Imitation Vanilla

http://rhythmshare.com/f78ve1

I get lifted till I'm spinning like a sandstorm
'Cause imitation is flattery of the highest form
They called me Daniel eight days after I was born
By age four I was more middle class than Marshall Mathers was poor
So this is my story in all its glory
How I went from Columbus Torah all the way to the top forty
I'm not the real Slim Shady 'cause Marshall Mathers came before me
Taught me how to perform and make your fans adore me
He told me "don't do drugs because they're habit forming"
My formative years spent with my white Jewish peers
Pop music by gay men was always ringing in my ears
Like Elton, Pet Shop Boys and George Michael
And Freddie Mercury was always riding his bicycle
But what did I know? I was just a little vanilla icicle
Searching for a rebbe, a role model whose ideas I could recycle
So I took a walk down the Shvil Yisrael
Eschewing showers, collecting sea shells
Five weeks on trail we were beginning to smell
Like a country garden in the nether reaches of hell
Alter Shimon always had a rhyme to spit or a tale to tell
He memorized "the real Slim Shady" so well he had me MFROTFLOL
And little Danny Pop had never heard that stuff before
Like someone snuck into my mind and opened a trap door
Before I knew it I was Slim Shady number three hundred and four
The new unit out the drawer from the Slim Shady store
Attack of the clones like it was Star Wars
Now, would the world be worse off one Slim Shady fewer?
I'm not sure, but if you feel the way I feel I've got the cure
Imitation Vanilla, 100% pure

chorus:
I'm not Shady
I'm not the real Shady
I'm MC Complete and I'm just imitating
And while you're all debating who's the real Slim Shady
I'll be imitating all the music that you're making

Ran far away to Far Rockaway
So they keyed me up and threw the lock away
I talk a way that most folks can't understand
Like I'm a refugee from Hip-hopistan
I'm complete like a breakfast with Raisin Bran
But I'm losing my mind 'cause I can't find my master plan
I swear it was right here in my right hand
Must have been snatched by some sycophantic fan
Who wants to try to imitate the imitation man

(chorus)

So will the real Slim Shady please stand up
The Dr. Dre with the real degree stand up
All you record labels who like to compete stand up
And let's see who's got the sweetest contract

For MC Complete
Come on, you know you need it
Don't make me repeat it

Will the real Slim Shady please stand up
The Dr. Dre with the real degree stand up
The record labels who like to compete stand up
And let's see who's got the sweetest contract for MC Complete

They Come and Go

In the summer after I graduated from college, I hiked around Israel for a few weeks with my future brother-in-law, Alter Shimon Riess. We started at Kibbutz Dan in the north and hiked to Eilat in the south, more or less following the Israel National Trail. Somewhere around the middle of the country, I put my water in my backpack without screwing on the lid correctly. A few hours later, we discovered that the water had leaked out and drenched the camera (along with a few other unmemorable things).

For whatever reason, we hadn’t taken many pictures on the trip, and the ones we had taken were nothing to write home about. The only photograph that I really missed was the photograph of the wild chameleon. It had been a truly spectacular sight, and we’d gotten what had promised to be a great picture.

But in hindsight, who cares? I can search Google Images and get 20 million pictures of chameleons. I can even post one in my blog.

As Queen Maraud once said: in space, you’re weightless anyway.

The Naziest Sound Around?

I’ve been listening to some 2-Tone Ska recently. Mostly the two bands that I used to listen to in high school, “The Beat” (also known as “The English Beat” and “The British Beat” for copyright reasons) and “Madness”.

I started reading some wikipedia on Madness and ska and discovered some things that were very surprising to me. I had no idea that ska in general, and Madness in particular, is skinhead music. So then I read the wikipedia entry on skinheads. To my surprise, skinheadism originally had nothing to do with white supremacy, and was in fact originally inspired by the Jamaican “rude boy” subculture. Apparently the nazis took over skinheadistan in the 1970s, and there are still pockets of resistance. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinhead#Racism.2C_anti-racism_and_politics.

The wikipedia article on Madness in particular is very sympathetic. The basic idea is that, while many fans of Madness were nazis, the band in general tried to distance itself from skinheadism. (Note that Madness first gained success in 1979, by which time most skinheads seem to have been nazis, and see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madness_(band)#Skinhead_controversy).

Madness often opens live performances with the song “One Step Beyond”. This song was also the first track, and title track of Madness’ (very successful) first album. Here’s the lyrics:

Hey you, don't watch that
Watch this!
This is the heavy heavy monster sound
The nuttiest sound around
So if you've come in off the street
And you're beginning to feel the heat
Well listen buster
You better start to move your feet
To the rockinest, rock-steady beat
Of Madness...
One step beyond!

The song itself is an instrumental song by Prince Buster, but the lyrics are by Madness. The first two lines are a quote from another song by Prince Buster. Clearly, the term “buster” in line 7 is a reference to Prince Buster. According to Wikipedia, the members of the band idolize Prince Buster, who (according to some accounts) is the inventor of ska. Prince Buster is a black Jamaican.

The problem is that line 4 isn’t really “the nuttiest sound around”. Listen to it. It’s “the naziest sound around”. I’ve listened to the original and a performance from 1991. Is “nazi” just Cockney for “nutty”, or something? I checked three lyrics sites and they all said “nutty”. Also, Madness recorded a Spanish version; if some of my Spanish-speaking readers could listen to the Spanish version and tell me if that says something analogous to “nazi” or “nutty”, I’d very much appreciate it.

Free Egypt: A Platonic Dialog by MC Complete

Daniel: You know what really ticks me off? Dictators. I want the Egyptian people to be free. Mubarak needs to go.
Benjamin: But what if he’s replaced by somebody worse, like the Shah was replaced by Khomeni?
Daniel: That would be bad. I don’t want Mubarak to be replaced by another tyrant. I support the pro-democracy movement in Egypt. But I certainly don’t support Mubarak.
Benjamin: But don’t you think that even a democratically elected government in Egypt could be more anti-Israel than Mubarak?
Daniel: The Arab street can’t be trusted to vote the right way, so we should just stick with the dictators? I can’t accept that. Look, it’s possible that there will be a democratic government that is more anti-Israel than Mubarak. But I think that freedom in Egypt would be good for Egypt and for the Egyptian people and it would make the world a better place. We can’t let fear and small-mindedness prevent us from taking a stand for freedom.
Benjamin: But what if the current unrest is resolved in such a way that it leaves Mubarak stronger than ever? We don’t want him to be mad at Israel and the US. Other Western-leading Arab leaders are also afraid of democracy. Maybe we shouldn’t risk offending them.
Daniel: How many times have Mubarak and King Hussein complained about the occupation? They’re not exactly on the payroll of the Hasbara, if you know what I mean. Look, Israel has peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. We’re not shooting at each other. We even have diplomatic relationships. But we never promised to help prop up their oppressive, autocratic regimes. It doesn’t say “we will kiss your ass” anywhere in the peace treaties. (I think.)
Benjamin: Don’t you think you’re being a bit too idealistic?
Daniel: I am idealistic when it comes to freedom. And I’m not saying anything original or profound either.
Benjamin: I know, and your blog is usually so deep.
Daniel: I don’t even know why I’m writing this. I guess I was just feeling frustrated because of that story in Haaretz that said that the Israeli government was quietly supporting Mubarak in the diplomatic channels.
Benjamin: What makes you think that Israel has any influence in diplomatic channels?

Some Thoughts on Fine-Tuning in "The God Delusion"

If I could debate Richard Dawkins, I bet I could make an agnostic out of him. Here’s what I would say:

1. The only candidate solutions to the cosmological fine tuning problem (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine-tuning) are the anthropic principle and intelligent design (I mean cosmological design, not evolutionary design).
2. The anthropic principle only works in a multiverse.
3. Science can’t detect the existence of a multiverse.
4. In other words, science can’t distinguish between a multiverse and intelligent design.
5. Given the fact of cosmological fine-tuning, it’s reasonable to assume that either a multiverse exists or a designer exists.
6. You can’t invoke Russel’s Teapot anymore. There’s no reason that the burden of proof should be on intelligent design, nor, for that matter, is the burden of proof on the multiverse.

Many people I’ve spoken to don’t accept premise #1 & #2, but Dawkins does, and I think he’s right. God willing, I’ll explain why in a future post, or you can just read “The God Delusion”.

Some people wouldn’t agree with #3, but I think most people, including Dawkins, probably would.

At point #5, Dawkins strongly disagrees. He thinks that there is a good reason not to believe in a designer. Here is his argument:

1. The universe is very complex.
2. If the universe had a designer, the designer must be very complex.
3. So someone must have designed the designer.
4. But then, of course, someone must have designed the designer of the designer, and so on.

In my arrogant opinion, this is kind of silly. It’s basically an argument from personal incredulity. The problem is point #2; who says the designer must have been complex? Maybe the designer was/is very simple. But Dawkins just can’t accept that a very simple being could have designed a very complex universe, so he doesn’t believe in intelligent design.

Arguing on the Internet: Another Naive Atheist

I just read Ricky Gervais' op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, Why I'm an Atheist. It's well written, and it's nice in a lot of ways. I couldn't help agreeing with a lot of things he says. Gervais doesn't have the mesoraphobia and political ambitions of Dawkins' New Atheist crew. However, when Gervais starts talking about science and religion, he shows some naivete, in my arrogant opinion. So here's a platonic dialogue, where Gervais' lines are taken from the op-ed itself.

Ricky: Science seeks the truth. And it does not discriminate. For better or worse it finds things out.
Daniel: What do you mean, "science doesn't discriminate"? Do you mean that science isn't biased? Come on. Lots of scientists are biased. The scientific community has no shortage of biases.
Ricky: Science is humble.
Daniel: Oh, come on. I'm sure the scientific community could be more arrogant than it is, and of course many scientists are humble, but on the whole, the scientific community is not humble.
Ricky: It knows what it knows and it knows what it doesn’t know.
Daniel: Does it? Did 18th century science know what it didn't know? Scientists who think they know what they don't know are arrogant indeed.
Ricky: Whatever you “believe,” this is not as effective as medicine.
Daniel: What is that supposed to mean? Effective at what? According to statistics, religion seems to be pretty "effective" at making people happy. Religion may not be as effective at medicine in curing pneumonia, but neither is vector calculus. So what?
Ricky: From what I’ve heard the very definition [of God] is a logical impossibility in this known universe.
Daniel: Who told you that? That's not science. I think you've been reading too much Dawkins.
Ricky: You know, you're right. I should take the paragraph about science out of my WSJ op-ed.
Daniel: Wait a minute, you're only supposed to say things in this dialogue that you actually said in the op-ed.
Ricky: Why are you complaining to me? You're the one writing this blog!

keep on the shady side

MC Complete
Like a mana tzimhonit
Coming on fresher than a slice of whole wheat
After that, it’s rinse and repeat if desired
Why do I do hip-hop, you inquire?
Why don’t you ask Hashem? He’s the One Who inspires me
See ‘cause some Yiddin come with their emuna hard-wired
But my beliefs are acquired from the Yeshiva Boys Choir
I’m nerdy to the extreme, whiter than caesar dressing
But the sunny side is considered harmful like unit testing
It reminds me of a short story by Doris Lessing
One page and it’s already depressing
So keep on the shady side, steal the blessings
‘Cause the angel changed my name to MC Complete
I used to be continually discreet
Now I’m eating more beets on the shady side of the street

chorus:
Keep on the shady side, always on the shady side
Keep on the shady side of life
Find a cool and shady place
Far away from the ultraviolet rays
When you keep on the shady side of life

Hot sun beating down
Enough to put a frown on Jolly Solly the clown
It’s just a typical November in my home town
Sunshine everywhere like the cosmic microwave background
Oops! There was an error! File not found!
No plugin installed for that page that you crawled
Fortunately I have the antidote so I’m glad that you called
I’ll just shoot you a quick email with a really small attachment
It’s a safer, more secure implementation of Flash
So next time you’re watching punk videos by the Clash
My plugin will sell all your assets so you’ll have some extra cash
It’ll hack your Mac apart and make your Windows crash
Yo, I told you that the internet is a dangerous place
It’ll poison your mind like arsenic and old lace
Before you know it you’re friends with Ken Kaniff on MySpace
(OMG are you Slim Shady??) No, fool, I’m his replacement
Slim Shady is locked in the basement with Dr. Dre
If you really want them they’re on sale on E-Bay
‘Cause that savoy truffle is nothing but trouble and tooth decay
‘Cause it’s easy to be happy when the skies are gray
But it’s the shady side that saves your skin on sunny days

(chorus)

Yo brother where art thou?
We’re getting ready to start now
I got Imitation Vanilla in my shopping cart now
I guess it’s time to checkout
The Grand Design that Stephen Hawking is always talking about
Stephen Hawking an atheist? I seriously doubt it
These days the atheist chat rooms are too crowded
Endowed with nothing but loudmouths and shouting matches
Shuffling assumptions like dynamic dispatches
Hanging on every Babel fish that Douglas Adams catches
You atheists are more myopic than a cyclops with a eyepatch
So you can all just open my attachment

(chorus)