Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[Carl Tollander]

In another realm, look at Japanese transverse flutes ("shinobue" or simply
"fue").   So-called modern flutes are tuned to a western scale so that you
can get people from different parts of the world to play songs to some
reference.   For example, I have a #8 "uta" flute that is tuned to C, and
#6 "uta" hat is tuned to B flat.   You can see this in the varied spacing,
shape and diameter of holes from the major flute makers.  However, due to
the geography of Japan (central mountain ranges as an island "spine", short
rivers, many deep and nearly parallel valleys) there are many individual
traditional musics that share less of a standard.  A #6 "hayashi" flute
from nearby valley festivals is an approximate size; the hole size and
spacing is handed down; there's not much of a common scale.   So while you
see some similarities in song between different valley communities, the
actual notes produced have a lot of variation.   These differences persist
to the present internet , tunnel and train-infested day.   One can go to a
shop in Asakusa in Tokyo  and see many barrels of  recently produced
hayashi flutes from different regions of every shape and size.   This
speaks I think to my notion of the importance of development and there is
probably some analog to birdsong.

C


On Fri, Feb 17, 2017 at 12:19 AM, Carl Tollander  wrote:

> Well, there's order, duration, frequency and a bunch of other stuff.
> There is work from the signal analysis world, where people are concerned
> with fractal structure in signals as a means of compression, and tho its
> been years since I've done neural nets, I imagine heartbeats or nervous
> system signaling would qualify.
>
> As you remember, I am especially concerned with continuous
> developmental/learning aspects, rather than specific adult organisms at a
> specific time in some stable environment.  That said at my age I am of
> course biased.
>
> In my realm there is a figure-ground relationship at different scales
> between the developing traditions, the drummers, the individuals in the
> local group playing some arranged piece in the developing tradition, the
> drum itself (driven amplifier dynamics), drum design (much beyond
> membranophone descriptions and into wood types, metamaterials, turbulent
> flow, variance in the thickness and biology of skins and stretching
> processes, and such), the physics of the drum at the time it is played
> (humidity, temperature, what's happening in the drum next to it, how
> quickly it responds to that and the individual strike, the shape, mass,
> elasticity and internal qualities of the drumsticks, a large number of
> physiological qualities of the individual drummer and how each drummer
> works with focus, efficiency of motion and process,  the acoustic
> environment of the venue, the many ways in which the audience or a
> particular kind of audience responds and in which you can evoke or respond
> to those qualities.  So a complex drumbeat to me might not necessarily mean
> a sequence of beats, but rather a single beat in which all those qualities
> come together coherently (to me or anyone present now or in history) in a
> single hit.   Even if the state space of the aforementioned qualities is
> not precisely knowable just now.
>
> I don't imagine this is particularly different for any musician or that it
> necessarily qualifies as complex as you might mean it.   I'm certainly
> willing for that bar to be high.  As some say, you are the instrument, the
> voyage makes the captain, etc.
>
> Tying back to "temporal fracticality", the notion of temporal direction
> can maybe get factored out (a la Tralfamidorians) , ie many birds through
> their song are trying to get laid (temporal pun intended).   The eaglet is
> the father of the eagle, neh?. We make assumptions about how birds
> experience time.   There seems to be a "temporal emergent locality" that
> defines the horizons of temporal self-similarity (there's a lot of
> "emergent locality" stuff in the physics literature - not sure it applies
> here).
>
> C
>
>
> On Thu, Feb 16, 2017 at 11:22 PM, Nick Thompson <
> nickthomp...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>> Hi, Carl,
>>
>>
>>
>> Good to hear your “voice” again?
>>
>>
>>
>> I think you might be the person best positioned in my life to talk to me
>> about temporal fractality.  Are complex drumbeats fractal; and in what
>> degree?
>>
>>
>>
>> Am I over stretching the term?
>>
>>
>>
>> Nick
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Nicholas S. Thompson
>>
>> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>>
>> Clark University
>>
>> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Carl
>> Tollander
>> *Sent:* Thursday, February 16, 2017 10:49 PM
>> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
>> friam@redfish.com>
>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs
>>
>>
>>
>> Many birds do tend to migrate, so wondering what "stable 

Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[Carl Tollander]

Well, there's order, duration, frequency and a bunch of other stuff.
There is work from the signal analysis world, where people are concerned
with fractal structure in signals as a means of compression, and tho its
been years since I've done neural nets, I imagine heartbeats or nervous
system signaling would qualify.

As you remember, I am especially concerned with continuous
developmental/learning aspects, rather than specific adult organisms at a
specific time in some stable environment.  That said at my age I am of
course biased.

In my realm there is a figure-ground relationship at different scales
between the developing traditions, the drummers, the individuals in the
local group playing some arranged piece in the developing tradition, the
drum itself (driven amplifier dynamics), drum design (much beyond
membranophone descriptions and into wood types, metamaterials, turbulent
flow, variance in the thickness and biology of skins and stretching
processes, and such), the physics of the drum at the time it is played
(humidity, temperature, what's happening in the drum next to it, how
quickly it responds to that and the individual strike, the shape, mass,
elasticity and internal qualities of the drumsticks, a large number of
physiological qualities of the individual drummer and how each drummer
works with focus, efficiency of motion and process,  the acoustic
environment of the venue, the many ways in which the audience or a
particular kind of audience responds and in which you can evoke or respond
to those qualities.  So a complex drumbeat to me might not necessarily mean
a sequence of beats, but rather a single beat in which all those qualities
come together coherently (to me or anyone present now or in history) in a
single hit.   Even if the state space of the aforementioned qualities is
not precisely knowable just now.

I don't imagine this is particularly different for any musician or that it
necessarily qualifies as complex as you might mean it.   I'm certainly
willing for that bar to be high.  As some say, you are the instrument, the
voyage makes the captain, etc.

Tying back to "temporal fracticality", the notion of temporal direction can
maybe get factored out (a la Tralfamidorians) , ie many birds through their
song are trying to get laid (temporal pun intended).   The eaglet is the
father of the eagle, neh?. We make assumptions about how birds experience
time.   There seems to be a "temporal emergent locality" that defines the
horizons of temporal self-similarity (there's a lot of "emergent locality"
stuff in the physics literature - not sure it applies here).

C


On Thu, Feb 16, 2017 at 11:22 PM, Nick Thompson 
wrote:

> Hi, Carl,
>
>
>
> Good to hear your “voice” again?
>
>
>
> I think you might be the person best positioned in my life to talk to me
> about temporal fractality.  Are complex drumbeats fractal; and in what
> degree?
>
>
>
> Am I over stretching the term?
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Carl
> Tollander
> *Sent:* Thursday, February 16, 2017 10:49 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam@redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs
>
>
>
> Many birds do tend to migrate, so wondering what "stable environment"
> means here.
>
>
>
> Also thinking there is at play the developmental  environment (extended
> time of egg-to-bird-of-the-now) of the bird, as well as the outer
> moment-of-the-song environment.   How does one talk about developmental
> self-similarity?(we have L-systems for simulated plant growth and so
> on).As I recall from back in the day, self-similarity has limiting
> scale horizons, where particular dimensions of growth or development
> dominate to support the self-similarity.
>
>
>
> C
>
>
>
> On Wed, Feb 15, 2017 at 6:05 PM, Steven A Smith  wrote:
>
> Nick -
>
> This is one of your (wonderfully, and I mean that seriously) naive
> questions, and the naive answer is yes, they are surely coupled.   I'm very
> interested in "soundscapes"  so am often very aware of both the complex
> passive structure of most soundscapes (especially landscape vs urbanscape)
> and the active (birdsongs, garbage trucks, wind in the willows, sirens,
> ice-floes, domestic disturbances) elements.
>
> You are likely to have a better idea than I do about whether bird's songs
> are likely to be *formulated* in a more or less complex manner when in a
> complex "landscape".   I would guess yes to this.I would guess that the
> three most relevant scales are roughly the scale of the bird's body, it's
> food-source, and it's natural predators.   How well can it hide, how well
> can it's food hide, and how well does it's predator hide.   I"m sure this
> is an 

Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[Nick Thompson]

Hi, Carl, 

 

Good to hear your “voice” again? 

 

I think you might be the person best positioned in my life to talk to me about 
temporal fractality.  Are complex drumbeats fractal; and in what degree? 

 

Am I over stretching the term? 

 

Nick 

 

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Carl Tollander
Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2017 10:49 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

 

Many birds do tend to migrate, so wondering what "stable environment" means 
here.

 

Also thinking there is at play the developmental  environment (extended time of 
egg-to-bird-of-the-now) of the bird, as well as the outer moment-of-the-song 
environment.   How does one talk about developmental self-similarity?(we 
have L-systems for simulated plant growth and so on).As I recall from back 
in the day, self-similarity has limiting scale horizons, where particular 
dimensions of growth or development dominate to support the self-similarity.

 

C

 

On Wed, Feb 15, 2017 at 6:05 PM, Steven A Smith  > wrote:

Nick -

This is one of your (wonderfully, and I mean that seriously) naive questions, 
and the naive answer is yes, they are surely coupled.   I'm very interested in 
"soundscapes"  so am often very aware of both the complex passive structure of 
most soundscapes (especially landscape vs urbanscape) and the active 
(birdsongs, garbage trucks, wind in the willows, sirens, ice-floes, domestic 
disturbances) elements.

You are likely to have a better idea than I do about whether bird's songs are 
likely to be *formulated* in a more or less complex manner when in a complex 
"landscape".   I would guess yes to this.I would guess that the three most 
relevant scales are roughly the scale of the bird's body, it's food-source, and 
it's natural predators.   How well can it hide, how well can it's food hide, 
and how well does it's predator hide.   I"m sure this is an overly simplified 
model.

I think rather than fractal (literally), the more relevant concept is "with 
structure at many scales".   

IN any case, welcome to Alberto!  My own daughter happens to be a researcher in 
Flaviviruses, traditionally West Nile and Dingue, but now is drawn into the 
Zika thing...   I look forward to hearing more from you Alberto!

 - Steve

 

On 2/15/17 3:57 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Hell, List, 

 

I would like to introduce to you Alberto Alaniz (who describes himself in the 
communication below).  I “met” him on Research Gate when he downloaded a paper 
of mine on the structural organization of bird song.  I noticed that he was 
writing from a Landscape Department, and I thought, “A landscape person who is 
interested in birdsong! He must be interested in fractals!”  And I was right.  
So please welcome him.  Steve please note? 

 

The idea of his that I particularly want to hear you discuss is his notion that 
fractality (is that a word?) in one domain can effect, affect, impose? 
fractality in another.  So is there a relationship between the fractality which 
my research revealed in the organization of bird song and the fractality of the 
landscapes on which bird behavior is deployed.  

 

I particularly wonder what Kim  Sorvig and Jenny Quillen and ProfDave think 
about this, but also wonder if others on the list could put an oar in. 

 

Thanks, 

 

Nick 

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Alberto Jose Alaniz [mailto:alberto.ala...@ug.uchile.cl] 
Sent: Wednesday, February 15, 2017 2:21 PM
To: nthomp...@clarku.edu  
Subject: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

 

Dear Nick

 

I apreciate so much your invitation, so i really intrested in participate of 
your discussion group. I am a young researcher finishing my MS, and this types 
of oportunities look very good for my, specially if i can interact with other 
scientics. About your question, of course you can share my oppinion, now if you 
want i can writte a compleate opinion in extenso, and i will send to you 
tomorrow in the afternon.

 

My field of study is the ecologial modelling and the conservation biology, the 
last year i published my firsts papers in Biological conservation and 
International Journal of Epidemiology, the first one about ecosystem 
conservation and the secondth is a global model of exposure risk to Zika virus. 
Currently im working in ecosystems and in assessment of habitat loss in forest 
specialist species (with Kathryn Sieving from 

Re: [FRIAM] What does it mean to say that it will probably rain tomorrow?

[Carl Tollander]

Well, I think the weather forecast does not particularly care about your
particular location.   It cares about what area you are in where they can
make statements.   So, the statement that it may rain in Santa Fe with a
50% probability either means that in some larger region of which your
specific location is a part that it WILL rain all of the time in the time
period over 50% of the area.   Or that it may rain half the time over all
of the area.  Or that, given that you are in the area, it's 50% probable
that it will rain upon you given that it will definitely rain in the area
somewhere.  Or something else.   Not quite the same things.

C




On Thu, Feb 16, 2017 at 11:23 AM, Shawn Barr  wrote:

> Hi Nick,
>
> In an effort to diaspeirein(?), let me offer the following:
>
> According to the axioms of probability (maybe you heard this already on
> Friday), saying that something has a probability of 1 (or .5) doesn't mean
> that it will happen (or happen half of the time); it just means that the
> probability of something not happening is 0 (or .5).
>
> In terms of a weather forecast, (which I assume might be what you were
> getting at,) saying that there is a 50 percent chance of rain tomorrow
> could mean something like, conditioned on the present, rain happened 50
> percent of the time in the past.  Assume that the future and past are
> conditionally independent given the present and expect a 50 percent chance
> of rain tomorrow.  Or maybe that's not not a not (?) sensible expectation?
>
>
> Best,
> Shawn
>
> On Sat, Feb 11, 2017 at 9:49 AM, Nick Thompson  > wrote:
>
>> Dear all,
>>
>>
>>
>> We had an interesting conversation in the Friday meeting of the local
>> congregation concerning the question, “What does it actually mean to say
>> that there is a 50 percent chance of rain in Santa Fe tomorrow?”  Exactly
>> what operations would you have to go through to discover if that claim was
>> appropriate or not?
>>
>>
>>
>> I took the position that whether it actually rained tomorrow had very
>> little to do with validating the claim.
>>
>>
>>
>> I am wondering what those of you in the diaspora thought.
>>
>>
>>
>> Nick
>>
>>
>>
>> Nicholas S. Thompson
>>
>> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>>
>> Clark University
>>
>> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>>
>>
>>
>> 
>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>>
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[Carl Tollander]

Many birds do tend to migrate, so wondering what "stable environment" means
here.

Also thinking there is at play the developmental  environment (extended
time of egg-to-bird-of-the-now) of the bird, as well as the outer
moment-of-the-song environment.   How does one talk about developmental
self-similarity?(we have L-systems for simulated plant growth and so
on).As I recall from back in the day, self-similarity has limiting
scale horizons, where particular dimensions of growth or development
dominate to support the self-similarity.

C

On Wed, Feb 15, 2017 at 6:05 PM, Steven A Smith  wrote:

> Nick -
>
> This is one of your (wonderfully, and I mean that seriously) naive
> questions, and the naive answer is yes, they are surely coupled.   I'm very
> interested in "soundscapes"  so am often very aware of both the complex
> passive structure of most soundscapes (especially landscape vs urbanscape)
> and the active (birdsongs, garbage trucks, wind in the willows, sirens,
> ice-floes, domestic disturbances) elements.
>
> You are likely to have a better idea than I do about whether bird's songs
> are likely to be *formulated* in a more or less complex manner when in a
> complex "landscape".   I would guess yes to this.I would guess that the
> three most relevant scales are roughly the scale of the bird's body, it's
> food-source, and it's natural predators.   How well can it hide, how well
> can it's food hide, and how well does it's predator hide.   I"m sure this
> is an overly simplified model.
>
> I think rather than fractal (literally), the more relevant concept is
> "with structure at many scales".
>
> IN any case, welcome to Alberto!  My own daughter happens to be a
> researcher in Flaviviruses, traditionally West Nile and Dingue, but now is
> drawn into the Zika thing...   I look forward to hearing more from you
> Alberto!
>
>  - Steve
>
> On 2/15/17 3:57 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
>
> Hell, List,
>
>
>
> I would like to introduce to you Alberto Alaniz (who describes himself in
> the communication below).  I “met” him on Research Gate when he downloaded
> a paper of mine on the structural organization of bird song.  I noticed
> that he was writing from a Landscape Department, and I thought, “A
> landscape person who is interested in birdsong! He must be interested in
> fractals!”  And I was right.  So please welcome him.  Steve please note?
>
>
>
> The idea of his that I particularly want to hear you discuss is his notion
> that fractality (is that a word?) in one domain can effect, affect, impose?
> fractality in another.  So is there a relationship between the fractality
> which my research revealed in the organization of bird song and the
> fractality of the landscapes on which bird behavior is deployed.
>
>
>
> I particularly wonder what Kim  Sorvig and Jenny Quillen and ProfDave
> think about this, but also wonder if others on the list could put an oar
> in.
>
>
>
> Thanks,
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
> *From:* Alberto Jose Alaniz [mailto:alberto.ala...@ug.uchile.cl
> ]
> *Sent:* Wednesday, February 15, 2017 2:21 PM
> *To:* nthomp...@clarku.edu
> *Subject:* Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs
>
>
>
> Dear Nick
>
>
>
> I apreciate so much your invitation, so i really intrested in participate
> of your discussion group. I am a young researcher finishing my MS, and this
> types of oportunities look very good for my, specially if i can interact
> with other scientics. About your question, of course you can share my
> oppinion, now if you want i can writte a compleate opinion in extenso, and
> i will send to you tomorrow in the afternon.
>
>
>
> My field of study is the ecologial modelling and the conservation biology,
> the last year i published my firsts papers in Biological conservation and
> International Journal of Epidemiology, the first one about ecosystem
> conservation and the secondth is a global model of exposure risk to Zika
> virus. Currently im working in ecosystems and in assessment of habitat loss
> in forest specialist species (with Kathryn Sieving from University of
> Florida).
>
>
>
> *Alberto  Alaniz Baeza*
>
> Lic. en Geografía, Geógrafo & Magíster (c) Áreas Silvestres y Conservación
>
> Becario, Laboratorio de Ecología de Ambientes Fragmentados
>
> Departamento de Ciencias Biológicas Animales, U. de Chile
>
> Investigador, Laboratorio de Ecología de Ecosistemas
>
> Departamento de Recursos Naturales Renovables, U. de Chile
>
> Académico, Centro de Formación Técnica del Medio Ambiente IDMA
>
> +56996097443 <+56%209%209609%207443>
>
> https://albertoalaniz.wordpress.com/
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe 

Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[Nick Thompson]

David, 

 

Thanks for pitching in.  

 

I have some hazy data concerning bobolink song that might relate to your 
hypothesis.  We did two studies of bobolink song in relatively stable and 
relatively disrupted habitats.  At least that is what we thought was the 
relevant variable.  In the more stable environment, the song was hierarchically 
organized into strings of several songs that were widely shared between 
neighbors in the same field.  Not fractal, exactly, but definitely, 
multi-level.  In the more disrupted field, the songs were essentially random 
with no repeated long elements shared between neighbors.  

 

That’s all I got!

 

Nick 

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Prof David West [mailto:profw...@fastmail.fm] 
Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2017 10:54 AM
To: Nick Thompson ; Friam ; Kim 
Sorvig 
Cc: friam-ow...@redfish.com; alberto.ala...@ug.uchile.cl; Jenny Quillien 

Subject: Re: FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

 

Nick,

 

As asked (effect, affect impose?), my answer would be no. A partial test of the 
answer would be to see if the songs of birds living, even for multiple 
generations, in arguably non-fractal environments, e.g. mid-town Manhattan, 
lost their fractal nature. This test would not rule out the possibility that 
the 'evolution' of songs was isomorphic to the evolution of bird morphology AND 
isomorphic to an evolving fractal environment.

 

A different way to approach the question might be to ask if "fractality" is 
somehow a substrate upon which living things rely in order to be recognized as 
"alive." Two things lead me to ask the question in this manner. First, fractal 
geometry is used to generate digital landscapes and digital life forms, e.g. 
trees, with results that are far more "lifelike" than attempts based on other 
graphical systems — Ed Angel should enlighten us here because it is his area of 
expertise, not mine.

 

Second, you have hear me talk of Christopher Alexander and his search for the 
Nature of Order. He posits fifteen properties (e.g. centers, boundaries, 
alternating repetition, contrast, deep interlock and ambiguity, etc.) that, he 
says, are fundamental and essential to the creation of built environments that 
have "liveness." It has always seemed to me that the compositions created using 
these fifteen properties would also be, in some manner, fractal.

 

Jenny might have ideas as to the second reason, but she is in Amsterdam for six 
weeks preparatory to a move there in the fall and might not see the question on 
the list. I have asked Richard Gabriel for an answer in his role as another 
expert on Alexander.

 

davew

 

 

On Wed, Feb 15, 2017, at 03:57 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Hell, List,

 

I would like to introduce to you Alberto Alaniz (who describes himself in the 
communication below).  I “met” him on Research Gate when he downloaded a paper 
of mine on the structural organization of bird song.  I noticed that he was 
writing from a Landscape Department, and I thought, “A landscape person who is 
interested in birdsong! He must be interested in fractals!”  And I was right.  
So please welcome him.  Steve please note?

 

The idea of his that I particularly want to hear you discuss is his notion that 
fractality (is that a word?) in one domain can effect, affect, impose? 
fractality in another.  So is there a relationship between the fractality which 
my research revealed in the organization of bird song and the fractality of the 
landscapes on which bird behavior is deployed. 

 

I particularly wonder what Kim  Sorvig and Jenny Quillen and ProfDave think 
about this, but also wonder if others on the list could put an oar in.

 

Thanks,

 

Nick

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Alberto Jose Alaniz [mailto:alberto.ala...@ug.uchile.cl] 
Sent: Wednesday, February 15, 2017 2:21 PM
To: nthomp...@clarku.edu  
Subject: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

 

Dear Nick

 

I apreciate so much your invitation, so i really intrested in participate of 
your discussion group. I am a young researcher finishing my MS, and this types 
of oportunities look very good for my, specially if i can interact with other 
scientics. About your question, of course you can share my oppinion, now if you 
want i can writte a compleate opinion in extenso, and i will send to you 
tomorrow in the afternon.

 

My field of study is the ecologial modelling and the conservation biology, the 
last year i published my firsts papers in Biological conservation and 

Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[Prof David West]

Nick,



The second point I made, i.e. about Alexander, Richard Gabriel confirmed
that Alexander did cite Mandelbrot and fractal geometry as
"confirmation" of his ideas about liveness arising from  proper
composition using the fifteen properties. Also cited the work of Nikos
Salingaros as a rich resource on this topic.


dmw





On Wed, Feb 15, 2017, at 09:17 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> Steve,



>  



> Birdsongs can be **temporally** fractal.  If curious, see
> https://www.researchgate.net/publication/239787151_A_system_for_describing_bird_song_units
> .
> Please let me know if you can’t get at this, and I will post it
> another way.
>  



> By temporally fractal, I mean, for instance,
> ABABABCDCDCDABABABCDCDCDABABABCDCDCDABABABCDCDCD
>  



> Is that stretching the meaning of fractal beyond the bounds of
> propriety?
>  



> “Naïve” may not be the best word for what I am up to, here.



>  



> Nick



>  



> Nicholas S. Thompson



> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology



> Clark University



> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/



>  



> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Steven
> A Smith *Sent:* Wednesday, February 15, 2017 6:06 PM *To:* The Friday
> Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group  *Subject:*
> Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs
>  



> Nick -



> This is one of your (wonderfully, and I mean that seriously) naive
> questions, and the naive answer is yes, they are surely coupled.   I'm
> very interested in "soundscapes"  so am often very aware of both the
> complex passive structure of most soundscapes (especially landscape vs
> urbanscape) and the active (birdsongs, garbage trucks, wind in the
> willows, sirens, ice-floes, domestic disturbances) elements.
> You are likely to have a better idea than I do about whether bird's
> songs are likely to be *formulated* in a more or less complex manner
> when in a complex "landscape".   I would guess yes to this.I would
> guess that the three most relevant scales are roughly the scale of the
> bird's body, it's food-source, and it's natural predators.   How well
> can it hide, how well can it's food hide, and how well does it's
> predator hide.   I"m sure this is an overly simplified model.
> I think rather than fractal (literally), the more relevant concept is
> "with structure at many scales".
> IN any case, welcome to Alberto!  My own daughter happens to be a
> researcher in Flaviviruses, traditionally West Nile and Dingue, but
> now is drawn into the Zika thing...   I look forward to hearing more
> from you Alberto!
>  - Steve



>  



> On 2/15/17 3:57 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:



>> Hell, List,



>>  



>> I would like to introduce to you Alberto Alaniz (who describes
>> himself in the communication below).  I “met” him on Research Gate
>> when he downloaded a paper of mine on the structural organization of
>> bird song.  I noticed that he was writing from a Landscape
>> Department, and I thought, “A landscape person who is interested in
>> birdsong! He must be interested in fractals!”  And I was right.  So
>> please welcome him.  Steve please note?
>>  



>> The idea of his that I particularly want to hear you discuss is his
>> notion that fractality (is that a word?) in one domain can effect,
>> affect, impose? fractality in another.  So is there a relationship
>> between the fractality which my research revealed in the organization
>> of bird song and the fractality of the landscapes on which bird
>> behavior is deployed.
>>  



>> I particularly wonder what Kim  Sorvig and Jenny Quillen and ProfDave
>> think about this, but also wonder if others on the list could put an
>> oar in.
>>  



>> Thanks,



>>  



>> Nick



>>  



>>  



>> Nicholas S. Thompson



>> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology



>> Clark University



>> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/[1]



>>  



>> *From:* Alberto Jose Alaniz [mailto:alberto.ala...@ug.uchile.cl]
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, February 15, 2017 2:21 PM *To:*
>> nthomp...@clarku.edu *Subject:* Fractal discussion Landscape-
>> bird songs
>>  



>> Dear Nick



>>  



>> I apreciate so much your invitation, so i really intrested in
>> participate of your discussion group. I am a young researcher
>> finishing my MS, and this types of oportunities look very good for
>> my, specially if i can interact with other scientics. About your
>> question, of course you can share my oppinion, now if you want i can
>> writte a compleate opinion in extenso, and i will send to you
>> tomorrow in the afternon.
>>  



>> My field of study is the ecologial modelling and the conservation
>> biology, the last year i published my firsts papers in Biological
>> conservation and International Journal of Epidemiology, the first one
>> about ecosystem conservation and the secondth is a global model of
>> exposure risk to Zika virus. Currently im working in ecosystems and
>> 

Re: [FRIAM] What does it mean to say that it will probably rain tomorrow?

[Shawn Barr]

Hi Nick,

In an effort to diaspeirein(?), let me offer the following:

According to the axioms of probability (maybe you heard this already on
Friday), saying that something has a probability of 1 (or .5) doesn't mean
that it will happen (or happen half of the time); it just means that the
probability of something not happening is 0 (or .5).

In terms of a weather forecast, (which I assume might be what you were
getting at,) saying that there is a 50 percent chance of rain tomorrow
could mean something like, conditioned on the present, rain happened 50
percent of the time in the past.  Assume that the future and past are
conditionally independent given the present and expect a 50 percent chance
of rain tomorrow.  Or maybe that's not not a not (?) sensible expectation?


Best,
Shawn

On Sat, Feb 11, 2017 at 9:49 AM, Nick Thompson 
wrote:

> Dear all,
>
>
>
> We had an interesting conversation in the Friday meeting of the local
> congregation concerning the question, “What does it actually mean to say
> that there is a 50 percent chance of rain in Santa Fe tomorrow?”  Exactly
> what operations would you have to go through to discover if that claim was
> appropriate or not?
>
>
>
> I took the position that whether it actually rained tomorrow had very
> little to do with validating the claim.
>
>
>
> I am wondering what those of you in the diaspora thought.
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>

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Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[glen ☣]

This idea reminded me of the recent article:

Seeing shapes in seemingly random spatial patterns: Fractal analysis of 
Rorschach inkblots
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0171289


On 02/16/2017 09:53 AM, Prof David West wrote:
> A different way to approach the question might be to ask if "fractality" is 
> somehow a substrate upon which living things rely in order to be recognized 
> as "alive." Two things lead me to ask the question in this manner. First, 
> fractal geometry is used to generate digital landscapes and digital life 
> forms, e.g. trees, with results that are far more "lifelike" than attempts 
> based on other graphical systems — Ed Angel should enlighten us here because 
> it is his area of expertise, not mine.

-- 
☣ glen


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Re: [FRIAM] more fun with AI

[Steven A Smith]

holy shite REC!   Looks like pretty good KoolAid!

I cut my teeth 40 years ago on APL.  Feels like what I *wished for* back 
then (studying Physics/Math with CS "just a tool").


As we talked a few years ago, I have a (still open, hanging fire) 
project to do real-time stitching on a 360 stereographic camera (84 
cameras in a spherical array with more than 50% overlap with each 
neighbor, E/W and N/S)...


- Steve

On 2/16/17 8:57 AM, Roger Critchlow wrote:
I watched the livestream from the TensorFlow Dev Summit in 
Mountainview yesterday.  The individual talks are already packaged up 
as individual videos at 
https://events.withgoogle.com/tensorflow-dev-summit/videos-and-agenda/#content, 
but watching the livestream with the enforced moments of deadtime 
filled with vaguely familiar music (was that Phillip Glass, or a 
network trained on him?) was very instructive.


TensorFlow is a data graph language where the data is all Tensors, ie 
vectors, matrices, and higher dimensional globs of numbers.  Google 
open sourced it as python scripts and a C++ kernel about a year ago, 
updated with minor releases monthly, and released 1.0 yesterday.   
It's been used all over the place at Google, it's the top machine 
learning repo at github, and its products have made the cover of 
Nature twice or three times in the past year.


New stuff yesterday:

  * an LLVM compiler to native x86, arm, nvidia, etc.,
  * new language front ends,
  * pre-built networks and network components
  * classical ML techniques in case deep learning networks aren't your
thing
  * distributed model training on pcs, servers, and GPUs
  * a server architecture for delivering inferences at defined latency
  * embedded inference stacks for Android, iOS, and Raspberry Pi
  * a very sweet visualizer, TensorBoard, for network architectures,
parameters, and classified sets
  * higher level APIs
  * and networks trained to find network architectures for new classes
of problems

You can get a lot of this by just watching the keynote, even just the 
first 10 minutes of the keynote.


Whether you buy the KoolAid or not, it's an impressive demonstration 
of the quantity and quality of KoolAid that the Google mind can 
produce when it decides that it needs KoolAid.


An LSTM is a Long Short-Term Memory node, a basic building block of 
the networks that translate languages or process other variable length 
symbol strings.


-- rec --




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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] FW: Fractal discussion Landscape-bird songs

[Prof David West]

Nick,



As asked (effect, affect impose?), my answer would be no. A partial test
of the answer would be to see if the songs of birds living, even for
multiple generations, in arguably non-fractal environments, e.g. mid-
town Manhattan, lost their fractal nature. This test would not rule out
the possibility that the 'evolution' of songs was isomorphic to the
evolution of bird morphology AND isomorphic to an evolving fractal
environment.


A different way to approach the question might be to ask if "fractality"
is somehow a substrate upon which living things rely in order to be
recognized as "alive." Two things lead me to ask the question in this
manner. First, fractal geometry is used to generate digital landscapes
and digital life forms, e.g. trees, with results that are far more
"lifelike" than attempts based on other graphical systems — Ed Angel
should enlighten us here because it is his area of expertise, not mine.


Second, you have hear me talk of Christopher Alexander and his search
for the Nature of Order. He posits fifteen properties (e.g. centers,
boundaries, alternating repetition, contrast, deep interlock and
ambiguity, etc.) that, he says, are fundamental and essential to the
creation of built environments that have "liveness." It has always
seemed to me that the compositions created using these fifteen
properties would also be, in some manner, fractal.


Jenny might have ideas as to the second reason, but she is in Amsterdam
for six weeks preparatory to a move there in the fall and might not see
the question on the list. I have asked Richard Gabriel for an answer in
his role as another expert on Alexander.


davew





On Wed, Feb 15, 2017, at 03:57 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> Hell, List,



>  



> I would like to introduce to you Alberto Alaniz (who describes himself
> in the communication below).  I “met” him on Research Gate when he
> downloaded a paper of mine on the structural organization of bird
> song.  I noticed that he was writing from a Landscape Department, and
> I thought, “A landscape person who is interested in birdsong! He must
> be interested in fractals!”  And I was right.  So please welcome him.
> Steve please note?
>  



> The idea of his that I particularly want to hear you discuss is his
> notion that fractality (is that a word?) in one domain can effect,
> affect, impose? fractality in another.  So is there a relationship
> between the fractality which my research revealed in the organization
> of bird song and the fractality of the landscapes on which bird
> behavior is deployed.
>  



> I particularly wonder what Kim  Sorvig and Jenny Quillen and
> ProfDave think about this, but also wonder if others on the list
> could put an oar in.
>  



> Thanks,



>  



> Nick



>  



>  



> Nicholas S. Thompson



> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology



> Clark University



> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/



>  



> *From:* Alberto Jose Alaniz [mailto:alberto.ala...@ug.uchile.cl]
> *Sent:* Wednesday, February 15, 2017 2:21 PM *To:*
> nthomp...@clarku.edu *Subject:* Fractal discussion Landscape-
> bird songs
>  



> Dear Nick



>  



> I apreciate so much your invitation, so i really intrested in
> participate of your discussion group. I am a young researcher
> finishing my MS, and this types of oportunities look very good for my,
> specially if i can interact with other scientics. About your question,
> of course you can share my oppinion, now if you want i can writte a
> compleate opinion in extenso, and i will send to you tomorrow in the
> afternon.
>  



> My field of study is the ecologial modelling and the conservation
> biology, the last year i published my firsts papers in Biological
> conservation and International Journal of Epidemiology, the first one
> about ecosystem conservation and the secondth is a global model of
> exposure risk to Zika virus. Currently im working in ecosystems and in
> assessment of habitat loss in forest specialist species (with Kathryn
> Sieving from University of Florida).
>  



> *Alberto  Alaniz Baeza*



> Lic. en Geografía, Geógrafo & Magíster (c) Áreas Silvestres y
> Conservación
> Becario, Laboratorio de Ecología de Ambientes Fragmentados



> Departamento de Ciencias Biológicas Animales, U. de Chile



> Investigador, Laboratorio de Ecología de Ecosistemas



> Departamento de Recursos Naturales Renovables, U. de Chile



> Académico, Centro de Formación Técnica del Medio Ambiente IDMA



> +56996097443



> https://albertoalaniz.wordpress.com/





FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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Re: [FRIAM] more fun with AI

[Roger Critchlow]

I watched the livestream from the TensorFlow Dev Summit in Mountainview
yesterday.  The individual talks are already packaged up as individual
videos at
https://events.withgoogle.com/tensorflow-dev-summit/videos-and-agenda/#content,
but watching the livestream with the enforced moments of deadtime filled
with vaguely familiar music (was that Phillip Glass, or a network trained
on him?) was very instructive.

TensorFlow is a data graph language where the data is all Tensors, ie
vectors, matrices, and higher dimensional globs of numbers.  Google open
sourced it as python scripts and a C++ kernel about a year ago, updated
with minor releases monthly, and released 1.0 yesterday.   It's been used
all over the place at Google, it's the top machine learning repo at github,
and its products have made the cover of Nature twice or three times in the
past year.

New stuff yesterday:

   - an LLVM compiler to native x86, arm, nvidia, etc.,
   - new language front ends,
   - pre-built networks and network components
   - classical ML techniques in case deep learning networks aren't your
   thing
   - distributed model training on pcs, servers, and GPUs
   - a server architecture for delivering inferences at defined latency
   - embedded inference stacks for Android, iOS, and Raspberry Pi
   - a very sweet visualizer, TensorBoard, for network architectures,
   parameters, and classified sets
   - higher level APIs
   - and networks trained to find network architectures for new classes of
   problems

You can get a lot of this by just watching the keynote, even just the first
10 minutes of the keynote.

Whether you buy the KoolAid or not, it's an impressive demonstration of the
quantity and quality of KoolAid that the Google mind can produce when it
decides that it needs KoolAid.

An LSTM is a Long Short-Term Memory node, a basic building block of the
networks that translate languages or process other variable length symbol
strings.

-- rec --

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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