The Quest for Intellectualism

It's been awhile since I've tried to be an intellectual. A long time ago I thought that I was smart, I thought that I wanted to be smart, and I thought that it was fun to be a witty and intelligent person. More recently I have tried to dumb down my brain by drowning it with alcohol, partying and pornography. This switch toward the more basic pleasures in life was preceded by my head injury of which I realized afterward I did not want to live and I have since pursued pleasure so as to escape my mind which has been crying out to be silenced. I'm writing this blog because I don't want to be the cliche "don't want to live so cover up all unhappiness with drunkeness and sex". I have always hated being cliche but more recently it seems I have been seeking it out. This is not to say that I'm against partying or drinking, etc. but I definitely need to get my act together and get some quality of life. I've been heading down the wrong path for a good while now simply because I didn't want to engage the pain I felt after my head injury. I think that to a degree it was a natural reaction because when things turn to shit, it's often natural to turn to something to take that anguish away.

I see myself now as someone who has been seeking out partying, etc simply because I couldn't handle what's been happening in my life. I am still a party person at heart, but the reason I was seeking out the party's and alcohol was because I was so miserable. I would rather be seeking out the parties because I'm looking to have fun, not to escape my misery. so I'm becoming an intellectual again because I no longer want to escape my mind by being stupid. So yeah. sorry for such an unintelligent blog post. I've been kind of retarted lately.

The plan for the final project.

I would like to write my essay on how people attach themselves to their avatars online. I don’t have a specific thesis at this point, but I will definitely be using “A Rape in Cyberspace” for evidence of whatever I choose to be my thesis. I really fell in love with this text and the idea of people projecting themselves into digital spaces and it eventually having emotional consequences. I want to also bring in the idea of how people can act themselves in a virtual environment without physical restrictions on their personalities, yet they allow their avatars to affect themselves emotionally. I think a good movie to watch for the research of this essay is probably the Matrix Trilogy, partly because it deals with human consciousness over digital spaces, and a good book to reference will probably be Neuromancer by William Gibson.

Everybody reads my blog

The first thing I would like to address is that I think it's kind of ridiculous to not take advantage of using technology for our own benefit. This seems like such a simple statement, but I find it interesting when people get their panties in a twist because somebody happens to be better at utilizing technology. In the book, the first story that he tells us is about a girl who lost her cellphone in a cab and eventually it got stolen by this dumb girl who didn't think about the interconnectivity of cell phone companies. The thing that really got me about this cell phone finder was that it didn't occur to her to have the number changed, the sim card exchanged, or anything that might further protect her from being traced. It didn't necessarily say so in the article, but the impression I got was that she even maintained the same cell phone provider, sucking minutes, and texts from Ivanna.

I think that along with societies large groups being quickly formed and quickly unformed is nearly as useful in the understanding of society as what groups the people are actually joining and why. The fact that this group was formed against Sasha is important because it shows 1. that the people want justice and 2. that common goals that bring people together in digital space can manifest as a real life change.

cyberape should be allowed in cyberape muds

The reading that I choose is Dibbell. The reason I chose Dibbell is because I find the whole idea that cyberspace may often seem to be a place that is supposed to be free of physical constrictions, and yet people naturally have a tendency to put their physical presence into their avatar a very interesting one. The main reason I find it interesting is because people, in real life, project an image of themselves. The image is projected through the clothes they wear, the way their hair looks, and many other characteristics. In real life, some projections may not be chosen such as facial structure, etc. (although it can be changed), but the reason I find this fascinating is because many times, when people enter these MUD’s, they don’t realize that they are actually putting themselves (meaning their real life selves) out there through a digital space.

When Moondreamer ended up crying after she was raped by Mr. Bungle, it shows just how clearly she was attached to her avatar, even though she didn’t realize it at first. I find the fact that people get attached to their avatars even when they don’t mean to a very interesting concept. In the article, there is one quote that fully illustrates the unique space that divides the digital world with the real world: they are trying to figure out how to punish Mr. Bungle for the rape. They wonder if he could be punished for making obscene phone calls, or perhaps by contacting administrators at the university. I am more on the side of the anarchists in the room, believing that when it comes to the digital world, there should be no punishment for crimes unless they transfer over into the real world. If, however, there is a rule on the site that states there is to be no foul language, and one swears, then they must pay the consequences for that action, but the digital world as a whole, if it were to start being policed by the government for example, the digital world would lose all its attraction in my opinion.

Turkle Response 2:Epistemological Pluralism: Styles and Voices within the Computer Culture

This essay mainly focused on how each person can use a computer in a different way, especially when it comes to programming. By detailing people’s backstory and training (ie playing piano), etc and by analyzing people’s learning styles, we are able to see why people may succeed or fail at certain computing tasks, and how almost all learning styles can be accommodated by computers.

This article is really good in explaining no only why certain people program in certain ways, but it really gets into why it’s ok for them to program that way. For example, on page 137, it describes Alex as he makes a robot rather than a car.

I really identify with the analysis of learning in this article. I really feel like I often times have a unique learning style which changes with each problem I am given. I often can come across as a smart ass because of the odd questions I ask (and sometimes I do this because I think it’s funny), but most often, it’s because the way I address problems is to find what is interesting about a problem and solve it from the perspective that addresses the unique problems of the issue, not just figure out the answer.

So, for example, I, like Alex, would rather build a robot that uses the tires as feet rather than make the same car that every kid around me makes. Facing the problems of making a robot, which no one could assist me with (because it is a new approach and a new idea), is what having fun is all about. Of course, if I was getting a grade, I would probably make a car, but if I was given the freedom to do WHATEVER I WANTED and didn't have to face the pressure of getting a grade, I would most definitely take the robot approach.

So I encourage YOU, to be like Alex, and take the Robot Approach.

English. What? Do You Speak It.

One of the arguments that I found most compelling arguments in chapter 3 was on page 100 when she makes the argument that black people stand for “cool” and for an “authenticity” that whites obviously don’t stand for. I find this interesting because I can see a lot of truth in it, yet it still remains a somewhat taboo subject. This idea that black people are “authentic” is especially shown when the black people in the Matrix are dancing at the rave, mentioned on page 109, and they are dancing around and stomping their feet to the music, thus showing their “mojo” and this “mojo” is shown through a multitude of ways that makes the black people more “rebellious” and “cool”.

If you asked any given person off the street who the coolest black person was, I have no doubt that the most common answer would be Samuel L. Jackson. Simply no doubt. Samuel L. Jackson played one of the lead characters in the movie “Pulp Fiction” and in this particular role, describing him as “cool” doesn’t even do him justice. Who else could say the line “English motherfucker, do you speak it?” except Samuel L. Jackson. So yes, I totally agree with the concept that black people are portrayed as cool in cinema. I am not here to comment on whether this has any grounds in reality or that it is appropriate, but I definitely agree that blacks are portrayed as cool and authentic in cinema.

i prefer the phrase "prolonging publishing" rather than "procrastinating posting"

In standard style of attempting to write this, I’ve prolonged long enough to actually be more than half a day late. I apologize for letting my team down, and I’ve got a boatload of excuses, some of which include a rave, a dance, working late overnight, and the death of a family friend’s young son. And the Super Bowl tomorrow (which I won’t be watching).

So one thing that I would like to bring up first and foremost about the article I chose, which was titled “Artificial Intelligence and Psychoanalysis”, was that it was published in a journal called Daedalus which as we all know bears the name of a Greek mythological character who was known for being extremely crafty and cunning (look him up on Wikipedia like I did…). The only reason I bring this up is because Daedalus was the one who warned Icarus to not go too close to the sun lest the wax on his wings melt. This is sort of a private joke with me and myself and my blog readers that has to do with the dangers of when technology…goes…too… far.

But moving on to the actual text rather than just the title of the academic journal, look to page 251, she brings up the juicy stuff: a perceptron, “A pattern recognition machine designed in the late 1950’s and a good first example of emergent AI.” This machine reportedly, when asked to identify a triangle only needed to be told whether or not this or that was a triangle, and it would eventually learn what not a triangle was, and what it was. As it also states on page 251, “Perceptrons are not programmed, but learn from the consequences of their actions.”

This is referred to as “anti-Lovelace” technology because there was some famous dude scientist named Lovelace that said computers couldn’t act biologically and couldn’t learn, but this shows that computers can potentially evolve into more complex machines than they were originally designed for. Similar to human brains, computers may eventually be able to withstand certain traumas that injure, but do not completely destroy all functions. At current, often a computer will not function at all when it is damaged, meaning it will not adapt to the damages it acquires and continue operating, but rather quit operating completely.

If you are afraid of the robots taking over, beware of the other 29/30th

The passage is on page 670. It is the passage that starts with "Biology as it was once practiced".

This passage describes how computers have specifically changed how the Biology field has changed with increasing digital technology. The scientists in the field once used computers merely to record the findings of their experiments, but today, they are using the computer to carry out the experiments.

I think that this passage is amazing because it goes to show us how technology progresses from an assistant to the physical world (as a tool), to a modeler of the physical, and perhaps eventually to an encompassment of the physical in the future. Technology one day may not be completely dependent on people as it is today. Looking backward to how much computers have increased in speed and capability in the near past, it is scary to think what computers will be like in 100 years or more. I personally think that computers will start to become more biologically oriented instead of merely advanced abacus’s.

In the rest of this essay, there is reference to how the technology we are using today is beginning to observe things for biologists rather than just being there for data entry. One fine example is the mapping of DNA, which is done mostly by computers now. With the advancement of computers to where it is now, computers can do the monitoring and the insertion of data rather than people.

In an article I found on the internet (it’s rather old), at http://www.transhumanist.com/volume1/moravec.htm, the author is discussing the plausibility of a computer eventually becoming as smart as a human, and he asks the question “Why tie up a rare twenty-million-dollar asset to develop one ersatz-human, when millions of inexpensive original-model humans are available?” And I find it interesting that eventually, far down the road, computers will be as smart as humans, and they won’t cost twenty million dollars.

The reason I think this is because I believe that people will eventually become the computers. In the same article, it says that humans, at their best, use 1/30^th of their brain’s computing power. And we are just now creating (large scale) computers that can rival that. Except for one problem, the computers are always, and will always BE external because they are not biological, so complete union is impossible. Even in the case of Darth Vader, technology wasn’t completely fused with flesh, he still had distinct parts, some of which were biological, some of which were electronic.

Sure technology can help us observe biological happenings which the passage on 670 refers to, but my proposal is that we as humans will never be able to unify with our technology in cyberspace or elsewhere until the technology becomes biological and we are able to tap into the other 29/30ths of our brain’s computing power.

Popeye wants to be rich. DTC 375

One of the biggest things that popped out at me in this book was the constant referencing of yams. I don't know why, but I just really find this word enjoyable to say. It’s less enjoyable to write for some reason and this just goes to show that I can enjoy something orally and not literally. The yams in this story are basically the currency of this particular community and a mans worth is associated by a few things, one of which is how many yams he has. Cultures use things that they find around them as currency and I guess the Igbo happened to have a yams in decent amounts such that they could serve as the primary currency. We do get that at one point the Igbo accept a virgin and a young man as currency to stop war, so the culture once again uses things that it has available to it in order to allow transactions. The other culture, in all probability also grows yams, but since it was a blood debt to be paid, it was paid with a higher currency than yams could provide which was with humans.

In addition to them using yams as a currency, they also use it constantly in their language to describe things. We talked about a similar subject in class when we talked about how in Orality and Literacy, oral cultures have difficulty describing a circle and they instead describe it as something which they have had exposure to. Ikemefuna is described as growing like a "yam tendril" which is using the common theme in their culture to describe how fast he grew.

a boring title about my awesome forum sites.

Two virtual communities that I reside in are Image-Line.com Forum and Tastyfresh.com.

The Image-Line.com Forum is a gigantic forum where users of Image-Line programs such as FL Studio, Deckadance, and EZ Generator can ask questions of other users, post bugs or complaints concerning the software, share music tracks and advice on works in progress, and network with fellow electronic artists.

One can only gain access to the forums if a product has been purchased from the company. I have purchased FL Studio Signature Edition, which is a $300 program, and I was granted access to the site. The site has so many members, it's hard to keep track of who is who. The majority of the people on the site are users who have purchased some version of FL Studio and many of them live throughout the globe. In fact the main office is in Belgium.

Due to the widespread popularity of the program, the website is constantly updated with new songs that people are working on, or technical problems or user difficulties that can be troubleshot by those who have a curiosity for such a thing. The website's main attraction is the free content and advice from other producers and dj's as it contains thousands (if not millions) of songs that have been uploaded, edited then re-uploaded, remixed, or posted as free gifts from artists who want to get some free publicity. The website has every style of music and most of it is electronic. (although there is the occasional song with real instrumentals and not just samples).

An interesting phenomenon that occurs at the site is when the majority of the members, whom I have never met, upload a track that they are having some problem with, and I have assisted them (by offering editing tips) in making their music better, and thus earning them money, while I am payed nothing and while I am offered no credit for the song. This doesn't bother me however, as everyone there is under the non-verbal agreement that we help each other for free. One reason is because in the long run, when you analyse another persons song and offer suggestions, it helps to look at your own songs more critically and thus helps you create a better product yourself.

Two of the main barriers that stop people from going to this site are

1. they have to have an interest in an Image-Line product, enough to purchase it and

2. After they have purchased the product, they have to be interested enough in either networking with other artists, or improving their own music or helping others improve theirs.

Tastyfresh.com is a social networking site and a forum that is specifically meant for Christian DJ's, fans and producers of electronic music. I've been on this site for a few months and the community is relatively small. The active members number somewhere around the 20's, but there are approximately 900 (different) people that visit the site each month. This is due to the content that the active members put up, the active members putting up reviews of new dj equipment, recommendations on songs that did well in the clubs that they play at, and overall dj peer advice.

This website also has a chatroom where I can chat with people from the website and even chat one on one with the main designer of the web site to just get to know each other. The website also features dj's, both active and inactive on the site, presenting podcast mixes of their favorite music. This is a major feature to the site and includes a podcast that features submitted music from unknown artists, mixes from popular dj's, and mixes from dj's that haven't become popular yet. Overall I feel like I am a much more important member of this particular community than I am at Image Line forum since when I participate, for example giving advice on a track that someone is working on, I feel more connected with that person because there are less people on the tastyfresh website.

I would also be much more likely to meet with a member of Tastyfresh.com in "real life" because of the fact that each of the members of the forum are so tightly knit. Many of the forum members know each other, and even though I haven't met any of them in real life, I know their personalities in such a way that I feel my meeting with some of them (not all of them) would be a seamless transition from the digital world to the "real world". I would be much less trustworthy when presented with the possibility of meeting with a member of the Image Line forum because of the fact that it is not a close knit community, and it has so many people, it is hard to get to know anyone's real personality.

Blind People Are an Oral Culture

Blind People belong in a category all their own. This is in no way a judgement or in any way making fun of their impairment. In a certain way, I’m actually awed and extremely curious about how they would fit into Orality and Literacy. The whole point of the book is to draw academic distinctions about how Oral Cultures are different from Cultures with a written language (or perhaps a phonetic vs. non-phonetic, as in the difference between Chinese and English). And where my curiosity starts to heighten is when we think of blind people as living in a visual society, as Oral members. Ong continuously draws distinctions (especially in chapter 4) about the differences in thinking processes between Oral and Literate Cultures and of course this would lead one to wonder about what if someone was living in a culture where they didn’t belong. Naturally, they would try to fit in, but when they meet up with a barrier that stops them, such as a speech impediment (think Moses from the Bible) or a visual impediment that cannot be overcome, they need to adapt accordingly.

Of course people with total blindness are a relatively small fraction of our society, but it begs the question of whether or not the people who are completely blind can equally exist in a society with exit signs, poison labels, obstacles, and street signs. The short answer is
“no, they cannot”. They need to have dogs to guide them, or someone who will walk with them and help care for them. I am not saying that blind people are bad or that they can’t live a normal life, etc. But when there are such clear distinctions being drawn between Oral and Literate cultures, I wonder if living as a blind person would have been much more manageable when living during Homer’s time because of the fact that they lived in a society that focused less on what was seen with the eyes and more about what is heard through the ears.

This Blog would sound much better than it looks. Except that Comfortaa is my fave font. DTC 375

Does "in good faith" mean we can't be sarcastic or have fun with our posts? As dry as orality and literacy is, I would at least like to try and have some fun with it. I don't know exactly how I can make orality and literacy funny, since it’s a very serious book about a relatively boring subject. But the fact that I think Orality and Literacy is boring is proof that the society I live in is radically different than ancient societies with no written word. So I’ll just try and relate it to my experiences and see what happens. No big expectations for my first blog in this class I hope.

I’m going to be honest, I’m honestly not enjoying Orality and Literacy. But this is a very popular book in acadamia so it’s sort of required reading in a college class. I had to read some of it for another class and the material in this book that I enjoy is when he starts to talk about sound and the nature of speech and communication. The reason I care about sound and communication is because music comes from speech and sound. And music is something I care very much about.

I make primarily instrumental electronic dance music, but lately I’ve been feeling more of a pull to include lyrics in my songs. This is ironic because I write a lot of poetry, but I usually refrain from combining spoken or sung words and music together.

The reason I do not currently create music with lyrics is, (if I may self analyze for a minute) because I want to connect more with the sound and the primitive nature of the song rather than allowing people use their analytical and visual minds when listening to my music (all my music is made explicitly with the computer, so calling on a primitive nature hopefully doesn’t make me a hypocrite...). The reason I make music is for people to dance, not to gain wisdom from my wise words or to get distracted by envisioning something specific that I want them to think about. I want them to fill in the details of the music with their own experiences. Giving people details and making them think is what poetry and spoken word is for.

I think the reason I make music the way I do is similar to how the ancient societies told stories. When they told a story, the point was to entertain and to engage the listener. The focus was less on tangible facts and more about living a particular experience that could potentially change with time. When the stories (meaning myths more specifically) were told, they were meant for the audience (meaning the people in a specific geographical area) not for people thousands of years later to analyze the errors. The reason the ancient story tellers were able to get away with telling outlandish stories is because the convincement they used was oral and sound oriented, not strictly visual as it is in today’s society. Which provided a bit of leeway for the listener to fill in some of the bits themselves.

Help me pay for College tuition. Who cares if it's legal.

Is it wrong to try and get money by placing adsense blogs on my blog that my classmates are forced to read? I don't know, but I'm anxious to see how it turns out. If nobody ever comments or reads my blogs, I guess I'll have learned my lesson. I can't wait until we talk about the ethics of Cyberspace in DTC 475.

For the record I wrote this before DTC 475 Class today.

I think it’s wrong to choose a definition for Cyberspace. Cyberspace is about the future and by choosing a definition for it (even if it’s from a most highly esteemed professor’s list), we destroy everything that cyberspace stands for. Yes cyberspace is about increasing technology; yes cyberspace is about computers; yes cyberspace is about research, but morally, cyberspace simply should not have a list of attributes. It deceives us into thinking cyberspace is ultimately a good thing and therefore controllable. Humans think that if we can include something in a list, it means it has been catalogued and thus easier to influence. This is when Cyberspace appears harmless. The maxim (meaning the philosophical term) of any technology is catastrophic to humanity as beings with free will because what is meant to make our lives easier ends up taking them over completely.

Cyberspace is about eventually combining all technologies to completely destroy human kind. You think I’m joking. Cyberspace is about making humans not human. Cyberspace is a suicidal venture…without death. A perpetually zombie existence. People always talk about the zombie apocalypse, but the problem is that zombies exist today, in the form of people who spend all their time on computers, or texting or in some other way being absorbed by what is referred to as Cyberspace.

Yes Cyberspace is all the things on the list, you got me… But none of these items contain the goal or the purpose of cyberspace, which is far more ominous and important, I think, than providing a “list of cyberspace attributes.”

The goal of Cyberspace is to escape who you really are. It provides this by offering one or more of the following promises:

1. Escape being tortured by mental problems (remembering people’s phone numbers for example)

2. Escape being tortured by emotional problems (I have no friends and I can be popular on “SecondLife”)

3. Escape being tortured by physical problems (I can run fast… without real legs: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-466904/The-fastest-man-legs-Olympics-sights.html)

Cyberspace is the bane of humanity, because it takes away weakness and covers up our flaws (botox, spellcheck, etc.). It is the culmination of technologies that, when classified as individual technologies are not always harmful.

Some people may say that anything, even a pond in the case of Narcissus, can serve as a tool for destruction, and this is true, but the difference between Cyberspace and a pond is that cyberspace is often used contrary to it’s original purpose. A pond was not invented to have someone stare endlessly into it until they die. The existence of Cyberspace is solely to allow people to escape themselves. Yes, perhaps they have a terrible life and they NEED the brain scanner thingy in order to communicate with their loved ones (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1230092/Rom-Houben-Patient-trapped-23-year-coma-conscious-along.html) Which is fine and dandy but it doesn’t excuse the fact that by creating this machine which helps this one man, eventually will result in millions eventually becoming zombies.

The First Post in order to Get "2 free points for doing what I'm supposed to do anyway" and making sure to keep the title non-generic

Hey there, my name is Brandon Andersen I will at times write blogs with longer titles than my actual post. I am an electronic artist currently enrolled in DTC classes at WSU Tri-Cites. I am a "good" Catholic who enjoys upbeat music (sorry to burst your stereotype). I play drums at Holy Spirit Catholic Church on Clearwater every Sunday at 5:30pm if you were ever so inclined to hear what a mass sounded like without the whole organ and choir thing going on.

I would tell you about my specific traits that would make you irresistibly attracted to me, but I think that would give away a lot of the adventure. I organize and dj for events called "CRAVE's" which are essentially Christian Raves (visit the website). I make techno music under the pseudonym "Boogie Maximus" (go to the "fan page" if you are so inclined.) and I really like being in groups of people. I do the whole one-on-one thing, sure, but I usually would rather meet someone new instead of sticking with the same clique since preschool.

Electronically Yours,

Brandon