Relativity, Rescheduling, Remembering (Patreon)

Featured image: Béla's neon pink string cover

Bonus image: Dog with bangs

0. Introduction: Obsessions Convert Time Into New Connections

So say I'm working on a script about Emmy Noether, her life and work and etc. I steep myself in all the ideas and carry them throughout my days and weeks, so that I can stumble upon all the little connections that give me a way to say the thing I want to say, translated into life and metaphor and words. This is one of the ways I turn time into better videos, which is really the main skill of my job.

One of Noether's more well-known accomplishments is Noether's Theorem in physics, now sometimes called "the most beautiful theorem in physics" or "one of the most important discoveries in 20th century physics", where she stepped in to help Einstein and Hilbert figure out a point of contention with relativity and resolved the issue with something more amazing than anyone could have imagined could possibly be true about the universe (but that, as is often the case, makes perfect obvious sense in retrospect).

So of course I'm thinking about relativity, both as a physics thing and as a metaphor, and go through my days looking for connections that will help the larger idea of the video come across.

I like to stay aware that new connections aren't always true connections, but I create art, stories and metaphors where new connections don't need to be factual in order to add truth and meaning to the work. Relativity in physics doesn't necessarily have anything to do with moral relativity, for example, but we can still use the connection as a tool for introspection.

Not all of those connections will actually end up in the video though, so for today's writing warmup I'll mention a couple places where relativity has come up in my life as connected with memory, which is another topic on my mind because it's been a VIM LIVE topic recently.

1. Relative Calendars and the Re-Rescheduling of VIM LIVE

In my last post, I mentioned we were rescheduling VIM LIVE to Monday, instead of the usual Tuesday. And, come Monday, I entirely forgot. It was Memorial Day so I tried to be a good "don't work all day every day" human and took the day off to read a book, ignoring my phone and calendar.

I realized late in the evening, oh no! How could I forget! M must have left me a million messages trying to figure out why I didn't show. And usually an entire 2 people show up to watch so hopefully no one's too mad about it besides M, but those 2 people still matter!

Indeed my phone had missed calls and texts from M. Ironically, they were not wondering where I was, but apologizing for missing the stream. We both forgot! (It's now re-rescheduled for tomorrow, Thursday the 31st, at the usual 5pm Pacific)

I knew exactly the mental mistake I had made, though. I tend to think of my schedule relatively. I have a mental bucket for things to get done on the first day of the week, and usually that's Monday, but when Monday's a holiday the first day of the week is Tuesday, which is the normal day for the stream and thus did not draw any suspicion when on Monday I vaguely thought "the stream is tomorrow, Tuesday, the first day of the week". 

All the facts seemed consistent. Relativity is a great way to create the illusion of truth through consistency.

2. The First Time I Forgot Something

I remember the first time I ever forgot an appointment. I was 12, and when my appointee came up to me and asked where I was during lunch, I stood in shock.

I'd forgotten. 

How is that possible? How could my mind betray me like that? Who's running the ship, here?

Before the age of 12, I did not keep a calendar, and thought it a ruse that anyone did. When I was young, I simply remembered everything. I knew everything. I thought school was where kids pretend to be stupid so that adults can pretend not to feel guilty while they take advantage of free babysitting.

I thought "I forgot" was one of those socially constructed excuses, a polite "I didn't want to", a ritual as meaningless and essential as Santa Claus or How-are-you-Fine-thanks. A lie invented for the comfort of others, meant to communicate "I don't expect you to take action in acknowledgment of the truth".

I eventually started keeping a calendar. I even realized that young kids were not just pretending to believe in Santa Claus, that some people are actually fine thank you, that adults were not just pretending to believe in god, vegetables, and public education, and that I did not in fact know everything.

In fact, the older I've gotten the more skill I've gained in forgetting things and not knowing things. My progress is quite remarkable!

I still, however, believe that a good chunk of human communication translates to this: 

"We all know how unlikely it is that acknowledging the truth will result in actual positive action or change, so lets just get along and go along."

It would be good advice, if only it were used a little more sparingly. It depends on the relative values of getting along vs the risks and rewards the truth might bring, and to whom.

3. Relativity in Sight Reading Music

In the past month I've been working on another project in my spare time: learning to properly sight read music for piano. This is both for my personal enjoyment and in preparation for a series of mathemusical (and music theory/appreciation) videos I'd like to make in the future.

My childhood memory skills got me into some bad habits. My memory was good enough that all I had to do was struggle my way through the sheet music once, taking an hour to "e-g-b-d-f" my way though each and every note and then "a-b-c" my way though the piano keys to hear what it sounded like, and then I'd have it memorized forever, and only once it was memorized could I hope to possibly ever play it.

Then I learned some music theory, and once I knew my chords and intervals I could read music relatively, starting with the first note and then knowing "up a major third, down a fifth, minor chord in 1st inversion" and so on. I could find the next notes in my head using these relative intervals, and then play them by ear in real time, as long as it wasn't too fast or complicated.

This works great for vocal music, less so for piano where there's a lot going on at once and sometimes very large leaps or notes coming into existence out of nowhere in a new range. Still, combined with my still almost perfect musical memory it worked for my needs.

Imagine my surprise the first time I learned that some people play from sheet music not only without knowing how it sounds first, but in order to find out how it sounds!

4. A Ramble on Notation, Meaning, and Literacy

Now my brain is making up for its front-loaded memory skills. I can't memorize a long complex piano piece in a few hours, or even a few days. And I can't identify complex sets of intervals at the speed I used to. So I'm learning how to look at a note on paper and know where it is on the piano, without knowing what it sounds like, and it's super weird!

How can my hands play music without knowing the music? If it bypasses my ears and goes straight from my eyes to the keyboard, it's just noise-making. The first read-through of unfamiliar sheet music can't be music if it's not mediated by the human mind's understanding. Music exists only in the mind, and the rest is just dots on paper or buttons pressed. It's like copying the lines of an unfamiliar script without knowing what the words are until they're down and you see them. That's not writing, it's... something else. 

When we read text out loud we look at it, know what it says, and then say words, not noises. Literate adults don't first sound out the letters and then listen to ourselves to hear what the words mean.

(Although... there's a theory that back in the first millenium people did exactly that, and silent reading was an uncommon skill... which if we are to connect this theory with the musical analogy might explain why memorizing and then reciting shorter things was more common whereas reading unfamiliar long-form work was not a hobby until the last couple centuries. Currently, replaying known music is more rewarding to most people than reading through something long, new, and non-repetitive, like the musical analogy to the novel, the novel being a relatively recent literary invention, and the musical equivalent perhaps not being possible without higher rates of musical literacy. And as with novels, I often enjoy the version of a piece that exists in my head more than any production of it.)

But let us not take the analogy too far. Some musical figures I recognize as "words" but some aren't in the dictionary and must be sounded out first, whether it's only in my head or through my fingers. Sometimes the latter is faster, and that's what I'm working on learning to do. Luckily learning to sightread is a lot faster if your hands already speak piano.

Literacy is just the craziest thing. Pathological, when combined with near-instantaneous communication like our internet. Someday alien humanographers are going to be like "and here's the point in history where humans figured out how to instantly send their thoughts through the air to other humans everywhere. As with most telepathic species, they went extinct soon after."

Um. This writing warmup has gone on a little longer than I intended, but that's how we explore! Writing is a tool for thinking! Bye! Your homework is to write a comment about relativity in your life!

Vi