MOOCs - Philosophy and the Sciences - In what way can philosophy or philosophical thinking contribute to the physical sciences?

Many of the great scientists were also philosophers, and a number of great philosophers were scientists. I am of the opinion that it is where boundaries are blurred that the best scientific advancements are made, be it between sciences, or very different subjects. It is a philosophical approach that will allow for the inclusion of unexpected behaviours and observations, as this will encourage the consideration of a different approach to the problem.
Descartes is often quoted most significantly as a philosopher, yet many scientific interactions owe a debt to his system of co-ordinates, and much of mathematics and the physical sciences would not exist without that underpinning.
In 2006 there was discussion over the realisation that Van Gough (the artist) had depicted in his painting, Starry Night, something which mathematics is still struggling with, the concept of turbulence. Whilst Van Gough is not known as either a scientist of a philosopher like both of those occupations artists depict the world as they see it in a medium for others to interact with.
Both philosophers and scientists search for further meaning, and the abstraction that philosophy supplies allows for a different kind of understanding compared to that of a physical, measurable science.
That abstraction has been a foundation of science, as with cosmology. Kant, a philosopher, describes the balance between various forces which we now use as a basis of cosmology which Laplace, a mathematician, moved on.
In a similar fashion, observations that did not conform to the current model of the solar system lead to the hypothesis of extra planets. This was true in one case (Neptune and the effect it had on Uranus), but it was a different theory which explained the other (General Relativity rather than Vulcan existing). There was no way at the time of each hypothesis to be certain which of the two were correct, and it is that which I perceive to be the heart of philosophy, considering a thesis and examining it.
The Anthropic Principle is a philosophical concept that is used by many scientists, even if they don't know the term. The aim is to strike that balance between what is observed and what is understood. A good explanation will make something seem more usual, or more acceptable to the person being explained to. This principle can be applied not only to cosmology and the related fields, but to the other end of the size spectrum to subatomic interactions. The principle could also be applied to artists, as they can depict graphically what a scientist might depict mathematically.
In my experience we teach abstractions which are out dated as scientific fact, and then tell people that this theory has been superseded by this one, and here is the experimental proof for it. For example, an atom was once taken to be the smallest possible example of an element which was the simplest possible thing. This then developed into the existence of components for an atom, and their charges. Many places still teach atomic structure with pictures of electrons orbiting a nucleus as if they were planets within a solar system. Yet, the behaviour is more chaotic than that. The introduction of Leptons/Mesons is often left to a high level of learning, and yet there are consistent ways of using muons ('discovered' in 1936) to perform other experiments and learn more still about the behaviour of the universe we live in. Muons were discovered through experiments relating to cosmic rays, an observation was made as to the behaviour of a particle which did not conform to those that were known about. As such a new thesis was required, and this is the philosophical contribution. If Anderson and Neddermyer (who are attributed with finding the muon) had been dogmatic in their approach, and merely observed, and decided that their readings were incorrect, or their equipment faulty, then whole areas of research may have been impossible to understand. Instead, they considered options and considered whether or not there were other reasons for the observed behaviour, and applied a philosophical approach to the problem at hand.
In conclusion, the biggest contribution philosophy can give to the physical sciences in my opinion is that it challenges the narrow view of only the evidence, and encourages the theoretical view of possibilities that have yet to be proved.

Site Specific Performance, Assignment 3

This assignment took the setup of

A highly-regarded arts organization has invited you to submit a proposal for a site-based work for an upcoming arts festival. In this proposal you are encouraged to make as many pre-production decisions as possible, from conceiving some of the major artistic elements such as movement, sound, etc., to creating a preliminary budget. What you come up with may not be a finished piece, but that is okay. The primary purpose of the assignment is to put some of the technical and practical skills learned to date into practice while expanding on the possibilities of what you could do in your selected site. As an option, you may include a short video or photographic storyboard to illustrate your proposal. 

I didn't include a storyboard, but did go through the other sections as follows (my responses are quoted below, with the questions in the body text)

Part 1: Description of Work / Artistic Approach
In the space below, paste your 300-400 word description of work from Assignment #2 with any edits and changes as required based on peer feedback you received or other creative decisions. As mentioned above, imagine this description is the first part of a genuine proposal, so you may want to tailor it to your target audience: the festival's selection committee. Be as descriptive and persuasive as you can here within the word count.

Title: Awen (A Welsh word meaning inspiration/spirit of creation type things)
Summary: The audience will gather, likely as an amorphous set of small groups, at the start of the footpath on what is a fairly busy road. Here there would be a small performance piece while the audience are stood with a slightly futuristic feel to it, heavily influenced by street dance as a style. The styling of the performers however would have to be quite extreme, as they need to be the first instance and feel of dark faery types, as they will start to 'steal' the audience along the route of the performance. There would be about 8-10 Street Dancers, who then continue on through the performance.
As soon as this first set piece is done then the audience are invited/encouraged/herded as required onto the path, the music changes to being a little more contemporary and familiar. Over the net few hundred meters the audience are ushered to a bridge. At the bridge they pause and the future faeries are joined by another group, who have less extreme costumes, but are heavily of the era of the music, and at the bridge this should have reached about the 50s/60s. At the top of the bridge the audience are encouraged to look back along the footpath, where they should see the performers doing a jive type dance, with the routing covering each of the Latin partner dances, ending with the Charleston. This would be undertaken by about 10-15 couples, but can incorporate at least half the Street Dancers. Whilst walking the performers should be interacting with the audience, providing a feeling of fun creepiness - similar to the feel of The Addams Family.
The performance then travels again, with all the performers interacting with the audience.
The next point of journey is a young wood. At this point we are joined by the dryad type faery, a contemporary dance style with only a few dancers 5 or 6, who beckon the audience and their brethren into the centre of the stone circle, around which all the different types of faery come into a bacchanalia style and end by drifting into the woods and away from the audience. The music by now should be folk music, with a similar abandoned feel to the dancing as you get at the end of a long ceilidh.

Part 2: Production/Technical Proposal
Thinking back to some of the guidelines and suggestions provided in the course to date, what are some of the production and technical decisions you need to make to bring your work to fruition? In the space below, write a 200-400 word proposal that outlines these key technical decisions and why you are going to use them. To help you, here are some questions you may need to ask yourself in developing your proposal:
What is the audience design?
What is the structure of the performance?
What time of day is your performance?
How many performers do you see in the space?
What are some of the production elements involved in your piece?
Will you be using lights, sound, costumes or other media?
Who are some of the major personnel you will be hiring or working with?
If you do not have a lot of technical requirements in your work, please give reasons why! Is the site already equipped with the production elements you need? Is your work a guerilla-style or spontaneous performance? Or do you choose not to use external lighting, sound, etc because you prefer a simple and straightforward aesthetic? Please explain your technical considerations here.

Technical Proposal

The Performance will be a promenade performance, so there is for most of it a loose audience design, which should also allow people to join it in progress, or leave if required. As such there is little formal guidance as to where the audience should be situated, although they should be gathered in the centre of the stone circle at the final point.

The community could easily be involved in performing this piece if appropriate organisations could be brought on board.

 

Location 1 - Street and Houses, Street Dance style, 8-10 dancers

For the first location, the Street Dance, the sound will be very modern, so good quality speakers and sound system will be required at this point. This is an open

Lighting would be specific, spotlights highlighting sections of the dance, they should be integrated into the performance.

Costumes for the street performers will be extreme, bright/odd colours for hair, LEDs/glowing items included in the costume so that when in the dark they become even more otherworldly.

There are various street dance groups for all ages in the community, and they could be involved as part of this.

 

Location 2 - Bridge and path under the trees, partner dances, 15 to 20 couples

At the second location, again sound is a requirement.

This section is more likely to require lighting, with a wash of light to cover the whole path. Keeping this to either a yellow or green tint should retain the natural feeling of the location.

Costumes here would still be odd, although the feel should be a little less futuristic.

There are a number of partner dance groups covering modern jive and ballroom/Latin styles who could become involved in this section.

 

Location 3 - Woods and stone circle, contemporary and all out, 5-6 for the contemporary, all dancers involved in the final section in the stone circle

Sound is likely to be the biggest requirement here, kept simple and traditional/

Lighting here should be understated, at most a couple of highly strategically placed spotlights, with any extra light needed coming from either the costumes, or from less intrusive sources such as (probably best to be fake, as this is a wood in summer) flames, small groups of coloured LEDs being held by the performers. The light is intended to be an addition and enhancement, not a core part of this production, so the choreography will need to be enough without the lighting.

The extra costumes here are for the contemporary dancers and pale green/yellow 'floaty' fabrics with long sleeves and skirts should enhance the ancient feel of the costume.

I'm leaving out the budget aspect, as this was all very much a learning attempt, and is unlikely to ever see the light of day, so that bit, which is very abstract I'll leave out.

Site Specific Performance, Assignment 2

Part 1: Site Inventory and Research
In the space below, write a 300-400 word response that outlines your intended approach for your site based on the data or information you have your initial research

Site: Footpath from town along old railway line to woods and stone circle
Brief Concept: The audience walks the footpath with the performance going on around them, being taken from a modern feel where the houses are closest to the path, to a 'faery' circle and bacchanalia.
Filter: The Physical Site (some elements of Community and Current Use)
Choosing a walking performance along a public footpath to a public wood implies that then level of traffic could be varied. Some sections of the planned route are busy roads, but, for most of the route it's a footpath and cycle track, so the biggest impact would be to/from the cyclists. The final section is likely to be quiet as it is a walk away from most of the town. There is nothing much at any point along the route, except the back of people houses, but it is well delineated along most of the pathway. It is all outdoors, and the sounds are that of nature, so any music played for a performance would potentially be an intrusion, but keeping a simple acoustic/traditional sound should have less of a jarring effect. Because the audience would be walking from a modern feel to an otherworldy experience. Because of the route the textures are varied, with concrete and bricks at the beginning, and vertical lines of young trees surrounding a large open clearing with the stone circle in the middle. One of the angles that interested me most along the route was that of being able to look back from the top of a bride along the path you have just walked which could be used as a pause moment, with the performance occurring 'underneath' the audience, or at a level depending on the size of audience. At this point there would be some potential obstructions from lamp-posts and similar. The only lighting I would plan to use would be the natural light, making this a summer project, as I'm in Oxfordshire, UK the weather is likely to be a risk.
Filter: Site History
Whilst this particular site is only a couple of decades old it links back to similar sites in concept which are thousands of years old (e.g. Stonehenge) and the magic of that history could be exploited to build up the expectations and feel of otherworldliness.

Part 2: Description of Work / Artistic Approach
In the space below, write a 300-400 description of the work you are proposing for the site. You should include:

• The title of the work, if you have one
• A brief summary of the work 
• Where it will be located in the site 
• How an audience would encounter this work 

Your response should also address some of the conceptual ideas behind the work. Some questions that might help you are:

• Is your work site-specific or site-adaptive? 
• What filter(s) are you examining through this work? (Remember, you don’t have to use all four filters here!) 
• What are some of your conceptual ideas behind the work? How does the work align with your existing practice or ideas about performance/installation/etc? 
• What do you hope to accomplish with this proposed work? Or why is it important to make this work for this site?

You will have an opportunity to refine this response in the next assignment, so don't worry if you haven't finalized your idea at this point.

Title: Awen (A Welsh word meaning inspiration/spirit of creation type things)
Summary: The audience will gather, likely as an amorphous set of small groups, at the start of the footpath on what is a fairly busy road. Here there would be a small performance piece while the audience are stood with a slightly futuristic feel to it, this is likely to be a reframe from the studio type piece, the piece would be heavily influenced by street dance as a style. The styling of the performers however would have to be quite extreme, as they need to be the first instance and feel of dark faery types, as they will start to 'steal' the audience along the route of the performance.
As soon as this first set piece is done then the audience are invited/encouraged/herded as required onto the path, the music changes to being a little more contemporary and familiar. Over the net few hundred meters the audience are ushered to a bridge. At the bridge they hold and the future faeries are joined by the acts, who now look less extreme for costumes, but are heavily of the era of the music, and at the bridge this should have reached about the 50s/60s. The audience pauses at the bridge, and looking back along the footpath they should see the performers doing a jive type dance, taking it back through each of the Latin partner dances, to be left with the Charleston before being ready to continue. This set piece is again likely to be a reframe from the studio, whilst the performers when walking would be doing something slightly more site-specific.
The performance then travels again, with two lots of 'faeries' who can interact with the audience.
The next point of journey is a young wood, the trees are still quite regimented in their growth, with noticable lines of trees. At this point we are joined by the dryad type faery, who beckon the audience and their brethren into the centre of the stone circle, around which the different types of faery come into the bacchanalia style and end by drifting into the woods and away from the audience. The music by now should be folk type music, heave on acoustic instruments. This is site-adaptive work at this point.

MOOCs - The site I followed through, assignment 1 of Site Specific Performance

This was my second site to explore for the same questions as the previous post, I then followed this one through for the rest of the course.

Site #2: Woodland Path leading to stone circle
Site Location: This is specifically being considered for a footpath and stone circle in my home town and a nearby wood, however this is likely to be a highly site adaptive production, as there are many similar situations in the areas I grew up in Wales (rarer where I live now)
Purpose/Use: This is a footpath, and a wood with stone circle to commemorate the Millennium (year 2000). These are public areas, linking the centre of the town with the countryside around it
Relationship: Having grown up Welsh I will always have a romantic view of the stone circles. This same romance is often echoed with the way people respond to sites such as Stone Henge. Locally, it is a short walk from my home, and takes me from the edge of the town centre into Oxfordshire countryside. Because the wood is fairly new it has the young feel I imagine that the earliest settlers of Britain would have come accross, rather than the old woods we know now.
Concept: This is likely to be highly site-adaptive, and as such I am thinking of it in that way. The feel I get is of stepping back through time as I walk the route, and there is an odd mix of history reclaimed by nature and new bits. This would be a promenade performance, starting at the end of the footpath, and leading to a final showpiece in the stone circle. The performance at the beginning would be modern, or even futuristic, so contemporary dance styles. As you move along the path then the 'spirits' of the old world would start to lead you to their world. At the end of the walk it would be mainly fantasy. The 'spirits' I'm considering are the fairies of traditional lore, so more Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream than Sugar Plum or flowers. These are the fairies that would steal children, and the idea would be to give the audience as they are ushered/lead/follow the path of performance to feel as if they have been stolen away into another place. Having these spirits move from the gremlins of modern technology to the dryads in the woods, to all of them capering around an audience in the centre of a stone circle with the different layers could be interesting.

Photographs to describe the site:

Although taken a bit too far back this is close to location with houses nearby

This is a view over the path walking up

An idea for the location of the performers towards the end of the route with a 'dryadic' feel

The end of the route view of where the audience would be gathered within the stone circle

MOOCs - Site Specific Performance

I've been doing a few of these, and some of them have involved doing dangerous things like songwriting, there's even clips of my voice out there on soundcloud. Many are programming based, so don't really translate onto systems such as this. However, a few have been written work so far, and I thought I'd add a couple of posts to the blog with the essays/written work included, just for my own memory, and to make them easy to share.

First up to be put here is my submissions for Site Specific Dance, which was great fun to do.

This post is the first of my two outlines for assignment 1: Site Selection and Audience Design.

The task was:
In the space below, write a short description of Site #1. Include:

• Where the site is located 
• What its purpose is, or describe its use 
• Your relationship to it (did anything significant happen here in your past?) or why you are drawn to it 
• Any relevant links, if desired.  

In the same space (and preferably in a separate paragraph), explain how you envision a work could be performed in Site #1, and how an audience would experience that work. This doesn't have to be a definitive plan; you may choose two or three locations within the site as possibilities at this point.

From your documentation of Site #1, select four (4) or more photographs that include, at minimum:

• Two photographs that describe the site
• One photograph that shows where the work could be performed (from the point of view of the audience) 
• One photograph that shows where the audience would be located

The spiel I wrote for my first site, and the corresponding photos follow:

Site #1: Didcot Railway Centre (http://www.didcotrailwaycentre.org.uk/ )

Site Location: This is right next to the railway station in my home town, which in on a busy set of tracks from London to the West of England/Wales, only 45 minutes out of London

Purpose/Use: This is a museum basically, but of industrial items related to the railways.

Relationship: It as a venue has no specific significance to me, however, it is one of the places locally that echoes where I grew up, which had a strong railway connection and was a docks town. This sympathetic mirroring draws me to this as a venue, the industrial travel for a purpose, combined with the pleasure access that you get in a museum, and got where I grew up as it was also a seaside resort.

The museum also has days where they run steam trains along some of the old branch lines in the area. It has been used already in a number of films and TV shows, which means it can be a familiar feel to a wide range of people.

This is likely to be a promenade performance, as there is a wide area with a range of old stock and other interesting sites throughout the centre which performance could enhance the joy of exploring.

There are most likely aspects of all 4 categories of site-specification that could be used, e.g. a scene from The Railway Children, studio work could transfer to a platform, something which uses a flat space and a general item of rolling stock could be adaptive, with some things being only available at Didcot, and probable the overall piece being site-specific. As well as the audience actually walking, if this were combined with a steam day then the romance of the steam will add to the mood, as well as providing an opportunity for the audience to ride a train with further performances occurring where they would be unlikely to go on foot, or even within the carriages.

This is a view from offsite to give a feel for the overall location

A couple of photos to give a feel for the museum itself

This could be a good location to intermingle the audience and the performers:

Performance spots (from audience perspective)

The turning circle

This one was taken a little late, but there are some derelict type spots that can just be seen to the left hand side of the photo

Possible audience locations

Travelling on a train, sat in the seats, or gathered outside to watch

I failed to take a photo for this massive green space from the other side - hence being on the train, the performers would actually be at other points most likely, the turning circle is in that shot, although it is difficult to tell that.