The Brain is not a Digital Computer (The Muse In The Machine, Gelernter 1994)

David Gelernter. The Muse in the Machine. (1994) A strange book, which makes a number of major points or claims.

First, Gelernter posits a spectrum of attention, from the barely conscious, half-recalled dream state to the rational, hyper-focussed attention and linear thinking that we’ve learned to accept as the best kind. However, says Gelernter, creativity is highest when attention is low and the mind “wanders.” Hyper-focussed attention is on the contrary not very creative. Its main (and perhaps only) value is to bring order to the usually chaotic structures of the insights created when our attention is low.

There’s some truth to this. In fact, it’s become a pop-psych cliche. Every now and then some analogy tripped over when the mind wanders triggers an insight.  But in my experience those events are not guaranteed. In fact, they are rare enough to make them memorable. I think that pretty well everybody has worried a problem until a solution “presented itself” unexpectedly. But we know that it’s a process that we can’t control. About all we can infer is there is a lot of thinking well below the level of conscious attention, some of it surfaces, and occasionally the product is useful. We can allow this process to work by letting go of a problem and chilling. But there’s no guarantees.

A Wandering Mind?

Second, the mind is not software. I agree, in part for the reason Gelernter puts forward, which is that the analogy of  “mind” with “virtual machine” breaks down. A virtual machine is one that’s implemented in software running on another machine. Abstract the concept of “machine” to an entity that performs some task in response to some input, then any program is a virtual machine. E.g., the wordprocessor I’m using takes data from the keyboard, and transforms that into a block of data in memory. It sends copies of the data to the graphics processor, which translates them into a display on the monitor. When I hit Print, it sends data to the printer, which in turn lays microscopic dots of ink onto a sheet of paper. To my eye, it’s the text I composed.

This is not how the brain works.

The analogy is that “mind” is a massive data-processing program running on the brain. Or a mess of such programs running in parallel. Hence a virtual machine. Write the program(s) in a suitable language, and the “mind” can run on any capable “substrate.” Such is the fantasy supporting the desire to “upload” the self and live forever. Gelernter is no biologist, but he argues that his concept of an attention spectrum requires a body. IOW, a mind cannot exist apart from a body. I agree, but my reason is I think somewhat simpler. The brain’s primary function is to operate the body. Most of its energy is expended in doing just that.

(https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/thinking-hard-calories/)

 “Thinking”, such as it is, takes up a very small part of the brain’s energy budget. Being “me” is what thinking is mostly about, and it’s really just an afterthought.

The last part of the book is a nicely done symbolic reading of the Song of Solomon. Gelernter is a believing Orthodox Jew. He posits that the hyper-focussed attention that we nowadays equate with thinking is a recent development. (Schooling is intended to train us to think this way.) An unfortunate effect of high-attention rational thought is a misreading of ancient texts, which are, he says, the products or records of low-attention thinking, hence their nonlinear narratives, symbolism and metaphor, and reliance on analogy to make both narrative and thematic sense. I think this is the most valuable part of the book. But it doesn’t prove that the concept of an attention spectrum explains creativity.

A curious book, with many interesting and useful insights. Worth a read. **½

S Is For Silence (Grafton, 2005)

Sue Grafton.  S Is For Silence. (2005) Violet Sullivan disappeared on a July 4th evening. Her daughter Daisy wants her found, because she feels abandoned. Kinsey winkles out the truth. Her investigation upsets a lot of apple carts, as usual. Grafton includes flashbacks to narrate Violet’s story up to the time of her disappearance. These also give us glimpses of the suspects and bystanders, as well as clues that Kinsey (and later the police) do not have. Even so, it takes the reader (me) a while to suss who killed Violet.

Grafton’s interested in character, and in how mistaken ideas of morality, the yearning for respectability, and the rigidity of socially defined roles deform relationships and prevent happiness. That some people bring psychopathic evil into the mix just makes the world more dangerous. Still, in the end, a sort of justice prevails, and people achieve acceptance of what they can’t change. Grafton indulges in a few bits of poetic justice, thus satisfying our all-too-human thirst for revenge.

One of Grafton’s best, not least because the interleaving of past and present. ****

Conspiracies: Foucault's Pendulum (Eco, 1989)

Umberto Eco. Foucault’s Pendulum. (1989) It took me about a month to read this book. Not a page-turner, but it drew me in, and I kept returning to it. A rich mess of reality, conspiracy theories, human gullibility, back stories, esoteric lore, epigrammatic observations on anything relevant to narrative moment, paranormal (or maybe not) events, computer science, code breaking, the mysterious history of the Templars –  all this and more just kept me reading. And of course Foucault's Pendulum, swinging through its arc every 16.5 seconds.

The central conceit is that three editors, who work for a publishing house, decide to invent a new version of the Templar story, which has occupied too much of the attention of the hapless authors who are seduced into paying to publish their discoveries of the secret of the Templars, the Freemasons, the Rosicrucians, the Illuminati, and the other secret societies believed to run the machinery that we are pleased to call real life.

A rich and satisfying book. Read it. ****

Art – random thoughts.

Art, like money, is what we think it is. That’s why money is, apparently, the only measure of art. If it’s free, it’s not art. Or so it seems.

Painters were once prized as picture makers. Cameras have devalued the craft of making pictures by hand. That has shifted the focus to making pictures worth looking at. Composition now matters in ways it did not matter before. Hence abstract art, which is pure composition. Impressionism, which refuses to provide the optical illusion of reality. Expressionism, which claims to show emotions and meanings directly. Pop art, which detaches the image from its context. And so on.

Even photographers now attempt to do something other than make a naïve representation of reality. The subjects are staged, disparate objects are brought together in front of the camera, the photographer moves around to get the best angle of view, digital technologies enable manipulation well beyond the capabilities of the darkroom. 

Old and new image-making technologies are attempts at exploring and redefining picture-making in order to make images worth looking at.

All the while, the ease of making images has discouraged looking. Too many images – very few worth a 2nd look – how do we know that worth? By their nagging presence in memory? By the content? By the palette? The composition?

Any or all of these will make an image stick. The unpredictable part is individual preference or taste. And that perhaps even more elusive entity, meaning. All images signify, but what they signify depends on how the viewer decodes what they see. That includes the image maker, whose perception of meaning is no better or more valid than any other. The image maker’s intention cannot overcome the inherent ambiguities in the image. This inability to determine the significance of the work is common to all forms and modes of expression. Including this one, which is certain to be misunderstood, to be interpreted in ways I do not intend and cannot prevent. This lack of control explains the futility of censorship.

Curling with the Devil (Mitchell, The Black Bonspiel of Willie McCrimmon)

 W. O. Mitchell. The Black Bonspiel of Willie MacCrimmon. (1993) Mitchell’s version of a folk-tale trope: the defeat of the Devil. “Mr Cloutie”, on one of his regular visits to Shelby, Alberta, needs his curling boots repaired. Willie MacCrimmon obliges, one thing leads to another, and he’s pledged his soul if he loses a match against Mr Cloutie and his hellish rink, but gets a guaranteed slot at the Brier if he wins. Mrs Brown, wife of one of MacCrimmon’s rink, opposes curling on Sunday, and has guilted Mr Pringle, the United Church minister, into announcing the prohibition from his pulpit. That and several other obstacles must be overcome, but of course MacCrimmon’s rink wins, and they advance to the Brier. All’s well that ends well, as in any well-made fable it should.

Mitchell’s ability to puncture hypocrisy, show up the confusion of respectability with morality, and other sins makes this more than a mere entertainment. It also affirms, rightly, that curling is the true Canadian game. This edition has nicely apposite illustrations by Wesley W. Bates.

Recommended, if you can find a copy (I’m keeping mine). ****

The Pegnitz Junction (Gallant, 1982)

Mavis Gallant. The Pegnitz Junction. (1982) The title novella plus five short stories, all about post-war Germany. They have the ring of truth; Gallant knows herself, and so knows the human heart and mind. She notes the small gestures, the shifts in voice and posture that express emotions and hint at thoughts, the conventional speech that hides true feelings. She is a writer “on whom nothing is lost”. She has a subtle and ruthless moral sensibility, presenting us with characters who condemn themselves with their words and actions.

Post-war Germany was unmoored, aware of but unwilling to face its past, unable to do more than reconstruct a material prosperity that served as a shield against unpleasant thoughts and memories. Austria also was mired in this moral vagueness and ambiguity. That’s likely why I found these stories strangely familiar and unsurprising.

An early collection, before Gallant’s skill and artistry were widely recognised. Recommended. ****

The Defiant Agents (Norton, 1962)

Andre Norton. The Defiant Agents. (1962) From the back-cover blurb: “Travis Fox, once the unwilling captive of the run-away spaceship Galactic Derelict, has volunteered - eagerly - for the mission to colonize Topaz....” Some kind of mind-alteration reverts the colonists to their Apache ancestry. A similar technique has reverted a rival group of Russians to their Mongol ancestry, and so we have a conflict. The Russians are also subject to vicious mind-control which makes them robot-like slaves to their (unchanged) Russian masters. The assumption that far future space travel would be dominated by the rival USA and USSR demonstrates the common argument that5 SF is about the present. The mind-altering  element recalls the Cold War fear of "brain washing".

There are also mysterious ruins left behind by previous occupants of the planet. This subplot is scanted, I think because pulp publishers wanted short books.

Norton has worked out most of the glitches in this set-up, and provides a typical mid-century pulp entertainment, weak on character and ambience, but strong on plot. It reads like a magazine serial. A pleasant entertainment for SF fans, this is an early work. Norton became one of the masters. **