Attention

Calibration

Content

Plasticity

The ‘Metaverse’

User Experience

Visualisation

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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EWQYAfuMYw">A clip of what is commonly considered the first ever computer game Spacewar! (1962) being played on the Computer History Museum's PDP-1 </a>

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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EWQYAfuMYw">A clip of what is commonly considered the first ever computer game Spacewar! (1962) being played on the Computer History Museum's PDP-1 </a>

<figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img src="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/2560px-Spacewar-PDP-1-20070512.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-3760"/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Spacewar! running on the Computer History Museum's PDP-1 (credit: Wikipedia)</figcaption></figure>

The source code is available on GitHub: <a href="https://gist.github.com/JonnieCache/4258114" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">https://gist.github.com/JonnieCache/4258114</a>

The source code is available on GitHub: <a href="https://gist.github.com/JonnieCache/4258114" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">https://gist.github.com/JonnieCache/4258114</a>

Insert an image to make a visual statement.

Image

Start with the basic building block of all narrative.

Paragraph

0099 – Spacewar! (1962)

The Sphere at The Venetian Resort, which houses the worlds largest digital screen in the world has now opened.

The Sphere at The Venetian Resort, which houses the worlds largest digital screen in the world has now opened.

The Sphere at The Venetian Resort is a spherical music and entertainment arena in Paradise, Nevada, near the Las Vegas Strip and east of the Venetian resort. The project was announced by the Madison Square Garden Company in 2018, and construction was underway the following year.

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<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">The Sphere at The Venetian Resort is a spherical music and entertainment arena in Paradise, Nevada, near the Las Vegas Strip and east of the Venetian resort. The project was announced by the Madison Square Garden Company in 2018, and construction was underway the following year. <cite>- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphere_at_The_Venetian_Resort</cite></blockquote>

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core/columns

0098: The Sphere at The Venetian Resort

The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) commissioned 2 science fiction authors, PW Singer and August Cole, to write a series of ‘useful fiction’ stories inspired by potential future threats.

The fictional tales aim to spark discussion and creative insight which might challenge established thought.

Extensive research and interviews with subject-matter experts are woven into each narrative, using the art of engaging fiction-writing and artwork (within the PDF version) to deliver research-driven, non-fictitious insights.

<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) commissioned 2 science fiction authors, PW Singer and August Cole, to write a series of ‘useful fiction’ stories inspired by potential future threats.The fictional tales aim to spark discussion and creative insight which might challenge established thought.Extensive research and interviews with subject-matter experts are woven into each narrative, using the art of engaging fiction-writing and artwork (within the PDF version) to deliver research-driven, non-fictitious insights.<cite><a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/stories-from-the-future-exploring-new-technology-through-useful-fiction" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Stories from the Future: exploring new technology through useful fiction</a></cite></blockquote>

"Fictional intelligence" - Military strategists turning to science fiction writers to predict the future.

"Fictional intelligence" - Military strategists turning to science fiction writers to predict the future.

"The latest example is Britain’s Ministry of Defence, which commissioned PW Singer and August Cole to write eight short stories about future warfare. The US, Canadian, Australian and French militaries have also conducted similar literary exercises, creating a demand for “fictional intelligence”.&nbsp;

<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">"The latest example is Britain’s Ministry of Defence, which commissioned PW Singer and August Cole to write eight short stories about future warfare. The US, Canadian, Australian and French militaries have also conducted similar literary exercises, creating a demand for “fictional intelligence”.&nbsp;<cite><a href="https://www.ft.com/content/66bc46a2-a1f6-496b-a467-25751d6e0f8e" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">‘Fictional intelligence’ can blind us to real-world dangers</a></cite></blockquote>

PDF: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1138973/Stories_From_Tomorrow_FINAL-web_issue.pdf

PDF: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1138973/Stories_From_Tomorrow_FINAL-web_issue.pdf

<a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/futuristic-visions-from-sci-fi-writers-offer-insights-for-defence">https://www.gov.uk/government/news/futuristic-visions-from-sci-fi-writers-offer-insights-for-defence</a>

<a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/futuristic-visions-from-sci-fi-writers-offer-insights-for-defence">https://www.gov.uk/government/news/futuristic-visions-from-sci-fi-writers-offer-insights-for-defence</a>

<a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/stories-from-the-future-exploring-new-technology-through-useful-fiction">https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/stories-from-the-future-exploring-new-technology-through-useful-fiction</a>

<a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/stories-from-the-future-exploring-new-technology-through-useful-fiction">https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/stories-from-the-future-exploring-new-technology-through-useful-fiction</a>

Stories from the Future

0097: “Stories From Tomorrow”, Fictional intelligence

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<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0ggXvICpv8
</div></figure>

A lecture exploring the ways in which artefacts and the built environment are entangled with neural cognition. 

A lecture exploring the ways in which artefacts and the built environment are entangled with neural cognition.

Discussed is the work of Luiz Martinez et. al which suggests a correlation between the form of early human pottery and relative hierarchy of the communities which created it, measurable with contemporary eye-tracking techniques. Link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0ggXvICpv [45 Minute Lecture + conversation]

Discussed is the work of Luiz Martinez et. al which suggests a correlation between the form of early human pottery and relative hierarchy of the communities which created it, measurable with contemporary eye-tracking techniques. Link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0ggXvICpv [45 Minute Lecture + conversation]

Add a block that displays content pulled from other sites, like Twitter or YouTube.

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Andy Clark – Architectures of the Entangled Mind

0096: Andy Clark – Architectures of the Entangled Mind

<a href="https://huggingface.co/spaces/ClassCat/Brain-tumor-3D-segmentation-with-MONAI" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Brain tumor 3D segmentation with MONAI on Hugging Face</a>

<a href="https://huggingface.co/spaces/ClassCat/Brain-tumor-3D-segmentation-with-MONAI" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Brain tumor 3D segmentation with MONAI on Hugging Face</a>

0095: Brain Tumor 3D Segmentation with MONAI

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMkbD4v3bNE
</div></figure>

by <a href="https://twitter.com/quorumetrix" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Tyler Sloan</a>

by <a href="https://twitter.com/quorumetrix" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Tyler Sloan</a>

More info: <a href="https://twitter.com/quorumetrix/status/1605592702174625792" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">https://twitter.com/quorumetrix/status/1605592702174625792</a>

More info: <a href="https://twitter.com/quorumetrix/status/1605592702174625792" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">https://twitter.com/quorumetrix/status/1605592702174625792</a>

Visualizing the MICrONS dataset

0094: Visualizing the MICrONS Dataset

A novel distributed network within human primary motor cortex, that disrupts the famous—but incorrect—motor homunculus, and that exhibits strong connections to high-level control networks.

<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">A novel distributed network within human primary motor cortex, that disrupts the famous—but incorrect—motor homunculus, and that exhibits strong connections to high-level control networks.</blockquote>

via - <a href="https://twitter.com/gordonneuro/status/1586026653402402818" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Evan Gordon</a>

via - <a href="https://twitter.com/gordonneuro/status/1586026653402402818" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Evan Gordon</a>

Give quoted text visual emphasis. "In quoting others, we cite ourselves." — Julio Cortázar

Quote

A mind-body interface alternates with effector-specific regions in motor cortex

0093: The Mind-Body Interface

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxHTaTmPlwQ
</div><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Seeing Cell Division Like Never Before</figcaption></figure>

Seeing Cell Division Like Never Before

0092: Seeing Cell Division Like Never Before

0008 – Things Falling Apart

“Limits to Growth (business-as-usual)”, Digital Artwork (2015)



The artwork pictured was a response to the 1972 report “Limits to Growth”, written by Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, Jørgen Randers, and William W. Behrens III. A book review in the form of a diagrammatic mural, inspired by the various plaques produced by Nasa for deep space probes.&nbsp;



The report represents one of the first attempts to model humanity and earth, using the World3 model to calculate the interactions of between core planetary systems such food, industry, agriculture and pollution. It is best known for being hugely influential within environmental discourse and as a foundational text for the degrowth movement as a result of some of the conclusions drawn by the authors, as well as sparking critiques from across the political spectrum, provoked by not least by it’s provocative title. Even now, to invoke it as a point of reference implies some ideology or political allegiance, even if the messages and content of the book itself are often misrepresented.&nbsp; Reading it for the first time left a deep impression on me, not only for the clarity of it’s arguments but also in it’s simple extrapolation of the dynamics of systems, taking only half a dozen key system and demonstrating how interactions between them may behave counter-intuitively.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="1024" src="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-1024x1024.png" alt="" class="wp-image-3674" srcset="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-1024x1024.png 1024w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-300x300.png 300w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-150x150.png 150w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-768x768.png 768w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-1536x1536.png 1536w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-2048x2048.png 2048w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/limits-to-growth-2023-re-edit-2-1200x1200.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure>



It is also representative of a historical moment, a shift in scientific methodology at the birth of the computer age. The report is perhaps more fully asking it’s readers to orientate themselves within a system and it’s fluctuations, striving to identify what the really key factors are, in doing so aiming to define plausible scenarios which might resemble the future. &nbsp;



This approach of thinking through ‘scenarios’ or attempting to envisage the pathways towards alternative futures is a very powerful design tool. It’s deeply integrated into global climate policy, most recently in the designation of  5 Shared Socio-economic Pathways (SSPs) used within the modelling of the IPCC’s AR6 report. Using the scenarios as method of forecasting within design is something we have also attempted to integrated in various research and teaching projects at <a href="https://www.instagram.com/_heat_island/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Heat Island</a>.



<figure class="wp-block-image alignfull size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="576" src="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/model-1024x576.png" alt="" class="wp-image-3670" srcset="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/model-1024x576.png 1024w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/model-300x169.png 300w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/model-768x432.png 768w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/model-1536x864.png 1536w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/model-1200x675.png 1200w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/model.png 1920w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure>



One of the lessons we might learn to the controversy surrounding the book is to observe that&nbsp; underneath the short term chaos of everyday of politics still lie deeply rooted ideas and disagreements about humanities future, representing some of the most unstable ideological fault lines. The book is a reminder that we can anchor our understanding of the world around simple but unavoidable questions which might better help us identify these divisions &#8211; for instance:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Do you believe that technological progress will rebalance the ecological impacts of humanity? </li>



<li>Would you be willing to bet the future of an ecosystem on your answer?</li>



<li>How does your view of the future change if one (or many) of the trends seemingly shaping humanities development were to radically reverse?</li>
</ul>



The question of how well it’s predictions have held up continues to fascinate though. For it’s 30 year anniversary, several attempts were made, by both the original authors and other academics, to test the accuracy of the predictions made in the book. That one of the scenarios (’business-as-usual’) they outlined appears to track closely with the global situation we currently find ourselves in should perhaps not be so surprising, given they aim of providing a range of credible future scenarios. In this respect, the report is perhaps closer to Svante Arrhenius’ very earliest scientific predictions about carbon di-oxide induced atmospheric warming at the turn of the last century than the complexity contemporary climate modelling that the report would set in motion.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-full is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Gillick_Liam_a.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-3664" width="600" height="764" srcset="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Gillick_Liam_a.jpg 600w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Gillick_Liam_a-236x300.jpg 236w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">&#8216;1972&#8217; by Liam Gillick, from the Air de Paris Tattoo Collection</figcaption></figure>



The core theme however &#8211; that we may be living within a decades-long “overshoot”, that we are taking too much, too fast from the eco-systems on which we depend –&nbsp;is no longer in any way controversial even if the various approaches to restoring a balance are. With the benefit of hindsight we can also understand that successfully predicting future crises is not the same exercise as being able to formulate requisite solutions for them, even if the former demands the we consider the latter.

0007 – Business As Usual

0006 – Driving To Pick Up Grapes (Plasticity, Prediction & City Brains)

0005 – Model Behaviour

0004 – It’s On Like Comic Con

0003 – Who Makes The Map, Makes Us

0002 – The Content House

0001 – Orange Moscow (Notes on a City Changing Colour)

My name is Christopher Burman, I&#8217;m a designer and artist from London. You can find out a bit more about the projects I&#8217;ve worked on <a href="https://www.burman.work/">here</a>. 



While writing has always been an important personal tool, to date I&#8217;ve haven&#8217;t made a serious effort to share much, in part due to a wicked and contradictory mix of shyness, perfectionism, laziness &#8211; and worse still &#8211; an increasing reflexiveness about the value of even producing &#8220;content&#8221; at all.



To escape the clutches of this cycle, I&#8217;m aiming to publish more of this writing in a rapid and direct way, under the guise of this, a new project: <a href="http://fulfilment-centre.burman.work">Fulfillment Centre</a>



In the broadest strokes, the aim of Fulfilment Centre to think more clearly about experience and meaning of near-future infrastructures and technological systems, especially with respect to sensory perception, machine intelligence and the decarbonisation of cities.



While ostensibly these subjects might appear only loosely connected, I&#8217;m increasingly of the view that they are highly interdependent and to reflect on any of them requires taking a pretty wide view encompassing all of them. 



My default setting is normally to relate to the world by making and design things, usually exploring sensory, spatial and computational systems. However creative agency appears more than ever at the mercy of exactly how rapid and uneven developments in these fields actually are. The bits of writing that will make up <a href="http://fulfilment-centre.burman.work">Fulfilment Centre</a> are perhaps best understood as personal fields notes on doing these things, as the philosophical and physical terrain around us shifts so rapidly.











<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="1024" src="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2-1024x1024.png" alt="" class="wp-image-66" srcset="https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2-1024x1024.png 1024w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2-300x300.png 300w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2-150x150.png 150w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2-768x768.png 768w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2-1536x1536.png 1536w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2-1568x1569.png 1568w, https://writing-api.burman.work/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-2.png 1701w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Preamble: Notes On Getting Started</h2>



I&#8217;ve been on the verge of launching a writing project several times over recent years but hesitation has always grabbed the wheel. The mind-killer&nbsp;fear&nbsp;and distraction, teaming up with a furious circulation of subject matter.



Space emerged over the last 18 months, primarily from both a deliberate retreat from social media and a curious &#8211; and at times worrying &#8211; lack of in-bound email. With the churning of the world recently on pause, silences both uncomfortable and fulfilling become more expansive.



One concern in particular, gnawing away for several years previously, became quickly more urgent. Broadly, that the methods and rhythms of absorbing knowledge about the world and it&#8217;s future, were generally muddying rather than clarifying the picture, despite the urgency of those near future questions. A uncomfortable storm of firm signals gradually distorting into noise, flavour without texture, comprehension without structure.



Perhaps the effect perhaps of too long spent drinking straight from the firehose but online life sometimes has quality of a factory line churning out &#8216;actually quite meaningful&#8216; things, unable to sustain longer term value in the face of over saturation and over stimulation. Threads that are as vital, brutal and succinct as they are tangential to everyday lived experience. Like a pig hunting for truffles in the forest though, perhaps nothing is ultimately unsatisfying or nutritionally irrelevant as actually finding them.



In one spiritual or intellectual way, this maybe have always been the case but it&#8217;s still worth acknowledge the strangeness of living at a time that demands brandishing a Swiss army knife of cognitive techniques simply to manage the deluge. Exerting whatever guidance you have over your own conscious attention now seems like a primary life skill, and certainly not one I have mastered. This is not a lament about the perils of the internet age however. It is still very much possible to access forms of knowledge that previously lay hidden or protected, most of all through social media itself. Alongside rampant mania, paranoia and polarisation is serious expertise, research and the hot gas that ignites the irresistible red hot glow of the media ecosystem as a whole.



What I currently sense however is that any attempt to contend with these forces is more than ever a social exercise, requiring active participation. Most helpful of all is to acknowledge such deep confusion, not least the absurdity of information overload itself being motivation for yet more online content.



Alongside this another motivation also lingers. One reasonable definition of fully reaching adulthood is the passing of enough time and distance to recognise in people you once knew, significant and definitive change in their world view. In part because it also illustrates that you, yourself have can and have likely changed too, but also that the mental models we all use to process the world are fungible and at times structurally unsound. Realising that our own perceptions and the proverbial &#8216;grip&#8217; on reality is perhaps only temporary is of course a force for both humility, and for me a powerful motivation to act in the moment, to produce, to work.



In fact it seems that the speed at which such internal models can be melted down and reformed is accelerating. People who we once knew, and might have presumed to be more firmly tethered to one particular version of reality, are able to jump more quickly between ships. At once our social circles are appear alive with political and social reconsideration swirling alongside a sudden embrace of darkly unstable paranoia.



We may also simply be more aware of these rapid fluctuations of course &#8211; in the past they would have been largely invisible outside of interactions bounded by much smaller communities but I tend to think that performance of our online lives is proving to be self-reinforcing.



My tendency is always towards optimism, after all better to have a plastic mind, capable of continuously adapting that one that slowly rusts into inflexibility as cognitive scientists might previously have believed. How we adapt to the era mass connectivity is perhaps just the next stage of the human project. It&#8217;s pertinent though to recall Kurt Vonnegut&#8217;s, evergreen line &#8211; &#8216;We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be&#8216;. Now as equally true of what we pretend to read, to know, to watch.



Ultimately though, while you can probably pretend to think, you can&#8217;t really pretend to publish writing. Which takes us to the paradoxical conclusion &#8211; output is the only way through, even or perhaps especially, at a time of maximal noise. It is in this spirit that I wanted to give more time and space to writing, specifically on the subject I am most confused about, but more importantly to share directly with friends, including those I have perhaps yet to met. My initial strategy is simply not to be boring. Feel free to point out (politely) if I do not meet this standard.

0008

Things Falling Apart

0007

Business As Usual

0006

Driving To Pick Up Grapes (Plasticity, Prediction & City Brains)

0005

Model Behaviour

0004

It’s On Like Comic Con

0003

Who Makes The Map, Makes Us

0002

The Content House

0001

Orange Moscow (Notes on a City Changing Colour)

0000

Introducing… Fulfilment Centre