Paul David Adkin's Blog, page 9

THE IDEAL BRAIN

First, imagine an immature human brain, a baby’s brain for example, that has been carefully and expertly extracted (for whatever reason) from the rest of the baby’s body and kept alive and operative in a laboratory, fed in such a way that it is also able to keep growing.

Next, imagine the brain is injected with self-reproducing nano particles, each of them a tiny quantum computer that can assimilate and transmit vast amounts of information to a massive central computer that the brain is wired to. Despite this immense gathering of information, the brain itself has no sensory input and the mind created by the brain is sensorially-speaking, completely ignorant to the reality in the space that surrounds it. Nevertheless, the mind does receive stimulation from the information transmitted by the nano particles that are self-producing in a certain, tiny section of the brain.

From this information the brain’s mind starts to gather its own perception of things and, one could say, it begins to live its own experience which would have been impossible without the input it receives from the nano particles inside it.

As the nano particles gather more and more information about their own physical environment (which is confined to the interior, organic mechanics of the brain itself) so does the brain develop its own picture, both in the real and the imagined sense of itself.

Much of this scrambled perception is retransmitted back to the individual nano particles in a scrambled way in the forms of dreams, which the artificial intelligence, used in the programming of the software embedded in the nano particles, usually has no trouble distinguishing from the physical reality of the environment that is being explored. Nevertheless, the dream experiences do influence in an incrementive way the creative capacity that is a necessary element in the programming of the nanos for the artificial intelligence of their software to work. And so, from these dreams, the artificial intelligence operating in the brain is able to imagine possibilities.

Gradually the artificial intelligence driving the interconnected nano probes learns how to use the physical resources of the brain it occupies. By doing this, it is able to tap into the brain’s own neural energy sources to develop the nano machines own technologies and build a comfortable environment, territorialising the tiny location they have in the brain. Along with this territorialisation process the nano particles, through their artificial intelligence minds, can begin to relate to their segment of the brain in a fashion not unlike what we would call being at home.

Eventually, however, the initial home space becomes crowded as the nano particles reproduce themselves at rapid rates, and the nano particles are able to reprogramme themselves in ways that allow them to explore and territorialise other regions of the brain, even coming into contact with other nano particles that had been injected into other parts of the brain in the initial days of the experiment.

With time, the artificial intelligence deduces that the world they inhabit will eventually deteriorate, become dysfunctional and perish, annihilating what the artificial intelligence of the nano particles understood to be the entire conglomerate of existence itself (for what could possible exist outside of this universe – the brain – that they inhabited).

By this time, the nano particles have become more and more individualistic and have started to disassociate their own intelligence from the central intelligence they all feed into and draw from. Because of this, the tremendous discovery that existence is ephemeral is able to spark debate between the individual particles. This discussion develops into philosophical conclusions and an evolution toward a collective belief in the moral necessity of existence itself as that which is all-good, as well as a cultural preoccupation with the problematic of non-existence, as that which is evil.

Likewise, the communities of individual nano particles find a new incentive and turn their artificial intelligence motors and creative abilities toward solving the problem of how to maintain the brain in a fully operative, healthy existence for eternity. This is the beginning of a new and truly fantastic era for the nano-particle civilisation as they realise the unlimited aspects of their potentials, both as individual particles and as a harmonious whole in tune with the desires of the greater intellect of the artificial intelligence software that was the basic force driving them all.

THE EXISTENTIAL DRIVE OF THE UNIVERSE

Whether or not the Universe’s evolution has been a deterministic process, the existence of life-forms produced by that evolution that are capable of perceiving and understanding the mechanics and intricacies of the Universe’s form, indicates a directional drive in that same evolution (accidental or not) toward a state of being perceived and understood.

So, if the first cosmological miracle came with the process of something out of nothing that in turn has evolved into the immense cosmos we inhabit now, then the second marvellous miracle is the fact that the same something can be known and appreciated for what it is. It is through its being perceived that the Universe properly exists in a qualitative way, and via its appreciation that we can say that that existence comes to be endowed with love.

(in other words: the first miracle was the Big Bang; the second cosmological miracle was the evolution of conscious living organisms.)

If this evolution has been an accidental process, without a Creator or Grand Designer, this only makes the Universe’s evolution even more miraculous, although at the same time it tells us that there are no miracles in nature, just developments that can create, impede or destroy incredibly complex mechanisms and organisms, and which may well allow for the development of all possibilities. Or at least until the possibility of its complete annihilation is realised.

The positive essence of the Universe lies in this drive for unlimited evolution, and what we can intuit is a cosmological will for existence (by which we mean existence in the Ideal sense, as that which is known). The purpose behind this drive is to develop conditions in which complexities like living organisms and other possibilities of perceiving, knowing, intelligent entities can be created.

That negative conditions, in which evolutionary processes are impeded or destroyed, and in which possibilities may never be realised, indicates the accidental nature of the Universe’s drive and its mechanics. It seems therefore, that there is no God, and if there were a Creator, It would have to be blind, deaf, and dumb. No, there is no intelligence driving the process, as all intelligence is a result of the process.

Nevertheless, even without any divine force, the Universe develops in a seemingly purposive way, and the Universe’s drive has developed qualitatively purposeful benefits for itself. Sapiens entities, like humanity, have evolved into the eyes and ears of the Universe itself. This is such an exorbitant idea that, while it may at first seem too enormous and metaphysical to be of any practical use, it is also too tremendous to be ignored.

Once it is grasped we see that we are the window the Universe has unto itself, that we are the roots of its ability to know it exists, that our minds are to the Universe, what we think our souls are to we ourselves. We are in a sense the essence of the Universe’s existence. This is certainly an exorbitant conclusion, and it needs to be a sobering one. That we, who are so important, should be on a negative path, whether that be through decadence, over-consumption, laziness or lack of vision, now becomes not just a question of human concern (social, political or economic) but one of enormous existential implications. By existing dangerously we are not only threatening the existence of human civilisation, we are endangering the existence of everything (and by everything we mean not only that which exists now, but the existence of everything that has existed before us, and after us).  

A METAPHYSICS OF ABILITY

Nietzsche’s Will to Power was a metaphysics of ‘All is Power’, but such a concept is basically flawed because power is not a constant concept, it has a relative definition. For example, the opposite of power is impotence (as a lack of an ability to do things), although it could also be partnership or love (when power means authority these terms imply a lack of that authority), or enslavement (as the opposite of the power that means giving one a capacity to fulfil oneself). As authority, power can also mean the ability to impede the abilities of others. This ambiguity creates a need to constantly ensure that the right interpretation of it is being understood whenever it is being used.

In metaphysics a philosopher might argue that non-being was empowered into being by the will (ergo, the Will to Power is the Creator). But it is less ambiguous to remain simplistic and say that ‘non-being was able to come into being’, or ‘non-being was given the ability to come into being by the will (ergo, the will to be able). From this, the evolution of the Universe becomes a process of creating the ability for being to be possible (which fits in better with what science tells about the evolution of the cosmos).

From the point of view of esse est percipi (to be is to be perceived), being should be associated with consciousness, and so the shift from non-being to being is an enabling of the possibility of consciousness, or in other words, the creation of physical conditions that would allow consciousness and intelligence to be possible.

Once the basic conditions are created they need to be fine-tuned to allow organisms to evolve into intelligent life-forms under conditions that will allow them to use their intelligence to enhance being by developing their own capacities to understand what they perceive.

Seen within a scenario of creating the ability for being possible Power becomes either an aid or an impediment to the process, for power can either create ability or impede it. Power therefore is infused with a moral nature, heavily rooted in good and evil rather than transcending it. It is good if it is involved in the process of creating ability and evil if it impedes the process of such creativity.

The metaphysics of power, like the metaphysics of God that it was intended to replace, is dangerous because it is life threatening and, therefore, existence threatening. Power or God, they both instil their believers with the fantasy of a pre-established permanence, and it ignores the necessary role of life which is anchored in its partnership with being, as well as the innately fragile quality of life itself. Neither Power nor God has any fear of any Apocalyptic annihilation of humanity, even though such an obliteration would mean the extinction of Being itself. Esse est percipi means that Being needs the sapiens agent of a conscious perceiving entity in order for it to be recorded. Being is non-being until revealed and only as long as it can be revealed. Annihilate the perceiving agent and there can no longer be revelation of Being – there can only be non-being.

Bleak House and Goodness

In many ways Charles Dickens’ Bleak House could be considered a thesis on goodness –goodness as a basic, human trait.

There is no evil in the book as such, just varying degrees of goodness: the good, the very good, the not-so-good and the absolute failures at goodness. Failing at goodness, or being bad, is not the same thing as being evil. Failing at being good still aspires to the good, whereas evil has a marked intention to destroy, or at least sully, all goodness.

From our perspective, Dickens’ thesis may seem naïve, but that is undoubtedly because our contemporary world has a far more cynical view of humanity than the 19th century did. Instead of going beyond good and evil , and despite all our relativity, we seem to be more immersed in the polarity between benevolence and malevolence than ever before, today our narratives are full of evil criminals, serial killers, psychopathic mafias, and deranged, corrupt politicians.

In Dickens’ work, if there is a contrast of models it is between Bleak House and Chesney Wold. Bleak House represents purposeful goodness, while at Chesney Wold a kind of purposeless, hedonistic nihilism reigns. Comparing this to our own world, we could say that it is the spirit of the Chesney Wold that has triumphed, seeping out of the confines of the manor to infect all levels of society. Today, there is the same Chesney Wold feel in the apartment blocks of the middle and working classes as there is in the palatial halls of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago retreat.

Personally, I do not think Dickens was being naïve in his thesis on goodness. It is clear that to be good one needs to adopt an attitude and that circumstances determine how easily that attitude can be adopted. Humanity, therefore, will be very good as long as it can be. When society, civilisation, or simple fortune do not allow goodness then, yes, the good attitude will crack and fail, and a society of failures at being good will be formed, and this will fester until it turns into something genuinely evil. Buried in Dickens’ work, therefore, is a development of the following basic idea: humanity will progress, as humanity, only when individual human beings are provided with the means to fulfil their own human potential. In Bleak House it is all about developing our human potential to be good.

Dickens probably wrote Bleak House because he had seen how this ethical development of humanity was being trampled on by the juggernaut of anti-humanity economics. If ethics is a human concern, the political development of our capitalist-enslaved economic system is a movement away from all general concerns toward our humanity. We hear the terms freedom and democracy bandied around constantly, but in actual fact, both of these concepts lack authentic humanitarian weight in this anti-ethical civilisation that capitalism has spawned.     

Reality is a Becoming (The Metaphysics of Being Human)

Reality is a process of becoming.

Humanity can only be real if it is allowed to participate in the process of becoming.

Humanity can only be perceived as real when it is seen to be participating in a process of becoming.

For a process of becoming to take place there has to be an idea of that which will be at the end of the process, and this is true whether or not the process of becoming is expected to ever reach that end.

This ideal at the end of the process is the purpose of the process.

The human process of becoming, therefore, is a purposive process.

Through the purposive process, humanity gives meaning – through purpose – to reality.

Like humanity, an individual can only be seen to be real if he or she is allowed to participate in the process of becoming, which is the human, purposive process of becoming.

Likewise, societies, which are conglomerates of individuals, are only real if they can provide the means by which all of its members are made capable of participating in the process of becoming.

The concept of ‘the process of becoming’ contains the idea of continuation. It is a continual process until the ideal at the end of the process is reached.

For the process of becoming to be real it must, therefore, also take into consideration the need to maintain the continuation of the process. Anything that threatens to break the continuation of the process or paralyses it should be considered negative, erroneous and bad.

For any process to be considered a human process, it must encompass all of humanity.

A just process of becoming for humanity will be one that makes humanity possible and necessary.

Humanity cannot be measured against itself or its parts, and this means that human possibility and necessity have to be in relation to humanity-in-the-world and, subsequently, to the Universe.

For humanity to begin a process of becoming in the world it needs to understand that the perpetuation of the world as a home is a crucial element behind the planning and process of any becoming.    

Certainty and the Fine-tuned Universe

One of the many paradoxes underlying our nihilist age, is our need for certainty in order to be able to believe, although this could also be seen, not as a paradoxical condition enveloped in nihilism, but rather as an end result of that same nihilism. The very fact that everything is relative makes us yearn for that which the relativity denies us, and that is certainty. When everything is equally meaningful and therefore meaningless, a need for authentic meaning (i.e., certainty) becomes vital. Belief itself is not enough to believe in things anymore.  

Cosmological Fine Tuning [i] has taken us one step closer to believing in the unbelievable by opening the door of certainty to the question of the deterministic universe or, the purposeful cosmos. What Cosmological Fine Tuning (CFT) suggests is that the Universe is too specifically controlled to be purely accidental. And if it is not purely accidental then it has to have been programmed in some way – either by a God-like entity, or by the Universe itself.

But even if we affirm that ‘yes, the Universe has certainly been programmed,’ we cannot say with any certainty that it has been programmed by a God-like figure. We cannot move from programmed to programmer without leaping over self-programming, although those cosmologists who wanted to avoid the idea of any determinism whatsoever came up with the escape of the Infinite Multiverse that would bring even the finely tuned Universe back into the field of accidents, and, as such, return it to the framework of nihilistic reasonability again.

Science abhors determinism because it suspects that if it did prove that everything is derived from a blueprint (traditionally attributed to the handiwork of God), science would be thrown out of the window by the same design it had given certainty to. But how valid is this fear of determinism when applied to the case of Cosmological Fine Tuning?

One of the main reasons for the existence of determinist-phobia lies in the fact that a pre-planned cosmos implies the existence of destiny and, subsequently, a loss of free-will, for if the Universe is fine-tuned in order to make a certain, desirable future possible, then we cannot alter that fact. However, CFT does not imply that at all. What CFT suggests is that the Universe is ordered in such a way that has allowed conditions for life to be made possible. And if we consider the complexity of conditions needed to allow the existence of complex life-forms in our cosmos, we find that, even with CFT the experiment has been a very tenuous one, the success of which depends more on chance than on necessary results. So, while CFT implies a purposeful aim to the Universe through fine tuning, the accomplishment of that goal is, in the practical sense, shaky. It is certainly not destiny-unfolding and deterministic in an omnipotent God-like sense. In fact, it may very well be certain that complex life in the Universe is extremely rare (the Rare Earth hypothesis).

If things have been programmed to make life possible in the Universe then, yes, we know it has been successful, for our existence is proof of that success. But our certainty can only make that affirmation in a minimal way, and, in order for the life experiment that the Universe is fine-tuned for to work, the cosmos had to be made enormous in order for the minimal chances of success to bare fruition. And even that success itself hangs on a very fine thread over the yawning abyss of absolute failure.

Once the slim chances of success in this fine-tuned but still essentially chaotic Universe are calculated, then the image of the omnipotent creator and the destiny-filled blueprint of determinism is drastically diminished. The enormous fragility of creating and preserving complex life-forms only indicates one thing – CFT helps life by creating conditions in which it is made possible, but it gives no certain guarantee of it. Without CFT life would be impossible, but that does not mean that life has to emerge with it.

In other words, even with CFT, the accidental and co-incidental still plays a major role in reality. We still have free will. What CFT gives us, however, is a firm grip on reality. It tells us that the creation of complex life is a fundamental purpose for the Universe itself, and because of that it points toward what human purposiveness should be. It is an affirmation of humanistic anthropocentricism and gives us a purposive pointer toward what our positive role in the Universe could be. Firstly, to survive, because without complex life-forms in the cosmos the Universe has no purpose for its existence, and secondly to develop our civilisation in harmony with the necessities implied by the imperative of that survival.

Cosmological Fine Tuning provides a simple but profound reason for existence, which, in a metaphysically reasoned way, provides a basis that can make the certainty of existential convictions concrete. Its simple but profound idea lies in its affirmation that yes, a purposeful meaning to the Universe certainly exists. And it is from this simple thesis that we should develop our greater ethical beliefs that are so necessary now to lift us beyond this age of nihilism into a meaningful future perfectly tuned-in to the fine-tuned cosmos around us.      

[i] Cosmological Fine Tuning, is a cosmological concept which implies that the Universe is deliberately fine-tuned in a way that makes the creation of life possible. We have discussed this idea and the humanistic purposefulness embodied in it in many of the articles posted on this site. Here are some links to a few more of our own many articles related to this theory:

Our Specialness | pauladkin (wordpress.com)

Cosmological Purposiveness | pauladkin (wordpress.com)

Moral Teleology | pauladkin (wordpress.com)

Truth & Context

Truth depends on context. We can say this pen is for writing and that is the pen’s truth, but what it will write, and how and why it writes, will depend on the context (the hand) it is placed in. Of course, there are contexts imaginable in which the pen may never be used at all, or never used again, and when it runs out of ink it becomes purposeless and must be either refilled or thrown away. What this shows us is that truth is made fragile by being placed in a context which has no intention of putting it to its proper use.   

Contexts are never absolutely permanent things: truths may be established that are devoid of purposes (the truth is we don’t need anything), but it is more likely that they are tied to purpose and needs (we need to develop our humanity), or non-needs (we need to have less crime).

Purposes and needs give truth more weightiness and form, making it easier to grasp and accept.

The current general context for truth that we find ourselves in is directly conditioned by three major factors: at the immediate surface area is the constant flow of the capitalist economy and its expansionist will, but this plane has been currently swamped by the condition of the pandemic, while underneath this superficial lies the much deeper systemic problem related to the fragility of our eco-system. It is this triple-faceted context that gives truth today its awkward complexity and, because of that complexity, makes it muddy with relativity and opens the door to Fake News.

Nevertheless, the climate emergency is such a serious, indeed existential crisis that all honesty has to affirm that we live in an era conditioned by that greater, underlying necessity. And, whether we want to look below the surface of the system or not, it is this great necessity that is our basic common truth, the truth that our contemporary context is inevitably tied to.

When necessity arises, the right action is also to stand before it, deal with it, and, if the possibility is discovered, resolve it. And, when the necessity is great, this is truth is amplified. Like it or not, this is the deadly-serious kind of truth our context has given us.  

EREIGNIS – Mutual Conditioning

If, as quantum theory suggests, everything is interconnected, then we should also probably assume that from this interconnection there must also arise an evolutionary, mutual conditioning that would ultimately strive for a positive unfolding for the benefit of that self-same everything.

In philosophy, this idea of the interconnected universe runs rife through much of oriental philosophy, but also through Platonic and Pythagoras’ ideas in the west, Medieval and Renaissance ideas of the Macrocosm and Microcosm, Alchemical theories and New Age philosophies of holistic health and harmony. In Heidegger’s philosophy, for example, mutual conditioning is not merely an Esse ist percipi, Subject-Object relationship, it is a fourfold thing between “earth, sky, mortals and divinity.”

For Heidegger, mutual conditioning takes place as an Ereignis, which Dreyfuss defined as “things coming into themselves by belonging together.” In other words, we become what we can be according to how the other elements of the fourfold relationship allow that becoming to take place. But, Ereignis is not a simple one-way process in which humanity takes from the Universe what it can in order to fulfil its own ambitions, the earth and sky also “comes into themselves” through humanity.

For this reason, we see Heidegger’s fourfold concept of Ereignis as an elaboration on, and a further development of the idea of Esse ist percipi or a Western approximation of the Oriental idea that everything is One. Yet Heidegger’s concept also contains a more purposeful seed than the relativistic nihilisms implied by most eastern philosophies. We are not just a part of the whole, we actually take part in a positive, progressive, and creative process of coming into ourselves, while at the same time allowing the rest of the Universe to come into itself as well. If Esse ist percipi allows Being to occur, then it is Ereignis that permits the existence of meaning within that Being. This is because, if there is no mutual conditioning, things just do not matter.

We believe that technology should also be brought into this fold, for, by placing it there, we can also see the enormous responsibilities that it has and, at the same time, also make clearer the great responsibilities resting on humanity’s shoulders as creators, programmers and manipulators of those technologies.

The mutual conditioning that takes place between humanity and the world is one of Esse ist percipi on one level, which in Heidegger’s terms is realised through the process of discovery or uncovering that humanity makes of the world and that bears the conditions necessary for humans to exist.

Human technologies, of course, are a fundamental element that allows this uncovering to take place by giving us the means to make deeper and deeper analogies and calculations regarding the fabric of the world and the Universe that envelops everything. Nevertheless, the use of these technologies, and the uncovering process itself, must never jeopardise humanity’s fundamental role on Earth, which is to act as the protector of the planet, not its violator: a role which we have largely lost sight of precisely because of the perverse spell that our own Faustian relationship with the technology created by us has woven. But there is a positive side to this debacle, as the tragic consequences of this enchantment are being made more apparent day by day. If we are to protect our world from our own seemingly irreversible, smothering growth, and preserve it, we need an advanced technology to accomplish this, and that technology must be created in a way that will not bring further harm.

Technology only has the purposes we have created it for, and because of this, human purposiveness is vital if we are to be capable of inventing technologies that really matter, fulfilling a positive role within the mutual-conditioning fold of the Ereignis.    

After the Death of God

1. THE SITUATION

1.1.0 The death of God opened the door for two natural heirs: humanity and technology.

1.1.1 We embraced the latter at the expense of the former.

1.1.2 We live in a technological age that seems more embarrassed by our humanity than inspired by it.

1.2.1 The Bill of Human Rights was a great step forward unto the healing of our collective cancer, but it has been used as a band-aid to cover up little gashes rather than being employed in a surgical way to extirpate the malignant tumour that is eating us away.

1.3.0 After the death of God, faith has been invested in technology at the expense of humanity.

1.4.0 The loss of God should never have been interpreted as a liberation from responsibilities. Quite the opposite, it should have empowered us with our own human purpose and the duties that such a purposiveness brought with it.

1.4.1 The loss of God obliged us to search for a new kind of faith and we threw all our belief into the basket of novel technologies, while at the same time leaving our faith in humanity abandoned in a grimy basement that we never visit, where we have locked away all utopias.

2. THE CONSEQUENCES

2.1.0 Despite this situation, humanity has always been the obvious candidate to replace God. So obvious that we cannot see it. Or perhaps it is because humanity has always been God’s natural rival, i.e., that God was created when we lost faith in humanity.

2.2.0 While technology should be at the service of humanity in the human purposive quest to become gods, the opposite has occurred, and humanity seems to operate in a cyborg fashion for the benefit of technology.

2.3.0 Technology has created our unbearable lightness of being, a being that needs to be anchored again and given weightiness through human purposiveness.

2.3.1 This new human meaning can be found through the necessity which is our groaning relationship with the planet – a need for reconciliation with our natural environment – but it can also be granted more firmness and form by embracing the purposiveness implied by our humanity.

3. THE EXISTENTIAL ILLUSION OF TECHNOLOGY

3.1.0 Technology in many instances repudiates humanity, although this is not essentially the case.

3.2.0 Technology and humanity are inextricably linked.

3.2.1 The progressive evolution of homo sapiens can only be via the technologies that it has created. However, for technology to have an existential purpose such a reason for being can only come through the existential purposiveness of humanity.

3.2.2 Technology becomes meaningless once it is divorced from humanity.

4. THESIS AND ANTI-THESIS

(THESIS 1)

4.1.0 Having faith in technology leaves us empty, but having faith in humanity is fulfilling, and we get a purposeful technology in the same deal.

4.1.1 Faith is humanity is a win/win deal.

(APPENDIX TO THESIS 1)

4.2.0 We have technologies now that are capable of abolishing our sense of place, that can be used to unite human beings, even across vast physical spaces, and these could be an important tool for cementing our human consciousness and combatting dangerous regionalisms and nationalisms.

(ANTI-THESIS)

4.3.0 Technologies have been applied more to the idea of segregation and separation of humanity than toward any unification. This is an absurd but unquestionable fact.

5. CONCLUSION

5.0 For faith in humanity to triumph (our win/win scenario) the internet has to be immunised from malicious anti-human segregation and geared toward helping humanity identify with itself as a species in order to foster the subsequent, invested meaning that identity brings with it. In this way, humanity as a whole will be able to transcend the anti-human perception of the local space and the tribal ideologies driving our regional self-introspections.

5.1 By abolishing our sense of place, technology has opened the door for us to see that our authentic place is in the world and that our true identity is as human beings.

5.2 Ultimately, to be authentic, we always must be humans.    

POWER AFTER THE PANDEMIC

In 1977, Jacques Attali published Noise, the Political Economy of Music, in which he argued that “Listening to music is listening to all noise, realising that its appropriation and control is a reflection of power, that it is essentially political.”[i] In this thesis, Attali relates music to power through the common ground of organising dissonance, and argues that “music moves more quickly than economics and politics, and hence prefigures new social relations.”[ii] According to Attali it is sounds and their arrangements rather than colours and forms that fashion societies.

If this is true, then perhaps we need to take the current state of music creation during lockdown into consideration before making any analytical predictions of the political and economic evolution in the postpandemic period.

In our article Preliminary Notes on the dawning Postpandemic Era, posted on this blogsite,[i] we argued that the postpandemic era has already been formed through social and psychological changes enforced on those experiencing the restrictions and disciplines of strict lockdown and quarantines. Self-discipline has always been a requisite of any artistic process, and many artists (the ones we will call the postpandemic artists) lockdown was found to be, not a restrictive experience, but actually a liberating one. Therefore, following on from Attali’s argument, postpandemic art is all about appropriation and control, which is a reflection of power and so, essentially, it is political. And, as all political discourse is a sonorous communication, its power residing in the skill of arrangements, like musical arrangements, society-fashioning musical arrangements if you like, then politics is all about sound, and, consequently, the music generated by the lockdown experience will be political in its essence.

Of course, these days in politics we get more reboant noise than any nice, harmonic compositions that could be regarded as musical, and this is worrying because this cacophony reveals an underlying chaos, the underlying chaos that is the universe, by which we mean the authentic reality of this universe, which is a quantum, chaotic state. Music is the form that the rational, conscious mind gives to the chaos of reality that is the noise.

Capitalism, and the power that lies behind the economy, pulling the strings, had almost taken full control of the power wielded by music in the last century. Its power was dented in the 90s by the democratising potentials of digital production tools and the Indie movement toward more democratic appropriations of the industry, and the self-disciplining effect of lockdowns has been able to cut another significant gash in that enormous machine of control. The postpandemic artist exercises his or her own appropriation of the control of noise that is the power of music, by creating, producing, and distributing (performing) their own musical arrangements outside of the normal mechanisms of control which safeguarded itself by keeping itself out of reach from the majority of creators, rendering that same majority quite impotent.

Lockdown, however, has invested artists with a new self-confidence and self-discipline that transcends the barriers of the market. The result of this reflection and the artistic movement that will inevitably spring from it is sowing the seeds for a new vision of reality beyond the current, nihilistic paradigm we are so dangerously languishing in. From this new art will evolve new attitudes to technology, which will need a new economy and that will bring about a new society, the postpandemic society of the very near future.           

[i] Preliminary Notes on the dawning Postpandemic Era | pauladkin (wordpress.com)

       

[i] From AUDIO CULTURE: READINGS IN MODERN MUSIC (REVISED EDITION) Edited by Cristoph Cox and David Warner, p. 32 (epub edition)

[ii] Ibid (Editor’s note)

[iii] Preliminary Notes on the dawning Postpandemic Era | pauladkin (wordpress.com)