Thursday, June 05, 2008

Distant Voices: Ophelia Benson & Jeremy Stangroom

Catastrophism
A theory describing what occurs when we're asked to explain our ideas clearly.
Dream
Freud explained them. Whatever they seem to be about, they're about sex and wanting to kill people really. Except they're also messages from the Beyond or from extra-terrestrials.
Edge
A thing it is necessary to be on the cutting part of.
Education
Brutal, violent intrusion of arbitrary material into the clean innocent heads of children, which should be left empty.
Fashion
Important ethical principle. Something that is behind the times is very wrong indeed.
Force
A thing you want with you.
Human Gnome Project
Most likely something to do with genetic engineering. Probably the idea is to create a new race of tiny human beings.
Quantum
First name of various ideas that no one understands, least of all scientists, so it makes a great metaphor for chaos, complexity, relativity, randomness, Postmodernity, and just about anything one needs a metaphor for.
Relativity
What Einstein had a very special theory of, which means that it's all, like, relative.
Spiritual
What to call a belief that perhaps is not terribly plausible or even possible but makes people feel special and magical.
Truth
A quaint, old-fashioned word, like bustle or barouche-landau or button-hook. No longer needed.

- Dictionary of Fashionable Nonsense

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