Re: [microsound]digital silence

[Kenric McDowell <kenric@xxxxxxxx>]

> "studying nothingness" that the constuct is devoid of sound? that the empty
> soundfile, although it seems to have a sound, actually doesn't? or that the
> construct has an inherent sound, and that is what we are "studying"? thanks

I'm saying that it's not going to give you much enlightenment either way:
These types of experiments, sampling nothing, performing with an empty
sampler, must fall in the lineage of Cage's interest in silence which comes
from zen. The richness of this practice of looking at nothing (or walls or
whatever) is alluded to but cannot be fulfilled in these experiments because
what is revealed are not the limits of our perception or the impenetrable
unity of reality but the structure of a digital file. There is a thread of
hacker mysticism that makes zen-like metaphors for technical constructs that
are ultimately human/culturally born. We should be careful not to fall into
this trap.

-km