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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (125210)	2/28/2004 8:14:47 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

<Within this context, there are things one has a high degree of confidence in, and against which one judges the reliability of others. For example, I know a lot about art, especially modern art. Someone might know a fair amount, and have a valid opinion on the subject, and not know who Andre Derain is. However, I would be very skeptical of the competence of someone to opine on modern art who does not know who Matisse, Pollack, Duchamp, and Warhol are.> Oh, the old "You are not qualified to comment on jumping off cliffs without a parachute, the value and wisdom of Islamic Jihad, the tedium of a symphony orchestra playing some abstruse movement in D-flat major, the beauty of a sunset, bullfight or fox hunt, or the glories of the Aryan Race unless you are approved by the congnoscenti aficionados and are one of the in-crowd." It's the old priesthood syndrome. Fortunately, democracy doesn't work like that. Or, unfortunately, depending on one's point of view and what happens as a result of a democratic decision. I recall an excellent scamming of wine snob connoisseurs in France a couple of decades ago [or maybe more] whereby they were laughably duped. Which is not to deny that there are excellent wines, fascinating modern art, emotional music, thrill of a bullfight, instinctive joy in tribal victory and supremacy, and maybe even a parallel universe for jihad martyrs and cliff-jumpers - they find out by being a daring explorer; explorers have alwarys forfeited their lives in attempts to discover new worlds. But of all people, modern artistes should understand that perception is reality and all points of view are valid until tested in the cauldron of reality, which a modern art display is specifically NOT. There is no need to be one of the anointed to comment on Matisse's cans of Campbell's pumpkin soup or Warhol's pictures of the USA airforce. The modern artistes should be able to think outside Shrodinger's Box and Goedel's self-referential theorem rather than remain trapped in a world of their own perceptions. I've seen loads of modern art up close and personal and 47 bricks side by side in a row is still a fraud on the taxpayers. Here's another con, though Dave perhaps failed to understand the juxtaposition of modernity, its integration with technology and the absence of the present in cyberspace linkage of human to human and human to It.http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/living/columnists/dave_barry/7732864.htm Cricket Communications, a CDMA service provider, understood the presence of the absent well and actually used a Green Couch in their marketing - you might even have seen it. At least the taxpayer didn't have to pay for it. Even those in the know have bias, ignorance, limited perception, self-reverential tendentiousness and the old alpha male dominance hierarchy kleptocratic tendencies. They, like all of us, are stuck inside Shrodinger's Box and Goedel's Gaol, whether they know it or like it or not. The test of who is right and who is wrong is to be found in the empty couch. The future is not yet seated in the battered old seat. We can look at the empty armchair Dave gave us and ponder what will come to sit in it. The artistes looked and saw only a past [if I remember rightly]. They were looking in the wrong direction, the past instead of the future, but they will make good money if they can sell their con. But overall, you are right. Some people are much righter and more real than others. The problem is that each thinks they are grounded right there in reality, though held prisoner within their own perceptions. BTW, who the heck are Pollack and Duchamp? I'll ask Google. As for Andre Derain, he sounds like just another French guy. I notice that Matisse and Duchamp have French-sounding names too. Maybe the modern world is a modern mess in part because of the nihilistic surrealism of modern art over the last century. Mqurice PS: artcritical.com The real thing! The presence of the absence.