John Hopkins on Wed, 23 Jan 2013 10:47:28 +0100 (CET)


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Re: <nettime> living systems theory [2x]


----- Forwarded message from John Hopkins <jhopkins@neoscenes.net> -----

From: John Hopkins <jhopkins@neoscenes.net>
Reply-To: jhopkins@neoscenes.net
Subject: Re: <nettime> living systems theory
Organization: neoscenes
Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2013 09:20:03 -0700
To: list nettime <nettime-l@kein.org>

On 1/22/13 07:18, chris mann wrote:
>please, once again, computers process data. not information. they have no
>idea about what theyre doing or why, so it can only be data. computers have
>no motivation, no conspiracy, no horizon. therefore no possibility of
>dealing with information.

As an organized and indivisible expression of a wholistic and continuous 
living system (ours!), through their operation, or even merely their 
maintained presence, they are increasing local entropy, and in that sense 
they are carrying information into the future as long as they are more 
organized than their surroundings. We are not separate from the wider system 
that we are immersed within. If we were, why worry about systemic 
degradations of the ecosystem...? Why worry about consuming energy?

JH


-- 


++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Dr. John Hopkins, BSc, MFA, PhD
Watching the Tao rather than watching the Dow!
http://neoscenes.net/
http://tech-no-mad.net/blog/
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

----- End forwarded message -----
----- Forwarded message from John Hopkins <jhopkins@neoscenes.net> -----

From: John Hopkins <jhopkins@neoscenes.net>
Reply-To: jhopkins@neoscenes.net
Subject: Re: <nettime> living systems theory
Organization: neoscenes
Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2013 09:30:46 -0700
To: list nettime <nettime-l@kein.org>

On 1/22/13 07:38, chris mann wrote:
>if you make no distinction between information and data, no further
>distinctions are possible

Hi Chris ~

Given that I actually did not conflate the two, can you expand on this?

A machine (digital or otherwise) is not a closed system, it is an open 
system, and so that its very structure, provenance, existence, persistence 
carries information (as order). Maybe you are confusing the abstracted 
protocols that form the energy that pass through the machine for the 
materialized *thing* itself (which recursively is 'merely' an expression of 
other protocols and their actualized potential for directing energies in a 
specific way).

JH

-- 


++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Dr. John Hopkins, BSc, MFA, PhD
Watching the Tao rather than watching the Dow!
http://neoscenes.net/
http://tech-no-mad.net/blog/
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

----- End forwarded message -----i



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