* "thought and physicality are not antithetical"

To understand Hume means to accept that thought and physicality are not antithetical, this very much resonates with the 4EA (embodied ,embedded, enactive, extended and affective) cognition extensively described by John Protevi. Thus once this confusion has been resolved then someone can sense that the subject emerges from a field of physical sensations and other physical intensities.

Delanda nicely makes the analogy between software (thought) and hardware ( neurons) there is no way something significant to emerge when someone tries to map the word processed text that you are reading at this moment with the firing of and-gates or–gates deep within the transistors in the hardware. There are only different layers or better several softwares that bring the transistors and text into communication. The problem with the human mind is that no one has ever identified any of those layers that happened to be between neurons and thoughts.

The only thing neuroscience is capable of saying is not how we think but only “what our brain must be for it to be possible to think and feel in other ways” (Rajchman, p137). Delanda then provides through Deleuze an approach to the issue, “this problem should be approached evolutionary” to start from the simplest organism with simple sensations and minimum consciousness and then to add layers of complexity. for this argument Deleuze in different context brings forth Uexkull’s Umwelt to describe Tick’s cognitive process through three affects.

This kind of understanding concludes to the non antithetical nature of thought and physicality.

The above text is in form of scattered notes from the following sources

* Manuel DeLanda in

DeLanda, M., Ellingsen, E.(2007) Possibility of Spaces. In Models-306090, eds (Abruzzo et all), 306090 Inc. New York.

Rajchman, J.(2001) Deleuze Connections. Cambridge MA: The MIT Press, London

the history of hacking documentary

it is that moment that Nietsche's "gay science" produces innovation and redefines the ethical aspect...

steve wozniak

co-founder of apple computer

hacking is about invention

john draper

a.k.a Captain Crunch

hacking is about experimentation

kevin mitnick

wanted by FBI 1992-95

hacking is about subversion

Co-existence

it's been couple of days now that I wanted to write few things about the installation at the Welcome Trust here in london entitled "CO-EXISTENCE" which has been designed by Julia Lohman.

The installation rediscovers the boundarys of the human body.

"Only one in ten of our cells is human - the rest are microbes. The human body can therefore be considered as an ecosystem that supports and is supported by millions of 'other' living things" .

that brings again into the forefront that whole discussion about the constituion of the organism, the subject, the self. it reveals a rhizomatic understanding that moves the autopoietic theory towards machinic heterogenesis and the theory of assemblage.

anyway it is worth passing by the Wellcome Trust center at Euston road to see the installation and to realise that you are everywhere not only informationaly but also structuraly... you form a rhizome within a braoder ecosystem.

this whole discussion resonates with my research about the symbiosis of a meshwork of systems in the build environment... you will argue that this is not so novel however I will state the opposite... more soon hopefully!

since then, few things on the installation here

"the important thing is to understand life, each living individuality, not as a form, or a development of form, but as a complex relation between different velocities, between deceleration and acceleration of particles"

Deleuze, G.(1988) Spinoza: Practical Philosophy. Trans. Robert Hurley. City lights Books, San Francisco, p.123

here is another article from wired

the Programming of Architecture

Paul Coates' new book is finally scheduled to be published at the very early of 2010... you will be suprised that Paul strugles to make programming a method or/and property of architecture almost the last 30 years. The title of the book has been translated to the mainstream title "the Programming of Architecture" which direclty implies to the more computational one which was programming.architecture/architecture.programming... the book covers a history of experimentations from turing machines to alpha syntax and the most contemporary research on Neural Networks.

Before you dive into scripting and code hard geometric functions to produce the popular now voronoi diagram read how you can program simple rules and wait for the complex pattern/behaviour to emerge.

You can pre order the book here

kriegspiel

the kriegspiel or the Game of War

Guy Debord believed that the board game that he designed in 1977, after years having the idea in his mind, would be his legacy.

“I succeeded, a long time ago, in presenting the basics of [war] on a rather simple board game,” he wrote in 1989. “The surprises of this kriegspiel seem inexhaustible; and I fear that this may well be the only one of my works that anyone will dare acknowledge as having some value.” Guy Debord 1989

more on Kriegspiel

and trace its philosophical roots in Alexander's Galloway essay

your brain is like a pile of s***!

your brain is like a pile of sand! our brain is posed at the edge of chaos and for that reason it has all this creative power! A great article at the last issue of New Scientist brings our brain through a systematic view at a state of self-organizing criticality "these systems are right on the boundary between stable orderly behaviour and the unpredictable world of chaos." “The quintessential example of self-organised criticality is a growing sand pile. As grains build up the pile grows in a predictable way until, suddenly and without warning, it hits a critical point and collapses. These “sand avalanches” occur spontaneously and are almost impossible to predict, so the system is said to be both critical and self-organising”.

read the full article here

Aesthetics

"esthetics is for me as ornithology must be for the birds"

Barnett Newman

few ideas about Aesthetics

"Deleuze's Aesthetic takes the form not of a judgment, but rather of an experimentation and creation that defies judgment"

Rachjman, J. (2001) The Deleuze Connections. MAssachusetts Institute of Technology, p. 114

Aesthetics of pragmatics