SynapticNulship

We have an everyday sense of interfaces.  The computers we use all have interfaces, both in software and hardware.  If they didn’t, we wouldn’t be able to use them (of course, some interfaces are clearly better than others).  But interfaces aren’t just for computers—every tool or entertainment device has interfaces.  For instance the size and shape of a hammer or a pistol affords a certain usage by human hands which is very effective, and even comfortable.

But is there a more fundamental, general concept of interface?

First, we can enumerate a few of the more important roles that our common human interfaces can take: Interfaces can be thought of as translators, for instance human-computer interfaces translate a machine language into something humans can deal with such as text and/or graphics.  Interfaces can be masks, for instance avatars and augmented reality insert a layer of reality modification between users and worlds.  Interfaces can connect different types of substrates, for instance biological to electronics.  Interfaces can connect objects of different scales, for instance the interfaces of heavy machinery allow a single human to move massive quantities of material (or in a somewhat less common example, a human can manipulate specific atoms with the interfaces provided by a scanning tunneling microscope).

There are other types of interfaces, such as chemical surface boundaries between two phases.  Biology has various kinds of interfaces; computer science has its kinds of interfaces; and so on.  Basically, whenever two or more objects interact, there is an interface at that interaction.  Some interfaces are natural, and some are designed to make the interaction between the objects effective.  But there doesn’t need to be a third thing that is the interface.  The interface can be the transient place at which two or more things intersect.

What is the metaphysical situation for interfaces?  Do interfaces exist as universals?  Are they abstract?  Are they objective or subjective?  Let’s say that I am ontologically committed to the existence of objective interfaces.  So these could be concrete, but can an interface in its simplest form be concrete or must it be abstract?  Perhaps there is a universal interface—a class of which all interfaces are instances of.  This would posit that the phenomenon of interfacing is the same at all scales and regardless of whatever particulars were involved in the interfacing.

Now, let’s say that we thought there were real world instances everywhere of the universal interface.  At what scales would that stop?  Is there some underlying level in which entities no longer interface?

Now, why would I even bother to think about objective abstract interfaces?  Because, it’s possible that interfaces at the simplest conception are the basic connector of objects.  If that premise is true, then without the existence of objective interfaces there would not objectively exist anything separate from anything else—or there could be but they would effectively be in their own universes because they would never be able to interact.

If objective interfaces do not actually exist in this world, then we have to deal with the concept of interface just as a metaphor.

At the human scale, discussing interfaces seems to embrace an object-oriented point of view, which is basically the natural human point of view.  Humans operate largely by perceiving the world in terms of objects, with agents being a special class of object that operate autonomously.  Other humans are agents, other animals are agents, anything that appears to move by its own volition is suspicious and given at the very least temporary status as an agent.  But are objects, i.e. particular entities, necessary for the concept of interface?  Perhaps an objective theory of interface would not require objects.  Maybe objects are just slices of the world which are convenient for our minds to process.  Although it seems like we interface with objects, it’s possible that all interfaces operate between folds of the same cloth—some continuity that is not composed of objects (or the world itself is the only object).

Cross-posted with Science 2.0.

One of reasons I like Tron:Legacy is the existence of ISOs.  ISOs are “isomorphic algorithms”, which are lifeforms that emerged–unplanned–from the artificial environment of the grid.  Besides being a cool movie manifestation of ALife and emergent phenomena, there is also an association with certain philosophical and AI ideas via the word “isomorphic.”  The introduction to ISOs may have sounded like a brief moment of technobabble to some, whereas to me it was a brilliant reference to Gödel, Escher, Bach.

In this famous (in some circles) 1979 book by Douglas Hofstadter , the author suggests that since isomorphisms produce meaning in simple formal systems (they act as the link between symbols and real world objects) they might be behind all meaning in humans.

Hofstadter says (p. 82):

In my opinion, in fact, the key element in answering the question “What is consciousness?” will be the unraveling of the nature of the “isomorphism” which underlies meaning.

The other awesome element of Tron:Legacy is the digital DNA.  This can be repaired by manipulating the holographic interface of an entity’s identity disk.  In the movie this was demonstrated when Flynn fixed the digital DNA which then somehow resulted in the regeneration of Quorra’s missing arm.  Although this is Hollywood’s presentation of hacking incredibly complex system of codes (note that unlike most movies, Tron:Legacy shows actual UNIX commands being entered in the real world 2010 scenes, saving the fake interfaces for the Grid), it makes one wonder–what if repairing DNA and/or physical body parts really was that easy?

The concept of the ISO’s digital DNA is also a provocative idea aside from the ID disk interface.  Is this DNA better than biological DNA?  Are ISOs truly better than humans?  Or are they simply the Grid isomorphism of “real” world humans?  Flynn talks about all the improvements he can make in the world from Grid projects.  However, Flynn tells his program CLU (which is a partial copy of himself) that there’s no such thing as perfection.  So we are left in the middle ground, and anybody who thought this movie was a simple black and white good vs. evil epic Hollywood effects regurgitation has missed the important grey areas.

Quorra, an ISO

Cross-posted with Science 2.0.

The next iteration of my Tron-esque human cladding:

Ready to wear

The glove light

The back

Action!

I wore this to XMortis (completely against the sub-theme, but whatever), however the inverter that I built was overheating and stopped working eventually.  I had two inverters, so only part of the costume (the back) was working after that.  And yes I could have all hooked it to one inverter but there’s still more EL wire to add.  Next time I will have a more robust solution…

See also post on my Science 2.0 blog.