Re: virus: ZIP of the Mind

Eric Boyd (6ceb3@qlink.queensu.ca)
Wed, 19 Jun 1996 01:51:43 -0500


Reed Konsler wrote:

> Oh, I made up the term <shrug, grin>. I have this penchant
> for dilemmas. I could have also called it "Pygmalion's irony"
> or "Pygmalion's pyrric victory" the meaning is only shades
> different.
>
> The story of Pygmalion (a sculptor) and Galatea (his
> creation from clay...the "perfect" woman that came to
> life) is originates in Greek mythology.

Ah ha! I've read that one. Neat story, although I don't recall
actually drawing that moral from it at the time...

> The story is retold in a more modern and somewhat
> less fantastic version in George Bernard Shaw's play
> "Pygmalion".
>
> The story is retold again in the play and the
> somewhat more famous musical upon which it
> is based: "My Fair Lady"

Hmmm. I'll probably have a hard time actually finding these plays in
production. I'll try, though.

> If you always do your thinking while you are writing then your thinking
> will resemble your writing. However, if you do all your writing while
> you are thinking then your writing will resemble your thinking.
>
> So sayeth the holy McLuhan.

And I say that said statement is totally and completely meaningless.
And it's a tautology, as well. And as to holy, I think I'm going to
eliminate that paricular word from my vocabulary.

> You are misleading in your description of the process as pendular
> or cyclical in a closed way. The pattern is recursive, but in the
> extropian sense.

I just continued in the same vain as the quotation by McLuhan. But you
are right, in that no cycle is actually evident.

Having looked "extropian" up in three dictionaries and in the dictionary
of philosophy and not found it, I've had to conclude that it must be a
typo. What was it supposed to be, and what does it mean?

ERiC