[Edu-sig] Recanting

[kirby urner]

> In the little web research I did this morning I find him being
> described, with admiration, as someone who was driven mad by the 20th
> century.
>
> I've saved the 21st for that ;)
>
> Art

He makes a lot of people batty, but remained himself quite coherent
through it all.  At no point does he transform into a raving lunatic,
which is what happens at the end of some of these great genius stories
(Nietzsche, Howard Hughes, Ross Perot, Lyndon LaRouche).  However,
some, upon cracking the cover of Synergetics, beg to disagree.  They
don't see it as great American literature (yet).

Also, his contribution won't get lost in the whelter of whole foods
and banked freeway ramps.  The geometric iconography is quite
distinctive, much like the Grateful Dead's is/was.

The geodesic dome and hexapent are only two motifs in a much more
involved composition, complete with jitterbug transformation,
inside-outing, other stuff in my Python/VPython hypertoon.

But with all of these intellectual currents, it's really about the
people, the community, just as Python is a lot about the Python
community (Perl about Perl's -- which I'm awed by).  I'm one of the
players, the one doing to most to build a bridge to/from Python Nation
shall we say, but many more are working other angles.  Like, there's a
workshop going on right now, in Asheville, North Carolina...

Kirby