User talk:The Mad Echidna

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[edit] Just starting for the sake of it

Hi, it's just the owner of the page and I just thought I'd write nothing to see the result, and get the page off the ground, so you know I'm here. The Mad Echidna 03:07, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

==just seeing what happens if you don't close the equals signs for headings.

[edit] A welcome from Sputnik

Hi, The Mad Echidna, Welcome to Wikipedia!

- СПУТНИК^{ССС Р} 23:55, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Desolation Row-like lyrics

Hi Mad Echidna - I'm putting this here, because I don't want to bore everyone on the help desk with it, but I though you might like to see it. Several years ago, when I was working as a songwriter, I went on a binge of listening to Highway 61 Revisited and ended up writing a song which was...erm...shall we say strongly influenced by Desolation Row. Thought the lyrics might be useful to you:

Smog blows down the alleys, nature is in chains, yet weeds begin to show between the stones;

And knights in armour terrorize while wise men rack their brains in tarmac dirtied prisons made of bone.

As street musicians sabotage, local politicians frown - they're trying to put a brave face on their Nevertown

Dave and Leonora, dying in the sun, living in the shadow of their dreams;

Arriving twenty-second in a field of twenty-one where everything's exactly as it seems.

The new Messiah's leaving to become a circus clown - it's an ordinary day here in our Nevertown

The planters of our forests, Tolkien and Brunel, argue about compass needle bearings.

One too tired to question, one too weak to tell, both of them beyond the point of caring.

As a slice of life descends upon our heroes like a crown another dawn is breaking out of Nevertown.

As the walls begin to darken and the sky begins to fall in this second-hand suburban no-man's-land,

An amphitheatre wedding is beyond the reach of all — And anyway, no-one would understand.

The moon cries down accompanied by the baying of a hound; they're weeping for lost innocence in Nevertown.

And all the women stay indoors, and all the men wear brown; they're waiting for a second chance from Nevertown.

You keep your own life simple, you trim your golden hair, your teeth show white as tombstones when you smile.

I try to keep my distance between who knows what or where, but I haven't seen you trying for a while.

Yet you ask me questions: Why do fishes sometimes drown? Where did they go, so long ago, the old men of renown?

Still you ask for reasons why the rain keeps falling down —

Go take another look out at our Nevertown; go take another look out at our Nevertown.

Grutness...wha? 01:54, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Glad you like it - and the photos! Most of those are my own work - the handful that aren't I've noted as such. Grutness...wha? 02:20, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] question at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Science

Hi - I suspect our edits collided at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Science (I deleted the copy of your question that wasn't signed, I think you intended to also delete it but it was already gone - so your question is now gone). In any event, I think you might be interested in pitch correction. -- Rick Block (talk) 00:19, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The one and only Clio

Just me, Anastasia! Clio the Muse 03:14, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Orwell

I will think about this for a bit, digging around in my mole-like fashion, before getting back to you, Echidna, with a definitive 'position.'. I do not think there is much point in continuing the discussion on the Humanities page itself, as the thread in question will shortly tip into the archives. Have you read The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius? If not, I think you will find it highly revealing, particularly part III, The English Revolution. So here, before I depart, is one more quote, taken from the said essay: "The history of the past seven years has made it perfectly clear that Communism has no chance in western Europe...in English-speaking countries they [the Communists] never had a serious footing. The creed they were spreading could appeal only to a rather rare type of person, found chiefly in the middle-class intelligentsia, the type who has ceased to love his country..." There are revolutions and there are English revolutions. Finally, in relation to the point made by Lambiam, Echidna, my only comment is that all speculations are equal but some are more equal than others. I feel sure you will understand my meaning! Clio the Muse 00:04, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

[added point: to those following the debate, you only need to read paragraph 2 (not to be confused with 1b.)] The Mad Echidna 19:07, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

1a. Clio, I'm as sharp as a bowling ball. But my attempt at an interpretation: all speculation is equal, some by artifice is designed to look better, and fool a higher class of intellectual, but is only worse rubbish because of it. I was absolutely floored by this at first. The previous person's comment was openly insulting, and you are, apparently, directing it at me, and magnifying it. I don't know how exactly you intended your comment, but I shall assume that you found displaying your wit to be irresistible, which I can sympathise with. You are indeed very clever with words. However, you would have seen that both JackofOz and myself responded to the previous person's comment, to neutralise it, because we (I in particular) found it quite unpleasant. By not taking this into account, you allowed yourself to effectively repeat his comment, and hence, mimic that attitude. It took me a long while to absorb the shock, and come to a more positive (and, I hope, enlightened) conclusion.

1b. Now I shall illustrate something about the difference between our intellectual lives. I am always in awe of your knowledge and overall talent. Cambridge is an elite institution, and although I don't know if it is elitist in attracting students the way it is (I believe) with its professors, I doubt any of your lecturers could approach your ability. All of this at such a young age, and so highly precocious in style too. I am rather different. In intellectual and social maturity, I was rather a late bloomer. I also stray far outside my talents. I am highly gifted at mathematics, having won prizes in a nationwide tertiary maths competition, but I often prefer the humanities. This is because of a deep need to investigate my own soul, and find answers to the darkness within. Great literature can make me shake and tremble, especially when the emotional impact is strong (I broke down reading Middlemarch, and came close even in public). Thus my questions at the Ref. Desk are always quirky, because they are the product of burning desire, and a hunger for understanding. Read Aurelius' Meditations, 2:17 (Staniforth translation only please!) for my personal creed. Also 4:1 and 4:3, par. 4. Remember in this world that darkness is the form of the infinite, while the light endures for but a moment. Such are our differences. You are in your native habitat, only now unfolding your wings, and the light will shine as you soar. I am an intellectual protoplasm, in a sea without a name, in a territory claimed by no one. The darkness and the light create the shadows, wherein lie the secrets of the soul.

2. My questions may be quirky, but I try to be careful with my answers. In particular, I do not enjoy speculating. I used to (in my 20s), until I became possessed by the vacuousness of my own mind, and sought refuge elsewhere. I think you completely misread my speculation in the Orwell discussion. It was of a certain nature, for a specific purpose only. I have two gurus, Clio the Muse and "The Book", and if they are not in concordance, I have to put the pieces together, detective style. This is all I was doing. My facts of interest were your contributions, and the quote (Orwell's own) from the introduction to Animal Farm: " 'I meant the moral to be that revolutions only effect a radical improvement when the masses are alert and know how to chuck out their leaders as soon as the latter have done their job.' " I cannot reject either your quotes, or this one. Consequently, the facts need to be assembled into a picture. My speculation had this purpose, only to show that it could be done. If not, one side or the other has to be rejected, clearly the book in this case, but that requires that the writer completely misquoted him, or took him badly out of context. Your reply did not acknowledge this, I feel. The exact content of my speculation is far less important, although I would ask it to be taken seriously in this one case. I clearly dropped any reference to communism, and left only the claim that Orwell once supported revolutions. The speculation that his fulminations were the product of disillusionment was the only natural possibility that I could think of which was consistent with the data. I heard a very experienced, long-term anarchist on the radio saying that he had never heard anyone so bitter about the left as those who had once belonged to it. I have been there myself, and I recognised my own bitterness in Orwell's quotes. Conservatives have a very different arsenal, although I don't know what (lifelong) democratic socialists would typically say against revolutions. My understanding is they would usually be milder than Orwell, which my limited experience suggests to me. I believe if you want to correct this, you will have to take the premise on board that Orwell either made the comment I quoted, or that there is a compelling reason for doubting it. I can add more: there is a footnote on that page, in front of me now: "In a letter to Yvonne Davet, Orwell described Animal Farm as his novel 'contre Stalin'. He suggested as a title for the French translation, 'Union des republiques socialistes animales' - URSA (the BEAR). For the French edition Napoleon was renamed Cesar." I have given the whole footnote for completeness, but I only want to emphasise the first sentence. As for your further comments on my talk page, thank you very much as always, but they amount to the same thing: they show his opinions about Communism, and possibly orthodox creeds, but not quite revolutions.

3. This is my intellectual style, and sadly few seem to share it. You have done a lot, and in spite of your comment about speculation, you seem to have taken me very seriously on this, and engaged as a fellow thinker. You could have dismissed me with your evidence, but you have offered to read more. Even so, you didn't seem to directly acknowledge the potential strength of the evidence I presented, and didn't try to assimilate it. Your evidence carries vastly more weight, but this is something I never trust. I always try to assemble everything, and try all corners in a debate. Sometimes I fail, but when they are presented to me clearly, I take them on board. This is how I found my religion, so I can't change it. I was a Roman Catholic, but I asked myself "If heaven is a state of perfect union with God, how could temptation exist there? If not, what happened to Lucifer?" I had no answer, and my belief in the Church was far greater than my confidence in my logic, but I tried to reconcile the two, with various fudges the result. When I met Baha'is, they told me they had a God but no devil, so I didn't take long to see they were right. I have just come back rather buoyant from a Baha'i meeting, and I sat there thinking about how I wouldn't have met these people but for the "completeness" approach. I try to keep open to all ideas, and reconcile disparate threads of truth, which preserves a sense of reverence and awe, whilst allowing my mind to grow.

4. I thank you deeply for your time here, and in general. I am stunned at how much you put in. I used to beg in my mind for the day when there would be academics on the internet who we could debate with, and ask any question of, to see how it's really done. I used to wish there was a journal that printed the best student essays from around the country/ world, so we could see a reasonable standard for our level of experience (you can't learn to imitate the books, because student essays can't go into the same detail). Now I have been given the extraordinary gift of something much better. Someone answering simpler questions than those in essays, but doing so the way a real expert would. That is something you can learn from. Learn to write a paragraph, and you can learn to write great essays. Study how Clio answers a simple(ish) question on the reference desk, and you can learn how to construct a longer argument as well. You can't go the other way, from above down, from more to less complex. So I hang out for any answers you give. You told me one of my answers to a philosophy question was good (and in full view of everyone else :) ) so I took more to philosophy, as my presumed "strength". You mentioned Tolstoy's opinions on Shakespeare once, so I went looking for this, and lo - found Orwell's interesting rebuttal. You integrate your knowledge of literature and history, so you give me pointers there as well, and a meaningful perspective to connect with. In short, this is like awakening from a deep slumber. None of us on the ref. desk can hold a candle to you, but I offer you this, the dim rushlight of my gratitude. So that was two hours or more of thinking and writing (I'm a little tardy, I know), so I only hope you actually read this. Regards, The Mad Echidna 17:43, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

[addendum: fixed indentation] The Mad Echidna 17:46, 23 June 2007 (UTC) [addendum 2: fixed indentation of addendum 1 :)] The Mad Echidna 17:52, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Oh, my dear, dear, Echidna, I owe you a huge apology. I have upset you, and I would not knowingly do that for anything. I seem to have expressed myself badly. The words 'all speculations are equal but some are more equal than others' (an ironic modification of Orwell's 'all animals are equal but some are more equal than others') was in no sense directed at anything you wrote, all of which was interesting, to the point and very well informed. It was, rather, in support of Lambiam's observation about another contribution, which, to my mind, was justified critique, rather than merely unpleasant. To make a statement with no foundation whatsoever opens one to a critical rebuttal, and sometimes these can be quite hard. There is, in my experience, a tendency for some people-and I name no names-to make contributions to the Humanities Desk, even when they have nothing positive and meaningful to say. There is a history here that I would rather not go into. Just let me repeat that at no point have you written anything that I have not found both intelligent and worthwhile.

Orwell, I have to confess, has long occupied an important position in my intellectual pantheon. When in sixth form at school, I chose him as the particular object of study for my English class, and wrote a dissertation, to which I gave the rather grand title of The Development of Despair in the Work of George Orwell. It was part literary critique, part philosophical analysis and part political exploration. It was clear to me at a very early stage that Orwell belonged to a very English radical tradition, a thread going through people like William Morris, Charles Dickens, William Godwin, all the way back to John Lilburne. There was little, in other words, that would suggest any sympathy whatsoever for the abstractions of Marxism and Continental thinking in general. Yes, there is a concept of revolution in his work, but it is a very English concept, one the rests far more on a revaluation of cultural attitudes than naked economic forces. Please do read the essay I have highlighted above, which stands as good as any as Orwell's desideratum and political testament. It is there, among other things, you will find this declaration:

A Socialist movement which can swing the mass of the people behind it, drive the pro-Fascists out of positions of control, wipe out the grosser injustices and let the working class see that they have something to fight for, win over the middle-classes instead of antagonising them, produce a workable imperial policy instead of mixture of humbug and Utopianism, bring patriotism and intelligence into partnership-for the first time, a movement of such a kind becomes possible.

It's a revolution of popular engagement in the widest sense, a revolution of the people, not of the proletariat; a revolution based on Socialism as living practice not dead ideology; a patriotic revolution and, above all, an English revolution. It does not take much imagination to deduce what Marx, Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin would have made of it! Yes, Animal Farm, is against Stalin; but it is equally against Trotsky; against elitism and manipulation; and against Bolshevism.

I am deeply flattered by your assessment of me, Echidna, and value your good opinion above all others. I am also impressed that you have found strength in a faith without demons. My world, in contrast, is populated by all sorts of diabolical forms, both small and great! I am a fighter and a polemicist by nature, I've had to be, for all sorts of reasons. I despise fools. But once an individual has earned my respect it is never lost. I respect you, please be assured of that, even if we disagree on points of detail.

Love and best wishes from Anastasia and from Clio the Muse 23:45, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Oh dear (x10). Thanks for calming the situation down, though. I will be as brief as I can, since I feel this matter is best laid to rest as quickly as possible, but I must clear up a few points.

If a teacher were to say "All opinions are equal, but some are more equal than others," this would mean that there are still distinctions to be made, and that would have no pejorative connotations. But in this context, I could only see a more direct interpretation: the pigs set themselves up as the overlords, making themselves "more equal". In doing this, they are clearly the baddies. To apply the analogy, I needed two people to play the parts: one for the pigs and one for the other animals. As there were only two speculators in the thread, the casting decision looked pretty easy, on the whole.

I considered something like what you actually intended, but it didn't make sense. Jack had taken care of the matter, and all I did was to thank him, and remind anyone who was forgetting it, that the rest of us were reading too. It was just a gentle reminder, so I wouldn't have expected you to bring it up. In my religion, we can't talk about people behind their backs, so I'm often not alert to when it's happening, especially when it's done with subtlety. I have frequently, in my innocence, not registered when someone is being attacked, and adopted the wrong interpretation, as witness the current situation.

As for crackpot contributions, they do not seem much of a problem anymore. Since your arrival, they have dried up; they used to be quite common. Together with the likes of Marco Polo, and of course others too numerous to name, you have all created an intellectual culture that favours richness, and intellectual purism. It respects the elite, without harming the general. There is no need for anything more. Intelligent contributions create a vibrant, thinking community, and the dispute resolution procedures deal with troublemakers. They can still make a nuisance of themselves, but they can only go so far.

Regarding the Orwell thing, I won't continue it, but you may wish to read the preface to the Ukranian edition of Animal Farm, especially the bit where he describes his attitude to the Soviet Regime. It may be nothing new, though.

This has been quite uncomfortable. I am considering deleting this whole thread if the admins will allow it, so please leave a quick message that you have read this, and state any objections to deletion. I will trust anyone else reading this never to bring it up, since this would not be terribly pleasant (which is incidentally the strongest word I ever use in a dispute, bar a few rare exceptions). Salutations, and hope to see you at the ref. desk. The Mad Echidna 23:04, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Go ahead and do as you think proper, Echidna; nobody will object if you decide to drop the whole thing into the 'memory hole.' I admire your principles and will take the trouble to find out more about your religion, of which, I freely confess, I know very little. By instinct and experience I am skilled in the techniques of invective, often to the point of outright destruction, which is not always a good thing. I would be delighted if you would consider me to be one of your Wiki friends. That would give me so much simple pleasure. ♥ Clio the Muse 23:26, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Halle Berry

I appreciate your response about verb tense concerning Halle Berry's Oscar win at the Help Page for Language. I responded to your post on that page. Would you be so kind as to respond to my question posed to you there? Thanks a lot. (JosephASpadaro 00:31, 22 June 2007 (UTC))

[edit] Thread Deletion

OK I see what you're talking about. I am going to have to defer to the administrators here; I assume you want something more thorough than just selecting and deleting the text - you want it gone from the history? That'll probably need an admin, and they'll know what to do, in any case. I actually know very little about the technical side of the 'pedia; you'll be better off looking at the Admin noticeboard. And while we're here, I'd just like to express my admiration and awe for Clio's historical knowledge and the breadth of her expertise. I try and help out at the reference desks, and it never fails to amaze me (but it long stopped surprising me) to see a post answered with a long, fully detailed answer, complete with more sources than some Wikip. articles. I trust that you can satisfactorily settle this issue. Thanks! СПУТНИК^{CCC P} 02:36, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] correction for stuff on marriage law question

Hi Joseph. Thanks for getting back on the legal/ marriage question thread on the humanities desk. I wanted to add something to the thread, but somehow the connection stuffed up, and now it's gone into the archives.

I checked with my dad, a lawyer, that night about that stuff, and one bit was quite wrong. When two laws are in conflict, the newer one doesn't always get priority. If they are part of the same legal area, and enacted by the same parliament, then it frequently will, but otherwise it's a complex business. Whatever the case, I would still assume that the whole thing would take a while for the lawyers and politicians to sort out. Yes, I certainly meant the bit about suggesting you take up the law yourself in a good-natured way: legal debates hinge on tricky factual questions, but also on matters of the exact wording of a bill. So someone asking precise questions about legal and grammatical matters appears to have a lawyer gene in him somewhere. Also, I asked my dad what he thought would happen in the actual case, as per your original question, and he said he didn't know. So it's certainly tricky. Also, if you wish to reply to this post, you can leave your message here, since I've put a watch on your talk page, so I'll remember to check. The Mad Echidna 17:41, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Hello, thanks for your message. Sorry that it has taken me so long to reply. First, thanks to both you and your lawyer-Dad for the input on my original question. These types of hypothetical situations do indeed intrigue me. And it is only a matter of time before a real live case tests them out. I agree - they can all lead to a legal and political mess, thus needing to be sorted out. Thanks again for your input and comments. Also -- by the way -- I saw that quote / poem at the top of your user page. It seems awfully familiar to me, but I cannot place it. Where is that from? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 18:59, 12 July 2007 (UTC))

Hi again, thanks for the interest in my poem. I hope it isn't too familiar - I don't want to get done for plagiarism - though I suspect the familiarity is just because of the simple, universal style, and the fact that it's derived from well-known material (I claim a Lewis Carroll influence in there somewhere). It was inspired by a story called "Sand and Stone", see [1]. See you round the wiki :-)

Here is the beginning of the poem.

The courtroom was all hushed,
They had all come to see the show,
To learn once more for certain,
About how such things go.

The bunyip, he was judge this time,
He banged his mighty foot,
And they brought the mad echidna in,
All clothed in chains and soot.

The prosecuting rabbit stood,
Before the gathered crowd,
And he put his best foot forward,
And he started nice and loud:

"My friends, you know for certain,
About how such things go,
When creatures show their anger
And don't write it in the snow.

"And so this mad echidna,
To his friend, the laughing clown,
Did kick him in the shins
While he was in his dressing-gown.

"That was how he took his anger out,
And let the whole thing show,
When he should have done the right thing
And just wrote it in the snow."

by The Mad Echidna 01:04, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Hi. Wow, that's a great poem. I really like it. Yes, I can definitely see the Lewis Carroll influence in there. I had thought I recognized your poem because, in hindsight, it brought to mind Lewis Carroll's "The Walrus and the Carpenter." Your poem has the same pattern / beat / tempo as the "Walrus" poem. Great job! I am also familiar with the "Sand and Stone" story, and I like that one a lot, too. Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 04:10, 24 July 2007 (UTC))