Indecisive

Several years ago, I wrote a critique of a book styling itself The Mammoth Book of the World’s Greatest Chess Games – one supposes there are other “Mammoth Books” of various other things out there – in which I mainly criticized it for its selection – or perhaps presentation – of games that turned on one or two brilliant moves (or inaccuracies). I also found the notation off-putting, and the game notes uneven, but the lack of variety seemed its greatest drawback.

I am working through the volume again – the games, after all, are certainly among the best played, though other authors might make other choices – and would now mute that criticism somewhat. It’s still true that the notes tend to find a single “turning point” in most games, and true that the notes will often claim a certain key error, and then spend most analysis on another move instead. But what I noticed this time was a lack of clarity of purpose about the book.

Each game is followed by summary “Lessons from this game”, and if one supposes the work was conceived, choosing games exemplifying one or two key principles each – easily identified in a critical move or mistake – makes sense. There are certain stylistic problems that remain: many of the “lessons” are facile (the authors religiously adhered to at least three per game, leading to the inclusion of observations such as “Capablanca was a genius!” where other points are not easily found), while others are overly technical.

The “one key move” focus, though, could be somewhat excused as a teaching technique; but to make this case I am assuming the book was repackaged in some way for actual publication, which is not actually evident from any of the introductory material. And the second problem, that plagues discussion of many competitive events, is whether “greatness” in competition is most accurately found in a convincing display or superiority, or in an evenly contested struggle. These authors seem to lean towards the former – possibly influenced by looking for “teaching moments” – in this volume, despite claiming to seek “quality and brilliance of play by both contestants”.

Whether the selection is quite justified or not, the presentation, even on a modified view, does not quite live up to the task the authors set themselves: my explanation is a multiplicity of purposes not well represented to the reader.

Similarly plagued by a lack of single purpose is Dr. Gordon H. Clark’s small volume titled Logic, published in the 1980s. Though published by the author, it reads much like the hypothesis sometimes made to account for our versions of certain texts of Aristotle, which is that what we really have amounts to lecture notes. Clark attempts in some 130 pages to do no fewer than four things, which are: to defend the study of logic from a Christian point of view and against Christian critics (one supposes, Biblicists); to teach the Aristotelian or syllogistic system of logic; to introduce his own new system of logical notation; and to defend the the Aristotelian system, at least for ordinary use, against the intrusion of the logic of propositional calculus (especially as represented by the works of Bertrand Russell).

It is perhaps unsurprising that the work founders, as a whole. The first goal is largely accomplished in a short introduction. The didactic part of the work is contained in the first eighty pages, and is a reasonable outline of a textbook for a semester’s study, but not actually such a text itself. The next thirty pages or so are devoted to historical notes; miscellaneous logical topics not strictly Aristotelian; and a defense, possibly sufficient but not entirely clearly stated, of Clark’s own system against Russell’s approach – or at least, an approach to logic for which Clark is content to single out Russell as a key figure to blame. (Russell’s own lack of humility may have made him the target of choice, I would guess.) The final pages return to theological considerations, adding proof texts but otherwise nothing significant that was not stated more succinctly in the introduction.

The book – as might be guessed from this summary – drifts in tone. The introduction and preliminary instructional material seem written for high school or even middle school students; by the end, he is engaged in collegiate or even seminary wrangling. One supposes – as he was a college professor – that the latter represents the true intended purpose of the work; but the beginning makes me suspect his students may have found him patronizing. I also wonder whether those students – to say nothing of the additional audience gained by publishing the book – were quite as familiar with Latin as he assumes throughout: not that he uses much if any of that language, but he makes fairly frequent reference to its study.

The greatest weakness is clarity in the final third of the book. On the Aristotelian matter, Clark is clear enough, if leaving quite a a bit to work out “as an exercise for the reader”, as the books say. But his own notation is not entirely accessible, and gets muddled up for the reader as he tries to defend it, partly through his contention that Russell and others did not actually develop their own propositional notation correctly. It becomes hard to untangle what Clark intends to promote from his attempts to demonstrate the unsatisfactory results of others by correcting their systems and then demonstrating the error. I think, incidentally, that Clark has a point here! But I don’t think his system quite works out either, and in any case you don’t get much of anywhere by constantly jumping back and forth between topics.

But the first two thirds really would be worth somebody’s reworking them into a teachable text.

Miscellaneous

I’ve got less time to write with school starting up, but here are short reviews on a few things leftover from the summer.

Humankind

It’s a game mimicking Civilization-style gameplay. Two major differences are the inclusion of a “hunter-gatherer” phase before you’re allowed/able to actually found a city, and the ability to establish “outposts” without committing to a whole city. It’s also much easier to incorporate the neutral tribes (analogous to more recent Civ releases city-states) into your empire. In fact I haven’t finished a game yet but judging by game status I’m really not sure how you’d lose on normal difficulty.

I quite like the artwork, but it’s a little harder to follow the terrain – in part because there are multiple levels navigable. The interface doesn’t make it very obvious how to implement your different options or take advantage of resources/features, either. (I started with tips set to the level supposedly appropriate for having played games like this before; I wonder if extra tips would have helped? But in that case those tips aren’t very well calibrated.)

The computer’s combat AI is much, much better than I’ve seen from Civ games. I haven’t tried the “manual tactics” mode to see if it makes a difference, but computer forces are very good at targeting units they’ll defeat. I don’t mind the way the “retreat” mechanic works but I think it’s bugged – your units will automatically back away until some kind of condition is met in the programming, but this can end up with them halfway across the continent – distances that ought to take 7 or 8 turns. You’re also basically forced to keep up skirmishes in order to maintain your “war support” meters, which annoys me.

Overall, it’s got some neat features, and is a little more transparent in places than especially recent Civilization releases, but I don’t think it’s unseating the titan any time soon.

Moby-Dick

He just kept talking in one long incredibly unbroken sentence moving from topic to topic… quite hypnotic. Of course Melville doesn’t actually confine himself to a single sentence, but it really is a little bit like listening to somebody who just won’t shut up – and you don’t quite want him to.

I started reading this years ago on a college visit and was fascinated by the first fifty pages or so I read. I’ve kept meaning to come back to it. I’ve finally gotten around to it, but admittedly still haven’t finished it. I will; but so far I find it hard to believe I’ll ever re-read it afterwards.

It reads a bit as though it was published serially, although I don’t believe it was; my thought, honestly, is that Melville was a short story writer with delusions of novelistic grandeur.

Creatures of Light and Darkness

Like a couple other Zelazny novels, this one seems to have been cobbled together from previously-written short stories, possibly not intended to be related. The plot tying them together deserves, I thought, a little more reverence and pathos than Zelazny actually give it. The writing is that of the author at his most elliptical except for certain obscene details; I read it, and then immediately read it again just to figure out what actually happened. It is, in short, not to my mind a success as a book, whatever the effect of certain scenes.

The universe of the book, incidentally and anachronistically, reminds me of nothing so much as the work of Iain Banks; apart from certain unmistakable stylistic elements that mark it as Zelazny’s work, one could easily believe it a juvenile effort of Banks, before he mastered his own distinctive style – which is effective through realism: Banks leaves you convinced that the absurd and despicable might really exist side by side. But Zelazny’s style highlights the incongruities in the story compared to our expectations, and the end result here is highly unsatisfying.

Starliner

A stand-alone novel by David Drake, best known for his military science fiction, it might be one of his better efforts. The dedication calls it “a book I wanted to write”, and I can only speculate as to the reasons. Oh, there are fist fights and gun fights and mercenaries floating around – there’s a certain resemblance to the early Hornblower books – but on the other hand, there’s not that much sci-fi floating around out there glorifying customer service. I’m inclined to think Drake wrote it just to prove he could do something different.

But then there are the twists – and break-neck pace – of the last couple chapters, which leave you rather wrung out and wondering if the book was more serious after all. Watch carefully when the question of duty is raised – and Drake gives an answer, but he seems to me to be positively inviting criticism and discussion.

Review: Klara and the Sun

Kazuo Ishiguro’s latest novel tells the story of Klara, a fully intelligent robot designed as a companion for a child. The style is simple but clear enough. The plot is suspenseful, and characters are compelling despite being lightly sketched: since there are only a few main characters we understand their personalities through their interactions.

I thought overall the effect was something like a short story – I particularly was reminded of Ray Bradbury – expanded to the length of a novel. The novel is a story and only a story. Ishiguro neither makes ethical or philosophical asides himself, nor allows his characters to digress. However, it’s not an adventure, and the conflicts are muted, meaning the book has the tone of stories “about” some theme, which I associate with the short story genre: the reader is invited to draw conclusions, or make arguments, about the choices of the characters. Possible candidates for a theme could be: religion and superstition (which I would argue seems to dominate the narration); personhood and uniqueness; and risk, success, and social duties.

I found this a difficult read in places as the plot eventually revolves around an illness – the existence of which as a fact I deal with very badly in my own life, perhaps partly due to having avoiding virtually any serious hurt myself. I was fascinated by how Ishiguro handled this in story – or rather that he doesn’t “handle” it: like the rest, it is just there, an element of the story which must be accepted, starkly unsettling as it can’t be ignored or explained away or minimized.

The other thing worth mentioning is the unique way Klara speaks, especially when compared to her internal narration (the book is written as her first-person account), although that also has its idiosyncracies, which mostly serve to illustrate how she experiences the world.

At the final verdice, Klara and the Sun is a good book. It’s the first I’ve read by Ishiguro: if one assumes his prize-nominated and -winning novels are even better, they also are certainly worth reading as well.