The Runner- An elegy for Peter Holmes

Following the tragic death of fellow runner Pete Holmes on the weekend at just 24 I was moved to write an elegy for him. It doesn't do his positive attitude and eternal fighting spirit justice but it's just a tribute to a man who was a very influential blogger, so I thought I'd post it here:

The Runner

An elegy for Peter Holmes

The pistol fires. There is no sound,

As footsteps start to churn the ground.

One young man, no longer there,

Leaves behind his racing wear.

Forever reaching to the sky,

There was no earthly reason why

He journeyed to that foreign track,

And shoulder-high was carried back.

When last we met he boldly beat me,

Now the memories alone defeat me.

Our rivalry has turned to pain:

A fight against the empty lane.

I miss him most for what he loved:

A contest pure, unchained, un-gloved.

Not petty acts of spite or war,

But that which makes us something more.

The passing miles are silent now,

The watch alone can tell us how

The ailing seconds tick today.

His words no longer ease the way.

His faith was strong, and all his own.

Perhaps this comforts me alone:

He, the runner, will ever be,

Running strong.

Running true.

Forever free.

The poem, barring subsequent improvements, was originally written for Pete’s funeral. It took inspiration from his harrier spirit, and two moving texts: A. E. Housman’s beautiful ‘To An Athlete Dying Young’ and Pete’s favourite verse from the Bible (New International Version):

"I run in the path of Your commands,

for You have set my heart free."

Psalm 119:32

Review and linguistic observations of 'Sin nombre'

'Sin Nombre' by new director Cary Fukanaga will surely have a lasting impact on all of those who have no scruples watching subtitled foreign language films this year.

After seeing the pre-release showing in the "Rio" cinema in Dalston with a Q and A at the end with the talented young Fukanaga, the authenticity of the whole production was clear. It is a harrowing tale of two narratives, one following the journey of the Sayra (Paulina Gaitan) and her father and uncle on their trip to the US border from their native Honduras, and the story of the Mexican fugutive Willy, or "Caspar" (Edgar Flores) as he is known from his former gang, the Mara, who now hunt him. The two coincide on the train on their different jouneys and their struggles bind them together in friendship, and ultimately a tragic love story.

While this deeply moving film could still have an emotionally powerful effect through reading the subtitles, I think the effect is at its best if you either understand Spanish, or even better, are familiar with Honduran and Mexican dialiects of Spanish, which differ quite greatly from Castillian. That isn't meant to sound pretentious, in the pompous attitude that "the translation is a travesty" or anything along those lines, just the sound of the voices in this film are what really deliver the full effect. It is the Quinian problem of a linguistic utterance only being capable of delivering its complete meaning in the language in which it was uttered, for speakers of that language. I can't imagine listening to the moving words of Ronal Reagan in his speech about the Challenger Space Shuttle explosion in Spanish as much as I can't imagine an English oral version of Willy's forboding words about his former gang during the film: "La Mara tiene una buena memoria". The range of accents, 'street' language, the beauty of the Americanisms such as "homie"/"homito" and "Smiley", and the pronuciation of "Six Flags" and "New Jersey" have social comments and emotional worth that have a far greater effect than the words themselves. Phonology, phonetics, sociolinguistics and pragmatics seem to prevail for enriching content here. A truly brilliant film though.

Language

It's always good to write on a subject you know at least something about, so I thought I'd at least try to start a blog on my views on language. Hopefully it won't be too academic, though after a year in a Chomskyan school of linguistics at UCL it might be hard to keep the ivory tower at bay. Anyway, here are a few starter discussion points which are probably my favourite ones in the subject. I will just outline one each blog:

• Language is a system unique to human beings

Contrary to some folkloric ideas, humans are the only known species of animal with a language faculty. This is not to say we are unique in having a system of oral or visual communication, as bee dances indicating the position of honey and the warning calls of macaques, tamarins and vervet monkeys suggest. We are unique in having a symbolic linguistic system which we can understand and make use of for, amongst other things, communication, and this system gives us the ability to talk about our thoughts and interpret the thoughts of others.
This species-specific ability has lead many linguists and philosophers to call the phenomenon of human language "innate", but this term is controversial. As humans must acquire language through exposure to the environment, one puts oneself in a difficult position to claim that all of our language is innate, as sounds and vocabulary of different languages must be 'learnt' on some level. However, the fact that only humans have the ability to acquire language surely suggests there is some fundamental difference in our genetic make-up to other animals that allows us to acquire language, like any species-specific trait. This is irrefutable. Despite previous attempts at such things, we could no more teach a chimpanzee, our closest genetic cousin, to acquire a human language fully than could a fish teach us to breathe underwater or a bird instruct us to fly! There are fundamental biological differences which mean we can acquire these species-specific traits- through natural means at least.
So while Nativism has a strong argument due to the situation outlined above, the opposition in the form of Empiricism claims that due to a human being born as a tabula rasa with few innate capabilities, and the emphasis on the environment and learning is key. The strongest version of the Empiricist argument is that with a general learning ability (an idea attributed to John Locke) a human being can acquire language without recourse to needing a specific language faculty, simply by learning it from the linguistic data around him. Even Nativists accept the importance of the environment, and they may fall on their sword a little when introducing the idea of the 'critical period' for language acquisition in childhood, which is the minimum required time of linguistic exposure for a human to acquire a language fully. The debate rages on between the two camps, but one cannot deny the uniqueness of language to human beings, and it may be more of a defining characteristic in terms of differentiating ourselves from our primate cousins than we would like to imagine.

London dark poem

It's been some time since I've used the Blog, despite still believing it to be a great tool! For anyone who may or may not read this, due to its believe acquiesence, I post a poem about London, where I've been studying for the last few years. It's somewhat dark on subsequent reading, but perhaps summarised feelings on damp days there:


My dearest London
I’ll walk upon your streets again, my dearest London, when,
I tire of pleasant countryside where I have come to rest
And finally appreciate that town that knows me best.
When thrill of base amusement makes me leave my hideaway
To search for some dank alley where I’ll pass out in the day.

I’ll walk upon your streets again, my dearest London, when,
The cussing crowds all dissappear, and cease to squeeze and swarm
And sputtering, guttering poison fumes no longer keep them warm.
When acid clouds all reappear and drench us in a storm
And faces ill-remembered start to lose their shape and form.

I’ll walk upon your streets again, my dearest London, when,
With body gone and spirit free I finally walk alone
And streets become so empty I can rightly call them home.
When the darkness comes for me and light starts fading fast
I won't abandon you dear London; I’ll be here to the last!

BBC World Book Club with Richard Dawkins

Well, here's my first worthy blog entry really, as the first one was just a way of getting me into the blogging community/breaking down that initial barrier that confronts us in new tasks.

I'm still shaking with excitement (I do have nerve endings I've discovered, despite being pretty relaxed physically most of the time except while running!) from being involved with the show, being some 3 metres away from Richard Dawkins, a man who has had a massive influence on modern thought. The setting of a dead-quiet BBC recording studio, with padded walls and producers darting in and out with "health and safety" talks, advice on how to approach it, and I was heartened that it was really relaxed, not to a schedule, and could be re-edited to allow for cock-ups, and above all, that they encouraged us to have a shout if you want to- it had suddenly become not just a lecture but a form of debate.

Richard Dawkins, the erudite scientist, as he likes to style himself, was discussing his inaugural best-seller "The Selfish Gene", the main theme encapsulated in the title, which was one of the most exciting prospects in philosophy and popular science. He was a smallish man, with a jutting jaw, pince-nez glasses, a wandering curious but intense gaze and the most incredible feature of all, his incredible voice. He is truly a great performer, his sincere tone was not deep but incredibly powerful and his underlying determination to assert his views on the world became clear from the beginning.

I confess I still haven't read his first book cover to cover, but after this I will be racing through Dawkins literature, on his evolution stuff anyway! My Dad is an evolutionary theorist, so I may get my interest (through heredity or environment!) from him, but I'd agree with my old man in that it is baffling how so few people take such a casual or uninterested stance in that most important subjects in my opinion which are who or what we are, where we've come from and probably the most important question: why?

Dawkins commented during the show that the 'why' part is unimportant or not worthy considering, which is probably due to his aversion against religion and that emphasis on the begining of life: indeed he believes the 'word' of genesis is not worth mentioning. As a man interested in words, I find that hard to stomach, but apart from personal prejudices towards linguistics and languages, I do believe you can't just dismiss the ultimate question with such a casual attitude as indeed every story has a beginning. The story of life, which he tries to tell, lacks this definite start, it's all exposition and development, where as on the other hand, the creation story has a perfect structure, not that I believe in it personally. It can be said that the biblical tale is attractive, it has a sense of unity and purpose that we seek as humans.

So, as for my actual involvement in the debate, which was, I have to admit, more than I expected, and I felt like I was that six-year-old-grade-one-piano-taking kid again, absolutely loaded with fear and pressure- I failed my grade one, so pressure may not be good for me, but I think I managed a semi-coherent first question. It was a bit of a parasitic tag-along to the previous questioner who asked about the appropriateness of using the emotive term "Selfish" in the title of his great work, if Dawkins did want to come across objectively as a scientist. No doubt and self-confessedly Dawkins is a great communicator of science to the ignorant masses, but should such rhetoric be employed when looking at life in terms of 'survival machines', 'replicators' and other such inanimate or emotionless objects. The use of the adjective actually implies anthropomorphism, which I believe lies more in the realm of fiction.

So I followed with a little trash-culture question to ease my way in, which I mumbled out not quite correctly, asking whether the title could evoke notions which are not good for society, as in the projection of selfishness (although he doesn't advocate that in individuals) being a bad thing, I managed to get out that it permeates modern Western society, particularly on reality T.V. shows, with horrendous terms (I think for civilized society) like 'dog-eat-dog' and 'alpha male' being employed in everyday situations, and I don't think that's the best way of espousing an attitude that takes us away from animals in an evolutionary sense. He replied, as I expected as if I was a complete ignoramus, by saying that he is only espousing selfishness on the level of the gene, and not in individuals, to which I retorted that I understood that, just that others may not, and particularly if he wants to market his ideas in popular science. He got the last word in of course, saying, "Well these people obviously haven't read beyond the title."

First brush with genius over, I recline back feeling a little embarrassed to have asked a trivial question that he felt was so obvious and misinterpreted by me. I watch the red 'on air' light and the fascinated faces, all taken in by that voice. He never stutters, he reels off ideas with ease and at an incredible rate. His reciting tone is incredibly powerful, as for his sound test he recited a story he learned in his childhood perfectly. His ability with words is outstanding for a man of science. Anyway, not wishing to butter him up, I was pretty aggressive with the hand raising at every opportunity from then on in, as I'm sure he has no doubt of his ability to look and sound the part at these gigs, heckling time was in session!

So my big question, which stems from Dad's ideas, though I have thought about it personally, to do with the lack of attention paid to the random mutations that are the basis of neo-Darwinism espoused by Dawkins. I took the contentious line that if he persistently took this line on the computational nature of evolution, how could he justify copying errors within this theory? He replied that some mutations in the genes were beneficial, while others were errors in a negative sense, to which I got a little jab in "But is it good thing to look at evolutionary progress through copying errors?", to which I think he may even have got a little flustered: "Oh come on!"
His calm objectivity may have been rattled slightly? If it was he regathered composure in a microsecond, as he cut me down and indeed the interviewer cut me out of my follow-up on hybridism, which I admit now, wasn't completely related and due to my lack of thorough research, I meant 'mutants', but anyway, you win some you lose some!

The whole experience was fascinating, as he did express himself on a number of levels about so many topics, such as the idea of mimes, gayness in nature and his normal repartee on the ignorance and wickedness on religion. Well Professor Dawkins, the Hough clan aren't quite dead and gone yet, you may be the Alpha at the moment, but there's no reason why a few cunning like-minded people couldn't at least pose a threat to your dominance yet sir!