A fine conversation with Acid Horizon; thanks to all. I've been trying to formulate a question for Dr. Hart on these topics for some time, and in that conversation's wake I think I have it:
If we return to an older view of material reality still properly imbued with that richness of logos inherent in all beings – all four senses of cause and the fullness of potentiality at play, everything more “mind-like” – doesn’t the question of mind arise again, in a new way, for beings such as computers running AI? For they too will be replete with the mind-like quality of being. Does the matter of their artifice come into play in some way, such that their “intentionality” and telos would forever be dependent on that of their makers, and never truly their own? I’d love to hear any thoughts on this (from anybody).
Meanwhile I’ll offer that “Shine On You Crazy Diamond” lifts “Wish You Were Here” just one notch ahead in my book. The only Pink Floyd song that can make me weep.
No. A composite machine is not an organic unity, and materialist (cumulative) panpsychism makes no sense. The stuff of which a computer is made may participate in the mindlike structure of reality, and be a kind of "pathos." But the computer is not a thinking being.
I'm aware that your area of speciality is more the New Testament (and I recently bought the second edition of your translation), but what Old Testament translation(s) would you recommend, aside from standard translations like the NRSV? Are you aware of / have you read Robert Alter's Hebrew Bible translation, and if so, what do you think of it?
I adore the translations and notes myself (his poetry is, for the most part, very well done as well). Note that, though, if you’re not Protestant or are a high-church Anglican, the Deuterocanon isn’t really translated remarkably well anywhere - I just use the KJV or NRSV.
The podcast is Episode 4 of the "Minding Scripture" podcast from UND, by the way, for anyone interested (as I suddenly became at the mention of the existence of such a conversation). Thanks John!
Thanks for that podcast recommendation, which I've duly downloaded and will listen to in due course. In fact, the whole series looks to be well worth delving into.
Can’t wait for your Dark Side comments. I’ll have to give the album another listen all the way through. My favorite album has always been Wish You Were Here, but David Gilmour’s guitar solo on Time remains one of my favorite alongside Mother, and Comfortably Numb. Gilmour certainly had/has an innate transcendent sense of melody (for that reason, his atheism somewhat surprises me).
McCartney said in his show on Hulu that he was able to witness some of Dark Side’s recording sessions. Fitting, I suppose, since there would certainly be no Dark Side of the Moon without Sgt. Peppers and Abbey Road.
Re the Acid Horizon podcast: Many thanks to DBH and all concerned. It's a comfort that others, who know much more about such things than I do, are also afraid. Wasn't Owen Barfield, in his own way, on to the ultimate problem in Saving the Appearances? Barfield: "What the Psalmist wrote of the old idols is true no less of the idols of the twentieth century. 'They that make them are like unto them.'"
Man, if you or other readers enjoy Pink Floyd I'm sure you will enjoy much of of Porcupine Tree's discography as Steven Wilson (writer/singer/guitarist) was cut from the same musical cloth. Progressive rock is still my preferred "genre" that I tend to gravitate towards.
sadly I can't get into Pink Floyd that much anymore seeing as Roger Waters has become nothing but a spokesperson for Putin and the Russian Regime. A brilliant musician but the man has disgraced his whole name by this point
yes... and I am glad that Gilmour is calling out Waters. Waters just strikes me as one of those old school leftists who view everything through a "America and the West= bad" lens and everything opposed to them must be good
Interesting comments regarding "Dark Side of the Moon." It reminded that when I was reading your book "The Experience of God," at the beginning of chapter 3, "Being," especially your mediation on "primordial agitation," I recalled Floyd's "Comfortably Numb" from "The Wall" album. The lyric: "When I was a child /I caught a fleeting glimpse/Out of the corner of my eye/I turned to look but it was gone/I cannot put my finger on it now/The child is grown/The dream is gone." Truth, recognition, and melancholy.
Pink Floyd's durability is astounding. I began to listen 20 years ago, they carried me through fairly dark prodigal explorations into substance and other things in my teens, I never really let go after I came out the other side, and in the past decade they've remained the one band I always go back to. It happens to be the case that "Shine on Your Crazy Diamond" is my 5 y.o.'s favourite song.
I think that both Gilmour and Waters had such important contributions that albums like WYWH, DSOTM, The Wall were not going to continue to be made (The Wall is becoming eclipsed by Roger almost totally--but still produced apex PF songs like Comfortably Numb and Hey You and Run Like Hell--as was The Final Cut). I have a love-hate relationship with Animals--but "Dogs" and "Pigs on the Wing" 1+2 are true gems. "Pigs (Three Different Ones)" too, in another way.
Gilmour is, IMO, one of the most underrated male rock vocalists of the era. Momentary Lapse of Reason, and the Division Bell, are still so "Pink Floyd"y, and give a sense of what it would be like if Pink Floyd was all about "love and loss" (Gilmour's overarching motivation). Those albums lack the shock of Waters (his vocals are jarring, his themes are in your face, and for many of us, he will be forever wedded to the grotesque but inimitable art of Gerald Scarfe), which is a real loss. Moreso, they lack his poignant sense of the tragedy of war, which must be his main thematic impulse.
This is to say nothing f the Barrett drama, the early Gilmour days, or the important fact of the name of their first album (which links the legacy of Floyd, however thinly, to that whole expression of Pan-ism in folk rock of the era).
Well it really unites their early sensibilities to The Wind in the Willows. The psychedelic moment—1967, principally—was full of references to Lewis Carroll and Kenneth Grahame.
Animals is a great album all the way through. The Wall—too much Waters, not enough Gilmour. Everything after that I dislike.
Yes, it does (Wind in the Willows). I thought the outro of Time had that quintessential countryside-and-hearth sensibility (being home, by the fire, the vision of the bell across the field and magic). High Hopes (The Division Bell) had something of the same, but I guess it was more ethereal.
Have it your way re: Animals! I can't stand Sheep and that metallic voiced recitation of Ps 23 (if recollection serves); or "Psalm 23" - it was a subversion of the Psalm I think.
I have not listened to anything from Meddle except for Echoes and Seamus (love it!) in a long time. I'll listen today. I'd say The Division Bell is worth a re-visit, but you sound resolute.
I love “Sheep, “ to be honest. I can give The Division Bell another spin, but my recollection is that it contains a lot of Gilmour’s “headphones and lounger” style of chromaticism but not a lot of structure or melodic originality. Nothing comparable to “Echoes” or “Shine On, You Crazy Diamond.” I think that he and Waters and Wright really needed one another to be at their best.
Animals is probably my favorite. I don't really like anything but it & Wish anymore, but when I were a wee bairn the Floyd were my east & west. I still recall the cover of Atom Heart Mother with fondness.
Send him my regards. And warn him that he might be in danger of growing up into a somewhat melancholic poet with a hypertrophic sense of irony if he’s not careful.
Thank you, I found the interview with Acid Horizon fascinating, I knew nothing of them and so their genial interest in what you had to say, I found rather surprising.
I'm also interested in what will say relating to Dark Side of the Moon, I'm intrigued by your comment "how thoroughly that era’s popular music established its own enduring genre, but also apparently exhausted its highest potentials." I rather like Ian MacDonald's essay on the occasion of the release of the Echoes compilation album and how a reputation for psychedelic spaciness kept Pink Floyd afloat from the departure of Syd Barrett until their commercial breakthrough Dark Side of the Moon. A reputation encouraged by clever titles like "Saucerful of Secrets" but then Dark Side although it still had a certain aural dreaminess that was undercut by the deeply gloomy and depressing lyrics "Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way" etc. I felt & still do, some sense of betrayal of the expansive colourful hopefulness of the earlier psychedelic music (best embodied in Beatles Sgt Pepper) that it seemed to be the continuation of.
I don’t know about betrayal, but there’s a definite change of tone from the festive and childlike to the bitter and despairing. Waters was a brilliant lyricist in those days, and he used his gifts to cast a deep shadow over the band’s music.
Is it because you don't believe the new rules will help to mitigate the "three true outcomes" epidemic (as Theo Epstein claims), or is your hatred aesthetic/philosophical?
Both. What I do like is the return to a less lively ball. It had good effects last season, so I hope it continues. Also, as an Orioles fan, I was delighted to see the left field wall moved so far back and heightened. It led to a season with considerably more bunts, steals, and triples.
I shall wear "displaced Romantic" as a badge of pride. It was a grand way to spend a Friday evening (GMT).
There is no dark side of the moon really.
A fine conversation with Acid Horizon; thanks to all. I've been trying to formulate a question for Dr. Hart on these topics for some time, and in that conversation's wake I think I have it:
If we return to an older view of material reality still properly imbued with that richness of logos inherent in all beings – all four senses of cause and the fullness of potentiality at play, everything more “mind-like” – doesn’t the question of mind arise again, in a new way, for beings such as computers running AI? For they too will be replete with the mind-like quality of being. Does the matter of their artifice come into play in some way, such that their “intentionality” and telos would forever be dependent on that of their makers, and never truly their own? I’d love to hear any thoughts on this (from anybody).
Meanwhile I’ll offer that “Shine On You Crazy Diamond” lifts “Wish You Were Here” just one notch ahead in my book. The only Pink Floyd song that can make me weep.
No. A composite machine is not an organic unity, and materialist (cumulative) panpsychism makes no sense. The stuff of which a computer is made may participate in the mindlike structure of reality, and be a kind of "pathos." But the computer is not a thinking being.
Dr. Hart,
I'm aware that your area of speciality is more the New Testament (and I recently bought the second edition of your translation), but what Old Testament translation(s) would you recommend, aside from standard translations like the NRSV? Are you aware of / have you read Robert Alter's Hebrew Bible translation, and if so, what do you think of it?
He actually did a podcast with Dr. Alter, and he wrote a review in this collection of reviews (https://jewishreviewofbooks.com/articles/4901/robert-alters-bible-a-symposium/#, which, incidentally, I found entirely by accident).
I adore the translations and notes myself (his poetry is, for the most part, very well done as well). Note that, though, if you’re not Protestant or are a high-church Anglican, the Deuterocanon isn’t really translated remarkably well anywhere - I just use the KJV or NRSV.
The podcast is Episode 4 of the "Minding Scripture" podcast from UND, by the way, for anyone interested (as I suddenly became at the mention of the existence of such a conversation). Thanks John!
Thanks for that podcast recommendation, which I've duly downloaded and will listen to in due course. In fact, the whole series looks to be well worth delving into.
Alters translation is wonderful
Thanks for the info!
Can’t wait for your Dark Side comments. I’ll have to give the album another listen all the way through. My favorite album has always been Wish You Were Here, but David Gilmour’s guitar solo on Time remains one of my favorite alongside Mother, and Comfortably Numb. Gilmour certainly had/has an innate transcendent sense of melody (for that reason, his atheism somewhat surprises me).
McCartney said in his show on Hulu that he was able to witness some of Dark Side’s recording sessions. Fitting, I suppose, since there would certainly be no Dark Side of the Moon without Sgt. Peppers and Abbey Road.
I suspect most people give Wish You Were Here top place.
Yup.
Re the Acid Horizon podcast: Many thanks to DBH and all concerned. It's a comfort that others, who know much more about such things than I do, are also afraid. Wasn't Owen Barfield, in his own way, on to the ultimate problem in Saving the Appearances? Barfield: "What the Psalmist wrote of the old idols is true no less of the idols of the twentieth century. 'They that make them are like unto them.'"
Man, if you or other readers enjoy Pink Floyd I'm sure you will enjoy much of of Porcupine Tree's discography as Steven Wilson (writer/singer/guitarist) was cut from the same musical cloth. Progressive rock is still my preferred "genre" that I tend to gravitate towards.
sadly I can't get into Pink Floyd that much anymore seeing as Roger Waters has become nothing but a spokesperson for Putin and the Russian Regime. A brilliant musician but the man has disgraced his whole name by this point
But Gilmour and Mason are recording pro-Ukrainian songs. So…
yes... and I am glad that Gilmour is calling out Waters. Waters just strikes me as one of those old school leftists who view everything through a "America and the West= bad" lens and everything opposed to them must be good
Interesting comments regarding "Dark Side of the Moon." It reminded that when I was reading your book "The Experience of God," at the beginning of chapter 3, "Being," especially your mediation on "primordial agitation," I recalled Floyd's "Comfortably Numb" from "The Wall" album. The lyric: "When I was a child /I caught a fleeting glimpse/Out of the corner of my eye/I turned to look but it was gone/I cannot put my finger on it now/The child is grown/The dream is gone." Truth, recognition, and melancholy.
Pink Floyd's durability is astounding. I began to listen 20 years ago, they carried me through fairly dark prodigal explorations into substance and other things in my teens, I never really let go after I came out the other side, and in the past decade they've remained the one band I always go back to. It happens to be the case that "Shine on Your Crazy Diamond" is my 5 y.o.'s favourite song.
I think that both Gilmour and Waters had such important contributions that albums like WYWH, DSOTM, The Wall were not going to continue to be made (The Wall is becoming eclipsed by Roger almost totally--but still produced apex PF songs like Comfortably Numb and Hey You and Run Like Hell--as was The Final Cut). I have a love-hate relationship with Animals--but "Dogs" and "Pigs on the Wing" 1+2 are true gems. "Pigs (Three Different Ones)" too, in another way.
Gilmour is, IMO, one of the most underrated male rock vocalists of the era. Momentary Lapse of Reason, and the Division Bell, are still so "Pink Floyd"y, and give a sense of what it would be like if Pink Floyd was all about "love and loss" (Gilmour's overarching motivation). Those albums lack the shock of Waters (his vocals are jarring, his themes are in your face, and for many of us, he will be forever wedded to the grotesque but inimitable art of Gerald Scarfe), which is a real loss. Moreso, they lack his poignant sense of the tragedy of war, which must be his main thematic impulse.
This is to say nothing f the Barrett drama, the early Gilmour days, or the important fact of the name of their first album (which links the legacy of Floyd, however thinly, to that whole expression of Pan-ism in folk rock of the era).
Well it really unites their early sensibilities to The Wind in the Willows. The psychedelic moment—1967, principally—was full of references to Lewis Carroll and Kenneth Grahame.
Animals is a great album all the way through. The Wall—too much Waters, not enough Gilmour. Everything after that I dislike.
Don’t overlook Meddle.
Yes, it does (Wind in the Willows). I thought the outro of Time had that quintessential countryside-and-hearth sensibility (being home, by the fire, the vision of the bell across the field and magic). High Hopes (The Division Bell) had something of the same, but I guess it was more ethereal.
Have it your way re: Animals! I can't stand Sheep and that metallic voiced recitation of Ps 23 (if recollection serves); or "Psalm 23" - it was a subversion of the Psalm I think.
I have not listened to anything from Meddle except for Echoes and Seamus (love it!) in a long time. I'll listen today. I'd say The Division Bell is worth a re-visit, but you sound resolute.
I love “Sheep, “ to be honest. I can give The Division Bell another spin, but my recollection is that it contains a lot of Gilmour’s “headphones and lounger” style of chromaticism but not a lot of structure or melodic originality. Nothing comparable to “Echoes” or “Shine On, You Crazy Diamond.” I think that he and Waters and Wright really needed one another to be at their best.
I admit, this may be true. The music is not as good. It couldn't have been really because you're right: they were unique together, not alone.
There are a couple standout songs on the album (Division Bell), but I only know how it makes me feel.
But I reemphasize: "Dogs" is simply great. The best PF song casuals have never heard of, and an astounding display of Gilmour's vocals.
Animals is probably my favorite. I don't really like anything but it & Wish anymore, but when I were a wee bairn the Floyd were my east & west. I still recall the cover of Atom Heart Mother with fondness.
Who doesn’t love good cow photography? Those guys at Hipgnosis were geniuses.
This made me order this, to bring joy to my preteen self:
https://shop.pinkfloyd.com/product/X3CTPF1176/atom-heart-mother-cow-tshirt
Send him my regards. And warn him that he might be in danger of growing up into a somewhat melancholic poet with a hypertrophic sense of irony if he’s not careful.
He said something unprintable.
Thank you, I found the interview with Acid Horizon fascinating, I knew nothing of them and so their genial interest in what you had to say, I found rather surprising.
I'm also interested in what will say relating to Dark Side of the Moon, I'm intrigued by your comment "how thoroughly that era’s popular music established its own enduring genre, but also apparently exhausted its highest potentials." I rather like Ian MacDonald's essay on the occasion of the release of the Echoes compilation album and how a reputation for psychedelic spaciness kept Pink Floyd afloat from the departure of Syd Barrett until their commercial breakthrough Dark Side of the Moon. A reputation encouraged by clever titles like "Saucerful of Secrets" but then Dark Side although it still had a certain aural dreaminess that was undercut by the deeply gloomy and depressing lyrics "Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way" etc. I felt & still do, some sense of betrayal of the expansive colourful hopefulness of the earlier psychedelic music (best embodied in Beatles Sgt Pepper) that it seemed to be the continuation of.
I don’t know about betrayal, but there’s a definite change of tone from the festive and childlike to the bitter and despairing. Waters was a brilliant lyricist in those days, and he used his gifts to cast a deep shadow over the band’s music.
Can anyone tell me when that New York Times item that DBH mentioned was published. I couldn't quite make out the names.
Dr. Hart, what do you think of the new rule changes in the MLB?
I hate them all.
Is it because you don't believe the new rules will help to mitigate the "three true outcomes" epidemic (as Theo Epstein claims), or is your hatred aesthetic/philosophical?
Both. What I do like is the return to a less lively ball. It had good effects last season, so I hope it continues. Also, as an Orioles fan, I was delighted to see the left field wall moved so far back and heightened. It led to a season with considerably more bunts, steals, and triples.
I am of a certain age. In that genre, Wish You Were Here was my favorite. Yes annoyed me, mostly because of JA’s voice.
I lost all interest in popular music after the 1970’s, so I am eerily ignorant of almost all of it after 1979.
I had to come round to Bruckner.