)con-textualschizm( = cyburbanity

spN:
Thanks Scott, for forwarding this post, I missed it. Here is my response:

>On Sun, 24 Mar 1996, George Koutoupis wrote:
>> Now, what about architecture-in(of,through,for)-cyberspace? Is there ("out
>> there") any particular mailing-list or discussion on this matter?
>> My personal particular interest has to do with the question: which is and
>> will be the position of physical architecture after the experience of
>> cyberspace and virtual worlds? (cyberspace-in/of/through/for-architecture?)
>> Yours, George.

Scott:
>C. Ingraham just finished a brief two day seminar here at columbia about
>this question.  the virtual still exists as an exteriorization of our body
>as an
>extension of the body, unlike the prosthetic device which apparently
>comes from outside and is attached to the limb attempting to mimic the
>loss in a compound way where it replaces the function but also soothes in
>its representation of that which was lost. As an exteriority the virtual,
>as i understand it, is incapable of moving into a position where it will
>challenge the physical world's legitimacy
>>To end here i would like to ask what you think characterizes physical
>architecture as different from virtual? And in this description we may be
>able to determine what will legitimize this from another and so on...
>>p.s.
>Stephen, i would like to hear an explanation of hyper-surface in this
>context, if you please.

spN:
Scott, I am glad to see you struggle through the myriad complexity that is
our existing schizo/dichotomous condition between real and cyber worlds.
Catherine Ingraham, Decon/Deleuzean theorist, attempted to describe the way
computer proliferations are more an expression of a lament or lack that
exists due to a fundamental mistake in our self-understanding: That is her
reading of Jacques Lacan and the mirror stage as that moment when in the
process of identity formation a fundamental mistake occurs (mirror stage):
we take our own self-image as ourselves, thus imbricating and image for
what is the real.

We in effect have to live out this paradox such that to be normal means to
keep that mistake in tact. That technology and VR reaches into that
abyss/paradox is what makes it all so interesting. One must not make the
mistake that one can solve the paradox, that would be an utopian gesture
and only fall deeper into what is essentially impossible in this world, to
solve the deeply rooted historical and cultural tradition of fostering
identity in the terms of the mirror stage vis-a-vis Lacan. So the tendency
to foster an architecture in cyberspace IN OUR OWN IMAGE is really just an
extension of the way we understand most everything. And gee, wouldn't it be
nice to be whole and unified, right? But that is the paradox being
slippery, to be whole would be impossible because if we were, how could
there be identity BINGO, you fall into the pit of schizophrenia a very not
normal and unhealthy condition for us Western culture Cartesians.

So, what to do, and how to engage the abyss of Lacan's psychoanalytic
identity paradox without going off into nothingness.  You see, most critics
balk at this point, because even though they might acknowledge the merits
of surfing the abyss, you sacrifice knowledge and the dialectics of
understanding, and if you do that and go off into La La land, people in
this world are going to take advantage of your weakness (schizophrenia).
This is also Marxism kicking in here, the disdain for the mystical and
religious because of the way it affords control over people, necessarily
political control. This is why the deconstructors get criticized for being
onanistic, they become powerless in the face of deconstructing power.

But back to architecture and VR. When you refer to Hypersurface, my
neologism for a way into the abyss and a way to rethink/rework the
dichotomy between real/cyber, I get there by taking into consideration the
work of Heidegger and Derrida but then also Deleuze as well. One has to
work out from the middle. In this case the middle is the ubiquitous
terminal (screen) identity that our culture has become. It is important to
see how DeleuzeoGuattari went beyond Lacan (a teacher of theirs). But I
won't summarize that here, indeed their work _The Anti-Oedipus_ is an
important reconsideration of many of the shortcomings of psychoanalytics
(mostly Freudian and I believe Lacanian as well, although there are debates
about that).

The skinny on Hypersurface is that the extreme pervasiveness of
visualization and computer technology works a "substrate" or topology not
of the subject or the object, not the collective subjective consciousness
or essential structure of Habermas/Plato either, this topology is more an
appearance of our "collective" beings where our everyday work wears a
path...and today it is a fiber optic path, so it isn't in the realm of
rational construction as philosophy would have it. It is like the term
"Public." Today there is no location for such a concept, no theory that
really can identify how such a collective notion works, yet we use it all
the time in our everyday language.  It is more like Lyotard's "language
games," and Libidinal economy.  The incessant play of speech effects,
something that is not comprehensible as a totality. Hypersurface is
hypertextual presence, the effect of presence through a play and
intertextuality of language/substance effects. A combination of Katherine
Hayle and Deleuze's chapter on perception in _The Fold_.  I think of our
presence as an intersubjective phenomena that has priority over individual
subjectivity.

I am sure that none of what I have said will be of much use. I am slowly
working through this and it is still very fragmented.  And there is plenty
I don't want to say yet either. (especially since Hani Rashid lurks on the
list)(grin)  But I am generally less skeptical about technology than a
theorist like Ingraham or a Sanford Kwinter. I see the radical deployment
of technology as a tool that broaches the division between
conscious/unconscious. That WILL create a very tenuous situation indeed,
where we are poised on the brink of infinite manipulation and big brother.
And THAT is the situation, perhaps the promise of such rich manipulation
and control is a deep seduction-ploy rendering us prone to big brother and
the like. But it doesn't matter, for Ingraham and her thesis, it is just
too late, the chip not only has spread, but is deeply rooted in our
cultural logic. It will keep going and no amount of critical consciousness
is going to keep us from the evils. In the midst of such power, the call to
awareness seems to be drowned-out. Which is why we need new concepts like
Hypersurface with which to apply IN THE TRENCHES. Not from the armchair of
theory. That day may be over. As Deleuze said, "we have only to make new
weapons."  I say, you have to get in there and invent yourself.

spN