Machine2 [square]

By: Carolina Santillán Cano

Is it weird to think of asking a machine for help in order to perform a particular activity? Of course not! For many years he has worked with machines, for example, he has seen how IBM became a computer to make calculations for war and for the United States, thanks to this, he managed to send a man into space, but to make it work, humans were needed that the computer could not know everything. But 49 years have passed since then and things have changed.

In 2018 we can use machines, products made of metal that follow orders created by algorithms that were preloaded by other skin, bone and blood machines whose idea was to help and not replace: what does it feel like the metal starts to appear and the skin to disappear?

The RAE defines the machine as a set of combined devices to receive a type of energy and transformation into another more appropriate, or to produce a particular effect. What is the human body and what devices of energy systems and effects through certain actions? The fact that a machine almost perfect (because it can almost be done with the machine in perfect condition), because God made man in the image and likeness, man can make the machine in his image and like it or not?), to be able to work together is possible.

The work of machine-man can be seen in many cases, the creation of automotive parts, the development of software, in medicine and in enough, technological and scientific creations that approach the questions by the most physical human beings, though What art? In this space of creation, does it happen?

First, I invoke Lozano-Hemmer who created the work Hall of Pulses, where this machine-machine union takes us to a room with 1300 spotlights that turn on and off according to the variables that require a sensor on which the assistants put their hands and it detects the beating of the heart. A machine that detects something else and makes visible what we like, regularly, invisible supported by algorithms, variables, sensors and electricity that play with the obvious fact this information.

The algorithm and code are an essential part of what we now think of as a machine because, honestly, every time someone mentions that word (machine) I imagine these metallic beings with huge arms that bring tons of weight from here to there, and more recently, , I have begun to think of the machine as a form of production as in the case of livecoding.

Do you know the Algoraves? It's something like a music rave where a lot of people who know how to program start creating sounds (they have to read with a bit nerdy tone), where they put the code on the screen while, the one who is programming and making the sound , improvises and does wonders with the sound, the algorithm and the code.

This is one of the new forms of production (ok, not so new because I confess that I met it a year ago and it has more time to exist), where I can place this relationship man-machine, machine-machine, brain-brain and fingers- keyboard. Same that they play an information coming and going: one machine gives the orders, another executes them and, through a series of links between different machines, another presents it so that the rest of the attendees can see the result of what this cooperation produces.

I want to make a connection between the description of The Particle, a piece by Alex Posada, shown in the book Invasion Generativa Volume I and this phenomenon of the Algorave as a mixture between the vibration of sound, color and visual patterns that are evolving into chaos (in case the program performer fails to give a note) or the order (if a sound is generated that is harmonized with what is being heard). Whereas The Particle uses algorithms to create a visual illusion inside a sphere that grows and, as they are conjugated lights and vibrations that feed it, it is more or less like seeing the code in action, transforming this chaos and order into the piece eternally changing It is the result of this machine-machine a binomial that, apart from each other, exist and every day they merge more into this type of movements such as generative art and livecoding.

I remember that in the movie Terminator there was talk of a domination of metal machines, of robotic beings, in which to rescue the future you had to return to the past where everything began and thus, reconstruct what was affecting humanity, but is not it that we already have a domination of the machines with the difference that they have not gone crazy (yet), or better, turned against us?

The domain of a machine like the body is more or less like the domain of a metallic machine, if the human begins to dominate one, the other will be affected by the new knowledge that the human is enjoying. So one of the new intelligences would be the artificial one. In the beginning I mentioned in passing to IBM with its computer that revolutionized the world and who, last year, did it again. One of the artificial intelligences developed by IBM did in 45 hours something that a normal human would take weeks or months: the movie trailer Morgan. I remember that there was a small mention of this during the film's advertising campaign and some internet users pointed out that artificial intelligence, little by little, would surpass the human and that soon Terminator was not going to be just a fiction.

Possibly yes, but no. In my opinion, the machine-machine duality, does that, if the human still can not control himself as he is, an organic being that has capacities still to discover and to investigate, can not be dominated by a being created by himself (or yes?).

Although the idea of he smart phone dominating the human is something that we have as a present concept, I do not want to think that this is a domain but a dependence towards it, a dependency that can end when you destroy the device and realize that there is a world beyond of an 8-inch screen.

The work of human-machine becomes clear in certain cooperations and supports that occur between both, if I can not do it, maybe the machine that has been perfected by more people can do it, if I take hours, this artifact will be It will take much less, but this happens thanks to the fact that there is support between both entities and not in a loss of prestige and disuse of either of both. It is clear that what we witness is more a collaboration than a domination ... for now.

Bibliography:

Causa E. 2014, Invasión Generativa: Fronteras de la generatividad en las tres dimensiones, la
robótica y la realidad aumentada, Argentina, Invasores de la generatividad.

Causa E. 2015, Invasión Generativa II: Explorando la generatividad por las tierras del posthumanismo,
la composición musical y otros lares, Argentina, Invasores de la generatividad.

The Guardian, 2017, Run the code: is algorave the future of dance music? [en linea],
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/nov/30/is-algorave-the-future-of-dance-musicsheffield-
algomech-festival