OpakPták

2012-01-29T13:30:00.001-08:00

New Radio Work commissioned by rAdioCustica&Cesky Rozhlas3, to be aired 25/2 http://ping.fm/Khkmm

2011-12-31T16:30:00.001-08:00

New Ewe http://ping.fm/sbWRU

2011-12-21T22:10:00.001-08:00

death and continuance http://ping.fm/WWTRs

2011-12-15T07:15:00.001-08:00

Score for At Their Own Rates II (for Saturday’s concert at Gallery Skolska 28) http://ping.fm/A8Jgk

2011-12-08T08:30:00.001-08:00

links for concert at Skolska saturday http://ping.fm/2p2iq

Damned To Fail

2011-01-30T07:07:00.000-08:00

We pay the government taxes and fees to provide services to us. In the absence of competition or any motive other than altruism for innovation or efficiency, the work done, the product, or service provided, is often substandard or nonfunctional.

Private enterprise offers another way to recieve services. Since private enterprises must make a profit to survive, they compete with one another for customers, and customer's money. On the one hand, this can lead naturally to innovation as a way of attracting customers. This can also lead to effiency as a means of avoiding waste and overhead costs. On the other hand, often private enterprise results in other strategies such as lying, cheating, and manipulation in order to make a profit, reduce thier overhead costs, and/or attract customers. Thus, the work done, the service, or product, provided by private enterprise is often substandard or nonfunctional.

IV. The Speed of Time

2010-10-15T06:31:00.000-07:00

We apprehend a three dimensional world in time, and in time it has been since its beginning. From the moment at which the infinitely massive, infinitely dense, concentrated singularity explosively began its expansion outwards, creating space as we know it, the universe had a direction. This asymmetry, this basic directionality in the universe, is called Time
Time is change and change in time is irreversible. Time itself is irreversible, unrepeatable, and whether or not it exists outside of consciousness ,(footnote here regarding theories that time does not exist outside of the subjective consciousness)this principle of irreversibility is what time is. It has one fundamental property: direction. It is even misleading to say that time has a direction, in fact time is direction, and everything that inhabits it, the totality of the three dimensional world, can be described in term s of it.
The measurement of time, and its utilization in human communities throughout the world, in other words, the utilitarian concept of time in common practice, is both different and similar to the existence of time in the sense discussed above, as a universe principle. In the prior sense, time is a dimension, and its effect, that of directionality in terms of itself, is detectable throughout the universe. In our human experience, directionality in time is a fundamental irreversible constant present in every aspect of our experience, and this informs time’s utilitarian applications and our measurement practices regarding it. Commonplace linguistic and practical usage of time referents belie a deeper truth: expandable and compressible spacial dimensions – when describing an object like a planet or a peanut – exist in the medium of time. In the English language, in fact, objects are described as being “in” time, and the use of this preposition, and the inherent inside/outside dualism that it implies places objects within time as as if spacial entities, their developments, and space itself, exist in suspension, floating in a moving river of time, to borrow a common traditional metaphor. In any case, spacial entities, their developments, and space is commonly referred to in terms of time, and it seems as if it must be, as if time with its property of irreversibility, provides a ground on which the figures of spacial articulation, that is three-dimensional objects, interact. Yet a paradox lurks within this idea, for it is the expansion of space itself, outward from its beginning with a big bang, that creates the directionality, the endless change, that gives a future and a past to the universe, and thus creates time, which is this property of movement itself.
So then, looking past the immediate perception of time and thus sidestepping the entire question of whether the perception of time is an artifact of our conscious mind itself, a function of the memories we store as biochemicals in our brains, it is clear that if one adopts a cosmological model of universal expansion – at least for the present development of the universe- than one also accepts that the universe has a shape and a direction. Put another way, it is possible to assume a certain consistency between cosmological scales and human scales of time perception In common practice, given a consistent linearity between time as perceived in our own life experiences, and time as perceived in the earth’s fossil record, for example. In short, the action of time seems consistent across many (foot note ref QED Fenneyman) if not all frames of reference. Such an idea relates our sensation of time not inconsistently to the directionality of the universe as a whole, as implied by spacial expansion in one direction since the big bang.
At least one currently popular cosmological model seems to agree with this (citation). The universe, it seems, and space itself, is expanding, and always has been, since the beginning. Before the big bang time did not exist, and neither did anything else. Judging by recent estimates (citation and footnote) of how much mass exists in the universe, some theories indicate that it should, in fact, continue to expand forever. In such a model reversibility, or repeatability, could not exist on any scale. Such a universe of three, four, or more dimensions exists as a great puddle of change spilling forth from an initial point and such universal, infinite expansion of everything in an outward vector implies direction, at least, from an earlier more inward point. On the other hand, as such an expansion is not an expansion into anything, how can it be said to exist? If reality expands into, as it were, itself, than how can we trace its progress , and would the expansion itself be consistent or variable?
The answer comes along with that energy which itself makes it possible for us to know that such expansion exists. That energy is light. Light emitted by stars represents a broadband, high energy radiation. When it is shifted into the red from the perspective of an observer, this means that the object is travelling away from the observer. Fundamentally, this is very close to the audio phenomena of Doppler Shift, in which, for example, an ambulance approaching an observer at high speed, passing the observer and then continuing to speed away into the distance is heard to emit a siren which, from the standpoint of a stationary observer first rises in frequency (perceived as pitch) and then falls as the ambulance approaches and then passes the observer, respectively. This effect occurs from the standpoint of an observer because the sound waves emitted by a moving object are first compressed in the direction of motion with respect to the listener and then elongated as the sound producing source recedes into the distance. Since higher frequencies are perceived as higher pitches, the spacial compression of the wavelength emitted by the sound producing object (the siren in the example above) results in a higher frequency as perceived by the stationary observing listener, though the sound emitted by the siren itself (or any sound producing body in motion) remains consistent.
In terms of light higher frequencies correspond to the blue end of the visible spectrum and lower to the perceived red end, therefore objects in recession with respect to an observer appear to be redish in color, while those in motion towards an observer would appear blueish. Since, according to recent astronomical observations, all other galaxies appear to be redshifted with respect to our vantage point in the Milky Way, one can deduce that in fact these redshifted structures are moving away from us. All apparent large scale structures moving apart from one another seems a credible argument for universal expansion, for spacial expaqnsion. This becomes more complicated, however, if one considers the question of what the universe, what space itself, is expanding into.
Many cosmologists suggest (citation) that the cosmos is not, in fact, expanding into anything, but that space itself is expanding. Stretching, as it were, out into all dimensions. However, since space is more or less nothing, how do we map it in order to understand its direction of expansion. Further, how can we know the shape of the universe?
Space is mapped by the energy that it contains, whether this energy is contained in three- dimensional objects or whether it exists as fields of radiation. Light, or electromagnetic radiation in general, can function as an indicator to map out the shape and development of the cosmos. Radiation, including light, interacts with objects, including our telescopes and other instruments, and offers us a way to theorize about the age, size, direction of motion, or behavior in general;, of cosmological bodies. We look to the galaxies furthest from us, receding, from our perspective on earth, at a rate close to the speed of light, as an indicator of the furthest cusp of spacetime, and the edge of the expanding universe.
Here light emerges again, but this time its function is as a limit. As is well known in popular and professional publications (citation) the speed of light sets certain limitations on the realm of human experience. According to the theory of Special Relativity (citation) frames of reference in motion relative to one another account for the difference in the energies and information perceived by an observing system at rest relative to its own coordinate system and those emitted by a system moving relative to the observers coordinate system (whether or not that system is moving or at rest relative to their own coordinate frame. Further, as a moving system increases in velocity relative to an observer at rest relative to its own coordinate system, the moving system would be seen to elongate in space and become more massive. In addition, it would be observed that a clock present in such a moving system approaching the speed of light in relation to one at rest within a coordinate system would tick slower and slower as the velocity approaches the speed of light. From the standpoint of an observer within the moving system, however, all would progress as usual (or so goes the theory), such an observer would not perceive a change in size, mass, and the clock would tock as before, even Stephen, and the moving system could continue to try to accelerate towards the speed of light.
The problem is that this seems to suggest that in fact the speed of light cannot be exceeded. If, upon approach to it objects mass, and size increase towards infinity and time moves infinitely slower, than the situation becomes similar to trying to cross the threshold of a door by taking a step one half the distance of each previous step. Forgiving for a moment the limit of one’s foot size, which would impose itself on the situation rather quickly, one can see how the situation quickly explodes into an infinity of fractions and the doorway would remain forever unreachable. To try to port this metaphor into our experience of objects moving relative to one another and relative to the speed of light is fairly logical since we have information about objects at a distance do to the radiation, the light that they emit. A system moving faster than itself is not possible, and one moving faster than all energy emitted by it would certainly be invisible, not to say bizarre. Movement exists in relation to a coordinate system perceived to be at rest, or a system at rest relative to its own coordinate system, however if the universe itself is expanding as indicated by the directionality of the time dimension, it is difficult to say that stasis exists objectively anywhere.
Further, if the systems of perception, that is, the systems for receiving information are limited by lightspeed for their reception of radiation-energy than it would be logical that to exceed that would be impossible while inside of such a frame of reference. It also seems impossible to adopt another frame of reference, in practice. Any attempts to break out of this one by crossing the lightspeed limit result in the distortions discussed above, or so goes the theory. Thus, it seems that the speed of light sets a limit on the nature of reality in general. It is interesting to consider, however, if this is true across several orders of magnitude.
This introduces a number of problematic situations. First of all, the galaxies furthest from us, those mentioned above whose light we might hope to use to indicate the furthest visible cusp of the expanding universe, in fact seem to be moving away from us at a rate faster than the speed of light! Further, going the other direction along orders of magnitude, very small particles are sometimes annihilated within atomic reactions in which a particle is said to interact with an anti-particle of the same type (citation). In such reactions it has been argued that in fact what happens is that time is moving backwards as these energies are in motion close to light speed.
With regard to the first situation, that of the galactic recession at super light speed, it is possible to consider that the rate of expansion of space itself is in fact faster than the speed the light from the galaxies is traveling towards us. Thus the velocity of spacial expansion is faster than the velocity of light in space. If the spacial expansion can be utilized to explain the directionality of time, than it could be said that the velocity of time is greater than the velocity of light, and that does not, on the surface seem to make sense.
One partial solution to the problem, however, is to consider the coordinate system from which we are viewing these galaxies from. We too, are in motion, and seeing as the light reaching us from these furthest receding galaxies (as seen by the Hubble Deep Field telescope, citation etc) takes a considerable amount of time to reach us, along with the distortions enacted up on by the gravitational fields of massive objects around which light bends along with space itself, which, according to further relativistic theory, is the cause of gravitation (citation). This introduces still more fascinating problems such as how it is possible that the galaxies furthest from us appear to us to recede from us at a value greater than than of the speed of light. Is this due to some change in the value for the speed of light at the edges of the universe? Or could such a phenomena be caused by our observational position with regard to the universe as a whole?
Space and time, though often conceptually separated in commonplace experience, are tightly united physically and cosmically. Is space itself moving, expanding, faster than the speed of light? Since the Hubble constant is a spacial constant but not a temporal one, could it be said that galaxies expanding along with universe itself could exceed the speed of light? Does this mean that the speed of light might itself be slower than the “speed of time”, which in this case the rate of universal expansion itself?

in case anyone is actually reading this

2010-10-04T05:39:00.001-07:00

please bear with me, citations are coming and so are some revisions, especially for sloppy number 4.

III. Movement Towards Later

2010-10-04T05:38:00.002-07:00

All movement exists in relation to the idea of stillness. Bodies in motion move in relation to bodies at rest with respect to their local coordinate systems (citation). This is how we know they are moving. It could even be imagined that this imaginary quality called stillness is the medium within which movement happens. Still, stillness, like movement, is only relative to a particular situation (a coordinate system, ibid.) being considered. An elevator can be be said to be at rest on the 3rd floor of a building, and yet the planet on which the building itself resides is itself speeding through space, in rotation around both the sun, and about its own axis. Our galaxy, further, is in rotation about its center as well, and in fact, according to Edwin Hubble's slowly (from our coordinate system) stretching "constant" the entire universe is moving, expanding, as evidenced by the the fact that galaxies both distant and local to our own appear red-shifted with respect to us. Everything appears to be in motion, spreading apart, away from us, as the fabric of space itself expands.

Despite the fact that everything else is red-shifted, this does not imply that we are in the center, and are motionless, instead such red-shifted galaxies would be seen from any point in our isometric universe, and thus our own galaxy would appear red-shifted if seen from another, or so goes the theory.
Thus, nothing can really be said to be at rest. Even molecules super-cooled to absolute zero would retain the inertial mass of the coordinate system they exist in, the planet they are on. Yet typically human beings measure time as though we ourselves are at rest, and who can blame us? Our common sense idea of time, and thus of rest, as applied to our utilitarian exploitation of time works just fine.

So then, people characterize time in terms of direction. Tomorrow is in the future. Yet, the systems in place for quantifying and measuring time operates with reference to the three spacial dimensions, in terms of volumes of time, durations. We play out actions in three-dimensional space in terms of these time volumes, and without the implied but not quantified sense of directionality, which is caused by the movement of the expansion of the universe, the movement of space through itself, there would be no before or after. Everything would happen at a point, at once.

So what is time? Time, and the perceived quality of non-repeatability in our universe are analogous and inseparable. What we call time is a perceived vector quality. Time is a direction and a movement within our environment. The strange part is that really, the entire three-dimensional environment is moving, it moves, itself, though time. Everything exists, as it where, in time.

One curious side effect is that although the spacial quantities are reversible, at least to the zero point, time is irreversible. This is curious, because simply put, this is what time is, a principle of irreversibility. We can break time into units, and measure it out quantitatively (this is done despite the lack of any absolute zero state of rest to refer to), but unlike the spacial dimensions, in which reversibility is possible, at least down to zero and further in some cases), in time this simply isn't possible. It goes in one direction, and that maybe is its only attribute. You can lose weight but you can't go back in time.

In fact, when one tries to prove time's existence, the mind finds an irreducible barrier within the concept of non-repeatability. Time has direction, it is direction, in which space and everything in it, everything in our experience and seemingly outside of it, moves. The whole universe is doing it, and that is it, and really all we know about it. Time simply goes. As a certain natural scientist put it "evolution is just one damn thing after another" (citation), and maybe that could be said for time itself, if it wasn't for the fact that the things themselves seem to exist in the medium of time rather than the other way around.

Another curious experience is apparent fluidity of the movement of time. We have all experienced, certainly, at one time or another, the feeling of that time is "flowing" at different rates. This can at times be quite extreme. Waking, for example, from what one thought to be a short rest only to realize that one has slept for hours (if not years in the case of Rip Van Winkle mythologies). To compare such experiences with our imposed regular quantitative divisions of time, that is, clock time, are a source of wonder and amazement, but still all we can say about time is that it moves. It is MOVING. It IS moving. IT is moving. But where is it going? It is going towards Later.

We know this based on one thing: that we cannot go back. Repetition, in a very strict sense, is impossible. Every repetition, in a strict sense, is a new event against the axis of time. It is, at most, a similar shape, in the geometrical sense, if we where to imagine a four dimensional coordinate system with the three spacial axes and time as a fourth axis. The same three dimensional form at two points on the fourth dimensional axis creates a similar form but not the same one.

Perhaps, as present in science fiction and in certain Fenneyman (citation) -esque branches of particle physics (about which, this author admittedly knows almost nothing) retrograde temporal movement is possible. When one finds theories regarding this, they usually are framed in orders of magnitude much smaller or much greater than ours. Some theories about anti-matter particles imply a retrograde temporal movement to account for the existence of these particles but this is on an order of magnitude so much smaller than our own everyday world that very little in fact behaves in similar ways, even though we are made of that world. It seems impossible to experience such a transformation here and, with your pardon, now. No anti-author will appear to annihilate this author. Traveling the other direction, upwards to agreater orders of magnitude of spacetime, should the universe end in a big crunch in which time reverses backwards into an inverse big bang, the experience of this is still quite beyond the scope of our present discussion.

Time has every appearance, and in fact, we find our utility of it in the firm directionality of its development in relation to spacial forms. This directionality is time itself. Although some mathematical models, referred to earlier, describe time and space on a four dimensional coordinate system, and as such, more or less mathematically equivalent to one another, it seems that in some ways they are not equivalent. Spacial events happen in time. Time is, in this sense, the media in which spacial events happen. This idea is very commonly encountered in everyday speech. One doesn't say that time exists inside of an object. Yet an object, like a block of wood, clearly exists in time. The usage illustrates important aspects of how we use time itself, and these are formed by and indeed form our conceptions of what time is itself.

This is why, when in need of quantitative reference for time, we place a grid over it. This grid consists of assigned, regular units marked off according to a reference point, as we do with spacial coordinates. Throughout history, humanity has relied on myriad reference points such as the behavior or the sun and moon, tides, decaying isotopes, and so forth for such reference points, but what are we trying to do with our grid once established? We are trying to see the progression of three-dimensional events. For example, a baby book, in which parents collect photos of their child at regular intervals displays the three dimensional development (two dimensionally, of course, using photos) with reference to a time grid, here a calender. We make such grids to see change more clearly.

To put the problem another way, imagine an object in an environment. The object's environment (set A) is simply the collection of all other objects not object A (our initial object) inside set A. The development of object A (the changes which this object goes through while remaining, for the purposes of a perceiver, object A)in relation to the other objects in set A represents object A's path through time, if not the path of set A itself. All of this can then be set against time grid T, which is based on a regular division of time (which as stated before is simply this quality of irreversible movement in our universe). The relationships between object A within set A (the development discussed earlier), in reference to grid T, and set A's relationship to grid T can be described as a "rate of change", and units from time grid T can be used to describe it. This quantification thus describes both time and space, and both space and time coordinates are necessary to catch a particular bus or arrange a meeting with a person in the center of a crowded city.

Interestingly, this relationship of interdependence between time and space shows up in the tools of calculus, where rate of change is measured and often expressed graphically. Curves have attributes of being analyzable graphs of functions, and in this way share a behavior with other curves, such as those found in nature or in nature as designed by humans - architecture. Curves turn out to be curves whether they represent data about spacetime, or whether they are stone monuments. Still, this conceptual flattening of spacial and linear curves is something of a game. The effect of negating the function of such curves is unfortunately similar to the flattening effect of treating the three spacial values and the time dimension as mere numerical values or variables in a coordinate system when in fact their behavior seems to be very different.

Consider this final point: if time is taken to be a medium of sorts, in which spacial events happen, and irreversible a paradox emerges. Time described as the concept of movement cannot be quantified. When one tries, the best that emerges is the idea of a field. That is not problematic as certainly spacial events can develop against, or better, in, such a field, but that field itself exists in relation to something, since it itself describes a development. What then, is the field of time in development in, what is its medium, given that nothing could exist without or before it? After all, we have never known stillness.

II. One Hand Clapping

2010-10-04T05:38:00.001-07:00

A falling tree in a forest would be heard if someone was there to hear it in the same sense that it would be seen if someone where there to see it. Now there are no trees, no sounds, no observers of them, real or imaginary. We are leaving all that behind to talk about sound in terms of our utilitarian definition of it, as a system of interactions, or rather as an interaction of systems that define both our use and our experience of sound as a phenomena.

What makes a sound?

Every sound, heard or not, is produced, or rather, represents (as "a wavelike disturbance in an elastic media" citation) an interaction between two or more systems. For it to be heard, as we shall see later, still more complexity is required. Firstly, however, here on earth a sound moves outward, wavelike, propagating from an event in all directions, unless obstructed. What was the event? It was a basic interaction between two physical systems like two snapping fingers, or a hammer and a piece of board (and again, a medium, as we shall see momentarily). A sound could be said to be the effect of this interaction, it is not always the desired effect either, as I unfortunately can attest to each morning when the construction begins outside my bedroom window. After all, those machines for sawing wood and shooting nails direct their energies towards the wood and nails used, and the sound produced is actually "radioactive waste" in a sense, or at least wasted radiation, similar to the way that heat produced by machinery and released into the atmosphere can represent lost energy in a physical system. Nevertheless, the cause of the sound is the same, be it a saw or a violin (and often there is little difference), two systems interact, energy propagates outward, and if we hear it we call it sound. In fact, when we organize it for amusement or communicative purposes it is called music or poetry, or some other things, but we must leave that for an entirely different discussion. The point is this: hammer and wood interact, air pressure is displaced between the two, a sound wave (which is a pressure wave in air and water) vibrates outward in all directions at a constant rate. This is sound production on earth, that is, inside of our atmosphere.

With the addition of the atmosphere we must increase our model by an order of complexity. Instead of two systems of interaction we now must include a third: the atmosphere. This environment, the medium through which our sound travels, is certainly of itself complex, but then upon consideration one realizes that so is our hammer, forged from complex mineral crystals melted at high heat and recast in an iron alloy, and the wood itself, which it strikes. Unfortunately those fundamental layers of complexity, those systems and their own fascinating molecular interactions will not be considered here. We must return instead to our earth-based common practice human definition of sound as audible radiation which depends on at least two interactive three-dimensional systems and a closed system of atmospheric pressure. This pressurized atmospheric room surrounding the earth provides "ground" necessary for the "figurative" changes in the pressure which allow it to become audible, and thus to fall within our definition of sound itself as an "audible" energy. Our definition, it turns out, is already recursive on one order, and also a bit self-centered: The pressurized atmosphere renders sound waves audible to us because it is the medium through which the waves that we can hear propagate.

Such circular thinking produces a crises of third order, for now it is clear than it is not enough to have two interacting systems interacting within an atmospheric system which forms the medium for their interaction but further that to hear any of this further complexity is required! So, then, our common practice definition of sound implies the presence of a listener. Earlier, it was determined neither to precede with an investigation of the medium (our atmosphere, in the example given) nor of the two interactive systems (the hammer and the piece of wood it strikes) in terms of their internal complexity. Still, a listener, a human listener, as implied by the common practice definition of sound as audible energy, is worth looking into. What systems are required for a listener to hear, and further, to make meaningful, the pressure data retrieved from the environmental medium as sound?

Depending on the organism in question these systems can be integrated or separate from one another. Most animal life, including humans, feature highly complex inter-connected systems of perception and interpretation (further reading reference here). Computers, to the extent one chooses to consider them to be organisms, often feature perception and interpretation systems discretely housed if not totally separated from one another, often dependent on user interface for systemic integration. The main idea, however, is that these systems, whether animal or computer, are frightfully complex, and find their greatest interdependence in that mysterious complex known as consciousness. Since we are discussing particularly human listeners, it is germane to explore how the human sense of awareness functions in the listening process.

Consciousness, as entity or idea, remains fascinating and strange. Despite the research into it being conducted in multifaceted ways, it's structure and function remain largely unknown. Thus, it will be approached in materialistic terms. Despite volumes of research into sound perception, it is clear that we do not yet understand how the perception of sound happens in the human brain in a clear way. I do not understand my own, and I certainly do not understand yours.

So then, what can be said about sound as a perceived phenomena?

For one thing, it is clearly not a static, momentary, individual, occurrence, but rather something in time. It is dependent on the three spacial dimensions but by it's nature also implies a continuity in another dimension. Sound exists in relation to time and has a shape in time, a history. This history, the perception of which could be said to be based on the memory of the perceiver of the sound, relates to the cause and the chain of integral effects within the sound, producing it's line of development in time. This is what musicians call the form of a piece or what electronic musicians refer to in terms of individual sounds as an envelope, the two dimensional line which describes the life of the sound from it's birth (attack), life (sustain), old age (decay), and finally death (release). It describes the perceived effects of the process of a sounds creation, existence, transformation, and conclusion, for any sound no matter what duration. Yet from this one sees that a "sound" is actually itself a complex, an aggregate of parts, of systems of interaction that through a person's choice have been made into one meta-system, that makes a whole that can be described by such an envelope.

What is required for such a choice to be made? What is required to take a selection of pulsations within an environmental medium and group them together as a concrete line of development and to claim that these together, through their interactions, produce one thing, this sound? The answer is memory. Yet the experience of this envelope, this line of sonic development as perceived by the listener says something more about the listener than simply that memory is required and the listener has one. To be able to interpret, much less acknowledge the existence of this time dimension, or to have a memory at all a special sense is required, a sense different in kind from the normal five of seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, and tasting. To experience the development of a sound, or of anything, one must ask what the sound is developing against, what the medium for this development is.

Similar to the momentary pressure displacement in the air required to produce the sound wave discussed in the first section, the medium against which the movement of the subsequent sound wave is gauged is that of time itself, as apprehended by an observer, with their own relative clock. If we had no memory, we would know no time, or possibly if there was no time there would be no memory, or stranger perhaps if there was no memory there would be no time (citation), and eggs before chickens before eggs into eternity.

Sound, in the widest physical sense requires no observer. A wavelike disturbance can and will continue to disturb it's elastic media in the absence of awareness of it by anyone. Otherwise, the universe would not exist, after all more than likely no one was around to observe that. Yet nevertheless sound still requires an interaction of at least two separate systems and a medium to exist. It is often difficult in practice to isolate these three systems, but nevertheless, they exist. Finally, a time dimension is implied, and perhaps the ubiquitous use of the word "wave" in definitions of sound implies this, as a wave itself is a periodicity, even if it is a modified periodicity. Sound requires two interactive systems, an elastic environment, and time. So to solve an old problem totally out of context: One hand cannot clap, especially if taken out of time and therefore produces no sound.

I. Ghost of a Fallen Tree

2010-10-04T05:37:00.001-07:00

Children find fascination, or alternately horror, in imagining what goes on in their rooms when they leave home, or what goes on under their beds when the lights go out. In the imagination, toys become animate and monsters form out of the syrupy ether of darkness, as soon as one turns one's back on an environment. Adults too share in this obsession. People set up cameras to see if anything happens in their rooms when they leave. They ask themselves questions a to whether unobserved trees falling in an unobserved forest produce a sound.

Normally, upon investigating these questions it turned out that there where no monsters beneath the bed, that one's toys very likely remained in place and inanimate for the duration of one's absence from an undisturbed room. That, in the absence of intruders, the only action caught on the video camera left to record one's empty flat while one visited the grocery store was the changing light, the accumulation of dust, perhaps the movement from floor to couch and back of a dog or cat, or, given the presence of a time-lapse system and a longer duration, the normally imperceptible growth of one's houseplants, rendered visible. Still, the unobserved tree falling in the forest does in fact make a sound. The splintering crash of the this tree, though unheard, resonates down to the root of our perceptual and cognitive processes and this essay will be about why and how, and beyond this, will open a discussion of what sound is, what it is made of, and later what time is itself, and what it is made of.

Let's begin with the tree. Only the most dedicated solipsist would suggest that an unperceived event does not exist. Some take the situation still further to the point at which any event not perceived or experienced directly by themselves as observers cannot be said to exist. Such persons would do well to consider their own birth, or better, their conception. Luckily, none of us where around to witness that! Still, the affect of the action of our own conception in the womb is visible in terms of our existence. So unless the universe is far stranger than can even begin to be discussed here, extrapolating from what we know about other people and their bedroom behaviors, we can assume that something similar happened between our parents, and that this brought us into existence. Most of us would agree that this was not an action we witnessed (no doubt fortunately) and yet, here we are.

Thus, events do not need to be perceived directly to be said to exist. In fact, even their effects need not be perceived as we constantly assume or become convinced of the reality of objects and situations by the mere plausibility of them. Consider, for example, a news broadcast. We hear about an environmental crisis in Madagascar. YWould a reasonable person question the existence of weather in Madagascar, or the island itself? Of course not. If a friend brings you a report of a new restaurant in the neighborhood, you likewise accept the existence of such a restaurant. Why? Firstly, because the event is simply possible, and more than that, it is likely, it is ordinary. Secondly, analyzing the motivations of the speaker, we find that there is no reason we should doubt our friend's enthusiastic report, and we may even alter our plans for the afternoon and choose to visit this restaurant with our friend, similar to the way we may alter our commute based on the traffic report on the morning radio. In such a way we accept the existence of things we cannot see, and even modify our behaviors based on the mere plausibility of the existence of some situation, and the absence of a reasonable reason to doubt it.

A tree has fallen in the forest. Did it make a sound? Have you ever witnessed a tree fall in the forest that did not make one?

On such grounds an idea can be said to have an existence, at very least in terms of it's effect, similar to that of a physical object immediately perceived. There is something else, however, hiding in the question itself: a tree falls, unobserved, in the forest. Does it make a sound? Well, based on what we have discussed, yes. It makes an unobserved, unheard sound. Yet there is something strange in this, something that reaches both the physical and perceptual roots of what a sound is in itself, and this has to do with questions of utility, that is, with the tone the question is asked in. Thus, two further philosophical questions present themselves.

The first question is "what is a tree to itself?".
Beginning from a basic stance, it is clear that if a tree had any kind of consciousness or awareness at all that it would likely be very different from our own. We have completely different physiologies, for one thing. Thus, the second question: "Does a tree call itself a tree?" Unlikely, especially given that even among humans we don't agree on what a tree is or what it should be called (for example in Czech language a tree is "strom" and in Hindi it is " "). So then, with some sadness, the discussion must be narrowed. If an Englishman observes a tree falling in the forest and then is asked for a report, they will likely reply something to the effect of "a tree has fallen". Still, this event, as experienced by the tree itself, by an insect on the tree, or a squirrel on the ground, would no doubt be characterized quite differently than by our Englishman. So then, returning to our original question with the modifications we have based on the two questions above we rephrase it to read: "If a tree falls in forest, in the absence of an observant Englishman, has a tree fallen?" The action, of course, happens either way. The experience of it, is infinite.

This approach negated a highly important element of the original question. Looking back to the original, it is clear that the question was not, in fact, about the existence of the tree itself, but the sound which a tree might make upon falling. This is even more mysterious when one considers that sound is simply radiative energy. Our Englishman calls it "sound" simply because it is perceived the way most of what we have been taught to call sounds are perceived, that is, by the ears. Of course, if one takes a physicist like Harry F. Olson's definition, as expressed in the second edition of his seminal acoustics text from 1967:

"Sound is an alternation in pressure, particle displacement, or particle velocity which is propogated in an elastic medium, or superposition of such propagated alterations. Sound is also the auditory sensation produced through the ear by the alterations described above."

than one can see that here sound can exist apart from it's sensation. In addition, it is common (citation and example here) to simplify the above definition to "sound is a wavelike disturbance in an elastic medium", and here, as in the first part of the previous definition it is clear that an opening exists, as not only need sound not be heard, but sound need not even be hearable.

Though at first this seems surprising after a moment, it is clear that this is not a new idea. Dog whistles produce a sound. We cannot hear it. Still, we refer to it as a sound. Still it is interesting to consider the fact that sounds need not even be audible. Rather, like the sounds that make up earthquakes, they may simply be the energy, and medium around them, that is, that which resonates, determines how they are characterized.

I can hear the critical chorus rising even now: "But we are not," they sing forth in my imagination, "questioning the existence of radiation. We are asking a question about a tree in a forest." Therefore, let us return to common practice definitions of sound as heard energy, and continue to try and get to the bottom of this. "Tree" "falling" "inside forest" "unobserved". Does it "make" a "sound"?

Ignoring the ambiguities inherent in the quoted words above and forging forth with the common practice definitions of these things we nevertheless find ourselves stuck. How can that portion of the energy that would normally be heard, as produced by a tree falling unobserved in a forest be heard energy if no one, not even a squirrel, snake, bird, or insect, is there to hear it? One must again simply rely on the plausibility argument, extending to what one knows about the system called "forest". We know of no soundless forests, as all known forests are dependent on the pressurized atmosphere of our planet. Therefore, just as it is eminently plausible for a tree to fall unobserved, it is likewise expected that such a tree would produce a sound, though an unobserved, that is to say an unheard, one.

In the next section we will consider this common practice definition of sound, as "audible energy", and in particular what such a definition means in terms of our utility of sound in general.

Side Thought Regarding Interactivity in Performance as Fact and Fiction

2010-08-29T19:58:00.000-07:00

Performance, which I take to mean "activity carried out in the presence of an audience" is fundamentally an interactive art form. Layers of complex interactivity abound between performer, multi-dimensional space, and audience within any given performance situation. Though clearly there are exist whole highly developed genres of performance that focus on a particular type of interactivity, in which the audience determines, directs or influences the performer or the direction or structure of the piece in some way I will here discuss one aspect of performance interactivity at it's most basic psychological and physical levels. Thus, the term interactivity is here taken to mean the basic interaction between any person and any space or situation whatsoever, and in particular that interactivity present in the special and strange situation that occurs between an audience, a performance space and a person or group of people who present some actions to an audience within such a space.

Actually, I must add the fact that this essay was originally conceived long ago and forgotten about but because of a conversation I just had with Che Chen I decided to recall and publish here the most salient point, and in fact, the one point about this giant subject that I really think bears discussion or needs clarification or all of the above, and that concerns questions of communication and "honesty" in performance, which regards one complex of the dimensionality of the multi-dimensional performance space alluded to above, particularly, the social space.

Often, in the context of music performance and artistic presentations in general a premium is placed on some quality of the work or performance that is called "honesty". Since I am primarily a musician, I will at least start by discussing music. In musical performance, it is often expected that a performer is expected to communicate some information. This information can be emotional, or evocative of an emotional state, or it can be conceptual, fantastic, narrative, purely structural as in various modernist styles, historical (in the sense of the ballad and other forms), coercive (in the case of a political or advertising context) or even simply informative (as might be the case in a public service announcement). Other examples of communicative musical content are sure to exist, and in fact the list of possible contents is likely infinite as is the "list" of possible uses of music. Yet audience members use this information and a comparison of their perceptions of this information and the efficiency, uniqueness, and "honesty" of the presentation of this information as a basis on which to comment on a given performance.

To bring this back to earth simply consider how many times you have heard a musical performance described as "heartfelt". Adjectives of this type, reflexive to the performer, illustrate the belief that the performer in fact portrays the emotional (or other) content represented by the piece from the standpoint of the first person. In other words, the assumption is that the performer is in fact experiencing the emotional (or other) content in question in the actual act of performance of the music. This is the honesty considered to be a virtue of a good performance.

The folksinger illustrates this to a high degree. Though many times presenting music other than their own, or even music borrowed from another culture, the value (often referred to in terms of legitimacy, for some reason) of the performance is many times based on the perceived honesty of the performer. Even with the long term habit of gender crossing in folk narratives (where a female narrative is sung by a man from the female perspective or vice-versa), the honesty of the portrayal is cited often as a determinant of the legitimacy of the performance. Of course, such heartfelt legitimacy, such honesty is entirely theater, or at most the vicarious imagination and summoning of an emotional state on the part of the performer that probably never existed, or at most existed at a former point (but certainly not normally during the actual performance) in their life. Music performance is expected to be engaging but also to be honest, and as such brings to light a key contradiction present in all the theatrical arts of western culture. The audience enjoys imagining that the artist is the character presented in the work as this is the utmost in efficiency in terms of communication, yet to consider again the example of the folksinger most people would prefer to listen to a musician perform these songs than the actual characters present in the narratives...Loretta Lynn can tell us better about being a "coal miner's daughter" than an actual example of the specimen in question, even though clearly the honesty in question is dependent on something else, and this something else is the other major factor by which people seem to judge musical performance and performance in general in western performance art.

Ironically, the other major premium placed on performers is "theatricality". This means that a performer is expected to be engaging, and even to perhaps present "fiction". The prime example of the conflict between these two demands that the audience seems to make on almost every performance is most evident not in music but in theater. Actually, perhaps the funniest examples exist in politics, but then, that seems to be a type of theater in itself.

In theater the two modes of presentational honesty and theatricality are often mixed. Thus a performer is expected to presented the emotional content of a work honestly, even though they perform the same work night after night. In addition, actors and actresses many times are praised for an "honest" portrayal of a character that is completely fictitious, and in the minds of the audience the actor or actresses image becomes fused with this character (as Leonard Nemoy has, to his chagrin, become fused with the personality of Dr. Spock). Yet an actor or actress is a person who has studied and mastered the art of theatrical deception to highest degree. To compliment the honesty presented onstage is not particularly a compliment to someone whose goal is mass deception!

And so there it is. We are all dishonest, but believe us if you want to, after all, we probably in fact did at one point feel something akin to what we are presenting to you on stage. In fact, what is happening on the stage exists as much as anything else exists: what you are actually seeing in theater is an illusion (in most cases) but it certainly is a real illusion. What you hear in music is sound. That certainly is real, honesty and emotions aside for the moment, musical sound is as real as it gets, and thus we are in this together, and interactively.

Nice Interview

2010-06-28T01:31:00.001-07:00

http://www.nonalignmentpact.com/2008/08/curious-jorge.html

new releases...part 1

2010-01-23T06:36:00.001-08:00

Hello friends,

I am pleased to announce the release of two new Core of the Coalman/Nitro Uliře recordings:

Affinity Groups, is a self-released cd-r, recorded during last winters very long deep freeze. This recording features five highly textured tracks in which sounds arranged according to lattice-like pattern structures interweave, vibrate, and interfere with each other. Like sound propagating through the inside of a crystal or like being inside of one, the waves make disturbances in the surface and depth of a gelatenous structure in which the listener is immersed. Alternately, this music is structured aggregations of multiple similar events out of which these lattice forms emerge, at times self-organized, at other times organized by me... Or better, a metaphorical audio tour through the Geological Wing of a Natural History Museum. These tracks are the studio versions of material I have developed since I moved to Czech Republic three years ago, and represents the main material I have played on various tours during that time, here in Europe and in the US.

Affinity Groups, Core of the Coalman 7Euro (approx 9$) includes shipping
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New Cassette from George Chen and Steve Santa Maria's label Two Thousand Tapes features a variation on a continuous sound structure performed by Core of the Coalman many times in concerts in Oakland and San Francisco as well as in Czech Republic. Here, heavy, physical sounds drone and rub against one another in a crushing geological sexuality. New minerals are born here. This is something of a sequel to the very well recieved cassette Carnasie released by Custodian Color Zoo Containers a few years back.

(2/3)r to the 4th power, Core of the Coalman, cassette 4 Euro
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Note: This is my first attempt to use PayPal links directly from an email. If for some reason it doesnt work, please contact me and I will figure it out! I have tested it quite alot, and it should work! Thanks!

Core of the Coalman has other new releases on the way:

Aggregate and Crackle cdr, Chocolate Monk(UK)
Box of the Last Help, cd, Zum (USA)
Other Continues, cassette, Poot Records (UK)
You'll Need a Catapult cd, Klang Und Krack (CZ)

What/who is ...

Jorge Boehringer's viola axe and silver toned frequency drift for the vibration of the air surrounding the Aural Coils, electrically. Both of them, vibrated in phase pulses sometimes symmetrical, and other times it's life burning to pour out. Its Yam Yad much picked over when found in the company of a rough legged hawk. It's a barbershop quartet dedicated to performing baroque slink slop in concordance with thermoelectric properties, and when they are hot, they are hot. It's a theoretical cure for chronic coryza, and while the predicament is allieviated, the geocephalo-cotex is also direly affected, causing an initiative of obsessive vision: geological and musical time frames became supercooled and thus glacially motivated. Slow in form but powered and etched by sunshine continually, in the spirit of biting the hand that feeds one, Core of the Coalman is dyspeptic subtended prescient lacuna and cash money coated in peppermint oil and wrapped in a burning flag,a nest made from twigs stuck in the discarded remains of a dissected dream of textural structures evolving at their own rates and viewable from aan infinity of viewpoints and dimensions simultaneously, and all that, that sort of thing.
Core of the Coalman feedback-driven yodel triggers,descending tympanic pressures implying sexual interface, and (probably) extended upwardly mobile Carnasitic arrays, with ornaments. Its like the blurred fossil record of a biological crises during a time of intense geological speed. Know what I mean, man? its Ordovician noise. The invitations went out like 648 million years ago, it was old school. You still haven't showed up. I miss you
A compound eye may consist of thousands of individual photoreception units. The image perceived is a combination of inputs from the numerous ommatidia (individual "eye units"), which are located on a convex surface, thus point in slightly different directions. This, for Jorge Boehringer, results in a specific type of focus, in which multiple systems of polymathic pursuits are allowed to progress at their own rates, attaining, as such, a unified, rather than fractured, perceptive, though a perspective different from that enjoyed by our ancestors- human and otherwise. Mr. Boehringer is active foremost as a composer and you can find samples of his sound work by typing his name, or the name "Core of the Coalman," into your internets. He lives in Prague currently.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Czech Language version
s pomoc z Google Translator!

"Affinity Groups", je self-cd-r, zaznamenaných během posledních zim velmi dlouhou mrazu. Tato funkce nahrávání pěti vysoce dekorativní skladeb, v němž zní uspořádány podle mříž-jako vzor struktury proplést, vibrují, a navzájem ovlivňovat. Stejně jako zvuk množit přes uvnitř krystalu nebo jako být v rámci jednoho, aby vlny v důsledku narušení povrchu a hloubka gelatenous struktuře, v níž se ponoří posluchače. Střídavě, je to hudba strukturovaný agregace více podobných akcí, z nichž tyto mříže formuláře objeví, občas sebe-organizované, jindy pořádané mě ... Nebo lepší, metaforický audio procházku Geologická křídle Natural History Museum. Tyto stopy jsou studiové verze materiálu jsem vyvinul, protože jsem se přestěhoval do Česká republika před třemi lety, a představuje hlavní materiál jsem hrál na různé výlety během toho času, tady v Evropě a ve Spojených státech.

Affinity Groups, Core of the Coalman
nebo vložte tento ve vašem prohlížeči:
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New Kazeta od George Steve Chen a Santa Maria na etiketě Dva tisíce pásky funkce variace na kontinuální zvukové struktury provedené Jádro týmu Uhlířské v mnoha koncertech v Oaklandu a San Francisca, stejně jako v Česká republika. Tady těžké fyzické zní hukot a třít proti sobě v drtivé geologické sexuality. Nové minerály se zde rodí. To je něco, o pokračování velmi dobře přijatý kazeta Carnasie vydané opatrovníka Barva Zoo Kontejnery několik let zpátky.

(2/3)r to the 4th power, Core of the Coalman, cassette
nebo vložte tento ve vašem prohlížeči:
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Poznámka: Tohle je můj první pokus o použití PayPal odkazy přímo z e-mailu. Pokud z nějakého důvodu ono doesnt práce, prosím, kontaktujte mě a já na to pozor! Mám zkoušet to docela hodně, a měl by fungovat! Díky!

Jádro Uhlířské má další novinky na cestě:

Aggregate and Crackle cdr, čokoláda Monk (UK)
Box Poslední Pomoc, cd, Zum (USA)
Other Continues, kazetový přehrávač, Poot Records (UK)
Budete potřebovat cd Katapult, Klang Und Krack (CZ)

Co / kdo je ...

Jorge Boehringer na violu sekery a stříbrné tónovaný frekvence drift pro chvění vzduchu v okolí Aural Cívky, elektricky. Oba, vibrátorem ve fázi impulsů symetrický někdy, a jindy je to život hoří vylévat. Jeho Yam Yad hodně zvedl nad tím, kdy se ve společnosti vyskytují hrubé nohama jestřába. Je to holičství kvartet věnovaný provedení barokní plížit se sběrnou ve shodě s termoelektrické vlastnosti, a pokud jsou horké, jsou horké. Je to teoretická lék na chronické rýma, i když je dilema allieviated je geocephalo-cotex úděsně také ovlivněn, což způsobuje iniciativa obsedantně vize: geologické a hudební časové rámce, a tím se stal podchladí glacially motivovaný. Pomalý v podobě, ale pohon a leptané slunečním zářením neustále, v duchu kousat ruku, která krmí jedno, Jádro Uhlířské je pesimistický zorný jasnozřivý mezera a hotovostní peníze obalené v mátu ropy a zabalené do hořící vlajka, hnízdo z větviček uvízl v zlikvidovat zbytky snu o členité texturní struktury vyvíjejí své vlastní sazby a viditelný z aan nekonečno názorů a kót najednou, a tak dále, a tak podobně.
Jádro zpětné vazby Uhlířské-řízený jódlovat spouští, sestupně bubínkové tlaky naznačuje sexuální rozhraní, a (pravděpodobně) rozšířené vzestupně mobilní Carnasitic pole, s ornamenty. Stejně jako jeho rozmazané fosilní záznam biologických krizí v době intenzivního geologických rychlosti. Vím, co chci říct, člověče? ordovik jeho hluk. Pozvánky vyšel jako před 648 miliony roků, je to staré školy. Pořád ještě neukázal. Chybíš mi
Složené oko může sestávat z tisíců jednotlivých photoreception jednotek. Vnímán obraz je kombinací vstupů z mnoha ommatidia (individuální "oko jednotky"), které jsou umístěny na konvexní povrch, a tak místo v mírně odlišných směrů. Toto by Jorge Boehringer, výsledky v určitém typu zaměření, v němž jsou rozmanité systémy polymathic pronásleduje dovoleno pokrok na své vlastní sazby, dospívat, jako takové, jednotný, než roztříštěné, postřeh, i když z jiné perspektivy, která využívají naši předkové-člověk a jinak. Pan Boehringer je aktivní především jako skladatel a najdete ukázky své práce zvuk zadáním jeho jméno, nebo název "Jádro Uhlířské" do internety. Žije v Praze v současné době.

**********************************************************************************************************
http://www.nonalignmentpact.com/2008/08/curious-jorge.html
http://www.virb.com/coal
http://www.last.fm/music/JorgeBoehringer
http://www.myspace.com/coreoggthecoalman
http://www.last.fm/music/Core+of+the+Coalman
http://www.myspace.com/opakptak
http://www.last.fm/music/Jorge+Boehringer
http://www.youtube.com/coreogg
http://artofthestates.org/cgi-bin/complist.pl?st=B
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Core_of_the_Coalman

If It's Too Loud You Are Too Old

2009-12-08T02:52:00.000-08:00

Dear ________________,

I wanted to write to thank you again for your concerns and advice following my recent performance at ___________, and I want to take this opportunity to respond to a few of your comments.

First of all, I want to say that I entirely agree with you that in terms of volume I was louder than would be normal for the space in that room. There were several reasons for this:

1. I sided with achieving an overall physical balance of sounds in the room, regardless of the position of individual audience members. Since the music I was performing is meant to be heard in the chest and knees as much as the ears, and as it is common practice to wear earplugs at many of these concerts (as ridiculous as this practice is) I figured it would be a good idea to turn it up. Besides, you guys had just hosted the _____(big noise) Festival in ________there so I figured it would be fine to turn it up.

2. I sought and achieved a correct mix of live-acoustic and amplified sound in the space. For me to perform this music correctly it is necessary that the electronically amplified and the reproduced sounds be at least as loud and at most times louder than the acoustic viola. Due to the spacial positioning of the audience in this space, the sound system, and the performance area, a sufficient volume turned out to be a pretty loud one! Still, it was necessary to eliminate the dominance of the non-electric element in the music.

Bearing these factors in mind, perhaps it would have been wiser, upon realizing the intimacy of the space, to abandon these pieces entirely in favor or an improvisation or some other alternative. Maybe after seeing the other bands perform, I should have opted to play very very quietly like they did. Perhaps it was my poor judgment to try and present an immersive work in such a context, however, these are the pieces that I was presenting on this tour, and so I stuck to this model even though it was, admittedly, a small space.

I played the music I had prepared, which requires a sensitivity to the space, but not so much to every individual person in it. After all, I play the way I like. I don't conduct a social survey before I start to determine what each audience member might feel like that evening and then average them in the manner of Komar and Melimid to find the perfect mediocrity that satisfies the greatest number (in theory). I think these pieces are interesting. They haven't killed me yet. Since you are like me, by analogy, I assume you will like them too. That is my logic. Its a small space. Still, it is a small space inside ___________'s best known experimental music studio/theatre complex. So I figured people would know how to deal with it. With the exception of yourself, it seems most of them did.

In addition, I am sure you have been to numerous performances that occur at even higher amplitudes in even smaller spaces than yours. This is quite common today, fortunately or not. I am forced to present a good deal of my work in such contexts as many places that are not as well off as _______(rich country) and have little else to offer in the way of venues, especially for the immersive sound experiences, which I am designing. Ear plugs are standard equiptment at many venues associated with rock and "noise" music and I play a lot of concerts in such places. In my own work, I look for the line at which ear plugs should still be unnecessary when the scale and physicality of the sound I am seeking is reached. In fact, I don't think the sounds I was producing at my concert there were all that painful or dangerous, but if you wish to wear earplugs, or for that matter, go outside, please be my guest.

I am not fond of the fact that earplugs have become such standard equiptment. I believe the negative function is twofold. Firstly, in most cases people do not have good earplugs and the music is distorted, especially in the high frequencies, to a ridiculous extent. Second, musicians are playing louder because they and the audience have their ears plugged, and because of this ear plugs have become a requirement to avoid hearing damage at many concerts. I think this is ridiculous. Yet your venue presented the ______(big noise) Festival the weekend prior to my concert there. How was I to know that my show was to be a "quiet" show? Perhaps I was simply misprogramed. As you said, maybe I just played "on the wrong night." Its possible, but was that my decision? Not really. My music is generally quite large in terms of scale and in terms of amplitude in particular, promoters should know that, I sent samples. There is no secret.

Now, unfortunately, I do have a few differences of opinion regarding some other assertions you made about me and my music:

A. You observed that I kept increasing the volume as I was performing. This is, in fact, entirely inaccurate. I rather decreased the overall limit of possible volumes and worked for a balance between this and the component frequencies involved. The density increased, and yes, in the first piece so did the volume, but at no point did I raise the overall ceiling of the sound, and at all times it was well within control. As such, you may have thought it too loud, but I did not. This puts all the blame on my initial decision to play loudly, but as I explained earlier, I accept that.

B. You observed that my music is cumulative, and actually yes, in the case of a few of the pieces I am presenting on this tour, you are correct.

C. You questioned other promoters decision to present my music. This is totally indefensible and assinine. The promoter in question that you brought up organizes a lot of concerts, most of which you would probably find too loud. If you don't enjoy what I am doing than fine, don't come to my next concert, but keep out of my business. What I do with other people is not your concern.

D.Although "violin phase" by Steve Reich is indeed a wonderful piece. However, and though I am very grateful to Mr. Reich for his music, my current work bears only a passing, cursory and superficial relationship to this famous work, and only in terms of surface. These pieces, as one can hear easily with even a little attention or better, a little analysis, are structured entirely differently from the Reich piece. They employ totally divergent conceptual and constructive processes and at best can be said to share a starting point. In addition, they were, I imagine, arrived at through totally different perspectives, at least I would be very surprised to learn otherwise.

Still, you know, we are in a world of imitators. I like Reich's music and am now way concerned if a couple of pieces of mine bear a slight resemblance in passing to a few of his. He has written a lot of music, you know. Its like being told you look like a wonderful, beautiful model from the past whom you admire very much. It makes me feel quite glamorous that you think so highly of my work as to compare me to this guy. Still, in the larger body of my own work these pieces occupy a logical place and are in no way a stopping point. Besides, I enjoy playing them, and they are quite different from the work in question.

Further, this entire comment was misplaced as the only piece I played that can even be said to bear a resemblance to a Reich work was the one I used for sound check, but I didn't present this one at the concert. Additionally, this relationship is purely coincidental, and the only relation between the piece and Violin Phase is that I am playing the viola. In fact, the motive is similar to and inversion of the motive of Piano Phase, another Reich piece. Though still, this piece was arrived at independantly and from another perspective entirely. Thus if similarities ("to any persons living or dead") than it is purely coincidential. And then it is important to consider that I did NOT present this music on the concert.

E. Your final and most offensive comment was the remark implying that I am not paying attention or thinking about what I am doing musically. That one nearly got you a bloody nose, but I was to tired, in fact, to respond to your dim witted blather any more in any form. I hope by now your concerns as to whether I am thinking about what I am doing musically are satiated, though I appreciate your concern, and love above all else the pursuit of new questions. In that spirit, or should your prefer, the spirit of the bloody nose which I would still gladly give you when next we meet, I am happy to answer any more questions you have regarding my work (though you might need to wait until I have time to respond to you).

Good luck and happy listening.

Jorge Boehringer
the Core of the Coalman

Mobius Strip,or "Why I am Not Looping"

2009-12-08T02:31:00.000-08:00

To loop implies things. To loop implies that something heard once will be heard again. Is that even possible? I will leave that up to you, but from a certain perspective of time and progression it most certainly is NOT. That perspective is one which views time as an irreversible continuous flowing suchness, in which we float as little mice upon our leaf-rafts, on downward and upward through through the rivers of our lives. The rivers even change speeds, there are rapids...but this is the apparent perspective, the one most of us describe experiencing most of the time with respect to time.

Still, in all practicality, we do loop. We do it, or we say we do it. We move in circles and revisit recursive materials in time. And we say we do, we describe ourselves as doing "the same" things each day, going the same places, having been somewhere before. At least we don't know how else to describe these experiences otherwise, or it is merely too much trouble. Everyone understands what you mean, after all, so there is no point in delving into a phenomenology of time just to explain to someone that you have "seen that film before" when she asks you to the theatre.

Yet, hidden inside of this is something of a paradox. After all, the very thing which gives the "repetition" its experiential appeal, at least for me, is the very fact that a repetition highlights the fact of time gone by, or time going by. If the material being presented is kept exactly the same and presented in exactly the same way, which is not at all difficult to achieve digitally, there are still myriad changes in both the presented and perceived phenomena. These changes, the moving frame of the sounds, as well as the participative aspect of the mind and body of the listener and her environment (not to mention other listeners and their behavioral interactions with the aforementioned listener) are all highlighted by the presentation of repetitive material. The solid, exact repetition of a material of enough substance to take up a certain amount of attention or perceptual space, be it sound, or a physical object of static quality, can function to highlight the otherwise under- or un-perceived qualities of many experiences. The complexity implicit in our own systems and the environmental systems complexity which we are part of is highlighted by the regularity of the presented material, which inversely becomes a frame for the environment. This is, of course, a complete reversal of the normal framing aspect of an environment with regard to the sounds played into or on top of it to make music. And yet, there it is.

We loop, or say we loop. And in music especially. My friend Mike used to say when we were at school in California "everyone here is looping and drone-ing." Still, I am not looping even when I am and I will tell you why, after a little while.

To loop in music implies that material previously heard is heard again. In a sense it implies that it is played again and again either mechanically or physically. Regardless of whether that is philosophically possible (see paragraph one) I am not doing this. Not guilty.

The recurring materials that I set into play against one another are assymetrical themselves in terms of their phrase structure. Further, they are placed against one another in irregular and rhythmically asymmetrical ways. Thus they recombine on their own once set into play and these recombinations, since not sequenced or rhythmically quantized or otherwise locked into sync with one another, drift in time, and develop a certain amount of unpredictability, an indeterminacy in their relations. This is surprising and a source of great happiness to me, since the initial phrase material is quite set. This way I get to compose and be surprised.

This is true for almost all the "lattice patterned music" that I developed over the last couple of years and performed on the tours listed in previous entries to this blog. This music can be heard on the records Affinity Groups, which is not yet released, and on Box of the Last Help, which should come out on Zum records soon, I hope.

Where overall periods of true repetition in this music, that is to say, the point at which all individual patterns and periodic patterns of interaction between patterns become periodic (repeat), where such periods actually exist they are too long to be perceived as such, and likely they have been augmented by other material and their original orientation with respect to time and spatial function (background/foreground relation) in the music will have changed prior to the point at which repetition can be perceived where overall periods of true repetition in this music exist. Thus even when the material "loops" through the use of one or more electronic devices which play the recorded material again and again and again and again, it is either that the combination of two or more of these functions to create a highly changeable or even chaotic situation in which overall periods of repetition in the whole do not exist, or that the overall period is so long that it is negligible, where overall periods of true repetition in this music exist. Further, in these instances the material presented is not heard as a loop even when it is in fact, looping, in the sense of being re-presented by one or more electronic devices which record and then play back sounds in the manner of a tape-loop, but rather the material is heard as a continually shifting pattern of changeable pieces as in the manner of a polychromic kalidescope, in which individual sheets of colour are translucent and as such when superimposed affect one another in the manners described by Wittgenstein in his book about Colour. Sounds lack opacity in general. Though they can mask one another, when presented in a musical context sounds of similar timbre and amplitude will blend into an incredible variety of translucences. And this is what is happening when I play these patterns on top of and against one another, and since the colours are always changing the overall aspect is not looping. It doesn't repeat, even if the parts inside do, and the do, a lot.

In fact, the only way this recent music of mine can even be described as looping is in the most simplistic (overly simplistic, reductive levels of description) and with reference only to a few of the tools and techniques used to play this music live. Only in terms of construction can this even begin to be described in this way. In effect, it is something else.

The overall assymetry of the superimposed parts (themselves assymetrical) results not in bland repetition (which itself can be, or produce, very interesting effects as mentioned above in terms of functioning to re-frame the perceiving mechanism of the listeners themselves) but instead the result is the unfolding of a continuous process, which may only be described as looping in the specific cases where it wraps back on itself in the manner of a mobius strip, which is indeed a special sort of loop.

Frank and Claude

2009-12-07T06:11:00.000-08:00

The King and his very arrogant cartographer, Honza, were lost in the Great Grey Wood. The King had on a very large and heavy hat made of gold so that all could see his shining eminence, and the cartographer kept his back very stiff and straight and was very careful to always check his teeth in the small mirror he carried with him, to ensure that they remained clean and white.

It must have been during one of these breaks in Honza's concentration, when he was looking at himself in the mirror, that he failed to notice the trail receding behind him in the mirror and soon, despite being less than a 20 minute ride from the castle, they were perfectly lost.

Later, upon returning to what they believed to be the same mountain for the fourth time, and as they were without food and very hungry both Gentlemen began to become uncomfortable and move back and forth in their saddles. Ni ether wanted to admit aloud they were lost. After all, for the King, it was perfectly unthinkable that he should be lost in his own kingdom, much less just outside the walls of his own castle. For the cartographer, it was, of course, a matter of pride.

Soon, however, the two men and their two horses visited the same breathtaking vista for the fifth time. This time, clearly something had to be done, as it was certainly becoming quite late.

"I do say", said the King, clearing his throat loudly," I feel that I have seen thither mountain before..."
"Ah yes" said the cartographer," indeed."

This type of exchange continued for several minutes, the King becoming more and more frustrated and the cartographer more and more reserved and the horses more and more and more tired (the horses had long ago grown hungry and amid the droning monotone of their two noble masters could only think of how they might get moving again, for horses dot mind distance if they are moving but if they are forced to stop and listen to men talk, they get VERY impatient very quickly).

"And what is the name of that mountain" continued the king.
"Not sure..."replied Honza, the cartographer, smoothing his mustache," but you own it, oh liege"

And on and on in like manner, still neither nobleman wishing to admit that they were totally lost. Finally, it could continue no longer, after all, a horse must get home!

"Claude" said Frank the light coloured horse with the big socks, to Claude, the dark coloured horse to his left. "You reckon its a left up there, and then a right, to get back to the castle"
"Pffffffffft" said Claude blowing his nostrils loudly and shaking his mane," surely, I could have told you that hours ago."
"Well, why didn't you speak up then?"
"well, why didn't YOU speak up then?|
"OK, ok lets just get going" and so off they went, snorting and tossing heads and tails, in the direction that they knew would take them home for sure. A left, a right, and in the distance, though not at all too distant, the castle could be seen. The King and his map-maker were beside themselves. they couldn't speak and both were a little embarrassed.

"I am the smartest man in my land" thought the King," that is why I wear this great and noble crown on my great and noble head, and still these horses seem smarter than I. What if the people hear of this, that I, the King, became lost in my own wood and had to seek help from my horse? Can such a man lead his people? Better I keep this quiet, that no one will find out"

Meanwhile, the cartographer was busy trying to take credit for the achievement of the horses. "Look here, you beast, I told you to turn left hours ago, if you hadn't gone running off hither and thither but followed my directions we never would have been lost in the first place. And were do you think you are going now?" to which neither Claude nor Frank responded, endlessly loyal and defiant to their masters, and, truth be told, much happier to be moving along again.

Finally the King spoke aloud, but to the cartographer, as everyone knew that horses can't talk:
"I shall have your head"
at which point the cartographer, struck cold to his toes, stopped his bubbling and nonstop rant.
Then, disparate, he began again
"but how could you do such an unkindness to me? for if it was not for me we should still be lost deep within the wood and you would never have found the way home?"
the King responded, his voice deep and grave
"That, as usual, is untrue. You, in your arrogance and distraction, got us lost,and besides your maps are all wrong".
"OK, ok" replied the cartographer, "but lift my head from my shoulders and you shall have to explain to everyone how you returned from the forest with the help of a talking horse. Thus really you should consider it a great favor that I keep silent."

And so the cartographer lived to make it back to the castle, but his pride burned inside of him. That he, the royal mapmaker, could be bettered by a talking horse was simply inconceivable. Angrily he stomped back and forth in front of the stables, making such a fuss and racket that the boys who worked there left, not wanting to disturb the noble man in his foul mood.

Then Honza had an idea. If Frank and Claude had helped him in the forest, surely they could keep helping him. These horses must have many secrets to tell, after all they bore the great King on every hunt and midnight tyrst. These horses could help him have the power he had always wanted. So, looking around to make sure he was unobserved Honza entered the stables.
"Frank" he whispered, "Frank...wake up"
but Frank only snorted and tossed his head.
"Dammit beast," Honza said, punching the horse in the neck" wake up"
at which point Frank suddenly opened his eyes, and deep inside them for a moment, but only a moment a fire raged. Then, instantly, he remembered his place, and being loyal, looked blankly back at the servant to the king who stood in front of him.
"Look Frank, I brought you some nice oats" said the cartographer, pushing bundles of oats into the pen where Frank and Claude lived. But Frank ignored him. He could sense that something was strange, something was not as it should be. he just snorted, tossed his head.
"All I ask," began the cartographer, "is that we make a little deal. You like oats right? I like information. We are both looking out for what is right for this kingdom, yes? So maybe you can tell me somethings about where you carry our King at night and what things you hear..."
Again, Frank just snorted and tossed his head, moving away from the oats. They smelled of trouble.

"Fine!" yelled Honza, "if you can't cooperate with me, I shall have you made into dogfood! At least perhaps your colleague is more reasonable."
but Claude, Frank's "colleague" simply tossed his head and snorted, pretending to be asleep.

The map maker was beside himself with rage. Mixing with the fatigue from the days journey and the whiskey he had drunk earlier that evening, he was no longer sure if he had really heard the horses talk or if instead it had all been a dream. He feared for his own sanity but wanted power more than anything. "Speak!" he commanded them. "Damn you! Speak!"
but still the horses kept silent.

Honza grabbed a nearby broom and began striking Claude violently on the head again and again. Frank tried to put his body in the way of the broom but being tied to a pole managed instead to catch the pull force of the assault in the teeth.
Still, both horses stayed silent. After beating them for a few minutes, the map maker showed his teeth and snarled:
"last chance, speak, speak or BURN!" and being greeted with silence he spilled the oil from his lantern onto the hay beneath where the horses were tied. He lifted the lantern high above his head, ready in a moment to smash it down onto the oil soaked hay, his eyes glowing with murder. Frank and Claude, though frightened, stood their ground. They looked back at him with their deep eyes. Without hatred, they were his superiors.

And at that moment they were saved. In rushed the stable boy and poured water all over the fiend and his lantern. And in rushed the Sheriff and, wrestling him to the ground, placed handcuffs on the would-be horse murderer.
"Madman," he said, " why are you trying to burn the King's barn? The stable boy heard you in here talking to the horses and getting angry, so he called me to come. What is wrong with you, fool? You will be hanged in the morning for certain."

And so he was hanged the next day, and as the stable boy drove the cart with the body of the cartographer's body to the prisoner's cemetery (for, being a traitor, he could no longer be buried in the King's cemetery) he asked the horses:
"So, what was all that about last night? What did you say to make him so upset?"
Now the horses had long been friends with the stable boy and had come to love him very much and so when no one was around they talked openly with him.
"I said nothing" said Claude, "I just pretended to be asleep"
"Me either" said Frank, tossing his head and snorting.
"So what was the problem?" asked the boy
"dunno" said Frank, "maybe he was crazy, "thinking horses could talk"

Later that day, while Claude and Frank were chewing things in the pasture, the King came to see them.
"So," said the King, "I must thank you for showing me the nature of the incompetence and treacherous fool I had in my court. I owe you greatly, and from now on you will receive special oats every midday."
The horses said nothing, ignoring him, as is the usual behavior for them.
"But I must ask you" asked the King" how is it that you never spoke to me before, after all, I am your great and noble king?"
There was a long pause, and then Claude looked up from the grass, looked into the Kings blue eyes with his own dark infinite eyes, and said "you never asked".

And so it was true. The King went home, and everyone went to sleep.

Ancient Mammoth

2009-12-07T06:08:00.000-08:00

ancient mammoth
remain aloft
let not thy
eyelids drop
though heavy let me keep
the movement steady
the footprints deep
and roots that grow
through rock and ice
growing warmer
with ancient voice
whose ringing out
melts blocks of ice
and melting
dispells sleep

Deep Mine Nitro Uhlíře Time Tunnel parts 1-e

2009-12-07T06:04:00.000-08:00

Havent been really putting any writing up here for a while, because I have been busy for the most part but now I will begin to put some new things here...here is, more or less, the record of my tour from the end of last summer...there were some changes, some additions and things, but this was basically it.

Deep Mine Nitro Uhlíře Time Tunnel parts 1-e
letni konzerti
dates in chronological order, bands in no particular order, according to my memory or momentary proclivities
as such:

August 12
Tabor, Czech Republic
Core of the Coalman/Dead Labor Process/Crank Sturgeon/Hans Svoboda

August 15
Praha, Czech Republic
Core of the Coalman/Dead Labor Process/Steve Weenie

August 20
Edinburgh, Scotland
Henry's Cellar Bar (grind sight open eye)
Bo Ningen/Core of the Coalman/Fordell Research Unit

August 22
Glasgow gig cancelled due to miscommunication (I am pretty bummed about this but I might play a fest in Birmignham on this day)

August 25
Cambridge (organized by Bad Timing)
The Portland, 129 Chesterton Road, Cambridge, CB4 3BA.
Part Wild Horses Manes on Both Sides/Core of the Coalman/Motherfucking

August 27
Liverpool
Pilgrim
Blues Control/Tropa Macaca/Core of the Coalman

August 29th/30th
Manchester
Rowf!Rowf!Rowf! Festival

August 31
Leeds
Victoria Hotel
Blues Control/Tropa Macaca/Core of the Coalman

Sept 2
Hull
Core of the Coalman + other acts TBA

Sept 4th
maybe Blackpool? crossing fingers and things

Sept 5
Nottingham
Rammel Club@Chameleon
Blues Control/Tropa Macaca/Core of the Coalman

Sept 6
London
Upset the Rhythm @ Barden's Boudoir
with (seeing a pattern here?)
Blues Control/Tropo Macaca/Core of the Coalman

Sept 10
Brighton/Hove
The Greenhouse Effect
Murphy&Nyoukis/Teignmouth Electron/Core of the Coalman/Sunshine Variety

Sept 11
Hamburg, Germany
Sued-Balkon
Hosho/Core of the Coalman

Sept 13
Berlin, Germany
Fuel@ Schokoladen Club
Core of the Coalman and other acts TBA

Sept 16
Hamburg, Germany
Unlimited Liability
Core of the Coalman and other acts TBA

Sept 17
Berlin, Germany
Sinclub, Kruetzberg
Core of the Coalman & other acts TBA

Sept 18
Tillburg, NL
ZXZW Festival
I play at 8 I think in the cellar bar v39
Hey Greg, if you are reading this we should meet up and hang out because I think you are playing nearly the same day (but I could be wrong, it happens alot)

Sept 19th TOTALLY OPEN BUT REALLY IT WOULD BE RAD TO PLAY SOMEWHERE so drop me a message

Sept 20
Helsinki, Finland
(subject to small changes)
Ptarmigan
Core of the Coalman and Nicola Morton's Dog Cloning Workshop

Sept 22
Stockholm
and hopefully 23 in Sweden someplace TBA

Sept 25/26
Oslo, Norway
Sound of Mu
Core of the Coalman other acts TBA

Sept 27
Trondheim, Norway
Core of the Coalman other acts TBA

Sept 28
Koln, Germany
Tsunami Club
Core of the Coalman other acts TBA

Sept 29
Strasborg or Metz
Core of the Coalman other acts TBA

Sept 30
Hannover
Der Salon of Silly Art Fick
at Silke Arp Bricht
Core of the Coalman other acts TBA

Oct 1
Paris
Le Generale? unclear where show is actually
Chad Popple/Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 2
Angers
unclear where show is actually but its on
Chad Popple/Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 3
Lyon
unclear where show is actually but its on
Chad Popple/Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 4
Marseille
Le Embobnieuse
Chad Popple/ Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 5
Bordeaux
unclear where show is actually but its on
Chad Popple/ Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 6 WE WOULD LOVE TO PLAY SOMEPLACE IN BETWEEN HERE AND GENEVA OR THEREABOUTS

Oct 7 Milano? but really same situation

Oct 8
Geneva
Cave 12
Chad Popple/Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 9
Antwerpen in all hope
unclear where show is actually but its on I hope
Chad Popple/Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 10
Liege
unclear where show is actually but its on
Chad Popple/Core of the Coalman/Buital Orgasm/other acts TBA

Oct 11
Gent
unclear where show is actually but its on I think
Chad Popple/Core of the Coalman/other acts TBA

Oct 12
Maastricht? still dont understand if this one exists
Core of the Coalman and ???

Oct 15
Impakt Festival present by Kraak
Theatre Kikker

2008-12-08T12:55:00.001-08:00

CORE OF THE COALMAN+PLEASE THE TREES FRIDAY IN TABOR!!!

....
THIS FRIDAY IN TABOR CORE OF THE COALMAN and PLEASE THE TREES.
MC ORION 12/12/08 21:00

and next friday 19/12:Core of the Coalman, OTK and
Deerhoof

OTK and Core of the Coalman

www. silver-rocket. org/news/910
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Friday 19 December 2008 at 9:00pm

Meet Factory
Ke Sklárně 15
Praha
Czech Republic
Show on Map

Web: www. meetfactory. cz
http://nl. youtube. com/watch?v=ZNRwX1wH6xs&fmt=18
Starcastic & Silver Rocket presents:

DEERHOOF (USA, Kill Rock Stars), OTK (CZ, Silver Rocket), Core of the Coalman
Praha - Meet Factory, 19.
prosince 2008 www. meetfactory. cz

Geniální diletanti Deerhoof letos vydali na Kill Rock Stars vynikající desku "Offend Maggie", kterou jen potvrdili svoji výjimečnou pozici na současný scéně. Tahle kapela se nezastaví před ničím a její ikonoklastickej přístup k muzice je stejně neodolatelnej jako nebezpečnej. Deerhoof se při dekonstrukci rocku občas dostanou k hravejm melodiím, občas vás proženou hlukovou spirálou. Na jejich zvuku už na první poslech fascinuje absolutní svoboda, s kterou se pouštějí do dalších a dalších krkolomnejch dobrodružství. Pověstnej souboj nejhlasitějšího bubeníka na světě s nejtišší zpěvačkou planety máte poprvý možnost vidět i v Praze. Předkapelou Deerhoof budou OTK, protože - co si budeme nalhávat - tenhle rok byl ve znamení "Okolo" a OTK nehráli v Praze dlouho žádnej pořádnej koncert. A vánoční spojení geniálních diletantů s diletantskejma géniema musí fungovat... Večer otevře projekt Core Of The Coalman.

www. myspace. com/deerhoof
www. myspace. com/otka
http://www. myspace. com/coreoggthecoalman

9:23 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove

Odd Associations Between Spaces and Written/Read Language

2008-11-28T11:55:00.000-08:00

Want to know what I think is really weird? I think it is really weird that my brain assigns random photographic images of real (or really close to real) spaces that I pass through or by in everyday life to material that I am reading or writing. What I mean is that I will be reading and I will realize that that specific article or book has attached to it, for no apparent reason a specific frozen view, one perspective, of the parking lot of the grocery store by my house. Why?

The spaces attached to the reading (or at times written) material are always unremarkable places I have merely passed through, for example: the place the bus waits before turning when taking me to the metro station- there is a long concrete wall there with some plants hanging over it and this view is paired with Ada by Vladimier Nabakov. Ben Piekut's new musicological study "Testing, Testing....New York Experimentalism 1964" gets different spaces assigned to different chapters, for instance Chapter 3, about Bill Dixon and the Jazz Composer's Guild, gets the odd grassy square between some of the block buildings here near Malovicka, but the other chapters received different, now forgotten associations.

It seems to me that I have always done this. The only characteristic thing about the associations is that they are always unremarkable spaces, usually spaces I am passing through regularly during the time I am reading the book (not while reading, but in the same day or so) and the other thing they have in common is that they are forgotten as soon as I leave the book. Why does the brain merge these things which have nothing in common. It is rather nice, for nostalgia's sake, yet it is very strange, don't you think?

border states

2008-11-28T11:28:00.001-08:00

order/disorder

order and disorder/disorder and order

order from disorder/disorder from order

order in disorder/disorder in order

order in disorder in an individual/disorder in order in an individual

order from disorder in an individual/disorder from order in an individual

order in disorder from inside itself/disorder from order from inside itself

(from inside of its structure or its structure in interaction with itself)

order in disorder from outside itself/disorder from order from outside itself

(in terms of interaction with an environment, an other or others)

order from disorder en masse/disorder from order en masse

(in terms of an interaction with a similarly structured plurality of great magnitude)

order from disorder from being seen/disorder from order from being seen

order from disorder in being seen/disorder from order in being seen

order in disorder from being seen/disorder in order from being seen

order in disorder in being seen/disorder in order from being seen

order in disorder from looking/disorder in order from looking

order in disorder in looking/disorder in order in looking

order in disorder in looking at order in disorder/
disorder in order in looking at order in disorder

order from disorder in looking at order in disorder/
disorder from order in looking at order in disorder

order in disorder from looking at order in disorder/
disorder in order from looking at order in disorder

order from disorder from looking at order in disorder/
disorder from order from looking at order in disorder

order in disorder in not looking at order in disorder/
disorder in order in not looking at order in disorder

order from disorder in not looking at order in disorder/
disorder from order in not looking at order in disorder

order in disorder from not looking at order in disorder/
disorder in order from not looking at order in disorder

order from disorder from not looking at order in disorder/
disorder from order from not looking at order in disorder

order in disorder in looking at order for disorder/
disorder in order in looking at order for disorder

order from disorder in looking at order for disorder/
disorder from order in looking at order for disorder

order in disorder from looking at order for disorder/
disorder in order from looking at order for disorder

order from disorder from looking at order for disorder/
disorder from order from looking at order for disorder

order in disorder in not looking at order for disorder/
disorder in order in not looking at order for disorder

order from disorder in not looking at order for disorder/
disorder from order in not looking at order for disorder

order in disorder from not looking at order for disorder/
disorder in order from not looking at order for disorder

order from disorder from not looking at order for disorder/
disorder from order from not looking at order for disorder

order in disorder in looking at disorder in order/
disorder in order in looking at disorder in order

order from disorder in looking at disorder in order/
disorder from order in looking at disorder in order

order in disorder from looking at disorder in order/
disorder in order from looking at disorder in order

order from disorder from looking at disorder in order/
disorder from order from looking at disorder in order

order in disorder in not looking at disorder in order/
disorder in order in not looking at disorder in order

order from disorder in not looking at disorder in order/
disorder from order in not looking at disorder in order

order in disorder from not looking at disorder in order/
disorder in order from not looking at disorder in order

order from order from not looking at disorder in order/
disorder from order from not looking at disorder in order

order in disorder in looking at disorder for order/
disorder in order in looking at disorder for order

order from disorder in looking at disorder for order/
disorder from order in looking at disorder for order

order in disorder from looking at disorder for order/
disorder in order from looking at disorder for order

order from disorder from looking at disorder for order/
disorder from order from looking at disorder for order

order in disorder in not looking at disorder for order/
disorder in order in not looking at disorder for order

order from disorder in not looking at disorder for order/
disorder from order in not looking at disorder for order

order in disorder from not looking at disorder for order/
disorder in order from not looking at disorder for order

order from order from not looking at disorder for order/
disorder from order from not looking at disorder for order

order in disorder in looking in order for disorder/
disorder in order in looking in order for disorder

order from disorder in looking in order for disorder/
disorder from order in looking in order for disorder

order in disorder from looking in order for disorder/
disorder in order from looking in order for disorder

order from disorder from looking in order for disorder/
disorder from order from looking in order for disorder

order in disorder in not looking in order for disorder/
disorder in order in not looking in order for disorder

order from disorder in not looking in order for disorder/
disorder from order in not looking in order for disorder

order in disorder from not looking in order for disorder/
disorder in order from not looking in order for disorder

order from disorder from not looking in order for disorder/
disorder from order from not looking in order for disorder

order in disorder in looking for order in disorder/
disorder in order in looking for order in disorder

order from disorder in looking for order in disorder/
disorder from order in looking for order in disorder

order in disorder from looking for order in disorder/
disorder in order from looking for order in disorder

order from disorder from looking for order in disorder/
disorder from order from looking for order in disorder

order in disorder in not looking for order in disorder/
disorder in order in not looking for order in disorder

order from disorder in not looking for order in disorder/
disorder from order in not looking for order in disorder

order in disorder from not looking for order in disorder/
disorder in order from not looking for order in disorder

order from disorder from not looking for order in disorder/
disorder from order from not looking for order in disorder

order in disorder in looking in disorder for order/
disorder in order in looking in disorder for order

order from disorder in looking in disorder for order/
disorder from order in looking in disorder for order

order in disorder from looking in disorder for order/
disorder in order from looking in disorder for order

order from disorder from looking in disorder for order/
disorder from order from looking in disorder for order

order in disorder in not looking in disorder for order/
disorder in order in not looking in disorder for order

order from disorder in not looking in disorder for order/
disorder from order in not looking in disorder for order

order in disorder from not looking in disorder for order/
disorder in order from not looking in disorder for order

order from order from not looking in disorder for order/
disorder from order from not looking in disorder for order

order in disorder in looking for disorder in order/
disorder in order in looking for disorder in order

order from disorder in looking for disorder in order/
disorder from order in looking for disorder in order

order in disorder from looking for disorder in order/
disorder in order from looking for disorder in order

order from disorder from looking for disorder in order/
disorder from order from looking for disorder in order

order in disorder in not looking for disorder in order/
disorder in order in not looking for disorder in order

order from disorder in not looking for disorder in order/
disorder from order in not looking for disorder in order

order in disorder from not looking for disorder in order/
disorder in order from not looking for disorder in order

I BRAIN MY ONLY BREAK

2008-02-09T10:16:00.000-08:00

you know what the problem with this blog format is? it is that if you try and write some sort of consecutive things that are related to one another, you end up with the problem that a reader will inevitably start reading in the middle. Then, to make sense of what is being read, they scroll DOWN to the next article. The result of this is that people are reading what you are trying to tell them backwards and this of course changes the structure of the point one might try and make. You can, of course, choose to display your blogs with the first post first and set it up so that it scrolls chronologically downwards with the most recent at the bottom, however then when someone firsts visits your blog, the date of what appears to be your first post reads some old date like May 14, 1989 and this also discourages readers.

So if you are reading this, and you realize you are in the middle of something alread in progress (which I try to designate in my titles) please return to part one and start there and then read the others, thus things might make more sense.

ha!

corollary (moth part3)

2008-02-05T23:49:00.000-08:00

This is a corollary to the model of human need I posted in response to my idea for the moth ( that is could satisfy its dream of light and heat beyond its wildest ambition yet without killing or burning itself by simply figuring out how to wake during the day). After some thought I realized that each of the levels I gave below in my evolution of need in human life and culture could also loosely correlate to various aspects of the thinking mind of the human and the human individual, as opposed to what we seem to think about animal consciousness, plant consciousness, or the consciousness of a person not yet born or dead. The correspondence between these modes of consciousness and the needs in the earlier article are really not the point. They exist in some way but are not nessecary and are not especially solid or meant to be serious. In fact, the model of need represents development while this model of forms of attention is elastic with movement between all levels occurring at many times for many individuals.

I am using numbers both to suggest some sort of outward movement from a conceptual center and to represent the endless bifurcation of a frame of mind as it divides ideas of activity, self-consciousness, identity and the like. As in the hierarchical model of needs earlier, these numbers increase, their complexity increases, as one moves away from the more instinctual mode inherent at birth, and through normal development acquires a more specialized consciousness and tools or habits for working with attention. Again, this (as the other model earlier) is just an example of ways of organizing something, a personal view for the purpose of determining, like the moth, how to take what is in front of one, to realize one's dreams beyond belief without burning to death first.

The "space" represented by this model is a conceptual space only, not intended to be an analogue of physical space, but who knows.

and so consider some levels of awareness to be:

0. null: unborn, no separation from anything. no nothing.

1. unity: unaware of self, no separation between an individual and an environment

2. duality: beginning awareness of self, or skin at least. separation between environment and one's own self

3. trinity: continued separation. now there is a separation between mind and body within the individual in addition to the separation of the individual and the environment.

4. instance/moment: the discovery of time, frames of time and how these interact with individual attention further divide the environment, which now begins to re frame itself infinitely in the mind of the individual which sometimes includes its own body in this environment and sometimes does not.

5. purpose: the further awareness of these frames of reference, or of information about the mind, the body, or other aspects of "environment" provide for the individual to interact with the environment meaningfully on many levels, but as a separate entity. People move meanings, build houses, but as separate people operating in an environment not as a unity energy moving aspects of itself around. Individual consciousness reinforces this separation but also affords one the power of movement within this environment.

6. void: similar or identical to 1. a tabula rasa.
External to experience, a field of possibility. Is the movement discussed in 5 an illusion? What are the limits of reason/knowing? this is the mystic's return to the indivisibility of consciousness. Its outside the frame but aware of it if it chooses to be.

Maslow Inverted (moth part 2)

2008-02-05T22:53:00.000-08:00

If one where to apply the idea discussed in my previous post regarding moths to oneself, where would one begin?

As with design, one begins with need. It is not so difficult to think about what one, or even easier, you yourself might need.

Abraham Maslow did a pretty good job with his famous hierchy and of course all of his critics and followers did a nice job too. What I have come up with though, in thinking about my own needs has a different sense to it.

People often graph Maslow's hierarchy as a pyramid, for example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Maslow#Maslow_hierarchy
with basic, primative needs at the bottom and "self-actualization" at the top. This suggests a movement away from animal, or survival needs to some sort of spiritual, human quality. The idea of movement in this model is undeniable, and that is what gives it its hierarchical nature. The issue for me is that this goal, this self-actualization, isn't really a need. Further, to some extent it may even be post-human. If the basement of Maslow's hierarchy is somewhat sub-human, or at the very least represents needs that can be said to be shared by both humans and other animals than the attic might be a goal that transcends human possibility. That isn't a situation that interests me now.

Thus, my hierarchy of need works differently. It could also be graphed as a pyramid, but the movement begins at the top of the pyramid and descends. The model begin with the most basic, shared needs of all people and expands to represent the more specific expressions of these needs in their complex developments which mirror the development of a modern person's lifeline as well as the evolution of human society and culture.

Despite the vastness of this claim, it is quite a simple idea. When born, a modern human in the most modern city still shares all immediate needs with animals. As this human person develops physically, their skill set and lifestyle also develop and they have new more specific needs, which they share with less and less people. In addition, a person's needs move further away from the immediate needs of the body as the individual becomes increasingly self sufficient in providing for their body. This is a direct collaboration with the society the individual lives in. A society which provides more support and protection for the individual more quickly frees them from the immediate needs to insure adequate food, shelter and the like. Thus a modern society, free from the dangers of predatory animals, allows free time for humans to develop specialized skills and interests, bringing with them new needs, independent from the primitive ones. Interestingly, there is a curve somewhere in this, because as people age they once again find their needs intersecting with others. As the body slows and ceases function people once again become dependent on others and their needs become once more directly tied to maintenance of the human body.

In this hierarchy each level makes possible the development of the following one by providing a ground for the new needs to develop once the previous level's needs are satisfied. At the same time each new level reflects the influence of the all prior levels and may even restart the process from the primitive animal level. Thus highly specialized modern activities and their needs may satisfy primitive drives or provide expression of them. Since the hierarchy begins with birth, the sexual drive exists not in some theoretical quality but as a physically observable result of the feedback and interplay between levels. Thus birth is the catalyst to a new life (of need, ha ha) and the result of the fulfillment of other's needs and drives.

This is not meant to be taken as a complete analysis of course, but is only a sketch of a personal view which I am taking in light of the moth idea discussed earlier. One must know what the needs are, of course, before one knows which things are "habit" and which are really "essential". One musn't rely on instinct because instinct itself can lead to extinction. Once the essential needs are determined one can organize a strategy for addressing them. And so, without further claptrap:

birth ..............................................................................(catalyst)
results in the need for:

1.nutrition and shelter.................................................(survival)
which, once satisfied, provide opportunity for:

2.sex partners/families/community.........................(continuity)
which are grouped together because the larger units are nessecary to care for the recently born, representing the feedback discussed earlier. In fact the needs of the recently born represent level 1, and they are helpless to satisfy these on thier own. Nonetheless, in the creation of families and communities tasks for survival are distributed in some manner and this results in:

3.what is done while awake........................................(occupation)
which begins an increasing variety of technological possibilities and occupational specializations. The first level, the more essential tasks given to human invention when it is freed from subsistence enough to operate in a purely conceptual manner result in the organization and defense of communities through invention:

4.what is achieved through mental and physical exploration...(invention/organization of community)
community organization being set in motion, people are free to function in a purely mental (or purely physical realm for that matter) for the purpose of self enrichment. New questions are asked, new needs arise:

5. what is done to avoid boredom/provide sense to life/answer curious impulses
(invention: enrichment, speculative science, art, sports, religion, entertainment)

I do not mean to suggest that the development ends here but this is as far as my own needs for organization took me. The only reason I post this at all is as an illustration of a process by which one may analyze one's own (or in this case one's own view of everyone's) needs. This is in no way intended to be taken too seriously or scientifically as the analysis is totally incomplete and I don't know if I am really interested enough in it to complete it. I feel that it is useful to me as it is. The basic idea is that once a person's basic sustenance needs are accounted for, more specialized developments occur, and these provide new needs. It may seem at first that I am suggesting that art or religion are less important than food, but then I feel that maybe people only thought of these sorts of models or modes of living once they where warm and well fed enough to stop scrambling around like mad dogs.

Well, thats the news.

Also, I don't mean to suggest by placing theoretical (speculative, as opposed to applied) science on the same level as art, entertainment, and religion that it is simply a pastime. In fact I think none of these are simply ways of passing time. I think they are in fact ways of dealing with ideas of meaning or purpose, understanding. The thing is, to repeat, an individual isn't as concerned with the meaning of the cold when freezing to death. The issue is to get warm. Then, by the fire, one asks "what the hell?" or plays checkers or something.

A Suggestion for Moths

2008-02-05T21:38:00.001-08:00

Moths are attracted to flames. They will travel quite a long distance to reach one in fact. Lights too, it turns out. They like heat, and they are persistent. Persistence is usually such an important trait, so positive, but in this case, when it is combined with endurance and hyper-activity it is deadly. The moth decides to claim its prize by flying into the light or flame. Thus purposefully or by accident the individual ends up burned, maybe to death, maybe not.

Okay, but that aside there is a way out of this mess. It requires work of course, but the answer is right in front of the moth. All that is needed for all of its dreams to come true beyond its wildest conceptions is to change its habits. The moth must learn to wake during the day. It takes work is all, and may be slow, but the answer is there.

European Tour

2008-01-04T14:20:00.000-08:00

I have no idea what order things happen in though they end up having one, and so:

Sunday 6th
Helbaard! Den Haag, NL
Ducktails
Buffle
In the Eye of Vision
Core of the Coalman

Jan 7,8,9
various undefined actions not yet determined
as to their location or structure

Thursday 10
Salon Bruit @k77
Lichtblick Kino
Kastanienallee 77
Prenslaverberg
Berlin, Germany

Sunday 13
Hamburg, Germany
Radio FSK

Monday 14
at Occii in Amsterdam
Amstelveenseweg 134
door at 21:00
XBXRX
Core of the Coalman
Silver Salts

Friday 18
Udine, Italy
at Edera
Core of the Coalman
Al:arm!

Saturday 19
at SHOWCASE
in Reggio Emilia, IT
Al:arm!
Core of the Coalman

Sunday 20
at Lokomotive
in Bologna, IT
Above the Tree
Core of the Coalman

Monday 21

remains to be seen

Tuesday 22
Milanos, It
at showcase
Core of the Coalman
Above the Tree

Wednesday 23
Senagallia, IT
at Zabumba
Core of the Coalman
and mysterious other

Thursday 24
Arrezos, It
at Libreria Arrezo
Above the Tree
Core of the Coalman

Friday 25
I think we are in Firenze

Saturday 26
I think we are in Verona

(sometimes I am not sure where I am or what I am doing)

Sunday 27
Verona, It
at Villafrancas
Al:arm!
Core of the Coalman

Monday 28
Vienna, Austria
Core of the Coalman
Above the Tree
others yet unknown
(this is Marco Eneidi's series so I am very excited to be playing here but I havent alot of info yet because we just organized it, I believe it is located at
Celeste and starts at 22:00
Jazzkeller im Celeste
18 Hamburgerstrasse 1-1050 Wien

Wednesday 30
Prague, Czech Republic
at 007 Strahov
koleje UUJ Blok 7
Chaloupekého 7
169 00 Praha 6
Core of the Coalman
Above the Tree

you can hear Above the Tree who I am doing the entire Italian part of my tour + several dates at the end with athttp://www.myspace.com/bluerevenge1.

You can hear my Jorge Boehringer Core of the Coalman here

http://www.myspace.com/coreoggthecoalman

Last.fm page

http://www.last.fm/music/Core+of+the+Coalman

http://www.myspace.com/opakptak

and read it here
http://opakptak.blogspot.com/

cheers!

Jorge

Field Music Diagrams

2007-12-29T14:26:00.000-08:00

(this seemingly linear view actually moves in both directions, in the other drawings the center of those drawings represents the noise to silence vacuum at the margins of this one, similarly, the center of this represents the periphery of those, this is because these are two dimensional models of a three dimensional model of sound acting in a field sense moving between vibratory modes of equivalence between greater and lesser apparent complexity, dig?)
and this below is just a transcipt of what you cant read in the above photo:

stasis/symmetry feeling of movement/asymmetry asymmetry stasis/symmetry

large scale structures perceptible....surface perceptible only....large scale structures perceptible

combinatorial/transitional region combinatorial/transitional region

aperiodic periodic aperiodic periodic aperiodic

silence noise continuum pulse rhythmic increased complexity harmonic noise silence

yet it is the perceptual results of each stage that are interesting, in terms of what it is possible to pay attention to, for instance at either end of the scale, one's internal personal frame of reference provides the movement while towards the middle the imposition of the the musical structure increasingly provides the listener with a frame of temporal reference that must be adopted, coming first from one side in terms of silences added to a continuum to build rhythmic complexity as aperiodic relationships reestablish themselves, and on the other side in terms of increasingly distant harmonic relationships tending to a similar aperiodicity, that again reaches critical points in complexity and returns to pattern formation or silence.

So I hope this illustrates the idea somewhat. The sci-fi picture was irresistible (the more legible one ). Totally silly but since my drawing are very difficult to actually read it might help, if anyone is reading this anyway, to combine the two. Basically these drawings are cross sections of a three dimensional model for a way of seeing sound as expressed in music. The three dimensional form, not in cross section would look sort of like an attempt to render a Twistor (Robert Penrose) in a 2d drawing. Like a doughnut hole that feeds back on itself. An infinite surface that consists of a black hole at the top but then at the bottom it wraps back around mobius strip style and feeds back into itself through its own top, ass end style. Make sense? well I will try and put a drawing of that up or something but I haven't got a drawing program and I am probably going to get kicked out of this place soon enough anyway. Just wait, it might appear. Ah yeah and also its got two or three fat rings again made of the same substance, that form around the tube made of the hole as it elongates downward.

So its like an upside down atom bomb picture with those rings around the blast funnel, but instead of a big thunderhead of broccoli at the top it bends back around in all dimensions and feed back inside of itself. get it? A self-farm. And this is a cut made through it, and really none of this exists at all, its a model of how sound gets complex and simple and how its really all related you know, in music, man. You know what I am talking about??

Also, I tried to and create a typed analog of the "linear" chart under the drawing of itself. Please try and keep in mind that the whole thing is actually a cross section of a three dimensional form (that is itself only a model, I am not trying to show the structure of any physical phenomenon obviously). Thus these things are like skins. Okay and they are skins of movement that sound trajectory takes in terms of increasing complexity. Showing that after maximum complexity its all back where it started. dig?

and sorry I cant write right tonight ight

what I mean to say is partially:
silence is symmetrical the way that zero is
noise is extreme asymmetry on one scale, and equilibrium on another
at points of phase change, symmetry brakes and pattern formation begins
the perceptual mechanisms of people adjust to each of these differently as do composers
g'night.

"Whatever you do with a surfboard in the surf remains a part of surfboarding."

2007-12-19T00:29:00.000-08:00

That quote is part of the liner notes of David Behrman's piece on the record The Sonic Arts Union from 1971.

Seems sensible, no?

Sort of Like the Photo Below of the Black Wooden Pieces

2007-12-11T03:58:00.001-08:00

I think that there are really two poles of my interest and in my music, which interact like magnetic poles.

One deals with music of a continuous nature. This can be imagined as a drone or as like a pedal tone in a Bach organ piece, but one with no figuration above it, such that that the pedal tone itself or the details within it come into focus and figure/ground relations are discovered within it itself, and infinitely. Periodic pulses, regular and/or overlapping ostinatos also. These have similar effects. For me, the music I am writing dealing with these affects has to do with perception. It has to do with perceptual activity and creating a field for it to occur within. I am not pushing anyone but it is like an installation of sorts, an environment one enters voluntarily in which certain peculiar perceptual affects take place.

The second aspect of my interest deals with what at first seems to be the opposite. Music (by which, of course, I mean simply organized sound, or even sound-payed-attention-to, as this itself is a highly organizational activity), anyway, music made of sounds and silences whose relations and durations are unpredictable. In other words these occur with an aperiodic or at least an unpredictable juxtaposition or intersection to one another. This can be true for the performer, for audience members, or both. Who, after all, can say what another will predict?

The interesting thing for me, is that these two situations that I love seem at first to be so opposite one another, yet in truth they are completely related.

In the first case, the music functions almost as a machine for focusing attention.

In the second, focused attention is required for one to be interested. By "interested" I mean for separate from what one might ignore in the outside world. By being interested in such textures one's perceptual acuity is developed. Its fascinating.

well

interest = payed attention to

isn't that interesting?

"whatever I did it wasn't in my mind...and that leads to a kind of improvisation that results in discoveries"

2007-12-11T03:56:00.000-08:00

that from John Cage. I tend to like those moments and cultivate or at least look for them. Its okay with me if you don't, but please allow me to continue to do so.

The Special (Form Is Inevitable, Part 8)

2007-12-05T02:13:00.001-08:00

No
Nothing
Nothing can
Nothing can be
Nothing can be said
Nothing can be said to
Nothing can be said to exist
Nothing can be said to exist and
Nothing can be said to exist and simultaneously
Nothing can be said to exist and simultaneously denied
Nothing can be said to exist and simultaneously denied structure.

*

(Nothing that can be said to exist can be denied structure)

*

That got discussed alot earlier, in parts 1-7 of this essay. In addition, earlier, ideas where spoken of in terms of a special category. They were given a special designation because, although they interact with, act on, and motivate material forms they themselves are immaterial.

"If something is immaterial can it be said to exist?"

Of course, it can. Try it.

"If an immaterial thing is said to exist what constitutes its structure?"

An immaterial form is constituted of immaterial structures. This is why ideas may often transcend the physical laws of material forms. Ideas need not obey the law of gravity or the arrow of time and so we can fly in our dreams and revisit our childhood memories in reverie.

Yet if ideas are to interact with material forms in the ways summarized here and discussed at length earlier, how can they do this? There must be an intermediary that shares something of both the material and immaterial world of forms and structures, similar to the way a sign in a grammar shares something with the signified in terms of use, or metaphor. In fact this particular intermediary must share as much as possible with the world of material form while behaving with the freedom of immaterial form, as an idea.

The intermediary, of course, is language. Though immaterial and malleable (as doubtless evidenced in many places here) it is itself a system of signs functioning in terms of a grammar, the structure of which approaches laws and rules more commonly found in the material world than the material. As such, language may be used to transmit images from mind to mind regarding material or immaterial forms through a material medium of many levels (levels of linguistic structure, levels of physical material such as paper or air pressure) while remaining in itself an immaterial form which nonetheless clearly possesses structure.

Ludwig Also Says

2007-11-29T10:47:00.000-08:00

(this time substitute "musical" for "philosophical")

"Most propositions and questions that have been written about philosophical matters are not false but senseless. We cannot, therefore, answer questions of this kind at all, but only state their senselessness."
Wittgenstein, Tractatus

White Noise Ritual

2007-11-29T10:43:00.000-08:00

Isn't it interesting that we produce broadband white noise at the end of concert performances? I think it is espiecially effective on recordings.
It is sort of like dessert.

But wouldn't it be better if everyone did it before the music started?

Maybe before AND after? I guess we do applaud before concerts sometimes.

It seems like it would do more beforehand anyway.

Sculptures

2007-11-29T03:51:00.000-08:00

this one was in the the guggenheim

by Jorge Boehringer, all untitled
many more images at http://picasaweb.google.com/foodsuicide
this is in a forest outside of Prague, Cz

and these last two are outside of the Lourve, thanks, I Lourve You

Boudník's Theory of Super-Energy As Applied Arbitrarily to The Present Situation

2007-11-29T03:14:00.000-08:00

The resources of music have been opened completely to include everything, and yet the idea of 'music' has gained, rather than lost, meaning. Through work with experimental forms, music now includes many other fields, some not even sounding. Music, by its natures and through the florid embodiment of its manifold forms has led musicians to explore and collaborate with others directly exploring areas as far flung as time, acoustics, cultural theory, architecture, consciousness and neurosciences both physiological and otherwise, techological reasearch, memory, semiotics, artificial intelligence, religious ritual and spiritual practice, mathmatics, and psychology. Musicians have explored these fields in ways both general and highly specific, and continue to do so moving with infinite method outward and inward in infinite direction.

Of course, not every individual is moving in every direction at once, but together this seems to be what is happening. I am a musician, but I am writing about sound. I am really writing about all the arts, and their development as I see it from a certain perspective. This multiplicity of perspectives seems a trait in the arts of today, doesn't it? Even if every artist represents only a single view (and most represent many) and finds a single form to express it (most again, find many) the opportunity here for receiving new ideas, new views and sounds is incredible. The multiplicity of perspectives itself is amazing and the potential unknown. Its effect on culture is also unknown, but from my perseptive seems that it could only benefit a human race that must realize the need for shared reasources in order to sustain life, which is itself perhaps an experimental form.

It is nice that once resources are totally liberated, and the artist is open to do anything or nothing, that there is still the inevitablity that something will happen. People exhibit a strong desire to do things. Is this a profound humanistic principal? Even boredom is beautiful.

It fills me with a profound sense of place to feel free to move my awareness from one to the next perspective, or to feel movement between them. Is this statement paradoxical? Who is in charge then? Is it my waking voice in my mind or something else?

To be offered surprise at every changing and detailed moment or awe at every shift in movement from one level of structure to another, to watch forms develop linearly, burst into chaotic turbulence and reform themselves along some other development that I can see in time or otherwise: this is amazing, this is my environment and I can feel myself, as a self portrait within it, the negative space of me even within my own body (as environment) as laid out in the outlines or the force vectors of interaction on every level including time.

Perspective itself is a profound statement, and the arts, by offering the audience an opportunity for it, to be present in it with some form as it is, or to participate in perception (the process of perspective in motion) are profound. To look is enough, something will be done.

What Seemed So Linear Suddenly Burst Into a New Chaotic Form

2007-11-27T23:38:00.000-08:00

In light of the multiplicity of perspectives in artistic practices and the inevitability of form in existant materials, processes, and even concepts, it is most interesting for me to discuss at this point manifestations and various approaches to artistic and experimental practices of all kinds.

I will also add to the increasing turbulence and nonlinearity of this system at this point by directing this discussion at intervals selected by chance or choice to topics which strike my need or fancy, manifestations from my own practices, and the ideas behind these as well as observations that I observe in my observation and environment.

I'll Have What He's Having

2007-11-27T22:45:00.000-08:00

"If I try to make clear to someone by characteristic examples the use of a word like 'wish', it is quite likely that the other will adduce as an objection to the examples I offered another one that suggests a different type of use. My answer then is that the new example may be useful in discussion, but isn't an objection to my examples. For I didn't want to say that those examples gave the essence of that one calls 'wishing'. At most they present different essences which are all signified by this word because of certain inter-relationships. The error is to suppose that we wanted the examples to illustrate that this essence hadn't yet been correctly grasped. That is, as if our aim were to give a theory of wishing, which would have to explain every single case of wishing." Ludwig Wittgenstein (Philosophical Grammar)

I'll just order what he's having, but can I substitute an order of 'art' for the 'wish' please?

The arts, at least for now, have many, rather than one function. They have many, rather than one value as well and are motivated by many rather than a single perspective.

We are discussing some of these, some aspects of this.

It is, in fact possible, is it not, that this multiplicity of viewpoints is one of the most characteristic features and beneficial aspects of the arts as a whole within human societies today?

"Again, we cannot achieve any greater generality in philosophy than in what we can say...Here too (as in mathematics) we leave everything as it is." (Ibid.)

Lightning Bolt, for example, and multiple personalities as an ideal

2007-11-25T04:44:00.000-08:00

Form and function can be said to be negotiable in terms of the perspectives of the creators and users of particular forms. Even if one hasn't read any of the previous long long long long strings of words proceeding this present page, it seems obvious that if this is true anywhere within the encyclopedia of human industry it is true in the arts, especially the arts of recent times. Despite the efforts of the many lovers of classical and romantic tendencies, fearful that new ways of asking questions might threaten beloved historical solutions, elegantly elaborated throughout the ages, and addressed to problems long forgotten, AND in the face of the efforts of a critical establishment hostile towards that which it perceives as a threat to its vacuous base of power (that is, the psuedo-objective application of an arbitrary hierachy of aesthetic criteria based on conventional models arising out of a system of historical averages established through the misinterpretation of certain works considered historically significant and re-applied ad hoc to works which may in no way resemble the models in form or function which the criticism draws upon for its 'criteria'), OR despite the protest of others trying to disavow the existence of or otherwise disempower forms and functions in use by many people out of fear of the unknown or worse, DESPITE THESE THINGS, artists have managed to utilize the negotiability of form and function to discuss many possibilities from many perspectives.

"Wait, let me get a beer. Now do you mean to say that it is desirable to view things from multiple perspectives? Like even if the "thing" thereby ceases to be one things and instead becomes several??"

What I am saying is this: Art is useful for many reasons. One is Perspective, as Leonardo pointed out, but lets hold onto this idea because I have more to say about this later, for now I want to talk about experimental forms as manifest in the arts and their function. Realize, please, that I am don't mean "form" as some old or even new convention out of which works spring to to which pieces are cast in the manner of a mould. Rather I am referring to the 'form' as the thing in itself, the object or process that is present.

At first, it might seem like the notion of "experimental form" in the arts is redundant. Maybe it should be redundant. I mean, the arts are about creativity, right? Well, I thought so at least, however what seems largely expected of artists by cultural institutions, the critical establishment, and the public by and large consists of conventional behavior, a sentimentality acted on nostalgically to create warm memories of past aesthetic joys, and above all a respect for the dominant social values- even when the work in question pretends to disagree with them. Need examples? How about all the capitalist punk bands out there? It seems there is a contradiction here.

Out of this contradiction comes many things. Its like a cloudburst. One of these things is the habit of artists to consistently re-open the boundaries of the art world and art forms for themselves through the creation of experimental forms of work. One way that many artists do this, with or without knowing it, is through work in which the form and function are united, where they are simply different aspects of the same thing.

Experimental form emerges when someone decides to design or present their work in a way that the current conventional context for "art" or whatever else does not include. For example, an artist might decide that the very short film they are making (say the sixteen second one) is best presented on a very small (say, cell phone sized) screen. This is in contrast to the standards Hollywood has set, and enforced culture, for what is considered a "movie." A "movie" is thus for many people something which lasts for a specific duration and is projected a certain way, among other things. In fact, the convention could be taken further into what a "movie" has become for many people, as under the leadership of Hollywood the conceptual field available to the filmmaker is strikingly low, but this is really to frightening to discuss here. I am only trying to give an example, and that example is of a that is different from what is expected of a "movie" yet certainly could contain much useful content. In fact, the difference in presence do to this forms experimental nature might increase the effect of its content especially where the content and form are structurally integrated.

Another, deeper example could be given. If not only the form and function but also the motive behind the creation of a piece departs from the conventional set if motivating principals (if the piece has a distinctly different catalyst or reason for its existence than is common for works appearing to be of similar media) than a situation arises where the form created is already a priori its own function, which then continues to develop further functionality as it interacts with the public and the environment as a whole (including other artworks). I feel like Pauline Oliveros' music illustrates this idea nicely in that, taking active listening on the part of both performer and audience as a manner of operation, and the spiritual, conscious, awareness which her practice is involved in as its motivation she unties form and function. The uniting principal is the point of motivation for the work as well as its product.

Well I think I am going to make a new film.

"and what will it be about?"

you know I don't like talking about films I haven't seen...

"should be very popular"

I don't see why not.

Masterbation Convention

2007-11-20T23:52:00.000-08:00

At this point we are no longer discussing the presence of form, but its function. This is negotiable. Use is dependant on context, need, analogy, and experience. People will use a tool as needed in a particular instance, and thereby, a more general tool can address itself to a larger body of needs and finds more universal utility. People also apply a solution from one problem to another that they consider analogous to the first. Their application of design to this set of challenges may be based on their experience with a particular tool or set of tools, their experience with the problem or need in question or one considered analogous, or their observation of another's situation.

Over time, good and useful solutions are perfected and become conventions: the norm. This makes life easier and progress swifter in many ways. No need to re-invent the motor for each revision to the lawn mower paradigm, especially when the revision concerns the wheels or cutting mechanism. Yet not re-inventing the basic components of a design can result in dead weight or worse, a restriction of the possibilities one has available to work with in one's conception of reality. One can take too much for granted.

The arts, and for now I am referring to the Fine Arts of Western Culture, are simultaneously based on convention and inventiveness. The very designation "arts" has been applied to the genesis of convention. In Plato's Republic, an artist is a master of particular set of conventions, including those pertaining to war or say, plumbing. The definition of art given here is thus closer to the modern sense of an "artisan" or master of some trade. This idea of an art representing mastery over a particular set of conventions has refined itself throughout history, to the present in which the Particular Set of Conventions one masters in order to be an Artist are the "classical" or Fine Arts disciplines of painting, sculpture, music, dance etc. Yet masters of these Particular Sets of Conventions (the Fine Arts again) have also traditionally been expected to innovate, and they do, as do many who never become "masters" because their innovations lead them right out the door of the Fine Arts. In fact these Fine Arts have lost some of their designations and clear boundaries both between themselves and the rest of the world. There are fewer of these "masters" as well, in the classical sense, who work strictly within a single field, a single discipline. And why is this?

The is clearly nothing wrong, so we shouldn't panic. People still love beautiful dancers and fast guitar players, not much has changed.

Yet if a need exists, solutions are found. Over time a useful solution may be continually refined, eventually being appreciated for its own internal elegance. It could be possible to imagine a solution where as it developed on its own over time that it might outlast its initial need and even loose sight of it, thus developing its own structure and evolving as a form on its own. We are then in the presence of a complex form, a beautiful set of conventions that, like the vermiform appendix of the human body, is a relic. Whatever problem it posed a solution to has long been forgotten, and like the appendix, it can even contain the seeds of systemic distress.

Still, if this vestige is considered elegant or beautiful enough by enough people, some will find it so important as to defend it against anything they might perceive as a threat to it. While simple conservation might serve fine for their purposes (after all, why not preserve in a living way such fine works of human refinement?), often people adopt a more militaristic approach toward what they fear to be a threat to these elegant solutions to long forgotten problems. Thus, (an individual?) categorically negative first reaction to an experimental approach seen as a threat to a much beloved set of conventions could result from fear fed by cultural anxiety created out of the loss of the reason for the conventions to exist in the first place.

Perhaps this is why many become so hung up on 'meaning' in the arts. The idea that there is some meaning believed to be lurking in the background of an art piece beyond what is simply there in front of one serves to restore the lost reasons behind these conventions. It is no surprise then, that such meanings are expected by many people to be explicit, non-discursive, presented objectively and wherever possible re-expressed in a secondary medium (the explanatory text). This attempt at the restoration of lost meaning for swollen conventions is one way of appraising value the arts for a large number individuals.

In the absence of a clear use, people have nothing to evaluate the situation (environment) before them with. This situation, when not ignored, often leads to a sort of panic. Outside the arts, things are instantly evaluated for use conscious or not, and confusing, atypical objects or ideas are filed for later, forgotten, or in a few cases, followed to the genesis of a new perspective or until they are rejected as an unsuccessful route. Within the arts, a similar algorithm is applied. This is learned in school or socially, from or other people's behavior in real life or films or whatever. Ideas of aesthetic, narrative structure, and certainly "meaning" become criteria by which art is judged, by comparing it to how these values are perceived to exist in a handful of historically acknowledged works (which, in most cases, the viewer hasn't experienced). It is curious how many people who have not actually seen a famous art work, even reproduced, can still explain its "meaning", as if the object exists as a grammatical construction more so than it's physical embodiment.

The arts are, in fact, by nature conversational. That is one use of many objects. The arts are discursive, and perceptive disciplines. Innovation has always paradoxically, in light of what has been discussed just previously, been part of the expectation of the consumer of art works, and curiosity and the asking of questions expected to be part of the working process of artists.

So what?

So the arts in the west have evolved into a new use from within their own tradition. Now, through experimental forms, the arts can point anywhere. They point inward and outward, and possibly infinitely. Inward, certainly, combining what used to be viewed as distinct media, incorporating critical discourse as or into art works themselves and in many other ways, and outward also: right out of these traditional disciplines, and out of the refined conventions of the fine arts themselves, almost back around to Plato's sense yet, importantly, without the need to 'master' anything. The arts have become a place where ideas from many disciplines can be juxtaposed or examined in light of one another's criteria, they can be made algebraically interactive with each other with unknown results. This is a laboratory for cultural, individual, aesthetic, historical, scientific, political, improvisational, emotional, empirical, expressive, and or introverted questions, design responses, examinations, and problems and curiosities of all kinds.

At this point we are no longer discussing form, but function , which along with form is negotiable.

experimental form

2007-11-20T21:00:00.000-08:00

Human beings are designers. Responding to needs of all kinds we create new things. At times our inventiveness is such that the new forms we create bear little resemblance to the raw materials used to make them, and the use is often a departure from these materials as well.

When human beings rely on ingenuity and imagination more than convention, using conceptualization to deal with an imaginary or real scenario rather than simply trying to satisfy a unique need or specific problem with a solution designed by someone else or for some other purpose however analogous, experimental forms are the result.

It is natural to borrow solutions from others, or use what worked before in your own or what is observed to be others' experience. Analogy, and one's capacity for it, is part of intelligence, or what is generally thought of as "intelligence," right? Aren't IQ tests full of analogies? And consciousness, or at least "thinking" has a lot to do with metaphor, no?

Where and in what combinations of ingenuity and imitation do experimental forms emerge?

Where in human life DON'T they?

Some of my favorite examples of experimental form have to do with basic human needs like cooking (see below) and housing. Homeless encampments and cottage handiwork, in the absence or negligence of building codes and in the face or real need and human fancifulness (pleasure- "and who is to say pleasure isn't valuable" Eames) account for the later and my friend Ben Piekut's "baklasagne" (a hybrid correspondence of baklava and lasagna) the former. Outside of architecture and culinary experimentation humans constantly innovate utilities systems and agricultural systems, on large and small scales. The design of an agri-business network of shipping transports illustrates the large scale with respect to farming, but how is Ms. Alguire's method for keeping neighborhood cats out of the garden any less involved a design problem?

Further human experiments with form deal with the transitional zone discussed in earlier essays between ideas and material forms. Several examples from capitalism's more egregious expressions spring to mind. The selling of concepts, for instance, as insurance illustrates what must have been an experimental design solution to a perceived problem. Real estate furnishes many excellent examples of this concept selling, and even the notion of private property must have begun as a solution to a need, and risky one at that: the first deed-holder took who as authority of the authenticity of the deed? Probably god, whose inspiration of the worlds many religions at least partially satisfy many people's need to deal questions as to with the nature of life. In the arts too, capitalism has articulated fabulous examples of the intersection of ingenuity and imitation in an experimental design solution. I can think of two examples of people packaging and selling air as artwork.

Many more examples from every field of human activity exist, and certainly many outside of capitalism. My fondness for selecting these examples of experimental form based in ideas from capitalist manifestations comes from the fact that so much in capitalism is itself symbolic (like currency) and yet moves physical mass, and as such sits right on the line between idea and material. Also considering that this practice is entirely human and based in a need for stable exchange value seems to illustrate the point reasonably well. Yet I have other things to discuss.

The fact that experimental form is risky accounts for many of our human attempts to contain it. Such is the reason behind the aforementioned building codes. It is interesting but not surprising that humans, who are so inventive, are simultaneously resistant to invention and even go to great lengths to keep design fenced in a pasture (at best). And with good reason: one can't have one's neighbors experimenting with radiation, can one? Besides, change is certainly difficult. Yet the risk of "falling asleep on one's feet" is also very real. One may easily come to take too much for granted, allowing social convention to proscribe solutions for needs that one might design solutions better for oneself, had one not put their ingenuity out to pasture. Often, the 'solutions' supplied by convention do not even fit the needs of the individual or solve the problem at hand. Where design is most useful, and thus most dangerous, it has been largely relegated to ornamenting existent forms in a largely decorative manner, or creating new disposable forms (or needs) for the monetary benefit of the inventor or the inventor's patron. The arts, often seen to be the site of design's greatest elegance, have come to be where it is furthest removed from any material use, and thus along with the arts, design in this sense functions solely as entertainment.

But isn't this for the best? After all who hasn't spoiled dinner and all its ingredients after hours of preparation all because of a desire to try out some idea?

And so, what is the solution to this problem?

At this point we are no more discussing the presence or existence of forms but instead, of their function, which is negotiable.

BioNatural and HomoNatural

2007-11-16T10:59:00.000-08:00

As established previously, forms taken to be for the most part external to humans, or independent of us, operate by what we have decided to call natural laws. Basic interactive processes dependant on the internal component structures of the involved interactant parties and the overall structural rules governing the environment as a whole (a product of either larger interactive processes or component systemic structures or the synergistic or sum result of the component interactions within some field). Interestingly, within these natural systems design experiments still seem to occur, as part of the process of interaction between components of the systems themselves (organisms within environments, or even minerals in their chemical (in)organic environments).

I am more interested here in pursuing more pedestrian forms, their meetings and interaction with ideas (those immaterial forms) and their evolution as expressed in human life and especially in the arts.

Human-created forms are, of course, still governed by the same "natural laws" and interactive properties as everything else in nature. We still belong to an environment, everything we do is 'natural'. In fact, I can think of nothing unnatural (except maybe a thought, an immaterial form, that isn't really part of the universe. Still, some would say that the electro-chemical reaction that occurs simultaneously with my 'thought' is material so therefore thoughts are material, thus part of the universe, and therefore 'all natural.') That being said, our created forms must also answer to rules of interaction beyond that of many other forms found in nature. While still being beholden to their own internal structures and properties of interaction they are also subject to social needs and processes. Some extremely have extremely long lifespans thusly, while others, such as those forms governed by fashion needs, have relatively short ones.

In between the processes and laws of both natural and social orders, in the middle of the zone between immaterial and material manifestation, and with our brains, tongues, and opposable thumbs, we as humans create experimental forms in response to a need. Some needs are life-threatening, others are simply problems posed for amusement or research, yet through both processes experimental forms are the result.

Research, in particular, is something I am interested in. Human beings ask questions, express curiosity as a basic trait. This is the root of human inventiveness, and that is where these essays will continue: how the idea forms being discussed relates to the present human situation.

nature is like an industrial designer without a trash can

2007-11-16T09:38:00.000-08:00

Forms that evolve external to human beings seem to do so in terms of multi-dimensional processes of interaction. An individual organism's structure develops, with luck, from birth into adult forms which then die and decay. Each aspect of this process is interactive with the others, the genetics of the organism, the interaction and individual function of the component parts within the individual, and the interactions between the individual and the environment. The behavior of the individual within an environment is even to some extent dictated by it's internal maintenance needs.

Behaving within it's environment the individual organism (or inorganic object for that matter) becomes, from the perspective of another individual, a part of this second individual's environment. Nothing within an environment exists apart from that environment. Everything is simultaneously interacting with it's own version of the shared environment (from its own perspective) whether consciously or not.

As the individual interacts with and affects its environment (by its presence, even) so too the environment acts on the individual. To an equal extent, and often to a greater one, the development of form in nature, be it organic or otherwise, is directed by the environment the form in question is developing with. "With" because every environment is itself in a perpetual state of development, as are its components.

An individual's internal structural development can be seen to be effected over time by it's environment (early death by falling rocks). Taking an even wider view, of species evolution through natural selection, one can see how the environment can shape development. Slowly, nature responds to a need or a problem which another aspect of nature creates. The solutions produced to these problems take the form of experimental forms. Nature can be seen to operate, as such, through experimental processes, in response to a need.

It is interesting to compare this view of interaction and evolution in nature to this interview with Charles Eames regarding Design, in the normal human usage of the term. It is from the film 'Design Q&A':
Q.What is your definition of “design?”
A .A plan for arranging elements in such a way as to best accomplish a particular purpose.

Q.Is design an expression of art (an art form)?
A.The design is an expression of the purpose. It may (if it is good enough) later be judged as art.

QIs design a craft for industrial purposes?
A.No—but design may be a solution to some industrial problems.

Q.What are the boundaries of design?
A.What are the boundaries of problems?

Q.Is design a discipline that concerns itself with only one part of the environment?
A.No.

Q.Is it a method of general expression?
A.No—it is a method of action.

Q.Is design a creation of an individual?
A.No—because to be realistic one must always admit the influence of those who have gone before

Q.. ...or a creation of a group?
A.Often.

Q.Is there a design ethic?
A.There are always design constraints and these usually include an ethic.

Q.Does design imply the idea of products that are necessarily useful?
A.Yes—even though the use might be very subtle.

Q.Is it able to cooperate in the creation of works reserved solely for pleasure?
A.Who would say that pleasure is not useful?

Q.Ought form to derive from the analysis of function?
A.The great risk here is that the analysis may not be complete.

Q.Can the computer substitute for the designer?
A.Probably, in some special cases, but usually the computer is an aid to the designer.

Q.Does design imply industrial manufacture?
A.Some designs do and some do not—depending on the nature of the design and the requirements.

Q.Is design an element of industrial policy?
A.Certainly; as is any other aspect of quality, obvious or subtle, of the product. It seems that anything can be an element in policy.

Q.Ought design to care about lowering costs?
A.A product often becomes more useful if the costs are lowered without harming the quality.

Q. Does the creation of design admit constraint?
A.Design depends largely on constraints.

Q.What constraints?
A.The sum of all constraints. Here is one of the few effective keys to the design problem—the ability of the designer to recognize as many of the constraints as possible—his willingness and enthusiasm for working within these constraints—the constraints of price, of size, of strength, balance, of surface, of time, etc.; each problem has its own peculiar list.

Q.Does design obey laws?
A.Aren't constraints enough?

Q.Are there tendencies and schools in design?
A.Yes, but this is more a human frailty than an ideal.

Q.Ought the final product to bear the trademark of the designer? of the research office?
A.In some cases, one may seem appropriate. In some cases, the other, and certainly in some cases, both.

Q.What is the relation of design to the world of fashion (current trends)?
A.The objects of fashion have usually been designed with the particular constraints of fashion in mind.

Q.Is design ephemeral
A.Some needs are ephemeral. Most designs are ephemeral.

Q.Ought it to tend towards the ephemeral or towards permanence?
A.Those needs and designs that have a more universal quality will tend toward permanence.

Q.To whom does design address itself: to the greatest number (the masses)? to the specialists or the enlightened amateur? to a privileged social class?
A.To the need.

Q.Can public action aid the advancement of design?
A.The proper public action can advance almost anything.

Q.After having answered all these questions, do you feel you have been able to practice the profession of “design” under satisfactory conditions, or even optimum conditions?
A.Yes.

Q.Have you been forced to accept compromises?
A. I have never been forced to accept compromises but I have willingly accepted constraints.

Q. What do you feel is the primary condition for the practice of design and its propagation? A.Recognition of need.

Q.What is the future of design?
A.(No answer)

Summary and Disclaimer (form, part 7)

2007-11-13T12:47:00.000-08:00

In the previous essays I have used many words. Lest some be misunderstood I will clarify some things now.

First of all, in case it is not obvious from these previous essays, the idea of "form" being used here has nothing to do with "essences" in the Platonic or Phenomenological senses. Rather, this designation has been chosen in light of its common usage as regards artistic and especially musical practices. This will be the subject of the forthcoming section of which the previous section serves as an adjacent land.

What I have been discussing here is not concerned so much with ontological arguments of proofs or refutations of this existence of independent entities. One needn't simultaneously assert the existence of some idea or object (thereby putting it to use) and simultaneously be troubled as to whether the thing being used exists. Or rather, that too is an interesting approach, but is not the approach of these essays.

This discussion is concerned with the fallacy created by attempting to refute the formal existence or structural attributes of propositions and material objects stated to exist or expressed in utility. The falsifiability of such a proposition, and especially a material substance is paradoxical, and while entertaining it is otherwise useless. It is a partial description of a void in a made up language that violates its own grammatical rules.

As such, while phychology is also very interesting, the chemical processes, emotional correlates, and behavioral manifestations of the individual mind are not the subject of this discussion. I want to talk about action in light of forms the actor believes to exist.

Nor is the subject at hand Intentionality, even though I am discussing ideas.

Nor have we need to bring up whether or not ontology or epistemology is being placed first in the chain of analysis. That is another game, and besides for the purposes here they are quite linked, embedded in one another even. Here we are concerned with use, not even value (so ethics aren't really relevant either).

Furthermore, certainty is not the issue. We are dealing with material as such. It is said to exist, it is used, and thus its existence is demonstrate-able. The question is: can something which exists be deprived of form or or structure?

Points in Rotation (form, part 6)

2007-11-13T07:11:00.000-08:00

It seems that the meeting place for material and immaterial forms in human life and history is a zone of controversy. In the history of Science, for example, neither "the ether" nor gravity have ever been found to have either a physical body or to exhibit mass (lets ignore the controversial 'graviton' for ease of conversation). Yet both act as fundamental concepts, the ground on which much of the science of their (in the case of the ether) or our (in the case of gravity) rests. A change in belief as to the fundamental nature of these concepts, themselves fundamental, offers many new perspectives not believed to exist if not a complete shift in the shared predominant worldview, the 'reality' of science. Concepts moving from substantial (material) being to non-being (immaterial, insubstantial being) thus create quite a stir. Yet formally of course, they still exhibit structure much as material objects (mathematics, for instance, can be expressed entirely conceptually- this is the very nature of its existence. Yet, as pointed out in earlier essays, it, for all its mass-less-ness it has no lack of structure, but that is a different conversation).

It is interesting to note that before their redefinition, reevaluation, or replacement by other objects on the border between form immaterial and material that concepts held to be the fundamental ground on which systems of ideas are based function not only to support ideas but also as a barrier, or fence over which the imagination has a difficult time reaching. This is basically the converse of the idea in the last paragraph: the REASON that a change in belief regarding the structure of an idea between material reality and immateriality is often such a breakthrough (or alternately controversial) is that what is being tested is the limit of what was thought to be possible, even as a conception. Thus conceptual borders, fences, assume physical behavior in terms of what can be believed to be possible.

Also worthy of consideration is the strange power which energy in this transitional space takes on. People start WARS because of such shift in ideas. Religions, with all of the strife, oppressive behavior, magnificent architecture, civic organization, and mass movement of people that they inspire, require, effect and so forth have no mass! They are just concepts, and they clearly illustrate a pivot between the material and immaterial world. In fact, in many religions it is a gesture from a spiritual immateriality that granted existence to material suchness! Of course, though many people also feel that this evolution happened in the opposite direction, it cannot be denied that this point of transmutation, transmigration, or transmediation (whatever they call it) between the material and immaterial worlds of form and vice-versa (if one considers religions whose goal for the individual after death is a paradise- thus movement from material to immaterial form) serves as a center of motivation within a particular aggregation of individuals, an intense bond of unity capable of momentous action.

In this way shared immaterial forms container at the very least function in the material environment of material forms for the population which shares them. Despite the fact that this process is itself mental, some of these forms can function on a metastructural level, underlying basic thought processes resulting in assumptions as to the nature of existence shared by a collective population. These assumptions are strong enough to influence even individual perceptions of 'real' objects, to place the previously mentioned boundaries around the imagination (which, to be fair, might not be able to function without them) and effect even the ground of collective thought believed to be empiricist in nature. Thus immaterial forms can serve to control the aggregate if seen from a wider view (in a psychologically fascist sense). Of course, the same ideas can be seen to be the result, rather than the cause, if this process is viewed in reverse, as an (unconscious?) collective democracy, actively participating in the creation of their reality.

Independant Worm Saloon

2007-11-09T08:02:00.000-08:00

In light of all this discussion about form and structures innateness within things that exist it is interesting how easy it is to create something as a human being. As human beings we have such an ingenuity with which to create forms of infinite variety, basic natural forms (like our bodily forms) and the natural forms we create. I am espiecially interested in the forms that we create out of experiment, play, or individual or direct responses to specific needs.

It is interesting that the minute a sentence is uttered it can begin to acquire multitudes of meanings both for the speaker or for those who hear it. Not only can a proposition uttered with some literal intent carry many meanings but even a phrase created out of a deliberate attempt at obsurdity acquires meaning and exhibites form an structure as soon as it is uttered. Perhaps this even occurs as the phrase is being uttered, this aquisition of structure acting as a physical transition between the mental form (what we where referring to as a "special" sort of form) and the physical form (its spoken version, which not only exhibits grammatical and semantic structures but involves physical displacements of air molecules and muscular and nervous actions on the part of both sender and reciever).

Pavla is speaking about Dada here to me. Dada as impetous as a reaction to the senselessness of the war, and as senselessness itself. Yet there is no senselessness is there? Not once some form is put forth. The reseach value of Surrealism as expressed by its participants (and espiecially the early participants such as Desnos and Ernst) seems to circulate around this point. Juxtapostion, association, reaction conscious and unconscious - forms and minds interact through thier structures and processes and meaning arises, sometimes seemingly out of nothing.

I would like to give an example of one such (as Breton paraphrases Lautremont) "chance meeting of a sewing machine and an umbrella on a dissecting table," but rather than utilize the tired and perhaps at this point overly associative heritage of the surrealists or other bastard children of dada I would prefer to use an example close at hand. Take these two Butthole Surfers records "Rembrant Pussyhorse," "Locust Abortion Technition," and "Independant Worm Saloon." I mean each of those phrases consists of words that wouldn't really suggest the others. They could have easily been chosen at random or selected from lists of three word juxtapostions assembled by opening the dictionary at random. Yet each of them (I am reading them one at a time, slowly) suggest many images, and come with whole imaginary stuctures attached and carry moods, atmospheres, emotional overtones, as such meanings.

I am picturing an Independant Worm Saloon as an animated worm dressed as a cowboy with a hat and leather holsters standing at a wooden bar against a yellow background. The bar is in Texas and there is going to be a Libertarian party meeting but the Worm we are watching wants to get drunk first. He is drinking a tequila with a worm in it.

Form is Inevitable, Part 4

2007-11-07T06:07:00.000-08:00

What can be said to exist? Can anything not? If it is asserted that a thing does not exist is the assertion itself enough to prove it's existence?

Recall that we are not discussing the 'complexity' of the form in question. Recall also (Part 3) that ideas exist in a 'special' way that is different from other forms existent, and this is because they lack mass and do not occupy space. Yet ideas move forms that do occupy space and in fact have mass. Thus, while it is certainly a danger that such a discussion could easily avail itself to defenders of religious or of solipsistic world views, ones which are not within the scope of my present interest, I must still address some questions concerning the special form of the 'idea' and its role in defining 'reality' and its constituents.

It is often the case that they consequences of an observer's ignorance of an otherwise existent phenomena are negligible. The Form simple does not exist for this individual. If their internal structure or interactive processes are not impacted by this omission (say, as in the example which concluded Part 1) then it makes no difference either way whether said phenomena exists or not. This individuals world is complete without it. They can function in their environment (which they share with this ghost they have no knowledge of) and they strength of the both form's interactions are negligible to the other.

This completeness of a perceives world is called into question by doubt. Doubt arises out of interactions between a body and an unknown body, or between known bodies in which the interactions themselves are foreign, unpredictable or inexplicable under the structures and processes (the world view) believed by one form or another to exist. Of course by belief I am referring to human forms but the idea of belief could be extended to plant life. An organism is could be said to be expectant of, say, sunlight. If it does not arrive death does. Nor is any sort of consciousness necessary: Having removed what I believed to be all the rocks on the path outside my house I am stymied by my sandaled toes interaction with a sharp stone, out of which arises doubt in my belief that no stone existed there.

As such, doubt may come from any activity between forms. An unexpected form emerging within or joining an environment, or an unexpected interaction intruding on an unwitting form. Doubt, or enlightenment depending on how optimistic one feels about it, thus may bring all attributes of known forms and structures (again, the world view) within an environment into question. Especially for people, which is something I am interested in speaking about here for a moment.

Similar situations arise when two or more observers or groups share some environment but act under diverse perceptual sets. Thus their mental models of the environment, on which their interactions within this environment are based, include different pictures of 'reality'. While as in the case of the individual some of these attributes are negligible many must be agreed upon before the observers can interact within the environment without damage to one another. Conflict occurs as these differences are made apparent.

Another interesting case, similar to the solipsism mentioned earlier (or that of some schizophrenics) , is to imagine a phenomena that only a single individual responds to. In fact, many of these instances must exits, and perhaps they exist in every human consciousness. Again, most of these doubtless have negligible or even beneficial results giving us say, a creative or unique view of a situation or a solution to a particular problem. Other times, however, a phenomena known to exist by only a single individual can wield such a power over the individual and create such a strong divide between this individual and others that the doubt mentioned earlier can become expressed violently or destructively.

This is a problem for analysis by psychologists (they are working on it already of course). The question as to whether a phenomena existent for only one individual is likely a malfunction within that individual or not is a difficult one, as human beings must, of course, preserve their visionary and creative potential.

This discussion must wait, however, as first we must treat the relationship between form and structure in phenomena acknowledged by a majority to exist.

Isn't that, after all, how cities work? Is this very different from any human group? It seems that the collective unconscious manifests itself as a democratic reality.

Form is Inevitable, Part 3

2007-11-06T08:58:00.000-08:00

Can ideas be said to exist in the same way as other forms of existence?

Certainly they, like other objects, materials, or processes can be seen to exist throughout their interactions within their environments. Also, like other objects, materials or processes (that is, those things external to a person's imagination, those that occupy three dimensional space or exhibit mass) ideas can be seen from a multitude or even perhaps an infinity of vantage points. They also often have structures similar to the body in which they reside (the mind, the perceptually fueled imagination world of consciousness, or unconsciousness to the extent this could be said to exist). They may even control complex structural processes, generating or moving masses of other forms while having no measurable weight or even a discernible physical body and that is very interesting, isn't it?

Nonetheless, ideas must be considered special sorts of forms, even when they can be seen to exist in many people's imaginations or consciousnesses simultaneously, even when they drive the creation of three dimensional forms exhibiting mass. The can be said to exist, but they are "special," aren't they?

Form Is Inevitable, Part 2

2007-11-06T06:21:00.000-08:00

Form is built out of other forms. Structures, in the sense of the elements of which a single body is constructed and Processes, interactions between these elements. Form is also defined by its environment to a large extent, and in a parallel way analogous to its interactions within this environment.

In other words, the environment defines its physical body through its own systems of Structures which interact with individual Forms physically. At the same time, environmental Processes are interactions between the Form and other forms which together create the environment. A form apprehended and those apprehending it define themselves both in terms of their own physical mass and structure, and the mass, structure, and effects of their interactions within the environment that is their own creation. Thus an environment is defined and evolves at the same instant.

The environmental processes and structures with respect to a particular form spiral out from that form creating eddies around themselves and other existants within the environment. These eddies can be thought of as a lattice of structures within the environment (rigid or static structures within a crystalline frozen picture) or as vectors (active, moving) which define the shift in meaning and physical intensity between processes of interaction between forms and their structures.

The vector image of these interactions could be graphed as three dimensional waves or as lines of force (the lattice idea) displaying in a frozen moment the constructive and destructive interferences between all existants within an environment and even within a singular form. The processes and structures within each could be shown to spiral out from the center of each disturbance or action in a wave like manner in at least three dimensions, in turn effecting the structure/processes and the effects, themselves propagating like wave vectors in a similar manner of all other forms in the environment.

A thing which exists can be denied neither form nor structure.
As such, make sense of this:

http://www.digitalisindustries.com/foxyd/reviews.php?which=2736

Form is Inevitable, Part 1

2007-11-06T05:43:00.000-08:00

As much as something can be said to exist it can be said to posses form.

Form may be determined by the internal component structures of a body, or by other factors such as the internal component structures of other forms interacting with the primary form. Thus internal structures or processes of some bodies which exist in the environment of a specific body may be said to subjectively determine the form of the body in question, though of course this does not necessarily change the formal aspect of the body in question.

Between observers, attributes, or even the existence of a particular form may be disputable. This, however, often has more to say about a particular observer than about the phenomena (body, primary form) in question.

A form interacts with its environment. This is one way in which its existence can be described, or "proven".

The absence of an observer's belief in an existent form may in fact negate the existence of the form for that observer. The effect of this is more of less negligible depending on the strength of the form's interactions within the shared environment between the form and the (non) observer. This shared environment may be described in terms of an array of vectors of interaction which describe strength and proximity in the relation to and object existent and one perceived.

Of course, this is how a person may be struck by a car they didn't realize existed.