I'm used to people not paying me a whole lot of attention and underestimating me and, frankly, for me a big challenge is to have people believe that I can be the president of the United States.
I am conscious of trying to stretch the boundaries of non-fiction writing. It's always surprised me how little attention many non-fiction writers pay to the formal aspects of their work.
Dealing with complexity is an inefficient and unnecessary waste of time, attention and mental energy. There is never any justification for things being complex when they could be simple.
It has always surprised me how little attention philosophers have paid to humor, since it is a more significant process of mind than reason. Reason can only sort out perceptions, but the humor process is involved in changing them.
Plus the public's attention span is so short right now, if a skater doesn't strike while the iron is hot... well it's not like people will forget you, but they just won't care anymore.
Then there is the further question of what is the relationship of thinking to reality. As careful attention shows, thought itself is in an actual process of movement.
We havent really paid much attention to thought as a process. we have engaged in thoughts, but we have only paid attention to the content, not to the process.
I've written more songs for this record than I ever have in the past so I'm trying to give it a lot of special attention to be sure my ideas really get translated right.
