MikeLigalig.com

Bob Dylan and the literary idiot wind

By: Bernard-Henri Lévy
October 22, 2016

PARISâ€"Oh, the anger of the fusty at the announcement of Bob Dylan’s Nobel Prize! What an outcry from the academyâ€"not the Swedish one, mind you, but that of the world church of literaturology.

The panic of the literary bureaucracy, ensnared in its certainties and steeped in its petty calculations, its half-baked prognostications, its crafty shifts of position, has been palpable. Was the choice of Dylan political or nonpolitical? Why an American? Why not a woman? Or a voice, any voice, of a visible minority? Or this one, who’s been waiting 20 years? Or that one, who’s given up hope?

i can say that i know both ernie and chito personally. maguwang si ernie ni chito by more than a decade, sa akong banabana.

what is the libingan ng mga bayani (LNMB)?

The cemetery is reserved for Medal of Valor awardees, Presidents and other government officials, martyrs, artists and other citizens for “the inspiration and emulation of this generation and of generations still unborn.”

will this generation and generations still unborn be inspired and will thus emulate marcos? perhaps, given the chance, the marcos family may. as for the rest of the country, go figure.

by the way, the marcos family did not fulfill one of the conditions they've agreed on with then president fidel ramos for the marcos remains to be brought back to the country, vis:

#it is flown straight to paoay, ilocos norte
#he would be given honors befitting a major in the AFP because that was his last rank
#he would not be allowed to be paraded in metro manila
#the burial will have to be done in ilocos norte, there will be no burial in the LNMB

indeed, the family is patient by not burying the body but preserving it in a refrigerated crypt, open for viewing in a family mausoleum. they need him as a hero. no need to ask for forgiveness, no need to mete justice to the thousands of victims.

well, it looks like it's the marcos family that's going to heal. for them to have been "patient" all these years is to be patient to wait for the day when their patriarch would be deemed a hero by being accorded a hero's burial. it is injustice for the thousands of martial law victims.

those who were not around yet in those martial law years will naturally never understand what it was like to go through that 'thingy'. 

more at https://weather.com/storms/typhoon/news/super-typhoon-haima-lawin-philippines-china-forecast

Maximum sustained winds in Haima increased from 85 mph late Sunday morning to 160 mph by Tuesday morning (U.S. time), which means the typhoon has undergone rapid intensification. Rapid intensification is when maximum sustained winds increase by at least 30 knots (about 35 mph) in 24 hours or less.

The outflow of winds aloft exhausting the top of Haima, low wind shear and warm, deep ocean water set the stage for Haima's rapid intensification.

Steered by high pressure aloft to its north, Haima will make landfall in northern Luzon, Philippines, overnight Wednesday night, local time (the Philippines are 12 hours ahead of U.S. EDT) as a strong, dangerous typhoon.

This will be the second typhoon landfall in Luzon in a four-day stretch following this past weekend's landfall from Typhoon Sarika/Karen.

Super Typhoon Haima has rapidly intensified to Category 5 strength, and will be the second typhoon in four days to hammer the northern Philippines Wednesday, before turning toward southeast China late this week.

Haima was centered about 345 miles east-northeast of the Philippine capital, Manila, as of midday Wednesday, local time.

Infrared satellite imagery shows a classic, intense, west Pacific super typhoon with a large eye and an intense ring of convection surrounding it. The Japanese Meteorological Agency estimated Haima's central pressure had dipped to 900 millibars, and a satellite estimate from the University of Wisconsin estimated a pressure of 910 millibars Tuesday evening, U.S. time.


Current Storm Information, Infrared Satellite Image
The highest cloud tops, corresponding to the most vigorous convection, are shown in the dark red and purple colors.

Super Typhoon Haima (Lawin) Reaches Category 5 Strength; Targets Northern Philippines

By Jon Erdman and Chris Dolce
Oct 18 2016
weather.com

Story Highlights

Haima, known as Lawin in the Philippines, has rapidly intensified in the western Pacific Ocean.

It will push into northern Luzon, Philippines, as an intense typhoon overnight Wednesday night, local time.

Haima will then push into southeast China as a weaker typhoon Friday.

wow!

While Russian-language hybrid trolls use the Wikipedia troll message design to promote anti-Western sentiment in comments, they "mostly attack aggressively to maintain emotional attachment to issues covered in articles." Discussions about topics, other than International sanctions during the Ukrainian crisis, "attracted very aggressive trolling" and became polarized according to the NATO report, which "suggests that in subjects in which there is little potential for re-educating audiences, emotional harm is considered more effective" for pro-Russian Latvian-language trolls.

Psychological characteristics

Researcher Ben Radford wrote about the phenomenon of clowns in history and modern day in his book Bad Clowns and found that bad clowns have evolved into Internet trolls. They do not dress up as traditional clowns, but for their own amusement, they tease and exploit "human foibles" in order to speak the "truth" and gain a reaction. Like clowns in make-up, Internet trolls hide behind "anonymous accounts and fake usernames." In their eyes they are the trickster and are performing for a nameless audience via the Internet. (wikipedia)

The NATO report describes that a "Wikipedia troll" uses a type of message design where a troll does not add "emotional value" to reliable "essentially true" information in re-posts, but presents it "in the wrong context, intending the audience to draw false conclusions." For example, information, without context, from Wikipedia about the military history of the United States "becomes value-laden if it is posted in the comment section of an article criticizing Russia for its military actions and interests in Ukraine.

The Wikipedia troll is 'tricky', because in terms of actual text, the information is true, but the way it is expressed gives it a completely different meaning to its readers." Unlike "classic trolls," Wikipedia trolls "have no emotional input, they just supply misinformation" and are one of "the most dangerous" as well as one of "the most effective trolling message designs."

Even among people who are "emotionally immune to aggressive messages" and apolitical, "training in critical thinking" is needed, according to the NATO report, because "they have relatively blind trust in Wikipedia sources and are not able to filter information that comes from platforms they consider authoritative."

A 2016 study by Harvard political scientist Gary King reported that the Chinese government's 50 Cent Party creates 440 million pro-government social media posts per year. The report said that government employees were paid to create pro-government posts around the time of national holidays to avoid mass political protests. The Chinese Government ran an editorial in the state-funded Global Times defending censorship and 50c party trolls.

A 2016 study for the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence (NATO StratCom COE) on hybrid warfare notes that the Russian military intervention in Ukraine "demonstrated how fake identities and accounts were used to disseminate narratives through social media, blogs, and web commentaries in order to manipulate, harass, or deceive opponents."

Corporate, political, and special interest sponsored trolls

Investigative journalist Sharyl Attkisson is one of several in the media who has reported on the increasing trend for organizations to utilize trolls to manipulate public opinion as part and parcel of an Astroturfing initiative.

Teams of sponsored trolls, sometimes referred to as sockpuppet armies, swarm a site to overwhelm any honest discourse and denigrate any who disagree with them.

A 2012 Pew Center on the States presentation on Effective Messaging included two examples of social media posts by a recently launched "rapid response team" dedicated to promoting fluoridation of community water supplies. That same presentation also emphasized changing the topic of conversation as a winning strategy.

In Internet slang, a troll is a person who sows discord on the Internet by starting arguments or upsetting people, by posting inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the deliberate intent of provoking readers into an emotional response or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion, often for their own amusement. (wikipedia)


The advice to ignore rather than engage with a troll is sometimes phrased as "Please do not feed the trolls."

“If someone is just talking about one topic, has no friends, no followers, he only talks about one topic and posts about it every two milliseconds, that’s definitely a bot….But now, bot makers are getting more sophisticated in making human patterns and human interactions,” Sy said.

Lazatin, however, has a quick tip on how to defend oneself against trolls: ignore them. 

“I think trolls feed on attention and so the way to deal with the trolls is not to give them attention. That’s it,” said Lazatin. â€" Rappler.com

Defense vs bots, trolls

Thinking Machines founder Stephanie Sy said one way to fight back is to identify when an account is a bot, but she she said this is difficult.

“It’s actually like a real war between two types of technologists. Every time someone builds a better bot detection, someone else builds a better bot,” she said.

Sy said, however, that studying the patterns of how bots post can help better identify ways to stop them. She added that bots are normally not connected to accounts of real human beings.

“People like Donald Trump are sort of the world’s biggest troll because they put forth half-truths, sometimes outright lies, and people eat that up. Then it ripples out into the Internet galaxy in exponential rates. And what started out as a lie or half-truth becomes the truth when it reaches the general public,” said Lazatin.

Veteran journalist Vergel Santos of the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility acknowledged the positive effects of technology, as it allows for better transparency and accountability in society.

But for him, the Internet these days is being used as a “brutal, vulgar, indiscriminate” weapon. 

“Technology has no morals. Technology has no values. Technology is too neutral for us to be relying on it alone,” he said.

“They are purveyors of artificial ignorance and I think this is what we’re seeing a lot on the Internet, especially on social media. And because of that, it has swayed public opinion,” said Lazatin.

“And what I’ve noticed when we talk about public debate, the Internet is not so much as public debate anymore as it is a screaming match. Whoever screams the loudest gets the most attention. And I think this is the sad thing about the Internet and social media today,” he added.

According to Lazatin, some influential personalities like Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump may even be considered as a troll.

Bots, paid trolls are ‘purveyors of artificial ignorance’

'The Internet is not so much as public debate anymore as it is a screaming match,' says Vince Lazatin of the Transparency and Accountability Network

By Mara Cepeda
Sat, Sep 24, 2016


TECH AND PUBLIC DEBATE PANEL. From left to right: Rappler CEO Maria Ressa, Transparency and Accountability NEtwork's Vince Lazatin, Rappler reporter Pia Ranada, Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility's Vergel Santos, and Thinking Machines founder Stephanie Sy. Photo by LeAnne Jazul/Rappler

MANILA, Philippines â€" Transparency and accountability advocates warned against the increasing number of bots and paid trolls online, calling their presence the downside of evolving technology today. 

Transparency and Accountability Network’s Vince Lazatin called bots and paid trolls as “purveyors of artificial ignorance” during the Technology and Public Debate panel at the #2030 Social Good Summit on Saturday, September 24. 

glad i've always been a believer of vco.

tawon sad uy. di kahibawo mangulitawo si ondoy...

During downtime on his 1989 tour, Dylan went out to see Tim Burton's Batman.

There aren't many more details available, but it raises many questions. Was Dylan upset by the film's exclusion of Robin? Did he dig the Prince songs? Was he bummed out when Val Kilmer took over as Batman in 1995? Has he seen the more recent Dark Knight trilogy? How about The Avengers?

http://www.rollingstone.com/

Joan Baez was no pushover.

Maymudes was shocked when Dylan married Sara Lownds. "I asked him, 'Why Sara?!'" Maymudes wrote. "'Why not Joan Baez?' He responded with, 'Because Sara will be there when I want her to be home, she'll be there when I want her to be there, she'll do it when I want to do it. Joan won't be there when I want her. She won't do it when I want to do it.'"

Victor was there when the legend cut Another Side of Bob Dylan in one amazing night.

"He had never sang the songs in front of anybody before [that night]," Maymudes says. "He just blurted it out, like electricity building up in a capacitor, and then shooting out, he had packed it all inside himself and let it explode. I was in a daze."

George Harrison was pissed off about Dylan's 30th-anniversary concert in 1992.

The all-star show at Madison Square Garden was widely believed to be for charity. It was actually for profit. "Harrison was so angry, he made T-shirts with dollar signs on them and sent them to me and Bob," Maymudes says. "George also got in trouble with Olivia, his wife. She tracked the last number he dialed on the hotel phone to a limousine company that I had arranged for him to use to send a limo for a girl he was involved with. When Olivia blew up over that, I found myself in the middle of the confrontation."

Dylan quit drinking in 1994.

"He just stopped on a dime," Maymudes says. "He didn't talk as much once he stopped and he didn't laugh as loud either. It was a really big deal for him and really showed his commitment to changing his behavior. He was capable of dealing with a broader range of personalities when he was drinking and after stopping, his tolerance for certain types of behavior diminished. Bob lost a bit of self-esteem when he sobered up, became  little more introverted and a little less social."

The night Dylan met the Beatles was kind of awkward.

Maymudes provides one of the most complete accounts of the famous summit, at the Beatles' New York hotel on August 28th, 1964. "Bob tried to roll a joint and it fell to piece in his hands," Maymudes says, "scattering pot over a bowl of fruit sitting on the table." Victor took over and rolled the joints himself. That helped liven up the party, but Dylan, who'd been drinking, passed out on the floor within an hour. "The following morning, Paul came up to me and hugged me for 10 minutes," says Maymudes, 'and said, 'It was so great, and it's all your fault because I love this pot!'"

6 Things We Learned From the New Bob Dylan Tell-All

Longtime road manager Victor Maymudes spills about the night he introduced the Beatles to pot, his relationship with Joan Baez and much more



Not many people get close to Bob Dylan, but Victor Maymudes â€" who was Dylan's road manager in the mid-Sixties and again from 1986 to 1996 â€" certainly did. Maymudes died in 2001, but he left behind hours of interview tapes, which his son Jacob has turned into a revealing new memoir, Another Side of Bob Dylan. The book, which hits shelves this week, traces their entire time together, from the coffee house days in Greenwich Village to their legendary cross country road trip in 1964 to the madness of the Never Ending Tour in the 1980s and 1990s. Here are six things we learned from the book.

2.

Blowin' In The Wind

How many roads must a man walk down
Before you call him a man?
How many seas must a white dove sail
Before she sleeps in the sand?
Yes, how many times must the cannon balls fly
Before they're forever banned?
The answer my friend is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

Yes, how many years can a mountain exist
Before it's washed to the sea?
Yes, how many years can some people exist
Before they're allowed to be free?
Yes, how many times can a man turn his head
Pretending he just doesn't see?
The answer my friend is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

Yes, how many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?
Yes, how many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, how many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer my friend is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

two of my personal bob dylan favorites:

1:

Mr. Tambourine Man

Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to
Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I'll come followin' you.

Though I know that evenin's empire has returned into sand
Vanished from my hand
Left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping
My weariness amazes me, I'm branded on my feet
I have no one to meet
And the ancient empty street's too dead for dreaming.

Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to
Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I'll come followin' you.

Take me on a trip upon your magic swirlin' ship
My senses have been stripped, my hands can't feel to grip
My toes too numb to step, wait only for my boot heels
To be wanderin'
I'm ready to go anywhere, I'm ready for to fade
Into my own parade, cast your dancing spell my way
I promise to go under it.

Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to
Hey ! Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I'll come followin' you.

Though you might hear laughin', spinnin' swingin' madly across the sun
It's not aimed at anyone, it's just escapin' on the run
And but for the sky there are no fences facin'
And if you hear vague traces of skippin' reels of rhyme
To your tambourine in time, it's just a ragged clown behind
I wouldn't pay it any mind, it's just a shadow you're
Seein' that he's chasing.

Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to
Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I'll come followin' you.

Then take me disappearin' through the smoke rings of my mind
Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves
The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow
Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves
Let me forget about today until tomorrow.

Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to
Hey, Mr Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I'll come followin' you.

QuoteThe problem many critics have with calling song lyrics poetry is that songs are only fully realized in performance. It takes the lyrics, music, and voice working in tandem to unpack the power of a song, whereas a poem ideally stands up by itself, on the page, controlling its own timing and internal music. Dylan’s lyrics, and most especially his creative rhyme-making, may only work, as critic Ian Hamilton has written, with “Bob’s barbed-wire tonsils in support.”

aaargh.

However, the best, most straightforward answer may have appeared in the liner notes of his second album, 1963’s The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, where Dylan said, simply: “Anything I can sing, I call a song. Anything I can’t sing, I call a poem.”

https://www.poets.org/

Professor Ricks is not the only scholar who considers Dylan a great American poet. Dylan has been nominated for a Nobel Prize in Literature every year since 1996, and the lyrics to his song “Mr. Tambourine Man” appeared in the Norton Introduction to Literature.

So do his song lyrics qualify as poetry? Even Dylan gets the two genres confused sometimes. He once called Smokey Robinson his favorite poet, then later backpedaled and said it was Rimbaud. He has alternatingly avoided this question and mocked it, as in his song “I Shall Be Free No. 10”:

Yippee! I’m a poet, and I know it
Hope I don’t blow it

It is indisputable, though, that Dylan has been influenced a great deal by poetry. He counts Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine alongside Woody Guthrie as his most important forebears. He took his stage name, Bob Dylan, from Welsh poet Dylan Thomas (his real name is Robert Allen Zimmerman). He described himself once as a “sixties troubadour," and when he talks about songwriting, he can sometimes sound like a professor of literature: “I can create several orbits that travel and intersect each other and are set up in a metaphysical way.”

His work has also veered purposefully into poetry. In 1966, he wrote a book of poems and prose called Tarantula. Many of the liner notes from his 1960s albums were written as epitaphs. And his songwriting is peppered with literary references. Consider, for example, these lyrics from “Desolation Row," released on 1965’s Highway 61 Revisited:

Praise be to Nero’s Neptune
The Titanic sails at dawn
And everybody’s shouting
“Which Side Are You On?”
And Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot
Fighting in the captain’s tower
While calypso singers laugh at them
And fishermen hold flowers

“The case for denying Dylan the title of poet could not summarily, if at all, be made good by any open-minded close attention to the words and his ways with them," Ricks wrote in Dylan’s Visions of Sin. “The case would need to begin with his medium.”

The problem many critics have with calling song lyrics poetry is that songs are only fully realized in performance. It takes the lyrics, music, and voice working in tandem to unpack the power of a song, whereas a poem ideally stands up by itself, on the page, controlling its own timing and internal music. Dylan’s lyrics, and most especially his creative rhyme-making, may only work, as critic Ian Hamilton has written, with “Bob’s barbed-wire tonsils in support.”

Christopher Ricks, who has also penned books about T. S. Eliot and John Keats, argues that Dylan’s lyrics not only qualify as poetry, but that Dylan is among the finest poets of all time, on the same level as Milton, Keats, and Tennyson. He points to Dylan’s mastery of rhymes that are often startling and perfectly judged. For example, this pairing from “Idiot Wind," released in 1975:

Idiot wind, blowing like a circle around my skull,
From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol

The metaphorical relation between the head and the head of state, both of them two big domes, and the “idiot wind” blowing out of Washington, D.C., from the mouths of politicians, made this particular lyric the “great disillusioned national rhyme," according to Allen Ginsberg.

The debate has raged on ever since, and even intensified in 2004, when Internet rumors swirled about Dylan’s nomination for a Nobel Prize in Literature, and five well-hyped books were released almost simultaneously: Dylan’s Visions of Sin, by Oxford professor of poetry Christopher Ricks, who makes the case for Dylan as a poet; Lyrics: 1962-2001, a collection of Dylan’s songs presented in printed form; Chronicles, the first volume of Dylan’s memoir; Keys to the Rain, a 724-page Bob Dylan encyclopedia; and Studio A, an anthology about Dylan by such esteemed writers as Allen Ginsberg, Joyce Carol Oates, Rick Moody, and Barry Hannah.

Bob Dylan: “I’m a poet, and I know it”

February 21, 2014

In 2004, a Newsweek magazine article called Bob Dylan “the most influential cultural figure now alive," and with good reason. He has released more than forty albums in the last four decades, and created some of the most memorable anthems of the twentieth century, classics such as “The Times They Are A-Changin," “Like a Rolling Stone," and “Blowin’ in the Wind.”

While Dylan’s place in the pantheon of American musicians is cemented, there is one question that has confounded music and literary critics for the entirety of Dylan’s career: Should Bob Dylan be considered a songwriter or a poet? Dylan was asked that very question at a press conference in 1965, when he famously said, “I think of myself more as a song-and-dance man.”

President Barack Obama presents the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Dylan in the East Room of the White House in 2012. The award is the country's highest civilian honor. "I remember, you know, in college, listening to Bob Dylan and my world opening up, 'cause he captured something about this country that was so vital," Obama said.

http://edition.cnn.com/

Dylan performs during the Grammy Awards in 2011. Dylan has won 10 Grammys in his career, as well as one Golden Globe Award and one Academy Award.

Dylan poses for photos at the University of St. Andrews after he received an honorary degree at the Scottish school in 2004.

Dylan appears with actress Jessica Lange during a news conference for the movie "Masked and Anonymous" in 2003. Dylan co-wrote the movie and starred in it.

Dylan performs in Brighton, England, in 2002.

Performance artist Michael Portnoy is taken off stage during Dylan's performance at the Grammy Awards in 1998. Portnoy had been hired as part of the background dancers for the performance, but his shirtless interruption was not planned and he was carted off stage.

Dylan and Bruce Springsteen perform together in 1990.

Dylan poses for a photo with David Bowie in 1985.

Dylan performs with Tom Petty at Farm Aid in Chicago in 1985.

Dylan performs with Robbie Robertson of The Band, right, and Van Morrison at The Band's farewell concert in 1976.

Dylan performs on stage at Madison Square Garden in 1974.

Dylan appears on set for the film "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid" in 1973. Dylan also recorded the soundtrack for the film.

George Harrison and Dylan perform in the Concert for Bangladesh, held August 1, 1971 at Madison Square Garden in New York. The concert earned them the Grammy Award for Album of the Year along with Billy Preston, Eric Clapton, Klaus Voormann, Leon Russell, Ravi Shankar and Ringo Starr.

Dylan listens to recordings of his album "Highway 61 Revisited" in 1965. It contained "Like a Rolling Stone," which went to No. 2 on U.S. charts.

Dylan performs on stage in the 1960s. Dylan was known in his early career for playing the guitar and the harmonica, and for his distinctive vocal phrasing.

Joan Baez and Dylan perform during the March on Washington, a pivotal moment in the civil rights movement, on August 28, 1963.

Dylan performs in 1961 at The Bitter End club in New York City. His first album, "Bob Dylan," debuted in 1962 and consisted mostly of old folk songs.

Photos: Bob Dylan: Voice of a generation


Bob Dylan smokes a cigarette circa 1966. Dylan's music spoke to a generation of people during the 1960s, a tumultuous decade that forever changed America. He went on to become a rock 'n' roll legend and influence many musicians to come. In October 2016, the Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to Dylan for "having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition."

But not everyone was making fun of Dylan's achievement, some defended the winner.

"Folks: Songwriting is writing, and Bob Dylan is one of the most influential writers in the last 100 years. It's a defensible Nobel pick," John Scalzi tweeted.

Max du Preez called out the "intellectual snobs" who criticized the songwriter and said he was backing Dylan.

While Robyn Hitchcock reminisced and said Dylan "launched me and many others on oceans of which we'd never dreamed..."

Many rejoiced in the "great news," adding that Dylan's words are still relevant today.

His words still resonate today. FINALLY some great news! #Bob Dylan wins Nobel Prize for Literature (13 Oct 2016, Nikki Busch)

A self-professed expert also praised the singer's win: "As a Pop Culture professor I have to do a fist pump and say YES! Dylan won a Nobel Prize in Lit!"[/color] (13 Oct 2016, Mike Posey)

And others simply tweeted in excitement: "Bob Dylan wins the Nobel Prize. Yes. Yes. Yes." (13 Oct 2016, Jeff Daniels)

edition.cnn.com/

Others were amused, writing: "My dad has been a Bob Dylan fan for over 50 years, and even he thinks this is hilarious." (13 Oct, Michael Deacon)

Some even predicted what trivia contests of the future would look like: "In 20 years time 'what did Bob Dylan and Winston Churchill have in common?' will be great quiz question." (13 Oct 2016, Duncan Weldon)

And while the famous singer-songwriter was rewarded for "having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition," one user questioned whether younger generations even know who the 75-year-old is.

"Millennial populations furiously Googling who Bob Dylan is," Kabir Taneja posted on Twitter.

And others, such as Pamela Paul, expressed disappointment that so many "deserving novelists" missed out.

Another said that while he appreciates Dylan's selection, he is concerned about the future of the award.

"My worry is not Bob Dylan winning, but flood gates opening for lyricists in future," Kabir Taneja said, attaching the lyrics of Rihanna's song "Work."

Bob Dylan's Nobel Prize win stirs fierce social media reaction

By Bianca Britton, CNN
October 13, 2016



(CNN)Bob Dylan has become the first songwriter to win a Nobel Prize in Literature, drawing praise from many on social media while others expressed shock and even amusement.

The award for Dylan appeared to divide Twitter users as some argued the unconventional winner wasn't deserving, particularly because he isn't in the established canon of literary writers.

"I like Bob Dylan as much as anyone, but this still seems a little strange," Eric Gordy wrote on Twitter.

sadly, i cannot imagine our own f. sionel jose as a notch above the likes of mark twain, vladimir nabokov, james joyce and anton chekhov; none of them appears on the roll of honor of the nobel laureate for literature.

His contribution to music has been the understanding that lyrics don’t have to follow the rules of everyday speech. He has inspired generations of song-writers to combine words in unusual and interesting ways. When Paul Simon wrote that he had “squandered [his] resistance for a pocket full of mumbles”, or when Bruce Springsteen recalled “soul engines running through a night so tender in a bedroom locked in whispers”, they were mimicking Mr Dylan’s eccentricities. He once described the experience, with characteristic obscurity, as like disappearing through the smoke rings of his own mind. It is a journey that many others have repeated.

http://www.economist.com/

Words in his songs rarely go together conventionally. At times the result is gibberish. “Subterranean Homesick Blues” might sound anarchic, but it is hard to make sense of “jump down a manhole / Light yourself a candle / Don’t wear sandals”. “Tarantula”, his book of stream-of-consciousness poetry, contains such oddities as “the chief of police holding a bazooka with his name engraved on it coming in drunk and putting the barrel into the face of a lawyer’s pig”. Occasionally, when recording a time-honoured ballad or a tale of injustice, his lyrics are straightforward and bare. But at his best, every word has been chosen deliberately to produce a complex, unusual effect. “Blowin’ in the Wind” might have the simple language of a parable; it is hard to imagine somebody before Mr Dylan, however, describing a white dove sailing many seas before she sleeps in the sand. Most of his compositions are made up of such images, viewed one after another.

Regardless of what you think about Mr Dylan’s fitness to join the ranks of John Steinbeck and William Faulkner as American Nobel laureates, you cannot deny his influence on modern song-writing. Popular tunes tend to have bland, clichéd lyrics. As Mr Dylan was recording his first singles, radios across the land blared “round, round, get around, I get around” and “she loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah”. His protest songs brought him to fameâ€"he performed during the March on Washington in 1963, where Martin Luther King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speechâ€"but he was not the first popular musician to dabble with more weighty topics. Woody Guthrie sang in defence of labour unions in the 1940s, around the same time that Billie Holiday was lamenting lynchings in “Strange Fruit”. What made Mr Dylan exceptional was the way that he phrased his thoughts.

Sara Danius, a professor of literature at Stockholm University and the permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy, justified this year’s choice by comparing him to Homer and Sappho: ancient Greek poets whose verses were “meant to be performed, often together with instruments”. Though the link might seem tenuous, literary history is well stocked with works that were penned with listeners in mind. Geoffrey Chaucer, William Shakespeare and Robert Burns all wrote for live audiences and produced plenty of song lyrics, too. The idea that contemporary singers belong in that lineage is gaining support in bookish circles. Sir Christopher Ricks, a former professor of poetry at Oxford University and one of the most famous living literary critics, wrote a book about Mr Dylan’s verse with a particular focus on his allusions to T. S. Eliot and John Keats. Sir Salman Rushdie described Mr Dylan today as the “brilliant inheritor of the bardic tradition”. Yet it is hard to imagine either man rating the singer above Mark Twain, Vladimir Nabokov, James Joyce or Anton Chekhov. None of those names appear on the roll of honour.

Giving a prize that is usually reserved for writers of literature to a world-renowned musician might seem as daft and gimmicky as awarding Barack Obama the Nobel Peace prize less than a year into his presidency. But not all past recipients of the literary award have been famed for writing novels, plays or poems. Winston Churchill collected it in 1953 “for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values”. Philosophers Bertrand Russell and Henri Bergson are both on the list of laureates. Indeed, Mr Dylan isn’t even the first songwriter to win. Rabindranath Tagore, whose creative output included thousands of Bengali songs, was chosen in 1913 for his “sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse”.

Knockin’ on history’s door

Bob Dylan wins a Nobel prize

Oct 13th 2016

BY J.T.
Timekeeper



BOB DYLAN might not seem to have much in common with the likes of Ernest Hemingway and William Butler Yeats. But as of October 13th, they are bound together by the Nobel prize in literature. The Swedish Academy has awarded the medal annually since 1901 “to the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction”, as requested by the will of Alfred Nobel. Mr Dylan won this year’s accolade “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition”. Few people would challenge that description of his impact on popular music. Many have questioned the decision to recognise it with the same honour that was once bestowed upon George Bernard Shaw, Jean-Paul Sartre and Rudyard Kipling.

QuoteSi F. Sionel Jose kaha sa Nobel for Literature?

i will be surprised thus, as i am surprised that bob dylan made it.

what a good read. if only those grand old men (and women) who mete out judgments on awardees take notice of this article.

Rogelio Moreno Gill, Panama, Panama: Frontonia (single-celled organism) showing ingested food, cilia, mouth and trichocysts â€" Differential Interference Contrast, 200x

David Millard, Austin, Texas, USA: Curvepod Fumewort (Corydalis curvisiliqua) seed â€" Image Stacking, 4.5x

Douglas L Moore, University of Wisconsin - Stevens Point Museum of Natural History, Stevens Point, Wisconsin, USA: Polished slab of Teepee Canyon agate â€" Stereomicroscopy, 90x

Dr Csaba Pintér, Keszthely, Zala, Hungary: Goatsbeard flower (Tragopogon orientalis) seeds â€" Focus Stacking, 1.4x

Marek Mis, Suwalki, Podlaskie, Poland: Leg of a water boatman (Corixidae) â€" Polarized Light, Darkfield, 25x

Dr Alvaro Roura, Instituto de Investigacións Mariñas,Ecology and Marine Biodiversity, Vigo, Spain: Viperfish (Chauliodus sloani) â€" Reflected Light/Darkfield, 20x

Matt Inman, Cremorne, New South Wales, Australia: Beta-alanine and taurine crystals â€" Transmitted Polarized Light/Focus Stacking, 10x

Dr Oscar Ruiz, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Centre, Houston, Texas, USA: Four-day-old zebrafish embryo â€" Confocal, 10x

Dr David Maitland, Feltwell, United Kingdom: Analgesic compound (salicin) extracted from Willow tree bark â€" Polarised Light, 50x

Jochen Schroeder, Chiang Mai, Thailand: Butterfly proboscis â€" Image Stacking, 6.3x

Dr Igor Siwanowicz, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), Janelia Research Campus, Ashburn, Virginia, USA: Front foot (tarsus) of a male diving beetle â€" Confocal, 100x

This year, the public will select the winner of the Popular Vote category. You have until 25 October to choose your favourite image.

We've published 20 of our favourites in this gallery. You can see the other 75 finalists and vote for your winner at the Nikon Small World site.


Yousef Al Habshi, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates: Eyes of a jumping spider (Hasarius adansoni) â€" Reflected Light, 9x

More than 2,000 photomicrography images from all over the world were entered into this year's competition. The judges have evaluated them on originality, informational content, technical proficiency and visual impact, and have narrowed the field down to 95 finalists.

Many of the images reveal the hidden beauty that can be found in the most unlikely of places â€" such as this picture of delicate fungi growing on cow dung.


Michael Crutchley, Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, United Kingdom: Fungi on cow dung â€" Darkfield, 30x

Amazing microscope images reveal beauty in unlikely places, like cow dung

Help choose the best microscope images, from a centipede's fearsome poison fangs to dung-dwelling fungi.

David Sim By David Sim
October 12, 2016       

This image of the fearsome poison fangs of a centipede, magnified so that we can see every hair and battle scar, is one of the finalists in the annual Nikon Small World competition. Now in its 42nd year, the contest recognises excellence in photography taken under a microscope.


Walter Piorkowski, South Beloit, Illinois, USA: Poison fangs of a centipede (Lithobius erythrocephalus) â€" Fibre Optic Illumination/Image Stacking, 16xWalter Piorkowski

you demand respect when you people don't hesitate to insult and shout at those you invite to your investigations!

you want respect? earn it.

The following sections address the complete health benefits of honey in its raw form and of bee pollen, propolis, and royal jelly:

      Antioxidant Effects

Honey, particularly darker honey, such as buckwheat honey, is a rich source of phenolic compounds, such as flavonoids, that exert significant antioxidant activity.

      Energy-Enhancing Effects

Honey is an excellent source of readily available carbohydrate, a chief source of quick energy.

      Wound-Healing Properties

The wound-healing properties of honey may be its most promising medicinal quality. Honey has been used topically as an antiseptic therapeutic agent for the treatment of ulcers, burns, and wounds for centuries.

      Anticancer Benefits

Propolis contains well-researched phytochemicals that have numerous cancer-preventing and antitumor properties.

http://www.snopes.com/

The health benefits of a particular honey depend on its processing as well as the quality of the flowers the bees utilize when collecting the pollen. Raw honey is honey that has not been pasteurized, clarified, or filtered, and this form typically retains more of the healthful phytochemicals lost to the standard processing of honey. Propolis is a product of tree sap mixed with bee secretions that is used by bees to protect against bacteria, viruses, and fungi. Propolis is unfortunately lost in honey processing, thus greatly reducing the level of phytochemicals known to protect against the germs; recent research suggests that these may also prevent certain types of cancer. Also important, healthy organic flowering plants will provide the raw nectar that will confer a higher-quality nutrient profile to the honey produced.

Within the propolis are well-researched phytochemicals that have cancer-preventing and antitumor properties. These substances include caffeic acid, methyl caffeate, phenylethyl caffeate, phenylethyl dimethycaffeate. Researchers have discovered that these substances in propolis prevent colon cancer in animals by shutting down the activity of two enzymes, phosphatidylinositol-specific phospholipase C and lipoxygenase, that are involved in the production of cancer-causing compounds.

That same work also says of honey:

Referred to in ancient Sumerian, Vedic, Egyptian, and biblical writings, honey has been employed since ancient times for both nutrition and healing medicine. For centuries honey has been a multipurpose food, used to give homage to the gods and to help embalm the dead, as well as for medical and cosmetic purposes. Some evidence suggests that despite the risk of bee sting, collection of honey has occurred since 7000 B.C.E., and since at least 700 B.C.E., beekeeping for the production of honey (apiculture) has been used. To the surprise of the Spanish conquistadors, the natives of Central and South America were already keeping bees for the purpose of collecting honey when they arrived. Honey was considered a food of the rich for many years. More recently, honey has decreased in popularity as refined sugar, which is cheaper and sweeter, has replaced the sweet, viscous liquid in common households all over the world.

Honey is a source of riboflavin and vitamin B6. It also provides iron and manganese. A 3.5 ounce (100 gram) serving of honey provides 304 calories, mostly as 82.4 grams of carbohydrate, almost all of which is sugar, 0.3 grams of protein, and 0 grams of fat. However, honey is more likely to be consumed by the tablespoon (15 grams), which provides 64 calories, 17.3 grams of carbohydrate, and 0.1 grams of protein.

Cinnamon has a long history of use in both Eastern and Western cultures as a medicine. Some of its reported uses are in cases of arthritis, asthma, cancer, diarrhea, fever, heart problems, insomnia, menstrual problems, peptic ulcers, psoriasis, and spastic muscles. There are scientific studies to support some of these uses. Some of the confirmed effects of cinnamon are as a sedative for smooth muscle, circulatory stimulant, carminative, digestant, anticonvulsant, diaphoretic, diuretic, antibiotic, and antiulcerative.

Cinnamon's unique healing abilities come from three basic components in the essential oils found in its bark. These oils contain active components called cinnamaldehyde, cinnamyl acetate, and cinnamyl alcohol, plus a wide range of other volatile substances.

Cinnamon is often used in multicomponent Chinese herbal formulas, some of which have been studied for clinical effects. For example, cinnamon combined with Chinese thoroughwax (Bupleurum lactiflora) was shown to produce satisfactory results in the treatment of epilepsy. Out of 433 patients treated (most of whom were unresponsive to anticonvulsant drugs), 115 were cured and another 79 improved greatly. Improvements were noted not only by clinical symptoms, but also by improvements in brain wave patterns. Other clinical studies have shown cinnamon-containing formulas to be useful in cases of the common cold, influenza, and frostbite. However, it is not really known to what degree the improvements noted are actually due to the cinnamon versus the other components.

As for the more grandiose medical claims made here, however, there's no credible evidence that either honey or cinnamon is effective in lowering cholesterol levels and thereby heading off heart attacks. And although some studies have tentatively found that honey and cinnamon may each potentially have properties that could aid in the prevention or suppression of some types of cancer, no study has documented that "advanced cancer of the stomach and bones have been cured successfully" through the admnistration of those two substances.

Honey and cinnamon (individually and together) have long been touted in folklore and traditional medicine as possessing significant nutritional and health benefits (even though how much those supposed benefits have been borne out by modern scientific studies varies quite widely). The Encyclopedia of Healing Foods notes of cinnamon, for example, that:

Origins:   

This item extolling the medicinal virtues of honey and cinnamon is based upon a 17 January 1995 article that appeared in the Weekly World News, the erstwhile supermarket tabloid known for publishing the fantastically fictional (it has since transitioned to an online medium), so as a piece of medical literature it should be taken with many grains of salt.

In general, both cinnamon and honey have some moderate antibacterial/antiseptic properties, so the use of them may help ameliorate symptoms of minor ailments such as bladder infections, toothaches, pimples, and skin infections (if those ailments are being caused by bacteria that are sensitive to honey and/or cinnamon). However, neither honey nor cinnamon provides broad-spectrum relief of pain or other symptoms, and more efficacious remedies for all of these problems are readily and cheaply available.

CANCER: Recent research in Japan and Australia has revealed that advanced cancer of the stomach and bones have been cured successfully. Patients suffering from these kinds of cancer should daily take one tablespoon of honey with one teaspoon of cinnamon powder for one month 3 times a day.

FATIGUE: Recent studies have shown that the sugar content of honey is more helpful rather than being detrimental to the strength of the body. Senior citizens who take honey and cinnamon power in equal parts are more alert and flexible.

Dr. Milton who has done research says that a half tablespoon honey taken in a glass of water and sprinkled with cinnamon powder, taken daily after brushing your teeth and in the afternoon at about 3:00 p.m. When the vitality of the body starts to decrease, increases the vitality of the body within a week.

BAD BREATH: People of South America first thing in the morning gargle with one teaspoon of honey and cinnamon powder mixed in hot water, so their breath stays fresh throughout the day.

LONGEVITY: Tea made with honey and cinnamon powder, when taken regularly, arrests the ravages of old age. Take 4 teaspoons of honey, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon powder and 3 cups of water and boil to make like tea. Drink 1/4 cup, 3 to 4 times a day. It keeps the skin fresh and soft and arrests old age.

PIMPLES: Mix three tablespoons of honey and one teaspoon of cinnamon to make a powder paste. Apply this paste on the pimples before sleeping and wash it next morning with warm water. If done daily for two weeks, it removes pimples from the root.

SKIN INFECTIONS: Apply honey and cinnamon powder in equal parts on the affected parts to cure eczema, ringworm and all types of skin infections.

WEIGHT LOSS: Daily in the morning 1/2 hour before breakfast on an empty stomach and at night before sleeping, drink honey and cinnamon powder boiled in one cup water. If taken regularly, it reduces the weight of even the most obese person. Also, drinking this mixture regularly does not allow the fat to accumulate in the body even though the person may eat a high calorie diet.

IMMUNE SYSTEM: Daily use of honey and cinnamon powder strengthens the immune system and protects the body from bacteria and viral attacks. Scientists have found that honey has various vitamins and iron in large amounts.

Constant use of honey strengthens the white blood corpuscles to fight bacteria and viral diseases.

INDIGESTION: Cinnamon powder sprinkled on two tablespoons of honey taken before food, relieves acidity and digests the heaviest of meals.

INFLUENZA: A scientist in Spain has proved that honey contains a natural ingredient which kills the influenza germs and saves the patient from flu.

UPSET STOMACH: Honey taken with cinnamon powder cures stomach ache and also clears stomach ulcers from the root.

GAS: According to the studies done in India & Japan, it is revealed that if honey is taken with cinnamon powder the stomach is relieved of gas.

CHOLESTEROL: Two tablespoons of honey and three teaspoons of cinnamon powder mixed in 16 ounces of tea water, given to a cholesterol patient, was found to reduce the level of cholesterol in the blood by 10% within 2 hours. As mentioned for arthritic patients, if taken 3 times a day, any chronic cholesterol is cured. As per information received in the said journal, pure honey taken with food daily relieves complaints of cholesterol.

COLDS: Those suffering from common or severe colds should take one tablespoon lukewarm honey with 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon powder daily for 3 days. This process will cure most chronic cough, cold and clear the sinuses.

BLADDER INFECTIONS: Take two tablespoons of cinnamon powder and one teaspoon of honey in a glass of lukewarm water and drink it. It destroys the germs in the bladder.

TOOTHACHE: Make a paste of one teaspoon of cinnamon powder and five teaspoons of honey and apply on the aching tooth. This may be applied three times a day until the tooth stops aching.

HEART DISEASES: Make a paste of honey and cinnamon powder, apply on bread, chapatti, or other bread, instead of jelly and jam and eat it regularly for breakfast. It reduces the cholesterol in the arteries and saves the patient from heart attack. Also those who already had an attack, if they do this process daily, are kept miles away from the next attack. Regular use of the above process relieves loss of breath and strengthens the heart beat. In America and Canada, various nursing homes have treated patients successfully and have found that as you age, the arteries and veins lose their flexibility and get clogged; honey and cinnamon revitalizes the arteries and veins.

Honey and Cinnamon Cure

An article that extols the purported medical virtues of honey and cinnamon exaggerates their benefits.

David Mikkelson
From the Archive

Claim: Honey and cinnamon possess significant medicinal virtues.

Conclusion: MIXTURE

Example:   [Collected via e-mail, July 2006]

It is found that mixture of honey and cinnamon cures most of the diseases. Honey is produced in most of the countries of the world.

Scientists of today also accept honey as a "Ram Ban" (very effective) medicine for all kinds of diseases.

Honey can be used without any side effects for any kind of diseases. Today's science says that even though honey is sweet, if taken in the right dosage as a medicine, it does not harm diabetic patients. Weekly World News, a magazine in Canada, in its issue dated 17 January, 1995 has given the following list of diseases that can be cured by honey and cinnamon as researched by western scientists.