An interesting proposal...

[alexpgp]

In a post today, Russian writer and journalist Dmitriy Glukhovsky (dglu) muses about Paul, the Psychic Octopus.

For those who have not been following the news (or who have only been following the political pages), this cephalopod, which lives in Germany (and which has already been the target of a PETA demand that it be "returned to the wild," but I digress...), accurately predicted the outcomes of all the German's team's games and the winner of the World Cup final.

Glukhovsky suggests:

Теперь, думаю, надо заставить его предсказать дату конца света.

И если он будет жрать мидий из коробочки с надписью "2012", значит, пора собирать тревожный чемоданчик.

Now, I think, it must be made to predict the date of the end of the world.

And if it eats the mussels from the box labeled "2012", that means it's time to pack a "bug-out" bag. (Translation mine.)

I suppose I could start in on how much I can't stand listening to shows where "experts" hold forth on every kind of 2012 idiocy, but I'll spare you all that and merely note that there's something about this suggestion that I find... amusing.

Cheers...

Comments

[russia-insider.livejournal.com]

BTW have you read Glukhovsky's Сумерки? Or other books? Kind of nice easy reading actually.

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

I've read a chunk of the first Metro book (even translated a piece of it), but my leisure time for reading is rather limited.

I might argue the "nice easy" part, but then again, Russian is not my native language.

Cheers...

[russia-insider.livejournal.com]

The thing is that the Сумерки book is a mystical story about a translator who got into situation where he encountered some historical writings and through translating it became a participant of eery events. In Russia the book compared to famous Da Vinchi Code, so maybe you could find it interesting.

The description from one of internet resources:
"The Twilight" by Dmitry Glukhovsky is the first Russian intellectual bestseller. Such a status is proved by 100 000 people, who have read the novel on the internet. Earthquakes in Iran, hurricanes in the USA, tsunamis in Indonesia, drought and conflagrations in Russia… Newspapers’ headlines and TV news look like Maya Indians’ prophecies. These are the signs, which only one person can interpret. “The Twilight” is a breathtaking story of that person. Translating into Russian an old diary by a Spanish conquistador, he gets involved into the course of incredible events, which will help him to interpret the predictions and to look into the future, even at the cost of his life.