<nettime> Re: [_arc.hive_] Re: On Code and Codework

[Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>]

On Sun, 13 Mar 2005, [windows-1252] Bj=F8rn Magnhild=F8en wrote:

You're right about the entities; I should have stated at x, y, z, are
independent, classical Aristotelian entities.

> But isn't this where meaning is produced, contrary to eg. a tautology?
> So it would be to go to the source of meaning, and making a problem
> out of it, as long as it's not self-evident, which it isn't because
> the source is lost or already coded.

No, entanglement is different, inseparable. If I do a sieve and produce
primes I'm saying something that's fairly clear within well-defined
domains.

> I'm linking it back to to the anecdotial of 'not having a real basis'.
> It's a false link. And I don't understand the 'real' of 'real basis.'
> It's kind of a paradox in the middle of propositional logic -
>   X | X :: -X   (|=3DSheffer's stroke)
> X operated onto itself gives its negation, x|x=3D-x.
> Or equivalent, with the same truthtable -
>   X | -X :: -X
> X and its negation gives its negation. Or like -
>   -X | -X :: X
> Sheffer's stroke could be viewed as a binary negation operator, and since
> it's expressional complete, the core of propositional logic, producing its
> own negation.

But it's not a negation operator, that's -. And it's precisely that the
Shef. & dual _aren't_ paradoxes but functions, operators, that makes it
worthwhile to consider further. There's also Nicod's theorem, but that's
more difficult to unpack.

> Btw, it's a bit like complex numbers, having a real and an imaginary
> part, where the imaginary ,i, is defined as the square root of -1, so
> i squared is -1. Could it be another approach to view code similary as
> a complex entity with a real and an imaginary part? It's imaginary
> because it's not real, and still the calculations make sense, via 'an
> imaginary bridge' as Musil writes somewhere, paraphrased, you begin in
> the real and you're doing all these things in the imaginary which in
> the end, surprisingly, leaves you in the real.

Ah well.. For me, this is again a metaphor with problematic metaphysics
behind it. There's nothing imaginary one way or another about code; it's
real, just a different ontology, like a prime number is ontologically
different than a stone; on the macro-level they're within different
domains. For me it's like seeing if you add four apples and three apples,

you're jumping into the imaginary and out again. I think not, that all
you're doing is mapping different ontological domains - which for me
brings up, not meta- physics, but issues of threshold logic and the
conceptual geometries I mentioned. You might want to order the Eco book,
which talks about the different planes of code; it's an approach which I
think is just about the only useful one, outside of formal, i.e. mathe-
matical definitions.

> - A subject is all input - what is subject-object is already lost in
> transmission - Perhaps I'm subject, and perhaps I'm object - or I'm
> certainly both, coded and coding -

I lose you here. I don't think it has anything to do with subject/object
or all input. I'm talking about praxis. Encoding produces something that
doesn't look back. You translate out of Morse, you have a message. The
source or coding methodology are irrelevant. On the other hand, if you're
coding, you're concerned with articulation on a different plane.

> Not sure, encoding - the passive/tacit, that code has the effect of
> pacifying us by being the active/visible/promulgated, while encoding -
> disapperance of code - would support more interaction - correlate our
> functioning?

I was thinking, suppose A writes a program x; then B uses the program with
input y -> x -> y' or some such. So B's concerned obviously with y' - or
rather, y' goes out to C - as happens when you do something with code and
send out the result. C has y', doesn't have x or y, they may be of
interest, but y' stands by itself. On the other hand, A is concerned with
x, with the ongoing articulation; A produces a structure which is somewhat
'in-itself', perhaps almost a parasitic process on y. For B, encoding is
passive, just happening; someone knows a software program really well, but
doesn't know how it's made, etc. Like driving a car. For A, on the other
hand, it's the interiority that's critical, the aesthetics of the code,
etc.

- Alan


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