MachineMachine /stream - tagged with culture http://machinemachine.net/stream/feed en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Sweetcron text@machinemachine.net Don’t be a Materialist, be a Heroic Materialist http://tumblr.machinemachine.net/post/16816474397

Don’t be a Materialist, be a Heroic Materialist

]]> Tue, 31 Jan 2012 06:05:19 -0700 http://tumblr.machinemachine.net/post/16816474397 Culturomics: Quantitative Analysis of Culture Using Millions of Digitized Books http://mfi.uchicago.edu/publications/papers/Science_Culturomics.pdf/untitled Culturomics: Quantitative Analysis of Culture Using Millions of Digitized Books: http://t.co/sBpgdz1Z via @mosabou #PDF #digital ]]> Sun, 29 Jan 2012 04:05:11 -0700 http://mfi.uchicago.edu/publications/papers/Science_Culturomics.pdf/untitled The God gap http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/b2004496-41c1-11e1-a1bf-00144feab49a.html#axzz1keb5eZxX/the-god-gap-ftcom The God Gap: http://t.co/gkEY64dU ]]> Sat, 28 Jan 2012 11:35:55 -0700 http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/b2004496-41c1-11e1-a1bf-00144feab49a.html#axzz1keb5eZxX/the-god-gap-ftcom Re:Thinking Games http://www.furtherfield.org/researchpublicatios/artists-rethinking-games/artists-rethinking-games-wwwfurtherfieldorg Artists Re:Thinking Games | Editors Catlow, Garrett, Morgana | only a few left http://t.co/SmCu4kxu ]]> Wed, 25 Jan 2012 04:50:56 -0700 http://www.furtherfield.org/researchpublicatios/artists-rethinking-games/artists-rethinking-games-wwwfurtherfieldorg John Frankenheimer's "Seconds" http://www.metafilter.com/111915/John-Frankenheimers-Seconds Seconds (John Frankenheimer, 1966) is a disturbing film to watch. With its unresolved, horrific ending, it’s possibly one of the most depressing films ever made [SPOILER]. ]]> Sun, 22 Jan 2012 16:21:35 -0700 http://www.metafilter.com/111915/John-Frankenheimers-Seconds Kids, unlike adults, think technology is fundamentally human http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/01/18/study-shows-that-kids-unlike-adults-think-technology-is-fundamentally-human/ With children so easy to embrace robotics, it’s clear that there’s a ton of potential for integrating intelligent technologies into learning environments. Besides, the idea of “exploring and creating” sounds a heck of a lot better than answering true/false questions out of a booklet. Clearly there are tons of new and interesting ways to learn, and technology is, in many ways, responsible for this. Taking a deeper look at the stories the children created, the survey found that unlike many adults who see technology as separate from humanness, it seems that “kids tend to think of technology as fundamentally human:… ]]> Thu, 19 Jan 2012 03:13:06 -0700 http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/01/18/study-shows-that-kids-unlike-adults-think-technology-is-fundamentally-human/ Kopimism: the world's newest religion explained http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn21334-kopimism-the-worlds-newest-religion-explained.html Isak Gerson is spiritual leader of the world's newest religion, Kopimism, devoted to file-sharing. On 5 January the Church of Kopimism was formally recognised as a religion by the Swedish government. Tell me about this new file-sharing religion, Kopimism. We were founded about 15 months ago and we believe that information is holy and that the act of copying is holy. Why make a religion out of file-sharing? Why not just be an ordinary club without defining yourselves as being a religious community? Because we see ourselves as a religious group, a church seems like a good way of organising… ]]> Sun, 15 Jan 2012 14:32:57 -0700 http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn21334-kopimism-the-worlds-newest-religion-explained.html Lars von Trier’s “Melancholia”: A Discussion http://www.filmquarterly.org/2012/01/lars-von-triers-melancholia-a-discussion/ Lars von Trier’s latest has been overshadowed by the director’s ill-judged comments at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. This is a pity because, as Film Quarterly Writer-at-Large NINA POWER and editor ROB WHITE discuss (resuming a dialogue begun here in regard to von Trier’s Antichrist), Melancholia is a rich, fascinating, and radical work. ]]> Wed, 11 Jan 2012 06:07:49 -0700 http://www.filmquarterly.org/2012/01/lars-von-triers-melancholia-a-discussion/ On the trail of the wild and wonderful @Horse_ebooks http://splitsider.com/2012/01/the-ballad-of-horse_ebooks/the-ballad-of-horse-ebooks-splitsider On the trail of the wild and wonderful @Horse_ebooks : http://t.co/QYGn0092 #fb ]]> Tue, 10 Jan 2012 07:06:45 -0700 http://splitsider.com/2012/01/the-ballad-of-horse_ebooks/the-ballad-of-horse-ebooks-splitsider quote from High Techne - Rutsky https://findings.com/therourke/finding/163295 The position ofhuman beings in relation to this techno-cultural un-conscious cannot,therefore,be that ofthe analyst (or theorist) who,standing outside this space,presumes to know or control it.It must in-stead be a relation ofconnection to,ofinteraction with,that which hasbeen seen as “other,”including the unsettling processes oftechno-cultureitself.To accept this relation is to let go ofpart ofwhat it has meant to behuman,to be a human subject,and to allow ourselves to change,to mu-tate,to become alien,cyborg,posthuman.This mutant,posthuman sta-tus is not a matter ofarmoring the body,adding robotic prostheses,ortechnologically transferring consciousness from the body;it is not,inother words,a matter offortifying the boundaries ofthe subject,ofse-curing identity as a fixed entity.It is rather… ]]> Fri, 06 Jan 2012 08:52:17 -0700 https://findings.com/therourke/finding/163295 File Sharing Is Now an Official Religion In Sweden http://gizmodo.com/5873001/file-sharing-is-now-an-official-religion-in-sweden/file-sharing-is-now-an-official-religion-in-sweden File Sharing Is now an official Religion In Sweden: The Missionary Church of Kopimism http://t.co/Fq8kKFKr #CtrlC #CtrlV #copying #Piracy ]]> Wed, 04 Jan 2012 10:52:39 -0700 http://gizmodo.com/5873001/file-sharing-is-now-an-official-religion-in-sweden/file-sharing-is-now-an-official-religion-in-sweden I Was Kim Jong Il's Cook http://www.theatlantic.com/past/issues/2004/01/fujimoto.htm/the-atlantic-januaryfebruary-2004-i-was-kim-jong-ils-cook-fujimoto True tales from Dear Leader Kim Jong-Il's one-time chef http://t.co/U0UVeok1 ]]> Mon, 19 Dec 2011 10:35:58 -0700 http://www.theatlantic.com/past/issues/2004/01/fujimoto.htm/the-atlantic-januaryfebruary-2004-i-was-kim-jong-ils-cook-fujimoto The Dark Sides of Our Digital Self http://www.theemotionmachine.com/the-dark-sides-of-our-digital-self/the-dark-sides-of-our-digital-self RT @furtherfield: The Dark Sides of Our #Digital Self - http://t.co/C9JyB0O9 ]]> Sun, 18 Dec 2011 04:51:26 -0700 http://www.theemotionmachine.com/the-dark-sides-of-our-digital-self/the-dark-sides-of-our-digital-self VideoGames can't tell stories http://www.next-gen.biz/opinion/opinion-games-cant-tell-stories Games don’t do storytelling well because they can’t deliver the four key components of story. There is no hero. Time is in the control of the player, not the creator. There is no inevitability or sense of being powerless. And the story cannot have the player’s full attention. So a videogame Hamlet is just a guy running around a castle flipping switches and collecting items to kill his uncle, the big boss at the end. All those speeches just get in the way. The player is not treading the boards at the Old Vic. He’s solving problems, taking action, creating… ]]> Thu, 24 Nov 2011 03:53:57 -0700 http://www.next-gen.biz/opinion/opinion-games-cant-tell-stories The Mystery of the Five Wounds http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/history/2011/11/the-mystery-of-the-five-wounds-ready-to-go/ Why, though, to begin with, did stigmata materialize in 13th-century Italy? Part of the answer seems to lie in the theological trends of the time. The Catholic Church of St. Francis’s day had begun to place much greater stress on the humanity of Christ, and would soon introduce a new feast day, Corpus Christi, into the calendar to encourage contemplation of his physical sufferings. Religious painters responded by depicting the crucifixion explicitly for the first time, portraying a Jesus who was plainly in agony from wounds that dripped blood. Indeed, the contemporary obsession with the marks of crucifixion may best… ]]> Mon, 21 Nov 2011 13:07:55 -0700 http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/history/2011/11/the-mystery-of-the-five-wounds-ready-to-go/ Atheists, theists, and gnostics, oh my! http://www.google.com/url?null/redirect-notice Atheists, theists, and gnostics, oh my! - McGill Daily http://t.co/vqFZnHXw ]]> Mon, 24 Oct 2011 16:36:04 -0700 http://www.google.com/url?null/redirect-notice On Distributed Communications Networks http://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/2005/P2626.pdf/on-distributed-communications-networks Paul Baran (1962) ]]> Sun, 23 Oct 2011 15:08:44 -0700 http://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/2005/P2626.pdf/on-distributed-communications-networks The Constraint Histories of Digital Games http://blog.ihobo.com/2011/10/constraint-histories.html Attempts to provide a taxonomy of game genres founder on the lack of consistent criteria, and usually have to be arbitrarily assigned. Connecting ‘shooters’ into a lineage suggests scrolling shooters were direct influences on first person shooters, for instance. But there's no evidence suggesting Zaxxon has any connection with the design of DOOM, or that Space Invaders inspired Zaxxon. As a historical tool, genre categories can provide some useful connections – DOOM certainly did influence GoldenEye 007, for example – but genre cannot be used as a unifying framework for game history because the genre lineages are narrowly valid and… ]]> Wed, 19 Oct 2011 03:25:57 -0700 http://blog.ihobo.com/2011/10/constraint-histories.html Music moved on after modernism, but whatever happened to fiction? http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2011/oct/05/notes-letters-music-modernism-self The high arts of literature and music stand in a curious relationship to one another, at once securely comfortable and deeply uneasy – rather like a long-term marriage. At the securely comfortable end of the emotional spectrum we have those zeniths of song, the German lieder tradition, and high opera. In the best examples of both forms words and music appear utterly and indissolubly comingled. However, at the other end of this spectrum we have those kinds of music that attempt to be literary – so-called programme music – and those forms of literature that attempt, either through descriptive representation… ]]> Wed, 12 Oct 2011 09:54:22 -0700 http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2011/oct/05/notes-letters-music-modernism-self The case for reconciling the scientific with the divine -- and against the anti-religion of Richard Dawkins http://life.salon.com/2011/10/02/how_science_and_faith_coexist/singleton/?mobile.html As a both a scientist and a humanist myself, I have struggled to understand different claims to knowledge, and I have eventually come to a formulation of the kind of religious belief that would, in my view, be compatible with science. The first step in this journey is to state what I will call the Central Doctrine of science: All properties and events in the physical universe are governed by laws, and those laws are true at every time and place in the universe. Although scientists do not talk explicitly about this doctrine, and my doctoral thesis advisor never mentioned… ]]> Sat, 08 Oct 2011 10:01:04 -0700 http://life.salon.com/2011/10/02/how_science_and_faith_coexist/singleton/?mobile.html