In an attempt to provide a common language that describes form and function in biology and computer sciences (as well as all other sciences), Peter Bentley created a model known as "systemic computation". The model relies on notions such as embodiment, circular causality, and homeostasis to explain how information flows and is transformed by interacting systems, whether biological or artificial.

(Presentation given at the Tesla Symposium 'Visions and Imagination: Advanced ICT in Art and Science', organized by Gordana Novakovic at the Department of Computer Science of UCL on 24 November 2007, and funded by AHRC Methods Network.)

Bentley talks about his thinking process & worries ...

... worries about the organization of pebbles at Hastings

... worries about the emergent behaviour of neurons

... worries about fruit fly cells interacting & developing

... charts contrasting flows of computing

Video of talk @ Tesla Video Archive or Digital Arts & Humanities

Talk may be divided into 10 minute segments: Part 1 (worries) Part 2 (flows) Part 3 (image).

I remember hearing Steve Kurtz ( from Critical Art Ensemble) saying once that he wasn't the least bit interested in whether scientists and artists actually had anything to offer each other's disciplines. What he believed was important in science-art collaboration was whether you shared a 'political' project with each other and that if you did, the alliance between science and art could become very powerful. I think more shared political projects between artists and scientists on the basis of complexifying our ways of thinking about brains, bodies, thinking, sensing and perceiving are what is important right now.

(Dr.Anna Munster, Senior Lecturer School of Art History and Theory College of Fine Arts UNSW)

- See: CCK08

:: note :: ... an exercise in how we may grow knowledge ... perhaps concepts towards Rhizomatic patterns ... right hand words are the terminology of connectivism ... information flows ... are we educators aware of our political projects? ...