Tuesday, May 30, 2017

TeleRama

I woke up concerned about how to cross STEM with PATH, the meaning of each letter.  If STEM sprouts an A, turning to STEAM, should PATH cross on the A instead?  I always say "A is for Anthropology" knowing the Art folk may object. But what if we have a second T and make that mean Theater, as in screenplays for television.

There's an almost conscious effort to pry "programming" (as in television) and "programming" (in code) apart. We're too close to "brainwashing" though that's what it is, and really, what's so bad about mental hygiene. Why not turn it over to professionals, right?

Anyway, having watched the only two seasons of the critically acclaimed Dollhouse, I used non-AI sources to suggest additional TV series, netting Chuck, Veronica Mars, and I Zombie.  I'm sampling the first two.  The Movie Madness computer claimed to have all three, however Chuck was filed before Chicago PD under Millennial TV Heritage.

Back to Theater and multi-tasking, and the need for retakes.  Live theater requires rehearsing the whole thing a number of times, unless it's improv. I'm not the expert.

Computer programming is similar in that once you get a working copy in the can, you can put the code into production and watch it do its job.  Recorded media are reassuringly deterministic, even if the circumstances in which they're played may not be.

Philosophy
Anthropology
Theater
History

Science
Technology
Engineering
Anthropology
Mathematics

Theater includes a lot of business management, workflow analysis, operations research and the like. We might introduce the idea of fictional versus nonfictional theater.

The two sets overlap on "A" because we're somewhat anthropocentric by nature, and need to keep the impact of our work, on our quality of life, front and center.  What are the opportunity costs that come with dumbing ourselves down?