“Observing the human animal in its natural habitat – the shopping mall – [researchers in a classic study] documented 1200 instances of laughter, and found that only 10 to 20 per cent of them were responses to anything remotely resembling a joke. Most laughter was in fact either triggered by a banal comment or used to punctuate everyday speech.”
Tag: 07.14.10
Billy Collins Says eReaders Screw Up Poetry
“I found that even in a very small font that if the original line is beyond a certain length, they will take the extra word and have it flush left on the screen, so that instead of a three-line stanza you actually have a four-line stanza. And that screws everything up.”
The Experience Of Arts Education
“The benefit of arts education is generally twofold, employing both creative and kinetic practices to broaden a student’s synaptic frontiers. However, many programs make the mistake of setting themselves too far apart from the reality of the art market and process of artmaking.”
Despite Previous Fiasco, V&A Tries Again For Starchitect Expansion Building
“The last time the Victoria and Albert Museum tried to build an extension, the design [by Daniel Libeskind] was likened to an exploding cardboard box and sparked an eight-year battle for approval and funding which ended in a resounding no. … [Yet] the V&A will hold a design competition this autumn for a major extension on the very site where the bitterly controversial £70m Spiral was intended to go.”
A Computer That Can Decipher Unidentified Languages
“Archaeologists have translated almost every language humans have ever used. Yet eight or so elusive languages remain a mystery. Until now, researchers have not successfully used a computer to assist with deciphering languages. … But now researchers from MIT and USC have designed a computer system that does successfully model the logic and intuition of a human to decipher a language.”
Guardian Critic Just Can’t Trust Britain’s Dance Boom
Judith Mackrell: “As a critic I’ve long resigned myself to the idea that dance is a lowly member of the arts community. … But suddenly, dance has got noisy and visible, and everyone wants to be its best friend. … And when the carnival is over, I worry that serious dance faces a bleak future. In hard times, how many casual punters will pay to see dance in the theatre? How many councils will fund a dancer-in-residence rather than care for the elderly?”
Leonardo’s Virgin Of The Rocks, Restored
The da Vinci canvas is back back on display at Great Britain’s National Gallery “after an 18-month conservation project revealed details lost for a lifetime under a coat of darkening varnish.”
A Florentine Mystery: Medici Who Were Not Poisoned
Francesco I de’ Medici, the founder of the Uffizi Gallery, and his mistress-turned-second wife, Bianca Cappello, died agonizing deaths within one day of each other in 1587. For centuries, the suspicious believed that Francesco’s brother and successor, Ferdinando, had them poisoned, likely with arsenic. But recent tests have shown that Ferdinando was innocent (well, in this instance). What killed Francesco and Bianca? Just what the original examiners thought killed them, at it turns out.
American Psycho‘s Patrick Bateman Is ‘One Of The Funniest Comic Creations Since Bertie Wooster’
“Bateman’s voice – obsessive, and only a very small fraction of a degree madder than the average style magazine – is a superb achievement: equally unsettling when he describes a suit, the ’emotional honesty’ of Phil Collins, or doing unspeakable things to prostitutes. There’s also the disturbing uncertainty of the whole thing. Should we believe anything Bateman says? Does he actually look good? … Is he really a killer? Do cash machines really demand that he feeds them cats?”
Improv Troupe Does Star Wars Scene In Subway
“You are riding the subway, enjoying your commute by ignoring everyone else on the train. In comes a woman wearing a white robe. You probably ignore the buns on the side of her head thinking she is just wearing headphones. You may not even notice the title of her book: Galactic Rebellion for Dummies: Princess Edition.” (With video.)