Golden Goat-God’s Gateway

by in Aesthetics, Album Art, Art, Music, Transgression... and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Although this blog stands strongly and sternly against the use of any drugs weaker than water (which is all of ’em), some interesting art has been inspired by those weaker drugs. The front cover of Bongzilla’s Gateway (2002) by Malleus Rock Art Lab is a good and skilful example. Please be aware, however, that smoking grass is more likely to induce psychosis than turn you into a golden goat-god. Especially coz artificially strengthened varieties of grass are not what Gaia intended. (dot dot dot)

Post-Performative Post-Scriptum

Yes, the horns on the album-cover are those of a bovid, not a caprid, but I like to think of the image being that of a goat-god rather than a bull-god.

Chlorokill

by in Biology, Book Reviews, Botany, Literature, Science and tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

The Day of the Triffids, John Wyndham (1951)

If you want to know the difference between talent and genius, compare The Day of the Triffids (1951) with the book that obviously inspired it: The War of the Worlds (1897). John Wyndham (1903-69) had talent; H.G. Wells (1866-1946) had genius. But Wyndham had a lot of talent, all the same. And it’s powerfully displayed in The Day of the Triffids. However, although it’s his most famous book, it isn’t his best. I’m not sure what it is. Wyndham was an uneven writer, not very good at dialogue or characterization, and although he was born decades after Wells, in some ways his books have dated more.

And maybe he was better at short stories than novels. Either way, his big ideas were almost always good and so were the titles of his novels. There’s the humanity-hating submarine race in The Kraken Awakes (1953); the mysterious telepathic alien in Chocky (1968); the persecuted telepathic mutants in The Chrysalids (1955); and the world-threatening super-children in The Midwich Cuckoos (1955). In The Day of the Triffids there are really two big ideas: walking plants and worldwide blindness. In the chronology of the book, but not the narration, the walking plants come first: they’re the triffids, three-legged, seven-feet tall and equipped with a deadly whip-sting. Once you’ve mentally pictured them, the triffids will never leave your head. I think they’re a clever, chlorophyllic adaptation of the giant three-legged Martian war-machines in War of the Worlds.

But how can the triffids get loose and wreak havoc on the human race as the Martian war-machines did? Triffids are blind and sense rather than see their targets, so they are no match for sighted humans. Obviously, then, Wyndham had to take sight away from humans to get triffids and humans battling for possession of the earth. He did it in rather contrived but still memorable fashion, recorded like this by the first-person narrator as he lies in a hospital bed with bandaged eyes after a triffid attack:

“The sky’s simply full of shooting stars,” [a nurse] said. “All bright green. They make people’s faces look frightfully ghastly. Everybody’s out there watching them, and sometimes it’s almost as light as day – only all the wrong colour. Every now and then there’s a big one so bright that it hurts to look at it. It’s a marvellous sight. They say there’s never been anything like it before. It’s a pity you can’t see it, isn’t it? (ch. 1, “The End Begins”)

In fact, it isn’t a pity: it saves his life. It’s soon apparent that the green light from the “shooting stars” has destroyed the sight of everyone who watched them. The narrator describes how he takes the bandages off his eyes and discovers that he’s one of the very few sighted people left in a blinded world: London becomes “The Groping City”, as the title of chapter 3 puts it. The blindness would have been bad enough, but the triffids now begin breaking loose from the farms on which they’re being kept. The green light of the meteor-storm, probably an optical weapon accidentally released by a military satellite, has created a world where chlorophyll is king. Triffids don’t need sight to slash and slay, so blinded humans now have a simple choice: stay in hiding or try to find food and risk being stung to death by one of the triffids invading London in search of prey.

In the second chapter, the narrator looks back to describe the origin and spread of the triffids, and how he came to receive that a sight-preserving dose of triffid-poison in his eyes. Those opening few chapters have scenes and images that have always stayed with me since I first read the book as a kid. There’s the wonder and beauty of the meteor-storm; the horror of sudden, near-universal blindness and the first spate of suicides; the strangeness and deadliness of the triffids; and so on. Here’s one of the memorable images Wyndham conjures with words:

Perhaps Umberto’s plane exploded, perhaps it just fell to pieces. Whatever it was, I am sure that when the fragments began their long, long fall towards the sea they left behind them something which looked at first like a white vapour.

It was not vapour. It was a cloud of seeds, floating, so infinitely light they were, even in the rarefied air. Millions of gossamer-slung triffid seeds, free now to drift wherever the winds of the world should take them… (ch. 2, “The Coming of the Triffids”)

The triffids have been created artificially and mysteriously behind the Iron Curtain and yield a highly valuable vegetable oil. But that raises questions that aren’t answered. Why did they need to walk? Why are they equipped with long and deadly stings? Why are they uncannily intelligent? And how do they nourish themselves once they mature and begin walking? Their tripodic roots can’t dig very deep when they’re at rest and although Wyndham describes how they pull pieces of flesh off the decaying bodies of people they’ve killed, he doesn’t describe their digestive systems.

These unanswered questions mean that The Day of the Triffids is sometimes more like magic realism than hard science fiction. Particularly when the triffids show signs of intelligence, coordination and even cunning. But none of that is apparent when the triffids begin to sprout all over the world after the seeds in that “white vapour” reach the ground. The growing triffids attract curiosity but not wonder or fear. And even when they begin walking and stinging, they seem easy to manage. Thanks to that valuable vegetable oil, they’re soon being farmed in huge numbers. Their whip-stings are deadly, of course, and if the stings are docked, triffids yield less oil. But sighted humans can kept triffids under control easily enough, despite an occasional unlucky accident and the triffids’ unsettling ability to communicate between themselves. They have a kind of intelligence even though they don’t have brains. The narrator is a botanist conducting research on triffids and suffers one of the unlucky accidents, when a triffid lashes at the wire-mesh mask covering his face and a few drops from the poison-sacs reach his eyes.

So he’s in hospital when the meteor-storm lights up skies all around the world for a couple of days. He and a few other fortunates can’t watch the storm for one reason or another, so they keep their sight and have to fight the triffids to have a future. Wyndham describes how bands of survivors come together in various ways and decide on different ways of fighting the triffids. And that’s when the quality of the writing and the power of the imagery take a turn for the worse. The opening few chapters of The Day of the Triffids have always stayed with me since that first reading. I’ve re-read the book several times since then, but on this latest re-reading I found I’d almost completely forgotten what happened in the second half of the book.

But I can recommend it highly all the same. It might not be Wyndham’s best, but the triffids and their menacing ways will be with you for life once Wyndham’s words have become pictures in your head. And more than pictures:

The evening was peaceful, almost the only sounds that broke it were the occasional rattlings of the triffids’ little sticks against their stems. Walter [a triffid-researcher] regarded them with his head slightly on one side. He removed his pipe.

“They’re talkative tonight,” he said. (ch. 2)

Elsewhere other-accessible

• Reds in the Head — review of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds (1897)

Distal Disdain, Proximal Pusillanimity

by in Fantasy fiction, Literature, Parodies, Poetry, Quotations, The Sea and tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

When the sands are all dry, he is gay as a lark,
And will talk in contemptuous tones of the Shark:
But, when the tide rises and Sharks are around,
His voice has a timid & tremulous sound. — Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland (1865)

Strength thru Joyce!

by in English Usage, In Terms Of, Keyly Committed Core Components of the Counter-Cultural Community, Language and tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Here is a Clarificatory Conspectus for Core Comprehension of Key Counter-Culture:

(open in new window for larger version)

Please note the inclusion of James Joyce (1882-1941). You will see that he is at one remove from the Heart of Darkness represented by the despicable, deplorable and downright disgusting phrase “in terms of”. That is, I put Joyce in the clarificatory conspectus because he is popular among the abusers of “in terms of”, not because I think he would have abused “in terms of” himself. Although I can’t stand Joyce’s writing and think it has had a very bad influence on English literature, I also think he wrote too well and was too aesthetically and linguistically sensitive to use “in terms of” in the degraded fashion of his countless modern admirers and imitators.

Please note, however, that being at one or more removes from the Heart of Darkness is not exculpatory for any other inclusees in terms of the Clarificatory Conspectus (Marty Amis, Sal Rushdie, the LRB, etc).

Elsewhere other-accessible:

• Ex-term-in-ate! — core interrogation of why “in terms of” is so despicable, deplorable and downright disgusting…
• Titus Graun — core interrogation of key deployers of “in terms of”……
• Don’t Do Dot — core interrogation of why “…” is so despicable, deplorable and downright disgusting dot dot dot

Toxic Turntable #21

by in Currently Listening..., Music and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Currently listening…

• Acid Rainbows, Hammer of Goth (1992)
• Greenlandic Three, Danish Daze (1992)
• LeuKoToMy, You’ve Gone Harpist (2020)
• Johan Zunder, Nine Pines (Remix) (2012)
• Decurrent-CDX, World Warp III (1988)
• Oswestry Quintet, Wrekin Heaves (2009)
• Yim Pamuvb, Iaqahhu (2008)
• Kinaesthetica, Plinnit (1988)
• Alchemia, Xenotrope / Quagmire (1994)
• Vanadium Sorceress, Vanadu (2001)
• Freaky Bulbs, Under the Serene (1995)
• Gaccub Liuoba, Pvjuyo s 1980 (1979)
• Twa Corbies, Bonnie Blue Een (1991)
• Tania By Torchlight, La Reine Vous Voit (1999)
• Knights of Viriconium, Naphtha Regimen (2007)
• Uzegor, Ec’ac Gqa Ihtku (2003)
• Gwen Lebrun, Whispersong (2000)
• Quentin’s Figs, Laddie Chutterly’s Liver (1997)
• Two Million Lightning-Bugs, Went Zooming (1985)
• Georg Friederich Händel, Organ Concerti (1993)
• Hank Yorpen, Ja! Licht und Nagel! (1998)

Previously pre-posted:

Toxic Turntable #1 • #2 • #3 • #4 • #5 • #6 • #7 • #8 • #9 • #10 • #11 • #12 • #13 • #14 • #15 • #16 • #17 • #18 • #19 • #20 •

Trifylfots

by in Fractals, Geometry, Mathematics, Triangles and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Here’s a simple fractal created by dividing an equilateral triangle into smaller equilateral triangles, then discarding (and rotating) some of those sub-triangles, then doing the same to the sub-triangles:

Fractangle (triangle-fractal) (stage 1)

Fractangle #2

Fractangle #3

Fractangle #4

Fractangle #5

Fractangle #6

Fractangle #7

Fractangle #8

Fractangle #9

Fractangle (animated)

I’ve used the same fractangle to create this shape, which is variously known as a swastika (from Sanskrit svasti, “good luck, well-being”), a gammadion (four Greek Γs arranged in a circle) or a fylfot (from the shape being used to “fill the foot” of a stained glass window in Christian churches):

Trifylfot

Because it’s a fylfot created ultimately from a triangle, I’m calling it a trifylfot (TRIFF-ill-fot). Here’s how you make it:

Trifylfot (stage 1)

Trifylfot #2

Trifylfot #3

Trifylfot #4

Trifylfot #5

Trifylfot #6

Trifylfot #7

Trifylfot #8

Trifylfot #9

Trifylfot (animated)

And here are more trifylfots created from various forms of fractangle:

Elsewhere other-accessible

• Fractangular Frolics — more on fractals from triangles

Sic Sick Sicko!

by in Keyly Committed Core Components of the Counter-Cultural Community, Politics and tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

As the toxic stench of Trump begins – at last! – to fade in our traumatized nostrils, how better to begin the new year over at Papyrocentric Performativity than an interview with the proud Black-African Diasporan, anti-racism activist, and literary scholar Dr Nigel M. Goldbaum?

• Sic Semper Trumpo

Digital Dissection

by in Base Behavior, Binary numbers, Digit-sums, Mathematics and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

As I never tire of pointing out, the three most powerful drugs in the universe are water, maths and language. And I never tire of snorting the fact that numbers can come in many different guises. You can take a trivial, everyday number like a hundred and see it transform like this:


100 = 1100100 in base 2; 10201 in base 3; 1210 in base 4; 400 in base 5; 244 in base 6; 202 in base 7; 144 in base 8; 121 in base 9; 100 in b10; 91 in b11; 84 in b12; 79 in b13; 72 in b14; 6A in b15; 64 in b16; 5F in b17; 5A in b18; 55 in b19; 50 in b20; 4G in b21; 4C in b22; 48 in b23; 44 in b24; 40 in b25; 3M in b26; 3J in b27; 3G in b28; 3D in b29; 3A in b30; 37 in b31; 34 in b32; 31 in b33; 2W in b34; 2U in b35; 2S in b36; 2Q in b37; 2O in b38; 2M in b39; 2K in b40; 2I in b41; 2G in b42; 2E in b43; 2C in b44; 2A in b45; 28 in b46; 26 in b47; 24 in b48; 22 in b49; 20 in b50; 1[49] in b51; 1[48] in b52; 1[47] in b53; 1[46] in b54; 1[45] in b55; 1[44] in b56; 1[43] in b57; 1[42] in b58; 1[41] in b59; 1[40] in b60; 1[39] in b61; 1[38] in b62; 1[37] in b63; 1[36] in b64; 1Z in b65; 1Y in b66; 1X in b67; 1W in b68; 1V in b69; 1U in b70; 1T in b71; 1S in b72; 1R in b73; 1Q in b74; 1P in b75; 1O in b76; 1N in b77; 1M in b78; 1L in b79; 1K in b80; 1J in b81; 1I in b82; 1H in b83; 1G in b84; 1F in b85; 1E in b86; 1D in b87; 1C in b88; 1B in b89; 1A in b90; 19 in b91; 18 in b92; 17 in b93; 16 in b94; 15 in b95; 14 in b96; 13 in b97; 12 in b98; 11 in b99

I like the shifts from 1100100 to 10201 to 1210 to 400 to 244 to 202 to 144 to 121. How can 1100100 and 244 be the same number? Well, they are — or they’re not, as you please. In base 2, 1100100 = 244 in base 6 = 100 in base 10. But if all those numbers are in the same base, they’re completely different and 1100100 dwarfs the other two.

But some things you can’t please yourself about. Suppose you take the different representations of 6561 in bases 2..6560 and add up the 1s, the 2s, the 3s and so on, like this:


n=6561

digsum(1,6561,b=2..6560) = 3343 (50.95% of 6561)
digsum(2,6561,b=2..6560) = 2246 (34.23% of 6561)
digsum(3,6561,b=2..6560) = 1680 (25.61% of 6561)
digsum(4,6561,b=2..6560) = 1368 (20.85% of 6561)
digsum(5,6561,b=2..6560) = 1185 (18.06% of 6561)
digsum(6,6561,b=2..6560) = 1074 (16.37% of 6561)
digsum(7,6561,b=2..6560) = 875 (13.34% of 6561)
digsum(8,6561,b=2..6560) = 768 (11.71% of 6561)
digsum(9,6561,b=2..6560) = 1080 (16.46% of 6561)
[...]
digcount(0,6561,b=2..6560) = 31

Is there a pattern in the percentages? Let’s apply the same process to some bigger numbers (and note that 0 does not behave like the other digits):


n=59049

digsum(1,59049) = 29648 (50.21%)
digsum(2,59049) = 19790 (33.51%)
digsum(3,59049) = 14901 (25.23%)
digsum(4,59049) = 11956 (20.25%)
digsum(5,59049) = 9970 (16.88%)
digsum(6,59049) = 8550 (14.48%)
digsum(7,59049) = 7539 (12.77%)
digsum(8,59049) = 6672 (11.30%)
digsum(9,59049) = 6579 (11.14%)
digcount(0,59049) = 41

n=531441

digsum(1,531441) = 266065 (50.06%)
digsum(2,531441) = 177394 (33.38%)
digsum(3,531441) = 133128 (25.05%)
digsum(4,531441) = 106532 (20.05%)
digsum(5,531441) = 88815 (16.71%)
digsum(6,531441) = 76224 (14.34%)
digsum(7,531441) = 66661 (12.54%)
digsum(8,531441) = 59320 (11.16%)
digsum(9,531441) = 53928 (10.15%)
digcount(0,531441) = 62

n=4782969

digsum(1,4782969) = 2392219 (50.02%)
digsum(2,4782969) = 1595000 (33.35%)
digsum(3,4782969) = 1196370 (25.01%)
digsum(4,4782969) = 957300 (20.01%)
digsum(5,4782969) = 797700 (16.68%)
digsum(6,4782969) = 683850 (14.30%)
digsum(7,4782969) = 598444 (12.51%)
digsum(8,4782969) = 531944 (11.12%)
digsum(9,4782969) = 480870 (10.05%)
digcount(0,4782969) = 66

Yes, the pattern’s getting stronger. Let’s try even bigger numbers:


n=43046721

digsum(1,43046721) = 21525521 (50.01%)
digsum(2,43046721) = 14350754 (33.34%)
digsum(3,43046721) = 10763496 (25.00%)
digsum(4,43046721) = 8610980 (20.00%)
digsum(5,43046721) = 7175955 (16.67%)
digsum(6,43046721) = 6150924 (14.29%)
digsum(7,43046721) = 5382167 (12.50%)
digsum(8,43046721) = 4784232 (11.11%)
digsum(9,43046721) = 4306257 (10.00%)
digcount(0,43046721) = 86

n=387420489

digsum(1,387420489) = 193716365 (50.00%)
digsum(2,387420489) = 129145522 (33.33%)
digsum(3,387420489) = 96859980 (25.00%)
digsum(4,387420489) = 77488588 (20.00%)
digsum(5,387420489) = 64574220 (16.67%)
digsum(6,387420489) = 55349742 (14.29%)
digsum(7,387420489) = 48431250 (12.50%)
digsum(8,387420489) = 43050264 (11.11%)
digsum(9,387420489) = 38748357 (10.00%)
digcount(0,387420489) = 95

To the given precision, the sum of 1s is 1/2 of n; the sum of 2s is 1/3; the sum of 3 is 1/4; and the sum of 4s is 1/5. It looks as though the sum of a given digit d → 1/(d+1) of n as n → ∞. But why? My mathematical intuition is bad, so it took me a while to see what some people will see in a flash. To see what’s going on, let’s go back to the all-base representations of 100:


100 = 1100100 in base 2; 10201 in base 3; 1210 in base 4; 400 in base 5; 244 in base 6; 202 in base 7; 144 in base 8; 121 in base 9; 100 in b10; 91 in b11; 84 in b12; 79 in b13; 72 in b14; 6A in b15; 64 in b16; 5F in b17; 5A in b18; 55 in b19; 50 in b20; 4G in b21; 4C in b22; 48 in b23; 44 in b24; 40 in b25; 3M in b26; 3J in b27; 3G in b28; 3D in b29; 3A in b30; 37 in b31; 34 in b32; 31 in b33; 2W in b34; 2U in b35; 2S in b36; 2Q in b37; 2O in b38; 2M in b39; 2K in b40; 2I in b41;
2G in b42; 2E in b43; 2C in b44; 2A in b45; 28 in b46; 26 in b47; 24 in b48; 22 in b49; 20 in b50; 1[49] in b51; 1[48] in b52; 1[47] in b53; 1[46] in b54; 1[45] in b55; 1[44] in b56; 1[43] in b57; 1[42] in b58; 1[41] in b59; 1[40] in b60; 1[39] in b61; 1[38] in b62; 1[37] in b63; 1[36] in b64; 1Z in b65; 1Y in b66; 1X in b67; 1W in b68; 1V in b69; 1U in b70; 1T in b71; 1S in b72; 1R in b73; 1Q in b74; 1P in b75; 1O in b76; 1N in b77; 1M in b78; 1L in b79; 1K in b80; 1J in b81
; 1I in b82; 1H in b83; 1G in b84; 1F in b85; 1E in b86; 1D in b87; 1C in b88; 1B in b89; 1A in b90; 19 in b91; 18 in b92; 17 in b93; 16 in b94; 15 in b95; 14 in b96; 13 in b97; 12 in b98; 11 in b99

When the base b is higher than half of 100, the representations of 100 consist of a digit 1 followed by another digit. Half of a hundred = 50, therefore 100 in base 10 = 1[49] in b51, 1[48] in b52, 1[47] in b53, 1[46] in b54, 1[45] in b55, 1[44] in b56, 1[43] in b57, 1[42] in b58, 1[41] in b59… If you take binary and so on into account, 1 is the first digit of slightly over half the representations of 100. And 1 also occurs in other positions. Therefore digsum(1,100,b=2..99) > 50. As the number n gets larger and larger, the contribution of leading 1s in bases b > n/2 begins to swamp the contributions of 1s in other positions, therefore digsum(1,n) → 1/2 of n as n → ∞.

And what about 2s and 3s? Similar reasoning applies. One hundred has a leading digit of 2 in bases b where b > 1/3 of 100 and b <= 1/2 of 100. So 100 = 2W in b34, 2U in b35, 2S in b36, 2Q in b37, 2O in b38… In other words, roughly 1/2 – 1/3 of the representations of 100 have a leading 2. Now, 1/2 – 1/3 = 3/6 – 2/6 = 1/6 and 1/6 * 2 = 1/3 (i.e., 1/6 of the representations contribute a leading 2 to the sum of 2s). Therefore the all-base digsum(2,n) → 1/3 of n as n → ∞. Next, one hundred has a leading digit of 3 in bases b where b > 1/4 of 100 and b <= 1/3. So 100 = 3M in b26, 3J in b27, 3G in b28, 3D in b29, 3A in b30… Now, 1/3 – 1/4 = 4/12 – 3/12 = 1/12 and 1/12 * 3 = 1/4. Therefore the all-base digsum(3,n) → 1/4 of n as n → ∞.

And so on.

Luciferizing

by in Astronomy and tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Post-Performative Post-Scriptum

The toxic title of this incendiary intervention is supposed to be understood such that the verb “Lucíferizing” (acting like Lucifer, turning into Lucifer, etc) has an echo of “Lúcifer Rising”. Lucifer, or “Light-Bearer”, is also a name for the planet Venus, which is rising in the image of the foredawn sky.