I’ve been following the weird controversy over the Cordoba Center in New York with some interest, inasmuch as it’s a fascinating example of the politics of fear.

As far as I can make out, the arguments against it seems to be that Muslims shouldn’t build a cultural centre in Manhattan because it offends some ill-defined group of other people who think all Muslims are terrorists. Usually the actual person making the case acknowledges that the Cordoba Center people aren’t terrorists, so they have to come up with some quite bizarre logical gymnastics to explain why we should disregard what they know to be the case in favour of the ill-conceived notions of ignorant people who may or may not exist.

That would be bad enough if the Cordoba Center were a neutral organisation for private worship. In fact, it’s exactly the kind of organisation that’s on the front lines of combatting terrorism. Islamist terrorist groups do exist, and they operate by brainwashing young Muslim believers into thinking that Islam is locked into an unavoidable battle with the terrible Crusaders of the West. Thankfully these groups are tiny, and their message doesn’t stand up well to the day-to-day experience of most Muslims living in the West, but it’s a constant battle within Muslim communities to contain the influence of these cultish groups. This is where the real fight against Al Qaeda is being waged, and the Cordoba Center should be seen as a fortress defending the United States against terrorism.

Because… you know who wants you to think that all Muslims are terrorists? Osama Bin laden, that’s who.

I have two rooms coming available soon, if you or someone you know needs a place to live. Both are large, and close to the university and the chocolate shop. Must be a grown-up and like (or at least tolerate) cats.

Sometimes the best ideas are nothing more than reformulations of existing ideas in a convenient package. The iPad springs to mind, but that’s not what I came here to talk about. Another fine example is this hierarchy of disagreements by Paul Graham (via Marbury). There’s nothing there that hasn’t been observed countless times in human discourse, but the innovation lies in arranging the types of disagreement into a hierarchy according to how convincing they are, and (especially clever) giving them short labels. Thus:

• DH0. Name-calling.
• DH1. Ad Hominem.
• DH2. Responding to Tone.
• DH3. Contradiction.
• DH4. Counterargument.
• DH5. Refutation.
• DH6. Refuting the Central Point.

Graham notes that there’s a distinct shift in quality after DH3. Up to that point you have rhetorical techniques that will always unconvincing. DH4 is the first level that has any capacity to convince.

I believe there’s a simple reason for this shift in quality. DH0 to DH3 do not require that the speaker make any attempt to understand what their opponent is actually saying. You can do DH4 while missing the point entirely, but it at least involves staying on roughly the same topic.

I am particularly interested in what happens when one participant in a discussion is operating in the range from DH0-3, and the other is operating at DH4-5 (DH6 is, I think, seldom attainable). That is, one participant is discussing the topic and the other is just playing games. It’s tempting to just assume that this is a fixed state: no discussion is possible because one person is a troll, and they’re not going to change. But this isn’t the case in practice: sometimes people do shift from DH0-3 to DH4-5. The trick is to work out whether there’s any potential for this in any given conversation.

It’s hard to find a suitable historical precedent for what just happened at Copenhagen. There have been abject failures of leadership at a national level, and huge regional mistakes like the Treaty of Versaille, but I can’t think of any case as comprehensive as this. The leadership of the world has met in the face of a very obvious collective threat, and betrayed every person on the planet.

We’ve known for years how this has to work. Emissions trading, binding caps, and investment by the developed countries in cleaner infrastructure in the the developing countries. It’s been thrashed out many many times.

I understand the politics, and all the pathetic excuses for why this country can’t do this until that country does that, but you can’t reduce carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere by whining at them.

If you’d like to see me limp dramatically up and down some stairs, now’s your chance. Plus, you also get a crucifixion, birdpeople and an overwrought cow-woman. All the great things that have brought people out to the theatre for over 2400 years.

Prometheus Bound runs 8pm 9-12 December, at the Old Queens Theatre on Hereford Street.

More information at the Facebook page.

My bike lock stopped working. I bought a new bike lock, with four keys and a special bracket to attach it to the frame. The next day my new bike lock fell off the bracket in transit and is now lost. As a temporary measure, I went back to using my old bike lock as a prop. You can pull it apart without a key, but it looks like my bike is locked. Yesterday I forgot to take my old bike lock key with me at all, which wouldn’t have been a problem except that my old bike lock has unaccountably started working again, so I had to walk home. Now I find that I can no longer locate my old bike lock key.

As is so often the case, Plan D involves a hacksaw.

I am rehearsing two plays. In one I will be required to crucify a dude. In the other I shall be an aeroplane.

It is very important I do not get these parts mixed up. The Little Prince’s themes of yearning for lost childhood and the suffocating banality of adult society could possibly survive the unexpected introduction of a crucifixion scene, but I’m almost certain that Aeschylus (if the author was indeed Aeschylus) did not intend for Hephaistos to bear Prometheus around the stage on his shoulders making neeeyaaaaar noises.

While riding my bike north from Christchurch today, I met some guys driving south atop a giant smoke-belching steam engine. They were towing a spacious-looking homemade caravan, and behind that a mid-size commercial truck.

Me and those guys are ready for Peak Oil.

Do you like to talk? At length? With other people? And with nice food?

Here is the basic idea behind Talk Club:

1. We meet at 4pm on a Sunday evening.
2. Everybody brings a plate of food, and drink as you see fit.
3. Everybody brings something to share. It can be an idea, a question, a poem, a piece of music, a game to play, a powerpoint presentation… anything that people can discuss.
4. Everybody gets a card with their name on it.
5. We put the cards in a hat or a velvet bag or somesuch, and draw one out.
6. If your card is drawn, you present your presentation.
7. Following the presentation, discussion is allowed. Sometimes it’ll be the point of the exercise, sometimes it’ll be more like “what did everyone think of that?” Discussion will continue until it’s done.
8. Repeat steps 3 to 8 until everybody agrees we’re done for the evening.

If you think there should be other rules… we can talk about that.

First meeting is at my place from 4:00pm to 10:00pm on Sunday, 4 October 2009. Email me if you need the address.

Do you enjoy extreme Japanese experimental theatre, or intellectual New Yorkers talking over dinner? This is, of course an inclusive or, because everybody likes one or other of these things, but some people like both. And if you’re one of those people, then you may wish to come over to my place on Friday and watch some videos with more of those people, and know you are not alone.

We shall be watching a documentary on Butoh, followed by a selection of short videos of Butoh performances, followed by the classic film My DInner with Andre, in which Andre Gregory and Wallace “Inconceivable” Shawn discuss the purpose of theatre over dinner.

Time: 7:30pm Friday 11 September

Bring: Snacks and drinks

Invite: Anyone else who might be interested

Email: Me, if you’re not sure of my address