Flows of Inhomogeneous Matter: Improvising an augmented violin

2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-77
Author(s):  
Seth Dominicus Thorn
Keyword(s):  
Digital Signal ◽  
Musical Instruments ◽  
Felix Guattari ◽  
Trial And Error ◽  
Model Free ◽  
Action And Perception ◽  
Latent Potential ◽  
Synergistic Relationships ◽  
Gilbert Simondon ◽  
Mode Of Production

This article reflects on how personal digital musical instruments evolve and presents an augmented violin developed and performed by the author in improvised performance as an example. Informed by the materialism of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, an image of ‘flows of inhomogeneous matter’ provokes reflection on a mode of production common to artisanal craftmanship and digital lutherie alike, namely the pre-reflective skilfulness negotiating the singularities of inhomogeneous matter with the demands of the production – a process which itself may be thought of as im-pro-visation (‘un-fore-seen’). According to Gilbert Simondon, all technical objects develop in this way: functional interdependency emerges when abstractly ideated elements begin to enter into unanticipated synergistic relationships, suggesting a material logic dependent on unforeseen potentialities. The historical development of the acoustic violin exemplifies such an evolution, with, like all technical objects, additional latent potential. Digital artists can work like artisanal craftsmen in tinkering with technical elements, teasing out their synergies through abductive, trial-and-error experimentation. In the context of developing digital musical instruments, model-free design of real-time digital signal processing symmetrising action and perception yields highly refined results. Like musical improvisation – constrained by time – improvised development of these instruments turns the material obstacles into their very means of realisation.

scholarly journals Mechanica finalis and Raymond Ruyer’s Philosophy of Neofinalism

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 155-184
Keyword(s):  
Great Influence ◽  
Qualitative Evaluation ◽  
Felix Guattari ◽  
Complex Nature ◽  
Daniel Dennett ◽  
Final Cause ◽  
Main Work ◽  
Meta Level ◽  
Mental Entity ◽  
Gilbert Simondon

The article discusses Raymond Ruyer’s philosophy of neofinalism, which offers an original reading of the theory of final cause consistent with the data of the natural sciences. In contrast to the classical version of causa finalis, neofinalism accentuates not the object in its finished form, but rather the goal-oriented process of searching for the forms of its realization. Final cause opens out as unsubjected consciousness that is realized as qualitative evaluation which influences the object’s behavior. Ruyer calls this primary consciousness an “absolute survey” or external contour of consciousness. Its secondary version is an internal contour or the consciousness of intentional objects. The finalist process is realized through a mechanical consequence, and the result of finalism is a being, while the result of the mechanics is an aggregate. Mechanics and finality converge at the meta-level in the operations of trans-spatial and trans-subjective forms that assemble the structural solutions for local processes. Consciousness ceases to be “conscious about something” and on the contrary, becomes “something” itself, a thing that in precritical philosophy would have called a “mental entity.” Ruyer’s works exerted great influence on Gilles Deleuze’s philosophy and fit into the ongoing tradition of exegesis of the multiple and complex nature of reality alongside the oeuvre of Gabriel Tarde, Alfred North Whitehead, Henri Bergson and Gilbert Simondon. Ruyer proposed and developed such terms in Deleuze’s vocabulary as molar and molecular, assemblage, virtuality, transversality, trans-individuality and trans-spatiality. The article provides an outline of Ruyer’s writings and gives an account of his main work Neofinalism together with commentaries and comparisons with the views of Plato, Bergson, Simondon, Deleuze, Felix Guattari, Daniel Dennett and Antonio Damasio.

L’improvisation comme processus d’individuation

2009 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Bethune
Keyword(s):  
Gilles Deleuze ◽  
Felix Guattari ◽  
Gilbert Simondon

L’attitude philosophique se caractérise par la promotion de l’herméneutique. En effet, avec l’irruption de la philosophie, le sens se conçoit comme une réalité autonome ; au nom de cette autonomie, la pensée occidentale va privilégier l’interprétation au détriment de l’action. Or, si l’improvisation fait problème, c’est qu’elle remet en cause, par sa pratique, la pertinence de cette disjonction, objet pourtant d’un large consensus. Dès lors c’est la genèse du sujet (ou processus d’individuation) qui doit être reconsidérée. Dans la mesure où les « théories de l’art » ont emboîté le pas à la philosophie, ce sont les concepts clés de l’esthétique (œuvre, auteur, création, contemplation etc.) que la pratique de l’improvisation et –singulièrement de l’improvisation jazzistique – vient remettre en cause. Il ne s’agit donc pas de repositionner l’improvisation dans la perspective traditionnelle de l’esthétique, mais plutôt de montrer l’inadéquation des catégories de l’esthétique à comprendre l’improvisation. Dans ce travail critique la philosophie de l’individuation proposée par Gilbert Simondon et sa réinterprétation telle qu’elle nous est proposée par Gilles Deleuze et Félix Guattari constituent des outils privilégiés.

Emergence in video game production: Video game engines as technical individuals

2016 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 337-356
Author(s):  
Damien Charrieras ◽  
Nevena Ivanova
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Production ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Object Oriented ◽  
Hierarchical Design ◽  
Programming Paradigm ◽  
Game Engines ◽  
Production Vidéo ◽  
Programming Paradigms ◽  
Gilbert Simondon ◽  
Mode Of Production

This article is interested in the creative practices in video game production. More specifically, the research focuses on the ways in which the use of game engines – a toolkit that offers a set of functionalities to automatize the handling of a range of processes (graphics, sound, game physics, networks, artificial Intelligence) – make possible or impossible certain forms of emergences in video games production. The manipulation of objects in these game engines is done according to a certain programming paradigm. Two main programming paradigms currently govern the internal design of game engines: object-oriented/inheritance-based deep-class hierarchical design and component-based data-driven design. We will describe how different programming paradigms lend themselves to certain affordances to explore the ways in which game workers can interface with game engines. We will use the framework developed by Gilbert Simondon on the artisanal and industrial stage or mode of production. This will enable a better understanding of the technogenesis of different kinds of game engines and the ways in which they can be conceptualized as technical individuals enduring through their associated milieus. This way of describing game engines emphasizes non-anthropocentric forms of creativity and specific modalities of emergent techno-human processes that are too often underestimated in various accounts of cultural production processes.

scholarly journals Vicarious trial-and-error is associated with the use of place-strategies in human virtual navigation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neil Schmitzer-Torbert
Keyword(s):  
Trial And Error ◽  
Human Navigation ◽  
Response Strategies ◽  
Model Based ◽  
Model Free ◽  
Decision Points ◽  
Behavioral Index ◽  
Vicarious Trial And Error ◽  
Contrast Response ◽  
Navigation Strategies

Studies of decision-making in rodents have demonstrated that vicarious trial-and-error (VTE) is an important behavioral index of deliberation, when animals search through and evaluate the available options before making a decision. In rodents, VTE is enhanced during the use of hippocampally-dependent place strategies, which may represent a type of model-based behavior. While some evidence exists for VTE-like behaviors in humans during navigation, it is unknown if VTE in humans is specifically associated place-strategies, as would be predicted for model-based behaviors. To address this gap, humans were tested in navigation tasks in symmetrical environments, which allowed for the use of probe trials to assess navigation strategies (place or response) or impose them directly. The use of place strategies (on probe trials and place-training) was associated with increases in measures of VTE (reorientations and pausing) especially at high-cost decision points, similar to results from rodent studies. In contrast, response-strategies were associated with the development of efficient, stereotyped trajectories (consistent with model-free learning). These results support the identification of place- and response-strategies in human navigation with model-based and model-free learning, respectively, and demonstrate that VTE is specifically related to the use of place-strategies.

scholarly journals Consumo, estética, técnica e religião em Cloaca, de Wim Delvoye

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (47) ◽  
pp. 500
Author(s):  
Icaro Ferraz Vidal Junior
Keyword(s):  
Gilles Deleuze ◽  
Felix Guattari ◽  
Gilbert Simondon

Cloaca (2000-2010), de Wim Delvoye, consiste em um conjunto de máquinas desenvolvidas para produzir “merda real industrializada” em museus e galerias de arte. Após descrição sumária da série, desdobramos nossa análise em três eixos: o primeiro baseado na  articulação psicanalítica entre merda e dinheiro; o segundo na diferenciação formulada geneticamente por Gilbert Simondon (1989) entre estética, técnica e religião; e o terceiro no conceito de máquina, formulado por Gilles Deleuze e Félix Guattari (1972). Por fim, comparamos Cloaca e Anal Kisses (2011), projeto do mesmo artista, e buscamos identificar alguns vetores culturais que incidiram na recepção desigual dos dois projetos.

scholarly journals Beautiful Neduvangiyam also known as Nagasuram

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 65-69
Author(s):  
Sivasankar S ◽  
Alaguselvam A
Keyword(s):  
Structural Changes ◽  
Wave Theory ◽  
Musical Instruments ◽  
Wind Instruments ◽  
Trial And Error ◽  
Helmholtz Resonance ◽  
Resonance Wave ◽  
Wind Instrument ◽  
Sound Engineering ◽  
Design Techniques

The purpose of this study is to understand one of the earliest known non-brass double-reed instrument called Nagasuram (Nadaswaram). Our ancestors while defining Tamil music grammar in parallel focused on sound engineering, which helped them to invent new musical instruments. Sangam era alone saw more than 30 percussion and wind instruments. Among them, few instruments like Veenai, Urumi and Nagasuram are worth mentioning since their design techniques were known only to a handful of families. Their performance really stands out due to their versatile and adaptable nature to all genres of music. Music instrument, like any other scientific invention goes through the same process of trial and error before getting standardized for general use. Instruments with strong adherence to scientific and acoustic principles gain prominence among the rest, as they undergo minimal structural changes. Nagasuram (Nadaswaram) is one such instrument, which was passed on to us for generations. This instrument readily complies with acoustic principles such as sound impedance, Helmholtz resonance, wave theory etc. to get the characteristic of a loudest non-brass wind instrument.

scholarly journals Metamers of Bayesian computation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hansem Sohn ◽  
Mehrdad Jazayeri
Keyword(s):  
Internal Models ◽  
Cost Functions ◽  
Trial And Error ◽  
Bayesian Decision ◽  
Visuomotor Rotation ◽  
Model Based ◽  
Model Free ◽  
Sensory Experiences ◽  
Timing Task ◽  
Decision Outcomes

AbstractThere are two sharply debated views on how humans make decisions under uncertainty. Bayesian decision theory posits that humans optimize their behavior by establishing and integrating internal models of past sensory experiences (priors) and decision outcomes (cost functions). An alternative model-free hypothesis posits that decisions are optimized through trial and error without explicit internal models for priors and cost functions. To distinguish between these possibilities, we introduce a novel paradigm that probes sensitivity of humans to transitions between prior-cost pairs that demand the same optimal policy (metamers) but distinct internal models. We demonstrate the utility of our approach in two experiments that were classically explained by model-based Bayesian theory. Our approach validates the model-based strategy in an interval timing task but not in a visuomotor rotation task. More generally, our work provides a domain-general approach for testing the circumstances under which humans implement model-based Bayesian computations.

scholarly journals Shattering the black box: Technicities of architectural manipulation

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 295-305
Author(s):  
Stavros Kousoulas
Keyword(s):  
Gilles Deleuze ◽  
Ecological Engineering ◽  
Black Box ◽  
Felix Guattari ◽  
Active Process ◽  
Input Output ◽  
Design Rules ◽  
Gilbert Simondon ◽  
The Way

This article attempts to reverse a fallacy often met in architectural theories and practices: that of a supposed input which through processes of what one can broadly call translations generates a built output. The input–output fallacy produces an architectural black box that treats both architectural thinking and doing as a mere process of projecting, representing and annotating ‘properly’ what will later be executed. On the contrary, a manipulative account of architecture as an active process of ecological engineering will pave the way for not only reversing the fallacy but also towards a particular understanding of architectural practices: architectural technicities and their reticular, affective potentials. Drawing on the theories of Gilbert Simondon, André Leroi-Gourhan, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, I will examine how architecture can be genealogically approached as a reticular technicity which evolves by a reciprocal concretisation of its technical objects and a generalisation of its active practitioners: no longer the application of transcendental design rules, of symbolic deductions or statistical inductions but rather abductive heuristics of affective techniques; no input nor output but practices of sensorial amplification via material manipulation and vice versa.

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