Art, Technology, Consciousness: mind@large

Roy Ascott
Intellect Books, Bristol, 2000

Reviewed by Gérard Mermoz, January 2003

 

Like all conference proceedings, this collection of papers is eclectic and uneven; and readers will have to work hard to find their way through the profusion of over-optimistic claims in the name of multidisciplinary and multicultural approaches which seek to integrate scientific, technological and artistic interests.

 

The project is ambitious as it seeks to address, in the words of its editor, Roy Ascott, “contemporary theories of consciousness, subjective experience, the creation of meaning and emotion, the modalities of the senses, and relationships between cognition and location. Its focus is both on and beyond the digital culture, seeking to embrace the world of neurons and molecules, and to assimilate new ideas emanating from the physical sciences. At the same time spiritual aspects of human experience are considered along with the artistic implications of non-ordinary states of consciousness” (p.1).

 

The problem, however, is that this ambition rests on a number of assumptions which, in their claims and their delivery, fail to provide convincing arguments. Thus, a messianic faith in digital technologies and the changes they allegedly brought about in other areas of culture and human existence leads to naive, unsubstantiated claims and counterclaims.

 

What is disappointing, in these papers, is that the attempts by the editor and most participants to embrace the issues at hand are not sophisticated enough, in their epistemological considerations, references and methodologies to be of interest outside its own chapel. This is apparent in the first text, 'Edge-Life: technoetics structures and moist media', by Roy Ascott, which opens with broad and over-optimistic—even naive—generalizations about the so-called radical transformations of “the world of print and broadcasting” and the replacement of “the cult of the objet d’art with a process-based culture”, concluding that “at the start of this century we see a further artistic shift, as silicon and pixels merge with molecules and matter” (p.2).

 

Reiterating truisms such as “language is not merely a device for communicating ideas about the world but rather a tool for bringing the world into existence”, under the auspices of the ‘moist’ metaphor, the synchretic mélange of references on offer here — to Ancient mythology, Teilhard de Chardin, Zen, Philosophy and popularized science — betrays all the signs of auto-didactic, undigested knowledge about history, culture, and the arts at large. Unable to evaluate the epistemological changes which came about in the arts and the sciences at various stages of Modernity, and relying on a would-be Post-Modern mythology embodied in the theme of the Post-Human, Ascott and his co-authors in the book invite us to partake in an act of faith and celebrate the alleged new Times when “Time will become more dominant than space, system more significant than structure” (p.6).

 

The new ontology on offer rings absolutely phoney; a mere decorative use of concepts without substance served on a tray of optimism.

 

This may sound too damning; however the stakes are high; and I do not see the point of re-inventing the wheel in blind ignorance of what has been long achieved and more clearly formulated elsewhere; in philosophy, linguistics, semiotics, etc. The Moist Mind is a simplistic reification of an ambition to emulate MacLuhan or Baudrillard with a new slogan.

 

The next essay may be useful to students to pose the problem of the rapport between the discourses of art, science and technology in the perspective of multidisciplinary collaborations.

 

'The Posthuman Conception of Consciousness: a 10-point guide', by Robert Pepperell lists guide a series of truisms which capitalizes on the sound of its tenth point: “Culture is a way of defragmenting consciousness” (p15).

 

With Eduardo Kac, at last, we have a tangible set of propositions upon which the informed reader will have some material to react to or against, and with a great economy of words and no jargon! More convincing than Bill Hill’s 'Techno-Darwinism: artificial selection in the electronic age', which denotes a personal engagement with the issues it discusses, but leaves which denotes a personal engagement with the issues it discusses, but leaves open — in the absence of the work — the question of its effectiveness.

 

'Not Science, or History: post digital biological art and a distant cousin', by Michael Punt, sets cousin out to show that “bio-electronic art which deals with artificial life and genetic engineering should be understood as making a significant critical intervention in contemporary debates about the progress of both science and history”, but the epistemological tools used here to conjure up history are too rudimentary to fulfill the promise. Kathleen Rogers’ 'The Imagination of Matter, Pre-Columbian Cultural DNA and Maize Cultivation' is better documented and argued, and manages to open up important ethical (ecological) issues.

 

It is difficult to assess whether linguistic barrier or simplistic methodology — I shall venture a mix of both — should be held responsible for the limited insights offered by 'Capacity to Conceive New Meanings by Awareness of Conscious Experience' (pp.33-38).

 

With 'Motioning Towards the Emergent Definition of E-phany Physics', the long quotation at the beginning, in which Jarry defines Pataphysics as the “science of imaginary solutions” is never developed to any degree of sophistication and the jargon into which artistic intentions are formulated on p.40 will be of little help to those who are intrigued by the possibilities of transposing codes from one domain into another, as Kac had given us an example.

 

The rest of the papers follow very much in the same vein. One merit of the collection is that they are short and therefore easier to work through.

 

This collection reflects the current situation of academics when institutional pressure induces them to publish, whatever the cost, even if this means cluttering the ‘noosphere’ with expendable trivia.

 

In the frenzy for multidisciplinary projects focusing on new technologies, it is important to realize that reading a few texts from another discipline does not qualify one to make statements about that discipline nor to import its concepts for the purpose of offering insights to others.

 

Gérard Mermoz is Research Fellow in Typography in the Graphic Design Department of the London College of Printing