BE STILL MY BEATING HEART!
Rabu, 29 Agustus 2012
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I even love the modern designs...
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CONSERVATORY LOVE!
Selasa, 28 Agustus 2012
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CONSERVATORY LOVE!
Senin, 27 Agustus 2012
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Esoteric Explanations
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My recent posts have been concerned with the nature and process of explanation. This fascinates me because not only is it central to understanding learning, but also in understanding the broader ways in which human beings organise themselves in institutions, businesses, families, and so on. Explanation is the thing that is continually going-on within what can appear to be 'self organising' social systems.
I'm interested in understanding these processes and trying to formalise their dynamics. There are many paradoxes about even wanting to do this: what I am producing is, after all, an explanation! But at the same time, I think there is value in working towards a more formalised way of thinking. Here, it is Nigel Howard's work on the 'Paradoxes of Rationality' which is interesting me most. Howard's 'paradox' is essentially a critical appreciation of game theory, where the rational assumptions of Von Neumann's game theory are followed to the their logical conclusions, and the rational behaviour which is supposed to underpin the playing of games (with their assumed ordinal pay-offs) is undermined by a careful examining of meta-strategies, coalitions, and the meta-games that are played with meta-strategies. A different kind of mathematics emerges, and as with all mathematics, this begins to reveal the limits of logic and knowledge. There's a paper or two in that, but I'll begin to explore it here shortly.
But before I dive into this, I'm being dragged-back (as I often do) to thinking 'how does this work for music?'. Because, whilst I am thinking about new mathematical formalisms for thinking about how things like the Viable System Model might work (one of the 'games' that I believe can be accounted for by Howard's work), music presents different kinds of problems, which may or may not fit the game metaphor.
Kant characterised artistic experience as a kind of cognitive 'game'. He says in the Critique of Judgement that:
Here I think it is important to take a step back from these questions and ask why they are asked. What I recognise myself as wanting to do is 'explain music'. Kant and Gadamer have provided a tantalising glimpse of an explanation... but how to make it more concrete, less "arm-wavy"? But then, why am I not satisfied with this explanation on its own?
There seems to be a connection between the desire to explain phenomena like music and the desire to understand processes of human social organisation, economics, business management, etc. The problem lies in the poverty of the explanations for economics and business in the face of the raw and profound experience provided by music.
Recently I've been struck by the power of some explanatory frameworks to try to bridge the gap between the deep human sensual experiences and the prosaic organisational concerns. In fact, there is plenty of slightly 'wacky' literature out there to try to do this: for example, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, Beck's 'Spiral Dynamics' or Jungian personality types; I suspect the VSM also fits into this category.
These are relatively new-fangled explanations. But they bear many similarities to more ancient explanatory frameworks. What about Tarot, Astrology or the I Ching? Or, for that matter, the allegories of the major religions and myths? Notwithstanding the content of these explanations, their explanatory function is very similar. They consist of a series of distinctions with an explanatory framework which connects those distinctions together (or rather, manipulates a probability distribution of certain distinctions following on 'logically' from others).
I wonder if it is this pattern of weaving distinctions together that characterises the process of explanation. However music is explained, the explanation will take a form of "there are these elements, and because there are these elements, these events are more or less likely". In terms of explaining music, the words which we explain things will be uttered in social company: there will need to be agreement. Here, the game of explaining music is as social as the game of explaining business organisation. I suspect it's a game of 'maintaining coalitions'. But the agreement that the coalition will be built on will be based on something more profound, sensual and pre-linguistic. My suspicion is that agreement about these things depends on the recognition of shared absence.
Deep down, music is its own explanation. Like Isadora Duncan famously remarked about her dancing: "No, I can't explain the dance to you; if I could tell you what it meant, there would be no point in dancing it." Music (like dance) explains. Or perhaps we might say, music unfolds. The game that our senses play with the art object that Kant and Gadamer allude to is related to the game that we play with each other when we explain our understanding. It is an unfolding of possibilities. Our verbal explanations might well serve our maintenance of coalitions, attachments to others, etc; the unfolding of music, or the self-explaining of music may also serve our maintenance of coalitions and attachments to others, but through affording us a deeper relationship with ourselves. In the realm of the senses we re-adjust and reform our equipment for social life.
There's one more thing to add here. Because it is, I think, a mistake to see our sensory equipment as some sort of inner-processing mechanism. It is instead the very process of sensual play where we are one of the players in the world of the senses. The game reveals what lies beyond the game. Music, as with the other arts, helps us to perceive what we cannot know; it's action is negative. As it brings the unknowable into sharper relief, so the grounds for recognition, love and agreement can be established. The extent to which this negativity is fundamental to explanation generally is the central question which lies behind any attempt to formalise explanation (and any good formalism will itself reveal what cannot be known).
So I have one question at the end of all this, which may appear a little abstruse: is the identification of shared absence the deepest meta-strategy which leads to the broadest and strongest coalition?
I'm interested in understanding these processes and trying to formalise their dynamics. There are many paradoxes about even wanting to do this: what I am producing is, after all, an explanation! But at the same time, I think there is value in working towards a more formalised way of thinking. Here, it is Nigel Howard's work on the 'Paradoxes of Rationality' which is interesting me most. Howard's 'paradox' is essentially a critical appreciation of game theory, where the rational assumptions of Von Neumann's game theory are followed to the their logical conclusions, and the rational behaviour which is supposed to underpin the playing of games (with their assumed ordinal pay-offs) is undermined by a careful examining of meta-strategies, coalitions, and the meta-games that are played with meta-strategies. A different kind of mathematics emerges, and as with all mathematics, this begins to reveal the limits of logic and knowledge. There's a paper or two in that, but I'll begin to explore it here shortly.
But before I dive into this, I'm being dragged-back (as I often do) to thinking 'how does this work for music?'. Because, whilst I am thinking about new mathematical formalisms for thinking about how things like the Viable System Model might work (one of the 'games' that I believe can be accounted for by Howard's work), music presents different kinds of problems, which may or may not fit the game metaphor.
Kant characterised artistic experience as a kind of cognitive 'game'. He says in the Critique of Judgement that:
"The cognitive powers, which are involved by this representation, are here in free play, because no definite concept limits them to a particular rule of cognition. Hence, the state of mind in this representation must be a feeling of the free play of the representative powers in a given representation with reference to a cognition in general."Kant's ideas about play also form an important element in the aesthetic theory of Gadamer. But if what is happening in aesthetic experience is 'play', what's the game? is there one? can it be characterised?
Here I think it is important to take a step back from these questions and ask why they are asked. What I recognise myself as wanting to do is 'explain music'. Kant and Gadamer have provided a tantalising glimpse of an explanation... but how to make it more concrete, less "arm-wavy"? But then, why am I not satisfied with this explanation on its own?
There seems to be a connection between the desire to explain phenomena like music and the desire to understand processes of human social organisation, economics, business management, etc. The problem lies in the poverty of the explanations for economics and business in the face of the raw and profound experience provided by music.
Recently I've been struck by the power of some explanatory frameworks to try to bridge the gap between the deep human sensual experiences and the prosaic organisational concerns. In fact, there is plenty of slightly 'wacky' literature out there to try to do this: for example, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, Beck's 'Spiral Dynamics' or Jungian personality types; I suspect the VSM also fits into this category.
These are relatively new-fangled explanations. But they bear many similarities to more ancient explanatory frameworks. What about Tarot, Astrology or the I Ching? Or, for that matter, the allegories of the major religions and myths? Notwithstanding the content of these explanations, their explanatory function is very similar. They consist of a series of distinctions with an explanatory framework which connects those distinctions together (or rather, manipulates a probability distribution of certain distinctions following on 'logically' from others).
I wonder if it is this pattern of weaving distinctions together that characterises the process of explanation. However music is explained, the explanation will take a form of "there are these elements, and because there are these elements, these events are more or less likely". In terms of explaining music, the words which we explain things will be uttered in social company: there will need to be agreement. Here, the game of explaining music is as social as the game of explaining business organisation. I suspect it's a game of 'maintaining coalitions'. But the agreement that the coalition will be built on will be based on something more profound, sensual and pre-linguistic. My suspicion is that agreement about these things depends on the recognition of shared absence.
Deep down, music is its own explanation. Like Isadora Duncan famously remarked about her dancing: "No, I can't explain the dance to you; if I could tell you what it meant, there would be no point in dancing it." Music (like dance) explains. Or perhaps we might say, music unfolds. The game that our senses play with the art object that Kant and Gadamer allude to is related to the game that we play with each other when we explain our understanding. It is an unfolding of possibilities. Our verbal explanations might well serve our maintenance of coalitions, attachments to others, etc; the unfolding of music, or the self-explaining of music may also serve our maintenance of coalitions and attachments to others, but through affording us a deeper relationship with ourselves. In the realm of the senses we re-adjust and reform our equipment for social life.
There's one more thing to add here. Because it is, I think, a mistake to see our sensory equipment as some sort of inner-processing mechanism. It is instead the very process of sensual play where we are one of the players in the world of the senses. The game reveals what lies beyond the game. Music, as with the other arts, helps us to perceive what we cannot know; it's action is negative. As it brings the unknowable into sharper relief, so the grounds for recognition, love and agreement can be established. The extent to which this negativity is fundamental to explanation generally is the central question which lies behind any attempt to formalise explanation (and any good formalism will itself reveal what cannot be known).
So I have one question at the end of all this, which may appear a little abstruse: is the identification of shared absence the deepest meta-strategy which leads to the broadest and strongest coalition?
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COASTAL STYLE...
Minggu, 26 Agustus 2012
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Big Data Hubris
Jumat, 24 Agustus 2012
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One of the most extraordinary things going on in technology at the moment is the realisation of the potential for the analysis of communications data. Having created a giant electronic network that includes everyone (the internet), we have created a situation where a significant percentage of our daily utterances are now made in an analysable form: the text that we send to each other, the transparency of those communications, the metadata that accompanies messages (like location and time, for example), the vast capacity for recall of histories and the tracing-back of conversations. Winograd and Flores argued (before the internet!) that computers were about communication (rather than data processing) and that their primary function was to record the speech acts that we make to one another (see http://www.amazon.co.uk/Understanding-Computers-Cognition-Foundation-Design/dp/0201112973/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345795866&sr=8-1). I think they were clearly right. Moreover, the recording of speech acts is unprecedented in human history: it is not the 'connectedness' of people that is new with the internet (we have always been interconnected as human beings); it is the capacity for the strategic organisation, recall and manipulation of human commitments.
Literacy created shared memory and allowed for the expansion of culture beyond the confines of oral traditions. Writing, in all its manifestations, has provided a foundation upon which the cultures which surround us established themselves. The book has been the foundation of every cultural development in world history for at least 2500 years. The storage and manipulation of speech acts needs to be seen historically in that context. And just as those who in the early days of literacy must have wondered what it all meant, we should be similarly open-eyed and open-minded about what our current revolution might do for us. It is, after all, a very very recent development. It's worth remembering that in the ancient monasteries, it was the art of interpretation of texts, of asking 'what does it mean?' that occupied the scholars.
In which spirit I would prefer to see our current fascination with the analysis of what is being called 'big data'. I am certain that for all the excitement, there are big dangers. Technology can give us a false sense of confidence that somehow we know, or can calculate, what it means. Its hard, mathematical, logical designs leave little room for doubt and questioning. But the ones who say "This is what it means!" will be the tyrants.
As our educational institutions take more notice of the power of data analysis, there is a danger of hubris regarding the "uncontestable objectivity" of some data analysis. Some people will find this useful to their own ends and use it as ways of manipulating others. We will have managers buoyed-up by the apparent logical rationale and uncontestable analysis that supports their most devious plans. But their analysis can never be any closer to the realities of the daily experiences of those they manage than if they had simply asserted their will without any explanation. Data analysis should not be confused with explanation!
This is not to say that data analysis cannot be part of the process of explanation. It is here that I believe the most productive outcomes of our 'big data' fascination might arise. But our problem, and it is the problem that's thrown into sharpest relief by the technology, is that we don't really understand what an explanation is. I think if the medieval obsession in the light of literacy was with hermeneutics - with understanding the meaning of things, then our obsession in the light of 'big data' should be with a deeper understanding of explanation. That is to understand how the games that we play with communications lead to learning, community and flourishing. But what we must realise in that process (and this is the antidote to hubris I think) is that however we look at this, the need is always for us to explain.
Literacy created shared memory and allowed for the expansion of culture beyond the confines of oral traditions. Writing, in all its manifestations, has provided a foundation upon which the cultures which surround us established themselves. The book has been the foundation of every cultural development in world history for at least 2500 years. The storage and manipulation of speech acts needs to be seen historically in that context. And just as those who in the early days of literacy must have wondered what it all meant, we should be similarly open-eyed and open-minded about what our current revolution might do for us. It is, after all, a very very recent development. It's worth remembering that in the ancient monasteries, it was the art of interpretation of texts, of asking 'what does it mean?' that occupied the scholars.
In which spirit I would prefer to see our current fascination with the analysis of what is being called 'big data'. I am certain that for all the excitement, there are big dangers. Technology can give us a false sense of confidence that somehow we know, or can calculate, what it means. Its hard, mathematical, logical designs leave little room for doubt and questioning. But the ones who say "This is what it means!" will be the tyrants.
As our educational institutions take more notice of the power of data analysis, there is a danger of hubris regarding the "uncontestable objectivity" of some data analysis. Some people will find this useful to their own ends and use it as ways of manipulating others. We will have managers buoyed-up by the apparent logical rationale and uncontestable analysis that supports their most devious plans. But their analysis can never be any closer to the realities of the daily experiences of those they manage than if they had simply asserted their will without any explanation. Data analysis should not be confused with explanation!
This is not to say that data analysis cannot be part of the process of explanation. It is here that I believe the most productive outcomes of our 'big data' fascination might arise. But our problem, and it is the problem that's thrown into sharpest relief by the technology, is that we don't really understand what an explanation is. I think if the medieval obsession in the light of literacy was with hermeneutics - with understanding the meaning of things, then our obsession in the light of 'big data' should be with a deeper understanding of explanation. That is to understand how the games that we play with communications lead to learning, community and flourishing. But what we must realise in that process (and this is the antidote to hubris I think) is that however we look at this, the need is always for us to explain.
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PARADISE...
Kamis, 23 Agustus 2012
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Is this what we're doing to Universities?
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This is the amateur restoration of a fresco reported by the BBC today: see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-19349921
To quote the BBC article,
The once-dignified portrait now resembles a crayon sketch of a very hairy monkey in an ill-fitting tunic
A friend suggested to me a while ago that managerialism can be thought of as "the governance of professional organisations by non-professionals". My view on this at the time was that the 'profession' of the University was contested, and that managers believe the University should be something different from that which academics might believe it should be (in the manager's view, it should be something easier for them to manage!). But the contested nature means that it is hard to know who is 'right'. Is there a 'right' way?
This fresco makes me rethink this view, because essentially it is a view that says there is no objective value in the University, it is a social construct which can 'change with the times' (postmodernism has done so much damage to universities.. but that's another post!). And Universities have changed with the times. But at the same time, there has been some maintenance of their 'essential quality', which has been stewarded by people who cared for their institutions and honoured their history. From a postmodern angle, one could argue that what is contested in the case of the fresco is an interpretation of what the fresco should look like. But deep down, I think that is patently insane: it is hard to defend what has been done (except for its comedic value!).
That means that there was something of essential value which has been destroyed through amateur interference. If managerialism is governance by non-professionals, then might a similar result can be expected on the institutions they govern?
What is distressing about this is the fact that the damage is irreparable: there can be no going back; As with the library at Alexandria, it is now only a moment in history when something important was lost.
All that we can do is mourn and learn from what's happened.
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Clearing! (a new *exciting* game between students and institutions)
Rabu, 22 Agustus 2012
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I've been involved in a game of risk and strategy over the last week which has been played out in every University in the UK. The game is called 'Clearing', and it is a complex game of psychology that appears misleadingly simple. Actually, it used to be a bit simpler than it is now, but in the last year, the Society for Umpiring Clearing Knowledge and University Protocols (SUCKUP) has amended the rules regarding the pay-offs and penalties for certain moves which have had a profound impact on the way in which the game is played. Having said that, the moves that players may make in the game are unchanged.
Player A is an individual - usually an individual lacking in social, cultural or financial capital. The deep objective of Clearing is to increase capital, or rather increase cultural and social capital in the hope that financial capital will follow. Player A's means of increasing their capital is to enroll in an institution run by Player B. Not all institutions are open to Player A, depending on how much 'educational' capital they already possess. The higher the starting capital, the greater the choice for Player A.
Player B runs (or is employed by) an educational institution. Player B's goal is to maintain the viability of the institution by increasing (or at least maintaining) its social and cultural capital, which in terms of institutions is generally referred to as its 'reputation'. Player B's cards are not evenly distributed. Some Player Bs will have high reputation; others will not. The higher the reputation of Player B, the more likely they will be able to attract good Player As in order to maintain their viability and (potentially) grow.
With the amendments by SUCKUP, Player A must now pay a lot of money to Player B in exchange for the the cultural and social benefit. Given that Player A doesn't have any money, what they must in fact do is promise to pay in installments after they have left the institution.
In this situation, there are a number of risks that are borne by both Player A and Player B. Player B, if they have a poor set of cards, risks either not attracting any Player As, and therefore going broke, or only attracting Player A's whose educational capital is low, and whose risk of dropping out are high, with consequent damage to Player B's institution.
Player A's risks are considerable and unfold in the range of decisions that need to be taken as Player A moves through the game. These decisions are:
Some of the risks relating to these decisions are calculable, and others are not. The risk relating to each one can be summarised as:
Current indications show that there is a "graduate premium". It is difficult to predict if this will reduce or increase over the next 20 years.
These choices can be summarised in the diagram below:
Player A is an individual - usually an individual lacking in social, cultural or financial capital. The deep objective of Clearing is to increase capital, or rather increase cultural and social capital in the hope that financial capital will follow. Player A's means of increasing their capital is to enroll in an institution run by Player B. Not all institutions are open to Player A, depending on how much 'educational' capital they already possess. The higher the starting capital, the greater the choice for Player A.
Player B runs (or is employed by) an educational institution. Player B's goal is to maintain the viability of the institution by increasing (or at least maintaining) its social and cultural capital, which in terms of institutions is generally referred to as its 'reputation'. Player B's cards are not evenly distributed. Some Player Bs will have high reputation; others will not. The higher the reputation of Player B, the more likely they will be able to attract good Player As in order to maintain their viability and (potentially) grow.
With the amendments by SUCKUP, Player A must now pay a lot of money to Player B in exchange for the the cultural and social benefit. Given that Player A doesn't have any money, what they must in fact do is promise to pay in installments after they have left the institution.
In this situation, there are a number of risks that are borne by both Player A and Player B. Player B, if they have a poor set of cards, risks either not attracting any Player As, and therefore going broke, or only attracting Player A's whose educational capital is low, and whose risk of dropping out are high, with consequent damage to Player B's institution.
Player A's risks are considerable and unfold in the range of decisions that need to be taken as Player A moves through the game. These decisions are:
- Do I play the game at all?
- If I play the game, which Player B do I (can I) play with?
- What are my chances of success?
- Will success really increase my social and cultural capital?
- Will my financial commitment to my studies hamper me later in life?
- Will my financial capital increase as a result of my success with Player B?
Some of the risks relating to these decisions are calculable, and others are not. The risk relating to each one can be summarised as:
- Do I play the game at all?
If I don't play the game, I may be hampered in my career, but I will not be saddled with debt.
- If I play the game, which Player B do I (can I) play with?
If I choose my institution or course badly, I will increase my risk of failure. I will finish as if I had chosen not to play at all, but I will be carrying some debt
- What are my chances of success?
If I fail my course, I will finish as if I had chosen not to play at all, but I will be carrying debt according to how long it took me to decide to cut my losses
- Will success really increase my social and cultural capital?
If I choose my institution or my course badly, then even if I pass, my course may not reward me in the way I hoped.
- Will my financial commitment to my studies hamper me later in life?
The student debt is considerable. I will notice the payments early in my career when I am likely to be wanting to buy a house, get married and have children. I am unlikely to be earning enough for the debt payments not to notice until later in my career. Financial pressures might make it more likely that I get divorced, lose my house and end up on the streets!
- Will my financial capital increase as a result of my success with Player B?
Current indications show that there is a "graduate premium". It is difficult to predict if this will reduce or increase over the next 20 years.
These choices can be summarised in the diagram below:
The important point to notice here is that there are a number of ways that Player A can lose. They can choose not to play, but carry no penalty; they can choose to play but not succeed, where they lose whatever costs incurred up to the point they leave; and they lose even if they succeed if they fail to capitalise on their degree. At the centre of the problem for Player A is an inability to assess the risk they take in pursuing a course.
Player A has no knowledge when they make their early moves as to whether they will be able to succeed. There is nothing Player B does for Player A to help them assess the risk they might be taking. Ironically, this is also against the interests of Player B, because Player A's failure impacts on Player B's viability.
I think the logical conclusion from this is that Player B should invest in open education, making it easier for Player A to assess the risks they are taking. That way, the judgement of risk between playing and not playing can be left to Player A working with more complete information both about what they are dealing with and what they believe their capabilities are.
Amongst the recent initiatives of SUCKUP have been requirements for Player B to publish data concerning their success rates, employability and satisfaction. This presumably has been done as an initiative to address the risk situation bearing on Player A. However, this is unlikely to succeed because every Player A is different, and not every Player B reflects accurately in bland statistics: such statistics can in fact be mis-information.
Only the opening up of the actual product can do the job. An urgent amendment to SUCKUP's rules and regulations is required!
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OUTDOOR ROOMS...
Senin, 20 Agustus 2012
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Dark Princess Wallpapers
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Wallpapersa gives you an amazing collection of the dark side of fantasy. Do you like a stunning warrior girl on your computer background? IF your answer is yes then this spectacular collection of dark princess wallpapers is meant for your eyes. Discover just how much adventure hides in these amazing wallpapers just for you to enjoy all day long in everything you do.
Wallpapersa gives you an amazing collection of the dark side of fantasy. Do you like a stunning warrior girl on your computer background? IF your answer is yes then this spectacular collection of dark princess wallpapers is meant for your eyes. Discover just how much adventure hides in these amazing wallpapers just for you to enjoy all day long in everything you do.
Experience the beauty that dark fantasy has to offer along with tribes. Join the tribal princesswhen she goes on adventures beyond your wildest dreams. Meet all the friend in and guardians of the woods and learn well from them about all the dangers and secrets of walks around in the beautiful wilderness called the woods.
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