Tolkien, although admitedly gallophobic, could also speak and read French. I am unaware if he had any interest in the other Romantic languages, Italian, Spanish, etc, or Oriental languages, but I'm pretty sure he knew Latin, Greek, Sanscrit and Aramaic... but the point is he certainly was not merely concerned with the only the ancient language of the texts he studied and taught. Tolkien was a true polyglot, and likely could learn a new language unknown to him in a day. He indeed was also a linguist, though not formally. The man knew language. that much is clear.
Well, I would argue that Tolkien's contribution to "literature" was to put the epic-scale world-creation fantasy genre onto the map.
I like a good argument. I would argue Homer did that already, and whomever wrote Gilgamesh and Beowulf.
I would also argue that he contributed nothing more than that. I, personally, hated his writing style. As others have said--dry, and poor story telling.
Except that he did contribute a bit more. The world he created isn't in a vacuum, but is allegorical in several ways, (WWII, Christianity, others). Also, I think, even if his sentences were rambling, the story is built within our imaginations. If you think Tolkien is a poor story teller, I think its possible you may have an imaginiation deficit.
(Terrible analogy time). The LotR is like a coconut. You have to labor through the tough outer husk to get to the meat and milk inside, which only becomes wonderful once consumed.
Really? Where did I say that?
right here:
My landlord provided service through Comcast until recently...because Comcast cut off our service. I have been working on setting up a wireless connection to the nearby university campus (I work there, so that helps), at which point my landlord agree to cut the rent in exchange for my use of that connection (as it turns out, this is a hard thing to do -- I am working on an agreement with some neighbors to put a repeater on their roof).
First of all, your narrative is attrocious. You must work at Yale or something. But the salient details here are that you no longer have access to comcast at home... but if you can stretch your employeers network, for some unknown reason, your landlord will cut you a break on rent. Why? What would it matter to your landlord if you provided yourself access to the internet, and it had nothing to do with him? Obviously, your landlord isn't just handing out breaks on rent. You intend to give him something for the break on rent. Hmm... I wonder what it could be? Perhaps... unauthorized access to the university network? For him and all his tenants? Also, it matters not if all the other tenants are students and employees of the university. Check your terms of use carefully and you will see you alone have your access, and you can not share that access... period, regardless of anothers right to the network, they do not have a right to the network through your access.
I really do not see much point...
Nice backpeddling. I believe the trouble is not that I didn't bother to read your posts... but that you did not bother to think about whether you should do what you are planning. You see free cookies and you want to eats them and share them with anyone that wants them... you do not care who cookies belong to or what cookies cost is to those that produced them... you just see what you want, and rationalize your criminal, psychological egoist behavior. But you will be rudely welcomed to this world, because here there are no free cookies, and there is no free lunch. Its pay to play.
I am the plastic Lorax, I speak for the plastic trees. I speak for the plastic trees, for the plastic trees have no plastic tongues,
And I'm asking you, sir, at the plastic top of my plastic lungs --
What's that plastic THING you've made out of my plastic Truffula tuft?
You remind me of the parable of Colombus going into a bar and being given grief for discovering new lands. "Anyone could have done that... its obvious" say the patrons. And Colombus then proceeds to challenge anyone there to stand an egg on end. The patrons try as they may, the egg always rolls to its side and never stands straight. "It's impossible" they say. "Not impossible!" says Colombus, as he smashes the bottom of the egg to force it to stand on end, "merely not obvious." And then, of course, the patrons say "well, anyone could have done that." And Colombus responds "but no one did." (I probably messed this up... I can't tell a story to save my life... slashdot, please correct as necessary, kthx)
You are clearly intending to take something of value, something that is not free, something that costs actual money, that doesn't belong to you for your own personal gain
Something I already have access to and for which my access is not restricted by location or time. ÂThere is nothing in any agreement or law that says I have to be physically on university property to use their wireless connection.
I guarantee that your granted access does not extend to your landlord and his other tenants.
Theft
Theft of what? ÂI already have access to the university wireless network and I am allowed to use it whenever I want. How is using it from my house theft?
Are you being intentionally daft? We're not discussing you legally using the access you have a right to, we're discussing your leveraging that access for financial gain by bartering that access with your landlord against breaks on rent. Your landlord has no right to access the network, nor do the other tenants. And you have no right to trade access to the network for a break on rent. This is clearly theft. Moreso, there are laws against providing access to any network to those that have no legitimate access. In essance, its the same thing as the cable pirates: one person pays for cable access, and hooks up all his neighbors to his cable for free. Its stealing, whether you live in a fascist state or a communist one or any idealogy in between. But the difference is, the extra bandwidth you will allow your neighbors to use will actually cost the university money. Bandwidth isn't free.
Now... consider that every IT staffer is doing the same thing as you. Doesn't work.
Ah, you are being intentionally daft. This is not the argument. The argument is not "people that are allowed access are allowed access." The argument is that you intend to take your access, and share your access with untold, unaccounted others that may or may not have legitimate access to the network. Your landlord certainly has no claim to the network.
stop trying to leverage your employer's resources for your own personal gain.
Right, I should not use resources that I am entitled to use.
Are you thick? YOU are entitled to use the resource. You are entitled to the resource... you are NOT entitled to lease, sell or trade the resource however twisted your fallicious rationalizations are.
ÂÂMaybe you do not understand this, but I am under the same network usage agreement as the thousands of people who live on this campus and use the network as their primary Internet connection. ÂEmployees of this university routinely log on to banks' websites, social network sites, youtube, and a variety of other not-work-related systems using the school's connection -- nobody is breaking any rules by doing so.
Â
Ah, so you wish to continue with this newly introduced strawman fallacy. First you say you want to share the access you have with others that clearly have no right to access, and you support this argument by saying lots of people have access, so why shouldn't you give access to those that have no right to access the network? Your logic is nonexistent.
Moreover, there are plenty of university employees who use university resources for their hobbies. ÂMost of t
And the Sillmarillion is almost unreadable the first time.
The first chapter is insane... the music of creation... a cool idea, movements, countermovements, melody, harmony, cacophany... and I think it is probably Tolkien's best prose. Beyond that, the wheels sort of come off the beauty of the prose of the first chapter in exchange for the story he is retelling.
He was most certain not an expert on how "the language" worked
I'd have to strongly disagree with you there, and stand with the academic experts on the subject. Tolkien most certainly was not only an expert on how "the language" worked, he is arguably the greatest expert on how all languages work. Forget his day job, the man was really a philologist.
He was a historical linguist. That doesn't necessarily make him good at accessible writing, just like someone who studies music theory doesn't necessarily write popular music.
Right, but what Tolkien's mastery of philology allowed him to do that you nearly never ever see in any other author's work is not only create entire new alphabets and languages that never existed before, but play on the meanings of words and names, allowing for a massive amount of interpretability. His work truly boggles the mind once you begin to see that he must have intended it... and considering the density of it, I can forgive the sometimes boxy clumsiness of his rambling descriptions.
The Nobel judges were rank amateur hacks in comparision
Probably true. But English wasn't Tolkien's favorite language. He preferred Finnish. Perhaps he should have written LotR in Finnish rather than English, and the beauty of the language itself would have given him the edge to win the Nobel.
The whole series is definitely what I would call epic, much more than Tolkien IMHO.
Herbert and Tolkien do seem to draw a lot of comparisons. Personally I think Herbert was better at prose, but the Dune saga doesn't have nearly the same amount of interpretability. Dune is a great adaptation of a messiah story. Tolkien's work is far richer (again, interpretation-wise, not stylistically).
The Silmarillion was written as a mythological history for England
Have you ever stopped to think how weird it would be if Tolkien had tried to pull a L Ron Hubbard Scientology move and turn the LOTR into a "real religion"?
I stopped to think about it, and it was weird, let me tell you.
Not sure I agree with the GP's claim, however, if you are not aware that Tolkien was devoutly Catholic, you should be. In its simplest, most basic metaphorical interpretation, LotR has always clearly been Christian allegory. Ain't THAT a kick in the pants? LotR is a real religion: Christianity! And further than this, researchers know Tolkien borrowed and adapted a lot of Finnish mythology (like Gandalf). And we know mythology is really just old religion. So, bang... you were right twice and thought you were just weird.
And you found the other Nobel Price winners much more readable ;-) ?
Ever read Camus? Even in the worst possible translations from the French I find his works to be filled with incredibly beautiful prose. Every one of the man's sentences is a masterpiece. And Camus was a little upset at winning the Nobel, as he saw it as a lifetime achievement award, and he was still young when he received it (ok, well... middleyoungish, 44, and was killed 2 years later in a car crash).
Tolkien's work of course is quite wonderful from the big picture vantage point. He created an entire world (though borrowed much from Finnish mythology), and a world of allegory and metaphor that has such depth to its texture, the interpretations are manifold, unlike Camus who was a very focused and disciplined writer. However, at the molecular level, so to speak, Tolkien is sort of clumbsy with his prose. A few of his poems do stand out as folky perfection, such as the One Ring poem, and the Silmarillion is quite lovely, but, again, its in the broad strokes and metaphorical interpretation of major themes where Tolkien really excelled. You kind of have to live a life or two before you can fully appreciate Tolkien's genius... but even considering this, I'd have to agree with the assessment of low quality prose. Regradless, Tolkien is God.
Bartering?
Allow me to refresh your memory:
at which point my landlord agree to cut the rent in exchange for my use of that connection
You are clearly intending to take something of value, something that is not free, something that costs actual money, that doesn't belong to you for your own personal gain. Am I correct in assuming you have no intention of compensating your employer for this? And if your employer asked for compensation, you'd just not do it?
Theft (that is, taking something that isn't yours and not paying for it) is illegal, and, yes, immoral.
Let me make it chrystal clear to you. IF you believe you have this right, then what makes you different from every other IT staffer? So take it to the universal, if it is right for you, then it is right for EVERYONE. Now... consider that every IT staffer is doing the same thing as you. Doesn't work. It only works FOR YOU. This is called psychological egoism and its really not all that far from sociopathic behavior.
I'd have fired you for even asking. Do your damn job, and stop trying to leverage your employer's resources for your own personal gain.