Hello, World. And More Posts! - Revisited!

Hello World Post

 As I put the book that I was reading down into my lap for a moment, I shuddered.  Looking around the Quad I saw other students walking across the brick pathways, conversing and laughing with one another en route to class. It was a warm and breezy summer day, but somehow Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? managed to pull me out of this enchanting reality. I felt disconnected from it all. Confused even.

…. What was I doing here?

 The obvious, but wrong, way to interpret and answer that question would be that I was reading my book!  I paused and asked myself this question again as I imagined any amateur philosopher would. (Mainly by repeating the same question but with added emphasis.)

…What was I doing here?

 More questions ensued.  What is reality? What does it mean to be alive? Soon.  A flurry.  What does it mean to be human? How “human” am I? What does it mean to empathize with another human being? What does it even mean to be authentic? How the hell am I supposed to find the answers to any of these questions and, well, do androids really dream of electric sheep??

 Of course, maybe I had been out in the sun too long.  Who knows. Could it have been that these rambling delusions were the symptomatic signs of heatstroke, or had this book gotten under my skin somehow and struck a chord within me? 

 I admit that’s definitely, definitely not a loaded question. Anyway the point is, well, I’ve read Nietzsche’s The Will to Power, Hume’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, and many other short stories and works by other prominent philosophers, such as Dostoevsky, Kafka, Sartre, and Camus, for both pleasure and academic studies.  But never had I felt the urgency to put one of these books down and simply reflect on things.  I don’t mean to imply that these books are vapid and useless.  They’re fucking brilliant. 

But.

 These philosophical works just don’t have the same effect upon me as science-fiction novels do for many reasons.  And I’m not talking about superficial gadget science fiction here. This stuff is quality Scifi.  What I mean by that is that there’s not only tension produced by some pivotal/controversial force, but also character development that drives the story forward and generates a communicating, ultimate message.  (I realize that may sound confusing now, but I mean to elaborate on that in depth in future posts, specifically by examining the protagonist’s journey in Philip K. Dick’s novel, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?)

Returning to why I enjoy Scifi and not Phi for philosophical sustenance? Well I believe that it’s purely a personal thing. I’ve always loved hearing and telling stories.  If you haven’t noticed already, I have a very playful imagination and I always make the most of that.  And personally, I believe that however concise one is, that language ultimately limits.  I believe that more can be said with less. Scifi does not set out to unearth absolute truths as in philosophy, but to first and foremost tell a story.  Thus it is up to the reader to interpret the Scifi novel and arrive at his or her own level of understanding.  (Or in my case as I was sitting on the Quad) or question the truths that one previously held in regards to many different aspects of life.

This is truly the beauty of fiction, and not merely science fiction, I realize. 

Science fiction just allows the author to paint with a more extensive palette – to envision and create a story with a more imaginative setting and with no limitations and obligations to restrict oneself to mere reality.  

What it in the world could be better than that?  Well if I haven’t convinced you yet, that’s what I aim to do in this blog.  Stick around, give it a shot, and I hope you enjoy.

Profile Post – David Dufty’s PKD blog

I’m not sure how I found this blog to begin with, but with a URL like pkdick.com, the author of this site, David Dufty, must have created his blog “P. K. Dick: His legacy and influence” quite a while ago.  The site is very… “old-school” in its formatting in the sense that there are only seven columns on the left side of the page to navigate around the site, and with links within each of the seven column pages to other, more indirect pages.  This is somewhat confusing. (The dark blue screen with lighter blue text doesn’t necessarily help to make the blog more readable.  Hell… I feel like I’m staring at a blue screen of death...)

But more importantly than any of this is the context that Dufty has to offer in regards to Philip K Dick’s cultural impact.  And he really knows what he’s talking about.   He makes it clear under the “this site” column that his blog “is intended to be not so much about Philip K Dick himself, but about his influence on modern culture, ranging from science fiction to artificial intelligence and Gnosticism.”  He adds that he developed the site in a way to chart the rise of PKD in popular culture.  I like that the title of this section is “chasing the ripples”.  That almost has a chilling effect... “like tears…in the rain…” Well maybe not like that specifically, but still, pretty cool.

Anyway, I was already beginning to guess that Dufty was more than an enthusiast of PKD and possibly even a writer and/or researcher of Dick’s work.  Dufty’s personal blog confirms this.  No wonder his PKD blog is full of so many gems I’ve never read before! He has written a book about Philip K Dick called Philip K Dick Android (it’s kind of a crazy story, but I really want to check it out! Actually I plan on purchasing it soon.  I’m nerding out here, but this is worth going off on a tangent because I think it’s awesome how Dufty wrote his book as self professed “narrative non-fiction”.  He admits that it reads like fiction, since “a mixture of fiction and fact is always fiction, no matter what the ratio”, and this really excites me because I feel like I would enjoy that special experience)

The cover of David Dufty's new book!

Anyway, returning to a few specific posts from Dufty’s PKD blog…

Since my own blog is entitled Scifilosophy, it seemed pretty obvious that I would naturally gravitate first to the philosophy column.  Woah.  There’s some heavy stuff here and Dufty reveals the patterns and themes inherent in all of PKD’s works.  Gnosticism – the world is a prison! (Dufty has a link to a PKD gnostic society but I believe the link is broken, although I know it worked a few months ago...?)The i ching (Chinese fortune telling method).  Solipsism.  Reality. Paradoxes – catch 22’s, fate, and the infamous Voight-Kampff Test.  Oh man.  I could go on listing things for a while. This is my science fiction/philosophical wet dream right here.

Within this column, I clicked on the paradox link and found a post titled “Paradox, tragedy, and Philip K Dick” pertaining to Dick’s novel VALIS.  Which Dufty admits “contains the single most astonishing sentence I have ever read, in either fiction or non-fiction.” Which is… “I am Horselover Fat, and I am writing this in the third person to gain some much-needed perspective.”  From here on out, Dufty utilizes his analytical writing skills to deconstruct this sentence for us, much like how one would remove Legos from a completed Lego set one-by-one in order to see all of the original pieces.  He demonstrates how this literary device, where the author confesses this fact to the reader on page 3, that’s right, “page three of a two-hundred page novel.” Furthermore, although I realize that this is purely Dufty’s own extrapolation, Dufty seems to get inside Dick’s mind.  He explains that revealing this secret on page 3 “gives the impression that he wanted to keep it a secret, but he just couldn’t keep up the ruse.  He blurts it out like a five year old with a new secret.” Dufty even provides a colorful allusion to what kind of confusing, un-easing experience this is like for the reader. He calls it the “literary equivalent of getting into the passenger seat of a car, then realizing that the driver is on drugs.  You don’t know what’s going to happen next, and you’re wondering if you should get out while you can.”

I can’t think of a better way to explain the feeling that I get when I read certain works of PKD.  There’s something about that unease, however, that makes PKD’s novels challenging, but all the more exciting and incredible.  Assuming you can stomach it.

Another interesting post from Dufty’s website that I recommend is the PKD android.  I never knew about this before and it is ABSOLUTELY ABSURD.  Apparently someone thought it would be rather nifty to create a robotic, functioning replica of Philip K. Dick.  (Wonder if he’s rolling around in his grave at the thought of that one, huh?) I mean the guy wasn’t necessarily a roboticist himself, but many of his works explored the boundaries between humans and machines.  Anyway you can read it for yourself if you’re interested, and keep in mind, there’s a bizarre twist at the end! So that should keep you hooked if you weren’t already.

PKD the android! Crazy stuff.

And definitely check out the other contents of Dufty’s blog if you’re interested in any of the things I’ve mentioned.  Unfortunately, I don’t think Dufty regularly updates this blog anymore, but it’s a great launch site for PKD enthusiasts and it has links to many other interesting PKD blogs and websites.  Hope you enjoy.

Voice Post – Ragle Gumm’s Total Dick-Head Blog

With a title like Total Dick-Head, the real question is, how could I not choose this blog to examine voice? It’s not just an amusing play on words.  Ragle Gumm is obsessed with Philip K. Dick. In a good way.  And he updates his blog constantly with any news related to PKD.

Great 'shopped picture Gumm!
It's too funny.

A few years ago, Gumm discovered that another blogger named Gregory McNamee attacked PKD in an article McNamee titled Philip K. Dick - Even Paranoiacs Have Enemies.  (Which surprisingly, or maybe even more surprisingly, isn’t up anymore! I don’t know who blogs on Britannica anyway, but perhaps Gumm shamed convinced McNamee to take his blog down?) Well either way, Gumm’s counter-McNamee post is rather adequately titled “What A Dick!”

Titles speak volumes about not only what to expect from the ensuing material, but also how the author characterizes his or her own work.  In this case, it’s clear to me at least that Gumm has chosen to take an equally playful, but reprimanding approach toward addressing McNamee’s post.  (Either that or Gumm is more obsessed with Dick(s?) than I originally thought…)

Anyway moving on!

Gumm begins by establishing McNamee’s complaints.  Which mainly has to do with how Dick’s bleak outlook on life was a result of many personal problems.  Now Gumm is being a gentleman and a scholar here.  It’s clear he recognizes these things were an ongoing challenge that Dick faced while writing.  As he admits, everything McNamee stated was “chronicled at length in Sutin’s biography, Dick’s letters and even in his fiction”.  But he really doesn’t appreciate McNamee’s over-generalization and almost apathetic (android-like anyone? …anyone?) treatment of Dick’s persona.  I can tell that he feels this way because of how his sentence structure changes. 

After quoting McNamee saying that “Not much in Dick’s life was right”, Gumm states that “it’s the usual litany of accusation against the author: multiple marriages, drug abuse, agoraphobia, cruelty. OK, not exactly the nicest stuff, but certainly in bounds.” Gumm’s almost…casual defense of PKD… is exemplified by how he modifies litany with “usual” in order to convey the sense that McNamee’s arguments are not only under-qualified, but also a trivial contention that Gumm has most likely seen often from many other critics of PKD.  This feeling of such a regular occurrence is heightened by Gumm’s listing of all the aforementioned problems.  And he ends this list with a capitalized OK.  As in, that’s ENOUGH. WE GET IT.

After this point, it’s time for this Dickhead to point out the flaws in McNamee’s points, and simultaneously, PKD’s strengths.  In italics, Gumm emphasizes that what McNamee has said about Dick “is a terrible thing to say”.  It’s almost as if Gumm is scolding a child, and it very well might be the case because as Gumm continues, he makes it evidently clear that McNamee did not understand the complexities of PKD’s works. 

Here Gumm’s writing picks up pace and becomes a list of sorts, once again, but not in the same vein as before.  He wants us to appreciate how things in Dick’s works are “sinister, impenetrable, and unknowable; things have no community, only commodity, and act without concern for others”.  There is a flow of support from Gumm here, and the semicolon only serves to redirect that current into a more expansive idea set.

Gumm then uses a more passive verb such as “suppose” and in the first person to concede the fact that McNamee may be right in regards to how thing-oriented and materialistic some of Dick’s characters are.  However, he interjects that Dick “never lets these selfish people off the hook”.  Furthermore, Gumm drives this final nail into the coffin by cherishing the fact that these characters self-obsessed characters pay “for their self-concern and egotism with isolation and existential angst – isolation they feel precisely because they are human”.  Using italics for emphasis in this final sentence, Gumm is able to transcend the simple idea of how Dick deals with wicked characters with a dash that acts as a temporary buffer between two different, but equally important ideas.

With that abrupt and artificial pause, Gumm is able reach a more complex and profound conclusion that these characters, despite their egos, are still human.  And we, as the readers, can nonetheless learn from their.

ALSO:

…Comedy gold right here. 

Gregory McNamee replied to this blog (approximately a month later) saying:

“Your juvenile headline certainly doesn't put me in any hurry to reconsider my statement or opinion. Thanks so much for your contribution to humane discourse.”

Ouch.  Lighten up McNamee! Or at least reconsider your argument/address your concerns with Gumm.  I’d like to see that firefight go down sometime.

Oh and beneath McNamee’s hilarious comment? A spam-bot selling Tibia (the MMO) Gold decided to join the conversation.  And then a runescape-bot added a third plea for users to purchase gold.

Go figure…