Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 16, No. 211.
Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
<http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/humanist/>
<http://www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/humanist/>
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2002 07:21:42 -0700
From: lachance@chass.utoronto.ca (Francois Lachance)
Subject: problems, solutions and residue
Willard and Patrick
I am very intrigued by Patrick's call for sensitivity to solution/problem
mapping. I wonder if Mercator projections are analogous to XSLT? I ask
because by implication Patrick's posting invites us to separate the markup
(creation of a representation) from its processing:
> Date: Sun, 15 Sep 2002 07:43:18 -0700
> From: Patrick Durusau <pdurusau@emory.edu>
> >
> It is in fact unfair to SGML to lump it in with the poverty of structures
> that are possible to express in XML, where overlapping structures are
> simply ignored for the sake of the solution. SGML could in fact represent
> overlapping structures, a feature that was dropped from XML. One strategy
> to support the XML solution is to marginalize overlap as a "residual"
> problem and hence "interesting" but trivial in light of major problems
> being solved. (SGML solves the same problems without the limitations of
> XML, a fact that is often overlooked.)
I'm not sure at what point in this discussion the term "overlap" was
introduced. If I recall correctly, SGML makes room for the representation
of _concurrent_ structures. Could it not be argued that, likewise the
namespace mechanism of XML provides for the representation of _concurrent_
structures. Take for example a scene of wafting scent marked-up for two
foci and one storyline:
<beloved:scent>
<lover:body>
<beloved:body>
<lover:nose>
<beloved:erogenous_zone/>
<lover:nose/>
<lover:/body>
<beloved:body/>
<beloved:scent/>
The musicologists on the list may be in a position to contribute more
fulsome considerations to the more general question of notation systems
for the represenation of temporal aspect of artefacts in space --- the
question of _concurrent_ structures. Indeed, to musicologists on the very
complex notion of space, I am willing to lend an ear.
Coda:
In/between pages 77 and 78 of James Pritchett's _The Music of John Cage_
There is a wonderful chance operation in the typography where the page
break [a structure arising out of a process] interlocks nicely with the
semantics of the passage [a component of other structures]:
<quote>
[...] Cage's model of composition: there exists and infinte
completely non-dual space of unique but interconnected sounds; by means of
chance techniques, the composer can empty his mindf thoughts about sounds,
and thus identify wth this infinite space. [...] and the resulting
musical form is the passage <pb n="78"/> one situation to another.
<quote/>
As suggested in an earlier post, a finite problem space can have an
infinite number of "solution" paths cross through it. Part of the
humanist's lore is a sensitivity to purpose: map projections may serve
navigation in a physical and actual world but they may also serve to chart
passages through possible futures: witness the sets of maps that depict
nation states by per capita ownership digital devices and those maps that
project access to networks. [the difference between "ownership" and
"access" is as clear to me as that between "concurrent" and "overlap"
though I admit to being temporarily befuddled if asked to map the pairs in
relation to each other -- *smile* concurrent:ownership::access:overlap ]
In short, would it not be historically more accurate to tell the story of
the emergence from SGML of XML and XSLT and the namespaces and the
schemas?
--
Francois Lachance, Scholar-at-large
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~lachance/ivt.htm
per Interactivity ad Virtuality via Textuality
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