Albert Ellis' New Guide for Rational Living book review

We tell ourselves lies and half-truths about how things, others & ourselves should be, pretty much all the time and we end up believing it all. That's the root of Albert Ellis' New Guide for Rational Living and also the starting point to rationally fixing many neuroses.
In this book Ellis (along with Robert A. Harper) explains how these lies come about, their harm and how they can be successfully tackled. These irrational beliefs, as they call them, are:
1. You must have love or approval from all the people you find significant.
2. You must prove thoroughly competent, adequate, and achieving.
3. When people act obnoxiously and unfairly, you should blame and damn them, and see them as bad, wicked, or rotten individuals.
4. You have to view things as awful, terrible, horrible, and catastrophic when you get seriously frustrated, treated unfairly, or rejected.
5. Emotional misery comes from external pressures and that you have little ability to control or change your feelings.
6. If something seems dangerous or fearsome, you must preoccupy yourself with and make yourself anxious about it.
7. You can more easily avoid facing many life difficulties and self responsibilities that undertake more rewarding forms of self-discipline.
8. Your past remains all-important and that because something strongly influenced your life, it has to keep determining your feelings and behavior today.
9. People and things should turn out better than they do and that you must view it as awful and horrible if you do not find good solutions to life's grim realities.
10. You can achieve maximum human happiness by inertia and inaction or by passively and uncommittedly "enjoying yourself."


Note the 'musts' and 'shoulds'.


Each of these beliefs are given a chapter and given the same general exposition. First, the idea is presented and explained, point by point on how it is rubbish. Then, the authors give a transcript or two from their own patient interviews showing how they beat down their patient's resistance to sanity over hogwash. Finally, again point by point, give guidelines for self-adjustment.


It appears to me that great many an unhappiness can be dealt with this approach. However, I believe that for some others this can only be a starting point and that the help of a proffesional is to be encouraged. Recommended by itself and also as a modern approach to Stoic texts.

Chiptune on vinyl: a preview

So here you have me after deciding to buy a new record player, the AT-LP3, browsing through Amazon's vinyl offerings for new records to try out, when, at the soundtracks section, I came face to face with my first videogame chiptune vinyl. This was Castlevania released by Mondo and my first reaction was that of excitement. Just imagine the wonderful tunes from Castlevania re-created and on vinyl no less. However, my excitement soon turned to puzzlement as I dug deeper. This was no enhancement, or orchestration, but the music almost straight from the NES to the vinyl. Why?

Backside of Castlevania III

You may know all about it, but this is not just a one-time event. Several record producing companies have released over the last 3 to 4 years videogame music on vinyl. Immediately after Castlevania I came across Mega Man, Zelda, Street Fighter 2 and many many more totaling about something at least two dozen titles. All these belong to a category named "chiptune" which is a subgenre of electronic music and mostly refers to music from the 8-bit and 16-bit era and new original music composed in the same style.

Why the sudden surge of interest from the labels? The vinyl revival has been going on for close to a decade now and that adds the underlying push to any musical enterprise on the format and that, granted, is a factor. I have not zeroed in on the reason (my guess is demographic trends, our desire to own and nostalgia), but I can identify some common aspects revolving around this surge of video game music on vinyl:

• Most of the music appears to be without any enhancement.

• The releases are expensive. Plain and simple with no qualifications. In comparison with regular soundtrack releases one is paying more per LP and some titles can go quite high even while still in stock. Street Fighter II retails for $75 for instance; Persona 5, a recent RPG, for $100 and that's just the standard version. Shorter soundtracks go around $20-$35.

• The availability is not that great. From what I've seen each release is typically limited to 1000 copies, though there are some that go up to 2000 and not much beyond but that's including all variants. Represses of sold-out titles do happen, but this is chancy as even popular titles have it dim. I entirely missed the Mother/ Earthbound series.

• Some releases (Persona 5, Undertale, SF2) include what appears to be every sound which I feel is overkill. Does one really need to listen to (and pay for) everything only to get to the good parts? I'd rather have a carefully selected album than every bit of incidental sound, but that's just me.

• Out of stock releases seem to fetch high prices at Discogs.

• Acoustically speaking, I can understand on some level why it would make sense for something recorded digitally on good equipment, say, from the CD-ROM era onwards be transferred to the vinyl format. However, I find no reason why chiptune would sound better on vinyl. Without rehashing all the analog versus digital controversy, I do find that magic does happen when the needle strikes the wax. For that to happen, the medium and the needle have to have something to work with and it is my belief that chiptune doesn't cut it. The beeps and boops do not seem rich enough. I am yet to experience an actual chiptune recording, so I'll withhold verdict for now.

• There are complaints online about some releases in respect of quality control. Surface noise and off-center holes do happen with some frequency.

• Artwork is the third factor of the composition-wax-looks triad. In the wider encompassing soundtracks category, as well as in our current niche discussion, care, artistry and ingenuity have been poured into the releases of our current generation. The visual designs are generally all-new for all labels recovering the essential elements of the seminal works. This ramps up the visual enjoyment of owning physical media and firmly establishes many of the releases into the collectible sphere. While some labels do slack a bit going for minimalist designs on some albums, there are others that appear to bring out consistent eye candy (Wax Work Records comes to mind). I am somewhat against collecting as a hobby, as it distracts from religious duties for one, but I just cannot help drooling over some releases. It's hard to keep myself in check.

• Returning to video game vinyl some releases include obi strips. The vinyls themselves for the most part are anything but black. There are your standard colored, but also transparent, with splatters, swirls and half-and-half.

I find that I am not that interested in most of the releases. The ones that I would really pay for are re-issues or re-recordings of the Dragonquest series (orchestral!). And maybe the release of The 7th Saga.

So what did I do? I, of course, despite my misgivings, bought the three available Castlevanias at once because Symphony of the Night is expected to be released later this year and and that's a must get for its musical merits. I thought that it would be best to assemble my whole Castlevania set now that I had the chance and not regret missed opportunities later. Later, if I decide to stick with just a few, I can resell the extra ones. And I was lucky when I ordered, because I got the flat-rate shipping from Mondo and about a week later Castlevania III did go out of stock. For now, I'm skeptical of the musical value of chiptune on vinyl, but I'll wait until I have the complete set and write you a review on them.

I'll leave you now with some resources you can click on:

Recording labels:

Mondo https://mondotees.com/

Spacelab9 https://spacelab9.com/

Ship to Shore Phono Co. https://www.shiptoshoremedia.com/

Iam8bit https://store.iam8bit.com/collections/vinyl

Datadiscs https://data-discs.com/
Brave Wave http://store.bravewave.net/music

Lists of music on vinyl (though long, both appear to be incomplete!):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_game_soundtracks_released_on_vinyl

https://www.discogs.com/lists/Video-Game-Music-on-Vinyl/196505

News:

Podcast:

http://videogamegrooves.com/ 

These guys appears to be on top of things:

https://twitter.com/vgmvinyl?lang=en

https://blipblop.net/

Blipblop has a list of upcomming releases which you might want to check out.

Info on particular releases:

https://www.discogs.com/

Blair Witch (2016) review

In the 2016 movie  Blair Witch, Heather's brother, James, decides to find out what really happened to his sister and find closure as his friend Lisa puts it. As it turns out, not only he, but us the fans, who have waited for years to make sense of the ending of the original movie, now have a chance to do so. With the release of this new one we get more data, albeit still fragmentary, to piece together a clearer picture.

Stepping back a bit, this new installment retakes many of the elements of the original film and rehashes them, but in a less successful fashion as many other are left out. For one, the formula is now known to the viewer and the sense of being lost is less effective this time around which also makes the film rushed. The bewilderment of Heather, Mike and Josh at being lost is palpable in the original, but altogether different this time.

Another gripe that I have with the movie is the abuse of cheap scares. You know those. It is when out of nowhere someone or something jumps at the onscreen character and hence to the viewer. One cannot but react, alright, but I think it's better to keep  at a minimum and go for more sophisticated stuff. Now that I've brought this up, I'd mention the Paranormal Activity series as another big offender in this respect.

However, there are many things to like. The witch's still good with messing with technology and pulls out some new tricks from under her shawl. The mythology is furthered on a couple of instances. There's now another plausible reason for Mike's behavior in the original and we get to see more of the house and that corner from the basement. And, what makes the movie, are just a couple of seconds which show what we really wanted to see all these years. The events from the Book of Shadows are not alluded at all.

By itself, Blair Witch pales in comparison to the original, but as a follow-up, it does work. So I give my stamp of approval for those who have watched the first one. For the rest save this one for later.

For the fans

For the rest

The Forces of Krill book review

There were actually books based on Zork. Real, published physical books. Zork, as you may know, was one of the earliest computer game franchises from the early 80s, which also, if I may say so,  garnered a place in the hearts of those who played the series of games. Around that time the choose-your-own adventure book format came to prominence and the Zork books to which The Forces of Krill belongs is the lovechild of both cultural trends.

In it, sister and brother are transported to the world of the Great Underground Empire. The Empire has already fallen and the warlock Krill, of Enchanter fame, is about to take the remnants under his sway. Only the siblings can avert this by bringing the sword of Zork and the three palantirs to their uncle, who has the power to wield them against the forces of Krill.

As it goes it is a fun read. Some of the more famous landmarks from the first game are to be found here: the white house, the troll room and maze, FCD #3, the coal mine. A nice aspect of them is that the solutions, though they follow closely those of the game, differ enough to make them all new. 

Regarding its canonnicity, I cannot  decide on the matter. The events here don't really click in with the content of the games; on the other hand, it is written by Meretzky, one of the authors of Zork I, himself. Some previously unexplored areas are revealed and some perennial mysteries  cleared such as the owner of the white house. However I still prefer the open-ended enigmas of the original games. Having it all revealed actually diminishes the enjoyment for me. I'd rather just take the plot here as an alternate-story.

The book is intended for children and can be enjoyed by itself without having played the game, but gives enough hints and references to make the reader want to rediscover the old gaming classics. It is also some sort of collector's item.

The Forces of Krill can be bought dirt-cheap online and the series is continued by at least 3 more books.

How many classical texts are there?

I've said this before, but we are sure lucky of having the wonderful texts from classical antiquity come down to us. But, lucky, by how much? How many texts do we have? Had I been asked this question not long ago I'd have guessed that maybe around 300, but now I see we much more than that.

Let's see:

Collection	Year Started	Published volumes	Language
Loeb Classical Library	1911	532	English	http://www.hup.harvard.edu/collection.php?cpk=1031
Collection des Universités de France (Collection Budé)	1920	>800	French	http://lesbelleslettres.giantchair.com/collections/?collection_id=17
Bibliotheca Teubneriana	1849	2009 (?!)	German	https://www.degruyter.com/view/serial/36366#
Biblioteca Clásica Gredos	1977	411+	Spanish	http://www.editorialgredos.com/biblioteca_clasica_gredos

There's usually some regret about how much we might have lost (eg from the Library of Alexandria), but I read somewhere that for the texts that were considered valuable, it was made sure to make copies out of them, so we can be confident that not only do we have hundreds of texts, but most belonging of the upper tiers as well.

A defense of the classics

Ancient classics don't really need a defense of mine. This has been taken up by others on better footing and with much better style. The funny thing is that I've not come across said defenses. Since I cannot read one, I decided to pen my own. The immediate incentive came from reading Spencer's What Knowledge is Most Worth, where he shows that at his time, knowledge of the classics was ornamental for the most part. This need not be. Classics are not the dusty tomes you find in hinterlands of libraries that no one wants to read. They are a fountain of fantastic virtues:

• They are quite fun.

• They are readable. This might come to a surprise to some, but the classics are quite readable. For the most part there are some obscure reference to persons and events, but these can be cleared by a good annotated edition, or can be pieced together after a while (Pompey? Who's that? Oh, that one!), or then again many can be just passed over without much loss.

• I read once that English men of the Empire era profited from the classics education in that the texts made them ready to understand other cultures.

• They give examples of shining personalities (both good and bad) from when the world was younger and purer. We've got Socrates and Xerxes and Alexander and Caesar and Cicero and Seneca and so many others.

• They provide a common frame of reference.  These are (should be) known across the world and their most salient aspects can be called upon to make a point or illustrate certain topic.

• They give structure and sense to the world. Our society is built on the persons and history we read out of them.

• Morally interesting.

• Can give a lifetime of enjoyment.

• They are basis to (all) later texts. As explained in the Great Books post, ancient texts a built upon by later writers. So to speak, they are the root of the matter.

• It is a wonder to have them at all. Ever read the Name of The Rose? In a very real sense it a shame to have these survived for millennia and not profit from them.

• They also shed light on biblical times and texts, since the Bible events (I'd say from Ezra on) developed within the very same sphere on which the classical. Plus, the early church fathers grew, thrived, and built on within it.

• You can learn style from them.

Finally,

• You don't have to learn Greek or Latin. These are now translated to all major languages.

The only problem I find for English readers is the apparent lack of a good annotated collection, other than the Loeb Classical Library out there. The Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries appear to be an alternative (I've not flipped through one yet), but each and every title is outrageously expensive.

L'art du faire mat

In one of Danny Kopec's books he makes the comparison of baking a cake with a mate: first you visualize what it would look like, you follow the proper steps, and voila! you get the tasty results. To that end one must know what the fan of possible end results looks like and choose the practical ones for a given situation.  Enter  L'art du faire mat  (The Art of the Checkmate) by french champions by Renaud & Kahn which gives a whole catalog of mating patterns in a readily accessible way.

Each mating pattern is identified by number and, when present, by historical name. Isn't it much better to have these possibilities at one's fingertips, than to try to grasp in the darkness for  half-seen, half-remembered figments? This is what makes  this book  both practical and powerful. All is laid down on the table and the mechanisms laid bare.  Each pattern is also illustrated by stripped down diagram and with sample annotated games showing how each mate can be arrived at.  Interspersed there are 80 exercises of moderate difficulty. On the board the result is that you see what you have before you in a given situation and options readily pop up in your head.

When I first got this book, it was given to me by the owner of my local chess club who would assign it to newcomers as the first one to study. Yet, I'm sure it will benefit anyone who hasn't brushed up on the basics lately.

To make the most of the book, I would recommend you to get a dedicated mate solving book or software. With it you can put to practice what you just learned. One of the more popular ones is Reinfeld's 1001 brilliant ways to mate.

Reinfeld's book is categorized into different broad themes such as sacrificing the Queen, and storming the castled position and the problems themselves are well mixed enough to present a good challenge. Except for the last part, which is formed by composed problems, the book as a whole is a good companion to the Renaud & Kahn.

Here's an idea that you can try for yourself: take the 1001 and after solving each problem, try to equate the mating pattern to the Renaud & Kahn number scheme. I did, and from the start I began to feel how the patterns got a better impression on me, than if I had just read L'art , gave it the thumbs up, and stowed it away. Now I find it is easier to come up with a mating pattern with the material available on the board and call it by name. Oftentimes, the answer for a set situation pops immediately, which, I believe would be the prime objective. Be warned however, that not all Reinfeld's problems can be neatly fit into the Renaud & Kahn's scheme. Other than the regular mating sequences  described R&K, there are other sequences which ultimately result in so basic patterns that the French authors didn't think there while to describe them or that rely on a tactical motif such as a pin or a deflection of a defending piece, and mates that rely on bringing the King to the open chasing it around the board. These last ones, at least for me, are the most devilish and depend much more on the use of force than on regular set patterns. On the whole, the mix feels well balanced and can challenge ambitious lower rated players and refresh more experienced ones.