Algorithms

I think the more troubling aspect, however, is in how they suggest kids should think. They replace narrative reason with algorithmic recommendation, connecting events and objects in weird, illogical bursts lacking any semblance of internal coherence, where the sudden appearance of something completely irrelevant can nonetheless be explained because of its keyword-search frequency. Having a conversation with someone who thinks like this—who “thinks” like this—would be utterly alien, if not logically impossible.

So, to return to this post’s beginning, one of the thrills of thinking like a writer, so to speak, is precisely in how it encourages one to bring together things that might not otherwise belong on the same page, and to work toward understanding why these apparently unrelated subjects might secretly be connected.

But what is thinking like an algorithm?

"LivingConcepts was written to enable students of the Algorithmic Art and Artificial Intelligence class given by Prof. Remko Scha at the University of Amsterdam to explore the often difficult concepts that are presented in the course. "

convert your image into 3d (shockwave/vrml)..; not really stunning, but interesting

Introversion (Darwinia) are working on something ... but what ? anyway, procedural generation is always cool ;)

OptiMap, travelling salesman problem solver using Google Maps

"The resulting table shows your top artist ranking based on the estimated time you have spent listening to them. I think this is a more realistic summary of the underlying attention data, but its also quite interesting to see how much the ranking changes

"examine subtle correlations that appear to reflect the presence and activity of consciousness in the world. (...) We believe our view may be enriched by a creative and poetic perspective. "

mailing-list discussion - with a designer of the 1998 Prey