Do you think the hound is good to have around? I do because it might help us. If there were to be mechanical hounds the police,and fire departmentwould probably have them.To help find missing people.Or to save people,but that would be if the mechanical hound was not evil.

Who comes up with these questions? It's like asking whether it's better to have three hands or four. I for one am getting kind of annoyed with the absolute lack of deapth these questions exhibit. I hereby ask that others start asking smart questions or not ask them at all. Please, for the sake of those who are tired or reading endless queries as to whether FH is a good novel or a bad one. Please.
Cheers, Translator

[This message has been edited by Translator (edited 09-09-2004).]

Translator,
Apparently the recent spate of F451 questions inundating this board are from Lemont High, IL students whose first English class assignment is the reading and discussing of the book. Judging by the posts, the questions of what to discuss may also have been assigned. I suspect this will all fizzle out once they've moved on to another assignment...

Translator:

I'm curious how many students from Lemont High are Lithuanian. In Lemont, Illinois there is a large Lithuanian community. Many families are new to this country. I don't think Bradbury is read in Lithuania because of the lack of translating into the Lithuanian language. I have never come across a Bradbury book in Lithuanian.

So, tho these questions may seem a little simple, I would say many are discovering this fellow Ray Bradbury for the first time, among other things...

Are they reading? Are they writing and commenting? Are they actively involved? Maybe not experienced literary critics yet, but expressing ideas on a common topic - yes?
Have they insulted anyone, used profanity, or otherwise slandered someone else's opinion?

To send them brusquely on their way, rings of censorship to me. Is there an obvious irony floating about here?

[This message has been edited by fjpalumbo (edited 09-09-2004).]

Translator, what you are reading are postings by students who are reading FAHRENHEIT 451, and making these postings as part of the school work. I have no problem whatsoever with their postings, or their responses, or their questions. Rather, I welcome them. Hopefully, reading and discussing this book with stimulate these students to read other books as well.

[This message has been edited by Richard (edited 09-09-2004).]

Hey Nard,
I see a lot of slavic names around here, so there might be quite a lot of lithuanian students around here.
Others: Have you all actually read the questions? Some of them are absolutely thoughtless! I suspect that the students have to come up with something like three questions, and must get involved in some responses to get the marks. I have no problem with those who are here because they want to be here, but I do with those who are here only because they want marks. Those students are writing for the lenght, not the depth of the discussion. As such, they anger me very much, for their actions speak out against the Bradburian spirit. I want them either to stop, or to mend their ways and ask things they actually want to find out. That's it.
Cheers, Translator

I've enjoyed the questions. As a professor/instructor/teacher, I was glad for questions -- even if they appeared weak. The discussion stemming from them is often invigorating, and persons who ask initially "weak" questions, if they pay attention to the ensuing discussions, can learn to think and communicate more deeply. I have enjoyed the F451 discussions -- especially as a contrast to the ridiculous shouting matches that plagued these boards on Michael Moore and politics.

Again, I enjoy these postings. I was young and ignorant once, but I learned. Now I'm old and suffering from a lack of memory!! What's the cure for that? The imagination!

To quote a controversial figure, I say to these kids with thier questions: "Bring 'em on!"

Yes! Keep reading, guys - we may yet save the world!

The questions are all right but I do find myself at a loss as to answers, which is why I have left many unanswered.

I'll bite! Could the mechanical dog have been an effective device of law-enforcement efforts prior to the dystopian society that had evolved in the setting of 4-5-1? As in The Pedestrian, where only one police car was necessary to oversee the entire city - and was completely automated - tv screens satisfy all the needs of auditory and visual sensations. With daily pills and alcohol mixed in, life could not have been better.

To be a reader, walker, converser, or writer was to be a suspicious member of society. The files were padded and eventually you were arrested or simply disappeared.

Thus, as time passed, these perfected mechanical devices of the time became tools to assure the oppression. [Remember, Ben Franklin had organized the "fireman to start fires" and no one questioned the history of the facts.] So, just maybe, the dogs were turned against the populace because they had no other job when everyone became complacent. The real criminal types had long been controlled, and now readers and thinkers were the culprits.

Mr. Bradbury plays this tune in so many of his stories. Along with The Ped., Usher II, Exiles come to mind. The recent movie Minortiy Report (Philip Dick) captured this with that briefcase of spider-like intruders that listened and looked through the buildings.

Robots go into dangerous buildings, caves, under the oceans, and to other planets for man. Think extreme -I, Robot! Where does the line that separates benevolence and evil fall. Mr. B doesn't give us an exact answer to this, but he sure does give us warnings.

So, the question by vargairi actually has merit.

[This message has been edited by fjpalumbo (edited 09-10-2004).]

Geez, could someone just answer the guys question? I think the hound would not be good because the whole point of hunting for criminals is to put them in jail. Not kill them.

I liked Frank's answer. I don't think the point of the chase was to put the criminal in jail, at all. The point was to maintain the illusion of the omniscience and omnipotent power of the state. In F451, when they couldn't get Montag, they took out some other poor sap. What mattered was making the state look good. The state knew they didn't get the right guy, but as long as the "citizens" thought they did, that was all that mattered.

I liked the question. It was one I had never asked before.


[This message has been edited by Mr. Dark (edited 10-06-2004).]

well there are good things about the hound. It could help us find drugs and chemicals and all that other stuff. but it would be a little too violent. There all ready problems with the real and not robotic dogs. so what's the point in teh robotic dogs? there just gonna be more suing against the police department.

The hound is/would be a good thing to have around is the city to look for trouble. i dont think it was evil it was doing wat it was programed for or told to. i visualize it being scary but idk.