To interpret literature II

We were talking about René Girard's triangle, not a proper geometric triangle but a way to view relationships in a text, invented in 1965. Originally it was to show how two individuals in their relationship to the same object, idea, or position also have a relationship between each other. It was later developed to include the type of triangles that people are most prone to think about in a book or a film, the love triangle. But the triangle is much more fundamental than that.
In my own thoughts I began to imagine what interesting forms of topology you would get if you tried to identify all the possible triangles in a text. I started to get an image of many interconnected triangles to describe all the different possible relations. For more complicated stories it would of course not be possible to confine the triangles to just two dimensions, or even three. It is apparent that I am heavily influenced by my background in science.
Our teacher was talking about the triangle and invented an example with a man, a woman and the Bible. She explained how the man's understanding and relationship to the woman was influenced by a book that divide women in two groups Madonna or whore. And the book tell the man that the Madonna is good and desirable while the whore is bad and contemptible.
Now it wasn't the time to get into a long discussion outside the topic, but in my mind I did object to her example. I was surprised that someone that studies literature would use that kind of wording. If she had said “the church” instead of “the Bible” I would have understood it better. Because it is possible to find times and places where the church has indeed interpreted the Bible in this way. It is not even difficult to find these times and places. I would have thought that someone who studies literature would know the difference between what the Bible says and how people interpret the Bible.
There are those that would say that the message in the Bible is rather the opposite. You could read the message in Bible to be that there are no grounds to divide people into groups and assign them different value.
“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.”
Galatians 3:28

To interpret literature I

Since I live in a university city I try to take a few courses now and then. Of course it helps that taking courses at a Swedish university is free. Now I am taking a course in literature with some connection to rhetoric, which is my main topic at the moment. Although I have a background in science I find it rewarding to learn what people do in other areas of academia. It is not always easy to understand what people are talking about before you actually dive into a subject.
When I was studying philosophy I got a very good advice from a teacher. “Just because you don't understand what someone is saying doesn't mean that they are stupid and what they say is nonsense. “ One very important point that he didn't mention is of course that to not understand someone does not exclude the possibility that they are stupid and talk nothing but nonsense. What is important is to give people the benefit of a doubt. In debates you often see how people interpret their opposition's opinion as negative as possible. But this is not the ideal in academia, here you should always extend the best possible interpretation to the text you study.
It is probably even more important for sceptics than for many others to not assume the worst reading of a text. Some sceptics appear to think that just because a text uses terms that they are unfamiliar with, a convoluted form of reasoning, or concern a topic that they consider unscientific the text must be without merit. Since sceptics often encounter texts that have all the above characteristics and that really are nonsense we may to some degree be excused, but non the less it is better to always begin with the assumption that it is your own fault if you don't understand how brilliant a text is.
Now this tirade about strange complicated texts that still may have some kind of understandable message and even value, is not a critique of the course I am taking. Although some theories in the study of literature strike me to be more opinion than tools to reach understanding. This is just the background to my simple observation during our most recent class in the course.

Flattering surprise

I did not expect this but I found out this morning via a friend on facebook that I have a fan-club there. It is not a big fan club but non the less 82 people have decided to click “like'” so far. Since I have no idea who has made the page I guess that it is my unofficial fan-club.
To me fan-clubs are something that happen to other people but I can't help to be a little flattered although I guess the people who have joined are not too serious.

Opinions and knowledge

This is a reflection concerning a course I am taking at the moment between me and a fellow student and another friend. Sorry those of you that don't read Swedish, but I think you are better of not knowing the state of Swedish academia.

Jag: Du har rätt det var kursen jag tänkte på även om jag försöker låta bli. :)

Vän 1: Ledsen att jag påminde dig Per Johan Råsmark ;)

Vän 2: Vad läser ni för kurs?

Vän 1: Genusperspektiv vid textanalys

Jag: Det är inte en otrevlig kurs men det är väldigt mycket tyckande och väldigt lite vetande.

Vän 1: Det kan vara väldigt snurrigt också. Ibland vet man inte om de själva vet vad de försöker säga - och ibland förstår inte ens lärarna det heller (har läst lite i ämnet tidigare).

Vän 2: Låter kreativt, lite på lösan sand så där... ;)

An unexpected phone call

For some time now I have been one of the contributors to a sceptical column in the local newspaper Uppsala Nya Tidning. Yesterday I got a call from one of the readers who just read what I had written about dowsing. He said that he appreciated what I had written and it is of course nice to have people telling you that they like what you do. But it was unexpected to get a phone call.
We had an interesting conversation about his experiences living next door to a man who worked as a dowser for about 60 years and had a very different technique. Instead of using a rod or a pendulum this man used only his arms and sometimes he could feel the “force” or at least something, so strongly that it could knock him over.
It would have been interesting to learn more about this dowser and what he did but unfortunately he was already dead (The worked as a dowser for 60 years should have been a clue.) Apart from the unorthodox method the dowser appeared to behave as many other in the business. He didn't charge for his services but gladly accepted what people gave him. It also seemed as he was specialised on finding water.

Chines whispers

A friend of mine is in China at the moment and after my travels in that country I have an opinion about what to see and what to do. An opinion that of course is not based on a scientifically sufficient material just on my own experiences.
Putting together a few ideas in a mail to my friend I found the web page of one of the best guest houses for backpackers that I have ever been to. Not just one of the best in China but one of the best I been to anywhere. After I found the web page I also found on the page some interesting pictures (3) in the guest house's album. It is nice to see that one makes an impression. I mostly did card magic at that time and not that much mind reading. In addition it was easier to communicate using the cards than the tricks of the mentalist.
If you ever find yourself in Chengdu you should stay at Mix's guest house. Mix is absolutely one of the nicest people I have ever met and his friendliness has become the foundation of his guest house. This is not a Chinese whisper but first hand information about my opinion.

Museidagen 2011 (Museum day 2011)

One aspect of public performances is that you find yourself in the situation that people have come to see you perform. This is actually different from what most magicians and mentalists are used to these days. If you are the entertainment for a private party or the dinner talker at a cooperate event people have not come to see you, they came for some other reason.
I am pleased to say that a number of families apparently came to medicinhistoriska museet to see me today. (For more information of the show see previous blog post.) It was a very mixed audience with regard to age and education and that made it difficult to find a good level. But my first priority was the children and I was told that I found a very good balance in my presentation.
As is often the case in a city the size of Uppsala I ran into some people I know, and also one person that knew me. He came up to me after the performance to talk and apparently we had taken the same course in “vågrörelse lära” (wave theory). But this was a very long time ago, some time in the late 90's. I must say that I am surprised that he remembered me. I must have made quite an impression even at that time.
To be fair it is quite fun to perform for a mixed audience of children and adults. Though I confess that some of the adults probably know how one or two of the effects for the children are done, and maybe some of the children know how some of the effects for the grown ups are done.

Back to work

This will not be much mentalism since the audience is supposed to be mostly children. Though I hope that they will not be too young given that the show is in a museum. But I have a little bit of everything to have something for everyone.

11-11-11

Well I guess I had to write something about this day. Although it is not in anyway different from any other day in the history of the universe. This is a day that will have numerologist selling more books and I am sure my old acquaintance Uri Geller have said a few things about today's date. He says that he sees the number 11 so often that it must have some kind of importance.
To realise that for the universe this is not a special time there are many things to consider. I will only point out three:
1 It is not 11-11-11 everywhere on Earth at the same time.
2 If we had a different base for our number system it would just be as any other day
3 The date is supposed to be based on the year Jesus was born, but no one knows for sure what year he was born, it is 0 +/- 7 years (or something like that).

But this doesn't imply that there is not some special meaning with 11-11-11. There is obviously a special meaning with today's date. Several people have decided to get married today, some even hope to give birth at this date (which with a caesarian is not impossible to plan). Meaning is something we humans ascribe to things and thus a random patch of space-time can be given all kinds of mystical meaning.
This is published in the last minutes of 11-11-11 CET (since I wanted to make sure that nothing special happened) making this the first day I publish two blog post on the same day so I guess 11-11-11 is special.
My point is that it is fine to believe that 11-11-11 is special because the belief that it is special will make it so. But this should of course be done with moderation since it is from the universe's perspective just another rotation of the Earth around its axis. But it has the good thing with it that the Swedish and Anglo-Saxon standard for writing dates for once coincide.

The Bystander effect

In psychology there is phenomenon called the Bystander effect and it concerns the likelihood for people to act in a situation or remain a bystander. (It is called the Bystander Effect because that is unfortunately what usually happens according to the science.)
Psychologist began interesting themselves for the phenomenon after a brutal murder in New York that nobody seemed to want to prevent or get involved with, the story was somewhat exaggerated in its narration but that is a completely different thing. The details of the murder and what the Bystander effect is can be found on Wikipedia.

The reason I bring this up is that today I didn't see the Bystander effect in action. Just entering one of the shopping malls here in Uppsala (more like a Czech pasáž than an American mall) I saw a woman lying on the floor and three people kneeling beside her. Actually as I came in the three people got to the woman so I guess she must have fainted just prior to me entering the mall. Just after I noticed the situation I took out my phone but noticed that a girl coming from the other direction also had her out and was apparently dialling 112. We made eye contact and communicated that she was calling for an ambulance so I put my phone away. The people kneeling by the woman checked her breathing and pulse and laid her on her side. A person passing by stopped and asked if we had everything under control, and if we knew the woman. The passer by turned out to be a doctor and not the useless type that this city is full of. A moment later an other woman stopped by and she was a nurse. A shop assistant from a nearby shop came out with a phone to call 112.

It could not have taken more than a minute, a minute and a half, from the woman fainted for all of this to happen. It was not much like the Bystander effect, rather I got the impression that it was a well oiled machinery. The people closest to the one in need stepped in and did what they could do, not passing her by or waiting for someone else to do something. People around assessed the situation to see if they could be of any assistance. The doctor and the nurse of course doing more since they had the training. If anything like that ever happens to me I hope that I can get help just as quickly.

I left after the nurse had arrived. Since everything seemed to be under control there was no reason for me to stay there.

Is it all a scam?

Leaving my local supermarket today I met two gentleman with shoulder bags and clipboards, one of them started to talk to me and since I passed him by (or the other man) a couple of weeks ago I felt I could at least stop and listen to what he had to say.
The mission was to collect money and the cause was democracy and human rights in Iran. A fair and noble goal for any organisation. The two men looked like they could be from Iran though looks can be deceiving so it is hard to say. They were against capital punishment and I was quickly shown pictures of executions. They were also for an Iranian Christian pastor that was threaten with death if he didn't convert to Islam, and they had a picture of him as well.
After this I was shown some official looking pieces of paper that I was told was some kind of permit from the police in Stockholm and one paper from the police in Uppsala. Exactly what the papers were saying I don't know because I was told to write my name, phone number and address on a list and tick a box for if I wanted to give 300, 500, 800, or 1000 Swedish crowns. The reason for wanting my signature he said was that they were a “90-konto” organisation.

For people that are not familiar with a “90-konto” it is a bank account that begin with the number 90. They are only used by organisations that can prove that the money they collect really goes to what they claim. The rules are quite strict and not every organisation is allowed a 90-konto. The idea is that the giver can be sure that they are not being scammed when they put money into an account of this type.

Now I don't know if political organisations that work for democracy in Iran are allowed a 90-konto, but I do know that usually the reason an organisation has 90-konto is because they want people to use that account not to use as a form of persuasion when they collect money in the streets. I also never heard of other organisations that need your signature when they do collect money in the streets. Even worse than that, I have never heard of an organisation that need a permit from the police to walk around and try to collect money.

Being a sceptic and having all these questions I started to ask a few other questions to try to figure out what it was about. The behaviour of the man was not one that inspired me to trust him. It was apparent that he was more concerned with getting me to sign the list and give him money than to talk to me. At least that was the impression I got, and when I wanted to put a few crowns in his collection box (one that he did show me on several occasions but didn't act like he wanted me to put anything in) he quickly terminated our conversation and didn't even let me put all the coins I had into the box.

The behaviour was suspicious but I did a search for approved organisations that do have a 90-konto and I did find the organisation that he claimed to represent:
http://www.iran-demokrati.se/
So at least that part was not a scam.