universe

Symmetries is a digital text comprised of approximately three hundred eighty sextillion poems, or about one poem for every star in the universe. Given enough time, the piece will shift through all possible poems, but it does not do so entirely at random. Rather, Symmetries wanders through these poems according to three mathematical symmetries known as SU(3), SU(2), and U(1) that describe almost everything we know about how the universe works. That is to say everything we see in the world is what it is and behaves the way it does because of these three symmetries. Just as distant stars and nebulae and all living things are linked by these shared symmetries, so too are all of the words and poems (and even the background music) of this piece.

(Source: ELO conference:First encounters 2014)

Published in 2001 by Bluescreen, the pseudonym of the program’s creator, ExtraPhysicalWorld is a program found on the CD alire12, the twelfth installation of a review inspired by a cooperative of authors, including Phillipe Bootz. This collective that inspired Bluescreen was called L.A.I.R.E. (Lecture Art Innovation Recherche Écriture) and was created in October 1988. However, Bluescreen was part of another collective called Transitoire Observable, created in 2003. It is by means of the folders of the CD-ROM that the « site » ExtraPhysicalWorld is accessed. Normally, the sight could be opened via the internet. Yet as of September 2014, the site of ExtraPhysicalWorld no longer works. Thus, the program had to be accessed through the files of alire12. In any case, the program is characterized by several menus that provide information and various animations. The entry Écrits.txt in the menu includes an article written by Bluescreen in 2001 over the conceptualization of the extra-physical world. Écrits.txt also includes a glossary with numerous definitions such as those for the words univers, blobs and algorithme. It is in the menu Univers.exe where the « worlds » of the program are found. For example, in « Univers 01 : Blob unique au monde » the first « universe » can be seen inhabited by a blob that is in the form of a red cube. In this world, according to Bluescreen, the blobs are living beings and inhabitants. This blob appears to enlarge or approach the screen until it appears to fill it entirely. In « Univers 02 : Couple de Blobs (sic) Rouge » two blobs that behave similarly to the blob of univers 01 can be found, except they do not fill out the screen. With « Univers 03 : Couple partagé », three of these blobs enlarge or approach the screen, just as the blobs of univers 02, but one of the three blobs is larger than the other two. « Univers 04 : 5 Blobs Rouges » shows five blobs that are similar to the blobs in other universes. It is in « ETUDE 1 : Reproduction de Blob Rouge(1) » et « ETUDE 2 : Reproduction du Blob Rouge(2) » that one finds the first two universes but with changes to the behavior of the blobs. These blobs also appear and disappear, stretch and shrink. In truth, the reader does not know if these universes represent the text, or the literary side of the site, or if the paratext, i.e. the articles and the glossary in the menu under Écrits.txt, figures as the true text of the site. Moreover, one can suppose that Bluescreen was inspired by the notions of artificial life when he created his programs, and it is probable that this inspiration gave him the idea of representing this aspect of computing in a literary as well as numeric and electronic fashion. According to Bluescreem, the extra-physical world is “its own spatio-temporal dimension” that exists outside of the physical universe. Yet, the fact that the “universes” of the program are driven by a code that Bluescreen created himself complicates its comprehension since, if this code comes from the physical world, the artificial world is therefore rooted in the physical one.