Lattanzi, Barbara K on Sat, 9 Apr 2022 19:10:01 +0200 (CEST) |
[Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]
Re: <nettime> Further on Peak Data |
Hello
Michael.
Just
to add a bit to your commentary, focusing especially on this statement of yours:
"Some
years ago I became aware that the firehose of data from
interplanetary
missions, from the Hubble Space Telescope, from atom
smashers, etc, was far too voluminous for the relatively small worldwide community of scientists of various stripes to keep up with it. So of course it's archived. Creating a kind of digitized analogue of the
observable
universe, one that's _also only partially explored."
There
seems to be a similarly curious situation shared by archaeologists (at least in the U.S.). This summary was published in an hyperallergic.com article called "The Art Historical Gems of TikTok".
The
article cites @sberrygames: American archeology has a “curation crisis,” in which countless artifacts have been stored without being studied … for decades.
Hyperallergic
summarizes
@sberrygames telling of the curation crisis:
Maybe
the best scientific depository is the unconstructed, undisturbed ground itself.
Regards,
Barbara
Lattanzi
-------------------------------------------------------------
Message:
1
Date:
Sat, 9 Apr 2022 11:59:10 -0400
From: Michael Benson <kinpix2001@gmail.com> To: nettime-l@kein.org
Subject:
<nettime>
Message-ID:
<CAF3eCHFS5HXH4qT68z=8tYbiRv_r+RRPDji0yXbtZfqL6dw5HQ@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" As with Andreas, Geert's fascinating manifesto immediately reminded me of Borges 'only truly accurate map being one to one' concept. Which also has resonance with the Borges story 'Pierre Menard, Author of Don Quixote.' In the latter case the 'contemporary' author reproduces Cervantes word for word, but because it's 'composed' at a different time it is replete with new meanings. There's another parallel concept, of the emerging 'outside-in' universe, that of data. If we isolate a subset of the vast playing field of peak data of all kinds, and consider only the staggering bounty of data concerning both the macro and micro universe (in all electromagnetic wavelengths, from multiple gathering sensors, telescopes of all kinds and including also subatomic physics research from CERN, Fermi, etc), we're also effectively attempting to create a kind of one-to-one map. Even if we never get there, and never can. We're 'bound within a nutshell...' while counting ourselves 'king of infinite space.' Let me address this particular peak data subset, rarified enough to lie largely outside realms of manipulation and profit-seeking monetization, but of course is still subject to questions concerning funding (who funded what research and why) and subjectivity (why did scientists/NASA/ ESA/various technologists choose to focus on this or that field of inquiry and not another). Some years ago I became aware that the firehose of data from interplanetary missions, from the Hubble Space Telescope, from atom smashers, etc, was far too voluminous for the relatively small worldwide community of scientists of various stripes to keep up with it. So of course it's archived. Creating a kind of digitized analogue of the
observable
universe, one that's _also only partially explored._ So for
example
planetary rings specialist Mark Showalter, having developed certain
theories concerning the ring dynamics of Saturn, went back into the Voyager archives seeking images taken during flybys of the Saturn system decades previously. And in those ten thousand plus pictures he discovered several tiny moons embedded in the rings that had gone unnoticed previously. The empirical validation of theory was discerned in the database. This presents a fascinating (to me) scenario in which discoveries are not made through direct observations of nature herself, but through study of our simulations of nature and archives of observations of nature. Which takes me to Heisenberg: "What we see is not nature herself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning." And: "Contemporary thought is endangered by the picture of nature drawn by science. This danger lies in the fact that the picture is now regarded as an exhaustive account of nature itself so that science forgets that in its study of nature it is studying its own picture." This strays off-topic from Geert's text of course, but I wanted to put it out there as a kind of peak-data node largely outside the realm of manipulation, at least of the kind referred to in that text. And yet also subject to some of the issues concerning Big Data, signal to noise ratios, cosmic speed limits, etc. I'll end with a realization I had concerning the scientific method, namely that the more we know or think we know, the greater also is our ignorance. If we envision what we do know about the universe as an expanding circle set within the exceedingly vast spaces of our ignorance, then what we're doing as research produces ever greater understanding is produce a longer and longer border between what we know and what we don't. There's simply more of the latter, which comes with the former. The net result is an ever-expanding awareness of the extent of our ignorance. Knowledge concerning the limits of knowledge. Best, Michael PS: To Geert's list of Ukraine links I would add these fascinating ones: https://nam11.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=""> https://nam11.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=""> |
# distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: http://mx.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@kein.org # @nettime_bot tweets mail w/ sender unless #ANON is in Subject: