Rick Rosner, American Comedy Writer, www.rickrosner.org
Scott Douglas Jacobsen, Independent Journalist, www.in-sightpublishing.com
Rick Rosner: All right, so this is you and me talking. This has been a 10-year project, encompassing, I believe, around a thousand chapters of “Ask a Genius,” correct? Yes. Then, there are hundreds of other chapters. It feels odd and ridiculous because it hasn’t led to fame or fortune. At the same time, it’s similar to what other people do that does lead to such outcomes. Do you have to judge it solely by fame and fortune, or can you judge it for being an extensive document? What do you think?
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: It is an extensive document. It depends on what one values. Whatever people place their high-level valences on will be the metric by which they judge other things. Fundamentally, any metric of value is subjective. Social systems provide an intersubjective system of values in an otherwise bland universe. Human products will be subject to this as well. So, if the goal is fame, we will judge it by fame. If it is money, then we will judge it by cash. If it is productivity, then we will judge it by productivity. It depends.
Rosner: When I was your age, a man named Spalding Gray would come out and tell stories from his life. It worked pretty well for him. They even made a movie or two where he told stories, perhaps with some reenactments. It worked well until he took his own life. I wonder why he did so. Nonetheless, there is room for doing what we are doing. I could have done that if I had more discipline and a greater willingness to get up on stage and tell jokes thousands of times until I honed that craft. However, something must be said about our less rigorous approach here. The end?
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Rick Rosner 