woops

is not like other people
Interesting how a mirror is (was, since we don't really call it that that anymore) also a 'glass' - both something that reflects back at you and also something you see through.
"mirror" and "looking-glass" are my favourite cognates in English drawn from romance and Germanic languages
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
There's something about the difference between 'looking' and 'seeing' that comes together in a mirror isn't there? Would be interesting to look into the etymology of it.
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
Maybe, I know nothing about Berger. 'Looking' seems trivial, something anyone can do. 'Seeing' is comprehending the truth of something, and also more more linked to the imagination, the visionary.
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
Ah, that Ways of Seeing series rings a bell now, I think I might have watched an episode on YouTube ages ago.
 

version

Well-known member
Ah, that Ways of Seeing series rings a bell now, I think I might have watched an episode on YouTube ages ago.

Yeah, it's all on YouTube. I liked it. The first episode's mostly based around Walter Benjamin's concept of aura then the others cover things like advertising and the way women are depicted in art.

We have a Berger thread where it came up.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich

When I was young was always fascinated by mirrors. I particularly like it when you have two mirrors opposite each other and the images are repeating smaller and smaller. However much you know different it's very hard to convince yourself that it won't end somewhere, that one of the images right at the end of the line isn't doing something different somehow.

As a child I love Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and, more relevant here of course, Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. Both books were completely magical adventures to me, I loved the logic chopping and the nonsense poetry and... everything really. I think that I probably enjoyed the first book more, but I do think that reaching the magical land via a mirror is a much more satisfactory set-up than going down a rabbit hole. The latter seems like a fairly random idea that works well enough, whereas the former is something that speaks to us instantly cos we've all imagined what it would be like, wondered what is in the mirror world just out of of the frame and thus out of our sight - is that also a reflection of our world or is it different there?

Zerkalo directed by Tarkovsky is one of my favourite films... though in that case I just like the film as a whole rather than any particular mirror related stuff - I guess it's supposed to be a film that holds a mirror up to his life... maybe... unless there is something I've forgotten.

Newspapers tend to draw their names from a fairly small pool. I suppose ones called something such as Telegraph makes sense as it sounds like they are broadcasting a message - the news - to you, Times also is ok I guess, as when you look back on all the news it should theoretically compile to form the story of that time. Record is self-explanatory of course, and, just my personal taste, I don't find Star, Sun or similar so evocative of a news organ. Whatever, best of all is Mirror I think - I like the idea that a newspaper is a reflection of the world, showing it back to us. And also, given that mirror images are a perfect copy, but a reversed one, I like to think that a newspaper with the name Mirror does sort of contain the implication that news you read, see or hear is never just a totally neutral description of events, even the most unbiased reportage cannot help but filter it through the writer's choices - though I'm sure this is mere fancy on my part as newspapers - despite all the evidence to the contrary - like to imagine that objectivity is possible and that they represent the best approximation of it we will ever see.

There must be countless mirrors in literature and film. In Candyman you summon the monster by repeating his name and looking in the mirror but I'm sure that's an old idea they took, I bet it's one of those ideas we can file along with "who invented elves" as part of the folk memory long before they were ever written down.

Mirrors feature bigly in The Lady of Shalott which was a poem I really liked - once again as a child. I remember very little of it

Out flew the web and floated wide;
The mirror crack'd from side to side;
'The curse is come upon me,' cried
The Lady of Shalott.

You can tell the mirror is mentioned before that line when it all kicks off, and in fact having quickly read through it, it's pretty important in the poem.

Going back further you have Narcissus who fell in love with his own reflection - admittedly the reflection was in a pond or a puddle or something, but in my book, if a pond is flat and clear enough to reflect properly then it is a mirror to all intents and purposes. Also in Greek mythology you have Perseus who is able to defeat the hideous gorgon Medusa using her reflection in his shield so he doesn't have to look directly at her - which is good cos seeing her turns you to stone. I'm not sure that in his situation I would have gambled that the reflection would have been a loophole that prevented that happened but he did and it worked.

Anyway, that's mirror stuff off the top of my head, just need a theory to tie it all together... in the meantime I'll actually read through the read and see how many of those had already been mentioned... and so how much time I've wasted. Anyway, mirrors are fascinating so there should be something interesting to say about them, good idea for a thread surely... or have I just cursed it?
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Something you see play out over and over is someone complaining about the content they see online and someone else responding that it's tailored to them. They're complaining about the results of their own tastes and browsing habits.

That may or may not be true, but it's received wisdom at this point and one of the default responses.

But it could mean that it's been tailored badly. I mean, if I look at a load of stuff and an algorithm absorbs all that and suggests some other stuff I'll like, but I don't then I'm not sure that is my fault and I'm not sure it's that helpful to say "blame yourself". I have heard people say "the algorithm knows you better than you know yourself" - but that's when it comes up with uncannily accurate choices or predictions, I don't think it's an argument to say "well you should like it cos the algorithm says so and if you think you don't like it you're wrong".
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
This is not a very dissensus song but I like it... but more than that, I love the imagery, I think that burning mirrors would look cool.

 

version

Well-known member
But it could mean that it's been tailored badly. I mean, if I look at a load of stuff and an algorithm absorbs all that and suggests some other stuff I'll like, but I don't then I'm not sure that is my fault and I'm not sure it's that helpful to say "blame yourself". I have heard people say "the algorithm knows you better than you know yourself" - but that's when it comes up with uncannily accurate choices or predictions, I don't think it's an argument to say "well you should like it cos the algorithm says so and if you think you don't like it you're wrong".

Yeah, that's why I said it may or may not actually be true but people run with it anyway.
 
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