Back to Bartlett

One radical branch of philosophy would state that everything is matter, our thoughts too, that are defined by electronic states in our neurons. Other schools would say that all is in our minds, constructed on an individual or social level.
Let us take these viewpoints and look again at Bartlett's Cat/Owl proto-animal. First it is the drawing of an owl and finally it turns - after several generations of reproduction- into a more familiar animal, a cat. In between it is a sort of animal shaped blob, but it stays an animal.
It is fascinating for me.
Before I continue I have to go back to my University office and reread the experimental instructions, because I need to be sure about some details.
However, let us assume that all is in our heads. What keeps the drawing a picture of an animal? Was it Bartlett's instruction? Was it something inexplicable (scientists love such a question)? Was it some constraint of reality, some outer limit that confines our construction to certain borders of perception?
The owl could have turned into a house, a hammer or a plant.
Even without knowledge of the experimental instruction I will pose the following question: Is there always an experimentator who tells us what to do? (A Freudian über-ich or an alter or Bartlett himself)
Nevertheless, the truth somehow transcends the above-mentioned duality and in opposition to Descartes I would like to state: "As soon as I think, I am not."

Retro 7 Cannes

Day Seven Tuesday May 31

I am on another train between Vienna and Linz. I have just received the interview material from the two girls who have been hanging around room 50 in the Natural History Museum at the Synth-Ethic exhibition.

It is my second trip from Vienna to Linz since Saturday. The first trip was my return journey from Cannes Mandelieu in southern France, where I had attended at an ESF meeting of the EUROSYNBIO projects. My boss and I had arranged a World Café on societal issues and the communication of the synthetic biology projects.

My favourite presentation at the meeting was Cees Dekker’s investigations on cell division of bacteria under physical stress. 

In addition to nice scientific lectures and poster presentations I enjoyed the local atmosphere very much. On the first day I managed to visit the castle of Mary and Henry Clews at La Napoule. He did things like this.

More interestingly, there were several exhibits at the castle that showed hybrids of humans and animals. Mister Clews seemed to be a rather eccentric artist, a monarchist and a clear opponent of scientists, the establishment and of feminism. However his artwork, especially his later period is rather interesting.

From science to art let us get back to my ideas. When I studied Bartletts “Remembering” I came upon his serial reproduction of drawings of an owl that after several generations turned into a cat, which is the animal we are much more familiar with. The most fascinating stages of this process are the ones in the middle, where people draw some sort of proto-animal. This leads to the question of the core of information, similar to the core of social representations. Is there some kind of minimal information that transports the fact that it is the drawing of an animal and not just a spot of paint on a sheet of paper?

Could there be an analogy in other forms of communication?

Up to what stage does this proto information persist before it is turned into something new, more detailed or entirely different?

Maybe a closer look at the data of serial reproduction studies can shed light on these questions. 

While I travel peacefully between the capital of Austria and the capital of Upper Austria, some E.Coli strains haunt Germany and even more so they haunt the international media. The big advantage of all this seems to be that you can get fresh tomatoes, cucumber and other vegetables rather cheap.

The war in Libya rages on and I prepare to leave Europe for the first time in my life to go to Stanford for the Synthetic Biology 5.0 conference. Tomorrow I will need some meditation.

Visions of reciprocal lattices

One of my university teachers in christallography once said to me: "The reciprocal lattice does not exist. Keep that in mind when you do solid state chemistry. Otherwise you get crazy." That was true then. Nevertheless it somehow mimics how we see things, doesn't it. We have a spatial perception in which proximity makes things large and the infinite seems to lie within micrometers.
What a nice analogy anyway.
Maybe (:-)) physicists have discovered the utility of a reciprocal lattice only, so that we can see what the diffractometer can see, too (or the other way around?). However, there is a genius mind behind all that as is easy to see on Wikipedia.
Maybe one day reciprocal space and Fourier transformation can be introduced into sociological network analysis.
Neil Young would say: There is just one song

Retro 6 Leduc

Day Six Monday May 23 2011

Stéphane Leduc seems to be the scientist who coined the term Synthetic Biology in 1912. In some way his experiments and ideas are rather far from what biology does today. Today’s efforts in Synthetic Biology encompass DNA synthesis as technique, the development of a minimal organism by reducing the genes of existing organisnms (top-down approach), the creation of life from inorganic or simple organic pieces (protocell research/ bottom up approach) the design of artificial life using chemical components that are not part of natural organisms (Xenobiology/XNA research) and the arrangement of biological circuits following engineering principles with standardized parts. Nevertheless Leduc’s idea was more general, an attempt of introducing synthesis as a research principle into biology, which had been merely descriptive and analytical before that. In addition, he wanted to explore life by analogy, creating processes that imitate some aspects of life, like growth or movement. The latter aspects open up a wider perspective of research and can be inspiring for science, art and even philosophical discussions about the boundaries and properties of life.

The exhibit at the Synth-ethic exhibition by Roman Kirschner called “Roots” was inspired by such analogies and focuses on the metaphor of biological growth, though it contains inorganic matter and is powered by electrical currents.

Link: Roman Kirschner Roots at the Synth-ethic Exhibition Vienna 2011  Natural History Museum

An important analogy for me is the role of codes. We know about the genetic code formed by the nucleic acids guanine, adenine, cytosine and thymine in the DNA and of guanine, adenine, cytosine and uracil in the RNA. In computer science we use a binary code of electrical charges, mathematics is open to several numerical or alphanumerical codes. We have human languages and writing, the codes systems of sign language and symbols. On another scientific level, we use the code of chemical elements to describe molecules or chemical systems and in physics we have elementary particles. What are the interactions of these codes? Are there connections and hierarchies, analogies and interactions? Which codes are manmade, to have a model for the functioning of nature? Which codes are natural, given and is there a universal code?

So I have just been to the library to get some inspiration and ended up reading books about the psychology of time and the occurrence of improbable events. Such is the fate of the scientist.

Retro 5 A Joe Davis hug

Day Five Monday May 16 2011

I got a hug from Joe Davis. Now, I assume, my life is complete. I got a hug from a man who managed to send signals of vaginal contractions into space for the purpose of a very special SETI project.

Well, that was my personal highlight of the last four days, that included the Biofiction Science Art and Film Festival in Vienna as well as a meeting by the ESF financed SYNMOD project in the Falkensteiner hotel.

First there were two days of watching panel discussions and lectures, movies and gala events. In between that and after that there were talks and chats with artists, ethicists, scientists and journalists.

Then I had a day for recovering, especially from drinking in the red bar in Volkstheater, including a nice dinner at Silberwirt in the 5^th district of Vienna together with the SYNMOD team. The rest was hard core biology and our own contribution to the project.

In addition to all that I got to know Fritz Ostermeier from FM4 radio, who does the Sunday show: “Im Sumpf” and a female artist called Sonja Bäumel who won one of the prices of the Biofiction jury.

All the atmosphere was very dense in a real knowledge society feeling. Fritz Ostermeiers final comment on moderating the film gala was that he may become the Peter Rapp of knowledge society.

Now I am sitting in the train from Vienna to Linz, coming home into another world. A world with my love and our dog and everyday business as far as one can call it that way in my case.

After all this thinking and sensations, emotions and the beauty of so many things, like for instance the Museum of Natural History where the festival had taken place it will take some meditation for emptying the cup again.

There will be time for that.

Univers(ity?)

Some demi-philosophical semi published things

When taking a closer look at the bible one could come to some sort of working definitions of this place: Let's call it world, or earth or universe. According to the bible it is a hell of a place, or maybe paradise or both, or the two things well hidden somewhere else, and, as nowadays somewhere else is quite remote, why not put the stuff into another dimension.
Looking into ourselves for these categories of pain and pleasure is another hint given by the bible. Generations of physicians and biologists have tried to dig the stuff out of meat, tubes and bones with no countable success.
Therefore we come back to more modern definitions of hell, paradiese and the universe that could be named chaos, a rather complicated matter or most prominently 42 (By the way take a look at this: http://www.ted.com/talks/douglas_adams_parrots_the_universe_and_everything.html )
I would say that the creation myths are rather complementary: Forget about the snakes the turtles and the Adams-and-Eves, but look at the stories and metaphors.
Nevertheless, we the people of Gonzoland (where I am from) fight our little Armageddons everyday anew, while others prefer to dwell in heaven or paradise and call it a day. Some of us prefer to live. That is why we are here, and why there is a big place to do so.
If you want to know more about it read Douglas Adams or Terry Prattchett, the Ghita, the Bible or the Talmudi, the Koran or just make some more tea. :-)

Good luck

Latest Bauernbergpark Observations

More things that I have found out about the Bauernbergpark man: He has a system of small gravel heaps that he carefully arranges on rocks and park benches around his territory. These heaps appear in different numbers, but similar sizes, as if the little stones were counted precisely. I have discovered that instead of stone dust from gravel, he uses flour to make white lines on the ground. These lines seem to be borders, sometimes circular, sometimes following the edge of a path, or sidewalk. Furthermore he owns a nice notebook, in which he writes tiny and neat columns of numbers or letters, as if this was some sort of journal of his proceedings. At the moment he has another pram as well as a tarpaulin to keep the rain off his  
humble belongings and himself when he decides to take a nap in rainy weather.

Retro 4

Day Four Tuesday May 10 2011

Today I had another challenging conversation with my close friend B. about motivation. What is the motivation in Zen? You do not seem to do much but sit and meditate. But to what means?

Some might say: To gain enlightenment. But according to Roshi Suzuki, enlightenment is everywhere and it is a “tourist’s exercise” to look for some unique moment or state in life. So what is the motivation?

I suppose it is to learn to do good things and to learn to do these things well. A motivation can be to learn to live in every moment in life, and not to be caught too much by illusions and memories and hopes and above all fears.

When we were talking about these things the conversation somehow drifted away towards the idea of going crazy or being lonely. So I mentioned the tramp up in Bauernbergpark, who seems to live there owning a pram in which he transports most of his other belongings. He somehow collects plastic bottles, which seem to serve as a water reserve. He sleeps on and uses some park benches close to a gravel path and has the habit of collecting some of the gravel in small heaps. With the use of a middle sized and a larger flat stone he seems to grind some of the pebbles to powder. Another thing he does is to fill small portions of gravel into plastic bottles. Sometimes you can find him standing there turning over the gravel filled plastic bottles in a straight nice rhythm, which especially fascinates my dog.

However, I am sure he does all that to save the world.

Retro 3 German

Day Three Monday May 09 2011

Es folgt nun mal ein Eintrag auf Deutsch. Vorgestern hat es mich in den Botanischen Garten in Linz verschlagen. Zuerst wollte ich in der Krypta des Mariendoms meditieren, aber ich habe keinen gemütlichen Platz gefunden. Also marschierte ich durch den Bauernbergpark zum Botanischen Garten. Ich kann und möchte gar nicht aufzählen was dort alles blüht. Ich war beeindruckt und versuchte möglichst die ganze Fläche des Gartens abzugehen.

Es ist nach wie vor trocken während die Mississippi Region in den USA ein Jahrhunderthochwasser erlebt. Ich genoss die Trockenheit und die Tatsache dass die apokalyptischen Reiter noch woanders herum galoppieren bevor sie zu uns kommen.

Im Japanischen Garten setzte ich mich dann zur Meditation in einen der weißen Gartenstühle.

Als ich dann den westlichen Teil des Gartens abging bemerkte ich dass gerade ein LASK Spiel war. Scheinbar wurde das von Wien ins Stadion übertragen, denn wie mir das Internet gerade mitgeteilt hat, hat der LASK gegen die Wiener Austria 0:5 verloren, und zwar in Wien. Die Schlachtengesänge der Fans stellten einen seltsamen Kontrast zur Blumenpracht des Botanischen Gartens dar. Aber so ist die Welt nun mal.

Von mir aus könnten die ja das Stadion einreißen und noch einen Botanischen Garten dort hin pflanzen. Aber wo gehen dann die ganzen Fußballfans hin? Und die Leichtathletikfans? Und die Pink-Fans?

Der Botanische Garten ist trotzdem eine Stätte des Friedens, die ich wohl noch öfter aufsuchen muss.