Back To the Future?

Until now, I have not spoken of Art. Perhaps this is because the definitions and practices in contemporary globalized, commercialized, art scene interest me little.

However, i am (unfortunately) directly affected by the current cultural and commercial climate created by the developers of computer hardware and software -and the effect that their activities have on the belief systems of those who are active within the cultural and educational sectors.

The elegance, sophistication, plus of course the availability and price of computing tools directly affects the range of choices that I have to work with as primary material. The way these products are marketed has influence on the social and cultural climate in which I live. The social climate affects the education system -and the way young people think when they leave their institutions to find their way in world outside. The cultural climate is perhaps more easy to ignore in direct practical terms -but it does affect the way my work is interpreted -and it can also limit or expand the possibility of participating in interesting and potentially creatively productive dialogues with fellow artists and others.

The Art of Technology:

Revolutionary and Reactionary:

Personally, I find it interesting to discover from historical accounts that LISP and ALGOL were both invented very early in the history of modern computing (around1958) and that COBOL, which was the first administrative language ever -was invented by a woman (the Late Rear Admiral Grace Hopper) -who was credited with inventing the whole concept of high level languages. Unfortunately, I don't believe that any modern computer languages show the clarity of concept and application manifest by ALGOL and LISP. Nor do operating systems show much advance on the conceptual clarity of Unix. It seems that although some concepts and processes can become clarified over time, as a result of a wide range of empirical experience through practical implementation -in many cases, the clarity of the original concepts can easily become obscured by subsequent layers of "pragmatic" adaption to fit naturally changing circumstances. Sometimes, trying to fundamentally "re-invent" the wheel can be a very clarifying, but also very subversive, experience.

Profit and Loss:

Years of mapping and exploring cognitive and computational processes in remote academic and commercial laboratories do not seem to have brought general benefit to the public -but largely commercial profit at the expense of public understanding and the common good.

I do not believe that "computing" should be taught on one hand as an obscure and esoteric "technical" science and on the other hand as a social phenomenon devoid of the technicalities. I believe that "computing" should be seen as a part of the basic human cognitive process -and that it should be taught as part of a general education intended to improve both abstract and practical cognitive skills -as indeed "rhetoric" and classical languages were also once taught.

One might hope that artists and philosophers would lead the way to an integrated and intelligent use of technology in society. However, how are they to do so -if our artists and philosophers are also entirely dependent on the commercial market, the technology that it produces and the ideas that it promotes?
<On the Stairs: Between Old and New Media>

Some Apparent (late 20th century) Social Shifts:

Creative Systems:

The search for Order and Meaningful Pattern:

The construction of this short lecture has caused me to discover and order much material which was previously unknown to me. Personally, I suspect that an important aspect of creative thinking is not the "intelligence" of the thinker but actually their self-perceived lack of understanding of the subject in question. Because some people are unable to "understand" the things that they are told (or feel the need to do), they find themselves compelled to try and work it out for themselves. The resulting search then may well uncover inconsistencies in the accepted viewpoint. Anomalies, which when investigated lead the poor victim to discoveries which can surpass the previous boundaries of knowledge. Ideas which can become extremely threatening to the status quo (and those who profit from it) and therefore put the discoverer outside conventional society.

A Molecular Theory of Creativity?

Experience with the creative process also suggests that sometimes ideas develop in ways that might perhaps be similar to the way chemistry works. In this model, existing ideas are like molecules sitting in the brain, waiting until somebody says something, or one experiences something happening, which creates (or exposes one to) another idea. When two (or more) ideas meet, they then create a kind of "chemical reaction". Depending on the internal structure of each idea -some ideas will repel each other -or perhaps even glide past each other without any kind of a reaction -but some will stick to each other and form larger "compound" ideas. Later, some "compounds" may stick to other "compounds" to make even bigger and more complex structures -although sometimes an "explosive" reaction can take place causing complex ideas to fly apart into different ideas -or sometimes to collapse into much more simple structures. In retrospect, one can often discover a hidden "grammar" -which perhaps explains how and why some ideas relate and others do not. Perhaps (syntactic) "languages" also operate in a similar fashion -presumably, one could concider the (physical) rules of chemistry as being the grammar for the "language" of chemistry....... This suggests that languages might have "entropic" as well as "anti-entropic" qualities.

Creative Industry: Short sighted, bad management?

The Social horizon:

In art college, many years ago, I was conditioned to believe in the value of creativity and innovation. So I was shocked to read somewhere that commercially one can see ideas in terms of a social horizon. Ideas that are below this Horizon are considered to be too far away to be of any practical value. Obviously, ideas that are clearly visible are of no real commercial value either -so only the ideas that are just appearing are useful for innovative commercial exploitation. Unfortunately, it is often the more "impractical" (and largely invisible undeveloped) ideas that are the really big ones. I remember that Motorola once introduced a micro-chip on the market via a competition (with a micro-chip as a prize) for the best idea of what to do with the chip. In those days, one needed a mini-computer to programme a micro-chip.

Social Architecture:

I once used to live in an "Amsterdam School" building -very decorative, very romantic, very "linguistic". Surprisingly perhaps, the "decoration" was placed very rationally -as a kind of "language" used to break up large building masses into smaller elements, or to modulate between a horizontal land a vertical line around door and window frames. Historically, this art nouveau style was supplanted by "new efficiency" style. A visual degradation of the built environment but a big reduction in time and effort for the designer and the builder. Poor performance for the public but increased profit for the owner and builder.

Data General:

The computer company described in Kidder's book "The Soul of a New Machine", did not survive. Not many early companies have. Even IBM failed to be a commercial success in the PC market and has now sold off its PC division to a Chinese company: Despite having "kidnapped" the previously general term "Personal Computer" to use as a commercial brand name exclusively for its own machines -despite inadvertently (and somewhat unfortunately for IBM) giving birth to a whole industry of PC-clones in Taiwan -despite helping Microsoft gain its near global monopoly -and despite wiping most non-IBM compatible machines off the market..... Perhaps the failure of IBM and the success of Microsoft is one of the most important (and most poorly understood) sagas of modern times.

Political Vision:

Unfortunately, politics also has a built in short term vision, based on the period between elections. Modern capitalism even puts ownership largely in hands of investors who prefer individual short term profit over long term social advantages.

Academic Collaboration:

Some time ago, when Dutch universities were gearing up to become the hand maidens of commerce and industry, the Dutch trade paper the "Automatisering Gids" published an account of how Delft University tried interfacing their computer science research projects into the needs of industry. Unfortunately, the project failed because the companies wanted quick fixes and not long term fundamental research. So who is to provide the long-term vision: Should the community pay for fundamental research in universities -so that companies can make short term profits from the results? It seems that the national infrastructure (Transport, Communication, Education and Health) of any country is actually a hidden subsidy to industry. This may be fine when in support of national industries -but how does this function in a global economy? Who pays -and who gets the profits?

Possible and Desirable?

Creative thinking can be driven by the need to solve pressing practical problems. However, it can also driven by ego and the personal ambition for success and praise. Indeed, perhaps the dialogue between theory and practice, between desire and reality are truly fundamental principles underlying the creative dialogue. On the other hand, is every "new" idea a "good" idea? Does every new product on the market help to improve society by helping us to live better and more worthwhile lives: Or are we becoming consumerist junkies, who have lost all feeling for what is healthy -or what might be destructive to ourselves, including our social, cultural and physical environment?

Mental Technology:

Learning to read and to write might have enormous implications (McLuhan, Francis Yates, Socrates)......
Western culture also has many problems relating conscious, rational, sequential "thinking" to unconscious, emotional, concurrent "intuition".

-In the early days, wide range of programming languages (basic provided as standard) -now most users cannot even understand their OS.....

Early computers used mechanical switches and wirings to communicate between human and machines, then punched cards, punched tape and teletypes. Now it is mainly via VDU, mouse, touchscreen, etc... A transition from a practical and technical "electronics" connective approach to a more "literary" (typist) system of communication -which then becomes a more intuitive visual-tactile experience.

Scripting -tends to reduce "programming" the creation of "interfaces" for existing programme segments -with these "segments" being seen as mere implementations of algorithms. (the GUI as (platonic) social disaster).

We may be paying a high price for our "advances" but are too ignorant to ever even notice....

He Who Pays the Piper Calls the Tune:

How much of the world we live in -and the possibilities that it offers -are actually the result of a totally "free" choice of those that participate? How much is it the result of a power struggle between powerful political, military and economic interests? How much do our lives merely serve their interests -and how much do their actions serve anybody's interest (including their own) in the long term?