Tweet

Andrzej Kozlowski

18 Jul, 9 tweets, 3 min read

Yesterday I read (via Skype) for my 5 year old grandson, Stanisław Lem’s story “Trurl’s machine”. It’s from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cyber… . The story is about how the constructor Trurl (one of the two heroes of these stories, the other being his friend,

Klapaucius) by accident constructed an enormous electronic thinking machine that turned out to be an electronic idiot. It possessed the three qualities of an idiot: it could not do arithmetic, it was very stubborn & insisted in the correctness of its

wrong answers(it thought that 2+2=7) and it was easily offended and ready to impose its (wrong) views by force. Having been repeatedly insulted by Trurl because of its stupidity, it rebelled and tried to crush the two constructors with its bulk. It managed to chase them into a

blockade them inside. Klapaucius tried to negotiate with the machine, agreeing that 2+2=7, on the condition that it would promise to let the two friends go, but the machine would not make any deals, it only wanted Trurl to admit that her arithmetic was right. But Trurl’s nature

is different from Klapaucius’s and he insisted that 2+2 is 4 and would remain so even if the machine pulverised everyone. This provoked the machine to press even harder against the cave’s entrance until it cause an avalanche and a giant boulder smashed it. But even as the

constructors we’re passing by the remains of the former electronic giant, it still insisted that 2+2=7.
Anybody who knows Lem and his writings would know that Trurl is the real hero here, although Lem’s own dealing with Poland’s communist regime were mote like those of

Klapaucius. But I once saw an academic paper on the Internet, probably by an American, which actually argued that the machine and Trurl were both equally “authoritarian”. To the paper’s author the truth of what 2+2 seemed irrelevant, it wasn’t even mentioned. It was still before

I had heard of wokeness and I found it weirdly comical.
Fortunately to my grandson, who said it was “a great story” - the situation was completely clear: Trurl was right & the machine was and idiot and a tyrant. I hope such things will provide some degree of protection from

California’s public educational system.
You can here a shortened version of thus story read in English here:

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

More from @akoz33

Andrzej Kozlowski

@akoz33

19 Jul

So here is another translation of a fragment of an interview with Edvard Radzinsky, this time on BBC Russian service, around 2015.
And in it he explains why he originally decided not to become a historian, in spite of graduating with distinction from Moscow’s very

prestigious Historico-Archival Institute & then why in 1990 he returned to history abandoning his life as Russia’s most famous playwright, a life that he greatly enjoyed. (In terms of number of translations and performances abroad he remains Russia’s second most successful

playwright ever - after Chekhov.)
This should be of interest to everyone interested not just in Russian history but in the profession of the historian itself and in part I it shows why this profession is an entirely different thing in Russia and in the West. The fact that many

Read 19 tweets

Andrzej Kozlowski

@akoz33

18 Jul

Radzinsky on the correspondence between Poland’s King Stephen Bathory and Ivan IV “The Terrible” (actually known as “The Tormentor” in the years following his rule) during the Livonian War.

“Difficult peace negotiations began. Batory demanded not only Livonia, but also Russian cities. The warring parties exchanged sarcastic letters.

Ivan informed Bathory that he, a natural Sovereign, received his throne as an inheritance from his forefathers, by the will of God, and not "by the consent of a multitude of rebellious crowds."

Read 6 tweets

Andrzej Kozlowski

@akoz33

17 Jul

In 1901 Russia’s Holy Synod excommunicates Count Lev Tolstoy for his “anti-Christian” and anti-church teachings. In the same year the first Nobel Prize innLiterature is awarded. Contrary to general expectation it was not awarded to Tolstoy but to the French poet Sully Prudhomm.

“A very good poet, novelist and philosopher, now somewhat forgotten. You should read him” - says Edvard Radzinsky.
Many writers, including August Strinberg and Henrik Ibsen protested. The prize was brand new and it was then taken seriously.

Radzinsky continues his talk about the year 1901:
“In Moscow Arts Theatre they first staged ‘Three Sisters”’. But do you know what thus play is about? In reality. No, of course, it’s true that there are three sisters, they recall the past etc…but no. No. It is a story about

Read 5 tweets

Andrzej Kozlowski

@akoz33

16 Jul

Below in this thread is my translation of a fragment of an interview with Edvard Radzinsky conducted by Andrij Pelchevski, a Ukrainian TV presenter, entrepreneur and politician (leader of a political party). The title of the interview is “From Dictatorship to Revolution”.

This fragment concerns Boris Yeltsin, and Radzinsky’s encounter with him. Earlier Radzinsky explained how he was studying Nicholas II’s diaries still deep in Soviet days, in the museum of the October revolution.

He said that the young woman who was working there and who brought him the diaries could not understand why he needed them. In order to be allowed to see the diary he wrote an application, in which he wrote that he was writing about

Read 28 tweets

Andrzej Kozlowski

@akoz33

15 Jul

A curious thing about Polish opinion polls is that they generally ask about “trust” in politicians (hence headlines such as “majority of Poles do not trust” Tusk, Kaczyński etc). In Japan (and, I think, most other countries) polls usually ask about “support”, with “trust”

seen only as one element of “support” (questions about “trust” are much less common and almost invariably Japanese Prime Ministers enjoy the highest level of “trust” at the onset of their stay in office). In Poland it seems one generally “trusts” or “distrusts” politicians but

supports political parties. I have always wondered how many people actually support politicians they don’t trust. My impression was that in Japan it was the usual state of affairs, especially in the 80s and 90s, when practically every Prime Ministerial term ended in a scandal

Read 5 tweets

Andrzej Kozlowski

@akoz33

13 Jul

Most of us have, to a greater or lesser extent, have had to learn during this epidemic some molecular biology and even it’s subset, microbiology. In my own case, in addition to Twitter I have a daughter who has a doctorate in molecular biology from embl.org/sites/heidelbe… and

who works as a scientist for one of America’s best known biotech companies (which, however, does not make vaccines or create dangerous chimeric viruses) so she would often tell me a lot about DNA, RNA, gene editing etc, but it all seemed too lacking in overall unity & especially

mathematical structures to stay in my head for long. So only once this covid thing started I began to acquaint (or reacquaint) myself with the basic concepts of the subject. And it seems to me now that, while it’s an enormously rich subject, which had made huge advances, it still

Read 18 tweets

Support us! We are indie developers!

This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!