Between the Buried and Me - Automata I

Album review, meandering post-structural inquiry, both, or neither? Choices, choices...

... both it is!

Problem solving is a narrative structure that involves 3 components. 1) the application of a good/bad dichotomy and a classification as "bad"; 2) the application of learned strategies and consequences to flip that classification to "good"; and 3) the observation or affirmation that the dichotomy has been resolved. 

We need an example. 

I want to place things on a table, and i want them to stay on the table. Every time i place something on the table it moves to the other side, falls off the edge, and shatters. That entire gestalt is an identifiable problem, i need to apply some action to prevent it, and observe to my satisfaction that it has been prevented for future repetitions. 

In order to do that, we have to step inside the system and analyze its component parts. Thus, we have to define what is or is not a component. We could make a list of all the component actions like this: 

1 - placing on table

2 - object moving

3 - object falling off table

4 - object shattering on floor 

Next, we need to evaluate each component in terms of its effect on the gestalt, whether or not it contributes to the failure of the system. Most people would intuitively understand that the table is the real source of the problem, but that tells us nothing about the actual process used to reach that conclusion. We need to understand how to think through it without that invisible intuition. 

Logically, choosing to stop placing things on the table would prevent the problem from occurring at all, but that does not solve the problem as we have defined it. Placing things on the table is our intention, therefore it lies outside the system. 

At this point, reversing our thinking is a common strategy. I can prevent the things from shattering, then i can prevent them from falling, then i can prevent them from moving. This is a typical structural strategy of alleviating the symptoms until the system behaves accordingly. However, i think we can all see that it is the least efficient way to solve the problem. It would be better to prevent the objects from moving, as that eliminates the chain of events and accomplishes our evaluation criteria at the same time. 

This is all logical thinking. I could keep going, but you probably think it is silly. It is silly, but only because we already understand the gestalt. What if we take a step back from the system? What if we have no observation of that internal system? We set an object on the table reach down for the next one, but when we turn around the first one is gone and we hear a crash. What sorts of possible explanations might we invent? 

Someone stole it and jumped through the window..

It magically vanished.

I hallucinated putting the first object on the table.

There must be a hole in the table.

I guess we'll never know.

I'll set the next one down and watch it. 

These are the kinds of reactions that point to the real structure of our approach to problem solving, and we can train ourselves to reject or prefer certain reactions. You might notice that some of the reactions might better be described as 'Blame,' 'Avoidance,' or 'Testing,' or other such descriptive outlooks. These descriptions ultimately boil down to Avoidance or Investigation in relation to gaining knowledge. Keep in mind these are structural terms: do we avoid analyzing a system, or do we investigate how the system operates. 

That precognitive moment is an example of what i call binary flipping. Binary flipping is a moment when two separate instances of the same dichotomy clash, and the resulting cognitive process proceeds along the "wrong" path. In my example, there is a good/bad dichotomy attached to avoidance/investigation and a separate good/bad dichotomy for the system under observation. The moment when these two oppositions meet is a point of instability that allows the participant to proceed under an ironic fallacy; the investigation becomes contaminated by an underlying avoidance of knowledge, or being shocked by completely logical occurrences, and other well known analytical biases. 

Back to my descriptions of false agency (blaming the disappeance on an imaginary thief, for example). In this context we might reject that as silly, but it is not as trivial as it might appear. We falsely ascribe agency all the time. Santa and Elf on the Shelf spring to mind, but the left-eating sock monster, my favorite Gremlins, Murphy's Law, stereotyping, all these things are a constant part of our actions and communication a million times a day. We tend to frame this false-agency as humor, moral lessons, etc., but it can also be seen as a constant reenforcement of lying as an escape from challenging intellectual activity; the invention of Blame to excuse our preference for the pleasure of learned predictability, and protect ourselves from the embarrassment or pain of failure or ignorance. It might sound like i am dancing around the topic of "ego-death" that comes up in relation to psychedelic drugs, and that's because it is very similar (possibly the same phenomenon described from a different direction). 

I joke about reprogramming my brain all the time, but it is a useful metaphor. I've found that slipping into the underlying mode of Blame is a major psychological trigger for me, and by consciously choosing to adopt an Investigative mindset i can avoid the worst of my anger and depressive tendencies. Some might call that a high degree of "objectivity." I tend to think of it as playing with binary oppositions like legos: good/bad, up/down, forward/backward, motion/stasis, alive/dead, etc. combined in various ways to form an observational perspective. A stupefying web of contextualizations. I have to constantly "untrain" my reactions and keep a mental catalogue of plausible sequences. 

What does any of that have to do with Between the Buried and Me's 8th album, Automata I? Probably something, i'm still trying to comprehend how the lyrics fit into the concept of a corporation called Voice of Tresspass broadcasting someone's dreams for  entertainment. Maybe part 2 will clear that up, but it won't get here for another week. Automata I is a pretty great listen, though. Harder to follow than Coheed & Cambria or Mastadon, but who doesn't love the intellectual challenge of progressive death metal?

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