Rock music begets social science, or: Self-indulgence to run wild

There are many things in the world and much to know about each of them.  Nowadays (as centralized economic planning has been semi-discredited), few would claim it is possible for one person to know a lot about everything.  It is probably uncontroversial to say that is possible to know a little about almost everything.  It is also uncontroversial to say that one can come to know a lot about a few things.  It is probably only slightly more controversial to say that a well-rounded person is going to know a lot about a few things as well as a little about almost everything.

Fine, well and good.  Here's where I say something of interest:  I believe that perceived well-roundedness comes not solely from a person's possession of that knowledge, but from eir judicious application of conceptual lessons learned in the careful study of a few things to enhance eir understanding of the many things about which ey has little concrete knowledge.  (What in the 'ell...)

I haven't written much about music or art on the blog, but I am considering changing that.  You see...due to the twin accidents of personal taste and semi-suburban '90s upbringing, one of the few things in this world about which I know a lot is a rock band, the Smashing Pumpkins.  Given the Pumpkins, I've tried to make pumpkin pie (sorry) and draw a lot of broadly applicable lessons from following the band: lessons about fame, about the intertemporal dynamics of a career in the creative arts, about the nature of organizations, and about the importance of the difference between what might be called the "visible history" of an entity (which is based solely on publicly available material) and what might be called the "total history", or the set of all underlying realities (the vast majority of which are not incorporated into the visible history). 

I think that these lessons (or, perhaps more humbly, "claims I often make") are good stuff to blog about, but I just can't write about them convincingly without using my best examples, and that means talking about the Pumpkins.  I will try to make it interesting (it's rock and roll, how dull can it be?), but if it doesn't work for you, well, (half of) this is my blog.  This post is already too long to proceed immediately, but I have at least a couple posts' worth of Pumpkin-related thoughts in mind on the preceding themes.  You have been so forewarned.