A couple thoughts…

This technology is something that I have been fantasizing about for a while. I always foolishly imagined that if such a technology existed it would have full magical access to the myriad connotations of any image. My hopes being that the massive amount of information would crash the technology once it was available.

This is a lovely thought. I can see it, someone opens Google Goggle’s, photographs a Jeff Wall picture and immediately the world’s electronics shut down due to overload. Shepherd Steiner steps in, divulges the intricacies of the photograph and reaffirms man’s dominance over machine.

In considering this sentiment, it seems to comes back to one very human trait; the belief that we are special. And though I’m fond of my existence, I’m also not so sure how special or complex we really are. For example, scientists at Oxford claim they are only limited by storage in their attempt to completely map and duplicate every neuron in the human brain. It’s their belief that from this mapping, human personality can be downloaded and installed on computers once storage and price are no longer an issue. Humanness can be broken down to binary code.

Or, take for example, the music of David Cope. After suffering from a severe case of writers block, Cope wrote a piece of software that analyzed music and produced unique work based on the patterns it found. At some level, it seems, creativity can be replicated via computer analysis.

I should say that all this scares me to death. Working like hell to encourage the folding of brain tissue suddenly becomes a lot more tedious in the face of a computer that can write a symphony in 10 minutes. However, this idea of boiling down human personality to digits does provide a certain out of body perspective, one that I think encourages a sense of humility. That sentiment is something we could all use a little more of.

They have only replaced words with some images, a technical feat that does not capitalize on the potential of its components(words or images). It is another tipping of the scales towards the empirical/ technological rubric.

Not capitalizing on the potential of words or photos is exactly what makes this technology so potentially disturbing. It flattens the use and meaning of photography by turning it into a tool of the Google algorithm. With the use of Google so prevalent, I suspect this may mean a sea-change in the broader interpretation of imagery.

This technology is something that I have been fantasizing about for a while. I always foolishly imagined that if such a technology existed it would have full magical access to the myriad connotations of any image. My hopes being that the massive amount of information would crash the technology once it was available.

It seems to me that google goggles (at least right now) is more of an image-maker. Each example of using the technology demonstrates Google’s structures in use. It gives an image of the limitations of the technology and of the oddly boring scope of Google’s project.

They have only replaced words with some images, a technical feat that does not capitalize on the potential of its components(words or images). It is another tipping of the scales towards the empirical/ technological rubric.

We use empiricism on everything but empiricism. Arthur C. Clarke said that “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

Good thoughts Tim.