by my friend with the breath that stings the eyes...
to decrypt a message, one (well, probably more like a team) will probably start by trying to match the frequency of certain characters in the encoded message to the average frequency of characters in any other type of writing. there's also the frequency of 1,2,3, etc letter words, and really how many are there? unless u went and had ppl trying to send a message resort to only a somewhat limited vocabulary, and have a number represent each word. and these numbers could be written down using some obscure numbering system, like based on 17's or something. hehe, like hexa-decimal+1 :D the language used by the encoder would have to be considered. i wonder how much a message in say, french, sent from an english speaking operative to another would confuse things for someone trying to decrypt it. is this something usually suspected, or at least usu taken into consideration, by the decryptor? so there's the question of language. then perhaps the question of content subject - probably different frequencies of letters tend to occur in messages regarding different subjects. or maybe not..? then there's languages like chinese or other such non-alfabetical script. there could be a system of a character representing words, or just syllables. perhaps even a character could be used instead of writing out a very often used sentence. i wonder if for codes that simply exchange character for character, if there is usually a general "formula" that one could apply to be able to change back every character in a message coded in a such a way. that would be pretty complicated to try and decipher. or to make up. then messages could perhaps be written on a computer and a coding computer program could for example save a text or even pic message as pic of a sheet of paper with the message written on it. then it could be transmitted out - the enemy wounldt know what they'd be looking at - they'd be looking for a meassage when they should be trying to put together a picture, and THEN try to decipher whats written on it. but that's complicated and i wonder if it wouldnt require too much computing power and time for an in-the-field operative. hehe - this picture idea reminds me of johny mnemonic :) it might be cool to be a cryptographer :)
Saturday, October 04, 2003
Saturday, July 19, 2003
modularity, universe as a readout, common knowledge, etc.
just yesterday I had this idea in the shower that life, or maybe better: the universe, is but a complex "graphic" representation of some machine's parameters. Like nowadays maybe if ur monitoring a machine's operation, such as a car, u look at the different gauges and lights, or if ur rich ur looking at ur LCD display that tells u everything: coolant temperature, oil pressure, charging system voltage, speed, RPM's - everything. Well, maybe the universe could be such a "readout", but with so many parameters, that all these dimensions and ways of expressing them are necessary. just think of the being that's able to "read" all this stuff and understand it... first maybe simple things, like the distances between objects: so and so much on the vertical axis, so much on the horizontal and this much in depth. But then the objects themselves, so many of them, and of so many different kinds: a rock has its parameters, its describable by a mathematical equation, or actually a number of them, something for weight, something for density, something for volume and shape, something for texture, something for color. But I guess for something as un-complex u'd have an equation that's realtively small, esp as compared to plants or animals. Still, every object would probably have its own "equation", because it has its boundaries, physical limits. Hehe - unless rocks have dimensions to them we do not know about because it would be virtually impossible for us to detect. Hehe, like looking at an iceberg floating: looks like an ice mountain but actually all u see above water is only one third of the whole thing. Hehe, maybe rocks only seem dead to us because in so far as our senses detect, there's nothing more to them. But maybe in reality they're part of a larger "system" or equation, or "iceberg". And on our side of the "water" only this dead rock sticks out :) but that's a whole other discussion. Ok, so the universe is one big equation that's composed of all these other sub-equations, which are practically like modules. Like for example a person is one module, or sub-equation. With its own sub-equations, or modules, like for all ur physical characteristics, and modules that would be connected to all these physical modules, like for example the equation for movement would modify the equations governing/describing the physical aspects of a person. Another equation would have to do w/ feeling, another w/ thinking. Some equations would be more "powerful" than others, in terms of how much they would be able to affect other equations. Hehe, so we're a readout for a machine, and we delude ourselves that we have free will :D of course it would be more "comfortable" if I phrased it like our universe IS the real thing, and how its cool that it could all be described by one great equation, composed of many smaller ones. Hehe, but then again, if we are just a readout, or an equation for something, but this equation is so complex that it had to be encoded as particles, which would be woven into atoms, which would be knitted into molecules, which would be sawn into for example DNA. Which would be braided into persons, which would be modified by ideas, and other such curious "interactions" of other molecules in this person. Imagine: the whole universe is a readout, and someone just made it not w/ the purpose of writing a useless, extremely complex equation, but beacause they needed this equation or readout to describe something else. And they look at it all the time, reading it, all the parameters, all the sizes, and shapes and colours, and interactions, and ideas we think we have - its all part of a "picture" to them. Hehe - to make sure their galactic toaster oven doesn't burn out! :) we're the readout for the most complex toaster oven ever! It needs a whole universe to describe just whats going on with it! :) krazy... :) but ya, the general idea i suppose being that something can be described or represented as something else, perhaps for the purpose of simplification, or perhaps just because we are not yet able to see an electron, but we can sorta describe its bahaviour thru math equations or models we build etc.
but back to speaking of modules, I was also recently thinking of the modularity of language, how it started probably w/ more concrete thoughts, for concrete objects. Like the word "stone" describes only a stone. No ambiguity. U may not be able to see one but u know what it is. U may not even be able to draw one: but from that single word you infer a whole list of things u know about a stone: what makes a stone. The word is like an equation that describes the object. Like a module. Possibly a stereotype. When u think of the word "stone", u can probably think of it in concrete terms, like what it can be used for, what one might feel like, its size. But ur able to hold this "module" in ur attention, work with it. And so, more complex things were brought into light: feelings and other abstract ideas suddenly arent fleeting thoughts that u don't know what to make of, because u can hold onto their idea. U can even communicate this to someone else. But this someone else still has to be similar enough of an equation that parameters ur trying to convey are not alien to them: ur equation must be similar to their equation, so that the equation of an idea u had can fit similarly into their equation. Silly way to think about all this, eh? :) anyways, as u can see, I'm jumping from idea to idea, none of it is realy crystalized yet, or nicely "modularized" :), but I think I got some definite "clouding", or densening going on, like when jello starts to "cloud" or whatev? :) thought u might enjoy some of tomek's theorising once in a while :) another idea I had recently was that people keep having good ideas all the time, but probably most of those ideas "die out", or get "lost", b/c they don't get the necessary dissemination/propagation to reach a "critical mass" as it were, meaning, to be held by a large enough number of minds worldwide so that this idea doesn't die out, but is worked with, thought of, maybe even built upon or improved. fuck, it can even be ridiculed or whatever, as long as its talked about, it should catch on somewhere eventually if there's anything to it, right? :) Hehe - would be kinda cool to be able to say that an idea that has reached the status of "common knowledge" was originated by you... hehe, what about an idea that revolutionized something - sweeeeet! :D Like kopernik (none of this copernicus shit) - before this dude, it was common knowledge that the earth is flat. Motherfucker just went and proved them all wrong! Of course it took a few hundred years to sink in, but still :) now its common knowledge that the earth is round, or elliptical or whatev - a roughly spherical shape. I wonder what the next "big" idea will be... But anyhow, so if u want to spread an idea or something, if that tickles ur fancy, then u wanna try and give it maximum, possibly global coverage, yes? [hehe, or just by-pass the "hierarchy" and send it into outer space right away - maybe that'll finally convince "them" that there is some intelligent life on earth :)] Well, welcome to the age of the internet! Dudes have been playing w/ disseminating stuff for a while, but it seems most of it is crap = spam. Seems like they're trying to just be seen by everyone, and sometimes it works pretty good - like those emails that claim that the "make a wish" foundation is donating 6 cents for every forward of this email towards a child's heart transplant operation. It gets u, ur like - ok, I'll foreward this, out of pity or whatever works. So the messenger is pretty good, it gets disseminated to many people. But its ultimately empty - no real message to it, no value, at least not in my eyes. But if something in that format were used, but with a payload consisting of a cool idea, then if that got into many minds, and some ppl talked about it, then that would be awesome! But how do u do it? What, just email a dissertation to everybody and their friggin dog? I suppose some ppl would read it, but I don't think we'd be talking anywhere near the magnitude of critical mass. So what, disguise it? Hehe, maybe that's what these spam emails all are, and here I am, thinking I thought of a cool new idea :D maybe all these seemingly annoying spam emails have some kinda message embedded in them, maybe pieces of, so maybe all these pieces are just sorta laying dormant in all these minds, but one day the pieces are gonna start coming together into whatever ideas they were designed to be by whoever designed them. For whoever knows what purpose. Hehe - its the illuminati! Hilarious :D I just sometimes wonder if just adding ideas to the "collective" before attempting to screen them for possible future misuses is a good idea, or should I try and be a bit responsible? Of course one cant be expected to foresee everything, but if something jumps out at you, then perhaps telling the world how to make an atom bomb out of ingredients u'd find in a kitchen would be inadvisable.
but back to speaking of modules, I was also recently thinking of the modularity of language, how it started probably w/ more concrete thoughts, for concrete objects. Like the word "stone" describes only a stone. No ambiguity. U may not be able to see one but u know what it is. U may not even be able to draw one: but from that single word you infer a whole list of things u know about a stone: what makes a stone. The word is like an equation that describes the object. Like a module. Possibly a stereotype. When u think of the word "stone", u can probably think of it in concrete terms, like what it can be used for, what one might feel like, its size. But ur able to hold this "module" in ur attention, work with it. And so, more complex things were brought into light: feelings and other abstract ideas suddenly arent fleeting thoughts that u don't know what to make of, because u can hold onto their idea. U can even communicate this to someone else. But this someone else still has to be similar enough of an equation that parameters ur trying to convey are not alien to them: ur equation must be similar to their equation, so that the equation of an idea u had can fit similarly into their equation. Silly way to think about all this, eh? :) anyways, as u can see, I'm jumping from idea to idea, none of it is realy crystalized yet, or nicely "modularized" :), but I think I got some definite "clouding", or densening going on, like when jello starts to "cloud" or whatev? :) thought u might enjoy some of tomek's theorising once in a while :) another idea I had recently was that people keep having good ideas all the time, but probably most of those ideas "die out", or get "lost", b/c they don't get the necessary dissemination/propagation to reach a "critical mass" as it were, meaning, to be held by a large enough number of minds worldwide so that this idea doesn't die out, but is worked with, thought of, maybe even built upon or improved. fuck, it can even be ridiculed or whatever, as long as its talked about, it should catch on somewhere eventually if there's anything to it, right? :) Hehe - would be kinda cool to be able to say that an idea that has reached the status of "common knowledge" was originated by you... hehe, what about an idea that revolutionized something - sweeeeet! :D Like kopernik (none of this copernicus shit) - before this dude, it was common knowledge that the earth is flat. Motherfucker just went and proved them all wrong! Of course it took a few hundred years to sink in, but still :) now its common knowledge that the earth is round, or elliptical or whatev - a roughly spherical shape. I wonder what the next "big" idea will be... But anyhow, so if u want to spread an idea or something, if that tickles ur fancy, then u wanna try and give it maximum, possibly global coverage, yes? [hehe, or just by-pass the "hierarchy" and send it into outer space right away - maybe that'll finally convince "them" that there is some intelligent life on earth :)] Well, welcome to the age of the internet! Dudes have been playing w/ disseminating stuff for a while, but it seems most of it is crap = spam. Seems like they're trying to just be seen by everyone, and sometimes it works pretty good - like those emails that claim that the "make a wish" foundation is donating 6 cents for every forward of this email towards a child's heart transplant operation. It gets u, ur like - ok, I'll foreward this, out of pity or whatever works. So the messenger is pretty good, it gets disseminated to many people. But its ultimately empty - no real message to it, no value, at least not in my eyes. But if something in that format were used, but with a payload consisting of a cool idea, then if that got into many minds, and some ppl talked about it, then that would be awesome! But how do u do it? What, just email a dissertation to everybody and their friggin dog? I suppose some ppl would read it, but I don't think we'd be talking anywhere near the magnitude of critical mass. So what, disguise it? Hehe, maybe that's what these spam emails all are, and here I am, thinking I thought of a cool new idea :D maybe all these seemingly annoying spam emails have some kinda message embedded in them, maybe pieces of, so maybe all these pieces are just sorta laying dormant in all these minds, but one day the pieces are gonna start coming together into whatever ideas they were designed to be by whoever designed them. For whoever knows what purpose. Hehe - its the illuminati! Hilarious :D I just sometimes wonder if just adding ideas to the "collective" before attempting to screen them for possible future misuses is a good idea, or should I try and be a bit responsible? Of course one cant be expected to foresee everything, but if something jumps out at you, then perhaps telling the world how to make an atom bomb out of ingredients u'd find in a kitchen would be inadvisable.
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