I enjoyed watching The Irishman. I don't agree with the complaints about the lack of words for the female role of Frank's eldest daughter. Since when does the number of words equal impact? But, "having said that," (this is, by the way, Jerry Seinfeld's and Larry David's most hated expression), I enjoyed The Irishman's play with language. "It's what it is" - I'm using that all the time now, as a bottom line. Or nice little wisdoms, like the one from Al Pacino: "You charge with a gun, with a knife you run."
There is also a good joke in the movie:
How do three people keep a secret?
At least two have to be dead.
(The original version: "Usually three people can only keep a secret," Robert De Niro rasps, "if two of them are dead.")
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Daniel Chluba with his dollar gun in my class in Burg Giebichenstein, Halle |
From artist Daniel Chluba I learnt that jokes are an example of bisociative thinking. Bisociation is when two or more apparently incompatible frames of thought are brought together. A joke goes one direction and then it unexpectedly takes an unexpected turn. And that's what makes you laugh.
With their bisociative approach, jokes are in the very good company of science and art. Progress in science comes about through bisociative thinking. Chluba gave me the example of Einstein who did thought experiments as a teenager, like, for instance, imagining how it would be to travel on a light beam. All good art is bisociative. Take Meret Oppenheim's fur coffee cup.
There is a way to train your bisociative thinking. I'm planning a publication with Daniel Chluba that will reveal more about that in 2020. Yes indeed, dear reader, watch out and set money aside for AAAAA PPPPP Publishing in the New Year...