In lue of Lars’ absence last night, here’s a link to a story about a stuntman who has built a viking-style ship out of ice cream sticks. Who ate the ice cream is not reported.

This is not a post. This is just a filler to substitute for a post.

The weather today turned out to be both rain and snow. Precipitation full of ambivalence. The radio advises me to take about twice the time I’d ordinarily plan for any travel tonight.

On the bright side, the flight is delayed. (No, it’s not on American. Bet the plane’s full of bumped American passengers, though.)

This has all the earmarks of a night in which I may not get to bed at all.

Elsewhere on Britannica’s blog some folks are criticizing Ben Stein’s movie, Expelled, in context of an essay Stein wrote for the Expelled website. Robert McHenry writes:

“Darwinism . . . is a perfect example of the age from which it came: the age of Imperialism” [Stein says.]

And therefore . . . Well, he doesn’t say. This is called an enthymeme, or a rhetorical syllogism. The idea is that the conclusion gains force from seeming to occur spontaneously to the reader. This is the sort of thing that gives rhetoric a bad name.

But why isn’t “Darwinism” offered as a perfect example of, say, the Victorian Age? Or of the Steam Age? Or the Age of the Clipper Ship? Is it possible that Stein is loading the argument just a tad?

A little bit later he tells us that “Imperialism had a short but hideous history – of repression and murder.” He seems to think that the British, and specifically the Victorians, invented imperialism. This idea would surprise the Incas and the Arabs and the Spanish and the Portuguese, among others around the world. He seems also to believe that the results of European imperialism were uniformly terrible. Some were, some were not.

Somehow, I think McHenry is missing the point. Between the first quote and the second, Stein explains the therefore McHenry asks for. Stein writes:

But it fell to a true Imperialist, from a wealthy British family on both sides, married to a wealthy British woman, writing at the height of Imperialism in the UK, when a huge hunk of Africa and Asia was “owned” (literally, owned, by Great Britain) to create a scientific theory that rationalized Imperialism. By explaining that Imperialism worked from the level of the most modest organic life up to man, and that in every organic situation, the strong dominated the weak and eventually wiped them out, Darwin offered the most compelling argument yet for Imperialism. It was neither good nor bad, neither Liberal nor Conservative, but simply a fact of nature. In dominating Africa and Asia, Britain was simply acting in accordance with the dictates of life itself.

There’s a long comment thread after both essays.

Over the next four years, Disney plans to release 10 animated movies, 8 of which will be in digital 3-D. Coming up will be two princess movies, two sequels to Pixar films, what looks like an Underdog take-off, and one based on a Phillip K. Dick story.

Tags: Disney, animation, 3D

CBS.com has all of the original Star Trek shows online in a good quality stream with a few commercials. Other shows are available too. Looks like a great way to waste time.

It’s spring, but the wrong kind. More April in Bergen than Paris.

The weekend was nice. The weekend was great. As I drove around, spending too much money on stuff I’d put off buying for too long, I actually had to roll my car window down a little, to cool off. It got up to about 70° (that’s about 20° for you Celsius types).

But yesterday and today have been cool and overcast, with some rain. “Cool” in this case means temps in the 40s, which would have seemed tropical a couple weeks back. So I’m being unreasonable. I admit it freely.

My motives, however, are honorable. I want to go out and take my evening walks. And in my present health condition, still dragging the corpse of the flu around behind me, I refuse to tempt fate by walking in a chill breeze. Especially if it’s drizzling.

And I’ve come to the conclusion that working out on my ski machine in the basement actually causes me to get sick. Maybe there’s mold in the air down there.

Or maybe I’m just sick of the ski machine.

In any case, I watch for the sun as the watchman on the city wall waits for the dawn.

I’m sure that’s a biblical citation, but I can’t find it in my Cruden’s.

I bet I could find it if the sun was shining.

The guys at Rotten Tomatoes got to see 30 minutes of Pixar’s new summer movie, Wall-E, and talk to the director afterward.

What kind of reaction were you getting because in the first 30 minutes there was no dialogue in the film?

Andrew Stanton: First of all, I think that that’s a misnomer. There is dialog all through it. All I am saying is that they are not necessarily saying words in a language that you know. What I wanted was integrity. It all comes down to just as much as I believe that Luxo is a lamp and that it has a life in it and it thinks like a lamp and acts like a lamp and I don’t have to be told that, it doesn’t have to be spelled out to me, I just get it right away, I wanted the same thing with the robots.

I’d like a diagram of that last sentence, please.

Charlton Heston’s great ordeal ended on Saturday. Our condolences to family and friends. There must be some relief in the knowledge that he’s found rest at last, and there’s no shame in that. They’ve had plenty of time to say goodbye. Now is the time to commemorate an admirable life and a body of work that will live as long as our civilization is remembered.

Alas, I’ll never get the chance to see him play Sigfod Oski in the film version of Wolf Time, as I once dreamed.

“The Ten Commandments” was the first movie I ever saw in a theater (our family had seen “Around the World in Eighty Days” a while before that, but in a drive-in). My folks had to warn Moloch and me not to tell Grandma Walker we’d gone, because she didn’t approve of movies. Biblical movies didn’t make it any better—rather worse; they were a kind of blasphemy.

My major memories of that experience were the quality of the music (I’d never heard anything like it before), and the shots of the red clouds on Mount Sinai.

Later, my mom took Moloch and me (and maybe Baal, I’m not sure) to see “Ben Hur.” So I think I can say I saw both movies in their first runs. In actual theaters.

One of my favorite novelists, Stephen Hunter (who’s also film critic for The Washington Post) wrote an appreciation (hat tip: Powerline). I have to say I have a higher opinion of Heston’s movies, particularly of “The Ten Commandments” than he does.

I’m not one of those who watch TTC every year when they broadcast it on TV, but I did watch it again a couple years back. I recognized a certain stilted, pageant-like quality in the production, but I was also impressed with the way the screenplay (and Heston’s performance) delivered a faith lesson through Moses’ story. First you have the hot-shot young prince who thinks he can change the world with a single, dramatic action. When this fails, and he becomes a refugee, he thinks he’s learned his lesson. A small life and small goals are plenty for him now.

Then the burning bush appears, and he’s faced with the challenge of doing God’s work in God’s way. We feel his fear, his self-doubt and see how much hard work faith is. The powerful way Moses comes through in the end, looking just like Michelangelo’s sculpture (minus the horns) doesn’t diminish the fact that he’s earned his confidence through a series of very hard lessons.

I think it goes without saying that there’s no actor out there today the least bit like Charlton Heston. If they had the audacity to remake “Commandments” or “Ben Hur” today, they’d inevitably have to cast someone with a shorter shadow. But then the moviemakers would make the part smaller too. In the 21st Century, we look for heroes who make us feel better by comparison, not heroes who make us want to be greater than we are.

“The Robot Is Going to Lose. Not by much. But when the final score is tallied, flesh and blood is going to beat the damn monster.” – Adam Smith, economist.

I wonder if anyone has told these boys they’re going to lose. I wonder if they are programmed with Asimov’s three laws of robotics. (via Very Short List)

Writer Nancy Johnson says, “Say hello to your local cheesemonger.” She offers a few tips on trying new cheeses, reading about cheese, and even making cheese at home.

Here’s the best advice for storing cheese: don’t. Instead, take home small portions and visit your friend behind the cheese counter more often. If that’s impractical, then remember this: a good cheese is still alive, needs to breathe, and suffers if it loses too much moisture.

In related news, Wallace & Gromit will have a new adventure next fall.