Abstracting
To abstract an essence from a source means to focus on a single quality of the source and "pulling it out". This reduced, singled out, quality is then represented in a pure form free of the source's other properties.
Following up on my previous work, the source I used in this exercise of abstraction were prime numbers. Primes have many-many properties, but the most interesting by far is that their locations on the number-line are random. In other words there is no single mathematical rule that could be used to predict any n-th prime's numerical value. Prime's exist where logic breaks down. Primes inhabit the gaps between rules. This is exactly why they are applied in coding of all sorts. If we choose to look at mathematics as a creation of the human mind (conversely, it can be viewed as the discovery the human mind makes by observing nature), then primes form the background out of which some mathematical rules stand out. Viewed this way, primes are the negative, or the "dark matter" behind, logical rules. I believe that this is primes' fascination, this is why so many mathematicians, and others, are attracted to them.
In this Module I attempt to abstract this essence from primes in two representations. There are some caveats here for the viewer to bare in mind! Firstly, numbers are abstractions themselves, so what you are seeing here is the abstraction of an abstraction. Quite possibly by the second purification the essence doesn't quite resemble the source. Secondly, as my previous work in Modules 2 and 3 depleted some of the possibilities for more obvious, abstract representations of primes (patterning is a form of abstraction after-all), here I had to take quite a leap away from the source. For these two reasons I ask you to think, feel, about this work with an open mind. Read the text and view the pictures more than once, and rest between!
My first abstraction of the primes' beyond-reason quality is a linguistic one. Other than abstracting an essence, in this work I'm also aiming at creating a structural analogy between the text's random arrangement and primes' erratic distribution. The text is meant to be read as one, single piece. I'll explain more after your have read it. Enjoy!
I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did making it!
I aimed to endorse the text with an overall meaning even though its adjacent bits don't logically follow one from another. This is what you may feel as you work with primes, the rule eludes; this is what the black and white prime waves of Module 2 captured.
Mathematics is the most rational, logical, endeavor that mankind has systematically engaged in; its product, the mathematical construct, is as close to perfect logic as we can produce. As implied by this abstraction however, intuition has a central part in the deepest of questions we ponder, the same irreducible intuition is an indispensable tool even in mathematical thought.
The above text is a collage from several sources, some bits are from books and some are lines from movies. What makes them a coherent collection is that all of the originals deal, very successfully I may say, with questions reason alone can't resolve. Love, the Meaning of Life, the Finality of Death, Fate and Faith, Chance and Belief, Knowing through Feeling. This is the realm beyond rules that underpins the rules, this is what cannot be captured by reason, hence the connection with primes.
Sources:
2 Jiddu Krishnamurti - On Fear
3 The Bhagavad Gita
5 Quote from Max Planck (the father of quantum physics)
7 Aldous Huxley - Brave New World
11 The movie - The Matrix
13 Aldous Huxley - Brave New World
17 The movie The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
23 The Bhagavad Gita
29 Lewis Carroll - Alice in Wonderland
31 The movie Being John Malkovich
37 The Bhagavad Gita
41 Eiji Joshikawa - Taiko
43 Carlo Collodi - Pinocchio
47 The movie Forrest Gump
53 Hunter S. Thompson - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
59 THERE ISN'T A NUMBER 59, THAT WOULDN'T BE RANDOM
61 Eiji Joshikawa - Taiko
67 Quote from Max Planck
71 The Ghagavad Gita
73 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry - The Little Prince
79 Lewis Caroll - Alice in Wonderland
83 The movie The 12 Monkeys
89 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry -The Little Prince
97 Lewis Caroll - Alice in Wonderland
I aimed to endorse the text with an overall meaning even though its adjacent bits don't logically follow one from another. This is what you may feel as you work with primes, the rule eludes; this is what the black and white prime waves of Module 2 captured.
Mathematics is the most rational, logical, endeavor that mankind has systematically engaged in; its product, the mathematical construct, is as close to perfect logic as we can produce. As implied by this abstraction however, intuition has a central part in the deepest of questions we ponder, the same irreducible intuition is an indispensable tool even in mathematical thought.
The above text is a collage from several sources, some bits are from books and some are lines from movies. What makes them a coherent collection is that all of the originals deal, very successfully I may say, with questions reason alone can't resolve. Love, the Meaning of Life, the Finality of Death, Fate and Faith, Chance and Belief, Knowing through Feeling. This is the realm beyond rules that underpins the rules, this is what cannot be captured by reason, hence the connection with primes.
Sources:
2 Jiddu Krishnamurti - On Fear
3 The Bhagavad Gita
5 Quote from Max Planck (the father of quantum physics)
7 Aldous Huxley - Brave New World
11 The movie - The Matrix
13 Aldous Huxley - Brave New World
17 The movie The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
23 The Bhagavad Gita
29 Lewis Carroll - Alice in Wonderland
31 The movie Being John Malkovich
37 The Bhagavad Gita
41 Eiji Joshikawa - Taiko
43 Carlo Collodi - Pinocchio
47 The movie Forrest Gump
53 Hunter S. Thompson - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
59 THERE ISN'T A NUMBER 59, THAT WOULDN'T BE RANDOM
61 Eiji Joshikawa - Taiko
67 Quote from Max Planck
71 The Ghagavad Gita
73 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry - The Little Prince
79 Lewis Caroll - Alice in Wonderland
83 The movie The 12 Monkeys
89 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry -The Little Prince
97 Lewis Caroll - Alice in Wonderland
The second abstraction attempts to capture the same essence of primes that the above text tries to do. The random arrangement of the leaves on trees (and other plant structures) possess the same rule-less, while orderly, essence that primes' sequence has. Beholding the entire image, or focusing on myriad individual details, brings out a similar feeling as looking at the prime waves of the previous modules.
I took these pictures right by my house:
I took these pictures right by my house:
I hope that through these abstractions I managed to communicate that essence of primes that most fascinates me!
Jump to the next module!