Movie Review: Rush (2013)

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Hear the roar, the scream, and the whine of the engines!  Formula One World Championship auto racing in the 1970s.  Wow!  I wish my father was still around to see this film.  Rush was directed by Ron Howard, and it follows the story of the personal duel between the notorious British playboy driver James Hunt and the technical Austrian driver Niki Lauda, focusing on their 1976 fight for the Formula One World Championship.  (There is also some very good 70s music.) 

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My father was a fan of Formula One, mainly of the Memorial Day classic of the Indianapolis 500.  The Indy 500 was not a part of the Grand Prix circuit, but it was a big American tradition.  Memorial Day was one of our family’s biggest holiday get-togethers, the beginning of the summer season and right after my paternal grandparents returned each year to the north, with a picnic at either Pike’s Rocks or in our back yard.  The AM radio would be tuned to live coverage of the race. 

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I think my father closeted within himself a secret desire to drive that fast among those daredevils.  His Marine ferocity was (usually) very well controlled and suppressed, but sometimes it came close to bubbling to the surface.  He would tell me of great drivers of legend, such as Sterling Moss (active racing from 1951-1961) and even earlier drivers, with a gleam in his eye.  He relished the exploits of these men on the edge. 

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Rush stars Chris Hemsworth as Hunt and Daniel Bruhl as Lauda.  Music is by Hans Zimmer, with a couple of well-placed classic 70s rock tracks in the mix. 

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Voorrroooooooooomm!

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-Zenwind.

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Book Review: Lucretius, On the Nature of Things (1st century BC)

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The philosophy of Epicureanism – of which this book by the Roman poet Lucretius is a classic account – has been very dear to my heart and mind for some 45 years, since I first discovered it in my explorations in philosophy while in high school.  But I never completely finished reading this long poem On the Nature of Things until this year.  It is not an easy read, mainly because of some rudimentary – although astoundingly ahead of their time – physics in the early chapters. 

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The Greek thinker Epicurus (341-270 BC) was my kind of philosopher.  Unfortunately, his reputation has been scandalized through millennia by quite outrageous lies from those of opposing worldviews.  Epicurus’ ethical goal of “pleasure” meant the dispelling of pain and anxiety, and then achieving “tranquility of soul” or “imperturbability” while living a simple life of scholarship and conversation among friends.  His philosophy is not one of over-indulgence or gluttony, as his detractors allege.  Quite the opposite. 

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In this long poem, On the Nature of Things, Lucretius presents Epicureanism in Latin to the Romans, and the philosophy became very popular among them. Lucretius’ work is one of our best sources on it, but the poem itself barely survived.  One copy was discovered in 1417 in a monastery by Poggio Bracciolini, an avid document hunter from Florence, and then re-copied.  Its re-discovery gave a big stimulus to modern science.  Thomas Jefferson – who wrote that “I too am an Epicurean” – had five Latin editions of this work plus translations in English, French and Italian.  Montaigne also loved the poem. 

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Epicurus had developed Democritus’ materialistic theory of atoms, the entire universe being made up of their interactions in a void.  Natural laws rule the universe, not supernatural causes.  For us, it is Chance, not deities, that explains many of the things that happen to us, and we should abandon all superstitious fears.  The gods do not interfere in our lives, so we shouldn’t worry about them.  Death “is nothing to us” – since our soul/ consciousness/ mind dies with our bodies – and so we shouldn’t fear it.  We are all mortal, but we should enjoy life without worry or anxiety.  This kind of tranquility they called ataraxia in Greek.  Reminds me of some Buddhist traditions. 

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If you do wade into On the Nature of Things, here is a rough outline.  Of six books, the first two treat the physics of atomism – and these always stalled me out.  But they grade into book three which I find very good, tracing the materialistic roots of living things and of consciousness.  It is very modern in spirit.  Book four speculates on the senses, dreams, and sex.  The last two books again talk about natural phenomena.  

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I’m looking forward to reading it again someday. 

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-Zenwind.

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