The above in part is not a direct question. One wonders why we have words like 'artifactuality' (sounds like arty-farty') at all. And given there is a deep question lots will just trot out the usual 'god business' and secular equivalents as though producing a rabbit from the hat will do - in a manner that suggests artifactuality is beyond most and a chimp with a paintbrush is all we can hope for (or a mad artist equivalent). And how one longs to be able to say, 'Very artifactual Chris (add to taste), it's your round'!
On Oct 17, 2:23 pm, archytas <[email protected]> wrote: > Intentional agency is not limited to human beings. For example, in a > recent experiment a New Caledonian crow called Betty bent a piece of > straight wire into a hook and used it to lift a bucket containing food > from a vertical pipe (Weir at al., 2002). The action required for the > solution of Betty's problem, bending a metal wire into the form of a > hook, was quite “unnatural”, and apparently an instance of > intelligent, goal-directed action. Betty's hook may be regarded as a > simple artifact made for the purpose of gaining access to the food > bucket. Tool manufacture has also been observed among animals in the > wild, for example, chimpanzees strip leaves off twigs detached from > branches of trees and use the twigs for reaching termites or ants. > (Beck 1980, 117.) > > Beck, B. B., 1980, Animal Tool Behavior: The Use and Manufacture of > Tools by Animals, New York and London: Garland STPM Press. > Weir, A., Chappell, J., and A. Kacelnik, 2002, ‘Shaping of Hooks in > New Caledonian Crows’, Science, 297: 981. > > The term "artifactualiity" has to do with the intention of an artist > to produce a work of art for the art public. I'd generally rather > watch animals (and possibly talk to plants) than out up with terms > like "artifactuality". There is some kind of 'constructive force' in > nature that human ingenuity clearly doesn't match - bumping and > grinding produces offspring in a way we can't match in vitro. Just > when we think we're so smart, a bunch of chimps turn up and learn > stuff with numbers better than us. I'm always amazed to see a > creature specialised to tap only one tree's sap, and then floored to > discover there's another that lives by drinking the 'pee' produced as > the first creature drinks the sap. > > It seems the more we discover, the more there seems an > 'intentionality' other than to do with an individual human > consciousness (or set of them). Chimps do art and religion- at least > putatively and certainly better than me. Dolphins may well protest > they would paint much better pictures, but can't get over the problems > of perennially wet canvas. One other planets, dinosaurs not hindered > by asteroid annihilation may be the finest artists of all. Maybe this > is why I think art is for the birds? > > I'm struck that a fish out of water dies rather than transmutes in > evolution, though one can envisage stuff happening in the margins and > we can see evolution in real time (lizards and tails in the West > Indies, bacterial transformations and increasingly in lab experiments > with DNA, cell membranes and substrates). > > I want to know what before the crow makes the crow bend hooks. What > we can see of intentionality before human intentions. Get out an snap > some on your camera now Jenkins - yes you boy! And sleep at the front > of class not the back next lesson!
