Stanislas Klossowski de Rola. Alchemy. The Secret Art. London:Thames and Hudson, 1973.
J.C. Cooper. Chinese Alchemy. The Taoist Quest for Immortality.Wellingborough, Northamptonshire: Aquarian Press, 1984.
Robert Zoller. The Arabic Parts in Astrology. The Lost Key to Prediction. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions International (distributed by Harper & Row), 1989.
Dane Rudhyar. An Astrological Mandala. The Cycle ofTransformation and Its 360 Symbolic Phases. 1st ed. New York:Random House, 1973.
Cyril Fagan. Astrological Origins. St. Paul: LlewellynPublications, 1971.
Percy Seymour. Astrology. The Evidence of Science. Luton,Bedfordshire: Lennard, 1988.
Rodney Davies. Fortune-Telling by Astrology. The History andPractice of Divination by the Stars. Wellingborough,Northamptonshire: Aquarian Press, 1988.
"Astrological herbalism distinguished seven planetary plants, twelve herbs associated with signs of the zodiac and thirty-six plants assigned to decantates and to horoscopes" cf. Lévi-Strauss, Le cru et le cuit, p. 42. Ruth Drayer. Numerology. The Language of Life. El Paso, TX: Skidmore-Roth Publications, 1990.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) Nobel prize laureate, 1921.
He discusses the conditions of existence for which we are not adjusted in Über den Frieden, Weltordnung und Weltuntergang (O. Norden and H. Norden, Editors.), Bern. 1975, p. 494.
In a letter to Jacques Hadamard (1945), Einstein explained: "The words of the language, as they are written or spoken, do not seem to play any role in my mechanisms of thought. The physical entities which seem to serve as elements in thought are certain signs and more or less clear images which can be 'voluntarily' reproduced or combined" cf. A Testimonial from Professor Einstein, in The Psychology of Invention in the Mathematical Field, edited by J. Hadamard, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1945, p. 142.
Raymond Kurzweil, The Age of Intelligent Machines, Cambridge: MITPress, 1990.
"Rather than defining intelligence in terms of its constituent processes, we might define it in terms of its goal: the ability to use symbolic reasoning in the pursuit of a goal" (p. 17).
Alan Bundy, The Computer Modelling of Mathematical Reasoning. NewYork: Academic Press, 1983.
Allan Ramsey. Formal Methods in Artificial Intelligence.Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
M. Reinfrank, Editor. Non-Monotonic Reasoning: SecondInternational Workshop. Berlin/New York: Springer Verlag, 1989.Titus Lucretius Carus. De rerum natura (edited with translationand commentary by John Godwin). Warminster, Wiltshire, England:Aris & Phillips,1986.
-. The Nature of Things. Trans. Frank O. Copley. 1st ed. NewYork: Norton., 1977.
Epicurus, called by Timon "the last of the natural philosophers," was translated by Lucretius into Latin. His Letter to Herodotus and Master Sayings (Kyriai doxai) were integrated in De rerum natura (On Nature). A good reference book is Clay Diskin's Lucretius and Epicurus, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983.
Galileo Galilei. Discorsi e dimostrazioni matematiche (Two NewSciences: Including Centers of Gravity and Force of Percussion,translated, with a new introduction and notes, by StillmanDrake). Toronto: Wall & Thompson, 1989.
-. Galileo's Early Notebooks. The Physical Questions (translated from the Latin, with historical and paleographical commentary, by William A. Wallace). Notre Dame IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1977.
Starting out as a dictionnaire raisonné of the sciences, the arts, and crafts, the Encyclopédie became a major form of philosophic expression in the 18th century. Philosophers dedicated themselves to the advancement of the sciences and secular thought, and to the social program of the Enlightenment. The Encyclopédie showcased new directions of thought in all branches of intellectual activity. The emergent values corresponding to the pragmatic condition of time, tolerance, innovation, and freedom, were expressed in the Encyclopedic writings and embodied in the political program of the revolutions it inspired. One of the acknowledged sources of this orientation is Ephraim Chamber's Cyclopedia (or an Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences), London, 1728.
The examination of star naming is in some ways an exercise in the geology of pragmatic contexts. The acknowledgment of what is high, over, above, and beyond the observer's actions suggested power. The sequence of day and night, of seasons, of the changing weather is a mixture of repetitive patterns and unexpected occurrences, even meteorites, some related to wind, fire, water. Once the shortest and the longest days are observed, and the length of day equal to that of night (the equinox), the sky becomes integrated in the pragmatics of human self-constitution by virtue of affecting cycles of work. Furthermore, parallel to the mytho-magical explanation of what happens follows the association of mythical characters, mainly to stars. Saturn, or Chronos, was the god of time, a star known for its steady movement; Jupiter, known by the Egyptians as Ammon, the most impressive planet, and apparently the biggest. Details of this geology of naming could lead to a book. Here are some of the names used: Mythomagical: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Pluto; Zodiacal: Gemini, Capricorn, Sagittarius, Scorpio, etc.
Space: limitless, 3-dimensional, in which objects exist, events occur, movement takes place. Objects have relative positions and their movement has relative directions. The geometric notion of space expands beyond 3-dimensionality.
Paradigm: Since the time Thomas Kuhn published The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962), the concept of paradigm was adopted in philosophic jargon. The underlying thesis is that science operates in a research space dominated by successive research models, or paradigms. The domination of such a paradigm does not make it more important than previous scientific explanations (paradigms are not comparable). Rather it effects a certain convergence in the unifying framework it ascertains.
Logos: ancient Greek for word, was many times defined, almost always partially, as a means to express thoughts. By generalization, logos became similar to thought or reason, and thus a way to control the word through speech (legein). In this last sense, logos was adapted by Christianity as the Word of Divinity.
For a description of holism, see Holism-A Philosophy for Today, by Harry Settanni (New York: P. Lang, 1990).
Techné: from the Greek, means "pertaining to the making of artifacts" (art objects included).
Francis Bacon (1561-1626): Statesman and philosopher, distinguished for establishing the empiric methods for scientific research. Intent on analytical tools, he set out methods of induction which proved to be effective in the distinction between scientific and philosophical research. In The Advancement of Learning (1605) and especially Novum Organum (1620), Bacon set forth principles that affected the development of modern science.
René Descartes (1596-1650): Probably one of the most influential philosophers and scientists, whose contribution, at a time of change and definition, marked Western civilization in many ways. The Cartesian dualism he developed ascertains a physical (res extensa) and a thinking (res cogitans) substance. The first is extended, can be measured and divided; the second is indivisible. The body is part of res extensa, the mind (including thoughts, desires, volition) is res cogitans. His rules for the Direction of the Understanding (1628), influenced by his mathematical concerns, submitted a model for the acquisition of knowledge. The method of doubt, i.e., rejection of everything not certain, expressed in the famous Discourse on Method (1637), together with the foundation of a model of science that combines a mechanic image of the universe described mathematically, are part of his legacy.
Edwin A. Abbot. Flatland. A Romance of Many Dimensions. By aSquare.
A broad-minded square guides the reader through a 2-dimensional space. High priests (circular figures) forbid discussing a third dimension. Abruptly, the square is transported into spaceland and peers astonished into his 2-dimensional homeland.
Spatial reasoning: a type of reasoning that incorporates the experience of space either in direct forms (geometric reasoning) or indirectly (through terms such as close, remote, among others).
Linearity: relation among dependent phenomena that can be described through a linear function.
Non-linearity: relations among dependent phenomena that cannot be described through a linear function, but through exponential and logarithmic functions, among others.
Jackson E. Atlee. Perspectives of Non-Linear Dynamics.Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
S. Neil Rasband. Chaotic Dynamics of Non-Linear Systems. NewYork: Wiley, 1990.
Coherence: the notion that reflects interest in how parts of a whole are connected. Of special interest is the coherence of knowledge.
Ralph C.S. Walker. The Coherence Theory of Truth: Realism,Anti-Realism, Idealism. London/New York: Routledge, 1989.
Alan H. Goldman. Moral Knowledge. London/New York: Routledge, 1988.
A major survey, focused on the contributions of Keith Lehrer andLaurence Bon Jour, was carried out in The Current State of theCoherence Theory. Critical Essays on the Epistemic Theories ofKeith Lehrer and Laurence Bon Jour, with Replies (John W.Bender, Editor, Dordrecht/Boston: Kluwer Academic Publishers,1989).
David Kirsch. Foundations of Artificial Intelligence. (A special volume of the journal Artificial Intelligence, 47:1-3, January 1991. Amsterdam: Elsevier.
Self-organization is a dominant topic in artificial life research. The Annual Conference on Artificial Life (Santa Fe) resulted in a Proceedings in which self-organization is amply discussed. Some aspects pertinent to the subject can be found in:
H. Haken. Advanced Synergetics: Instability Hierarchies ofSelf-Organizing Systems and Devices. Berlin/New York: SpringerVerlag, 1983.
P.C.W. Davies. The Cosmic Blueprint. London: Heinemann, 1987.
G. M. Whitesides. Self-Assembling Materials, in Nanothinc, 1996. http://www.nanothinc.com/webmaster @nanothinc.com
More information on self-assembling materials and nanotechnology can be found on the Internet at http://www.nanothinc.com/webmaster @nanothinc.com and at http://www.foresight.org/webmaster@foresight.org.
Richard Feynman, in a talk given in 1959, stated that "The principles of physics…do not speak against the possibility of maneuvering things atom by atom. […] The problems of chemistry and biology can be greatly helped if our ability to…do things on an atomic level is ultimately developed, a developmet which I think cannot be avoided." (cf. http://www.foresight.org).
Preston Prather. Science Education and the Problem of ScientificEnlightenment, in Science Education, 5:1, 1996.
The money invested in science is a slippery subject. While direct funds, such as those made available through the National Science Foundation, are rather scarce, funding through various government agencies (Defense, Agriculture, Energy, NASA) and through private sources amounts to hundreds of billions of dollars. How much of this goes to fundamental research and how much to applied science is not very clear, as even the distinction between fundamental and applied is less and less clear.
Ernst Mach. The Science of Mechanics (1883). Trans. T.J.McCormick. LaSalle, IL: Open Court, 1960.
Henri Poincaré. The Foundations of Science (1909). Trans. G.B.Halsted. New York: The Science Press, 1929.
N.P. Cambell. Foundations of Science (1919). New York: Dover, 1957.
Bas C. van Fraasen. The Scientific Image. Oxford: ClarendonPress,1980.
Richard Dawkins. The Selfish Gene. New York: Oxford UniversityPress, 1976.
-. The Extended Phenotype. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982.
Elan Moritz, of the Institute for Memetic Research, provides the historic and methodological background to the subject in Introduction to Memetic Science.
E.O. Wilson. Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. Cambridge:Belknap/Harvard University Press, 1975.
Mihai Nadin. Mind-Anticipation and Chaos (from the seriesMilestones in Thought and Discovery). Stuttgart/Zurich: BelserPresse, 1991.
-. The Art and Science of Multimedia, in Real-Time Imaging (P.Laplante & A. Stoyenko, Editors). Piscataway NJ: IEEE Press,January, 1996.
-. Negotiating the World of Make-Believe: The Aesthetic Compass, in Real-TIme Imaging. London: Academic Press, 1995.
"Philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it," Karl Marx (cf. Theses on Feuerbach (from Notebooks of 1844-1845). See also Writings of the Young Marx on Philosophy and Society, Garden City NY: Anchor Books, 1967, p. 402.
Paul K. Feyerabend. Against Method. Outline of an AnarchisticTheory of Knowledge. London: Verson Edition,1978.
-. Three Dialogues on Knowledge. Oxford, England/Cambridge MA:Blackwell,1991.
Imre Lakatos. Philosophical Papers, in two volumes (edited byJohn Worrall and Gregory Currie). Cambridge, England/New York:Cambridge University Press, 1978.
-. Proofs and Refutations. The Logic of Mathematical Discovery(John Worrall and Elie Zahar, Editors). Cambridge, England/NewYork: Cambridge University Press, 1976.
Multivalued logic: expands beyond the truth and falsehood of sentences, handling the many values of the equivocal or the ambiguous.
Charles S. Peirce ascertained that all necessary reasoning is mathematical reasoning, and that all mathematical reasoning is diagrammatic. He explained diagrammatic reasoning as being based on a diagram of the percept expressed and on operations on the diagram. The visual nature of a diagram ("composed of lines, or an array of signs…") affects the nature of the operations performed on it (cf. On the Algebra of Logic: A Contribution to the Philosophy of Notation, in The American Journal of Mathematics, 7:180-202, 1885).
Brockman, John. The Third Culture: Beyond the ScientificRevolution. (A collection of essays with Introduction written byJohn Brockman.) New York: Simon & Schuster. 1995
Here are some quotations from the contributors: Brockman maintains that there is a shift occurring in public discourse, with scientists supplanting philosophers, artists, and people of letters as the ones who render "visible the deeper meanings of our lives, redefining who and what we are."
"We're at the stage where things change on the order of decades, and it seems to be speeding up…." (Danny Hillis)
Auguste Compte, in whose works the thought of Positivism is convincingly embodied, attracted the attention of John Stuart Mill, who wrote The Positive Philosophy of Auguste Compte (Boston: Lee and Shepard, 1871). Some of Compte's early writings are reproduced in The Crisis of Industrial Civilization (Ronald Fletcher, Editor, London: Heinemann Educational, 1974).
Stefano Poggi. Introduzione al il Positivisma. Bari: Laterza, 1987.
Sybil de Acevedo. Auguste Compte: Qui êtes-vous? Lyons: LaManufacture, 1988.
Emil Durkheim. De la division du travail social. 9e ed. Paris:Presses univérsitaires de France, 1973. (Translated as TheDivision of Labor in Society by W.D. Halls, New York: Free Press,1984.
Durkheim applied Darwin's natural selection to labor division.
Herbert Spencer (1820-1903): very well known for his essay, Progress: Its Laws and Cause (1857), attempted to conceive a theory of society based on naturalist principles. What he defined as the "super- organic," which stands for social, is subjected to evolution. In his view, societies undergo, cycles of birth- climax-death. Productive power varies from one cycle to other (cf. Principles of Sociology, 1876-1896).
Art(ifacts) and Aesthetic Processes
Art Speigelman. Maus. A Survivor's Tale. New York: PantheonBooks, 1986; and Maus II: A Survivor's Tale-And Here My TroublesBegan. New York Pantheon Books, 1991.
Started as a comic strip (in Raw, an experimental Comix magazine, co-edited by Speigelman and Françoise Monly) on the subject of the Holocaust, Maus became a book and, on its completion, the Museum of Modern Art in New York dedicated a show to the artist. Over 1500 interlocking drawings tell the story of Vladek, the artist's father. The comic book convention was questioned as to its appropriateness for the tragic theme.
Milli Vanilli, the group that publicly acknowledged that the album Girl You Know It's True, for which it was awarded the Grammy for Best New Artist of 1989, was vocally interpreted by someone else. The prize winners, Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus, credited for the vocals, were hardly the first to take advantage of the new means for creating the illusion of interpretation. As the 'visual entertainment," they became the wrapper on a package containing the music of less video-reputed singers. Their producer, Frank Tarian (i.e., Franz Reuther) was on his second "fake." Ten years earlier, he revealed that the pop group Boney M. was his own "mouthpiece." Image-driven pop music sells the fantasy of teen idol to a musically illiterate public. Packaged music extends to simulations of instruments and orchestras as well.
Beauty and the Beast is the story of a handsome prince in 18th century France turned into an eight-foot tall, hideous, hairy beast. Unless he finds someone to love him before his 21st birthday, the curse cast upon him by the old woman he tried to chase away will become permanent. In a nearby village, Maurice, a lovable eccentric inventor, his daughter Belle, who keeps her nose in books and her head in the clouds, and Gaston, the macho of the place, go through the usual "he (Gaston) loves/wants her; she does not care for/shuns him, etc." As its 30th full-length animation, this Walt Disney picture is a musical fairy tale that takes advantage of sophisticated computer animation. Its over one million drawings (the work of 600 animators, artists, and technicians) are animated, some in sophisticated 3-dimensional computer animation. The technological performance, resulting from an elaborate database, provided attractive numbers, such as the Be Our Guest sequence (led by the enchanted candelabra, teapot, and clock characters, entire chorus lines of dancing plates, goblets, and eating utensils perform a musical act), or the emotional ballroom sequence. Everything is based on the accepted challenge: "OK, go ahead and fool us," once upon a time uttered by some art director to the computer-generated imagery specialists of the company. The story (by Mme. Leprince de Beaumont) inspired Jean Cocteau, who wrote the screenplay for (and also directed) La Belle et La Bête (1946), featuring Jean Marais, Josette Day, and Marcel André.
Anselm Kiefer (b. 1945). Seduced by the relation to history, he produces allegories in reference to myth, art, religion, and culture. His compositions are strongly evocative, not lacking a certain critical dimension, sometimes focused on art itself, which repeatedly failed during times of challenge (those of Nazi Germany included).
Terminator 2 is a movie about two cyborgs who come from the future, one to destroy, the other to protect, a boy who will affect the future when he grows up. It is reported to be the most expensive film made as of 1991 (over 130 characters are killed), costing 85 to 100 million dollars; cf. Stanley Kauffmann, The New Republic, August 12, 1991, pp. 28-29.
Kitsch: defined in dictionaries as gaudy, trash, pretentious, shallow art expression addressing a low, unrefined taste. Kitsch-like images are used as ironic devices in artworks critical of the bourgeois taste.
The relation between art and language occasioned a major show organized by the Société des Expositions du Palais de Beaux-Arts in Brussels. A catalogue was edited by Jan Debbant and Patricia Holm (Paris: Galerie de Paris; London: Lisson Gallery; New York: Marian Goodman Gallery). Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831). Ästhetik (Hrsg. von Friedrich Bassenge). Berlin: Verlag das Europäische Buch, 1985.
Dadaism: Hans Arp defined Dada as "the nausea caused by the foolish rational explanation of the world" (1916, Zurich). Richard Huelsenbeck stated that "Dada cannot be understood, it must be experienced" (1920). More on this subject can be found in:
Raoul Hausmann. Am Anfang war Dada. (Hrsg. von Karl Riha &Gunter Kampf). Steinbach/Giessen: Anabas-Verlag G. Kampf, 1972.
Serge Lemoine. Dada. Paris: Hazan, 1986.
Dawn Ades. Dada and Surrealism Reviewed. London: Arts Council ofGreat Britain, 1978.
Hans Bollinger, et al. Dada in Zurich. Zurich: Kunsthaus Zurich, 1985.
Walter Benjamin. Art in the Age of its Mechanical Reproduction isa translation of Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischenReproduzierbarkeit: drei studien zur Kunstsoziologie.Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1963.
Walter de Maria's Lightning Field project was carried out with the support of the Dia Art Foundation, which bought the land and maintains and allows for limited public access to the work. As the prototypical example of land-art, this lattice of lightning rods covers an area of one mile by one kilometer. Filled with 400 rods placed equidistantly, the lightning field is the interplay between precision and randomness. During the storm season in New Mexico, the work is brought to life by many bolts of lightning. The artist explained that "Light is as important as lightening." Indeed, during its 24-hour cycle, the field goes through a continuous metamorphosis. Nature and art interact in fascinating ways.
Christo's latest work was entitled Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, July 1995. Regarding Christo's many ambitious projects, some references are:
Erich Himmel, Editor. Christo. The Pont-Neuf Wrapped, Paris 1975-1985. New York: Abrams, 1990.
Christo: The Umbrellas. Joint project for Japan and the USA, 25May - 24 June, 1988. London: Annely Juda Fine Art, 1988.
Christo: Surrounded Islands. Köln: DuMont Buch Verlag, 1984. Christo: Wrapped Walkways, Loose Park, Kansas City, Missouri, 1977-1978. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1978.
Christo: Valley Curtain, Riffle, Colorado. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1973.
The Bauhaus, a school of arts and crafts, founded in 1919 in Weimar, by Walter Gropius. Its significance results from the philosophy of education expressed in the Bauhaus program, to which distinguished artists contributed, and from the impressive number of people who, after studying at the Bauhaus, affirmed its methods and vision in worlds of art, architecture, and new educational programs. Among the major themes at Bauhaus were the democratization of artistic creation (one of the last romantic ideas of our time), the social implication of art, and the involvement of technology. Collaborative, interdisciplinary efforts were encouraged; the tendency to overcome cultural and national boundaries was tirelessly pursued; the rationalist attitude became the hallmark of all who constituted the school. In 1925, the Bauhaus had to move to Dessau, where it remained until 1928, before it settled in Berlin. After Gropius, the architects Hans Mayer (1930-1932) and Mies van der Rohe (1932-1933) worked on ascertaining the international style intended to offer visual coherence and integrity. In some ways, the Bauhaus was continued in the USA, since many of its personalities and students had to emigrate from Nazi Germany and found safe haven in the USA.
Leon Battista Alberti (15th century) wrote extensively on painting and sculpture: De pictura and De Statua were translated by Cecil Grayson (London: Phaidon, 1972). Alberti's writings on the art of building, De re aedificatoria, was translated by Joseph Rykwert, Neil Leach, and Robert Tavernor (10 volumes, Cambridge MA: MIT Press, 1988).
Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968). Intently against those who were "intoxicated by turpentine," he pursued a "dry art." From the Nu descendant un escalier, considered "an explosion in a fireworks factory" to his celebrated ready-mades, Duchamp pursued the call to "de-artify" art. Selection became the major operation in offering objects taken out of context and appropriating them as aesthetic icons. He argued that "Art is a path to regions where neither time nor space dominate."
Happening: An artistic movement based on the interaction among different forms of expression. Allan Kaprow (at Douglas College in 1958) and the group associated with the Reuben gallery in New York (Kaprow, Jim Dine, Claes Oldenburg, Whitman, Hausen) brought the movement to the borderline where distinctions between the artist and the public are erased. Later, the movement expanded to Europe.
Andy Warhol. The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: from A to B and BackAgain. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975.
-. Strong Opinions. New York: McGraw Hill, 1973.
Andy Warhol is remembered for saying that in the future, everyone will be a celebrity for 15 minutes.
Vladimir (Vladimirovich) Nabokov. Lectures on Literature. Edited by Fredson Bowers, introduction by John Updike. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980-1981.
"A rose is a rose is a rose…," now quite an illustrious (if nottrite) line, originated in Gertrude Stein's poem Sacred Emily.But "…A rose by any other name/would smell as sweet." fromShakespeares Romeo and Juliet can be seen as a precursor.
Symbolism is a neo-romantic art movement of the end of the 19th century, in reaction to the Industrial Revolution and positivist attitudes permeating art and existence. Writers such as Beaudelaire, Rimbaud, Maeterlinck, Huysmans, composers (Wagner, in the first place), painters such as Gauguin, Ensor, Puvis de Chavannes, Moreau, and Odilon Redon created in the spirit of symbolism. At the beginning of the 20th century, symbolism attempted to submit a unified alphabet of images. Jung went so far as to identify its psychological basis.
James Joyce (1882-1941). Ulysses. A critical and synoptic (though very controviersial) edition, prepared by Hans Walter Gabler with Wolfgang Steppe and Claus Melchior. New York: Garland Publishers, 1984.
Antoine Furetière. Essais d'un Dictionnaire Universel. Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1968 (reprint of the original published in 1687 in Amsterdam under the same title).
Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937). 2000 Pagine de Gramsci. A cura diGiansiro Ferrata e Niccolo Gallo. Milano: Il Saggiatore, 1971.
-. Gramsci: Selections from Cultural Writings. (Edited by DavidForgacs and Geoffrey Newell-Smith; translated by WilliamBoelhower). Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 1985.
-. Le Ceneri di Gramsci. Milano: Garzanti, 1976.
Pier Paolo Pasolini (1922-1975). Turc al Friul. Traduzione eintroduzione di Giancarlo Bocotti. Munich: Instituto Italian diCultura, 1980. Ken Kesey. The Further Inquiry. Photographs byRon Bevirt. New York: Viking Penguin, 1990.
Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880). Madame Bovary. Paris: Gallimard, 1986.
-. Madame Bovary. Patterns of provincial life. (Translated, with a new introduction by Francis Steegmuller). New York: Modern Library, 1982.
Donald Barthelme. Amateurs. New York: Farrar, Strauss, Giroux, 1976.
-. The King. New York: Harper & Row, 1990.
-. The Slightly Irregular Fire Engine or The Hithering ThitheringDjinn. New York: Farrar, Strauss, Giroux, 1971.
Kurt Vonnegut. Breakfast of Champions or, Goodbye Blue Monday!New York: Delacorte Press, 1973.
-. Galapagos. A Novel. New York: Delacorte Press, 1985.
-. Fates Worse than Death. An Autobiographical Collage of the 1980's. New York: G.P. Putnam's, 1991.
John Barth. Chimera. New York: Random House, 1972.
-. The Literature of Exhaustion and the Literature ofReplenishment. Northridge CA: Lord John Press, 1982.
-. Sabbatical. A Romance. New York: Putnam, 1982.
William H. Gass. Fiction and the Figures of Life. New York:Knopf, 1970.
-. Habitations of the Word: Essays. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985.
-. In the Heart of the Heart of the Country and Other Stories.New York: Harper & Row, 1968.
Gary Percesepe. What's Eating William Gass?, in MississippiReview, 1995.
Gertrude Stein's writing technique is probably best exemplified by her own writing. How to Write, initially published in 1931 in Paris (Plain Editions), states provocatively that "Clarity is of no importance because nobody listens and nobody knows what you mean no matter what you mean nor how clearly you mean what you mean." In an interview with Robert Haas, 1946) in Afterword, Gertrude Stein stated that "Any human being putting down words had to make sense out of them," (p. 101). "I write with my eyes not with my ears or mouth," (p. 103). Moreover: "My writing is as clear as mud, but mud settles and clear streams run on and disappear."
Gertrude Stein. How to Write (with a new preface by PatriciaMeyerowitz). New York: Dover Publications, 1975.
The author shows that "the innovative works of an artist are explorations" (p.vi).
-. Useful Knowledge. Barrytown NY: Station Hill Press, 1988.
-. What are Masterpieces? New York: Pitman Publishing Corp., 1970 (reprint of 1940 edition).
Edmund Carpenter. They Became What They Beheld. New York:Outerbridge and Dienstfrey/Ballentine, 1970.
The author maintains that the book became the organizing principle for all existence, a model for achieving bureaucracy.
It seems that the first comic strip in America was The Yellow Kid, by Richard F. Outcault, in the New York World, 1896. Among the early comic strips: George Harriman's Krazy Kat (held as an example of American Dadaism); Windsor McKay's Little Nemo in Slumberland; Milton Caniff's Terry and the Pirated.
Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876-1944). Il Futurismo was written in 1908 as the preface to a volume of his poetry and was published in 1909. Its manifesto was set forth in the words "We declare that the splendor of the world has been increased by a new beauty: the beauty of speed." Breaking with the livresque past, the Italian Futurism took it upon itself to "liberate this land from the fetid cancer of professors, archaeologists, guides, and antiquarians." The break with the past was a break with its values as these were rooted in literate culture.
Dziga Vertov (born Denis Arkadievich Kaufman,1986-1954). Became known through his innovative montage juxtaposition, about which he wrote in Kino-Glas (Kino-Eye). The film We (1922) is a fantasy of movement. Kino-Pravda (1922-1925) were documentaries of extreme expressionism, with very rich visual associations.
Experiments in simultaneity are also experiments in the understanding of the need to rethink art as a representation of dynamic events.
Michail Fyodorovich Larionov (1881-1964). Russian-born French painter and designer, a pioneer in abstract painting, after many experiences in figurative art and with a declared obsession with the aesthetic experience of simultaneity. Founder of the Rayonist movement-together with his wife, Natalia Goncharova (1881-1962), painter, stage designer, and sculptor-Larionov went from a neo-primitive painting style to cubism and futurism in order to finally synthesize them in a style reflecting the understanding of the role of light (in particular, as rays). His Portrait of Tatline (1911) is witness to the synthesis that Rayonism represented.
Fernand Léger (1881-1955). Machine Aesthetics, 1923.
"La vitesse est la loi de la vie moderne." (Speed is the modern law of life.)
Libraries, Books, Readers
In his Introduction to A Carlyle Reader, (Cambridge University Press, 1984), G.B. Tennyson is unequivocal in his appreciation: "No one who hopes to understand the nineteenth century in England can dispense with Carlyle," (p. xiv). Since nineteenth century England is of such relevance to major developments in the civilization of literacy, one can infer that Tennyson's thought applies to persons trying to understand the emergence and consolidation of literacy. Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) wrote Signs of Times. (He took the title from the New Testament, Matthew 16:3, "O ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky, but can ye not discern the sign of the times?") He condemns his age in the following terms: "Were we required to characterize this age of ours by any single epithet, we should be tempted to call it, not a Heroical, Devotional, Philosophical, or Moral Age. It is the Age of Machinery, in every outward and inward sense of that word; the age which, with its whole undivided might, forwards, teaches and practises the great art of adapting means to ends. Nothing is done directly, or by hand; all is by rule and calculated contrivance. For the simplest operation, some helps and accompaniments, some cunning abbreviating process is in readiness. Our old modes of exertion are all discredited, and thrown aside. On every hand, the living artisan is driven from his workshop to make room for a speedier, inanimate one," (cf. Reader, p. 34). Parallels to the reactions to new technology in our age are more than obvious.
New Worlds, Ancient Texts. The Cultural Impact of an Encounter, a major public documentary exhibit at the New York Public Library, September 1992-January 1992, curated by Anthony Grafton, assisted by April G. Shelford.
At the other end of the spectrum defined by Carlyle's faith in books comes a fascinating note from Louis Hennepin (1684): "We told them [the Indians] that we know all things through written documents. These savages asked, 'Before you came to the lands where we live, did you rightly know that we were here?' We were obliged to say no. 'Then you didn't know all things through books, and they didn't tell you everything'"
A. Grafton, A. Shelford, and N. Siraisi,The Power of Tradition and the Shock of Discovery, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992.
In comparison to Carlyle's criticism of mechanical mediation of the Industrial Age comes this evaluation of the Information Age or Post-Industrial Age:
"In the industrial age, when people need to achieve something, do they have to go through a series of motions, read manuals, or become experts at the task? Not at all; they flip a switch…. It isn't necessary to know a single thing about lighting; all one needs to do is flip a switch to turn the light on. […] To take care of a number of tasks, you push a button, flip a switch, turn a dial. That is the age of industry working at its best, so that you don't have to become an electrical engineer or physicist to function effectively.
"To get the information you need…do you need to go on-line or open a manual? Unfortunately, most of us right now end up going through a series of activities in order to get the precise information we need. In the age of information…you will be able to turn on a computer, come up with the specific question, and it will do the work for you." (cf. Address by Jeff Davidson, Executive Director of the Breathing Space Institute of Chapel Hill, before the National Institute of Health, Dec. 8, 1995; reprinted in Vital Speeches, Vol. 62, 06-01-1996, pp. 495, and in the Electric LibraryT.)
George Steiner. The End of Bookishness? (edited transcript of a talk given to the International Publishers' Association Congress in London, on June 14, 1988) in Times Literary Supplement, 89-14, 1988, p. 754.
Aldus Manutius, the Elder (born Aldo Manuzio, 1449-1515): Known for his activity in printing, publishing, and typography, especially for design and manufacture of small pocket-sized books printed in inexpensive editions. The family formed a short-lived printing empire (ending in 1597 with Aldus Manutius, the Younger) and is associated with the culture of books and with high quality typography.
Ray Bradbury. Fahrenheit 451. An abridged version appeared inGalaxy Science Fiction (1950) under the title The Fireman.
Adolf Hitler (1889-1945). Mein Kampf (translated by RalphManheim) Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971.
Mao (1893-1976). Comrade Mao Tze-tung on imperialism and all reactionaries are paper tigers. Peking: Foreign Language Press, 1958.
Umberto Eco. The Name of the Rose (translated by William Weaver). San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. 1983. Originally published in Italy as Il nome della rosa. Milano: Fabbri-Bompiani, 1980.
Topos uranikos, in Plato's philosophy is the heavenly place from which we originally come and where everything is true. Vilém Flusser wrote that, "The library (transhuman memory) is presented as a space (topos uranikos)" cf. On Memory (Electronic or Otherwise), in Leonardo, 23-4, 1990, p. 398.
Great libraries take shape, under Libraries, in Compton'sEncyclopedia (Compton's New Media), January 1, 1994
Noah Webster (1758-1843) wrote The Compendious Dictionary of the English Language, in 2 volumes, in 1828. He was probably inspired by Samuel Johnson (1709-1784), who wrote his Dictionary of the English Language in 1755.
Larousse de la Grammaire. Paris: Librairie Larousse. 1983
Dudens Bedeutungswörterbuch: 24,000 Wörter mit ihrenGrundbedeutungen (bearbeitet von Paul Grebe, Rudolf Koster,Wolfgang Müller, et al). Zehn Bänden. Mannheim: BibliographischesInstitut. 1980
Vannevar Bush. As We May Think, in The Atlantic Monthly, AMagazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics. vol. CLXXVI,July-Dec., 1945.
The blurb introducing the article states: "As Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Dr. VANNEVAR BUSH has coordinated the activities of some six thousand leading American scientists in the application of science to warfare. In this significant article, he holds up an incentive for scientists when the fighting has ceased. He urges that men of science should then turn to the massive task of making more accessible our bewildering store of knowledge," (p. 101). In many ways, this article marks the shift from a literacy-dominated pragmatics to one of many new forms of human practical activity.
Ted Nelson. Replacing the Printed Word: A Complete LiterarySystem, in Information Processing 80. (S.H. Lavington, Editor).Amsterdam: North Holland Publishing Company, 1980, pp.1013-1023.
Rassengna dei siti piu' utilizzati, and Bibliotechi virtuali, in Internet e la Biblioteca, http://www.bs.unicatt.it/bibliotecavirtuale.html, 1996.
The Infonautics Corporation maintains the Electric LibraryT on the World Wide Web.
The Sense of Design
The term design (of Latin origin) can be understood as meaning "from the sign," "out of the sign," "on account of the sign," "concerning the sign," "according to the sign," "through the medium of the sign." All these possible understandings point to the semiotic nature of design activity. Balducinni defined design as "a visible demonstration by means of lines of those things which man has first conceived in his mind and pictured in the imagination and which the practised hand can make appear." It is generally agreed that before Balducinni's attempt to define the field, the primary sense of design was drawing. More recently, though, design is understood in a broad sense, from actual design (of artifacts, messages, products) to the conception of events (design of exhibitions, programs, and social, political, and family gatherings).
"Nearly every object we use, most of the clothes we wear and many things we eat have been designed," wrote Adrian Forty in Objects of Desire. Design and Society since 1750 (London: Thames and Hudson, 1986; paperback edition, New York: Thames and Hudson, 1992, p. 6).
International Style: generic name attached to the functionalist, anti-ornamental, and geometric tendency of architecture in the second quarter of the 20th century. In 1923, Henri-Russel Hitchcock and Philip Johnson organized the show entitled International Style-Architecture Since 1922, at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Among the best known architects who embraced the program are Gerrit T. Rietveldt, Adolf Loos, Peter Behrens, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, Mies van der Rohe, and Eero Saalinen.
H. R. Hitchcock and P. Johnson. The International Style. NewYork: Norton, 1966.
Jay Galbraith. Designing Complex Organizations. Reading MA:Addison-Wesley, 1973.
Devoted to the art of drawing, a collection of lectures given at the Fogg Museum of Harvard University in March, 1985, Drawing Defined (Walter Strauss and Tracie Felker, Editors, New York: Abaris Books, 1987) is a good reference for the subject. Richard Kenin's The Art of Drawing: from the Dawn of History to the Era of the Impressionists (New York: Paddington Press, 1974) gives a broad overview of drawing.
Vitruvius Pollio. On Architecture (Edited from the HarleianManuscripts and translated into English by Frank Granger).Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970.
Marcus Cetius Faventius. Vitruvius and Later Roman Building Manuals. London: Cambridge University Press. 1973. This book is a translation of Faventius' compendium of Vitruvius' De Architectura and of Vitruvius' De diversis fabricis architectonicae. Parallel Latin-English texts with translation into the English by Hugh Plommer.
Le Corbusier (Charles-Edouard Jeanneret, 1887-1965). One of the most admired and influential architects and city planners whose work combines functionalism and bold sculptural expression.
Since the time design became a field of study, various design styles and philosophies crystallized in acknowledged design schools. Worthy of mention are the Bauhaus, Art Deco, the Ulm School (which continued in the spirit of the Bauhaus), and Post-modernism. A good source for information on the becoming of design is Nikolaus Pevsner's Pioneers of Modern Design, Harmondsworth, 1960.
The Scholes and Glidden typewriter of 1873, became, with refinements, the Remington model 1 (Remington was originally a gun and rifle manufacturer in the state of New York.) Encyclopedia Britannica, 15th Edition, Micropedia, Vol. 12, 1990. pp. 86-87). See also History of the Typewriter (reprint of the original history of 1923). Sarasota FL: B. R. Swanger,1965.
Peter Carl Fabergé (1846-1920). One of the most renown goldsmiths, jewelers, and decorative artists. After studying in Germany, Italy, France, and England, he settled in St. Petersburg in 1870, where he inherited his father's jewelry business. Famous for his inventiveness in creating decorative objects- flowers, animals, bibelots, and especially the Imperial Easter Egg-Fabergé is for many the ideal of the artist-craftsman.
Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933). American painter, craftsman, decorator, designer and philanthropist who became one of the most influential personalities in the Art Nouveau style who made significant contributions to glassmaking. Son of Charles Louis Tiffany (1812-1902), the jeweler, he is well known for his significant contributions to glassmaking.
Edward George Earle Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873): British politician, poet, and novelist, famous for The Last Days of Pompeii. (Encyclopedia Britannica, 15th Edition, Micropedia, Vol. 7, 1990. p. 595).
James Gibson. The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception.Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1979.
In our days, design is focused on major themes: design integrity (promoting exemplary forms of typography and form studies, as with the Basel School and its American counterparts), design function (of concern to industry-oriented schools), computation based on design. Originating from Gibson's studies in the psychology of man-nature relations, the ecological approach in design has its starting point in affordance. Thus many designers reflect concern for an individualized approach to the understanding of affordance possibilities.
Costello, Michie, and Milne. Beyond the Casino Economy. London:Verso, 1989.
D. Hayes. Beyond the Silicon Curtain. Boston: South End Press, 1989.
Mihai Nadin. Interface design: a semiotic paradigm, in Semiotica 69:3/4. Amsterdam: Mouton de Gruyter, 1988, pp. 269-302.
-. Computers in design education: a case study, in VisibleLanguage (special issue: Graphic Design- Computer Graphics),vol.XIX, no. 2, Spring 1985, pp. 282-287.
-. Design and design education in the age of ubiquitous computing, in Kunst Design & Co. Wuppertal: Verlag Müller + Busmann, 1994, pp. 230-233.
Kim Henderson. Architectural Innovation: The reconfiguration of existing product technologies, in Administrative Science Quarterly, vol. 35, January, 1990.
M. R. Louis and R. I. Sutton. Switching Cognitive Gears: From habits of mind to active thinking. Working Paper, School of Industrial Engineering, Stanford University, 1989.
Patrick Dillon. Multimedia Technology from A-Z. New York: OryxPress, 1995.
Politics: There Was Never So Much Beginning
Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843). So viel Anfang war noch nie, inPoems. English and German. Selected verses edited, introduced,and translated by Michael Hamburger. London/Dover NH: Anvil PressPoetry, 1986.
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963). Brave, New World. New York: ModernLibrary, 1946, 1956
Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931). Noted for inventing, among other things, the phonograph and the incandescent bulb.
Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922). Inventor of the graphophone. He is credited with inventing the telephone and took out the patent on it.
Otto Nicklaus Otto (1832-1891). Inventor of the four-stroke engine applied in the automotive industry.
Nikola Tesla (1856-1943). Inventor of the electric alternator.
Lev Nikolaievich Tolstoy (1828-1910). War and Peace. Trans. Louise and Aylmer Maude. New York: Oxford University Press, 1965. This is a translation of Voina i Mir, published in Moscow at the Tipografia T. Ros, 1868.
The Declaration of Independence was approved by a group delegates from the American colonies in July, 1776, with the expressed aim of declaring the thirteen colonies independent of England.
Signed at the Constitutional Convention in 1787, after much dispute over representation, the Constitution of the United States of America entered into effect once all thirteen states ratified it. Its major significance derives from its ascertainment of an effective alternative to monarchy. The system of checks and balances contained in the Constitution is meant to preserve any one branch of government from assuming absolute authority.
The Declaration of Rights of Man and the Citizen was approved by the French National Assembly on August 26, 1789 and declares the right of individuals to be represented, equality among citizens, and freedom of religion, speech, and the press. The ideals of the French Revolution inspired many other political movements on the continent.
Written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in a year of many popular uprisings all over Europe against conservative monarchies, the Communist Manifesto of 1848 expresses the political program of a revolutionary movement: workers of the world united, leading the way to a classless society. The Romantic impetus of the Manifesto and its new messianic tone was of a different tenor from the attempts to implement the program in Russia and later on Eastern Europe, China, and Korea.
Married…with Children: A situation comedy at the borderline between satire and vulgarity, presenting a couple, Al and Peggy Bundy, and their teenage children, Kelly and Bud, in life-like situations at the fringes of the consumer society.
Born in 1918, Alexander Solzhenitsyn became known as a writer in the context of the post-Stalin era. His books, A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch (1962), The Gulag Archipelago (1973-1975), The Oak and the Calf (1980), testify to the many aspects of Stalin's dictatorship. In 1974, after publishing Gulag Archipelago (about life in Soviet prison camps), the writer was exiled from his homeland. He returned to Russia in 1990.
Yevgeni Alexandrovich Yevtushenko: A rhetorical poet in the tradition of Mayakovsky's poetry for the masses. During the communist regime, he took it upon himself to celebrate the official party line, as well as to poeticallly unveil less savory events and abusive practices. His poetry is still the best way to know the poet and the passionate human being. See also Yevtushenko's Reader. Trans. Robin Milner-Gulland. New York: E.P. Dutton, 1972.
Dimitri Dimitrevich Shostakovich (1906-1975): For a very long time the official composer of the Soviet Union. After his death, it became clear how deeply critical he was of a reality he seemed to endorse. He created his harmonic idiom by modifying the harmonic system of classical Russian music. See also Gunter Wolter. Dimitri Shostakovitch: eine sowjetische Tragödie. Frankfurt/Main, New York: P. Lang, 1991.
There is no good definition of Samizdat, the illegal publishing movement of the former Soviet Block and China. Nevertheless, the power of the printed word-often primitively presented and always in limited, original editions-remains exemplary testimony to the many forces at work in societies where authoritarian rules are applied to the benefit of the political power in place. From a large number of books on various aspects of Samizdat, the following titles can be referenced:
Samizdat. Register of Documents (English edition). Munich:Samizdat Archive Association. From 1977.
Ferdinand J. M. Feldbrugge. Samizdat and Political Dissent in theSoviet Union. Leyden: A.W. Sijthoff, 1975.
Claude Widor. The Samizdat Press in China's Provinces, 1979-1981. Stanford CA: Hoover Institution, Stanford University, 1987.
Nicolae Ceausescu (1918-1989). His life can be summed up in JohnSweeney's statement: "In Ceausescu's Romania, madness wasenthroned, sanity a disease" cf. The Life and Evil Times ofNicolae Ceausescu, London: Hutchinson, 1991, p. 105.
Berlin Wall. Erected in August, 1961, the wall divided East and West Berlin. Over the years, it became the symbol of political oppression. Hundreds of people were killed in their attempt to escape to freedom. The political events in East Europe of Fall, 1989 led to destruction of the wall, a symbolic step in the not so easy process of German reunification. See also: J. Ruhle, G. Holzweissig. 13 August 1961: die Mauer von Berlin (Hrsg von I. Spittman). Köln: Edition Deutschland Archiv, 1981.
Red. B. Beier, U. Heckel, G. Richter.9 November 1989: der Tag derDeutschen. Hamburg: Carlsen, 1989.
John Borneman. After the Wall: East Meets West in the New Berlin.New York: Basic Books, 1991.
Political unrest, due to intense resentment of the Soviet occupation, and economic hardship led to the creation of an independent labor union, the Solidarnosc (Solidarity) in 1980. In 1981, nationwide strikes brought Poland to a standstill. Martial law was imposed and Solidarity was banned in 1982 after dramatic confrontations at the Gdansk shipyards. Reinstated in 1989, Solidarity became a major political factor in the formation of the new, non-communist government.
Massimo d'Azeglio (1798-1866): I miei ricordi. A cura di AlbertoM. Ghisalberti. Torino: Einaudi, 1971.
Germany has a rather tortuous history behind its unification. After the peace of Westphalia (1648) ending the Thirty Years' War, a sharp division between Catholic and Protestant states arose. After Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo (1815), the German Confederation (led by Austria) prepared the path towards future unification. In 1850, the attempt to form a central government was blocked, to be resuscitated after the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871). On his defeat of Ludwig II of Bavaria, the Prussian Wilhelm I became the first emperor of a unified Germany in 1871, and Bismarck his first chancellor.
Prepared by Garibaldi's conquest of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (1860), the creation of the Kingdom of Italy by Victor Emmanuelle (1861) ended with the seizure of Rome (1870) from the control of the Vatican. Italy became a republic in 1946.
The establishments of various Arab states is a testimony to the many forces at work in the Arab world. The victory of the Allies in World War 1 brought about the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Modern Turkey was established in 1920, ruled initially by a Sultan, becoming a republic in 1923 under the presidency of Kamal Atatürk. At around the same time, Syria (including Lebanon) fell under the mandate of the French League of Nations. Lebanon became a separate state in 1926. Iraq was established as a kingdom in 1921, falling under the same status as Syria within the British League of Nations. Saudi Arabia was created in 1932, and Jordan became an independent kingdom in 1946. The history of national definition and sovereignty in the Middle East is far from being closed.
For information on the Ustasha organization in Croatia, seeCubric Milan's book Ustasa hrvatska revolucionarna organizacija,Beograd: Idavacka Kuca Kujizevne Novine, 1990.
Chetniks (in Serbia), see A Dictionary of Yugoslav Political and Economic Terminology (cf. Andrlic Vlasta, Rjecnik terminologije jugoslavenskog politicko-ekonomskog sistema, published in 1985, Zagreb: Informator). The reality of the breakdown of the country that used to be Yugoslavia is but one of the testimonies of change that renders words and the literate use of language meaningless.
Omae Kenichi. The Borderless World. Power and Strategy in theInterlinked World Economy. New York: Harper Business, 1990.
Isaiah Berlin. The Crooked Timber of Humanity. Chapters in theHistory of Ideas. London: John Murray, 1990.
Fedor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky (1821-1881). Author of Crime andPunishment (Prestuplenie i nakazanie), Trans. David McDuff,Harmondsworth: Viking, 1991.
Toqueville noticed that "…scarcely any question arises in the United States which does not become, sooner or later, a subject of judicial debate…. As most public men are, or have been, legal practitioners, they introduce the customs and the technicalities of their profession into the affairs of the country…. The language of the law becomes, in some measure, a vulgar tongue" cf. Alexis de Toqueville, Democracy in America.
Gary Chapman. Time to Cast Aside Political Apathy in Favor of Creating a New Vision for America, in Los Angeles Times, Aug. 19, 1996, p. D3.
Edward Brent (writing as Earl Babble). Electronic Communication and Sociology: Looking Backward, Thinking Ahead, in American Sociologist, 27, Apr. 1, 1996, pp. 4-24.
"Theirs not to reason why"
A professional description of the initial strike in the Gulf War gives the following account: "In the blitz that launched Desert Storm, Apache and special forces helicopters first took out two early warning radar stations. This opened a corridor for 22 F-15E aircraft following in single file to hit Scud sites in western Iraq. Also, 12 stealth F-117A fighters, benefiting from Compass Call and EF-111 long-distance jamming, hit targets in Baghdad, including a phone exchange and a center controlling air defenses. Other such underground centers were hit in the south. Tomahawk missiles took out power plants. All this occurred within 20 minutes.
"About 40 minutes into the assault, a second wave of strike 'packages' of other aircraft, including 20 F-117As, attacked. They were guided by AWACs (airborne warning and control systems) crafts, which had been orbiting within a range of Iraqi radar for months. Coalition forces flew 2399 sorties the first day, losing only three planes." cf. John A. Adam, Warfare in the information age, in IEEE Spectrum, September, 1991, p. 27.
One more detail: "The architects of the huge raid are the Central Commander, Lieutenant General Charles A. Horner, and Brigadier General C. Glosson, an electrical engineer by training. For months they have overseen complete war games and rehearsed precision bombing in the Arabian expanse," p. 26.
Sun Tzu. The Art of War. Trans. Thomas Cleary. Boston & London:Shambala Dragon Editions,1988.
"Military action is important to the nation-it is the ground of death and life, the path of survival and destruction, so it is imperative to examine it" p. 41.
"Speed is the most important in war," Epaminondas of Thebes.Battle of Leuctra, 371 BCE.
Helmuth von Moltke (1800-1891). Geschichte desdeutsch-französischen Krieges von 1870-1871. The Franco-GermanWar of 1870-1871. Trans. Clara Bell and Henry W. Fischer. NewYork: H. Fertig, 1988. Reprint of the version published in NewYork by Harper in 1892.
Carl von Clausewitz (1780-1831).Vom Kriege. Michael Howard andPeter Paret, Editors. On War. Princeton NJ: Princeton UniversityPress, 1976.
Theodor Heuss (1884-1963). Theodor Heuss über Staat und Kirche.Frankfurt/Main: P. Lang, 1986.
C. W. Groetsch. Tartaglia's Inverse Problem in a Resistive Medium, in The American Mathematical Monthly, 103:7, 1996, pp. 546-551.
Roland Barthes. Leçon, Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1978.
The book is based on the lecture delivered at the inauguration of the Chair of Literary Semiology at the Collège de France on January 7, 1977.
"But Language-the performance of a language system-is neither reactionary nor progressive; it is quite simply fascist, for fascism does not prevent speech, it compels speech."
Alan Mathison Turing (1913-1954). British mathematician, one ofthe inventors of the programmable computer. During World War 2,Turing worked at the British Foreign Office, helping crack theGerman secret military code.
William Aspray and Arthur Burks, Editors. Papers of John vonNeumann on Computing and Computer Theory. Cambridge MA: MITPress; Los Angeles: Tomash Publishers, 1987. Charles BabbageInstitute Reprint Series for the History of Computing, Vol. 12.
John Condry, TV: Live from the Battlefield, in IEEE Spectrum,September, 1991.
Regarding the role of imagery and how it effectively replaces the written word, the following example is relevant: An Israeli visiting Arizona talked to his daughter in Tel Aviv while simultaneously watching the news on the Cable News Network (CNN). The reporter stated that a Scud missile had been launched at Tel Aviv, and the father informed the daughter, who sought protection in a shelter. "This is what television has become since its initial adoption 40 years ago…The world is becoming a global village, as educator Marshall McLuhan predicted it would. Imagery is its language" p. 47.
Darrell Bott. Maintaining Language Proficiency, in MilitaryIntelligence, 21, 1995, p. 12.
Charles M. Herzfeld. Information Technology: A Retro- andPro-spective. Lecture presented at the Battelle InformationTechnology Summit. Columbus OH, 10 August 1995. Published inProceedings of the DTIC/Battelle Information Technology SummIT.
Linda Reinberg, In the Field: the Language of the Vietnam War,New York: Facts of File, 1991.
The strategic defense initiative (SDI) was focused upon developing anti-missile and anti-satellite technologies and programs. A multi-layered, multi-technology approach to ballistic missile defense (BMD) meant to intercept offensive nuclear weapons after they had been launched by aggressors. The system consisted of the so-called target acquisition (search and detection of an offensive object); tracking (determination of the trajectory of the offensive object); discrimination (distinguishing of missiles and warheads from decoys or chaff); interception (accurate pointing and firing to ensure destruction of the offensive object). The critical components are computer programs and the lasers designed to focus a beam on the target's surface, heating it to the point of structural failure.
The Pentagon. Critical Technologies Plan, March, 1990.
Restructuring the U.S. Military, a report by a joint task force of the Committee for National Security and The Defense Budget Project. Obviously, the post-Cold War momentum provided many arguments for new plans for a scaled down, but highly technological, defense. The new circumstances created by the end of the Cold War require strategies for conversion of industries that until recently depended entirely upon the needs and desires of the military.
The Interactive Future: Individual, Community, and Society in theAge of the Web
Elaine Morgan. Falling Apart: The Rise and Decline of UrbanCivilisation. London: Souvenir Press, 1976.
David Clark. Urban Decline. London/New York: Routledge, 1989.
Katharine L. Bradbury. Urban Decline and the Future of AmericanCities. Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 1982.
Hegel's theory of state derives from his philosophy of history. Civil society affords individuals opportunities for freedom. But since the state is the final guarantor, it accordingly has priority over the individual; cf. Philosophy of Right, T.B. Knox, Editor. London, 1973.
E.A. Wrigley and David Souden, Editors. Thomas Robert Malthus. AnEssay On the Principle of Population, 1798, in The Works ofThomas Robert Malthus. London: W. Pickering, 1986.
"Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio.Subsistence increases only in an arithmetical ratio" (p. 9).
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778). Philosopher of the FrenchEnlightenment. In Du Contract Social, he stated the law ofinverse proportion between population and political freedom (cf.Book 3, chapter 1, Paris: Livre de Poche, 1978. Also in SocialContract. Essays by Locke, Hume, and Rousseau. Sir ErnestBarker, Editor. New York: Oxford University Press, 1976).
Bernard Rubin & Associates. Big Business and the Mass Media.Lexington MA: Lexington Books, 1977.
Craig E. Aronoff, Editor. Business and the Media. Santa MonicaCA: Goodyear Publishing Corp., 1979.
David Finn. The Business-Media Relationship: CounteringMisconceptions and Distrust. New York: Amacom, 1981.
Observations made by media scholars give at least a quantitative testimony to many facets of the business of media. Ed Shiller, in Managing the Media (Toronto: Bedford House Publishing Corp., 1989) states "The media are everywhere and they are interested in everything" (p. 13).
A. Kent MacDougall (Ninety Seconds to Tell It All. Big Business and the News Media, Homewood IL: Dow Jones-Irwin, 1981) observed that "To communicate with the American public, companies must first communicate with the media" (p. 43). Interestingly enough, they reach huge audiences by using the rent free public airwaves. Consequently, as the author shows, the news media shine by any measure of profitability. According to Forbes magazine's annual study of profits, broadcasting and publishing companies led all industry groups in return on stockholder's equity and capital in recent years. Specialized publications also keep track of the profitability of the media.
Study of Media and Markets, a service of Simmons Market Research Bureau, Inc., makes available standard marketing information. Communications Industry Forecasts, brought out by Veronis, Suhler & Asso. of New York, gives a detailed financial status of the entire communication industry (radio, television, magazines, entertainment media, recorded music, advertising, promotion).
J.H. Cassing and S.L. Husted, Editors. Capital, Technology, andLabor in the New Global Economy. Washington DC: AmericanEnterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1988.
Raymond Vernon. Exploring the Global Economy: Emerging Issues inTrade and Investment. Cambridge: Center for InternationalAffairs, Harvard University Press, 1985.
Stephen Gill. The Global Political Economy: Perspectives,Problems, and Policies. New York: Harvester, 1988.
Gene Grossman. Innovation and Growth in the Global Economy.Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991.
Facts for Action (periodical). Boston: Oxfam America, from 1982.
John Clark. For Richer or Poorer: An Oxfam Report on WesternConnections with World Hunger. Oxford: Oxfam, 1986.
J.G. Donders, Editor. Bread Broken: An Action Report on the FoodCrisis in Africa. Eldoret, Kenya: Gaba Publications, AMECEAPastoral Institute, 1984.
In his study Eighteenth Brumaire, (1852), Karl Marx described bureaucracy as a "semi-autonomous power standing partly above class-divided society, exploiting all its members alike."
Harvey Wheeler. Democracy in a Revolutionary Era. Santa Barbara:Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions, 1970.
Wheeler defineds bureaucracy as "a vast organism with an assortment of specialized, departmentalized tentacles for coping with the different kinds of reality it may encounter" (pp. 99-100).
Max Weber. Essay in Sociology. Edited and translated by H.H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills. London: Oxford University Press, 1946.
In this classical theory of bureaucracy, the author saw its roots in the cultural traditions of Western rationalism. As such, it is characterized by impersonal relations, hierarchy, and specialization.
R. Chackerian, G. Abcarian. Bureaucratic Power in Society.Chicago: Nelson Hall, Inc., 1984.
B.C. Smith. Bureaucracy and Political Power. Brighton: WheatsheafBooks, Ltd., 1988.
The author argues that "Bureaucracy is a political phenomenon" (p. ix), not a mere administrative occurrence.
Eva Etzioni-Halevy. Bureaucracy and Democracy. A PoliticalDilemma. London/Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1983.
George C. Roche. America by the Throat: The Stranglehold ofFederal Bureaucracy. Old Greenwich CT: Devin Adair, 1983.
Eugene Lewis. American Politics in a Bureaucratic Age: Citizens,Constituents, Clients, and Victims. Cambridge MA: WinthropPublishers, 1977.
Michael Hanben and Ronda Hanben. Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet. A Netbook. http://www.columbia.edu/~rh120/ch106, June, 1996
Michael J. A. Howe, The Strange Feats of Idiots Savants, inFragments of Genius, London/New York: Routledge, 1989.
"'Idiots savants' is the term that has most frequently been used to designate mentally handicapped individuals who are capable of outstanding achievements at particular tasks" (p. 5). He also mentions alternative labels: talented imbecile, parament, talented ament, retarded savant, schizophrenic savant, autistic savant. Among the examples he gives: A 14-year old Chinese who could give the exact page for any Chinese character in a 400-page dictionary; a 23-year old woman hardly able to speak (her mental age was assessed at 2 years, 9 months), with no musical instruction, who could play on the piano a piece of music that a person around her might hum or play; a subject who knew all distances between towns in the USA and could list all hotels and number of rooms available; a person who knew Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address but could not, after weeks of classes on the subject, say who Lincoln was or what the speech means.
In The Degradation of the Democratic Dogma (1920), Henry Adams presented a logarithmic curve of the acceleration of history. In 1909, Adams noted that between 1800 and 1900, the speed of events increased 1,000 times.
Gerard Piel. The Acceleration of History. New York: A.A. Knopf, 1972.
Nicolas Rashevsky. Looking at History through Mathematics.Cambridge: MIT Press, 1968.
End ofThe Civilization of Illiteracy, by Mihai Nadin(C) Mihai Nadin 1997