Consider Bookhling

On my recent excursion to the Met, I’ve had chance to sit in front of Giorgio de Chirico’s painting Ariadne. On days like that I enjoy strolling among the vistas of my thoughts, sightseeing in my own mindscapes. Sometimes I reach some interesting idea, and I’d like to share this particular one with you. I start with the first hand observation and speculation on the painting, and goes on to the social contexts and perspective on the relationship between art and artificial life. Of course, I am in no way educated in matters of art, so what I say about the painting is purely personal and speculative. If you want proper information about the painting itself, I’d suggest the official Met description and associated sources.

Ariadne awaits outside the labyrinth, frozen cold as a statue. The towers and progresses of the world slip by outside, unnoticed by her and the observer locked within the wall. Ariadne is a statue, but as I look closer she begins to resemble a stone cover of an ancient sarcophagi. It would fit with the melancholy atmosphere pervading through the painting. Theseus walked into the labyrinth ages ago with the thread of Ariadne, and he is yet to emerge from its dark paths. Or perhaps he has left the empty husk of the labyrinth a long time ago? Defeating it of the ferocious monster inside, leaving it as an empty dark corridor. Only the desolation remains and shadows haunt the dark corridors of the labyrinth.

When did Ariadne pass away? What had happened to Theseus? Perhaps he met the same fate he would have met within the dark corridors of the labyrinth, as a desiccated corpse. The activity of the world surrounding the walls begins to throw an ominous hint as to the fate of our hero and heroine. The heroic and dramatic gives way to the tides of the mundane.

The sense of timeless waiting and longing, intermingled with the thick taste of isolation and desolate serenity fill the whole of the canvas with strange attraction, and makes it stand out among the numerous canvases displayed in the white halls of the modern art exhibition of the museum. As I stare into the painting the position of the observer becomes uneasy, as I begin to wonder whether to apply myself to Ariadne, Theseus, or even the bustling activity of the world outside the wall.

Depiction of Ariadne as a sculpture provides some interesting insight into the world of the painting. What was the fate of Ariadne? In the state she is in now she has become a symbol in the lexicon of the consciousness. As I consider the matter of Ariadne and the rich symbolism of labyrinth in human history, I feel as if the world of the painting is being spread from the mind of the artist to my own. Perhaps the inside of the wall (though it might be argued that the stage is set outside, there is no way to tell) can be understood as the collective unconsciousness of the human world. Maybe it is a desolate, timeless place buried within the waves of zeitgeist. Perhaps the place within the wall is an ancient, timeless place in our psyche, waiting for some sort of resolution that we know for certain will never be found.

It is no secret that the mythical labyrinth associated with Ariadne held a minotaur within its dark corridors, and is a frequently visited theme across variety of cultures depicting the primordial passages of the human psyche. As such, labyrinths of almost any cultural significance is a path to some sort of resolution, guarded by difficult ordeal or mythic beast that must be overcome. Even within the labyrinth depicted in the painting, quite clearly devoid of all life, one cannot help but to think that some sort of secret still lurks inside, throwing an overwhelming curiosity toward us that soon borders on obsession. In fact, beneath the veneer of timeless desolation and serenity, one cannot help but to perceive of certain intense quality of questioning, as our eyes drift toward between the archways of the entrance to the labyrinth. The whole painting begins to metamorphose into a question in the back of the observers psyche, isolated from the world yet longing for something, some kind of attainment.

Here is where the conventional notion of the classic and the modern splits. Being classical or modern in this case has nothing to do with timeline in this case, of course. Classic and the modern are mindsets, values impressed into the very fabric of our social consciousness. The classics are obsessed with the idealized patterns, the equation of the human with the superhuman, contemplation of the nature of superhumanity and underlying human pursuits, and so on. A kind of peculiar disdain toward contemporary human condition and urges to metamorphose is a common universal sentiment among the arts and ideas commonly referred to as classical. The prevalent attitude encompassing almost every single work of art and ideas considered classical, all superhuman, not because human is, but because the human strives to be.

Yet certain indefatigable essences of the modern runs directly contrary to such sentiments. Consider the works of Gustave Courbet and his realism. Gustave Courbet and his realism is widely considered to be the first step of the true modernism in painting, in a twilight zone where the classical begins to turn modern. The most conspicuous feature of the modern is the depiction of the human wants. No more hero becomes the motto of the day, either by making everything heroic or denying the concept of the heroic. And as the process continues the art increasingly becomes the depiction of the art rather than depiction of the human of art.

It almost feels as if there is some sort of cycle, propagating through the stages of Middle Ages-Renaissance-Baroque-Rococo-Neo Classic-Empire, which are not as clearly defined as they would appear on paper but still retains certain zeitgeist that is apparent to a methodical observer. They all seem to revert back and forth in the relationship between the art and the human. Is this a primarily European (thus Christian) fluctuation? I am beginning to doubt it, for many other cultures like those in the Far East, show similar fluctuations of the relationship between the art and the human.

Such fluctuation is interesting in light of the oncoming possibility of artificial life. What will the art of artificial life be like? Idealized pursuit or depiction of the basic principles of the life? Life-like physical system treated as an art is a valuable opportunity to clarify some of the dilemma facing the issue of art and art’s relationship to the world and the human, though the precise form it would take is difficult to predict at the moment. Art, real or ideal, is quite discontent to be sitting on canvas and velvet lined pedestals. The art will inevitably flow out into the world (in some sense it already has) and walk and talk with us. Perhaps the divide between the real and the ideal, the focus on the art of art and the art of the human would manifest as a debate on the form of artificial life in human world. Perhaps it will be a debate on whether the human should BE artificial life.

Why my ongoing interest/obsession with the artificial life and the art? Why do I believe in art as life and life as art? Why my belief that the science and art should, and will, become inseparable from each other?

There was an interesting accident a few years back, when a young child stuck a chewing gum on a priceless painting of modern art, and gave an excuse to the horrified museum authorities that he did not think it was art. It is true that art in modern times seem to be an acquired taste, which is very peculiar to me. Isn’t art, at its naked core, a search and depiction of beauty? The nature of beauty might remain as illusive as ever, but for all intends and purposes it is universal. And if the social conception is in such a way that capacity to feel beauty must be educated into someone’s head, we have a problem. This might be the root cause behind today’s absurd separation between the field and practices of arts and sciences. Art in its inception should be universal to all of us, and that means it should be universal to all senses and all brains, something fundamentally integrated into the human system’s architecture that might even be replicated in non human life forms. The true nature of the origin that powers people to perform art and the true nature of the beauty that cativates us and evokes things and ideas that we never consciously thought of before, must in someway be related to our own physique, for life and consciousness cannot manifest without a body.

If the existence of the physiology and metabolism of life is essential to the process of art and aesthetic fulfillment, we have a pressing need for artificial life, both as scientists solving the great and observable problem of the human phenomena and as artists searching for the manifestation of art. The art will walk and talk among us, and no child will dare to stick gum on their faces. Everyone, even those without the art education and art sensitivity drummed into their heads will be able to intuitively grasp the presence of beauty and revel in the process of aesthetic fulfillment, since, in the end, human beings best understand things that resemble them. And what better resembles us than life, staring at us in the eye?

Today’s my day off, so I have a bit of time for some contemplative rambling about nothing.

Does anyone remember the game Vagrant Story? It was a game for the PSX that came out at the end of lifecycle of the system. I happened upon it by chance and was completely captivated by its unique brand of aesthetics and gameplay. I’ve always been curious as to what kind of real world inspiration was drawn for the Vagrant Story universe, so I did a little bit of researching while on one of my excursion to the Met.

Overall, the general aesthetics prominent during the gameplay is definitely 15th~16th century Italian, the period of high Renaissance on verge of crossover to the Baroque, another primarily Italian movement. However, being an artificial construct designed to represent a thematic world, the Vagrant Story and its version of Ivalice show certain interesting qualities while depicting the chronological changes within its own world using the subtle hints in architecture. The 15th~16th century Italian flair of the Vagrant Story universe is used in depiction of the ‘present time’ of the world from the player’s perspectives, against which the story of the forgotten city of Lea Monde and subsequent search for the Gran Grimoire are set. However, as apparent from quite a number of architectural stylings of the older part of the city of Lea Monde, like the Kildean Temple at the center of the city (which is told to have been built at the height of the city and the cult of Mullenkamp’s power, which in terms of the Vagrant Story timeline would possibly be ancient) shows distinct and unmistakable influence of the Byzantium art and architecture. The structure of the deities of the more ancient part of the city, the tiled backgrounds of the inner Kildean Temple, the majestic yet definitely not European or Middle Eastern arches of the walls, towers and ceilings, and the exquisite structure of the central dome of the Kildean Temple where the climatic battle between Ashley Riot and Guildenstern Rosencratz took place shows distinct Byzantine milieu, most likely taken from the real world example of the Hagia Sophia in the city of Constantinople, present day Istanbul. Indeed, the vast underground network of crypts and libraries beneath Lea Monde shows certain unusual Roman influences, putting it squarely within the timeline of the real world Byzantium.

It is somewhat interesting to note that surrounding public quarters of the Lea Monde, unlike specialized constructs like the aforementioned Kildean Temple, displays consistent central and southern European themes, reflecting their real world counterparts where magnificent architectures of old are preserved while the ‘normal’ housings surrounding them change with the times.

The most unique characteristic of the composite civilization of the Vagrant Story, the one that made the study of the real world influence on the Lea Monde architecture so appealing to me in the first place, is the novel use of lighting through out the changes of scenery surrounding the architectural works themselves. No doubt a technical decision was made at the time to compensate for the aging hardware of the PSX, it nonetheless proved to be a genius decision that made the world come alive to the player (thought the music and sound effects also had great part in it).

Within the engine utilized by the Vagrant Story, each scene is placed within a world with its own lighting and default color cue, a sort of universal ambient lighting saturated into every single texture within the scene. It means that for the most part every single cityscape/building in the game was placed within an even greater box of light. This gave each physical locale within the Vagrant Story universe to possess incredible range of lighting effects, each area becoming living and breathing worlds unified by architectural themes. The undercity has the atmosphere of the Styx, and the perpetual sound of running water and shades of bluish darkness accentuated by light sources of different, yet suitable color and scale. The lower Kildean Temple is perpetually basked in burning glow of yellowish crimson sunset, looking out into the violently crashing oceans formed during the violent earthquake of the past, while the red sun hangs suspended in the sky. The upper Kildean Temple makes extensive use of the contrast between the opaque red permeating through the sky and the deep darkness between the falling columns and crumbling extremities, giving us the profound feeling of holiness intermingled with the unspeakable decadence. It clearly displays the theme of eternally dying cathedral for a forgotten deity.

The psychological impact of such brilliant yet low tech use of lighting, and design decisions made to accommodate such lighting condition made profound impression on my then young mind. I still can’t forget the bleak, opaque red sky seen from the upper edge of the Kildean Temple, perpetually bathed in ominous sunset without gradient, the sun itself nowhere to be found. Only the darkness leading to the depths below in stark yet harmonious contrast… It had the ominous qualities of the best of Clifford Still paintings, and it still retains certain nostalgic quality for me.

In terms of realism, Vagrant Story is lacking. Yet I still remember each memorable scenes vividly, enough to draw and write about it despite not having experienced the game in six or seven years. Quite clearly, physical replication of the real does not equate the mind’s perception of the real. There seem to be a few immutable essences of the world that makes an impact of the mind’s eye to perceive that specific information as real (in such light, I am beginning to feel that many of the works of ‘modern art’ to be severely anemic in terms of true contemplature of the real and the simulacra of the real). If true, human perception of ‘beauty’ should be intimately linked with the perception of the outside world by the human cognition. Human cognition, physiology, and the illusive ‘human psyche’ are all interlinked with each other when in light of the aesthetic fulfillment of the self. Mind and body are inseparable when in observance of the world it seems. Beauty might be the brain’s way of propagating through the material world.

Writing this post made me think about a few things of art I would love to see (or, provided that I have the time, do myself). Painting of cityscapes. Just as the artists of the Bohemian era wandered the world painting landscapes (Gustave Courbet comes to mind. Interesting person. I should do a post on him someday), people of today should wander the world and paint cities at its most unexpected and beautiful/hideous moments in time (being that both are aesthetically fulfilling). Or even, take a cue from the Eastern landscape painters. Draw beautiful pictures of imaginary cityscapes, the ones where the viewer can walk through and dwell, perhaps learn a thing or two through the mind’s eye. The artists of the Renaissance were truly genius in this regard, as they succeeded in formularizing geometrically sound yet surreal drawings of buildingscapes that have almost psychological impact upon its viewer, like the ones for the panel at chapel La Bastie D’Urfe. It is rather strange to see no one capitalizing on such style in this age of digital arts.

The matter of rice shortage is becoming increasingly mainstream. The warning of possible shortage and dangerous increase in price had been around for a long time, and unusual price hike of rice in major exporters like Thailand had been reported in (relatively) mainstream media about three to four months ago. In fact, major United Nations advisers and IMF personnel had been giving warnings since mid 2007 in mainstream sources. I myself remember scoffing at a particular warning given by a United Nations forecaster, warning of possible food shortage and criticizing the rapid increase in biocrop cultivation as a major player. I guess such is the evanescence of appealing to mainstream media, where the specific sources and logistical data to support novel claims are frequently invisible or simply unavailable.

The warning was in place, and the back-up system for possible shortage in each of the nations most heavily affected had been more or less in place. So why do we have a developing crisis at hand with reported casualties? The answer I believe, lies in the lack of distribution network in the world today. Of course, with the advent of the technology the world itself is ever more networked than before. As each second passes it is predicted that the network of the world will become thicker and wider, someday possibly encompassing every single member of humanity in direct and accessible way. But that is the network of information. What about the physical network, the infrastructure, the ones we use to ship the things we order through the virtual spaces of the net? The airlines, the shipping lanes, the railroads and the expressways. I have on reliable sources that the actual range and volume of physical shipping across the world had remained at similar or lower levels since the height of the age of imperialism so long ago (the specific source I can’t find at the moment, if someone knows otherwise please correct me). It is somewhat unlikely that there is an actual shortage of food (at least not to the degree that some sensationalist media would have us believe). What we have at hand is more akin to the lack of distribution network, so that the flow of resources are channeled into the most readily available physical network without regards to economical balance, or even, the need. In the type of eschewed free market system we have in place at the moment, there is virtually no incentive for tapping into parts of the world without pre-built infrastructure. And without the resources of the world available at hand, popular discontent is bound to rise, leading to further instability.

Living in New York city, I am physically and mentally insulated from most of such problems plaguing the world. Hipsters in fashionable clothings walk into fashionable restaurants and eat a plateful of vegetables, supposedly crafted from fashionable ingredients, possibly grown in fashinable dirt, as they clutch their fashinable laptops while hoping someone sees them writing down a ‘novel.’ In the subway a woman so bloated that she has to take up two sits and a half holds onto her third bucket of KFC. Is there something wrong with this picture? I do not particularly think so. Of course, the scene I’ve just described is certainly distasteful, but I do not believe people should be judged and criticized for utilizing the resources made available to them by the environment. The physical network of the world is configured in such a way that massive amount of cheap resources and resources expensive beyond their actual value exist hand-in-hand, composing the greater fabric of the market system.

We are all cogs reinforcing the current system of the world. And this system of the world, this world-wide system of ‘free-market’ seem to be suffering from some sort of bug. A free market system without proper physical distribution network for the market to take place on is fundamentally oppressive and exploitative, even without malice, even with good will of the individual members of the system. Perhaps it is possible to speculate that the fiasco experienced by certain biocrop based national economies are very similar to that experienced by planned and enclosed economies of the old communist nations. There had been a few novel attempts at readjusting the system of the world through various means, like freer access to information network from poorer places of the globe allowing development of a market system based on information and knowledge, but outcome of such works-in progress are unpredictable at the moment.

All I can say is, I think the problems like the kind we are seeing right now seem to stem from certain inadequacy of the global network itself, and will persist in different forms so long as that inadequacy continues to plague the system of the world. And the developed nations of the world are making a huge mistake in allowing such unbalance to continue, as such difference in network-system tend to cluster individual components into groups sharing similar traits, which in this case would be poverty and isolation of economic and cultural nature.

This reminds me, how about donating some rice to the UN? It won’t cost you a dime and you’ll probably have fun doing it.

This is a two thirty in the morning post, just letting you know.

I came across an interesting service awhile ago, thought I’d share it with you.

http://vixy.net

It’s an online application that transcodes FLV files into other format of choice, like mp4 for ipod or avi for desktop viewing (for those who don’t have flv viewer). Although there are free desktop applications that does the same thing better, this one is useful in that it doesn’t eat up your computer’s resources. I’m transcoding some music videos and interesting TED talks into mp4 format right now.

Oh, and in case you don’t know what TED is, it’s an annual meeting of brilliant minds across the globe, giving talks on issues related to betterment of humanity. Their topics vary widely, from performing arts to particle physics, and each of those talks are truly a gem. I’ve been binge watching/listening Craig Venter these days. He is currently attempting to build a minimal genome network for construction of a base life-like system, so it has a lot to do with my obsessive interest in artificial life. It’s interesting how easy it is to find genome and synthetic biology relevant talks among the TED list. Whatever the result may be it is certainly the trend of the times… Makes me want to live forever.

The weather outside is the cool shade of a thunderstorm. I hope it continues into tomorrow.

This is a cross post of something I wrote before. I liked this post too much to leave it in middle of nowhere, so I’m moving it here.

This is something I ran across in my visit to the Met today. It’s a funeral marker of the ancient Greece, around 500 B.C. or so. According to the description given by the little placard at the bottom, there was an inscription on the stele at the original site. The translated version of the inscription reads like this.

“My daughter’s beloved child is the one I hold here, the one that I held on my lap while we looked at the light of the sun when we were alive and that I still hold now that we are both dead.”

The time was almost three thousand years ago, but the human sentiment runs the same. I might even argue that the dying grandmothers of the old were much more articulate than the living young ones we have right now. Nonetheless, I feel saddened and glad at the same time when I remember this scene, bathed in a solemn and melancholy light, phrases and situations telling its story through subtle hints which later echo in the heart of a young man from three thousand years in the future. Will we leave something behind as such? Will we leave behind something so that people living in three thousand years in the future would shed a tear or feel their heart wrench at the tales of people long gone and forgotten? Will the human identity remain resonant throughout the times?

Another something I picked up. It’s from roughly the same era as the above funeral marker. This one depicts a little girl saddened to let her pet pigeons go. This clumsy photo of mine doesn’t do justice to the subtle nuances and expressions that were retained in this piece despite its age. People talk of evolution and change all the time, but what we consider to be fundamentally human trait doesn’t seem to have changed much, if we can communicate across space and time like this through frozen motions and facial expressions.

I am beginning to suspect that the fundamental nature of what we consider to be humanity is more closely linked with the body at deeper levels. Perhaps the overall nervous structure and its extent affects the development of consciousness itself to some degree. Perhaps there is a minimal template of what we can consider to be a ‘mind’ just like the minimal framework of gene for the base artificial life, and the traits we consider to be human consciousness arises from there just like how the base gene later expresses itself in multiple ways, as a complex synthetic life form. If so, human psychology, and much of the subtle traits of being a human being, is locked with the type of body to certain extent, and therefore can be engineered like genes and engines.

I’ve been reading up on quite a bit of transhumanist literature recently, both arguments for and against it. I must say, I’m beginning to think that the biggest hurdle to any kind of transhumanist and historical/technological singularity ideas is the shallow naivety of the transhumanism/singularity proponents themselves.

Technology will not magically fix the ailing of the world, and the nature of intelligence and consciousness will take much longer to understand fully; it is only that we will be capable of simulating such characteristics using artificial medium. Electric networks certainly catalyzed some great changes for the system of the world, but in the end it was merely catalyzing of the potential already there. The human network and corresponding complex system of human-nodes and social-economic-cultural links were already put in place long time ago, to the extent that we classify such trait as a fundamental part of humanity as organisms. This also means that simple increase in technological capacity will not be enough to surpass the nature of the human network itself, only speed the process already in place.

Mind you, I am very enthusiastic about the future potential of humanity. And I do certainly believe that some sort of chapter-opening change of human civilization will take place sometime soon, not necessarily while I’m alive (I’m 21 by the way) but definitely soon when viewed from the scales of world history. I am simply becoming increasingly skeptical of the kind of change expected to take place by the transhumanist community at large (if there can be such a thing). Massive information processing and storage ability does not translate into intellectual capacity without human input. There simply aren’t enough scientific evidence to support such a claim. The very idea that some sort of external intelligence engine would be able to fix the world’s problems is a vague notion that makes me want to question the degree of understanding possessed by some of the more radical supporters of transhumanism regarding matters of intelligence, brain physiology, and complex system dynamics. Certain degree of performance boost in brain capacities will definitely change the face of human civilization. Artificial intelligence in its ideal form will transform everyone’s lives. There is no doubt about that. I am just very irked about the underlying notion that such advances would be the singular answer to the singular problem of the world. Does anyone remember the concept of legacy anymore? I suggest you to find and read Jaron Lanier’s essay on irreducible complexity (I’ve read it in a book) if you don’t know what I am talking about.

I believe in singularity-esque future, and all the good things it will bring. I also believe in reasonable ideas and sound scientific basis for reality, something some people seem to be forgetting in their rush to live forever.

The world science festival 2008 is happening in NYC from late May to June.

I am so excited! I just can’t wait to attend the events. They have bunch of big-name Nobel-laureates giving talks in conjunction with performance/conversation with artists, on wealth of interesting topics like the human identity, the ever-staple nature of quantum universe, future cityscape and physical basis of life.

I especially like how major art institutions and artists are participating along with the traditional scientists. “Come for the art, leave with the science” They say. Maybe this will be the first remarkable step towards the true artscience. Like I said, I can’t wait for the festival to start. I’m already browsing through their website marking down events I want to attend. They are happening all over the city and many of their time lapses with each other, so anyone planning on visiting one of the events should plan ahead.

Bring your children, your family, or your girl/boy friend! What’s the benefit of living in one of the biggest cities in the world if you don’t participate in the festivals, right?

Thinking of Olin Levi Warner’s Twilight.

The sky outside my room-size balcony is in the thoughtful shade of blue. The field of trees extending into the horizons are shimmering in the last rays of the sun, already sinking into the other end of the land. I can see thin lining of clouds turning violet just above the tree line.

I love the twilight. This is my favorite time of the day, neither light nor dark, everything feels so calm, and everything feels as if they are thinking. At this time everything seem to regain their true shape, lost and twisted during all the happenings of the day, and will be lost in the opaque obscurity of the night. In this hour, something seem to reach out to my being beyond the veil of the world, scattering strange, indescribable feelings. It’s a feeling that reminds me of all the beautiful things I’ve ever seen in my life.

In this hour, I feel like I’m truly alive, and the mysteries of the universe brushes silently against my windowsill.

I wonder how the ancestors of human beings felt at times like this. Does the impression of the world surpass the ability to articulate it? Is there some primordial phenomena purely composed of ‘feeling’ without involvement of intellect or consciousness? If so, can we understand the phenomena of the holy moment (anyone remember the Waking Life?) as innate to all complex and cognizant life-like systems? What is a cat thinking when she stares into the deepening twilight? Did my languageless ape ancestor stare into the twilight with a piece of bone in his hand, surrounded by indescribable feeling like I have?

People can teach art and science separately, but that doesn’t mean they reside in different worlds. Someday we will be able to explain beauty to our children without any nonsense.

I read this one a long time ago. I can still remember it vividly, filled with fantastic beings and locales. This book is a sort of crossover between creative fantasy and fairytale, though when I think about it practically every single creative writing can be said as a variation of the two categories. The style of the book is very reminiscent of the free-form fantasy /anything-goes style that seem to be all the rage these days, and the general scenery is sketched down in very imaginative and carefree manner tied together by meticulous storytelling ability.

Majority of the book really does revolve around the city of dreaming books, Bookholme, which is said to be inspired from the used books stores from the East Coast USA. Bookholme is an ancient city built upon giant network of caves and dungeons originally dug up to store precious and/or dangerous books away from prying eyes. As the time passed and the city got larger, people began dumping more and more books into the underground, which led to the formation of people called book hunters. Somewhat different from the book hunters we are familiar with from works like the Club Dumas, the book hunters of Bookholme are hunters first and book readers second (if they even know how to read), capable of dealing with giant monsters and blood sucking insects nesting in the subterranean book dungeon, as well as the ‘dangerous books’ created by book alchemists of the old.

As you can probably realize, this book is a real treat for the little bibliophile in all of us. Illustrated and light on tone, there is no mistaking that this is a children’s storybook, although I must say that the book is never childish like some of the forced children’s literary content out there. I’d rather classify this as a family content rather than a book aimed straight at children. Nothing beats a sunny afternoon, a good cup of tea, cute pastry, and a chapter or two of the city of dreaming books for relaxation.

The humanity’s obsession with information containing medium had been around since the beginning of history, and it might even stretch further than that, into the primordial side of us as life-like constructs. I’ve always been curious about that. Why would there be such mysterious appeal to information containing medium in nature? Books, monoliths, codex,and drawings, the signs are a plenty. Will it be too much to understand them as an attempt to create some sort of artificial life through the means at hand? A layer of translation between the world and the human psyche, perhaps?