User:Kim/reading/The truth of fact, the truth of feeling

by Ted Chiang Subterranean Press Fall 2013

mentioned texts, yet to be linked:

"The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective" Donna Haraway
"Feminist, Queer, Crip" Alison Kafer
"the queer art of failure" Jack Halberstam
"Telling is Listening" Ursula K. Le Guin

#1

I mostly think of writing and reading together - when we write we read and when we read we write (annotate, inscribe)? : interesting how there is such a huge gap between both here

I am curious to think of how technology shapes our ways of memorizing : maybe not only in the most common doom "we loose ability to remember" but also how we benefit or change

I also thought of the the “Extended Mind Thesis” originally established by philosopher and cognitive scientists Andy Clark and David Chalmers in 1998 ( the mind does not exclusively reside in the brain, or even the body, but extends beyond and into the physical world )

lastly I find it interesting how with remem memory becomes very reliant on image/ the visual apparatus (and all the ideologies/ predispositions that come with visibility?)

#2

europeans :,(

materiality: paper

"how can paper tell a story?" I really liked the question, feel it adheres to something/ questions that understands paper as an active/living being with its own materiality and individual relations (different than human or animal ones maybe)

paper is a record, writing is recording

this is about time: preserving (future), looking back (history, past)

"interpreting" reminded me of the browser and protocols - the machine/ code knows one interpretation while the human one is ambigous

#3

surveillance and police states

it also made me think of the used phrasing of "truth" and objectivity -- here supposedly based on image/ vision

and reminded me of Donna Haraway's Text on situated knowledges:

"The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective"

also I just here go that apparently videos can be sent between individuals: this brings a whole new level to idea of 'personal memory' but also to perspective?

I dont like the phrasing "what technology brings out in people" , it renders the human, the user passive and unknowing

also these effects (often negative?) are too often made an individuals responsibility (instead of the creators hidden capitalist, racist etc agency)

#4

"each mark indicates a sound" made me think of the different theories there are on how writing systems emerged: vocals or sounds humans made in their communication or from objects that were named like animals, plants, tools

"words are the same wether you speak quickly or slowly" I dont think they are, writing digitally or by hand gives hints to the pace they had been written in, also though paths are different in different paces I think

I liked the idea of spaces making the framework of language, speaking visible

lastly: reading and writing are intertwined in that they shape each others practice and perception (as we see in last paragraph here)

#5

aspiring to integrate remem into thought process made me think of muscle memory and the gestures towards or with technology that are already so habitual for us we dont recognize them anymore (swiping, scrolling, how we hold a device, typing)

the phrasing of cognitive cyborgs remembered me of a chapter of Alison Kafer's "Feminist, Queer, Crip" a critical examination of normativity (towards bodies and sexuality) in the cyborg context

also "misremembering" what is that supposed to mean? a memory is always mediated, in this case even if one sees an actual video of a situation, this si still seen and interpreted by a human (and therefore ambigous)

I hope I will always be able to forget! the here highlighted role of forgetting (failure) in relationships reminds me of Jack Halberstam's "the queer art of failure"

and specifically two chapters on forgetting: "Dude where's my Phallus: Forgetting, Loosing, Looping" and "Shadow Feminisms: Queer Negativity and Radical Passivity", where Halberstam writes about Dory, the forgetful fish from finding Nemo

#6

literal embodiement of telling stories different from text on paper?

In "Telling is Listening" Science Fiction Author Ursula K. Le Guin writes:

– speech connects us because it is a bodily process

– “all living beings are oscillators: we vibrate

– “We entrain one another all the time”

– listening not as reaction but connection – not only respond but join in, become part of the conversation/ story

"How does writing help you think?"

"once you wrote them down, you could grasp your thoughts like bricks in your hand"

#7

semantic memory

knowledge / general facts

preserved in writing, books etc

episodic memory

recollection of personal experiences

recorded in diaries, images?

in the case of images, our memories are still technologically mediated (sometimes we remember from an image)

truth in autobiography

“On the one side are the truths of fact, on the other the truth of the writer’s feeling" (Roy Pascal)

where both coincide can not be decided by outer party nor in advance

does remem only produce facts and no feelings?

memories are highly individual, because they rely on subjective perception and detail: two beings cant have similar memories even of the same situation

#8

Jijingi is named scribe for tribal court
book is mentioned -- but as something normal? why is writing an extraordinary thing but the technology of the book isnt?

“Our language has two words for what in your language is called ‘true‘... there is what’s right, mimi and what’s precise, vough.

in a dispute: principals speak mimi and witness are sworn to say vough (what happened) -- after hearing out, its decided on what action is mimi for everyone.
the truth of fact the truth of feeling applied -- justice (objective) vs situated (subjective)

#9

for research: a crowdsourced lifelog, one thats not your own perspective (fragementary)
using crowdsourced livelog, author reviews crucial relationship event and finds out he remembered it wrong (opposite)

#10

tribe elders disagreement -- can we settle it with consulting paper?

#11

author visits his daughter to understand past and make amends

#12

Jijingi brings back paper, record of past events but sabe mistrusts

“Questions of kinship cannot be resolved by paper."

record was vough (precise but not enough to settle question), only mimi could settle the disagreement

#13

writing is a technology
idea that past shouldnt change is product of literate cultures, oral cultures understand past differently -- histories don’t need to be accurate so much as they need to validate the community’sunderstanding of itself.

benefit of digital memory: not to prove you were right but to admit you were wrong