More Thoughts: Ideas and Image Broadcasting

Sorry, I wrote kind of sloppy; I was trying to get the gist down as quickly as possible. Eh, just more thoughts on Image Broadcasting / Projection Theory. The bottom part hints at a real-world example. Most of this is common sense, just from my point of view...

How does a person know that they are making a difference...? How many people does one person affect...?

How does anyone know anything...? My previous thoughts on truth lead me to: 'truth is relational' (although we can argue that truth is constant). The truth I am talking about is the truth that we can verify through our senses and the ideas that are evoked via communication with one another. The type of idea I am talking about is the generic idea, but also is defined as a 'feeling' accompanied with a thought, a visualization or other replay of one's physical senses (in the mind). 

I am lead to believe that we share similar characteristics between our truths because we (people) identify or judge similarity via the 'idea' that is evoked when communicating with other people. This lead me to realize that communication is basically one person evoking an idea within himself, or one person projecting a message of some sort designed to evoke an idea in another person, and if recognized by the other person, will have been evoked in them as well. If there are no similarities in both people's 'truths', then neither person will feel the same as the other. A person cannot evoke an idea in another person if they have never felt or realized that idea. This also lead me to realize that the evoking of ideas is a conditioning process, i.e. humans have to learn how to evoke the idea via conditioning, and if it is not learned then the idea will not be evoked when it is supposed to be stimulated.

We can take language as an example. If someone who only speaks Russian greets someone who only speaks Mandarin, the idea that was evoked in the Russian speaker will not be evoked in the Mandarin speaker (solely based on speech). Yet, we can say that both the greetings from Russian and Mandarin will generally evoke the same idea, it is just WHAT evokes them that is different for each person. Language is an example of something that needs the conditioning process to evoke ideas.

Now an interesting question we can pilfer from this is whether or not ideas can be evoked in nontraditional ways that are counter to regular communication, i.e. can we evoke the 'hello' idea in people who speak totally different languages without using speech or hand gestures, but some other method (such as the objects in the room). Basically, what we'd have to do is find out is what basic 'things', or identifiers, evoke the 'hello' idea and systematically put them in the same room or place as the person. This is a simple example that could be expounded upon.

So we know that ideas are moreover evoked via stimuli because we are conditioned to evoke them. The Image Broadcasting / Projection Theory basically says that people broadcast other people's motives through their behavior, so obviously ideas are evoked through behavior but a question that leads from this is whether image broadcasting / projection works from inanimate objects.

If the answer to this question is YES, then all things physical can carry and project motives (which seems sort of magical (not real), but it is interesting none-the-less). It is not short of propaganda and television, which, arguably, seem to evoke ideas in people even though they are 'inanimate'. However, I was thinking of some object even more inanimate than that, like a book.

If the answer is NO, then motives can only be carried by humans which leads to the revelation that the motive behind propaganda technique would be useless if there wasn't a complete network of human beings to carry the motive from the creator and pass it through the network.

Back on subject, so how do we know how many people we affect? An answer for this is, WE DON'T AFFECT ANYONE. If an 'affector' is everything within a person that can be used to create an idea that can be evoked then we carry the same affectors that have been around since the beginning of human life, meaning, a person can only evoke an idea from another person who has been conditioned, however, we all carry the potential to be conditioned. Nothing gets passed, physically, but it is sort of like a virus in that it can be passed via abstractly, but different in that we all have affectors: they are within us in dormant mode until we make an idea, or are conditioned to evoke one.

So, what I might be saying is, all human communication is just the evoking of ideas by people using stimuli that can be 'taken-in' through our five senses.

This is interesting because we can predict what people will do after evoking an idea in them, we can base our technology off of the ideas that are evoked in people, and we'll know what a person has experienced by getting all of the identifiers that are associated with certain ideas. On the technology end, we might be able to read user's thoughts, however that would be secondary to being able to tell what a user has experienced. Not only that, but, perhaps, based on image decay, we would be able to tell by a coefficient how many people the conditioned idea has gone through or even possibly how many people were present at the time the idea was conditioned or the image broadcast / projected.

How many people does one person affect...? How do we know they are making a difference...? Maybe soon we can try a network experiment for maybe 100 or more people in which we can test the theory out. The network will be dynamically drawn in a hierarchical / web diagram that will be interactive and we'll have each person behind a screen and in a different physical place...

(tbc.)

-XJ

A Brief Thought: Image Broadcasting via Network Hosts (Resonance)

This idea is very, VERY, interesting. I don't think I've heard of anyone trying it out, on any website or video game whatsoever. Websites today are very one dimensional, including the social networks. There are endless possibilities with implementing this. I will definitely include it in my current project...

┌────────────────────────────────┐

│ Image Broadcasting via         │

│ Hosts in a Network (Resonance) │

└────────────────────────────────┘

"You could do something BIG with your psychological energy, if it is focused. When it comes to affecting other people, this remains to be researched. I have no final say on the matter as of yet, but I have one initial theory..."

-XJ

The idea stems from, "What if people broadcast their motives through other people...?" Meaning, other people's motive's are accomplished through us by our 'picking-up' of their motives, whether it be consciously or not, and being the main transportation for those motives to be broadcast to other people. The theory is, we are the vessels by which other people broadcast their motives and other people are our vessels. We pick up another person's motives by coming in contact with the people that carry the motive. This means that we don't necessarily have to know or directly come in contact with the original source in order to broadcast the motive from the original source.

This is very interesting because based on this, a whole entire image or some other type of complexity could be intertransferred or carried between a network of people and, if deciphered correctly, would basically yield the same image as the source no matter who it is deciphered from.

This is also very similar to a source of energy or an energy beam that has been diffused into the atmosphere, then replicated hundreds of times by hosts, then refocused back into a copy of its original state. All of that would depend on the arrangement and focalization of different nodes in the network. No social network I know of has used this theory at all for any type of innovative interaction between the users in the network.

Of course we have to deal with image decay but the whole concept is very interesting. Obviously, if this were implemented in a social game there would be other factors that also play into this including 'resonance' and 'behavior'...

(tbc.)

-XJ

A Brief Thought: What is RIGHT...?

┌─────────────────┐
│ WHAT IS RIGHT?  │
└─────────────────┘

In my previous post I brought up my argument that life is a transition from the known to the unknown. Because it is constant, the inevitability of the unknown upon us (or death) is used to facilitate or conduct the overarching business of trading (buying or selling) emotional and psychological states or well beings. This is all done on a stage with invariable boundaries, i.e., at this moment in time, humans cannot get up and choose to leave the 'business' because that choice is non-existent (where would we go...? and furthermore, would we bring our problems with us...?).

Because this life is arguably a transition stage we can assume that there is at least one other 'stage' beyond this. That is the definition of transition, to lead from one thing to the next. And if we can assume that there are other stages besides life, then the ideology that life should be thought of as 'the only thing that matters and that we should base all of our decisions on' diminishes in value (I could go into this later). So, if life is not AS important as it usually is, my question is, is it right to ignore another human being who we are aware of and is suffering psychologically...?

There is a man crying for help in the roadside. Do we help, or do we NOT help...? The argument that says we should help basically stems from the popular right thing to do.

"Why wouldn't you help a man who is suffering...?"

The argument to NOT help basically says,

"Well, since life is a transition stage and there is a stage after this then it doesn't really matter what I do because the man that is suffering psychologically won't suffer forever or I won't be here forever to be able to see him suffer and do something about it..."

What is RIGHT anyways, and why do all my arguments seem to point to its definement...?
...
(tbc.)

-XJ

Video Game Studies: What makes a successful video game...?

"Life is a business."

Some people might say that the world's oldest profession is prostitution. However, I argue, since the beginning of intelligence on earth, life itself has been and continues to be a business for those involved.

Life is a business and it can be similarized to a market, i.e. the "transition market": 'transition' because we go from 'knowing' to the 'unknown', the inevitability that is always constant: 'market', in that it exists on a stage within invariable boundaries that is prey for those who wish to fully profit from that constant inevitability. The currency being used and acquired is psychological. It is an error to think that the significance of a trade ends with the product itself. The value is ultimately determined by the psychological state of the consumer. Hence, a dollar bill, or $1.00, is only a representation of the emotional and psychological well-being that is attained after giving it away.

"I'll help you feel more emotionally stable if you help me feel more emotionally stable."

An interesting question for future ponderance: What if currency could be traded psychologically...? This would be a literal take on psychological currency. Do you see where I'm going with this question...? An example: In a normal, current, real-life scenario there are two people trading with each other for the resulting psychological welfare that will follow. Man A trades $29.00 to Man B who gives him a new release of the movie, 'The Hobbit'. The physical trade is the two objects, the $29.00 and The Hobbit. The psychological results (or trade) is Man A feeling 'good' while watching The Hobbit (for reasons we will discuss later) and Man B feeling 'good' because he spent the $29.00 on a video game. Here's where the novelty comes in. Instead of each man trading physical objects, i.e. representations of the resulting psychological and emotional states, in the proposed future scenario, Man A and Man B will both directly trade those states. This could be literal as in the trading of physical synthetic or manufactured 'good' 'feelings'. It could also mean trading psychological states via brain waves (facilitated through some sort of technological device). All this points towards another argument and the realization that emotions and psychological states being traded by themselves relinquish the connection of behaviors previously associated with the emotional and psychological states. I know that has been thought of before, but I thought I'd bring it up. More thoughts on this later (also, other ideas can derive from this)...

I began thinking about this after studying successful video games and looking into why they were successful. Why did I love playing certain video games earlier in my life, and on a side note, why did I lose that initial fervor...? Perhaps the formula for a successful video game does not work on everyone in certain situations, however, as is proven, it obviously does work for a mass amount of people. I wanted to figure out why, because, ultimately, I want to put the research into practice (perhaps creating something similar to a video game...).

"If you keep a group of people entertained, they will be more docile."
-anonymous

To start the research I basically did some easy empirical observation. I searched through Google and did some quick skimming (as my library did not have any books or articles). Taking from several very successful video games, most notably two Nintendo RPGs (Role Playing Games), I jotted down all of the ideas that I thought, or arguably, made them successful. Below is the summation of all of them into a STRONG characteristic of successful video games that is so potent it is used in almost every entertainment field or industry.

░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░
░┌──────────┬────────────────────────┐░
░│ Keyword: │ HERO COMPLEX (VG)      │░
░├──────────┼────────────────────────┤░
░│ Property │ ■ Illuminati Reference │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ quest collectibles   │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ evil villain         │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ savior complex       │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ good vs. evil        │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ customizeable        │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ puzzle gameplay      │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ engrossing plot      │░
░│          ├────────────────────────┤░
░│          │ ■ target audience      │░
░└──────────┴────────────────────────┘░
░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░

(tbc...)

-XJ

Music: A Little Of My Philosophy

I'm saving this bio here for future reference.

BIO:
Played violin for 12 years. Studied Computer Graphics Technology at Purdue University.

In thinking, I guess I believe that art or work should make people think, even if it doesn't ask a question. Most artwork, if not all artwork, has a purpose even if it is not apparent to its creator. When someone creates artwork they are creating a physical representation or recording of the subliminal conscious of an artist's world or society. If you know how to pick apart pieces of artwork, one would be able to determine the artist's psychological state at the time of being. This is what I believe.

Art is like an abstract wormhole through a non-existent time. Because of its abilities to broadcast states of being to the viewer or audience, art can also be purposefully utilized to project a message adherent to a motive. Studies have shown that there is a purpose for systematic design in art that affects how the artwork is construed and how the message of the artwork is assimilated. In knowing this, it is possible to make a bigger impact, or difference, on the audience that is viewing the artwork, simply by being conscious of what makes them think (whether it is consciously or subconsciously). Countless techniques have been devised since the beginning of the study of such matters and are at our disposal for this purpose. The question then becomes, if we are able to make a bigger difference and we have the tools to do so, why aren't we doing it...? To me, knowledge of 'image broadcasting' (which applies to CG and Music) comes with a responsibility that is mandatory to uphold. Therefore, I believe that all of my work must project a message, one that is consistent with my beliefs. Arguably, this could also be called rhetoric.

This philosophy of image projection is something I want to put in my current and future projects. Right now, I'm working on producing (for the first time) a premier collaboration album as a promo and something to add to my portfolio (think 'Shock Value' for unsigned artists). Music is a part of me, but it's not ALL of me. Besides being a composer and wanting to produce for video games and films in the future, I have other plans and talents concerning CG and Art, perhaps my first loves, including merging some of my ideas with music to go into other fields such as the Video Game Industry, the Movie Industry, and the Computer Graphics Industry.

Some of the ideas I've come up with include producing mock video game and movie websites (with a mock soundtrack), for the purpose of measuring the affect they might have if they were actual productions, producing book websites for classical books without soundtracks, for the purpose of showcasing my composing abilities while practicing on non-funded projects, creating neo-social networks that utilize ideas from the music / audio component, and among other things, ultimately, one day building a new type of DAW implementing design and broadcasting techniques from CG. These are a few of my ideas and talents I have in store for XJ Hall. And one day, as you might have guessed, I want to launch my own brand / company. You might call me a jack of all trades concerning the entertainment industry. Just because I haven't done it yet, doesn't mean I don't know how.

HOW I WORK WITH OTHERS
OVERVIEW:
Give me a concept to work with and I will create the soundtrack or beat to that concept in as intelligent way as possible. This includes using new techniques such as 'literal' organization of music or melodies in a song. For instance, if you want me to make a song about the planets aligning using a mandolin, I would take that idea and start out the beat with 8 different notes in different spaces of the audio field (left 90 degrees, left 60 degrees, left 45 degrees, left 30 degrees, right 15 degrees, right 30 degrees, right 45 degrees, right 60 degrees). Then, I would emulate the movements of the planets into alignment by moving the stereo notes simultaneously into alignment over a period of time to ultimately be mono. Another example, is when I'm making a soundtrack to a book, I will use instruments that are associated with the 'image' that is trying to be conveyed. Hence, a soundtrack about a 'Lake Shore' will utilize seagull audio samples. Those are examples of how I do my work.

EXPERIENCE:
Still building portfolio... Over 150 beats, ideas, and pieces of work and counting.

TECHNOLOGY:
I have enough technology to make exemplary pieces.

-XJ

Thoughts: The Difference Between 'Alone' And Independent

"Wow, look at that man sitting over there. He's always by himself, talking to himself. He must be a really lonely guy..."

-anonymous

People. There is a difference between being 'alone' and independent. 'Alone' stipulates that there is a network to which it belongs. Whereas it is impossible for a network to exist with an independent being, therefore, it is not possible for 'alone' to exist. In other words, when a person or node is 'alone' this would mean that they exist in the network but are void of a direct connection with the other node(s). An independent node exists by itself, therefore there is no network (seeing as a network requires two or more nodes). There has to be two or more people in a group in order for a person in that group to be alone. But of course, there can be a group of independent beings, however there cannot be a network of independent beings. Basically, calling someone 'alone' when they are independent is incorrect. Furthermore, there is no way we could identify who is 'alone' or not, seeing as we can't measure what people depend on or how. So basically, 'alone' is only theoretical or hypothetical.

-XJ

Propaganda: How What We Choose To Be Controlled By Affects The Outcome

First, the title could be better. Now, read this short story. I wrote it so you could understand what I'm talking about when I explain what I'm talking about. Be forewarned, it's a little bit graphic. But it gets the point across.

"A perfectly calm and self righteous man is walking in the forest, alone and by himself. He's hiking in one of the most remote places in the world. Hours away from civilization, he has a two week pack on his back, complete with fold out tents, water supply, water filtration devices, food full of protein, fire-starters, an extra set of clothes... I don't know, you know what I mean, the consumerist kind of things that go with these kind of ventures. Everything he needs he's got. It seems as if he's all set for survival. Especially knowing that he's an expert on this stuff. He's walking up a boulder filled hill when he sights a boulder that looks like it has some kind of... well, something written into it. Like it is etched or something. The man is intrigued, so he gets closer to find out it is an etching of a cross. Just a cross, like a plus sign. The man hesitates to move for a minute. It looks as if he's trying to interpret the sign. All of a sudden the man takes off his backpack, removes his knife from its holder and slits his throat. The man dies there, never to see or be seen by anyone ever again..."

You might wonder why I would write such a grotesque story, that seemingly has no meaning to it. I began thinking about why and how people believe or perceive what they want within certain circumstances. For instance, if I was an artist and created a masterpiece that was rejected by the public, why did they reject it...? Did I have any say in whether it was to be rejected, or is it entirely out of my control how the public perceives my work...? Who's at fault for the meaning behind an image, the person projecting it or the person perceiving it...?

Obviously, anybody can assign any meaning to anything. Anybody can think anything about anything. However, at what point is it that the person who etched into the rock ultimately has total control over what is construed or communicated...? It all comes down to, I think, the difference between control relies on what we allow ourselves to be emotionally evoked by. That is, there are two or three modes of control in life: maintaining control over oneself by not giving control to other people, giving control to other people by not maintaining control over oneself, and getting control from other people by their subsequent dis-maintaining control of themselves, or in other words, getting control from other people by them giving it to you.

It is interesting to think about. You're probably thinking, "What does this have to do with the man slitting his throat...?" Exactly. Why did the man slit his throat over seemingly just looking at the etched cross...? Perhaps the cross had meaning that we can not comprehend. One could argue that it is a travesty for such a thing to happen and that it was entirely the man's fault for choosing to do so, even though we don't know why. However, one could also argue that the fault and culpability is on the person that etched the cross into the rock in the first place, for without the cross the man would not have killed himself...

more explanation here...

I will let you in on a secret. The man that etched the cross into the boulder was the same man that interpreted it, and died thereafter. What does that make you think...? Interesting isn't it...? Why would a man react to something so strongly that he created...? Think what you will.

Now, I will bullet point some of the stuff I've been thinking about...

1.) We cannot give anyone control over us unless we choose to be emotionally evoked by the stimuli that is presented or the image that is projected. I.E. There is no image unless we perceive there to be.

2.) We can make the argument that some emotions are evoked automatically without our control, i.e. they are biological processes. Fight or flight response is an example.

3.) If a criminal killed someone's daughter, and the parent became irate, is it the parent's choice for becoming irate, or did the criminal force the parent to become irate...? This question leads me to believe that we are the ultimate determining factor in whether we give control to other people or maintain our control. Hence, it is a choice. We choose to give control, or we choose to keep our control.

4.) In Propaganda, the difference in getting control from other people, as opposed to not making a difference at all, relies on how ignorant the host is. The more educated we become, the less control we give to other people...

...(TBC)

Well, this wasn't very well written. But it's an idea...

-XJ