Re: Magic 107 oops, real science

[jorn@chinet.chi.il.us (Jorn Barger)]

Steve VanDevender
> I'm willing to believe that your personal use of a recording will
> gradually alter it, and that you can uniquely identify the
> recording by these alterations.  Furthermore, I'm also willing to
> believe that listening to your personal recording is more likely
> to bring up personal associations that would not come with
> listening to another recording that doesn't have the same pattern
> of tape hiss.

(Jeez, you sound like a lawyer!  But I appreciate that you're talking 
content rather than spewing denial!)

So the moot point is: could this fine, personal layer of 'hiss' encode 
some handwavy 'hologram' (say) of the *consciousness* of the attentive 
( -but-negligently-hiss-imposing) listener?  One that might be 
readable in a way that helps you get empathically 'inside their head'?

I tend to believe those stories of Indian trackers who could look at a 
hoofprint and tell you whether the horse's human rider was (say) 
*smiling*  ;^)

My experience is that when my emotional state is *clear*, I can see 
into things' endless depths, and by extrapolation, if perfect clarity 
could be attained, to *everything* that's ever left any imprint on 
them.  Colin Wilson wrote several novels on this theme, especially 
"The Mind Parasites".  (Don't bother squawking over the title, you 
hyenas.  He was speaking metaphorically of *you*.)

Quantum mechanics paints this depressing image of *The Real* in which 
at the finest level, everything is *probabilities*.  IE, everything is 
*fog*.  I don't buy that.  That's not in the formulas, that's just the  
way they're most comfortable projecting their *egos* onto the 
formulas.

Van der Waals forces, for example, are explained, sub rosa, as the 
result of neighboring molecules coming into electronic 
synchronization.  So this "fog" has enough internal structure that it 
can be in-phase or out-of-phase with its neighbor, and moves towards 
synchrony, which means it exchanges an imprint with its neighbor.  So 
how do we know where the boundary is drawn between ultimately-
meaningful-signal and ultimately-meaningless-noise?  How can we 
*presume* to know that every electron field isn't exactly a dewdrop on 
the web of Indra, precisely refracting the whole rest of the universe?

And if the information is in there, how to you know the nervous system 
hasn't evolved a way to extract it back out?

> But as for digital recording media not being as alterable, I'd
> have to disagree.  While a CD is not degraded by the act of
> playing it in the same way a tape is, normal handling of a CD is
> likely to accumulate scratches and smudges that will end up
> affecting the sound produced.  So let's not say that CDs are so
> vibe-proof :-).

I want to distinguish hiss that's added by external means, and hiss 
that's written by the read-mechanism.  It's the latter that seems 
inherently 2-way to me, for vinyl and tape, but not for digital.

> I would not deny the importance that these personal associations
> can have in one's thoughts and emotions. 

Thank you, Mr Psych 101.

> However, I do not see
> these "vibes" existing as a separate entity.  What you call
> "vibes" cannot be separated from either you or the recording.

What you're saying, then, is that there's an empathic barrier, 
insurmountable by its deepest nature, that irreversibly locks us out 
of knowledge of others' subjective perceptions.  That's *bleak*.

> If you feel that subjective perceptions are an important part of
> life, then I can agree, to a point. 

So long as they're kept in line, by the authorization of consensus 
reality? ;^)

> Every memory in your life
> will have a subjective component because you will perceive it in
> the context of your own unique experience.  But our
> communications and relationships with other people depend on
> shared, objective experience. 

Like Star Trek, or something?

(She sulks.)
He: "Honey, relationships with other people depend on shared, 
objective experience!"
(Still she sulks.)

> While you can attempt to describe
> the nature of a subjective experience, I don't think you can ever
> bring another to experience _exactly_ what you feel.

"exactly"???  *That's* a straw man.  Who said exactly?

How 'bout *striving to communicate better*?  Ain't that *art*?


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