Back in April, I wrote about the Dunning-Kruger Effect – the inability of an incompetent person to recognize their incompetence because they’re too incompetent to know any better. However, as quoted in a recent New York Times article, David Dunning himself calls it “the anosognosia of everyday life”. And being the brilliant man he is, Dunning can explain it much better than I can:
An anosognosic patient who is paralyzed simply does not know that he is paralyzed. If you put a pencil in front of them and ask them to pick up the pencil in front of their left hand they won’t do it. And you ask them why, and they’ll say, “Well, I’m tired,” or “I don’t need a pencil.” They literally aren’t alerted to their own paralysis. There is some monitoring system on the right side of the brain that has been damaged, as well as the damage that’s related to the paralysis on the left side. There is also something similar called “hemispatial neglect.” It has to do with a kind of brain damage where people literally cannot see or they can’t pay attention to one side of their environment. If they’re men, they literally only shave one half of their face. And they’re not aware about the other half. If you put food in front of them, they’ll eat half of what’s on the plate and then complain that there’s too little food. You could think of the Dunning-Kruger Effect as a psychological version of this physiological problem. If you have, for lack of a better term, damage to your expertise or imperfection in your knowledge or skill, you’re left literally not knowing that you have that damage. It was an analogy for us.
I don’t know when, if ever, it will happen, but I look forward to the moment I can unholster this baby and pull the trigger.
What do “Knowing” and “Contact” have in common besides being films ill-advisedly made in the first place? The answer is “apophenia”. In both films, the lead characters look for patterns in seemingly chaotic systems. If you were wondering what the big difference between the movies is, the answer is one movie had a phenomenal lead, the other had Nick Cage.
Dana Stevens of Slate.com was quite the wag when it came to reviewing the new Diaz/Cruise vehicle, “Knight and Day”. My co-worker Zach and I were laughing about her characterization of Cruise, but stumbled over this paragraph:
The character of Roy Miller is so quintessentially Cruise-ian that he skirts the edges of self-conscious parody. He’s an indestructible superspy who’s bottomlessly cheerful and yet vaguely malevolent. Roy seems to lack any interiority whatsoever; even when he’s telling the truth, he appears to be lying. (Cruise’s most memorable characters have tended to be liars: Jerry Maguire, the kid in Risky Business, the unstable self-help guru in Magnolia.)
Zach turned to me and asked, “What’s ‘interiority’?” I had to admit, I had never heard the term before, but hanging around theatre folk for a good portion of my life led me to believe that it was some new-fangled acting technique that are always coming out of New York. Then I remembered something an ex used to call “the Neve Campbell Interior Moment”, a pause in acting during which the “Party of Five” would check to make sure her character and her character’s actions were still in sync. Apparently, not doing that can now be called “the Tom Cruise Spelunking Moment.”
New X-Men #114
New Mutants #14
The Once and Future Master Mold. No wonder New X-Men #114 was re-issued this week.
“Second Coming” continues with Part 11 this week. It’s still mass destruction on all sides (though I seem to care less about which characters are dying than I did way back in “Mutant Massacre”), and all the B-list mutants (like Colossus) are taking the heavy knocks. Of all my impressions of this book, the strongest one I come away with is that I don’t like Doug very much. Actually, I don’t like any of the Muties very much. They’re all grouchy and smarmy and way too cocky for their own good. At least when they were teens, there was a reason for their cockiness (i.e., they were teenagers who thought they knew better than everyone around them); now it just reads as snark. And transparent snark at that. And what happens after “Second Coming” ends? What is the next genocidal plan Marvel will put into motion? I know that The X-Men will join “The Heroic Age” next month, but I probably won’t be along for the ride. “Mutant Massacre” was back in 1986, and it’s been one long assassination attempt since then. And “The Heroic Age” pits the X-Men against Dracula. Wow. Didn’t that happen back in 1983? Well, it will free up a few bucks every month to start my Bird of Prey, volume one collection. Speaking of which…
DC Legacies #2
Birds of Prey #2
Brightest Day #4
Apparently, “Brightest Day” is not going to be the solution to the endless deaths and editorial-driven disasters that I have assumed it to be. In an interview for the DCU Blog, Alex Segura has Geoff Johns as saying
“Brightest Day” is about second chances. I think it’s been obvious from day one that there are major plans for the heroes and villains from Aquaman to take center stage in the DC Universe, among many others, post-”Blackest Night”. “Brightest Day” is not a banner or a vague catch-all direction for the DC Universe, it is a story. Nor is “Brightest Day”a sign that the DC Universe is going to be all about ‘light and brighty’ superheroes. Some second chances work out…some don’t.
Yet, for being “just a story”, it’s leaking all across the DCU, even into the restart of Birds of Prey (granted Hawk and Dove are now part of the team), so it seems to be more of a paradigm than a story. After reading my DC titles this week, I’ve come to the conclusion that this could be a great opportunity to shake things up in DCU. Yeah, yeah, “again”, but everyone loves a crisis,right? Looking at DC Legacies, the heroes of the Silver Age disappeared rather than reveal who they were to the government and thereby lose their effectiveness to fight crime. But look at this week’s Birds of Prey: Oracle’s Braves know who the Penguin is, know his real name and know that he’s a bad guy. I’ve never really thought about it before, but, really, everyone in the DCU knows who the villains are. They don’t have secret identities per se, though they do have criminal personae and $$$ and guns and guards and compounds and Machines of Doom. Yet for some reason, they persist like untreated athlete’s foot even after year of head-butting with any number of heroes. But how much more fragile is a hero’s secret identity. The whole plot of BoP is the ruination that would follow revealing a hero’s alter ego. Witness what happened to Black Canary, and she’s apparently just the first. Does this make her more vulnerable (as we’ve always thought), or does this free her to be more of a hero? If “Brightest Day” is about second chances and not about being “light and brighty”, then maybe the way the heroes can get the upper-hand and not make porridge out of this second chance would be to adopt the villains’ “lifestyle” – live openly and without apology.
At least, that’s how I’m making sense of “Brightest Day”: that there really is a plan to drastically cut back on the snuff porn and get back to good stories. Of course, I thought that keeping New Krypton around for more than a minute was a good idea, too. Oh oh oh! and leaving Paradise Island intact.
burned flesh, irreversible blindness, cutting through some metals: these are all the first steps to making my Jedi dreams come true. Wicked Lasers has developed a lightsaber-like product that can inflict loads of damage, but without the philosophical claptrap to get in the way of some real mayhem.
Wicked Lasers radically redefines the way we see lasers yet again. For the first time in history, direct blue laser diodes have now become available in the consumer market. Wicked Lasers took the direct blue laser diode components and made the world’s first 445nm direct blue diode laser, the Arctic.
The Artic emits a 445nm cool blue, ultra high power 1W beam which appears up to 4000% brighter than the Sonar’s 405nm violet beam. This direct blue laser diode is the result of the evolution of laser technology. Less than one year ago, this laser would have cost thousands of dollars to build. Don’t let the Arctic name fool you, this laser possesses the most burning capabilities of any portable laser in existence. That’s why it’s also the most dangerous laser ever created.
And I need to get one before the FAA decides that no one needs that much power hanging on their belt.
For Immediate Release: June 10, 2010
Media Contact: Patti Neff-Tiven, Managing Director, Weird City Theatre Company
512-786-5033
Patti@WeirdCityTheatre.com
Weird City Theatre Company
Announces World Premiere
Giants in Those Days
AUSTIN—Weird City Theatre Company announces the world premiere of Giants in Those Days, an original graphic novel to stage adaptation by local writer, Sean McGrath. Heroes and villains of the muscle-y spandex-clad kind have been all but expunged from the world by the godly decree of Jason December, but one man remembers the Heroes of the Superior Union – shining beacons of everything mankind could become – and their stand against the evil of The Karnivale. Alone, he attempts to resurrect hope and decency and light in a new generation of heroes. But victory isn’t guaranteed for the good guys… Directed by Patti Neff-Tiven, the cast includes WCT Artistic Director John F. Carroll, Company members Kevin Gouldthorpe, Bethany Harbaugh, Nick Orzech, Jenni Bauer and Russell Minton and features Jennifer Baldillez, Chris Romani, Braden Hunt, Daniel Moore, Paul Camp, Austin Davison, Terri Lynne Hudson, LeRoy Beck, Ronis Alvarenga & Xaq Webb. This multi-media piece includes film, puppetry and panels from the original comic book. Featuring original art by Benjamin Ruth, Nockiman, William O. Tyler, Michael Troy, Joe Palmer, Ren Burke, Christopher Moshier, and Sean S. Martin.
Performances run July 8 – July 25, 2010 at the Dougherty Arts Center, 1110 Barton Springs Road, Austin, TX. Performances are Thursday through Saturday nights at 8:00PM and Sundays at 5:00PM. Tickets are $15.00 for adults and $12.00 for children, seniors and students (with ID), and group rates are available. Tickets can be purchased at our website, www.weirdcitytheatre.com, or by calling 512-745-2636.
Weird City Theatre’s mission is to encourage the growth of the artist and represent the uniqueness and vitality of Austin through re-envisioned classics and original works. Keeping a child-like sense of play, we focus on the process of the actor and we are playing our part to keep Austin weird!
Weird City Theatre is a sponsored project of Austin Circle of Theatres, a nonprofit performing arts service organization.
Joe Jervis provided me with another Yiddish word today, “shonda”, “a shame”. I need pearls to clutch when I use it.
Acts of Violence
I often say that Noir is dead though my saying so doesn’t stop people from trying to put the corpse on stage and make it dance. Noir was a time and a place that doesn’t exist anymore, and woe betide anyone who thinks its resurrection is imminent. This being said, it’s so much better just to write a 1920′s gangster story or a rural justice anecdote in one’s own voice the way that Martin Scorsese did in Gangs of New York or The Departed… well, maybe The Departed is a bad example of “better”. The team behind Acts of Violence took the better path, and in doing so put out a collection of four outstanding stories. I’m not one for gratuitous, over-the-top violence, but I am one for good stories, and the four tales here – “The Three Princes”, “Six O’clock Noose”, “Reggie-Town” and “The Orchard” – are excellent reads. I was especially intrigued by “Reggie-Town” with its deluded protagonist and the unexplained fate of the baby he kidnapped. Without histrionics nor finger-wagging, these stories stare at a black spot in the human psyche then take a picture.
Grade: A+
Batman/Superman Annual #4
Lex Luthor is one of those characters who can be admired for his ability for do impossibly heinous acts in the name of some twisted moral code and yet slip away form punishment like Louisiana shrimp from the hands of a shrimper… too soon? For this same reason he is also a source of frustration for me. Yeah, he’s Superman’s greatest enemy, but I’m rather tired of him (especially in the movies), so it’s nice to see that he will eventually (at some far-flung future time which should reach the newsstands in about 3130) get what’s coming to him. And while I at first thought he was a commercial ploy, I’ve grown to like Batman Beyond, and wouldn’t mind seeing him in an on-going series of his own, especially if Renato Guedes continues to draw him (his transitions are somewhat awkward, but his coloring and linework are peerless).
Grade: A-
Brightest Day #3
Wow. This is a total downer. And not all that bright at all. Seriously, Blackest Night had more hope than this. The story is intriguing and well-paced, but it’s not living up to its title. Yet. I’m standing by my man and saying that things will get better as the series goes on.
Grade: B
There is no language to truly express my love for Dan Savage. He’s never not on his game and his arms are just so ripply. In this week’s column, he got a letter which read:
One of my best friends at college is gay. I’m a straight female with my own boyfriend. We’re going to be sophomores in the fall, and I feel like this is about the age where coming out to one’s parents is in order. However, my friend’s parents are conservative. His older brother is also gay—and when he came out, his parents cut off all funding for college and excommunicated him from the family, so my friend is understandably terrified.
When his parents come to visit, I tag along on “dates” with him to “meet the parents.” It’s a free meal, but it feels a little dirty to lie to his mom and dad about how “in love” we are. Moreover, my friend is coming to my house in California this summer. I had said I would love for him to come visit—as a friend. But his parents think he’s going to be staying with his girlfriend, and they’re thinking of tagging along so they can finally meet their future in-laws, i.e., MY PARENTS. I feel like this is getting way out of hand. How far should we take this act?
I Should Win An Oscar
When you feel bad about lying, ISWAO, remind yourself that you’re doing a good deed—you’re doing God’s work—every time you pass yourself off as this boy’s girlfriend. Yes, you’re lying to his mean-spirited, emotionally abusive parents, two complete shits who deserve so much worse than simply being misled. And he only lies to them because—for the time being—he must.
You should ask him to do three things to secure your continued cooperation in this deception. First, he has to make a solemn promise that he will come out to his parents the day after he graduates. Second, he has to reach out to his excommunicated brother and, if his brother can be trusted to keep his secret, he has to come out to his brother. Third, he has to break up with you at the end of the school year.
The course of true love never did run smooth, as someone or other once said, so a painfully messy June breakup with his college girlfriend—right before summer break!—not only makes your friend’s Potemkin heterosexuality that much more credible, it also gets you off the hook for this ill-advised summer visit. Then when September rolls around, ISWAO, you two crazy kids get back together. Repeat as necessary, i.e., be “on again” when his parents are in town, be “off again” when your parents are in town, over summer breaks, holidays, etc.
And help him look around for his next girlfriend—perhaps a lesbian student with similarly batshit parents—because he can’t expect you to be his beard for your entire college career.
I’ve heard of the movie The Battleship Potemkin, but didn’t know how that related to a gay man needing a beard, so I looked it up. It turns out the usage is from a post-Crimean War story, which says that a Russian minister had fake villages built to show Catherine II that the land she had won was indeed prosperous. It now means any hollow deceit used to maintain power or position or status.
Dear Dan Savage,
Today, you taught me something new….
