Well Begun and All Done: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The book: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson (translated from the Swedish by Reg Keeland).

Opening line: It happened every year, was almost a ritual.

Closing line: She tossed Elvis into a dumpster.

Unless you live under a rock in the middle of the Kalahari Desert in a wi-fi dead zone, you have heard of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson's immensely popular murder mystery/corporate thriller. Then again, if you live under such a rock, you probably aren't reading this blog. So the hell with you.

If you haven't already read the novel, TGWTDT tells the story of Mikael Blomkvist, an investigative journalist who, as the novel begins, is convicted of libel for writing an "unsubstantiated" story about billionaire businessman Hans-Erik Wennerstrom. Although Blomkvist has been set-up to take this fall, he cannot defend himself without betraying a source, so he allows himself to become a journalistic pariah. While contemplating his next move, he is approached by a lawyer for another major industrialist, Henrik Vanger, who wants to hire Blomkvist to investigate the forty-year-old missing person's case of Vanger's niece, Harriet. The police have long since given up on the Vanger case, and Vanger wants Blomkvist to take one last crack at solving the mystery.

Assisting Blomkvist (eventually) is the eponymous heroine, Lisbeth Salander.

(DIGRESSION: You've gotta love words like 'eponymous.' So handy. So specific. So high-falutin'. EOD)

Salander is a twenty-something free-lance researcher (i.e., hacker) with photographic memory and a lot of anger. Her righteous fury is particularly aimed at sexually abusive men. Not that there's anything wrong with that. She's certainly the most interesting character in the novel and, we suspect, the reason for the book's fanatical following. She comes on board to [SPOILER ALERT] help Blomkvist solve the Vanger case and, ultimately, redeem his reputation by getting the goods on the nefarious Wennerstrom.

So what do the two cases have to do with each other? Well, nothing, actually, and therein lies one of the major problems with the book. It seems Larsson wanted to write a murder mystery AND a story about a crusading financial reporter bringing down corrupt business titans AND the story of an avenging fury striking back at her sexual tormentors (another story-line). The "main" story--the mystery--ends on page 497; the book, however, continues on to page 590.

And then there's the writing. As one of our commenters previously noted, when discussing books in translation, one cannot fairly discuss the author's--as opposed to the translator's--style. Style aside, though, this is not a well-written book. Larsson, a crusading journalist in his own right, was very thorough, but he seemed to prefer to throw in details for details' sake, without any particular regard for whether the details matter. To cite perhaps the most egregious example, here are two paragraphs about Salander's purchase of a new computer:

"Unsurprisingly, she set her sights on the best available alternative [to her PC laptop]: the new Apple PowerBook G4/1.0 GHz in an aluminum case with a PowerPC 7451 processor with an AltiVec Velocity Engine, 960 MB RAM and a 60 GB hard drive. It had BlueTooth and built-in CD and DVD burners.

"Best of all, it had the first 17-inch screen in the laptop world with NVIDIA graphics and a resolution of 1440 x 900 pixels, which shook the PC advocates and outranked everything else on the market."

This comes some 200 pages into what is supposed to be a tense thriller.

In our writing classes, we always enjoin students to give detail. Most have difficulty coming up with sufficient supporting details to illustrate their points. Once in a while, though, we have students with the opposite problem: encyclopedic detail about irrelevant material. Sadly, Larsson suffers from the same quirk.

The book itself is relatively satisfying in an undemanding, brain-candy sort of way. But it would have benefitted from a much stronger editorial hand.

Solipsistography:
Stieglarsson.com

Breaking News

We just read that Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) is in critical condition after being shot in the head at a constituents' meeting. As of this writing, she is in surgery in critical condition. Several others were also shot, and one of her aides was killed.

As yet, there is no word on the gunman's motives. If and when it comes out that her assailant is a "Tea Party Patriot," we eagerly await the GOP's attempts to spin.

Cry Me a Cold Shower

Breaking news from the world of science--or, rather, SCIENCE:

Weeping is not an aphrodisiac.

After extensive research, scientists have determined that women's tears have an ingredient that acts as a sexual appetite suppresant, decreasing men's sex drive.

We wonder if the "turnoff" is, in fact, the tears. We suspect that bloodshot eyes, heaving sobs, and copious amounts of snot may play a small part in the romantic mood-killing.

It should be noted that the anti-aphrodisiac quality is found only in emotional tears, not in tears arising from physiological causes like cutting an onion or, presumably, getting kicked in the stomach. Good news for wife-beaters everywhere.

In order to test the de-arousing effects of tears, researchers had men "sniff" both women's tears and plain saline and then rate pictures of women. Those exposed to actual tears rated the women less attractive.

After sniffing, the men were also shown a "sad" movie: "The Champ." Researchers found that the men, whether they had sniffed tears or saline, experienced sadness after watching the movie, but that tear-sniffers "showed reduced sexual arousal and lower levels of testosterone." The most disturbing aspect of this finding is its suggestion of a "baseline" level of sexual arousal appropriate for men watching "The Champ." We think the young Rick "Don't Call Me Ricky" Schroeder was cute and all, but. . .really?

Future avenues of lachrymosal de-arousal research include the animal kingdom, where related phenomena have been observed: A study has shown that "when blind mole rats washed their faces with tears, it reduced aggression in other males." They were probably laughing at the moles who had just been tricked into washing their faces with tears.

Solipsistography:

"In Women's Tears, a Chemical That Says 'Not Tonight, Dear'"

More Damn Lies

Just sayin'.

***************************************************
Quite a bit about statistics in the news today. First, the New York Police Department has commissioned a panel to determine whether commanders are cooking the books. Specifically, they worry that precinct commanders may downgrade felonies into misdemeanors or fail to submit reports in order to make it seem as if the rate of serious crime is going down. Disturbing if true, but an understandable response to the reliance on statistical performance measures.

The NYPD depends on a program called CompStat, which looks at rates of different crimes in different areas and then places the onus on precinct commanders to reduce those rates. If sufficient progress is not achieved, these commanders' careers may suffer. So commanders have a clear incentive to minimize felony rates.

On the other hand, programs like CompStat guarantee their own ultimate failure. Initial progress may be relatively easy--reducing the number of armed robberies from 100 to, say, 75 in a given area: a nice 25% drop. But as numbers decrease, it becomes ever harder to achieve further reductions. And in a city like New York, where the crime rate is unlikely ever to hit zero, the incentive to fudge one's numbers to achieve continued "success" may become overwhelming.

This is not to excuse precinct commanders who deliberately brush serious crimes under the rug. But those who live by statistics must adapt those statistics to measure results once "success" has been achieved.

Or one could just make up numbers, as it appears "Doctor" Andrew Wakefield did several years ago when he trumpeted results of a study that linked vaccines to autism. His report has finally been revealed to be a hoax, which may or may not convince vaccine-averse parents to protect their kids against nasty diseases. Numerous studies undertaken in the years since Wakefield's hoax that showed no link between vaccines and autism didn't convince these folks, so we are less than optimistic.

On the bright side, trillions of measles viruses that would have died needless deaths due to vaccinations did get to live out their lives happily in children's bloodstreams since 1998, when the original study came out.

Finally, a prominent psychology journal will publish an article offering compelling proof of the existence of ESP. Professor Daryl J. Bem of Cornell University bases his conclusions upon (among other things) an experiment wherein volunteers were asked to predict which side of a covered computer monitor contained an image. When the image was erotic in nature, participants were correctly able to guess--sorry, "predict"--which side contained the image 53% of the time (as opposed to 50%, which would be attributable to "chance"). Interestingly, the participants did not do better than chance for non-erotic pictures.

In other words, smut increases one's psychic ability by approximately 3%. So, before you make any major investments in the stock market, you might do well to flip through some back issues of Hustler.

Solipsistography:
"Taking Control, G.O.P. Overhauls Rules in House"
"New York City to Examine Reliability of Its Crime Reports"
"Study Linking Vaccine to Autism Was Fraud, Journal Reports"
"Journal's Paper on ESP Expected to Prompt Outrage"
Image of Dr. Evil from Moviefone.co.uk.

Heartless

Former Vice-President Dick "The Impaler" Cheney recently had his 497th heart surgery, this time to install a ventricular assist device--a partial artificial heart. Interestingly, this device "leaves patients without a pulse." As if we needed further proof that the man is a vampire.

Seriously, though, we extend our best wishes for a speedy recovery to the entire Dracul--uh, Cheney--clan. This is surely a difficult time for them: The cost of Cheney's surgery, after all, is approximately $200,000, and given the Republican hostility to healthcare reform or any sort of governmental insurance program, we assume the former veep paid for the whole thing out of pocket. As soon as we hear where to send donations, we'll be sure to let you know.

Solipsistography

"Cheney Is Back, with Heart Pump and New Outlook"

PubMed.gov, a website of the U.S. National Library of Medicine at the National Institutes of Health

Bowled Over

As we find ourselves in the midst of another new year's interminable cavalcade of bowl games, we would like to go on record advocating the adoption of a true playoff/tournament format to decide the college football national championship.

(DIGRESSION: In case you were wondering--'cause we were--why football games are called "bowls," it apparently goes back to the days when the Rose Bowl was, literally, the only game in town. The "bowl" then referred not to the game itself but to the stadium in Pasadena where it was held--the Rose Bowl. Subsequently, when others sought to capitalize on the Rose Bowl's popularity by organizing other college-football showcases, they adopted the "Bowl" suffix. EOD)

We are sure the current powers-that-be have reasons for avoiding a playoff format, and we imagine these reasons primarily revolve around money. If that is the case, though, we don't understand. One reason the Solipsist--a sports fan--is at best indifferent towards college football is precisely because of the neverending parade of obscure bowl games. Seriously, the AdvoCare V100 Independence Bowl? The San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl? The Franklin American Mortgage Motor City Bowl? (No, we didn't make those up.) Unless your favorite team was playing in one of these things, would YOU care? Could you really take pride in the fact that your alma mater won the Chick-fil-a Bowl?

(DIGRESSION: Congratulations to the Orange of Syracuse for their victory in the, sigh, New Era Pinstripe Bowl. EOD)

Besides, a playoff wouldn't necessitate the elimination of any of these games. They could still be played and colleges and universities could collect whatever goodies they currently collect. The "big" bowl games--what now constitute the BCS championship games--could simply become part of a playoff system.

What would be the drawback in taking, say, the top 12 teams at the end of the season--essentially what happens in the NFL--and having them compete in a playoff? That way, we wouldn't have the spectacle of an undefeated team like Texas Christian University winning the Rose Bowl but having no chance of being declared the national champion. That honor will go to the winner of next week's game between Oregon and Auburn--two other undefeated teams who can certainly claim to be among the nation's best, but would either of them beat TCU head-to-head? We'll never know.

To get back to the point about money: A playoff series, culminating in the crowning of an undisputed national champion, would attract at least as many viewers as the current crop of games and probably many more. The same sports fans who now, for example, thrill to the NCAA men's basketball tournament, despite perhaps having only a casual interest in the game throughout the rest of the year, would likely send college-football playoff ratings through the roof.

In the meantime, we suppose TCU can claim a moral victory and tell themselves that they could have beaten whichever team claims the championship. Of course, another word for a moral victory is defeat.

Solipsistic References:

"Rose Bowl Victory Shows Texas Christian's Prowess"

Answers.com

ESPN.go.com

Judgment Day

In the "Terminator" movies, computers become sentient and declare war on humanity. Since the machines control all of mankind's weapon systems, including nuclear weapons, their victory is swift.

We fear we may be on the verge of our own sort of "Judgment Day." We don't worry so much about the increasing intelligence of computers as we do about the lack of intelligence--or at least foresight--of their programmers. And we worry less about a nuclear holocaust than we do about a sort of financial armageddon that could have the same civilization-destroying capacity.

If you needed any more proof that the entire financial industry is (ahem) a solipsistic enterprise that ultimately produces nothing other than more grist for its own mills, consider the advent of "High Frequency Trading." In HFT, computer algorithms allow traders to execute trades within millionths of seconds. By taking advantage of the slightest--and we mean slightest--head start, traders can exploit fractional differences in stock prices and make fast profits.

If we understand this phenomenon correctly, it works like this: Computers programmed to scan the markets for--well, for whatever: We don't know what programmers base their algorithms on--identify a stock and execute a "buy" order. Let's say that the price is $100.0001. The computer makes the purchase, and then the stock may "skyrocket" to $100.0002 (perhaps in response to the very purchases the automated trader just made). Other (ever-so-slightly) slower autotraders notice the movement and begin making their own purchases. By now, the stock may have shot up to, oh, $100.0004. So it's time for the first trader to sell! Sure, we're dealing with fractions of a penny, but if you consider the fact that tens of thousands of trades can be executed every minute, the profits can accumulate quickly.

Note that profit and loss seem to have absolutely nothing to do with the inherent worth of any sort of product or business. The only commodity of value in HFT is speed--microseconds of speed. If a programmer sets up an algorithm to make purchases of a company specializing in snail-poop, he can presumably attract the notice of enough other high-frequency traders to turn a tidy profit before these other investors realize they're buying crap. And if autotraders misread market signals, they can provoke a panic that can quickly send the broader market crashing (as happened last spring).

(We realize our explanation is probably extremely simplistic. If anyone can offer a more thorough explanation of HFT--and ideally explain HOW it adds any real value to the world--please feel free to do so in the "Comments.")

What can be done? Probably not much. It does make one wish that these traders--indeed, most of the high-flying financiers who make money for nothing while playing video games with other people's actual savings--could simply be sealed off in their own sector of society. They could then safely play their games and we could watch (or not) while we go about the real business of the world.

Solipsistic References:
"The New Speed of Money, Reshaping Markets"
If you're among the few people on the planet who haven't seen "Terminator 2," you should: It was from James Cameron's pre-"Titanic" days when he just made really cool science-fiction movies.

Obligations

The Solipsist has had it up to here (his hand is at his chin) with people blaming the nation's economic woes on unions, particularly public-service unions. At a time when right-wingers oppose any attempt to raise taxes on millionaires, it seems disingenuous at best to claim that the main culprit behind state-budget disasters is the pensions of teachers and other public-sector employees.

Certainly there are abuses. People react with justifiable outrage to stories of retired politicians collecting six-figure pensions, but these are the exceptions, not the rule. In New Jersey, whose citizens have expressed some of the greatest outrage, the average public-sector pension is $20,000 a year; teachers earn, on average, $46,000. Pardon us if these figures don't provoke an urge to march, pitchfork in hand, to our local UFT office demanding a clawback of hard-earned tax dollars.

Obviously, the Solipsist--a teacher and son of a teacher--is a biased commentator. But we have little patience for those who claim that teachers (along with other government employees and civil service workers) should accept pension cuts in the spirit of shared civic sacrifice. Put simply, many of these folks have already sacrificed.

Consider: Teachers are, by definition, highly educated people. They must graduate college and then either satisfy state-certification requirements or earn post-graduate degrees or both. The Solipist's FFB Emi Ha has jumped through hoops over the last year or so to prove that she is qualified to teach in her new hometown, despite having multiple degrees and teaching experience and having satisfied all certification requirements in her previous hometown. The Solipsist himself has two post-graduate degrees, as well as a BA and state certification to teach in New York.

Our point is, when one decides to become a teacher, it is not for lack of intellectual capacity or professional ambition. These are people who could easily have chosen more financially remunerative careers in law, politics, or finance. They chose, though, to provide service. They sacrificed.

In many cases, these workers continued to sacrifice. Indeed, in the face of state and municipal budget difficulties, some public-sector unions agreed to forego wage increases. The spirit of sacrifice exists in these workers. Ironically, one of the concessions that some unions made was to forego raises in exchange for pension guarantees--guarantees that are now apparently endangered.

By all means, look at abusive pension-padding practices and crack down on those. But stop blaming deficits on the people who have chosen to take a lifetime pay cut to serve their fellow citizens.