Norman Bel Geddes’ models have added an extra dimension to pictorial reporting. By recreating large or small parts of the sea and the earth’s surface in miniature they have made it possible for the camera to take positions which would normally be highly unusual or impossible. By the use of these models, the lens may [...]
Category Archives: Language
“It’s all language”
I prefer my title to the one the video uploaded was with: “Graphic Design can change your life”. On his blog, Erik Spiekermann comments it with a simple “their words, not mine”. A blog really worth exploring, by the way. This excerpt is taken from an interview with Gestalten.tv (which I’ve just discovered as well). [...]
Also posted in art & design, media studies Tagged language, materiality, visibility, writing 1 Comment
Mechanics of thought
When one considers the structure of the Difference and Analytical Engines, their resemblance to living “computers” becomes even more apparent. Babbage knew little or nothing about anatomy or physiology, and before the articulation of cell theory in the late 1830s, the organization of the nervous system was poorly understood. By his own admission, however, Babbage [...]
Signs of infinity
Observe that our contact with infinity is always and only through writing Rotman, B. (1993). Ad infinitum–the ghost in Turing’s machine: taking God out of mathematics and putting the body back in: an essay in corporeal semiotics. Stanford: CA: Stanford University Press. p. 6.
Also posted in media studies, philosophy Tagged communication, language, materiality, visibility, writing Leave a comment
“The Balloon the the Mind”
HANDS, do what you’re bid; Bring the balloon of the mind That bellies and drags in the wind Into its narrow shed. – Yeats, W. B. The Wild Swans at Coole. New York: The Macmillan company, 1919; Bartleby.com, 1999. www.bartleby.com/148/. [Date of Printout]. A concise and pertinent contemporary view of the mind/body dualism.
Computer Guts
I booted Ubuntu 10.10 on my netbook a few days ago. As I pressed ESC to start the procedure with my USB drive, codes erupted on the screen. Swift white on black alignments accumulated too quickly for my eyes to follow. The netbook’s hum grew as they appeared. I hadn’t witnessed a boot sequence for [...]
Also posted in computing Tagged materiality, performance, programming, Unix, visibility Leave a comment
Thought embodiment
You need to give the thoughts a physical embodiment, to put them down on paper. A thought written down (and not immediately thrown into the wastebasket) is stubborn, doesn’t change its shape, can be compared with the other thoughts that come after it. You can only learn how few thoughts you really have if you [...]
Mathematics as language
…little need to insist that mathematics is a language: who after all among those familiar with it would deny the proposition ^ Certainly not those users – accountants, engineers, economists, actuaries, statisticians, cliometricians, meteorologists, and the like – who have no choice but to translate in and out of mathematical expressions and terminology on their [...]
Also posted in philosophy, physics Tagged language, materiality, mathematics, writing Leave a comment
The Possible and the Actual
Take, for instance, the possible fat man in the doorway; and again, the possible bald man in the doorway. Are they the same possible man, or two possible men ? How de we decide ? How many possible men there are in that doorway ? Are there more possible thin ones than fat ones ? [...]
Index revisited
I’ve been taking care of an index for a few days. Short contract. A lot of work to do in too little time. But I took the opportunity to write down a few questions on the contemporary art of indexing a book: The first questions relate to the words and their context: Is the instance [...]
Also posted in philosophy Tagged creation, materiality, ontology, technology, writing Leave a comment
