Quilted Network Patterns

Networks: Cast Aluminum Ant Hills

Chase These Blues Away: Strong Patterns and Networks Are Beautiful

The Modular Mind

From Wiki:

Modularity of Mind

Modularity of mind is the notion that a mind may, at least in part, be composed of innate neural structures or modules which have distinct established evolutionarily developed functions.

Somewhat different definitions of "module" have been proposed by different authorities.

Evolutionary Psychology and Massive Modularity

Other perspectives on modularity come from evolutionary psychology, particularly from the work of Leda Cosmides and John Tooby. This perspective suggests that modules are units of mental processing that evolved in response to selection pressures. On this view, much modern human psychological activity is rooted in adaptations that occurred earlier in human evolution, when natural selection was forming the modern human species.

Evolutionary psychologists propose that the mind is made up of genetically influenced and domain-specific mental algorithms or computational modules, designed to solve specific evolutionary problems of the past. Cosmides and Tooby also state in a brief "primer" on their website, that "…the brain is a physical system. It functions like a computer," "…the brain’s function is to process information," "different neural circuits are specialized for solving different adaptive problems," and "our modern skulls house a stone age mind."

Critics of the Theory

Several groups of critics, including psychologists working within evolutionary frameworks, argue that the massively modular theory of mind does little to explain adaptive psychological traits.

Proponents of other models of the mind argue that the computational theory of mind is no better at explaining human behavior than a theory with mind entirely a product of the environment. Even within evolutionary psychology there is discussion about the degree of modularity, either as a few generalist modules or as many highly specific modules.

Other critics suggest that there is little empirical support in favor of the domain-specific theory beyond performance on the Wason selection task, a task critics state is too limited in scope to test all relevant aspects of reasoning. Moreover, critics argue that Cosmides and Tooby's conclusions contain several inferential errors and that the authors use untested evolutionary assumptions to eliminate rival reasoning theories.

Wallace (2010) observes that the evolutionary psychologists' definition of "mind" have been heavily influenced by cognitivism and/or information processing definitions of the mind.

Critics point out that these assumptions underlying evolutionary psychologists' hypotheses are controversial and have been contested by some psychologists, philosophers, and neuroscientists.

For example, Jaak Panksepp, an affective neuroscientist, point to the "remarkable degree of neocortical plasticity within the human brain, especially during development" and states that "the developmental interactions among ancient special-purpose circuits and more recent general-purpose brain mechanisms can generate many of the "modularized" human abilities that evolutionary psychology has entertained.

In contrast to modular mental structure, some theories posit domain-general processing, in which mental activity is distributed across the brain and cannot be decomposed, even abstractly, into independent units. A staunch defender of this view is William Uttal, who argues in The New Phrenology (2003) that there are serious philosophical, theoretical, and methodological problems with the entire enterprise of trying to localise cognitive processes in the brain. Part of this argument is that a successful taxonomy of mental processes has yet to be developed.

Merlin Donald argues that over evolutionary time the mind has gained adaptive advantage from being a general problem solver. The mind, as described by Donald, includes module-like "central" mechanisms, in addition to more recently evolved "domain-general" mechanisms.

For more, go to:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modularity_of_mind

Beat Visionary: Brion Gysin

My newest HPB art book purchase -- more art about patterns and networks:

Gadfly or Genius?  -- Genius!

Brion Gysin: Tuning in to the Multimedia Age by Jose Ferez Kuri (Editor)

This comprehensive biography presents the achievements of Brion Gysin, a multi-faceted artist whose work has influenced performers such as David Bowie and Mick Jagger.

Recalling the heady atmosphere of the so-called Beat Hotel in Paris in the late 1950s and 1960s, it features first-hand reminiscences by contemporaries, plus a biographical essay and chronological listings.

The book explains the invention of the cut-up technique and Brion Gysin's productive literary collaboration with William Burroughs. As well as looking at his work as a sound poet and performance artist, it features reproductions of his paintings and graphics, and examples of his permutated poems and other writings.

From Publishers Weekly:
Brion Gysin (1916-1986) was a U.S.-born cultural provocateur whose first 40 years found him, after a Canadian adolescence, flitting from career to career, as poet, painter, set designer (he assisted Irene Sharaff on a sheaf of major Broadway musicals in the 1940s), historian of the system of slavery in Canada and international gadabout in the homosexual coterie of Paul Bowles, Denham Fouts and Cecil Beaton.

When he became involved with William S. Burroughs at the so-called "Beat Hotel" in Paris in 1959, Gysin made a leap into literary and hipster history by inventing the "cut-up," joining together ripped sections of newspaper to form a nonlinear yet theoretically readable text. (Burroughs used this method, he claimed, in writing his novels The Soft Machine and Nova Express.)

Gysin also invented the "Dream Machine," a strobe-heavy sort of orgone box designed to drive its users into the systematic derangement of the senses foretold by Rimbaud.

The debate about Gysin will always be whether he was a lightweight gadfly or a great Leonardo-type genius with tragically limited appreciation of his accomplishments.

This book, coming out of a 1998 Gysin retrospective at the Edmonton Art Gallery, includes a plethora of Gysin documents and suggestive texts by a variety of art writers and Gysin geeks, should put Gysin's detractors on the defensive.

He did everything, and most of it's here: He showed with Picasso, posed for Carl Van Vechten, led Brian Jones to the Pipes of Boujouka in Morocco, preached the gospel of kif, recorded a kind of spoken-word jazz with Steve Lacy and used the Dream Machine to help design dozens of abstract "calligraphic" pictures (among 195 color and 60 b&w illustrations here).

The individual reader, of course, will decide whether it all means anything-or everything.

About the Author
Jose Ferez Kuri has been researching the life and work of Brion Gysin since 1986; in 1998 he was co-curator of the major Gysin retrospective held at the Edmonton Art Gallery.

Networks: Philip Taaffe Pattern Paintings

From yee Wiki:

An admirer of Henri Matisse’s cut-outs and of Synthetic Cubism, from the mid-1980s Philip Taaffe (b. 1955) began to borrow images and designs directly from more recent artists.

In We Are Not Afraid (1985), he develops Barnett Newman’s zip motif into a spiral; the title is a reply to Newman’s series of paintings Who’s Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue (1966–70). In Defiance (1986), he reinterprets work by Op Artist Bridget Riley.

Taaffe's first solo exhibition was in New York in 1982. He has since been included in exhibitions at Carnegie International, two Sydney Bienniales, and three Whitney Bienniales. His work is held in the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Taaffe's work often blends motifs from multiple cultures.

Tree of Life: Evolutionary Branching Network





 

Along With "Plastics"...."Networks"

Joan Miro's Constellations Paintings -- Networks?

From:

http://madamepickwickartblog.com/2011/01/miro-constellations-looking-for-signs-from-above/

For a while Joan Miro practiced pure automatism as advocated by the Surrealists.

Soon, however, a horde of neatly described if unidentifiable monsters invaded his stage. In the early thirties, geometrical abstraction reached its high water mark, and Miro was influenced by the painters Mondrian, Leger and Arp -- his forms became less anecdotal, his compositions more severe. Even so, he remained himself.

In 1936, the specter of civil war rose over Spain. Again Miro was affected -- his fantastic scenes became anguished, oppressive -- the dreams turned into nightmare.

When the Second World War broke out, Miro then left a collapsed France. Miro sought shelter amidst the stars -- or rather behind them. In the cacophony of a demented world, his “Constellations” captured an echo of the music of the spheres.

Artist Carroll Dunham has written, "Beginning around 1924 Miro gradually cut himself free from most of the things that had previously given painting its 'look.' From our present cultural perspective we have trouble really feeling the radicality and depth of some early Modernism, which can look fussy and illustrational to us.

But it's important to see how radical this work was--nothing like it had appeared before. Miro's break and subsequent blossoming obviously didn't occur in a vacuum, but they have a special quality. He was close in spirit to the prehistoric artists of Altamira and Lascaux; the impulses in the work seem 'human' rather than 'Modern"'or 'European.' There is a wonderful comfort with playfulness and sexuality in the work. He achieved a scale and an openness several generations ahead of the conventional wisdom in painting, and he integrated language into his imagery through the collapse of writing and drawing into one activity. The implications of all this are still being explored."

Networks Not Hierarchies

Grow and Groom Your Networks

I prefer the decentralized network, but this image makes for a nice radial design.

Welcome: You Are Now on the Don Mangus Network



Which networks are Don Mangus-approved?


The correct answers are B and C.

Pablo Picasso, Project for a Monument to Guillame Apollinaire, 1962, painted steel, Museum of Modern Art

Duncan J. Watts YouTube: "Six Degrees"

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pFK1bpQwHF4

Duncan J. Watts discusses connectivity and the math of "Six Degrees."

On the Reading Stand: "Brain Bugs" by Dean Buonomano

From the clearance book "to read" pile comes my latest, and just 25 pages in, it looks to be a winner.

Brain Bugs How the Brain’s Flaws Shape Our Lives by Dean Buonomano. The human brain is more beautiful and complex than anything we could ever build but it’s far from perfect. Our memory is unreliable; we can’t multiply large sums in our heads; advertising manipulates our judgment; we tend to distrust people who are different from us; supernatural beliefs are hard to shake and we prefer instant gratification to long-term gain.
       Dean Buonomano illuminates the causes and consequences of these "bugs" in terms of the brain’s innermost workings and their evolutionary purposes. He then goes a step further, examining how our brains function—and malfunction—in the digital, predator-free, information-saturated, special effects-addled world that we have built for ourselves. Along the way, this lively, surprising tour of mental glitches and how they arise gives us the tools to hone our cognitive strengths while recognising our inherent weaknesses.

"Brain Bugs is not only well written and researched, it also does a terrific job of explaining why we inevitably get many things wrong, and why we're brilliant at some things but hopeless at others." --   BBC Focus

"...an absolute delight to read and truly fascinating." -- Popular Science Blog

"Excellent...[Buonomano] reveals the intricate limitations and blessings of the most complex device in the known universe." -- The Atlantic

The human brain may be the best piece of technology ever created, but it’s far from perfect. Drawing on colorful examples and surprising research, neuroscientist Dean Buonomano exposes the blind spots and weaknesses that beset our brains and lead us to make misguided personal, professional, and financial decisions. Whether explaining why we are susceptible to advertisements or demonstrating how false memories are formed, Brain Bugs not only explains the brain’s inherent flaws but also gives us the tools to counteract them.

“[An] intriguing take on behavioral economics, marketing and human foibles.” (Kirkus Reviews )

"Writing a book about the hardware and software flaws of the human brain is an ingenious idea, and Buonomano has fully delivered on its promise. To a degree that is difficult for most of us to imagine, much less understand, our successes and failures, joys and sufferings, are the product of protein interactions and electrical changes taking place inside our heads. Brain Bugs is a remarkably accessible and engaging introduction to the neuroscience of the human condition." -- Sam Harris, author of the New York Times bestsellers The Moral Landscape, and The End of Faith

"In Brain Bugs, Dean Buonomano has brilliantly pulled off what few psychological scientists can do. In elegant and clear writing, he masterfully conveys the astonishing capability of the human mind, along with its flaws and limitations." -- Elizabeth Loftus, Distinguished Professor at the University of California, Irvine, and author of Eyewitness Testimony

"He takes readers on a lively tour of systematic biases and errors in human thinking, citing examples that are staples of psychology courses and other popular books. What is new, however, is Buonomano’s focus on the mechanisms of memory, especially its "associative architecture," as the main causes of the brain’s bugs." -- Christopher Chabris, New York Times

"What makes the book all the more compelling is the lucidity with which Buonomano recognizes, amidst its weaknesses, the brain's insurmountable strengths, feats artificial intelligence is ages from reaching--most notably, its remarkable penchant for pattern-recognition and what Buonomano calls "the inherent and irrepressible ability of the brain to build connections and make associations." -- Maria Popova, The Atlantic

"One of the things I liked most about this book was the way it leaps from neuron to brain and then to person and on to society and back again, making useful comparisons all the way." -- Susan Blackmore, Focus Magazine

Biography

Dean Buonomano is a professor in the Departments of Neurobiology and Psychology, and a member of the Brain Research Institute, and the Integrative Center for Learning and Memory at UCLA.

His research focuses on the neural basis of learning, neural computations, and how the brain tells time. His research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

He has been interviewed about his research on timing and neural computation for Newsweek, Discover Magazine, Scientific American, Los Angeles Times, New Scientist, and The New Yorker.



On the Reading Stand: The Web of Life: A New Scientific Understanding of Living Systems by Fritjof Capra

“Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.”

-- Chief Seattle

In the study of my latest interests --  in networks, open systems, and emergence -- comes this new, terrific HPB Clearance Sale book find:

The Web of Life: A New Scientific Understanding of Living Systems by Fritjof Capra 

The vitality and accessibility of Fritjof Capra's ideas have made him perhaps the most eloquent spokesperson of the latest findings emerging at the frontiers of scientific, social, and philosophical thought. In his international bestsellers The Tao of Physics and The Turning Point, he juxtaposed physics and mysticism to define a new vision of reality. In The Web of Life, Capra takes yet another giant step, setting forth a new scientific language to describe interrelationships and interdependence of psychological, biological, physical, social, and cultural phenomena--the "web of life."

During the past twenty-five years, scientists have challenged conventional views of evolution and the organization of living systems and have developed new theories with revolutionary philosophical and social implications. Fritjof Capra has been at the forefront of this revolution. In The Web of Life, Capra offers a brilliant synthesis of such recent scientific breakthroughs as the theory of complexity, Gaia theory, chaos theory, and other explanations of the properties of organisms, social systems, and ecosystems. Capra's surprising findings stand in stark contrast to accepted paradigms of mechanism and Darwinism and provide an extraordinary new foundation for ecological policies that will allow us to build and sustain communities without diminishing the opportunities for future generations.

The Web of Life is cutting-edge science writing in the tradition of James Gleick's Chaos, Gregory Bateson's Mind and Matter, and Ilya Prigogine's Order Out of Chaos.

Scott London blog Book Review:

http://www.scottlondon.com/reviews/capra.html

Albert-László Barabási at TEDMED 2012

Networks guru and author Albert-László Barabási says diseases are the results of system breakdowns within the body, and mapping intracellular protein networks will help us discover cures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10oQMHadGos


Q & A video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkurtDHFnac&feature=relmfu

On Mind and Body Networks: Antonio Damasio

Railroad worker Phineas Gage took one for the neuroscience team when his metal tamping rod was launched through his skull and brain by an accidental spark that exploded a gunpowder charge intended to level a rock outcropping.

I'm still on a brain science reading jag. I keep finding new books to add to my ever expanding must-read list. Normally, I like to vary my reading selections with a few crime novels or general science books here and there, but I'm very deep into the neuroscience books at present. Apparently, this brain science stuff is very complicated (but not as complicated as tring to grow money with investments).

I'm also in "work crunch" mode, racking up a ton of OT hours at work, day after day, week after week. I've said it before,, and I'll say it again, in this crazy modern culture, you either work all the time or hardly at all. so, I tend to go on buying sprees via the internet to reward myself for the hours I'm putting in, spending like a drunken sailor on shore leave. It's Amazon, eBay, Half Price Books, and abe.com, here I come.

I'm halfway through Antonio Damasio's 1994 book, Descartes Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain . This is a smartly written primer about brain anatomy and emotional processing. It's a bit more literate, and more enjoyable to read than Joseph Ledoux's still excellent book, The Emotional Brain (which delved more into the nuts and bolts of the brain lab experiments and research techniques).

Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain by Antonio Damasio

From Amazon: "Pioneering scientist Damasio's international reputation is based on his explorations into the neurology of vision, memory, and language. His influence will extend far beyond the parameters of the scientific community with this marvelously lucid and engaging presentation of his innovative ideas about the interconnectedness of mind and body. Damasio begins with some dramatic case histories of people who have survived brain damage without severe physical impairment only to experience bizarre degradations of personality and thought processes. He explains these puzzling maladies by analyzing the various systems at work in the brain, from those associated with life support to the highest echelon of cognition. After discussing how emotions and feelings are expressed by the bodypounding heart, trembling hands, and blushing, Damasio launches into one of his main themes: how essential emotions are to our ability to reason and make decisions. As he illuminates numerous ways the body and the mind work together to process stimuli, draw upon memory, and fuel thought and judgment, Damasio convinces us that the self is a perpetually recreated neurobiological state. Descartes' error, then, was his belief that the mind and body are separate entities. On the contrary, Damasio tells us, their continual collaboration is the key to consciousness and individuality." --  review by Donna Seaman.

From Kirkus Reviews

"Few neuroscientists today would defend Cartesian dualism -- the idea that mind and body are separate -- but Damasio takes one more leap: Not only are philosophers wrong to separate brain and body, but psychology's separation of reason from emotion is also wrong. Most neuroscientists agree that what we call the mind reflects the functions of the nervous system -- in short, crudely speaking, the body. Modern science, however, has transferred the old mind- body split into a brain-body dichotomy in which the brain occupies a hierarchically privileged place. But Damasio (Neurology/Univ. of Iowa College of Medicine) democratizes the relationship between brain and body; he posits a powerful interdependence in which our physical experience of the world around us is central to the creation of our sense of self, and colors our behavior. His persuasive argument begins with Phineas Gage, a 19th-century railway worker who suffered brain damage when an iron rod shot through his head like a missile, destroying his left eye and parts of his frontal lobes. The result was not a loss of speech or memory but profound personality and emotional changes and an inability to make rational judgments about the present and future. Damasio and his wife, Hanna, have studied patients with similar frontal-lobe damage and similar effects: IQ, memory, and language are intact, but there is a lack of feeling and an inability to put current events in context and make future judgments. These points are eloquently expressed, along with the anatomical/physiological evidence linking the frontal cortices with sensory-motor areas and emotional networks that feed forward and backward from the body surface and internal organs. Damasio is the first to admit that he cannot prove all he says. In the meantime, one can read with pleasure and share the excitement of a neuroscientist who sees that in the union of the many parts of the human brain lies its strength."

To quote Tex Avery's Droopy, "Gruesome, isn't it?"

Survey Says: Statistics and Networks

Super Crunchers: Why Thinking-By-Numbers is the New Way To Be Smart by Ian Ayres

"An international sensation—and still the talk of the relevant blogosphere—this Wall Street Journal and New York Times business bestseller examines the “power” in numbers. Today more than ever, number crunching affects your life in ways you might not even imagine. Intuition and experience are no longer enough to make the grade. In order to succeed—even survive—in our data-based world, you need to become statistically literate.

Cutting-edge organizations are already crunching increasingly larger databases to find the unseen connections among seemingly unconnected things to predict human behavior with staggeringly accurate results. From Internet sites like Google and Amazon that use filters to keep track of your tastes and your purchasing history, to insurance companies and government agencies that every day make decisions affecting your life, the brave new world of the super crunchers is happening right now. No one who wants to stay ahead of the curve should make another keystroke without reading Ian Ayres’s engrossing and enlightening book."

The Lady Tasting Tea: How Statistics Revolutionized Science in the Twentieth Century by David Salsburg

"An insightful, revealing history of the magical mathematics that transformed our world.
At a summer tea party in Cambridge, England, a guest states that tea poured into milk tastes different from milk poured into tea. Her notion is shouted down by the scientific minds of the group. But one man, Ronald Fisher, proposes to scientifically test the hypothesis. There is no better person to conduct such an experiment, for Fisher is a pioneer in the field of statistics.

The Lady Tasting Tea spotlights not only Fisher's theories but also the revolutionary ideas of dozens of men and women which affect our modern everyday lives. Writing with verve and wit, David Salsburg traces breakthroughs ranging from the rise and fall of Karl Pearson's theories to the methods of quality control that rebuilt postwar Japan's economy, including a pivotal early study on the capacity of a small beer cask at the Guinness brewing factory. Brimming with intriguing tidbits and colorful characters, The Lady Tasting Tea salutes the spirit of those who dared to look at the world in a new way."

Linked: How Everything Is Connected to Everything Else and What It Means by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi

"A cocktail party? A terrorist cell? Ancient bacteria? An international conglomerate?

All are networks, and all are a part of a surprising scientific revolution. Albert-László Barabási, the nation’s foremost expert in the new science of networks, takes us on an intellectual adventure to prove that social networks, corporations, and living organisms are more similar than previously thought. Grasping a full understanding of network science will someday allow us to design blue-chip businesses, stop the outbreak of deadly diseases, and influence the exchange of ideas and information. Just as James Gleick brought the discovery of chaos theory to the general public, Linked tells the story of the true science of the future."