Two days in and three books down.
I haven’t the first idea what an algorithm looks like or what it does or how it does it. It’s something mathematical and that finishes it for me. But Robert Harris‘s The Fear Index takes an interesting look at the sort of thing that went wrong in the financial and banking sectors: hubristic gamblers ceding too much to computers on the grounds that they can do the sums quicker. The moral questions come thick and fast.
Julian Barnes has written a beautiful novella in The Sense of an Ending. Apart from the narrative itself, which kept me intrigued until the final page, the writing is wonderful. The idea of someone having to re-write their history in the light of information that arises later in life about events that happened when younger is a familiar one to anyone with a pulse. But Barnes ruminates on mortality, relationships, loss and regret. And there is a poignancy running through the narrative that captures the common experience of thinking that life should be better than it usually is:
Just as all political and historical change sooner or later disappoints, so does adulthood. So does life. Sometimes I think the purpose of life is to reconcile us to its eventual loss by wearing us down, by proving, however long it takes, that life isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. (p.105)
Discuss.
John Bell needs no introduction. For many people his name is synonymous with the Iona Community. HIn addition to his prolific output of music and hymnody, he broadcasts on Thought for the Day on BBC Radio 4′s Today programme. He is never boring – he uses words as if each one matters and finds the language to engage as well as inform. Rooted deeply in the language and content of the Bible, he brings to his speaking and writing a prophetic, reasoned passion that demands an equally biblical response. His second volume of ‘thoughts’ and essays is entitled All That Matters and cannot be read without some response.
One taste reflects back onto the questions raised by Harris and touches on Barnes’ sense of mortality:
The prophet is someone who reads into the present state of society and discerns two things: the consequence of present actions in advance of a crisis, and an alternative reality which is worth striving for. (p.55)
A fourth book, which I am reading a bit at a time, is David Crystal‘s wonderfully informative and entertaining The Story of English in 100 Words. Number 7 is ‘Mead’ and in Old English you could call someone who had drunk too much of it ‘medu-werig’ (mead-weary). From Barnes I learned the word ‘lucubrations’ (look it up – I had to!), but I can see I’m going to get far more use out of ‘medu-werig’.
January 3, 2012 at 1:54 am
Conditions of uncertainty abound, not only on econometrics, but in film and literature, such as Resnais’ Last Year at Marienbad, based on the Robbes-Grillet script, or R-G’s The Eraser, or Scott’s Alexandria Quartet.
Using a computer to do the sums shouldn’t make any difference to the morality, people make the decisions, and greed/self interest are usual motives. We are built that way, for the most part, and our models of human behaviour rely on them. Without such predictability much of life and most economic life would be without a compas.
Snowflake5 ‘s blog on US non Recoursive Mortgages is a sine qua non for understanding what went wrong. The root of the failure in the derivatives Market has a very simple and moral root: US mortgage holders (most) can walk away from a mortgage and owe nothing, which in a property recession makes sense. It means the poor don’t get lumbered with debts if they have to move on. Moot perhaps, but not invomprehensively wicked.
January 3, 2012 at 11:28 am
Hi Nick,
I have just read ‘The Sense of an Ending’ and found it a fascinating read – never has my Kindle dictionary been so well-used…
Also making a second attempt at reading Robert Harris’s ‘Imperium’.
Every blessing for 2012! Mick
January 3, 2012 at 11:39 am
“Moot perhaps, but not invomprehensively wicked.”
Does that mean, then, that there is no moral element? Were private individuals in the US not bombarded with cheap credit offers, cheap mortgage offers, up to 120% mortgage offers? Were banks really lending economically and morally responsibly?
Or was it, like in the UK, far too much based on the lazy assumption that property prices would keep on rising and that, ultimately, no-one would ever have to pay?
January 4, 2012 at 9:20 am
I was very disappointed in Barnes’ book. It was Adrian Mole in late middle age. Veronica was less funny than Pandora and less believable. The conversation with her half-brother’s carer was quite off the wall. But most of all I am surprised that you too are dazzled by his fine prose into colluding with his negative view of life. Neither Foucault nor John of the Cross thought their life a failure. It is a serious failure to allow such views as his so well expressed to go unchallenged.
January 4, 2012 at 2:29 pm
RHW Arguile, I didn’t collude with his negative view of life. I thought it was a good book and well-written. I also recognise that there are huge numbers of people whose hopes of life are constantly disappointed – possibly because their hopes are unrealistic. Acknowledging this reality is not the same as thinking it is all there is to say about it.
January 6, 2012 at 11:54 am
In response, I am sure that there are differences of opinion about how good Barnes’ book is. The point may be a subtle one. Is Becket’s Waiting for Godot to be admired? If so, is its challenge to faith to be taken seriously? I answer, Yes to both. Barnes’ sad story is a challenge to faith: it does not merely question the value of memory and the significance of life as a narrative; nor does it merely identify a single disappointed life: it purports to defend that view of life as normative. It is a clever book but a bad book. Ulrich Simon, that great OT theologian was able to say of Brecht that his very cleverness confused people into accepting his virtue-denying principles. The angels do not have a single dogmatic vision but one has to discern whether one is on their side.
I am an admirer of your blog but I think that sometimes speedy insertions can suffer from lack of reflection. I think that you do collude with Barnes wider distopic vision, which is a shame.
January 6, 2012 at 6:44 pm
RHW Arguile, I do not collude with Barnes or his world view. But, he represents the world view assumptions of many, many people I know. A representation of that – and the consequences/implications of it – is no bad thing. Not every narrative has to be topped and tailed with a moral corrective. Maybe I have spent too much time with complicated people with complicated lives doing complicated things in complicated times.
January 7, 2012 at 10:40 am
I was ordained even longer ago than you, I fear and am not without experience. Always dangerous to pull rank. I think the book stinks.
January 7, 2012 at 3:25 pm
RHW Arguile, I have re-read my response to you and fail to see where I ‘pulled rank’. I accept that you don’t like the book; I did. Not because I agree with Barnes’s world view, but because I ink he represented very well the world view of many people I know. I think the ‘rank’ issue is yours and not mine.
January 8, 2012 at 11:19 am
‘Maybe I have spent too much time with complicated people with complicated lives doing complicated things in complicated times.’
January 8, 2012 at 1:57 pm
RHW Arguile, what on earth does that have to do with length of time we have been ordained or ‘pulling rank’? It is a statement about me, not you. I have no idea who you are – and certainly don’t head for Crockford’s in case any commenters are ordained. I respect your view of the book, but to read into that comment a motive that isn’t there suggests that ‘rank’ is an issue for you and not me in this instance. However, I hope it won’t stop you commenting and disagreeing with my choice of books.
January 8, 2012 at 4:05 pm
what is crockfords?
either way, JB is a great writer!
January 8, 2012 at 4:13 pm
I have followed this debate with interest because I, too, have been reading “The Sense of an Ending”. It seems to me that Barnes refuses to conclude either way or any way, even with the line of thought that all you can truly say of any historical event is that “something happened”. The sense we have of an ending, any ending, is precisely that, a sense of something i.e. not the thing itself, which never does end. What we have is “accumulation” etc [last lines of the book]. Interestingly, the passage that Nick quoted is immediately preceded by this:
” Someone once said that his favourite times in history were when things were collapsing, because that meant something new was being born. Does this make any sense if we apply it to our individual lives? To die when something new is being born – even if that something new is our very own self?”
He doesn’t answer that question, he follows it with an alternative possibility. When he achieves such a careful balancing act, I don’t see how it is possible to conclude that he has “a negative view of life”. Why would anyone write such a book, any book, if he thought it was not possible for a phoenix to rise from the ashes?
January 11, 2012 at 11:44 am
I am sorry. I deduced, perhaps wrongly, that your comment on your own breadth of experience implied that this gave you a wider view as to the merits of the book.’Too much time’ is otherwise a strange phrase. It was, with respect, not I who introduced the element of autobiography. My response merely pointed out that others had spent a lot of time with those whose lives were complicated but came to a different view. ‘Rank’ had nothing to do with our respective roles within the church but the breadth of our experience in dealing with complicated lives. I am sorry if that confused you.
I am sure that writing a blog is very demanding and exposes you to criticism. You quite rightly want to take advantage of every opportunity to debate the gospel in the world. You take a risk because you must write in haste in order to be topical. The risk is worth taking. However, I think the last contributor misses the point: people do, like Samuel Becket, Sartre and Bacon make artistic statements which point to a very negative view of life. I take the point that the book is more nuanced than I had described it and one fruit of all this is that I shall read it again. I did not mean to irritate you, only disagree.
January 11, 2012 at 6:22 pm
RHW Arguile, I assure you I was not irritated – I just wanted some clarity. Thanks for reading the blog and for commenting. Please do not stop either!
January 11, 2012 at 6:24 pm
I think this story has moved on and we should close this thread now. I haven’t been able to keep up with responding as I have been working all hours. Thanks to all for comments and debate – all of which remains on the record here for when we pick it up again in the future.