autonomous

Content type
Author
Year
Platform/Software
Record Status
Description (in English)

In the 17th century, Leibniz proposed to create an encyclopedia that would bring together all the fields of human knowledge. This led him to be interested in the works of Raimundo Llull, Athanasius Kircher or John Dee and to anticipate the ideas of Vannevar Bush or Ted Nelson by several centuries.The book of the end of the world is also constituted as an encyclopedia, only, in this case, it is an unfinished and open corpus, providing a questioning about the space of identities and differences according to which we distribute, recognize and name our world.Reminiscent of Aloysius Bertrand, Marcel Schwob, or medieval bestiaries, The Book of the End of the World proposes the creation of different possible worlds, autonomous universes, each with its own order, laws, and regularities.The inclusion of hypertext works and the link to the book's site on the Internet emphasize the notions of non-linearity and bifurcation implicit in the conception of the work.

Description (in original language)

En el siglo XVII, Leibniz propuso crear una enciclopedia que reuniera todos los campos del conocimiento humano. Ésto lo llevó a interesarse por los trabajos de Raimundo Llull, Athanasius Kircher o John Dee y adelantarse en varios siglos a las ideas de Vannevar Bush o Ted Nelson.El libro del fin del mundo se constituye igualmente como una enciclopedia sólo que en este caso se trata de un corpus inacabado y abierto, proporcionando un cuestionamiento acerca del espacio de identidades y diferencias según las cuales distribuimos, reconocemos y nombramos nuestro mundo.Con reminiscencias de Aloysius Bertrand, Marcel Schwob o los bestiarios medievales, El libro del fin del mundo plantea la creación de diferentes mundos posibles, universos autónomos, cada uno con su propio orden, leyes y regularidades.La inclusión de trabajos hipertextuales y el vínculo con el sitio del libro en Internet enfatizan las nociones de no linealidad y bifurcación implícitas en la concepción de la obra.

Description in original language
Screen shots
Image
El libro del fin del mundo
Description (in English)

With the exception of this introduction, the writing in this book was all done by a computer. The book has been proofread for spelling but otherwise is completely unedited. The fact that a computer must somehow communicate its activities to us, and that frequently it does so by means of programmed directives in English, does suggest the possibility that we might be able to compose programming that would enable the computer to find its way around a common language "on its own" as it were. The specifics of the communication in this instance would prove of less importance than the fact that the computer was in fact communicating something. In other words, what the computer says would be secondary to the fact that it says it correctly.

(Source: from Bill Chamberlain's introduction at Ubuweb)