(Above: Me playing at the Psychetect album release party)

Psychetect interview on the G-Spot

A couple notes:

1. I announce during the interview the upcoming City of Dead Toys EP, a collaboration between Skerror and me.

2. I’ll be opening for The Steven Losambras at The Parlour in PDX on April 30th.

HipGnosis is the recording name of the Des Moines based electronic musician Eric Young. In addition to producing, Eric also DJs the Glitch.fm online radio show Between Zero and One every Wednesday from 10PM-12AM (CST).

Klint Finley: How would you describe your music to someone who’s never heard it?

HipGnosis: Wow. Hmm. Experimental, psychedelic, electronic dance music combined w/ elements of hip-hop, classical, and plain weirdness.

I was classically trained, though I don’t play any “traditional instruments” any longer. Now I play a computer.

Read the rest of this entry »

Cracked has a surprisingly interesting article on the psychology of rewards and how it’s applied to game design:

Do you like your job?

Considering half of you are reading this at work, I’m going to guess no. And that brings us to the one thing that makes gaming addiction–and addiction in general–so incredibly hard to beat.

As shocking as this sounds, a whole lot of the “guy who failed all of his classes because he was playing WoW all the time” horror stories are really just about a dude who simply didn’t like his classes very much. This was never some dystopian mind control scheme by Blizzard. The games just filled a void.

Why do so many of us have that void? Because according to everything expert Malcolm Gladwell, to be satisfied with your job you need three things, and I bet most of you don’t even have two of them:

Autonomy (that is, you have some say in what you do day to day);

Complexity (so it’s not mind-numbing repetition);

Connection Between Effort and Reward (i.e. you actually see the awesome results of your hard work).

Most people, particularly in the young gamer demographics, don’t have this in their jobs or in any aspect of their everyday lives. But the most addictive video games are specifically geared to give us all three… or at least the illusion of all three.

Cracked: 5 Creepy Ways Video Games Are Trying to Get You Addicted

(via Social Physicist)

Clackamas County Circuit Court Judge Steven Maurer sentenced Jeffrey and Marci Beagley to 16 months in prison this afternoon, calling the couple’s decision to not seek medical care for their 16-year-old son, Neil Beagley, a “crime that was a product of an unwillingness to respect the boundaries of freedom of religious expression.” [...]

“The idea of sending Jeffrey and Marci Beagley to prison is heart-wrenching,” Maurer said in a lengthy explanation of his sentence. “I think, certainly, that I’m in complete agreement with the jurors who observed that the Beagleys are good people.”

But Maurer said too many children had died unnecessarily because of the church’s beliefs: “It needs to stop.”

Oregon Live: Jeffrey and Marci Beagley sentenced to 16 months of prison for their son’s faith-healing death

(via Religion News Blog)

(Image Credit: mike 23 / CC)

This is a guest post by Chris Arkenberg. Many readers wanted to know more about systems thinking after my interview with Chris, so he’s returned to provide us with some resources. – Klint

The term “systems thinking” has a few different connotations. Classically, non-linear dynamic systems represents a set of principles that describe the organization of energy as an extropic function of information, driven by power laws and bounded by limits. The formulas within this domain are often applied to natural systems such as populations, fluid dynamics, and so-called chaotic processes like dripping faucets and epileptic seizures. Some of the better-known ideas within dynamic systems are attractors, bifurcations, and the process of iteration.

Read the rest of this entry »

The world’s first patient-ready and commercially available brain computer interface just arrived at CeBIT 2010. The Intendix from Guger Technologies (g*tec) is a system that uses an EEG cap to measure brain activity in order to let you type with your thoughts. Meant to work with those with locked-in syndrome, or other disabilities, Intendix is simple enough to use after just 10 minutes of training. You simply focus on a grid of letters as they flash. When your desired letter lights up, brain activity spikes and Intendix types it. As users master the system, a few will be able to type as quickly as 1 letter a second. Besides typing, it can also trigger alarms, convert text to speech, print, copy, or email. Retailing for €9000 (~$12,250), Intendix isn’t cheap, but it’s the first thought to type system available that’s geared towards easy to setup personal use in the home. Brain computer interfaces just got more accessible, and that’s a step towards them becoming more common all over the world.

Singularity Hub: Intendix, The Brain Computer Interface Goes Commercial

(via Edge of Tomorrow)

See also:

Chris Arkenberg’s 3 Scenarios for Brain Computer Interface.

I had no idea the link between serotonin and depression was in doubt. Very interesting:

Via Dormivigilia, I came across a fascinating paper about a man who suffered from a severe lack of monoamine neurotransmitters (dopamine, serotonin etc.) as a result of a genetic mutation. [...]

Overall, though, the biggest finding here was a non-finding: this patient wasn’t depressed, despite having much reduced serotonin levels. This is further evidence that serotonin isn’t the “happy chemical” in any simple sense.

On the other hand, the similarities between his symptoms and some of the symptoms of depression suggest that serotonin is doing something in that disorder. This fits with existing evidence from tryptophan depletion studies showing that low serotonin doesn’t cause depression in most people, but does re-activate symptoms in people with a history of the disease. As I said, it’s complicated…

Neuroskeptic: Life Without Serotonin

See also:

Serotonin and Depression: A Disconnect between the Advertisements and the Scientific Literature

In addition to the number of frameworks and ideas, and the density of the interconnections among them, there was a strong normative quality to the material and its presentation. “If one hopes to make any progress at all,” we were told, “you need to both understand and accept these related ideas.”

This particular version of systems thinking is not unusual in this respect. Peter Senge’s 1990 edition of The Fifth Discipline describes one manager’s reaction to a five-day introductory workshop on his approach, which among other things, requires growing comfortable with eight archetypes: “It reminds me of when I first studied calculus (p. x).” Systems dynamics, the Soft Systems Method and other approaches face similar concerns.

Each of systems thinking’s various manifestations demands some degree of subscription to an orthodoxy (a particular view of just what systems thinking is). And each requires that the user master a large number of related ideas and techniques, most of which are not particularly useful on their own.

Fast Company: Lessons Learned — Why the Failure of Systems Thinking Should Inform the Future of Design Thinking

(Thanks James Curcio)

See also:

John Kay’s work on obliquity, which critiques decision science.

(Photo credit: Gutter / CC)

Shapeways has a round-up of evolutionary, algorithmic & generative design projects, including the “cellular bowl” above, designed with Processing.

The marriage of tech and design is all around us. In a world where everything is designed a meta “way to design” that algorithmically cuts through the clutter is very appealing. A perfect design algorithm could potentially engender choice in design the same way that Google’s PageRank set of algorithms do for the web. And this is what generative design already partially does. It simplifies design by codifying it and somewhere within lies the promise of “true”, “simple” & “beautiful” design.

With technologies such as 3D printing letting everyone design or co-design things there is also a real need for generative tools. They allow for unique designs but since each is machine made, the marriage is a conceptually comfortable and inexpensive one. Also, rather than forcing the customer into a “blank canvas conundrum” whereby the sheer possibility overwhelms them to the point inactivity, generated models could lead to choice or guided choice in design.

Shapeways: Dasign: data driven, evolutionary, algorithmic & generative design

(via Bruce Sterling)

Doctors treat millions of children with Ritalin every year to improve their ability to focus on tasks, but scientists now report that Ritalin also directly enhances the speed of learning.

In animal research, the scientists showed for the first time that Ritalin boosts both of these cognitive abilities by increasing the activity of the neurotransmitter dopamine deep inside the brain. Neurotransmitters are the chemical messengers neurons use to communicate with each other. They release the molecule, which then docks onto receptors of other neurons. The research demonstrated that one type of dopamine receptor aids the ability to focus, and another type improves the learning itself.

The scientists also established that Ritalin produces these effects by enhancing brain plasticity – strengthening communication between neurons where they meet at the synapse. Research in this field has accelerated as scientists have recognized that our brains can continue to form new connections – remain plastic – throughout life.

PhysOrg: Ritalin boosts learning by increasing brain plasticity

(via Chris S.)

Above: Amal Graafstra’s self-administered RFID implant.

It sounds like something from a sci-fi film, but one in four Germans would be happy to have a microchip implanted in their body if they derived concrete benefits from it, a poll Monday showed. [...]

In all, 23 percent of around 1,000 respondents in the survey said they would be prepared to have a chip inserted under their skin “for certain benefits”.

Around one in six (16 percent) said they would wear an implant to allow emergency services to rescue them more quickly in the event of a fire or accident.

And five percent of people said they would be prepared to have an implant to make their shopping go more smoothly.

PhysOrg: One in four Germans wants microchip under skin: poll

(via Chris S.)

See also:

Scrapheap Transhumanism

Lepht Anonym’s blog

Amal Graafstra’s blog

Sotantar Simrat Singh – Sun Gong

I listened to this all morning. Love it. (Not laying down for the proper “gong bath” experience, but lovely none the less.)

(via Arthur)

Mac Tonnies posthumous book The Cryptoterrestrials: A Meditation on Indigenous Humanoids and the Aliens Among Us is out from Anomalist Books.

I would have loved to interview Mac on this occasion. Seeing that the book is out makes me sad all over again. I look forward to reading it very much.

There’s also a new Mac Tonnies tribute site up.

Daniel Shenton should be the most irrational man in the world. As the new president of the Flat Earth Society, you’d imagine he would also think that evolution is a scam and global warming a myth. He should ­argue that smoking does not cause cancer and HIV does not lead to Aids.

Yes, that Flat Earth Society, a group that has become a living metaphor for backward thinking and a refusal to face scientific facts. Yes, it is still going, and no, this isn’t an early April fool.

In fact, Shenton turns out to have resolutely mainstream views on most issues. The 33-year-old American, originally from Virginia but now living and working in London, is happy with the work of Charles Darwin. He thinks the evidence for man-made global warming is strong, and he dismisses suggestions that his own government was involved with the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

He is mainstream on most issues, but not all. For when Shenton rides his motorbike, he says it is not gravity that pins him to the road, but the rapid upward motion of a disc-shaped planet. Countries, according to him, spread across this flat world as they appear to do on a map, with Antarctica as a ring of mountains strung around the edge. And, yes, you can fall off.

Guardian: The Earth is flat? What planet is he on?

(Thanks Paul)

Do you want to make your own layer? This tutorial tells you how to do it! These are the requirements to create your own layer:

Webserver with PHP and JSON support
MySQL database with phpMyAdmin
For testing: Layar installation on your iPhone 3GS or Android based phone (with GPS and compass)

Stedelijk Museum: Creating a Layar layer: a step by step tutorial

(via Bruce Sterling)

AttractiveCity – an interactive City generator from steffiX_stefanieSixt on Vimeo.

(via Bruce Sterling)

Obliquity describes the process of achieving objectives indirectly, such as the financial success that comes from a real commitment to business. And obliquity is ubiquitous – it can even be applied to happiness. It has long been suspected that the happiest people are not those who pursue it directly. John Stuart Mill was the strongest exponent of utilitarianism, the notion that the goal of mankind was the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people. Yet towards the end of his (far from happy) life, Mill found that ‘this end was only to be attained by not making it the direct end. Those only are happy (I thought) who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness – on some art or pursuit, followed not as a means, but as itself an ideal end. Aiming thus at something else, they find happiness by the way.’

Surely obliquity goes against everything we’ve been taught? Isn’t it true that you must do better if you set out to maximise something – happiness, wealth, profit – than if you don’t? Surprisingly, the answer is no. Life is too complex and uncertain for us to be able to predict and follow the most direct perceived route to success. Our knowledge is always imperfect, and events are influenced by the unpredictability of other people and organisations. Instead, our objectives are best achieved by a more meandering approach that enables us to adapt our strategy to changing situations. And we learn about the nature of our objectives and the means of achieving them through a process of experiment and discovery.

Management Today: Obliquity: the roundabout route to success

See also: Kay’s previous Financial Times article on the subject.

(via Relevant History)

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrhayata/1875046344/ / CC)

Atheists may be smarter, but are we also disagreeable? (Well, this guy may be).

A new analysis comparing the personalities of religious and less religious people has found that religiosity is generally linked to agreeableness and conscientiousness. Well, that’s the headline. To understand why this might be, you need to dig into the details of the study. [...]

The five-factor model is the most widely used measure of personality. According to this model, individuals can be defined according to where they lie on one of five scales: extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness.

One consistent finding stood out: across all measures of religion, cultural areas, and age groups, people who scored higher on agreeableness and conscientiousness also reported being more religious.

Epiphenom: Atheists are disagreeable and unconscientious

There’s also the whole problem relying on personality testing to begin with.

Howard Schmidt, the new cybersecurity czar for the Obama administration, has a short answer for the drumbeat of rhetoric claiming the United States is caught up in a cyberwar that it is losing.

“There is no cyberwar,” Schmidt told Wired.com in a sit-down interview Wednesday at the RSA Security Conference in San Francisco.

“I think that is a terrible metaphor and I think that is a terrible concept,” Schmidt said. “There are no winners in that environment.”

Instead, Schmidt said the government needs to focus its cybersecurity efforts to fight online crime and espionage.

His stance contradicts Michael McConnell, the former director of national intelligence who made headlines last week when he testified to Congress that the country was already in the midst of a cyberwar — and was losing it.

Threat Level: White House Cyber Czar: ‘There Is No Cyberwar’

See also:

Cyberwar Hype Intended to Destroy the Open Internet

Cyber warfare: don’t inflate it, don’t underestimate it

Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative

“The airport is named after one of my heroes and his view on religion was pretty much the same as mine. I thought it was an insult to his memory to have a prayer room in his airport.” That was part of the evidence given in court by the self-styled “militant atheist” campaigner Harry Taylor, 59, to explain why he left anti-religious materials in the multi-faith Prayer Room of Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport (pictured).

The jury of ten women and two men, at Liverpool Crown Court wasn’t having it. It took them just 15 minutes to find Mr Taylor guilt of “religiously aggravated intentional harassment, alarm or distress” after viewing the “grossly abusive and insulting” images in court. The cartoons — which had been cut from newspapers, magazines and other mainstream publications — included one showing a smiling Christ on the cross next to an advert for a brand of “no nails” glue. In another, the Pope is shown wearing a condom on his finger. Others featured Islamic suicide bombers at the gates of paradise who are told, “Stop, stop, we’ve run out of virgins.”

BBC: “Militant Atheist” found guilty of religious harassment

(Via Religion News)

Since stories have started surfacing more recently, many have wondered, if the rumors are true. Are there really ‘continents’, or massive floating garbage patches residing in the pacific ocean? Apparently, the rumors are true, and these unsightly patches are reportedly killing marine life and releasing poisons that enter the human food chain, as well. However, before you start imagining a plastic version of Maui, keep in mind that these plastic patches certainly aren’tsolid surfaced islands that you could build a house on! Ocean currents have collected massive amounts of garbage into a sort of plastic “soup” where countless bits of discarded plastic float intertwined just beneath the surface. Indeed, the human race has really made its mark. One enormous plastic patch is estimated to weigh over 3 million tons altogether and cover an area roughly twice the size of Texas.

Daily Galaxy: Are There Really ‘Continents’ of Floating Garbage?

(via Atom Jack)

The “theory of everything” is one of the most cherished dreams of science. If it is ever discovered, it will describe the workings of the universe at the most fundamental level and thus encompass our entire understanding of nature. It would also answer such enduring puzzles as what dark matter is, the reason time flows in only one direction and how gravity works. Small wonder that Stephen Hawking famously said that such a theory would be “the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we should know the mind of God”.

But theologians needn’t lose too much sleep just yet. Despite decades of effort, progress has been slow. Rather than one or two rival theories whose merits can be judged against the evidence, there is a profusion of candidates and precious few clues as to which (if any) might turn out to be correct.

Here’s a brief guide to some of the front runners.

The theories they summarize:

-String theory
-Loop quantum gravity
-CDT
-Quantum Einstein gravity
-Quantum graphity
-Internal relativity
-E8

New Scientist: Seven theories of everything

(via Wade)

Gustave Doré was a world famous 19th century illustrator. Although he illustrated over 200 books, some with more than 400 plates, he is primarily known for his illustrations to The Divine Comedy, particularly The Inferno, his illustrations to Don Quixote, and Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven.

Gustave Doré Art Collection

Wikipedia entry on Gustave Doré

(via Reclusland)

After meeting with various religious groups for decades, the White House Friday had its first official meeting with atheist organizations. The reaction from many religious leaders was neither “accepting” nor “tolerant” — even though their groups loudly demand such treatment for themselves.

The organization which met with Tina Tchen, director of the White House Office of Public Engagement — the President himself did not put in an appearance — is the Secular Coalition for America. This 501(c)(4) non-profit lobbying organization has ten member non-profits, including American Atheists, the Council for Secular Humanism, the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers, and the Secular Student Alliance.

Council Nedd, chair of In God We Trust:

It is one thing for Administration to meet with groups of varying viewpoints, but it is quite another for a senior official to sit down with activists representing some of the most hate-filled, anti-religious groups in the nation.

Paliban Daily: Atheists Visit White House – Religious Right has Fit

(via Atom Jack)

The project is in a very early alpha stage. Some of the current goals for the project include:

-Create a workable and easy to build hardware design to allow experimentation similar to that done by Dr. Persinger.

-Develop firmware for any integrated controllers

-Develop software that facilitates controlled application of TMS or rTMS utilizing the hardware

-Software integration with openEEG and Sbagen for a rich experimental environment

Open-rTMS Project

(via William Gibson)

(Photo Credit: h.koppdelaney’s / CC)

See also:

The God Experiments