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Tag: nature

This website was archived on July 20, 2019. It is frozen in time on that date.
Exolymph creator Sonya Mann's active website is Sonya, Supposedly.
August 9, 2016

Cyzombies

Artwork by Antoine Collignon, via ArtStation. Illustration of a wired cyborg.

Artwork by Antoine Collignon, via ArtStation.

Artwork by Antoine Collignon, via ArtStation. Illustration of a wired cyborg.

Artwork by Antoine Collignon, via ArtStation.

Can a cyborg become a zombie? Since a cyborg is a regular ol’ flesh human with extra hardware installed, I don’t see why not (assuming we accept zombies as a prior). In fact, the idea that humans will figure out how to technologically augment our bodies and minds, then succumb to a modern Black Death, is fitting.

I don’t think zombies transplanted straight from horror movies are likely, but a devastating epidemic is not implausible. Heck, even now, Zika is intimidating. I doubt that our society can quickly engineer ourselves all the way to pure `0`s and `1`s.

If the side effects of industrialization — say, global warming and dramatically reduced biodiversity — allow nature’s destructive randomness knock us back to square one just as we’ve reached the ultimate reward of having mastered machines… Well. That would be poetic.

The artist, Antoine Collignon, appended this quote from The Animatrix to the image above:

“In the beginning, there was man. And for a time, it was good. But humanity’s so-called civil societies soon fell victim to vanity and corruption. Then man made the machine in his own likeness. Thus did man become the architect of his own demise.”

Humans are nothing if not expert self-saboteurs.

August 7, 2016

Arboreal Networking: The Internet of Trees

We gave the Internet to the trees. Their cyberspace is alien, they grow roots through it instead of moving about, commune in giant rhizomes

You plant a kread, a treeform avatar in one of their groves and they talk to it, a slow intertwining of roots, exchange of virtual chemicals

krëad: (n) from kreîas (meat), analogous to dryad, except it’s flesh trying to talk to wood, a tree of bones, meat, skin and hair

— Eye of Beholder / @allgebrah on Twitter

A tall redwood tree. Photo by Hitchster.

Photo by Hitchster.

Redwood trees are among the tallest in the world. Come to the northern coast of California, and visit some of our national parks. It is difficult to convey in words just how massive the trees are. Just how ancient they are. I suspect that most Exolymph readers are atheists, as am I. But when standing beneath a centenarian redwood tree, it’s easy to understand why early humans ascribed spirits to these organisms.

The modern version of a spirit is a computational mechanism. That’s how science conceives of our brains — the metaphor of a biological machine fits decently well.

Back to redwoods.

It might be intuitive that such tall, heavy trees would have deep roots. They don’t. Instead, redwoods have shallow roots (one of the reasons why they need plentiful water nearby). Their roots stretch out horizontally, intertwining with other redwoods in their forest. The whole city of trees is woven together beneath the soil. Storms and heavy winds are easier to withstand.

Tree of Life illustration by Emilia Varga.

Illustration by Emilia Varga.

The Tree of Life is a recurring religious archetype, a subset of the “sacred tree” mytheme. Redwoods are evergreen, but deciduous trees visually embody the seasons, mirroring the Maiden-Mother-Crone cycle as their fresh green leaves turn gold, dry out, and fall to the cold ground.

Industrialization didn’t wipe out the resonance of this metaphor. Now that we’ve reached the digital age, how will we bring the tree mythos up to speed? Is that desirable, or should we treasure the old, slow-moving beings as they are?

The Anthropocene epoch is not always kind to old, slow-moving beings.

What if we put together a multi-entity Tree of Life that was in fact an arboreal internet? Linking together all the trees into one vast system that thrived on information rather than nutrients? (It’s been posited that some trees already have a version of this.)

In the Judeo-Christian canon, one of the functions of the Tree of Life is to induct humans into the way of knowledge, a fundamentally divine domain — which ruins our innocence. The current internet performs that task well enough already.

Tree of Life illustration by Eddy Adams.

Illustration by Eddy Adams.

See also:

“The implications of the Wood Wide Web far exceed this basic exchange of goods between plant and fungi, however. The fungal network also allows plants to distribute resources — sugar, nitrogen, and phosphorus — between one another. A dying tree might divest itself of its resources to the benefit of the community, for example, or a young seedling in a heavily shaded understory might be supported with extra resources by its stronger neighbors. Even more remarkably, the network also allows plants to send one another warnings.”

July 24, 2016

We Appear to Be Globally Heated

The Computing Generation and all subsequent generations will have to cope with climate change (née global warming). That’s my own demographic cohort and probably yours as well: those of us who grew up with laptop keyboards and seemingly instantaneous information transfers. It’s important to remember that global warming is only bad insofar as it affects human beings.

Nature doesn’t give a shit, inherently. Global warming is fine as far as Nature is concerned — the key point is that Nature isn’t concerned at all. Wild flora and fauna constitute a vast assortment of interlocking systems, not a single entity with agency. Events like mass extinctions are only “bad” because human beings want to exploit biodiversity. Moral rectitude or lack thereof is in the eye of the beholder.

I find this revelation both comforting and terrifying. On the one hand, I needn’t feel guilty about hurting Gaia. She doesn’t care. On the other hand, will I live long enough for none of this to matter?

June 7, 2016

Exporting Japanese Currency & Culture

Sponsor: Bret Bernhoft

I’m thrilled to announce Exolymph’s first sponsor! Bret Bernhoft is creating an experimental futuristic character called Ruby Leander:

“In 2034 (age 18), Ruby decided to have transhuman implants ‘installed’ into her physiology. Devices/technologies that will follow her throughout the rest of her life. […] She was hired into a new policing program/effort dedicated to sniffing out impurities, forgeries and/or attempts at sabotaging/misusing modern technologies.”

Read the first installment of Ruby’s story and learn more about Bret on his website.

Exporting Japanese Currency & Culture

Artwork by ThvnderKat.

Artwork by ThvnderKat.

Thomas Vallance of Virtual Mech (website currently under maintenance) emailed me the following contribution. Lightly edited for this venue.

While the information is flowing I would contend that the gatekeeper is merely a man. Matt Pearce hasn’t spent a considerable enough time sitting by Satan’s eye to say such things. [Vallance is referencing Pearce’s comment about the Panama Papers — “Nobody loves a gatekeeper” — which I quoted in a previous dispatch.]

The euro continues to subdue smaller state currencies — this is true for most except Japan, who has a more powerful running economy than its larger counterpart China. In fact, they contend with economic giants like the United States, Britain, and Europe. This leads one to question; how is it that a nation so small outweighs those with populaces and landmass well beyond their own? Asia in general should be posting a considerable yield, yet we turn to little Tokyo for our Eastern trade opportunities. And that’s the kicker, the yen clocks in so high that unless you speak their language you won’t get a foot in the door.

Not surprisingly, the yen is growing more powerful. Where is China’s great and powerful yuan; is it just another case of outsourcing? An example: when I spoke to my local paper about advertising the comic I am currently writing, they didn’t respond. When I dropped into their office to ask why I hadn’t received a reply, I was referred to an advertising group in Malaysia (they don’t even have the same first language). This off-handing of all queries to Asia, specifically in Japan, seems a common trend, if not an absurd one. You want to ask questions? Just translate them into an Asian language.

Yoshide Suga reported on emergency call numbers as they currently experience 7.3 earthquakes in Kumamoto. Sendai Nuclear Power Plant has reported “no irregularities” — meanwhile US markets will eventually crash under the pressure from China.

I am presently reading the Japanese version of The Godfather, Yakuza — it details their overarching presence in Japan, one that has seemingly spread well beyond their border. I find it interesting that the Yakuza is quite well known while the Triad hardly appears on our radar, apart from niche features.

Back to Sonya again. The Triad is actually pretty well-known in the Bay Area due to its influence on San Francisco’s Chinatown.

I can’t speak for Vallance directly, but I think he’s reflecting on some of the oddities of globalization. The interactions between various national economies are exceedingly complex, but fundamentally human-defined, whereas the natural disasters capable of disrupting everyday life come from deeper powers.

The unleashed energy of nature, pressure built up over centuries — it’s easy to liken it to rage, but an earthquake is more like a cat stretching. Just instinct, just built-up tension following the path of least resistance.

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