The latest issue of E-flux is now out, and perusing it I have been reading Negarestani's latest piece HERE. It is highly recommended if you haven't looked at it already.
Mute magazine is also on fire having published papers from December's Accelerationism Symposium. (As an aside, I found an intriguing article by Simon Mussell from an older issue HERE. The article incidentally mentions yours truly in its first footnote!)
Saturday, February 15, 2014
Function: Decomposition, Localization, Abstraction- Workshop feat. Brassier & Negarestani in NYC
Function: Decomposition, Localization, Abstraction Speakers: Ray Brassier, Reza Negarestani. March 25th, 6:30pm @ The New School.
Although principally associated with a thesis in the philosophy of mind, functionalism has wide-ranging ramifications. The concept of "functional role" or "functional organization" ties together a metaphysical problem about the basis of the distinction between matter and form, an epistemic problem about how to distinguish semantic content from physical information, and an engineering problem about the relation between structural and functional properties. This workshop will try to unravel the metaphysical, epistemic, and engineering aspects of functionalism by developing themes from the work of philosophers including William Bechtel, Robert Brandom, Wilfrid Sellars, and William Wimsatt.
Hosted by the Center for Transformative Media at The New School.
Tickets HERE
Friday, February 14, 2014
update on my book through Open Humanities Press
I heard from Joanna of OHP yesterday and now that the first draft of Animal Experience: Consciousness and Emotions in the Natural World is done she states that it should be about three months of review and editing until official publication of the book. We have been told that the book (hopefully) will appear before the end of June. As After Nature readers know, last year we began work on the book which is to appear through Open Humanities Press' "Living Books About Life" series.
Now that we are finished and have some hindsight on the project, I am proud to say that I am quite happy with how the book turned out. There is a fairly large introduction, an extensive bibliography, and a table of contents featuring some very interesting cutting edge research. The most intriguing part, I think, is the last section which focuses on philosophical views of animals and the emotions. There you'll find work presented by Philippe Descola, Isabelle Stengers, and Bruno Latour.
Others who have published in the series include Dave Berry, Jussi Parikka, Claire Colebrook, and Steven Shaviro, to name a few.
I am excited for After Nature readers to see this new volume of OHP appear!
Living Books About Life from Peter Woodbridge on Vimeo.
Now that we are finished and have some hindsight on the project, I am proud to say that I am quite happy with how the book turned out. There is a fairly large introduction, an extensive bibliography, and a table of contents featuring some very interesting cutting edge research. The most intriguing part, I think, is the last section which focuses on philosophical views of animals and the emotions. There you'll find work presented by Philippe Descola, Isabelle Stengers, and Bruno Latour.
Others who have published in the series include Dave Berry, Jussi Parikka, Claire Colebrook, and Steven Shaviro, to name a few.
I am excited for After Nature readers to see this new volume of OHP appear!
Living Books About Life from Peter Woodbridge on Vimeo.
Thursday, February 13, 2014
quote of the day
- John Dewey (1897), "Hegel's Philosophy of Spirit," in John Dewey's Philosophy of Spirit: With the 1897 Lecture on Hegel (New York, Fordham UP: 2010), 114.
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Incredible Machines Conference next month with Galloway, Negarestani, Woodard, and more
Krista contacted me from Incredible Machines 2014 and I am glad that she did. I am hoping to participate via google (by watching and hopefully getting chance to ask a few questions etc.). Here is the info on this interesting looking conference...will just copy it below.
INCREDIBLE MACHINES
DIGITALITY AND THE MODERN SYSTEM OF KNOWLEDGE AT THE THRESHOLD OF THE 21ST CENTURYMarch 7-8, 2014
SFU Woodwards, Vancouver CANADA
Organized by Mohammad Salemy, curator-in-residence, Access Gallery
A spectre is haunting the space of knowledge — the spectre of telecomputation. Unlike the modern age when scientific authority and the idea of objectivity were typically embodied in concrete objects like atlases, encyclopedias, books and photographs, the materiality and credibility of human knowledge in the contemporary moment is determined to a great extent by the gathering and sharing, as well as the algorithmic processing and visualization of digital data. This new space has been materialized by the technical synthesis of mass telecommunication and mass computation, enabling a new kind of collective production of knowledge unseen in human history. Resting upon the computational promise of ever-new developments in hardware, software, and network technologies, a visually dynamic, statistically driven and object-oriented form of structural positivism has emerged as the dominant condition for the production and dissemination of knowledge. Starting first in the natural and social sciences and later spreading to the humanities, the ‘digital turn’ has recently begun to reshape how artists look at the world, conceive of their practices and connect with audiences.
Many artists, philosophers and scholars from a variety of fields agree that the widespread use of networked computers in the last two decades has forever transformed the overlapping relations between art, technology and the process of knowledge production. What is still contested however are the ways in which this shift needs to be accounted for and incorporated into an inherently political understanding of the contemporary theory of knowledge.
The Incredible Machines conference marks the second phase of a multi-part curatorial project by the independent curator Mohammad Salemy, which began in September 2013 with an exhibition at Vancouver’s Access Gallery, where he is currently curator-in-residence. The exhibition, Encyclonospace Iranica (http://encyclonospace.com), showcased works by nine Iranian artists who responded to the relationship between computation, knowledge production and the distinct approach to technology proposed by the Iranian philosopher Reza Negarestani. Incredible Machines probes the ramifications of knowledge production’s dependence on machines, mechanical thinking and telecomputation as well as the theoretical and practical entanglement of technological apparatuses with aesthetic theory and art practices.For more information, please contact: incrediblemachines2014@gmail.com
In addition to physical attendance, those interested in participating in the conference are welcome to watch and interact online by using the following links during the event:
Featured Speakers
Benjamin H. Bratton is a theorist whose work spans philosophy, art and design. He is Associate Professor of Visual Arts and Director of D:GP, The Center for Design and Geopolitics at the University of California, San Diego and a Professor at The European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland.
Clint Burnham is an associate Professor in the Department of English at Simon Fraser University, in Vancouver. He has a PhD in English from York University.
Michael Ferrer is an insurgent scholar living in Portland, OR. He has written about neuroscience and Continental philosophy, the ludic impulse in 20th century art, and contemporary electronic music.
Alexander R. Galloway (1974) is an author and associate Professor in the Department of Media, Culture, and Communication at New York University. He has a Bachelors Degree in Modern Culture and Media from Brown University, and a Ph.D. in Literature from Duke University in 2001.
Suhail Malik is a writer and holds a Readership in Critical Studies at Goldsmiths, London.
Reza Negarestani is a writer and a philosopher. He has contributed extensively to journals and anthologies and lectured at numerous international universities and institutes.
Daniel Sacilotto is a fourth-year comparative literature PhD student at UCLA. His research focuses on the reconciliation of rationalism with materialism, and the pursuit of a revisionary naturalism through the work of Wilfrid Sellars, Robert Brandom, and Ray Brassier.
Benedict Singleton is a designer and strategist based in London, where he's active on a mixture of self-directed projects.
Nick Srnicek is a PhD graduate in International Relations from LSE, and the coauthor of the #Accelarate Manifesto.
Benjamin Woodard is a PhD candidate at the Centre for Theory and Criticism at the University of Western Ontario. His research uses the Naturphilosophie of FWJ von Schelling to expand the domain of naturalism focusing particularly on the themes of space and motion.
Plenary Session Moderator
Jaleh Mansoor is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Art History and Visual Art at the University of British Columbia. Her areas of research and teaching include post-WWII abstraction, Marxist theory, and critical curatorial studies.
Additional Information
Incredible Machines conference marks the second phase of a multi part curatorial project by Salemy that began in September 2013 with an exhibition at Vancouver's Access Gallery. The exhibition, Encyclonospace Iranica (http://encyclonospace.com), showcased works by nine Iranian artists who responded to the relationship between computation, knowledge production and the distinct approach to technology proposed by the Iranian philosopher Reza Negarestani. The conference probes the ramifications of knowledge production, the dependence on machines, mechanical thinking and telecomputation as well as the theoretical and practical entanglement of technological apparatuses with aesthetic theory and art practices.
Mohammad Salemy is an independent critic and curator from Iran. He holds a masters degree in Critical and Curatorial Studies from the University of British Columbia.
Access Gallery is a non-profit organization dedicated to emergent contemporary art practices. Access strives to spark critical conversations about contemporary art through experimentation and risk-taking within the gallery space and beyond.
Press ContactKrista Bailie
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
quote of the day
- Friedrich Schiller, Philosophical Letters
Sunday, February 9, 2014
Meillassoux dictionary on amazon for pre-order
For those interested I just re-posted onto my academia.edu page HERE a talk that I gave on Meillassoux's connection to process theism.
Saturday, February 8, 2014
my review of Hartshorne's Creative Experiencing now published
A copy of the original and lengthier form of the review can be found in two parts HERE and HERE.
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
P.E.S.T. and Jean Paul Sartre
Today I am struggling to edit/upload P.E.S.T. mp3s. Audacity is far from intuitive for me, and that has been true for quite some time. It's the reason I rarely upload any audio of my own. Although, I suppose if I'll be learning how to podcast Audacity is something that I *must* learn.
Listening to the "Speculative Misanthropy" mp3s had me thinking about Sartre's "No Exit." I really never tire of Sartre. I'm in a minority of folks who actually enjoy his writing style.
Sartre described consciousness as "an open wound," afterall. So true.
Listening to the "Speculative Misanthropy" mp3s had me thinking about Sartre's "No Exit." I really never tire of Sartre. I'm in a minority of folks who actually enjoy his writing style.
Sartre described consciousness as "an open wound," afterall. So true.
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