The Monochord

Pythagoras in School of Athens

  

A monochord is an ancient musical and scientific laboratory instrument. It is also the class-name for any musical stringed instrument having only one string (such as the Vietnamese Đàn bầu). The word "monochord" comes from the Greek and means literally "one string." In a true monochord, a single string is stretched over a sound box. The string is fixed at both ends while one or many movable bridges are manipulated to demonstrate mathematical relationships between sounds.

[Slide 3-3: Closeup of Tablet, Bouleau. Janson, H. W. History of Art. (Fifth Edition.NY: Abrams, 1995). p.497
Raphael’s School of Athens shows Pythagoras is explaining the musical ratios to a pupil. Notice the tablet. It shows the words diatessaron, diapente, diapason. The roman numerals for 6, 8, 9, and 12, showing the ratio of the intervals, same as in the music book frontispiece.The word for the tone, ΕΠΟΓΛΟΩΝΕΠΟΓΛΟΩΝΕΠΟΓΛΟΩΝΕΠΟΓΛΟΩΝ, at the top. Under the tablet is a triangular number 10 called the sacred tetractys]

 The monochord can be used to illustrate the mathematical properties of musical pitch. For example, when a monochord's string is open it vibrates at a particular frequency and produces a pitch. When the length of the string is halved, and plucked, it produces a pitch an octave higher and the string vibrates at twice the frequency of the original (2:1)  Play (help·info). Half of this length will produce a pitch two octaves higher than the original—four times the initial frequency (4:1)—and so on. Standard diatonic Pythagorean tuning (Ptolemy’s Diatonic Ditonic) is easily derived starting from superparticular ratios, (n+1)/n, constructed from the first four counting numbers, the tetractys, measured out on a monochord.^{[citation needed]}

The Divine Monochord, from Fludd’s Utriusque Cosmi Maioris Scilicet et Minoris Metaphysica (1617)

The name "monochord" is sometimes incorrectly applied to an instrument with one open string and a second string with a movable bridge; however, such a two-string instrument is properly called a bichord. With two strings you can easily demonstrate how various musical intervals sound. Both open strings are tuned to the same pitch, and then the movable bridge is put in a mathematical position to demonstrate, for instance, the major third (at 4/5th of the string length)  Play (help·info) or the minor third (at 5/6th of the string length)  Play (help·info).

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SEE:Infinite Fire Webinar II - The Emblemata of the Atalanta Fugiens by Dr. Peter J. Forshaw



See: Atalanta fugiens

What is Beauty in a Abstract World?

 Pierre Curie (1894): “Asymmetry is what creates a phenomenon.”

This has been of some interest to me as this issue is explained.  I can see where such abstraction when not in some way connected to the real world would to one seem as if it is a dry unimaginative world,  just moving through qualitative functions. It has to mean something more, doesn't it?

Pauli understood that physics necessarily gives an incomplete view of nature, and he was looking for an extended scientific framework. However, the fact that the often colloquial and speculative style of his letters is in striking contrast to his careful and refined publications should advise us to act with caution. His accounts are extremely stimulating, but they should be considered as first groping attempts rather than definitive proposals. See: Pauli’s ideas on mind and matter in the context of contemporary science

Held in context we trust that the philosophical basis is understood as it is being represented in today's world of science. This position with what is self evident must be correlated between theory and physics. So,  I wanted to point to something quite significant for the dry and death forborne mathematician who finds no correlates in the real world. Just goading.

Many prediction-making abilities are low-level and innate. We might say that trees \predict" the arrival of winter and decide to shed their leaves, for example. But in discussing the sense of beauty we are dealing with something that is uniquely human, or nearly See: Whence the Beauty of Mathematics?

It has not past my attention that Beauty is described as not being significant by some of these mathematicians who find no value to it. It means nothing? But for a minute,  think, that if supersymmetry is not established,  then does this in some way reduce the effectiveness of math to explain the symmetrical nature of reality? Should we try to describe these abstract things as being less then beautiful? What use then "any language" that is established,  from that math?

Professor Gates,  what would happen with the beauty of the Adinkra?

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See Also:

• TVO S James Gates on Does Reality have a Genetic Basis
• Adinkra Symbols(physics)

School of Athens

Raphael, School of Athens, fresco, 1509-1511 (Stanza della Segnatura, Papal Palace, Vatican) See: Raphael, School of Athens 

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See Also:

• Raphael's Fresco of the School of Athens

Quantum Mechanics and the Geometry of Spacetime

See:Colloquim January 30, 2014 - Quantum Mechanics and the Geometry of Spacetime

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Angels and Devils: MC Escher's use of Hyperbolic Space

See Also:

• Juan Maldacena's NYU colloquium on QM, GR

Unus Mundus-One World

Unus mundus, Latin for "one world", is the concept of an underlying unified reality from which everything emerges and to which everything returns.

The idea was popularized in the 20th century by the Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung, though the term can be traced back to scholastics such as Duns Scotus^[1] and was taken up again in the 16th century by Gerhard Dorn, a student of the famous alchemist Paracelsus.

The striving  for me was to dig deeper into our very natures.  It always the quest to understand the  patterns that reside in us. The very idea for me was that in  this quest to unify,  the objective world(matter) with the world that resides in a center place. To me that place was the source from which all things manifest.

 Jung, in conjunction with the physicist Wolfgang Pauli, explored the possibility that his concepts of the archetype and synchronicity might be related to the unus mundus - the archetype being an expression of unus mundus; synchronicity, or "meaningful coincidence", being made possible by the fact that both the observer and connected phenomenon ultimately stem from the same source, the unus mundus.^[2]

So while there was this objective striving to see how such formations emerged as materiality of such expression,  was a final construct that existed in that external world. For me this was something no one could quite explain to me, yet,  as I moved forward  I began to find such correlates as to others who tried to map that expression.

 It was this psychoid aspect of the archetype that so impressed Nobel laureate physicist Wolfgang Pauli. Embracing Jung's concept, Pauli believed that the archetype provided a link between physical events and the mind of the scientist who studied them. In doing so he echoed the position adopted by German astronomer Johannes Kepler. Thus the archetypes which ordered our perceptions and ideas are themselves the product of an objective order which transcends both the human mind and the external world.^[2]

This as the idea emerged,  I looked for what emergence might mean, as an example of a beginning,  and the subsequent model that may emerge from that source. This then became know as the "arche,"  and the tendency to form"(type)" as a movement forward in the solidifying of that expression. This was a matter bound expression, fully recognizing the need for a spiritual recognition of this opposition as a struggle in with consciousness to seek balance with materiality. Polarity,  as the world of the real.

One of Duchamp's close friends Man Ray (1890–1976) was also one of Duchamp's collaborators. His photograph 'Dust Breeding' (Duchamp's Large Glass with Dust Notes) from 1920 is a document of The Large Glass after it had collected a year's worth of dust while Duchamp was in New York. See:
Dust Breeding (Man Ray 1920)

Such histrionically values were tied to such expressions to have found that the inner world and the outer-world were extremely connected. The observance not seen until it was understood that this psychology was topological interpreting itself from an inductive/deductive stance,  as to the question, and with regard to the nature of the question.

 Jung interpreted the practice of alchemy as the symbolic projection of psychic processes. In Psychology and Alchemy and Mysterium Coniunctionis (1955/56), Jung’s empirical exploration and rediscovery of the objective psyche led him to recognise that the basis of the alchemist’s endeavour was the archetypal union of opposites by means of the integration of opposing polarities: conscious and unconscious, reason and instinct, spiritual and material, masculine and feminine. In the last summaries of his insights on the subject, influenced in part by his collaboration with the Nobel Prize winning physicist Wolfgang Pauli, the old Jung envisions a great psycho-physical mystery to which the old alchemists gave the name of unus mundus (one world). At the root of all being, so he intimates, there is a state wherein physicality and spirituality meet. See:Reflections On Duchamp, Quantum Physics, And Mysterium Coniunctionis

This would place myself in the position of questioning this causal nature to have said that "will" was deeply connected to our psyche,  to have not understood this deeper perception of a reality connection. Also,  that such unification was deeper embedded in this practice of unification,  so as to strive to form,  as a example of an idea into expression.

Betrayal of Images" by Rene Magritte. 1929 painting on which is written "This is not a Pipe"

This alchemy valuation of that work toward expression was based on a fundamental reality of joining the objectified world with the nature of the source. This forming process,  the constructs,  as a fundamental structure of the reality given.

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See Also:

• The Arche, is a Fundamental Point of View?
• Who is the Clockmaker?
  
• Pauli's World Clock
• Crystal Structure

The Arche, is a Fundamental Point of View?

The term phase is sometimes used as a synonym for state of matter, but there can be several immiscible phases of the same state of matter. Also, the term phase is sometimes used to refer to a set of equilibrium states demarcated in terms of state variables such as pressure and temperature by a phase boundary on a phase diagram. Because phase boundaries relate to changes in the organization of matter, such as a change from liquid to solid or a more subtle change from one crystal structure to another, this latter usage is similar to the use of "phase" as a synonym for state of matter. However, the state of matter and phase diagram usages are not commensurate with the formal definition given above and the intended meaning must be determined in part from the context in which the term is used.

One may find a correlate here with regard to how a question can be properly placed. Lets say, as a result of a inductive/deductive approach this puts one in a position of being truly like the fisherman/woman, looking for fish. However, one might look at that terminology, this might be an insightful way of recognizing a fundamental feature of always gong to the "edge of something?" Dropping a line into the deepest waters of.....?

To wit, it’s the concept of “being directed toward a goal.” In the good old days of Aristotle, our best understanding of the world was teleological from start to finish: acorns existed in order to grow into mighty oak trees; heavy objects wanted to fall and light objects to rise; human beings strove to fulfill their capacity as rational beings. Not everyone agreed, including my buddy Lucretius, but at the time it was a perfectly sensible view of the world.Reality, Pushed From Behind

So you may throw coins to the winds and ask the winds, "which way is it going to blow today," yet, there is an underlying fundamental feature associated with this question? It is an improved version of an ole method, that seeks to be explained in the fundamental of approach given today.

To Plato it may be this "One Thing," while to Aristotle, a hand sweeping as to indicate as to say  it is all around you?

So given the truth of what a seeker will find, its correlate, may surprise you.

Landsat Science

The Landsat Program provides repetitive acquisition of high resolution multispectral data of the Earth’s surface on a global basis. The data from Landsat spacecraft constitute the longest record of the Earth’s continental surfaces as seen from space. It is a record unmatched in quality, detail, coverage, and value.Landsat Data Continuity Mission Overview

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Landsat Eight Bands

Urban areas and some kinds of soil are pink. In the true-color image, wild vegetation is almost uniformly olive-colored, but here we see a distinction between peach-colored scrubland, mahogany-colored woodland, and so on. Cooling onshore breezes appear as a slight purple gradient along the coast of the city. The colored strips on either side of the image are areas where not all sensors have coverage.

 

 Landsat 8 measures different ranges of frequencies along the electromagnetic spectrum – a color, although not necessarily a color visible to the human eye. Each range is called a band, and Landsat 8 has 11 bands. Landsat numbers its red, green, and blue sensors as 4, 3, and 2, so when we combine them we get a true-color image such as this one:

Unleashing the Power of Earth Observations: Barbara Ryan

Unleashing the Power of Earth Observations

 Jan 21, 2014 • In December 2013, the Secretariat Director of the Group on Earth Observations gave a TEDx talk in Barcelona, Spain making the case that all Earth-oberservation data collected from governments and institutions should be open and available to everyone. She illustrates how this could reduce hunger and improve the quality of life of all Earth’s inhabitants. Ryan emphasizes that Earth observation data show Earth without political boundaries, as an entire system. See: The Landsat Program

Atlantis?

View Larger Map

Atlantis and Plato Seamounts 33 28'N, 29 39'W

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Plato's TIMAEUS :Atlantis against Athens

;Many great and wonderful deeds are recorded of your state in our histories. But one of them exceeds all the rest in greatness and valour. For these histories tell of a mighty power which unprovoked made an expedition against the whole of Europe and Asia, and to which your city put an end. This power came forth out of the Atlantic Ocean, for in those days the Atlantic was navigable; and there was an island situated in front of the straits which are by you called the Pillars of Heracles; the island was larger than Libya and Asia put together, and was the way to other islands, and from these you might pass to the whole of the opposite continent which surrounded the true ocean; for this sea which is within the Straits of Heracles is only a harbour, having a narrow entrance, but that other is a real sea, and the surrounding land may be most truly called a boundless continent. Now in this island of Atlantis there was a great and wonderful empire which had rule over the whole island and several others, and over parts of the continent, and, furthermore, the men of Atlantis had subjected the parts of Libya within the columns of Heracles as far as Egypt, and of Europe as far as Tyrrhenia. This vast power, gathered into one, endeavoured to subdue at a blow our country and yours and the whole of the region within the straits; and then, Solon, your country shone forth, in the excellence of her virtue and strength, among all mankind. She was pre-eminent in courage and military skill, and was the leader of the Hellenes. And when the rest fell off from her, being compelled to stand alone, after having undergone the very extremity of danger, she defeated and triumphed over the invaders, and preserved from slavery those who were not yet subjugated, and generously liberated all the rest of us who dwell within the pillars. But afterwards there occurred violent earthquakes and floods; and in a single day and night of misfortune all your warlike men in a body sank into the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like manner disappeared in the depths of the sea. For which reason the sea in those parts is impassable and impenetrable, because there is a shoal of mud in the way; and this was caused by the subsidence of the island.

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So you have google earth and your looking at a specific location, "Atlantis and Plato Seamounts 33 28'N, 29 39'W". Now if you look closely from above, there is a long fracture down the center of the Atlantic, but what is interesting, now that your looking at this expanse of water, is having the question in mind, what would happen if lets say the bottom dropped just below the azores and Pico, that waves would wash over a plain and leave indication, that such a drop is recorded in the terrain?

If the water was going in one direction, what would that terrain look like as the water swept over it?
What do dunes look like if the winds flow over them, the dunes would point in which direction?

 It is interesting that as you get closer to the surface of the ocean, the water now indicates movement and motion.

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See Also:

•  Sarah Parcak: Archeology from space and more
• Comparison of different translations of Plato's Atlantis by Benjamin Jowett, R.G. Bury and Sir Desmond Lee

Glast to Music

What does the universe look like at high energies? Thanks to the FermiLarge Area Telescope (LAT), we can extend our sense of sight to “see”the universe in gamma rays. But humans not only have a sense of sight,we also have a sense of sound. If we could listen to the high-energy universe, what would we hear? What does the universe sound like?The Sound of a Fermi Gamma-ray Burst

Putting a Fermi Gamma-ray burst to music. Made by Sylvia Zhu