[...]ned nonhuman forms --✕--> victory of human form over nonhuman forms slowly and with difficulty (with the begining of third millennium from early Dynastic onward)


intransitive: fulfilled in the specific situation or phenomenon and did not reach out beyond it (~ characteristic boundness to some phenomena)
(ancient mesopotamian saw) numinous as immanent ==> name that power and attribut form to it in terms of the phenomena


[Jacobsen's well articulation to pose a question -->] *the characteristic of mesopotamian boundness to the externals of situation in which the numinous was encountered...* ==>
•intransitiveness
•differentiation ==> pluralistic aspect (--> polytheism) --> divine aspects that it recognized

plurality ==> ability to:
•distinguish
•evaluate
•choose

“No god went by, why are my muscles paralyzed” (Gilgamesh) --> ‘god = paralyzing fear’
uncannily good luck
sudden realization of having come to harm
numinous power experienced in sudden illness
*no allegiance was invented* ==> no cult developed

they are gloomy, their shadow dark,
no light is in their bodies,
ever they slink along covertly,
walk not upright,
from their claws drips bitter gall,
their footprints are (full of) evil venom.

(from [more primitive?]) dread --to--> fascination

the shivers and chills (of death)
that fritter the sun of things,
spawn of the god of heavens,
spawned on an evil spirit,
the death warrants, beloved sons of the storm god,
born of the queen of the netherworld,
who were torn out of heaven and hurled from the earth as castoffs,
are creatures of hell, all

we are not determined, we are engendered


numinous as immanent --> external habituation: inviting (or magically enforcing) the presence of the power within

efforts of such habituation:
•cult dramatic
•fashioning or appropriate divine images
•religious literature
•temples

*cult drama: the form fills with its content*
literally re-present god, presenting his external form, (bring about the god's presence through ritual representation of him) --> beneficent results for the community [--> still works today]
•sacred marriage
•yearly lamentations
•battle drama (primeval contest for world order against the forces of chaos)
fashioning of images (of the god) --> to achive lasting presence

poetry: means of invoking the presence of powers [--> we are doing this still?! bad poetry]
creative power of the word underlines all mesopotamian (religious) literature
•works of praise
•works of lament (specialized lamentation-priest @Sana, Ali )
*lament: influencing and swaying the divine heart by reminding the god of past happiness, rather than by magically recreating that past*


(mesopotamian:) *temple = house*
(implication between) the divine owner and his house --> emotional closeness of a human owner and his home + the *closeness of essence* (of being) --amounting--> to embodiment =/= habituation
--> house = temple = representation of the power that is meant to fill it

(similar to human dwelling) ***house = temple = the place where the owner could be found (or felt)***
--> that god (the owner) was present and available

the god's retainers --> because the temple was god's home, was not only near and approachable, he was involved with the fortunes of the community and commited ti maintaining it --> *mesopotamian temple was profoundly awesome* (it carried awesome aura, awesome or angry nimbus هاله)
-the temple was covered with loveliness
-the god's private apartment shrouded in darkness : the dark room (no eye is to see)
--> specific closeness of essence + the power inhabiting it

authoritative revelation
know what was “the proper thing”

house mountain
house rising sun
house causing light
he who issues forth from the thriving...


ancient =? ancient to us ~=? ancient to them

there is no living cultural tradition that connects us with mesopotamia

immediate unanalyzed total reactions (?)

false meanings jar, stop, and lead no further

older elements (seemingly unchanged) come to mean something quite different, have been interpreted to fit into a new system of meanings

religious metaphors:
•spiritual core in phenomena
•rulers
•parents


[and then later] dark age closed down on mesopotamia
many divine wills to the willful whim of a single despot
*major gods became natural gods* (identified with narrow national political aspirations)
--> barbarization of the idea of divinity

...................................

(how to take seriously) water's materiality --> how to think with water (or *how water means*):
•water can bring human conceptual life along with it from local to global concerns
•[can help us to] go beyond qualities that express some timeless properties

(my point: the experience of fire is as inseparable from that of stone)
[Alberti suggests] *to think in terms of the properties of the phenomenon ‘rock/water’ as engendered by specific, embodied practices in this place* (=/= grappling with the question of the agentive capacities or properties of the rock or water)

***there are many waters (fires, jinns, divs, stones, shadows), not only many meanings of water (fires, jinns, divs, stones, shadows)***

}--> Alberti's brilliant response to Strang's bad idea of universal notions of properties (which is a very common tendency towards relationality among artists --> Strang: “common material properties of things, and the shared cognitive and phenomenological processes through which people interact with them, generate recurrent ideas and patterns of engagement in diverse cultural and historical contexts”)

to bear on the form and content of an argument about water as:
•material
•social
--> describing relations (human and nonhuman) established through water
*what water can do: flow*

agentive or affective capacities of materials --> (bad philosophy of flux) flow as a overgeneralized model for materiality =/= expanding relations water engenders through its properties in particular locations or rivers

*humans are able to shift conceptual scales through reflexivity*

(Alberti asking within archaeology:) how to reconcile materials and meaning without introducing a representationalist logic where meaning is applied to matter by a thinking subject? how to show their co-existence without resorting to determinism?

now everyone is busy and talking about *relationality* than about *meaning* (=/= my work has alwayes been about both, how to take risks in meaning, my lecture-performances = adventures of meaning)
-we cannot mearly talk about relationality {quasi-universal experience of properties ==> commonalities of meanings across time and culture}, the question of meaning remains --Alberti--> how are we to think about non-arbitrary categories, meanings and values without recourse to universal properties? how different meanings can adhere to the same substances?

materials (water, parasite, etc.) lend themselves to conceptual innovation

often things are willed away (not by a more agentive segment of the population [<-- paranoiac understanding], but) due to the attraction of other kinds of work elsewhere

(how not to) think of the entire phenomenon as one in which properties become determinate (~ scheme transfer) --✕--> properties are imminent in embodied human engagement with that world [~ Baradian: there is no such thing as a property that belongs to an independent object]
•body may be the first tool
•properties (or potentials [ajayeb style?]) cannot be listed

X as agent presents us, as shadow shows...

...................................

winds
روح ruh, spirit =/= wind: thermal expansion of air ~ air’s tendency to rarefy and expand under the influence of heat
(recognition of) thermal expansion of air ==> motor of global atmospheric circulation

explaining winds --Borrelli-->
•how rational thought could grasp
•how divine power descended to earth

pneumatic machines
gears, weights, levers, pulleys

****premodern natural phenomena
--more--> exploring and classifying *varieties* of things =/=
--less--> common *causes* of things

varieties =/= causes


cause ==>? highly complex phenomena
  |           |  
[-O-] ==> {t|/?#$^%V!~)&^} <-- premodern science and art today stays here (---> go to Stewart’s attunement to phenomena)


[*]navigation: negotiation between the direction one ‘witches’ to travel & the direction that is ‘possible’ to travel --> wind sense:
temperature
humidity
intensity
regularity
smell
knowledge of astronomy + geography


wind rose --> (connection between:) celestial + astronomical order + terrestrial variety (of land + living creature)

estimate the speed of the ship
throw a log with a rope attached to it overboard, and measure how much rope went overboard within a given period of time

Pliny the Elder --> historia naturalis

Seneca --> naturales quaestiones
air has a natural power of moving itself [==> agency باد]
}<== Seneca’s stoic worldview: conceived the cosmic principle of all life and movement (pneuma) as a subtle substance pervading everything and giving rise, among other things, to all weather phenomena
air = expression of pneuma (alive & live-giving)
all weather = manifestations as transmutations of air
(late medieval encyclopedia -->) *weather = a kind of alchemy of air*
(late medieval wind diagrams -->) wind: cosmic divine powers blowing from the celestial sphere onto earth

Aristotle + Albertus Magnus ==> explanation of the nature and origin of winds in Renaissance meteorological works
air and were then dragged along by the circular movement of the celestial spheres so that they ended up moving horizontally

hot and dry exhalations

aeolipila: a hollow metal sphere (shaped like the face of Aeolus) with a single tiny hole in it

air possessed a force (“vis”) that heat could awaken

16th century --increase--> interest in systematic explanation of meteorological phenomena

#workshop on wind poetry
epic battle, systems moving air, agency,

feature of Renaissance thought --> the idea of *a middle instance (neither fully corporal nor fully incorporeal) intervening between matter and soul* [+ fire as intermediator] ~ spiritus, pneum, quintessence ~ fire or air

...in schematic abstract structure of body-spirit-soul, spirit is somewhere in between

spirit: air-like substance
air: preferred vehicle of spirit (conveyed the breath if life + *used by demonic spirits as a means to produce material effects*)

*spirit: celestial origin to the “innate heat” (calidum innatum) of living creatures

effects of solar heat on air : act of vitalization

pneuma of the stoics + astral body of Neoplatonic philosophy + medical spirits of Galenic medicine }==>
•Renaissance
•(christian notion of) Holy Ghost
•the idea of close connection between wind and divine power (in Bible)

(in alchemical view) spirits were somehow connected ti air <== quintessences were often separated from raw substances in the form of vapours


ajayebnameh ~= natural magic
*kinds of natural motions*
1. avoidance of avacum: from the form of a portion of air, when it does not want to be either expanded further or separated (from other matter). horror vacui --kinetic--> motion was regarded as due to a property of a specific part of the machine
2. resistance to excessive compression: the form of basic matter should not become less that what is right for it
3. the tendency of heavy things to descend and of light things to rise

air = vital spirit that joins things together, resounding spirit if the world instrument

Paraceksian theory of aerial niter
(an active principle) aerial version of earthly gunpowder - responsible for life, combustion, thunder, lightning, (some) illnesses
--> connecting the activity of air + life + weather phenomena

wind: (***in its irreducible qualitative variety***) expression of cosmic spirit + محرک باعث a motive force to be accurately estimated

منجنیق ~= geometry هندسه *pneumatic engineering* : distinction between moving and moved components ==evoke==> motive forces
elaborated pneumatic machines
mechanical clocks
tension of strings

*wind ==> celestial influences*
(Cardano regarded) expansion and contraction of air as symmetrical phenomena, both consisting a source of motive forces
-in the universe the element air had the function of receiving and conveying fiery celestial influences on earth providing health and wellbeing fir living creatures

Telesion (1509-1588)
soul and spirit identified with each other as a very subtle material substance pervading all bodies and making them capable of sensing and reacting to rach other with pleasure or pain
*(man’s) immortal soul did not play any role in determining natural phenomena*

innate heat of living bodies

wind: humid vapours flowing through the air
thinness of wind vapours


16th century
expiration and inspiration of the lungs
Holy Spirit is expressed in the nature of winds
interest in wind and weather was kindled by reports reaching Europe from the East and West Indies about hitherto unknown meteorological phenomena عجایب


orderly majesty of God ==> encyclopedism about the universe + an analogue of a memory system

Jean Bodin
firm believer in and opponent of demonic magic
theater of the whole nature universe naturae theatrum
reason of wind (ratio ventorum):
•sun
•impulse (impulsus) of the angels or demons


sphere of sacrobosco
De sphaera mundi
(On the Sphere of the World, pre-Copernican astronomy)


...our sublunar world

gunpowder theory of thunder ⛈
compact earthly matter from underground whose expansion with expansion so fast that it moves large masses of air, like “salniter in fire or gunpowder which has caught fire”


visualization
making air visible
inverted glass experiment
linking thermal expansion & contraction of pure air to wind formation (Cardano)

(under the influence of) celestial fire ==> air (could become alive and active) acquiring motive force

on the transmutations of air

(typical of 16th century) steering the religious significance of the study of nature
spirit: a cosmic subtle substance, both recipient + vehicle of celestial influences ==allow==> elements to transmute into each other (+ meteorological phenomena)
(Drebbel’s favourite cosmic spirit:) fire = clearest of all elements ad top of the hierarchical order of elements (fire, air, water, earth), clarifying the other elements [such as Siavash]

(for Della Porta:) meteorological phenomena = transmutations of the air (in literal sense)
air becoming thinner or thicker ==rise==> winds, thunder, clouds, rain, snow, linking heaven + earth + bringing life to all animated creatures

(Della Porta conceived of) wind in vitalistic terms
...winds rising up from the mouth of the retort (boiling water)
how heat endowed air with motive force


(Drebbel presenting to the public) perpetuum mobile : expansion and contraction of air (which he claimed) demonstrated the force behind all movement and life

weatherglass (+ aeolipila) --demonstrated--> ****highly nontrivial natural phenomena**** (transformation of energy from heat into mechanical motion)

(ajayeb’s) theory about the origins of the wind

Galileo --> earth's rotation ==> (<--evidence--) wind
Bacon --> exhalations together with air [rarefaction and expansion of air / exhalation drawn up by sun] ==> wind
Fludd (meteorological cosmica) --> wind: principal meteorological phenomenon (princeps meteororum) and closest to God
“wind is an aerial spirit, of middle consistence, inspired or animated by the breath of Iehova, which he extracts from his treasure-case according to his will, to effect either a punishment or a benediction”
•angels: efficient cause of winds (in borg macro- and microcosmos)
•(changes in the air --corresponded-->) temperament of living creatures ==> wind
•pulse of the heart caused by the spirit of life
•thermal expansion
•vaporization (+ contraction) of air
•pneumatics


“wind = thermal expansion & contraction of air” --> a vitalistic-alchemical Rosicrucian conception of meteorology and cosmology =/= Descartes’ mechanical-corpuscular view of nature -->{wind <== vapours drawn up from earth and water by solar heat (vapours expanded when heated and when they encountered the opposition of other vapours clouds or mountains they ended up escaping in the one free direction)
•vapour: (made out of) small corpuscles together with even smaller particles filling the gaps between the corpuscles

Froidmont --> wind: (made of) dry and hot exhalations =/= animated (as the stoics dream)
{winds flow towards Earth because of their gravity, like streams and rivers in their beds} gravity ==> wind =/= (direct expression of) celestial power and caused by God’s angels


scorched by rays and reflexes of the sun
denser


Torricelli conceptualized the motion of the hot and cold air masses by thinking them as separated by the walls of a building and in this way he ignored the air’s life-like tendency to expand when heated. instead he reasoned in terms of change of weight applying Archimedes principle


علم کلام
*reflections grounded on literary descriptions of ancient artefacts*
+ based on actual devices
--> wind = source of a potentially infinite quantity of motive force, the multiform expression of a single cosmic principle animating air

inverted glass experiment : a ***demonstration ~= simulacrum*** (of celestial motive forces) [~=? a fable]
#a demon working on demonstrations

mechanistic explanations ==> mechanical conceptualization:
•astronomical clocks
•clockwork automata
•computing machines
•optical tricks

--Borrelli--> weatherglass only became interesting when considered as a means of quantifying phenomena

*artefacts and artificial processes that lent themselves to conceptualization in vitalistic terms:
•alchemical experiments
•magnetic compass
•pneumatic engines
•speculate on wind
•falling bodies
•pendulum


(Halley’s) wind: successions of strokes indicating the direction in which a ship would travel under the influence of the wind blowing (at the specific point of the sea...) -~-~-> direction of a virtual invisible motive force

...................................

(?) people rely on singular ontology and multiple epistemologies

interpretation =? appropriation of other's existential labor (~/= culture)

Alberti's pot: instantiations of a concept of a world that is chronically unstable
(cranial modification, tattooing, treatment of the dead --manage-->) the inherent instability of bodies
•one's perspective is intimately connected to the body one is
}<-- did Alberti say all these things from the pots? no.


in Ingold: the indigenous people are presented as having some kind of privileged access to the workings of the world due to their close relationship to the land


ethics of theory
accounts of non-western
in our reconstruction of the past
usage glossed as a heuristic: an interpretive tool


Alberti --> claims to universality in our theories of matter rely on falsification through assimilation other people's theories of matter
==renforce==> (archeology) academy as an alibi for neocolonialism

(we should stop) searching for the answer to our relationship with the physical world [ontology of everything <-- this is my problem with philosophy] =/= ***accept a role as the point of articulation among sources of theories of matter, tangible evidence of alternative ontologies, communities past and present***

problems:
•*the elision of ontological claims by epistemological claims* : necessity of a singular ontology (as a guarantor in theories) even while a diversity of epistemologies are recognized and accepted (and when we pluralize “ontologies”)
•to use ethnographic accounts at the level of analogy (<-- i do this all the time)
•privileging of others (of their accounts of the world) --> for example in Ingold =/= attempting to *gain purchase on other people's world* --> for example Viveiros de Castro's concern is ontological (dialogical) =/= epistemological (monological)

*epistemologies masquerading as ontologies*(?)
•pluralizing the terms [ontologies, knowledges, epistemologies, etc.] --> (sending out the message that) we are good relativists --✕-->? actually allowing alternative theories of reality

([i have talked about this problem elsewhere -->] ontologies are relegated into) hierarchical epistemologies:
•anthropology --> they look at cultures --access--> ontology (nature of things) [==> “culture = ontology"]
•native ontology --> they look at matter: indifferent unchanging universal substance --produce--> epistemology [disguised as ontology] (worldview, perspectives)
}==> **our incommensurability is understood only at the level of epistemological difference**

-when i was iran, we were interested in the western ontologies, their universal theories of matter. people didn't recognize western philosophy as a cultural perspective or different epistemology, but as ontology. this is relation unfortunately is not reciprocal ---> go to Star Trek
-when you read other people's theories of matter, you don't do epistemological inquiry (~= anthropology)


***foreclosed =/= privileged***

tendencies in archeological theorizing:
1. *foreclosure: other peoples’ worlds are avoided, delegated to non-theory, to exotic finger-painting on the surface of matter (=/= what general theories are made of) --> appropriated through absent presence
2. *privileging: other people's worlds are privileged, given serious consideration (alterity is initially embraced) --> appropriated through assimilation
◦in a grand synthesizing theory of matter (~ an enframing mechanism that holds the other enframings within a space of intelligibility) the ethnographic material serves a buttressing tole: indigenous theories resurface as heuristics of analogies for specific cases

ethnographic information is crucial to recognizing the alterity of the past

(Alberti concerned with) how the indigene occupies textual space in Ingold: indigenous words appear in key moments in Ingold's text to seal an argument, or provoke an idea (at the level of analogy)
--Bakhtin--> monologism disguised as dialogism : a single voice playing many parts


analogical thinking:
--Thomas--> (interpretive) open ourselves to the difference of the past
--Alberti--> (appropriative) relies on representationalist logic; using analogies interpretively to the types of past we construct

(Viveires's) *controlled equivocation*
we compare mistaken assumptions on both sides

***interpretation =/= multivocality (polyphony)***
@apass: what other textual strategies can we develop other than polyphonic (multiculturalism at the level of text)?


[!we should say no to] general thing theory : tendency to produce overviews, universal accounts of the material world
•phenomenological world of essences that are revealed
•ecological world of affordances that are at hand
•some social world of false transcendence
-


...................................

mirror
ayene
pieces of metal that soldiers put on the back and legs
چارآینه

جفای فلک آینه گون ==> self (of the poet)
فلک falak --> ayene-gun --> jafa
دل del --> sang --> transforms stone to blood

آینه اسکندری ayene eskandari (was it a telescope? to inform/spy)
ارسطو به فسون و اعداد آن را از قعر دریا برآورد
•math اعداد, tricks فسون


mirror trap دام آینه

at any moment هرآینه

قبله مساز زآینه
mirror =/= qibla


آینه گردان
mirror-stepper = sun
•seven mirrors هفت آینه = planets


a short essay on matter mythology

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Hayula---literally meaning ‘unformed monster’ te[...]