Duncan's blog

Brains from the BBC

Duncan — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:55:24 +0000

3 BBC News items on brains

University of California psychology and neuroscience professor Bob Knight explains how computers are being used to decode imagined speech.

World premiere of brain orchestra

Brain waves from thoughts of sounds used to move cursor

Moving a computer cursor by thinking about a series of vowels.

Archaeoacoustics around the world

Duncan — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 21:18:03 +0000

The Landscape & Perception project of Jon Wozencroft & Paul Devereux is conducting ongoing research in “Archaeoacoustics.”

Previously mentioned here by Gordon, ancient sites with acoustic “ringing rocks” have been discovered all over the globe. Of note is research conducted by the L&P team with ICRL fellows ( lead by Robert Jahn, formerly of PEAR ) whose paper “Ancient Architectural Acoustic Resonance Patterns and Regional Brain Activity” appeared in Time and Mind, March 2008.

Percussionist Z’ev has played on lithophones in Carn Menyn, Wales ( see the bottom of the sidebar here for photos and a sampling of the sound ).

The Sound Machine

Duncan — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 19:27:15 +0000

Roald Dahl’s “The Sound Machine”, first published in the September 17, 1949 issue of The New Yorker, proposes a device that can pick up high frequency sounds and convert them into the range audible by humans. The inventor of the machine first hears shrieks of roses being cut by a neighbor. Taking an axe to a beech tree the next day, he is surprised to hear “a harsh, noteless, enormous noise, a growling, low-pitched, screaming sound…”

A radio dramatization of the story is on archive.org in MP3 format.

Several short films have been inspired by the short story. Two on YouTube are embedded below.

Scans of the original issue of The New Yorker are available via one-time payment or subscription at their site.

Singing Mice

Duncan — Tue, 10 May 2011 14:24:30 +0000

Featured in the May 2011 issue of Smithsonian magazine is an article about the vocalizations of different species of mice. Matina Kalcounis-Rueppell, biologist at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, is a behavioral ecologist with expertise in how animals use sound. While working a California field site in 2004, she used an ultrasonic recorder ( analogous to Gordon’s Bat Box ) to capture nighttime sounds, some of which she suspected to be those of mice she was studying.

Bringing the recordings into the computer, Matina’s team noticed a fairly loud four-note song that turned out to be from a deer mouse. A slowed down recording of the mouse song sounds eerily akin to whale song. Have a listen.

Do Plants Feel Pain?

Duncan — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 00:31:52 +0000

Photo by: brewbooks

What is ‘sentience’? When a person or animal is injured they react by experiencing pain, marshalling the body’s defense systems to repair the damage and begin the process of recovery. The question, surely, is whether we know enough about sentience to be quite certain that plant life does not have it.

Every ecologist out there, and even amateur gardeners, have been known to swear that plants, too, ‘feel’ things, but it is only recent research that has demonstrated just how ‘intelligent’ they really are. Plant life has a heritage far older than mankind, and in some respects, it makes we humans seem inadequate! Is it not about time to take more notice?

(Via Environmental Graffiti)

Lutie Larson on Radionics

Duncan — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 03:45:27 +0000

Lutie Larson, after reading The Secret Art, had an interesting comment on the difference in the way she views subtle fields and radionics.

I know that Dr Abrams felt the the fields he was testing were emanations from the physical form. He was primarily focused on negative patterning associated with disease in the physical form. I feel that the physical form reflects the subtle field information, that the subtle field information we are measuring in radionics, are manifesting patterns. To me that makes sense and is why we can work at a distance and why we must wait to se how the form responds to the balancing that is done radionically.

Below is an excerpt of material from Lutie's books Little Farm Tips and Techniques for Farmers and My Understanding of Radionics to further illustrate her point.

David Bohm, renown physicist of the 1950s, taught extensively of an implicate order of things. He said, “The field of the finite is all we can see, hear, touch, remember, and describe. This field is basically that which is manifest, or tangible. The essential quality of the infinite, by contrast, is its subtlety, its intangibility. This quality is conveyed in the word spirit, whose root meaning is wind, or breath. This suggests an invisible but pervasive energy, to which the manifest physical world of the finite responds. This energy, or spirit, infuses all living beings, and without it any organism must fall apart into its constituent elements."

In radionic research we actively seek out this infinite energy field. We link with it, listen to it, observe its action. We attempt to capture it in language with rates or settings on our instruments. Our communication skills on these levels are still very sketchy and often we don't know exactly what it was we did that set things into motion. Fortunately the path one takes in radionics is well marked. It is a logical path. The principles are there for anyone to discover. The results, amazing as they may seem, are well grounded on solid principles. It is a field of research that stretches and strengthens our trust in the infinite world of subtle fields. It was this very realization that led George de la Warr to exclaim, "Seeing is not believing; believing is seeing!"

Our pattern of health lies deep within our subtle fields and is part of our inherited pattern of perfection. Most religions teach us to strive for perfection and refinement. They teach that God lies within. I believe that this is true and as we become more aware and more resonant with these patterns we also become more refined spiritually. Fortunately we also become refined physically. Our health is improved and we can create resonant surroundings. This is one of the ways radionics is affecting our world today.

In a basic course I spend quite a bit of time defining the subtle energy we call subtle bodies or layers. I use a simplified model that students can relate to and I include the physical body as a subtle body. It is the last, the newest, and the most dense of all our subtle bodies. It is also the one with which we are most familiar. The reason for this is that our culture, and lifestyle, emphasizes physical activity and we have little time for anything else. Other cultures have emphasized spiritual things and have much more of an awareness of the other subtle bodies.

In order to work in the subtle energy fields, a student needs a clear understanding of the subtle bodies. The idea of subtle bodies may seem metaphysical in nature rather than scientific because our cultural consciousness does not include an awareness of anything more than the physical. It seems that with new discoveries in nuclear physics our consciousness is changing. Scientists are becoming aware of subtle energy fields and the auric fields are being detected with "scientific instruments" and procedures. Back in the 60's Kirlian photography was first thought to demonstrate these fields.

I think a good definition for subtle body fields is "--a set of primary vibrational fields associated with (and necessary for the maintenance of ) a physical form." Each subtle field increases in density from the finest, which seems to be the spiritual essence, to the most dense, which is indeed the physical form.

Whether all physical forms have the same number (or type) of subtle bodies is a subject of discussion among researchers. These vibrational fields appear to be unique to the kingdom (and possible phylum) of each organized form. Even a man-made tool or machine seems to have a set of subtle bodies. The finest aspect being the "idea" and the most dense aspect being the tangible physical form.

Alyce Santoro on The Secret Art

Duncan — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 06:31:47 +0000

Friend Alyce Santoro has written up an excellent review of The Secret Art. The review originally appeared on Facebook and Amazon on January 9th.

A “radionic apparatus” is a system, mechanical or otherwise, developed for the purpose of receiving and transmitting subtle forms of energy through an earnest practitioner into a subject. Since the early 1900’s, some developers of such technologies have been using the word radionic to describe devices used mainly for purposes of healing.

Mr. Laurie’s book provides a through and fascinating account of the history of this little known and much-maligned field. He suggests that outside of the medical and scientific communities, not only are radionic phenomena heartily accepted, they have been functioning effectively for thousands of years at the hands of shamans, artists, and musicians.

Mr. Laurie’s thesis is that radionics, while by no means a lost art, may be a slightly-misplaced one - the ideas behind it have been discounted by those unable to appreciate the power of forces that cannot be quantified. When presented as science or medicine, radionics is easily challenged. Introduce it as a powerful creative tool, however, and radionics becomes “The Secret Art”.

We take for granted that all human beings are inherently capable of experiencing intangible, unquantifiable sensations such as intention, intuition, inspiration, and other emotional states. Technologies for accessing and working with these invisible forces have been cultivated by shamans, artists, and holy people since the dawn of time. That a work of art or a piece of music can be found “moving” or “transformative” comes as no surprise. Why, then, is it such shock (to the western mind, at least) when a force we find “mysterious” serves as the catalyst for physical transformation? Because our in our culture we have come to look to the scientific method as an all-purpose evaluation tool – if something doesn’t measure up scientifically, we tend to discount it as useless or non-existent.

But as we hurl ever forward into an age of new quantum-techno-science, old paradigms begin to break down. We encounter tangible evidence of the power of the invisible every day as information that arrives via internet and wireless technology routinely shapes our lives. Research into quantum physics alludes to the existence of strange micro-realms that work behind and within the scenes to compose our macro reality.

Ironically, discovery of the structure of DNA, holographic imaging, and other modern scientific breakthroughs are only serving to help lend insight into why many established “intuitive” technologies, such as prayer, shamanic and Tibetan Buddhist ritual, and radionics, actually work.

“The Secret Art” is an invitation to consider that the power of intangible forces and our relationships with them may hold keys to the ways we shape ourselves and our world. Mr. Laurie suggests that it could be artists, unfettered by limiting beliefs and already consciously attuned to subtle energy, who may be best equipped to combine traditional systems with contemporary research to generate powerful new technologies. The book is a radionic device in itself, a call-to-action for those willing to work with phenomena that we are aware of through our senses, but that are yet to be classified by science.

RISD students

Duncan — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 08:00:00 +0000

Rafael Attias brought students from two of his classes ( 7001 - Interactive Text and 7028 - Soundmarks ) at RISD down to visit the studio. Gordon and I will help mentor the students in their class projects.

Duncan Laurie studio visit - November 24, 2009 from Rafael Attias on Vimeo.

Volcanic rock generates a signal that gets translated into sound.

EMLI

Duncan — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 20:53:48 +0000

Photo by Vincent Leclerc

EMLI is a student project from Daniel Campbell and Daniel Roberts, made while they were enrolled in Vincent Leclerc’s Physical Computing class at Concordia University in 2007.

The two Daniels built a hardware interface to receive millivolt signals from plants and sonify them in MAX/MSP on an Apple MacBook Pro. Their results and especially the reactions of the plants were eerily similar to our own findings. Most interesting is the end of their video, seen here, where the plant reacts to the intent to close their program, but stops when they point this out.

Their project was inspired by many of the same researchers that we have looked to: Cleve Backster, George L. Lawrence, and Michael Theroux.

Preventing Forest Fires With Tree Power: Sensor System Runs On Electricity Generated By Trees

Duncan — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 05:52:21 +0000

MIT researchers and colleagues are working to find out whether energy from trees can power a network of sensors to prevent spreading forest fires.

What they learn also could raise the possibility of using trees as silent sentinels along the nation’s borders to detect potential threats such as smuggled radioactive materials.

The U.S. Forest Service currently predicts and tracks fires with a variety of tools, including remote automated weather stations. But these stations are expensive and sparsely distributed. Additional sensors could save trees by providing better local climate data to be used in fire prediction models and earlier alerts. However, manually recharging or replacing batteries at often very hard-to-reach locations makes this impractical and costly.

The new sensor system seeks to avoid this problem by tapping into trees as a self-sustaining power supply. Each sensor is equipped with an off-the-shelf battery that can be slowly recharged using electricity generated by the tree. A single tree doesn’t generate a lot of power, but over time the “trickle charge” adds up, “just like a dripping faucet can fill a bucket over time,” said Shuguang Zhang, one of the researchers on the project and the associate director of MIT’s Center for Biomedical Engineering (CBE).

The system produces enough electricity to allow the temperature and humidity sensors to wirelessly transmit signals four times a day, or immediately if there’s a fire. Each signal hops from one sensor to another, until it reaches an existing weather station that beams the data by satellite to a forestry command center in Boise, Idaho.

Scientists have long known that trees can produce extremely small amounts of electricity. But no one knew exactly how the energy was produced or how to take advantage of the power.

(Via ScienceDaily)

David Last - The Secret Life of Plants

Duncan — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 14:23:46 +0000

DAVID LAST

THE SECRET MUSIC OF PLANTS

In the summer of 2007 I joined some friends at a special location on the shoreline of Rhode Island. This location is the home of Duncan Laurie, a friend who is a sculptor and researcher of the connection between science and sound.

Upstairs on this property there is a laboratory with a wide array of unusual electrical research equipment, and a full sound system with subs. What happens at this place is research into the nature of biofeedback and sound. While we were there, Duncan had connected electrical sensors to the surface of plants; a venus flytrap, a potted houseplant, and what looked like a soggy variety of moss. The sensors are the kind of electrical sensor you might put on the surface of your own skin to measure slight fluctuations in your natural electric field. I believe they are the same thing you might see in movies attached to the foreheads of people undergoing lie-detector (polygraph) tests. They are also used generally to give bio-feedback in relaxation experiments.

One night Justin Boreta (who was also there at the time) did some technical work to connect these electrical sensors to MIDI signals which were sent into music software, by way of a sensor data translation program called ‘IBVA’. Justin did some amazing work that night, translating the electrical signals from these living plants directly into abstract sound. The sound sources were, I believe, both software and hardware synthesizers, and a digital harmonization processor. The sounds produced directly by the plants’ natural electrical fields were complex, and sounded like some kind of alien form of consciousness (which in a way, they kind of were). When rounded off into notes instead of free-flowing tones, the melodies produced were eerie and (as might be expected) quite organic. The following day Justin had to leave, but together we had installed IBVA on my laptop. That day I created a stereo audio mix of the elements Justin had created.

Though Justin had gone, the IBVA system was still there, and I had worked briefly with Justin to get it working on my computer, so I did one experiment of my own. It was less ambitious than Mr. Boreta’s experiment, because it dealt with the data from only one sensor, and dealt with a single audio instrument. This experiment is what I would like to share with Modyfier.

THE EXPERIMENT

I set up my laptop with the IBVA feeding data into my music software, which was running a granular sampler patch. On my laptop, I was able to play recordings of music I had been creating, and step through microscopically short segments of this music. The position of playback of these tiny sound ‘grains’ was determined by the electrical data coming in from the plant itself. In other words, the electrical charges on the surface of the plant helped to select what part of what musical sound file on my hard drive would be played. In this way, the piece is a collaboration between myself and a single houseplant.

The goal of the experiment was to find out if it is possible to allow a plant to unconsciously structure a piece of music (or at the very least, to use the biological flux of electrical signals from a house plant in order to determine a musical structure, in collaboration with a human (me)).

The collaboration was multi-layered. I had been preparing sketches of orchestral music for my own projects, and there were a large number of sound files on my hard drive; these were used as ‘building blocks’ for the musical collage. Some of the sound files contained full pieces of music I had composed; some contained only orchestra instruments playing melodies or chords, some contained crazy sound design, recordings of bells from a carnival, or choir voices singing dissonant tones. Almost all of these sounds were acoustic in origin. All of these sound files were made available to the Reaktor patch I was using in order to create a new piece of music out of many fragments. As the piece progressed, I could change which sound files were being accessed, and the plant’s energy readings could change what part of the sound file was being played, and how much of the sound file would be heard. Whether this constituted conscious collaboration is, to my mind, irrelevant.

So, not only was there collaboration in terms of how the files were being played back (my interpretation of how the plant’s ‘alien intelligence’ electrical signals could be used to generate music), there was also a collaboration in terms of my offering of the original audio source material for ‘mulching.’ Certainly, in order to get musical results, I heavily impressed my own sonic personality on the experiment; however, the plant’s feedback did in fact help to create a composition I never would have created myself.

The recording is totally un-edited, recorded straight to disk. The 16 minutes of running time are exactly as they sounded coming from Reaktor, live in the room! There are several ‘movements,’ and the whole thing strikes me as very similar in its overall feeling to modern classical music.

The whole thing was made exactly 1 year ago. I hope you enjoy it!

download: david last - process part 088 (music for house plants in rhode island)

(Via modyfier)

The Geoglyphs of Teohuanaco

Duncan — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 21:45:28 +0000

Using earth orbiting satellites, acclaimed researcher David Flynn has studied the high plateau of Bolivia and found previously undiscovered unnatural patterns stretching outward from Lake Titicaca for hundreds of square miles. The geoglyphic works range from arrow straight parallel lines, enormous over lapping perfect circles and rectangles to ‘labyrinth like’ systems of walls and mounds extending over every feature of the terrain.

One hundred and twenty miles south of the lake, spirals, linear arrays and crisscrossing paths are scored into the earth covering an entire desert. Closer to the lake, branching walls and rectangular cells can be seen running vertically down hills. Many of these walls extend for hundreds of feet or more and maintain an average width of 15 feet. The estimated combined mass of the geoglyphic formations surrounding Lake Titicaca is staggering, exceeding many of the greatest known constructions of the ancient world.

Many researchers believe that the ruins of Tiahuanaco, situated only 12 miles south of Lake Titicaca and near the center of the geoglyphic landscape, is the oldest city ever discovered on earth. Consistent with these theories, the Inca living in the region during the Spanish conquest explained that Tiahuanaco had existed for thousands of years before their civilization began.

According to Inca legend, Lake Titicaca was revered as the location where the god Viracocha created a race of giants and later, the first humans. The Inca maintained that the giants built Tiahuanaco and also many other cities and structures in the area. However, due to their great evil, Viracocha destroyed the giants in a world flood. This legend is still believed by the local Indian inhabitants to this day.

(Via Raiders News Network.)

Earth's Cries Recorded in Space

Duncan — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 05:06:02 +0000

Earth’s Cries Recorded in Space: “Earth emits an ear-piercing series of chirps and whistles.”

(Via SPACE.com.)

Rock Music paper posted

Duncan — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 00:50:06 +0000

The Rock Music paper that was presented at the Spark Festival this past February is now online in it’s entirety.

Abstract: Millivolt level signals produced by certain rocks lend themselves to scientific, artistic and mythical interpretation. Empirical probing of these signals by an artist and an electrical engineer observed both linear and non-linear displays. Whether interpreted through the lens of science or panpsychism, the signals themselves provide an excellent template for sonic experimentation. Accumulated years of unstructured qualitative data indicate these tiny voltages originating in the core of the rock react to outside stimulus in a variety of perplexing ways. Creative application has therefore tended to produce unexpected and unexplained results.

G. K. Chesterton Quote

Duncan — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 03:21:33 +0000

“One of the deepest and strangest of all human moods is the mood which will suddenly strike us perhaps in a garden at night, or deep in sloping meadows, the feeling that every flower and leaf has just uttered something stupendously direct and important, and that we have by a prodigy of imbecility not heard or understood it. There is a certain poetic value, and that a genuine one, in this sense of having missed the full meaning of things. There is beauty, not only in wisdom, but in this dazed and dramatic ignorance.”

— G. K. Chesterton

"Submitted by Chris Davies Hooker, one of Thayer H. Laurie’s friends at the time of Thayer’s death on March 7th, 2008; Thayer was 92 years young."

David Wexler

Duncan — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 21:14:37 +0000

David Wexler, a filmmaker and culturally informed young man came by the studio for a visit. Friend Todd Thille had met David at the Amsterdam Film Experience last Fall and put us in contact. David is in the process of launching Mandelbot.tv, a platform for mind-expanding media in the 21st century. His personal blog is at mbot.tv.

Spark Festival, Richard Devine, Radionics, Neg-entropy and Duende*

Duncan — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 12:37:28 +0000

The Spark Festival provided Todd Thille and I the opportunity to perform the first ever ‘authentic’ rock concert; that is to say, a concert where the rocks were making the tunes. For me, it was also my first ‘public’ performance as an electronic musician. But it wasn’t until Thursday night when Todd, Steve Nalepa and I went to the Whole night club to hear Richard Devine be interviewed that the thoughts which present themselves here began to assemble.

I met Richard last summer for the first time when he came, at the invitation of Steve, to stay for a few days at the studio. We had exchanged a few emails, but I was not up to speed on his actual history or approach to sound. What immediately struck me when he began to narrate his learning process in the interview, was the extremely visceral and physically intense approach he had to sonic composition. Richard described his completely obsessive quest for the right instruments, and from them, the right sounds, which he hammered and wrestled into anti-compositions. He described his early work as a fusion of Punk and Hip Hop, to my ear a violent, consumptive rendering of sound that would make any junk yard demolition crew proud. To Richard’s ear, the psychedelic impact of hearing a wad of paper being crunched into a ball while high on DMT is about as good a sonic experience as one could ever wish for.

Richard Devine - Dragonline Studio, July 2007

Last summer, I began to get a good sense of this inner demon of de-constructed sound down. He devoured every sonic tool we had, all to forging an alien sonic space. I hadn’t at the time realized that he also designed his own equipment. Then, at one point in the Spark narrative, Richard flashed pictures the instruments in his home studio he had commissioned to be built, I sat up. Briefly, as images flicked by, I saw what I thought to be a Radionics device. Asking him about it later, he said it was the "Chaos Synth", a processor custom built for him by Tim Adams. What I took for radionic rubbing plates were indeed rubbing plates, but ones used to control volume and tone with the surface of a finger.

"Chaos Synth" (Image courtesy of Richard Devine)

de la Warr radionic device

At that moment, in my mind a very unusual series of correlations began between sonic art and radionics began.

Few people today believe radionics devices actually do anything. There is even a scathing display in the Minneapolis Science Museum section on Medical Quackery devoted to Dr. Albert Abrams, the founder of Radionics. The distain is mainly because the energy radionics devices purport to manipulate can not be authenticated by science. As I listened to Richard describe the process he has evolved for making his music, I also saw that the sounds he was searching for only became available as the technology evolved which enabled them to be synthesized. Their origin in Richard’s psyche was also beyond authentication by science. Sure, the types of sounds probably could be heard in nature or conjured out of some mechanical thrashing, in the manner of Cage and Stockhausen, but without electrical stretching, processing and overlay, could these sounds effectively become functional components of sonic composition?

So, my thinking rambled, maybe the creation and design of radionics machines made the mysterious blend of chi and electronic energy usable for their inventors as well? Could not some subtle sense of design, like whatever drives Richard to find new sonic sources, also have guided these healer/inventors to appropriate energy directly from the core of Nature, calibrate it through dials, and direct it with intent through wires or light? Perhaps certain instruments have to be used by someone in a special way before everyone else knows what they can do; true enough in music, right? Could sonic based art forms exist without artists first manipulating new or unlikely tools, in such a way as to contort their original meaning and purpose into something never before heard? And then, in turning the process around, design new tools to find yet more sounds?

OK, you think, but sound is audible and can be scientifically measured; it’s not some invisible ‘energy’ like we say the radionics box is directing. True enough, but while the sound can be measured, the ‘art’ component of a work cannot. The ‘art’ comes from the same type of invisible domain that the healer enters to reverse the process of a disease. Both artists and radionic healers apply their knowledge to instruments that are in the here and now, but they control them in ways that defy and transcend mechanistic analysis. If manipulating any measurable sound was enough for Richard, he wouldn’t still be scouring the world for sound configurations that haven’t been heard before. The ‘art’ component is the unmeasurable process that extracts new meaning from form. Sometimes in order to discover new meanings, old formal processes have to be overturned. To understand radionics, the scientific prejudice for discarding the role consciousness plays in any empirical inquiry or analytical activity must be re-considered. Radionics cannot be studied in a scientifically ‘objective’ manner because it is a self referential methodology like art. And like art, radionics is impossible to practice without first considering the role of the practioners consciousness in the activity.

So, if that is true, then what type of an art tool is a radionics device?

Well, watching Richard, Todd, or Steve or anyone else I have seen make electronic compositions with a computer, I would have to say the computer IS the radionic device. I am saying a radionic device is a tool that translates a non-material intent into an external environment or living system. In fact, most art making tools are radionic, pure and simple. But what does that mean?

When making art, the artist works against their own inertia. He or she also works against cultural inertia, the burden of all previous art and artistic assumptions. All our instincts to remain in relative comfort in a familiar artistic world is in fact submission to confinement within fixed cognitive boundaries. Breaking through these self-imposed boundaries reduces the inertia of culture and habit. We feel freer and happier the less inertia life imposes upon us. To attain freedom, we utilize tools and techniques we first discover in ourselves and then apply to our tools. I am a carver by profession. When I began carving I was all thumbs. Every time I hit the chisel, the next time I hit my knuckle or finger. My consciousness was trying to learn how to direct the chisel into the stone to manipulate the surface without hurting my hand. The pain on my blunders added to the inertial weight of learning the carving process. I needed to employ my consciousness to alleviate the inertia. The better I paid attention, the more I overcame the inertia, or unconsciousness, of being a novice carver. The hammer and chisel were the radionics device I employed to overcome inertia.

Of course I wasn’t using a chisel to cure a disease the way a radionics device appears to do, unless you allow ignorance as a disease. I was using the chisel to train my mind to embrace a state of neg-entropy in my work process, making the work move faster and better, with more control. As I sat and listened to Richard, I heard him describe finding and utilizing numerous sound technologies for much the same purpose. The sound being produced wasn’t the point; it was the degree to which the process of creating the sounds produced that feeling of ascension; i.e, the neg-entropy. The composition was a by product of the ascension, but that is what was left to share.

That isn’t all. As I carved, I naturally grew tired. Carving is a very physically exhausting task, compounded by the pain of striking ones hand with a heavy hammer. Yet there were many times that toward the end of any given day or night, just before I was about to collapse with fatigue, that suddenly everything changed. The exhaustion would dissipate; the hammer blows would begin to harmonically align, making carving graceful and easy. In short, my mind and body slipped into a state of neg-entropy, a state of sublime harmony that spontaneously arose at the end of the work cycle. No doubt most people have this experience in some way or another; it’s very gratifying and hard to forget. I get the feeling artists in particular crave the experience; it certainly seemed familiar to Richard.

So, if by accident, working with simple tools in a creative way can precipitate this very pleasurable release from ones’ ordinary constraints and foibles, what could happen if more sophisticated tools were developed that accelerated the process? Don’t we agree that computers provide acceleration of this sort, especially when wedded to a creative process?

Performance artist Carly Ptak of Heresee using a de la Warr radionic device.

Electronic music is usually found in night clubs. VJ’s, like Todd, expand the medium into light and space. Most performances are spontaneous, not extensively pre-conceived; the artists work through improvisation, interpreting and guiding the atmosphere of the club as it unfolds throughout the evening. An environment is generated that creates a communal neg-entropy; spirits are lifted, people move and dance, the worldly cares grow remote. These effects aren’t accidental. The DJ’s and VJ’s have to use their tools to spring the energy. They have to put hand and mind to instrument and carefully guide the space into an enveloping sense of beauty.

So what does radionics have to do with this familiar occurrence? Think of radionics as something that works directly on inertia utilizing directed intent. If I can discover that a hammer and chisel can be used to dispel inertia and open my mind to pouring free flowing cosmic energy into my work, why shouldn’t I believe it is possible to use a calibrated instrument composed of dials and rubbing plates to extend that energy into specific parts of my body or my art, or for that matter, the environment?

What happens to a sound signal when you tweak it with all the effects in your software? It radically changes its nature. You can guide the sound design with a very intuitive part of your being. You then mould it into fixed, pre-determined parameters. Why shouldn’t we believe we can refine ourselves the same way, by removing the inertia that holds us down? Why not have at our disposal instruments that reduce inertia—ones of dials & chips & wire, programmed to focus neg-entropy on our own blocked circuits?

Who says we can’t utilize consciousness in technology to help us overcome the inertial barriers we may confront? Doesn’t music sooth the savage beast and TV the savage child? Could not our predecessors working at the dawn of electrical instrumentation have accidentally invented a methodology for accessing neg-entropy, back in the days when nobody really understood electro-magnetism very well? Couldn’t they have done it just because they decided they could? Look at all the other wonderful things they discovered then? How can we be so absolutely certain radionics devices don’t work, when a hundred years later they are still being designed and used all across the world?

A hundred years ago who would have believed we could store a thousand symphonies on a microchip? Who would believe you could sit down with a slender typewriter like device and design and play the complex sonic architecture used everywhere in multi-media composition? Richard followed a sonic design process that began in the outside world with hitting keys on a piano as a child. He quickly morphed his consciousness into a labyrinth of sonic machines, electronic devices and finally today, advanced, multi-layered computer processing. At each stage he moved deeper and deeper into the invisible landscape of coded information, searching all the while for an elusive sonic element. Is it so hard to imagine this journey won’t eventually reach a symmetry break with the external world, and Richard will find himself entirely inside the matrix of his own consciousness, using radionic tools to fashion a music of the spheres?

Personal Radionics. Our effort to articulate and demonstrate a case for biological or Nature based intelligence through our experiments with plant and rock milli-voltages has elicited a not unexpectedly high degree of skepticism. What is hardest for well trained scientific minds and also for less well trained ordinary skeptics to accommodate is the idea of an all pervasive, numinous life energy that is filled with intelligence. We are used to experiencing energy in utilitarian forms such as power generation or communications, and in the familiar turbulence throughout nature. The hard nut to crack is the role emotion and feeling play (as energy) in bridging the divide between Human Intelligence and Nature Intelligence. Our capacity to feel allows us to get outside ourselves; thus, the role of art.

On the plane back from Minneapolis Todd and I were discussing the inertia-busting function of art, when the passenger to my left asked if I was a physicist. Hardly, I replied, just a submerging artist experimenting with sound. It so turned out our conversationalist was himself a Bach scholar and accomplished professional choirmaster ( Dr. Thomas Rossin of Exultate ). We couldn’t resist the opportunity to play for him our plant recordings, and so the conversation began. While non-committal about what he heard from the plants, when the question arose about experiencing the inertia-busting characteristics of music, he had much to say.

I had asked whether in his choral experience he had ever experienced something like ‘duende*’ [tenure duende/ having soul]. Duende is the mysterious, dark force flamenco musicians speak of which arrives without warning, possessing and authenticating their art. In flamenco tradition, duende rarely makes an appearance during any public, commercial performance. It is mainly considered a private, sacred enchantment given only to the performances done purely for the sake of the art.

We have experienced the best aspects of bio-communication when it was entirely spontaneous and joyful, free of analytic probing and opportunistic demands. So, I was surprised when our traveling companion said that indeed, he had experienced in a public context that very experience of a powerful energy superimposing itself upon a performance, on two notable occasions. The first experience was the result of incrementally expanding emotional exuberance felt by the whole choir. Our companion said that at the peak, the energy literally pushed him off the podium. On the second occasion, the choir was singing in Poland in a small church following the liberation of that country from Soviet oppression. At the highest moment of public exhilaration, a small child was moved to walk alone down the aisle of the church and press her only doll into the hands of Dr. Rossin. This incomprehensible expression of selfless giving caused all in attendance to reach an extraordinary plateau of emotion and religious rapture, upon which our companion simultaneously experienced a state of transcendence.

So, what is this experience, this energy? We know it is often perceived in daily life as the product of a very emotionally charged situation. Consider for a moment that Nature Intelligence may be, may continually experience, such a totally Monist, unified, ego transcendent, purely immersive state of being, state of awareness at all times. Such an experience, when we allow it to touch our own individual lives, becomes a form of rapture. It blows away science, cognition, all duality. Is it only our investment in our individuality, with its fear of death, that filters such sustained contact with Nature? Do the subtle signals we think we hear coming from rocks and plants actually have more in common with love than with electricity?

"I have with me a whole treasure of learning, but where is the sigh of the morning and the tear of the early night?" Khwaja Hafiz

Duncan Laurie 3/7/08

——————-

* DUENDE, From Wikipedia:

"So, then, the duende is a force not a labour, a struggle not a thought. I heard an old maestro of the guitar say: ‘The duende is not in the throat: the duende surges up, inside, from the soles of the feet.’ Meaning, it’s not a question of skill, but of a style that’s truly alive: meaning, it’s in the veins: meaning, it’s of the most ancient culture of immediate creation.

"Everything that has black sounds in it, has duende." (ie emotional ‘blackness’).

"This ‘mysterious force that everyone feels and no philosopher has explained’ is, in sum, the spirit of the earth, the same duende that scorched Nietzsche’s heart as he searched for its outer form on the Rialto Bridge and in Bizet’s music, without finding it—-"

"The arrival of the duende presupposes a radical change to all the old kinds of form, brings totally unknown and fresh sensations, with the qualities of a newly created rose, miraculous, generating an almost religious enthusiasm."

"All the arts are capable of duende, but where it naturally creates most space, as in music, dance and spoken poetry, the living flesh is needed to interpret them, since they have forms that are born and die, perpetually, and raise their contours above the precise present."

—García Lorca, Theory and Play of the Duende

Botanicalls Twitters

Duncan — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 19:16:54 +0000

Botanicalls Twitters: “
In case you hadn’t heard, we’ve made Botanicalls Twitter as a do-it-yourself example for people who like to-well-do it themselves. It’s the first step in making Botanicalls available to a wider audience, and the online press has taken note. In the last 48 hours, we’ve been graced by the attention of:
Make Magazine
CNet
Slashdot
Lifehacker
Gizmodo
Wired
…and even Business Week
Botanicalls Twitter would not have happened without both brilliant code and sage advice from Limor Fried. We also appreciate the support of Phil Torrone who inspired our Twitter venture and helped to make it a success. Botanicalls is a project from Kate Hartman, Kati London, Rebecca Bray and Rob Faludi.Senhas e Segredos do Windows XP - Tem senhas de jogos 2D toques de corneta em um novo Widget.”

(Via Rob Faludi’s Blog.)

Living Materials

Duncan — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 13:18:31 +0000

Living Materials: “At the Artissima art fair last month in Turin, i discovered a new player on the local art scene: the Parco d’Arte Vivente (Park of Living Art).

It all started when i almost fell on my knees in front of an installation by Michel Blazy. The first time i saw his work was at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. The installation Post Patman stank, rot, crumbled and formed mushrooms, attracted insects and birds but i love it.

The work on show at Artissima, Le tombeau du poulet aux quatre cuisses (The grave of the four-legged chicken), is a skeleton laying on a bed of earth and surrounded by mushroom. The skeleton looks indeed like the one of a chicken, a giant chicken and as it is made of dog biscuits (made themselves from animal products) will be slowly desintegrating over time.

The PAV was also exhibiting one of Jun Takita’s sculpture Jusqu’aux recoins du monde, the sculpture of a brain recovered with bioluminescent algae. For years, the Paris-based artist has been interested in bioluminescence.

Jusqu’aux recoins du monde

According to traditional classification, photosynthesizing organisms
belong to the plant kingdom. Plants transform light into energy but are not capable of bioluminescence —that is, they cannot emit light. Excepting a few species like the dinoflagellates, which belong to both the plant and animal kingdoms, bioluminescence is found in only a few animal species. Biological evolution has not
given rise to an organism that can both consume light as energy and use that energy to create its own light. However, over the last few years, genetic manipulation has made it possible to create bioluminescent plants. These plants/nonplants artificial organisms transgress the laws of nature.

Light only Light, by Jun Takita. Image Yusuke Komiyama

It is easy to perceive a figure in the landscape within 10° of one’s line of sight (the size of the visual field of a fist held out at arm’s length). For example, constellations are based on the principle that one reads stars at a distance of up to about 11° from one another as part of a group. Even when we look at the sky, the human hand is the unit of reference for measuring an image. If an object exceeds this 10° visual field, we have to move our eyes in order to perceive it in its entirety. Vision is then constructed by the accretion of several images memorized by the brain. In 1998, the artist started to work on a garden project based on this phenomenon.

On the left, portrait of Jun Takita

The elevated garden is to be situated on top of a building in Tokyo. As Tokyo is a very polluted city, it is not unusual to see gardens being grown on the top buildings by inhabitants in order to cool down a bit the temperature of the city.

The central element of Takita’s own garden is a mineral sculpture composed of three walls forming a cave and a bush pruned into a hemisphere. The inside of the cave is to be covered with a bioluminescent moss produced with genetic engineering technology. The moss will emit light via photosynthesis. The visitor is led to a viewpoint along the axis of the sculpture, where the bush is framed by the cave. The distance from this point to the bush will permit the eye to perceive the whole installation at once.

The visitor is invited to discover a visual experience made possible through genetic engineering. During the day, the light of the sun is much stronger than the one emitted through bioluminescence, therefore the form of the bush will be lit by the sun, and its shape will serve to distinguish it from a dark background. After sunset the opposite happens: the bioluminescent background will be broken up by the silhouette of the bush, forming a negative figure (via Takita’s paper and the notes i took during the artist’s presentation during the round table, titled Places and creative processes of the living arts, and organized by the Parco d’Arte Vivente at artissima).

Last week i went to the temporary headquarters of the PAV to check out their exhibition Living Materials. It closed yesterday but will be traveling to Austria. I do not have the details about that second show yet. But when i do, i’ll let you know because Living Materials is a very charming exhibition.

Every work presented involves the public in a timed process cadenced by the cyclic rhythm of biological and ecological phenomena. Life and death are simultaneously present and aesthetically represented in the continuum of procedural works which ask us about the man-nature relationship in the age of biotechnology.

The works on show include Le Poulet and photos of Jun Takita’s work but also:

Ennio Bertrand, The creator has a master plan (first created in 2003 under the title Lemon Sky and revamped for Living Materials).

An array of hundreds of lemons are pierced with small metal sheets, they are in fact Volta batteries supplied with citrus energy which powers tiny Leds, one every 4 lemons. Originally the lemons looked like the ones you can see on the image above but when i visited the PAV, the lemons were a yummy green as you can see on the image on the right. I actually liked that a lot, in yellow, they were too perfect, too plastic looking, but covered with decay they were more living than ever.

The artist writes: I imagined that the lemons during their ‘work’ of withering and decomposing would give back the sun stored by the tree in his fruits during its productive phase in form of small flares.

I think it’s fascinating that a fruit of nature through an electronic device can palpitate for some days. It seems the proof to me of our dependence on the environment, of our tight and deep bond to nature.

The project proposes a reflection on the energetic resources of our planet and re-explores one of the artist’s theme of predilection: time. Six months of ripening, several days of life for the work and very short flashes of light, like snapshots of the passing by of time.

The last work on show is Food Island, by Andrea Caretto & Raffaella Spagna. The complex water system feeds several interconnected little islands containing various natural elements: stones, plants or animals.

A pump dipped in a water container sends water which reaches each island through transparent tubes. The water produced through various natural mechanism or which is not needed by the island is then collected and sent back to the main water container. the whole installation constitutes a kind of hypertextual narration which explains phenomena of growth and transformation of the material, from inorganic to organic and vice-versa.

All my images.
and the press pictures from three sixty. Video interview of Michel Blazy.

(Via we make money not art.)

Silent Dialogue at the ICC, Tokyo

Duncan — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 07:03:57 +0000

Silent Dialogue at the ICC, Tokyo: "

Just as i was panicking that i wouldn’t be able to post anything today because i had spent most of my time doing some silly shopping, enters Vicente Gutierrez. Our Tokyo correspondent went to visit the latest exhibition at ICC, swift as the light he wrote a few lines about it and thus saved my life. I like drama, you might not so let’s go straight to his report from the show:

Currently at the NTT InterCommunication Center[ICC] in concrete-laden Tokyo is an exhibit devoted to nature’s inter-relationships within the ecosystem we share with plants and animals.

Focusing on the interaction between plants, animals and humans, or this ‘invisible communication’ of nature which our senses might not always perceive, the works in the Silent Dialogue exhibition exhibited make those signals visual and audible through the use of biosensors as well as other algorithm-based software programs. Relying on such simulations, the works on display are a true fusion of science, design and art and provide a glimpse into the secret lives of plants while revealing more about the human effect and affect within the ecosystem we share. Investigating how plants, animals, or insects communicate and behave offered new perspectives to the effect of making us more apt to the signals our environment sends in an era of increasing interaction from humans and technology.

Call ? Response, 2007, by tEnt [Tanaka Hiroya + Cuhara Macoto], with technical support by Kamiyama Yusuke

Call <-> Response by Tanaka Hiroya and Cuhara Macoto (who are working under the collaborative title, tEnt) simulates a natural environment for birds in an effort to derive and explore how they communicate. Attempting to communicate beyond human language, the software was designed to record, generate and layer simulated bird calls. Here, the coconut shell is fitted with a small speaker which emits varying bird calls via a continuous algorithm-based signal.

Bio Photon: Allelopathy, 2007, by Ando Takahiro

One of the most interactive works displayed was Bio Photon: Allelopathy by Ando Takahiro. As plants germinate and grow, photons are emitted from their leaves. They are invisible to our eyes but in his work Ando work visualizes the amount of photons via the discreet sensors which results in a hyper-sporadic display of flickering lights across the dome at light speed, if you will. Ando has intentionally set up two electric-current-generating for us, which upon touching, allow us to feel the currents that we couldn’t otherwise visualize.

Paphio in My Life, 2007, by Fujieda Mamoru + Dogane Yuji

Dogane Yuji, a botanist who has focused his research on orchids, collaborated with composer Fujieda Mamoru for Paphio in My Life, where the inaudible sounds of plants are picked up by connected wires then converted to manifest a plant’s ‘voice.’ As plants respond to environmental stress, simulated by varying vibrations induced by the artists’ algorithmic program, the plant’s ‘voices’ vary accordingly. By broadcasting such a dialog, Dogane hopes to bring us closer to plants through this glimpse into their life.

Orchisoid 03, 2003, by FUJIHATA Masaki + DOGANE Yuji

In Orchisoid 03, Dogane Yuji worked with renowned digital media artist Fujihata Masaki (some of his previous works include Unreflective Mirror and Beyond Pages) to better understand adaptation and homeostasis in plants. For this project, several orchids were again wired and set to experience a variety of vibrations from the shifting table they rest upon. The artists concluded that the physiology of the plants changed the same way as human brain wave patterns change in response to stress. And because the orchid’s wave-activity fluctuates in real time, rather quickly, Dogane recognized it as a sign of high-level information processing.

Interactive Plant Growing, 1992, by Christa Sommerer and Laurent Mignonneau

Also on display were Christa Sommerer and Laurent Mignonneau’s installation Interactive Plant Growing from 1992. Touch the plants and watch the screen fill up with a digital cascade of the plant’s leaves; still a great example of physical action into digital realization.

Ha, Ha! Your Mushrooms Have Gone, 2005, by Michael Prime

For a glance into the secret lives of mushrooms, Michael Prime affixed bio-sensors to various kinds of locally grown mushrooms to reveal a dialog we perhaps thought never even existed. From their docile setting in an aquarium, the bio-receptors broadcast the sounds of pulsating waves of noise through speakers in the installation space. The result- a surprising continuous drone that shifted tones rather sporadically revealing a brash, trance-like state of mushrooms- fascinating, surreal and surprising.

Until February 17, 2008 at the NTT InterCommunication Center[ICC].

All images Courtesy of ICC.

Fresh from our fruit & veggie aisle: Life Support Systems - Vanda, Night Garden, Post Patman, Upside Down Mushroom Room, Regulated Fool’s Milk Meadow, Living Letters, Real radish races on the net, Flora fights back, Plants racing for survival, etc

(Via we make money not art.)

The Way We Live Now: Mind of a Rock

Duncan — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 01:39:23 +0000

By JIM HOLT

Published: November 18, 2007

Most of us have no doubt that our fellow humans are conscious. We are also pretty sure that many animals have consciousness. Some, like the great ape species, even seem to possess self-consciousness, like us. Others, like dogs and cats and pigs, may lack a sense of self, but they certainly appear to experience inner states of pain and pleasure. About smaller creatures, like mosquitoes, we are not so sure; certainly we have few compunctions about killing them. As for plants, they obviously do not have minds, except in fairy tales. Nor do nonliving things like tables and rocks.

Continue reading: The Way We Live Now: Mind of a Rock: "Is everything conscious?"

(Via NYT > Magazine.)

Bat House Project - Winners

Duncan — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 14:49:58 +0000

The Bat House Project competition ended recently and the winners have been announced. Good to see bats regaining some habitat.

Invention: Microsoft mind reader

Duncan — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 22:04:46 +0000

Invention: Microsoft mind reader: "This week’s patent applications include Microsoft’s plans to read your thoughts, a metamorphic amphibious vehicle and a wearable medical sensor network.

(Via New Scientist - Latest Headlines.)

DARPA Testing Numenta's Brain Tech

Duncan — Sat, 13 Oct 2007 15:46:47 +0000

DARPA Testing Numenta's Brain Tech: "lousyd writes 'CNN Money reports that DARPA and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency have given $4.9 million to Lockheed Martin to develop an image recognition system that will be used to scan satellite images and photographs for familiar objects. Called Object Recognition via Brain-Inspired Technology (ORBIT), the system will fuse commercial airborne EO and LIDAR sensor data into a three-dimensional, photo-realistic model of the landscape. The brains of the system, so to speak, will be Numenta's Hierarchical Temporal Memory technology, modeled on the technology growing inside human heads. The system is expected to increase image analysts' productivity by 100 times.'

Brain-computer interface for Second Life

Duncan — Sat, 13 Oct 2007 15:46:40 +0000

Brain-computer interface for Second Life: "

While recent developments in brain-computer interface (BCI) technology have given humans the power to mentally control computers, nobody has used the technology in conjunction with the Second Life online virtual world — until now.

A research team led by professor Jun’ichi Ushiba of the Keio University Biomedical Engineering Laboratory has developed a BCI system that lets the user walk an avatar through the streets of Second Life while relying solely on the power of thought. To control the avatar on screen, the user simply thinks about moving various body parts — the avatar walks forward when the user thinks about moving his/her own feet, and it turns right and left when the user imagines moving his/her right and left arms.

The system consists of a headpiece equipped with electrodes that monitor activity in three areas of the motor cortex (the region of the brain involved in controlling the movement of the arms and legs). An EEG machine reads and graphs the data and relays it to the BCI, where a brain wave analysis algorithm interprets the user’s imagined movements. A keyboard emulator then converts this data into a signal and relays it to Second Life, causing the on-screen avatar to move. In this way, the user can exercise real-time control over the avatar in the 3D virtual world without moving a muscle.

Future plans are to improve the BCI so that users can make Second Life avatars perform more complex movements and gestures. The researchers hope the mind-controlled avatar, which was created through a joint medical engineering project involving Keio’s Department of Rehabilitation Medicine and the Tsukigase Rehabilitation Center, will one day help people with serious physical impairments communicate and do business in Second Life.

(For video of the Second Life BCI, check the links on the Ushida & Tomita Laboratory news page, right above the first photo.)

[Source: Nikkei Net]

(Via Pink Tentacle.)

"12th C. Islamic Geomantic Device" British Museum, on display now

Duncan — Sat, 07 Apr 2007 07:00:00 +0000

From the British Museum a 12th Century AD Islamic Geomantic Device - picture and description here .

Scientists Image Plant 'Attack' Signaling System

Duncan — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 07:00:00 +0000

From Brookhaven National Laboratory via Science Daily.

Techniques pioneered for medical science shed light on plants’ internal communications.

Perelandra Center for Nature Research

Duncan — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 07:00:00 +0000

Perelandra Center for Nature Research designed by Machaelle Small Wright in Western Virginia along the same lines as Findhorn in Scotland. Ms. Wright teaches techniqies for establishing a 'co-creative' working relationship with Nature Intelligence in all areas of life.

New research opens a window on the minds of plants

Duncan — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 01:04:48 +0000

From the Christian Science Monitor March 3rd, 2005.

Article about nature intelligency is here .