Folding Thought

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Moving, marking, making

Well the semester has drawn to a close. There has been movement and administrative arrangements (no internet). A range of paid employment tasks (namely marking) and the wrapping up of my own engagement with Nietzsche. Hence, this space has been quiet. Helped in part by a rather unexplained and problematic outage from the web hosting company. If there wasn’t something compelling in hosting my own solution I would go to wordpress (something to remember in future - with full DNS control). However, that is another story.

Mid year delivers a point whereby analysis of what has occurred can take place, while also move towards the end of the year and the warmer weather. This winter has me longing to sit on a beach in Northern Australia and read, eat and drink… more on that another time…

After a number of revisions and edits, the latest issue of Colloquy - Issue 15, was launched a couple of weeks ago. I am excited as it contains my book review on Mark Poster’s Information Please (pdf). As I return to the art of research honing my project and working towards confirmation, this first step is something to mark along the way. More to follow (provided there is an element of stability).

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Marking: inbetween policy and theory

The semester is drawing to a close. As such, the level of work has ramped up to an astronomical scale. A number of policy papers to mark, a heap. This is in conjunction with attempting to be carving out a critical position in relation to Nietzsche. However, the time taken up by the papers has meant that it is not until this week that i could return to Nietzsche. There is a blank. A gap, where one ponders how rational stages works or the ladder of participation in relation to participatory policy making. This is an aside, yet, one that currently I feel able to explore. This is distracting. A further absence from here will be evident as the process of writing and working again consume all the hours of the day. They leave me with nothing. Struggling through the day, looking at texts that have been misplaced, scattered and diffused. The mental energy consumed has lead to a pause on future tutoring and a renewed focus to return to research and communication.

The sporadic nature of entries will continue. That being said, randomness is something that has come to be expected with this blog… until next time as I attempt to untangle thought, a thought that is bound tight that needs to have one strand unpacked and written out.

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Read, write, judge

Three aspects that are taken as the whole. The life element projected in text. The lingering question of what a Nietzschian Public Policy would look like. Jumping from text, the attempt to sketch out a plan that has meaning, that has an argument that centred upon the metaphors of Nietzsche as they play out upon the body and space. The assessment of assignments. Each 3,000 words judged on its merits within a cohort of students. Conflicting priorities, convergent deadlines. Both of these elements will consume many hours in the coming weeks.

These trying times, salvation from the cold is all that one can hope for. The continual counting down of the days that appear, emerging one after the other, trailing into the sunset. (Repeat) Written text that is just a proxy for clarity of expression, basically the continual denial of a relationship back into some form of being. The pencil that is continually diminished. The judgements made on a paper. A close reading of the text, a mere point of distraction.

Things on the horizon that fall into place. Visions in time, a projection, a contraction an abatement…

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Between in and on

As the semester draws to a close, or more so, its frantic finishing stages, I am at a loss. Not so much in what has to be done, than doing it. Hence, the silence here. That silence will continue, for a part into the future, well not exactly, it is the ability to organise and synthesise thought, condense and distil it into an entry, onto a post. The question of writing, when writing on the internet is is writing in or on? That distinction is blurred, the topology of the structure is something that is at arms length occasionally, placing an entry, the fact that it is called an entry means to enter inside and write in. However, the twofold nature of writing, the inscriptive surface that is connected through nodes and binary data, projected on the screen relates to on. Writing on a surface, a space, a plain a node of dimensionally, something that at once appears and disappears. The tension with the space, a coordinated set of ideas, developed over time. A genealogy of the self, the archive that is represented, projected, emergent and more so there, it has a presence.

Is the nature that of writing in/reading on. The analogy of paper writing in a book, writing on paper. One never writes in paper but in ink or lead. What are the words then that comprise the screen, what is the text that is presented here, by me, for you to read? How does it relate to me? What is its role?

The trouble with the in/on distinction is that it reflects a level of dimensionally. One cannot enter a two dimensional space, a plain. Yet one can enter into the third dimension, the level of spatiality that is contained within its volume is projected. To enter is to go inside and be surrounded by that which is now outside, but appearing in reverse. This angle, can be summated through code—code that is at once both a representation and an expression. An object that is at once a store, a repository of data yet invoked on the other end, a user who calls up the text, from the inside to the outside, from the in to the on, the representational mechanics of dimensionally that float through the tentacles of the network…

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Heads and/or Tails

How should one relate to a body of work? What is the role that one should take when it comes to the development of theory? In what way can the work of Nietzsche and Heidegger be developed as a departure into an exploration of the body, of an intersubjective ethics, of space, time and technology. These questions are positioned, poised with certainty yet clouded with obscurity. That the line of thought must have a specific question. The role of art and the aesthetic in structuring the relationship, an emergence from the will to power, or just another diversion. Creating that unifying thread, a centrality of exploration into the condition to the subject as it is affected by technology, tracing the historical development of the subject, ever more so in light of machines, but also of the very corporeality of the subject.

This line, this sketch that takes one forward. Heidegger’s reception of Nietzsche, his lack of account for the question, his denial towards the body—flesh as an inscriptive surface, yet also a boundary. When the horizon of Being is experience by the human being, yet Being is not the physical being, then we are left with a space of haziness. A melody that trembles pass the body, an engagement with digitised elements of the other, removed, close, in conjunction with other passing factors, an appearance.

Law, that envelope of concepts that contains the very regulative notion of the system, of the collective, or art and inscribes a limit to the body, is a point of entry into the debate. A point of departure to explore the origin, the role that language plays in formulating existence, in opening the clearing of Being to be questioned by being, yet also regulating responses in return. A historical trace that blends through time elements of history, practices and regulation.

Power that inscribes the law, a foundational moment; the connection between art, power, law and language make a mark, a point of difference from the animal. Still an animal, but a new conceptual framework arises, practices that appear different to the other, the step from human to animal, human as animal and the adoption of animal as human all present points of this difference, this opening up of language, or law… of a body embedded within the world, fixed—to a certain extent—negotiating through the boundary, the porous membrane of the senses, projected through the digitalisation of data, through the extension of the mechanical, and the relationship to the world…

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A change of interface

So, I am now the new found owner of a new Apple keyboard. Which, while I’m only in the early stages of using it, think is a step up from the old G3 keyboard I was using previously. Then we turn to the question of the interface. How does the interface between human and computer affect the way the subject relates to the machine. I think that this is a very pertinent question, while I also think that it reflects a lot on Apple.

The interface between the human and the computer, the body and the machine is something that is extended through a number of senses. There is this smell of new that permeates the air. Also there is a tactile contact that one has with the machine. My current machine, a G4 Powerbook is rolling along alright, however, there is regularly the spinning beach ball. But the machine is a fine machine to engage the world with, to suck down information on the internet. The keyboard is the tactile connection with the machine. While vision is the preferred mode of engaging with the world, it is the tactile that presents the connection. The tactile is an extension of the body, it is where the human and the computer meet in the flesh. It is this that needs to be thought through, needs to be realised.

How can this connection work? More so, how can we tap this connection to think through the relationships that move between the body and the machine. Typing on a new surface presents itself as a new connection to the machine. The sound of the keys, tapping out, the interface, detached, removed, working… this is where Apple shines. For all the good and the bad that may come out of any multinational organisation, it is the detail that is reflected in the human-machine interface, which is a product of substance, usability and style is paramount for any engagement with the world. As such, engagement to the machine is thought through the connection that one has to it. Where is the line that delimits the lived experience to the input, measured in the contact of flesh to the machine… this delimitation is a point of questioning - of the status of the body in relation to the machine, in relation to the body as object in relation to another object, in relation to the object providing the site to encapsulate the subject… open questions for another day…

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One loose outline

Many ideas are in the process of being sketched. Floating around, attempting to work themselves into a workable plan. Now it is being embedded into the broader concerns. By this, any sketch needs to be made in relation to the thematic of the larger project. This is where the call to thinking needs to be realised, how to situate a line of thought in a broader schema. By this, it is the (re)working of the thesis that presents the problem. Thoughts of a Heideggerian approach are pushed to one side. In order to get a run up on the problem, one needs an origin, not in a foundational sense but a definition of the question. It is the issue of the question that continually pushes research, digging, scraping out an idea, creating new assemblies.

This is the position I currently face. The development of Heidegger’s thought can be demarcated around a number of different periods. It is this development which on the one hand enables one to seek a flow in relation to Heidegger’s thought but on the other hand, being bound to one line of thought may have limitations in its own right. With this in mind, how then can I commence research, framing the question, thought that permeates and emerges into its own form. The other element is Nietzsche.

Nietzsche opens up explorations in philosophy. Figures in Nietzsche’s thought, presented in relation to the problem of the body and how it is disclosed in relation to space is a line of thought to open. However, the question of beginning is something that can frame research. A line, a figure is presented in relation to aesthetics and the relationship that the subject has to the object. It is the breakdown of this distinction that is key, along with the subsequent issues of how the subject can related with other subjects and is embedded within a collective, is mediated and known from afar.

In order to think a line of inquiry that flows from Nietzsche (and his origins) through Heidegger to Foucault. The tension that can be teased out in relation to the way one is to relate to the world, how that reflects the sense of self and finally what role institutions may play in relation to the subject. This tension can be revolved around the figure of art, the reception of aesthetics, an opening - how the problem of aesthetics can present a starting point to the way the subject relates to the world. This doesn’t account for the way that the subject accounts for itself. It is just a line, a start, mere pondering on the edge of sense, however one that will reveal itself in due course…