Individual entities (nodes) can be grouped to communicate with each other in a myriad of configurations. Two cans and a string is the simplest networking model, where there is only one link between the nodes. The phone system is a complex network, allowing any node to relay to any other. Or you can think of social networks. In cases where “she told two friends, then she told two friends and so on, and so on.” In networks, tiny events can take on enormous proportions. Where a germ is passed between nodes, the epidemic charted over time, does not look like a gradual slope, but stays low, then suddenly explodes. The features of the network beyond the sum of its nodes are the emergent properties. For instance, telephones are only so handy in isolation but by connecting them in a network. That’s a simple emergent idea, but there are more complex ones. For instance, you can scream at one end and raise a person’s pulse at the other.
Published in Chapter:
Technological Social-ism
Judson Wright (Pump Orgin Computer Artist, USA)
Copyright: © 2009
|Pages: 32
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-352-4.ch020
Abstract
Culture is a byproduct of our brains. Moreover, we’ll look at ways culture also employs ritual (from shamanistic practices to grocery shopping) to shape neural paths, and thus shape our brains. Music has a definite (well researched) role in this feedback loop. The ear learns how to discern music from noise in the very immediate context of the environment. This serves more than entertainment purposes however. At a glance, we often can discern visual noise from images, nonsense from words. The dynamics are hardly unique to audial compositions. There are many kinds of compositional rules that apply to all of the senses and well beyond. The brain develops these rule sets specific to the needs of the culture and in order to maintain it. These rules, rarely articulated, are stored in the form of icons, a somewhat abstracted, context-less abbreviation open to wide interpretation. It may seem somewhat amazing we can come up with compatible rules, by reading these icons from our unique personal perspectives. And often we don’t, as we each have differing tastes and opinions. However, “drawing from the same well” defines abstract groupings, to which we choose to subscribe. We both subscribe to and influence which rule-sets we use to filter our perceptions and conclusions. But the way we (often unconsciously) choose is far more elusive and subtle.