rulers

Dear pizo - I couldn't help but notice that many of your 'straight lines' aren't
            so straight. Haven't you ever heared of rulers? - Perplexed in Illinois.

Dear Slightly Sarcastic: Wouldn't you know it but i often regret NOT using a
                         ruler- when [it] comes to drawing lines that i *intend*
(our old friend the intentiallist [sic] falacy!) to "read" as straight. However,
i find that the temptation passes quickly when you realise that unless you buy 
all of those architectural templates, you're limited to just two triangles
[30-6-90 [sic] (square root of three over two) or 45-90-45 (square root of two),
and of course circles (using either a caffee can lid to trace around, or a 
non-magnetic compass ;). 

Of course with rulers, you can get ALL of the straight lines you want (there are 
even these swell metal rulers with a cork under-coating that lifts the ruler up
off the surface for use with trad pen (nibbed) and ink out of a bottle). And of
course there are various versions of the so-called "French Curve" (hmmm, what 
do they call them in France ?? l'curve d'l'non Descartes?? ;) and then like i 
sed all of the various kinds of plastic trace-a-lot template thingies. But, then
even if i went out and bought them all (in all the various sizes - pretty much 
what i did when i took 2-d design from Don Taylor) - what would i do when i 
wanted to draw fractals, or Cantor dust, etc?

Also, of course even the straightest rullers [sic] (and believe me i learned all
about that in Quality Control 102 - Metrology (not to be confused with Geology
201 "Metrology" ;). Even the world's straightest ruler is only good to something
line 1 part in 10_000_000 - unless of course we used lasers. But, then we'd even
have to worry about gravitational forces and even if we wisked out to that
"new vast area of nothingness" that astronomer's recently discovered - you still
have the fine structure constant, quantum phenomenon to worry about. So, me thinks
it's better to just call a duck a duck and let it go at that. (The duck was not
available for comment for the article; we apppologise for the in-convenince). 


the-plants-the-plantzz

Dear pizo - I've noticed that many of your works (including the paintings, 
            print works, welded-metal drawings, and sculptures) seem to dwell
on plants and *rarely* are there are any animals (well, other than the bird in
the clock, ducks on ponds, and what appear to be amoebae, bugs of an "apparent"
instectial nature. Is there a reason for this, or is it that you just can't
draw anything as complicated as an animal? Not being mean; just curious about
the "plants". - Enjoying the flow.


  NOTE: Contains graphic violence towards animals, plants, and other 
        food-for-humans....

Dear Flow (or Flan, or Flynn as the case may be) - Yep. Yuh got it nailed in ONE.
           Other than the various birds (before i became an artist), i often 
sketched - they being (via Poe's "The Raven") an extremely strong influence on
me as a poet; see for example, my "Ode to a fallen worker"), i have trouble 
drawing much more than the head (straight on) of any animal. So, that puts me 
pretty much in the class of Egon Schillie ??sp?? *before* he went to art school.
Actually, when i took science in the 7th grade, we discected a frog and i (little
nazi vivi-sectionist that i was) recorded dutifully that after the heart (it wasn't
even an 'it') was removed it continued to bear for exactly 25 minutes. I've not 
forgotten that. It was rather odd, since as youth (Jungen Menchen) i'd found and 
caught and released frogs before'd, as well as snakes, and such. I will spare you
the other NON-Angst-MacKT of my encouthers with animals. (pray for me Goethe).

So, i led a charmed life: No animal ever did me harm; nor any plant - well, er ahm 
wasps? stickle-burens? .. what is one to live on? Air? - see Aristottle. Plants?
see "Don't Slay that PotatoE" by Tom Paxton. As we in the biz (see "life") "all are one".
Regardless began my way thru this thing called liff - id didn't help with all this
"Duck and Cover" t'stuff.

Thus, i just draw flowers, trees, vines, leaves, vacuolules, and things because,
why the Zarq not just say it:

   I *am* a tree-hugging hippy! (especially if my tree fort is built
   up in it and bully's are trying to kill my duck!! And at least 
   *i'd* like to see a Snail Darter.. Oh yeh. and tiger (that gambler
   on the insula'd'britanikique)

   cxxljl-bek' |


quantum-fractals-etc

Dear pizo - I'm still confused about the difference between the quantum, chaos
            and fractasl. Aren't they all just the same thing? - Ima Wave-Particle, 
            Chicago.

Dear Parti-Wave:  It's really hard to say. In the first place, the quantum occurs 
                  *only* at the smallest level of atomic phenomenon (and as such 
it is a *physical* property of our universe. Mainly it connects every point in the
universe with every other (well in theory). In the quantum equations the physicists
refer to "quantum numbers", such as n, l, j, q, s. When the basic (atomic state) 
number "n" gets much larger than say 1_000 then almost all of the quantum phenomenon
disappear (or are "schmeeered out" into a flow of inter-mingling states that can't
be separated out). Hence, this begins to look very much like chatoic phenomenon.

But, of course in both the lowest (atomic) and the highest (cosmological) levels,
entropy is everywhere - so where does it fit in? One of Stephen Hawking's most 
controversial (and beautifully ellegant; et tu Einstein?) forumlas relates entropy
to gravity and of course information flow. And remember when we bring in fractals
these are MATHEMATICAL things, because at the lowest level in any *physical* system
the quantum takes over completely. One of the main stumbling points is of course
that we can talk about something like fractals as mathematical (and hence *infinitely*
precise) or physical (and hence of interest in *certain* ranges of scale, energy 
fields, and such). And of course we can talk abou them philoosphically, artistically,
and even meta-physically - is god's knowledge of infinity fractal or simply exponential?
etc, etc. 

Don't forget that when the early *scientific* (and not at all even "merely mathematical")
ideas of Darwin's theory of Evolution, Freud's theory of the Id/Ego/Super-ego, and
Einstein's theory of Relativity broke on the scene - writers, philosophers, and of 
course artists all began to use their implication as paradigmatic shifts in thinking
within the frame works of their own areas.

the best books are *still* by the original discoverers of these things; eg, Herman Bondi,
Werner Hieserbert, Wolfgang Pauli, and especially George Gamow (Mr. Big Bang Theory) in
his "Mr. Tompkins in Wonderland" series - for the quantum. And of course for chaos
Jame Gleick's books, and Leon Glass's "From Clocks to Chaos". For fractals, it's GOT
to be Mandelbrot's original book. Just think that he discovered all of that by looking
at actual map coastlines. But, of course we *still* need new books on these!


the-kings-english

Dear pizo -