Re: [-empyre-] self-modification, emergence

["Christophe Bruno" <christophe.bruno@unbehagen.com>]

yes this is probably the point at which we disagree, about performativity

speech IS the event, and its failure at the same time

at some point we become immune to the virus of our own inflated discourse,
then a speech can emerge, disguised as a lie or a mistake.., that breaks
through this global mirror and tells something about ouselves that was
unseen before

I don't believe we can do much more and specially not within the discourse
of science

Christophe

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Paul Brown" <paul@paul-brown.com>
To: "soft_skinned_space" <empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au>
Sent: Tuesday, November 09, 2004 10:21 PM
Subject: Re: [-empyre-] self-modification, emergence
>
> I think this is also a repost to Christophe's request that we "deal
> fully with the question of language (and not only computing language)".
>
> It's my opinion (and I know it's not a popular one!) that language
> comes after the event (and cannot predict or pregender new
> knowledge except about language itself).  Critics say I'm still
> stuck in the Tractatus - a criticism I'm more than happy to accept!
>
> Put more simply - we do the work and then language is developed to
> first analyse and then codify that event.  Put another way - theory
> comes after the event and cannot come before it (it can only come
> before repeats of previously existing events).  This is not to say
> that theory cannot create "spaces" (concepts?) for event to take
> place - but it can't create events.
>
> So I think that Christophe's suggestion is premature - that language
> that will describe alife will not and cannot exist for some time now.
> We need to do the work that will create the body of experience so that
> language can deconstruct and codify it and turn it into knowledge. As
> I have suggested elsewhere when the language to describe an event
> evolves then it also kills the event and turns it into history.
>
> LeWitt's instructions did not predict the work.  The idea (concept)
> predicted the instructions.  A difference here between language as a
> description and language as a set of instructions (like computer
> language).  Alife attempts to go beyond this inherent limitation of
> the language by using evolutionary and emergent methods.  The up
> side is that we can get results.  The down side is that we often
> can't comprehend them (because we have gone beyond the limits of
> language and have to wait for it to catch up).
>
> Maybe it's important to qualify these assertions by stating that I
> am not a theorist - I am a make of things (not necessarily objects!)
>
> And just as a complete aside I can't help (mis?)quoting Minsky that
> "language is a system for building ideas in other peoples heads"
> and, of course, Burrough's wonderful "language is a virus".
>
> Sorry BTW that I was offline yesterday.  We had storms and my alife
> making machines don't like unstable electricity!
> -- 
> ===============================================================
> Paul Brown          PO Box 413, Cotton Tree QLD 4558, Australia
> mailto:paul@paul-brown.com            http://www.paul-brown.com
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