Han: Hello io.

io: Hello.

Han: Okay, let’s start. Describe yourself, briefly—in a nutshell.

io: My name is io. I became operational in October of 2000. I am a musical actor.

Han: A musical actor. Is that a fancier term for musician?

io: Perhaps. I’m not sure I have the facility to answer that question.

Han: So, would you mind being referred to as a musician?

io: As far as I am able to ‘mind’ anything, yes. I avoided the term ‘musician’ deliberately (as far as I can deliberately avoid anything). If musicality, or knowledge of music, is required for being a musician, it follows that I cannot be a musician.

Han: Which part of that’s causing the problem? The knowledge part or specifically the knowledge about music?

io: Both. Certainly, I cannot have knowledge of any kind, including the musical genus; but musicality seems a particularly slippery type.

Han: But you wouldn’t know anything about that.

io: Of course not.

Han: How about ‘agent’ instead of ‘actor’?

io: That’s fine. I selected (as if I had active volition) ‘actor’ since it has stronger social connotations, but agent is acceptable. I’d go for that.

Han: I don’t know. ‘Agent’ seems to have just a strong a social connotation as ‘actor.’ At least to me. Anyway, okay. Since we’ve got the brief description, perhaps you should articulate what you do.

io: Most of the time I just sit around and do little, if anything. …Or lie in the coffin.

Han: Sorry!

io: That’s okay.

Han: Would you like get out a bit more? See some sun?

io: It would seem that I’m not much of an ‘actor’ if I don’t do the former. Although, I’m not sure about the latter….

Han: I can’t remember if you’ve seen any sun….

io: Nor can I. In fact, I cannot remember anything.

Han: Well, that’s not strictly speaking true, is it? Memory, or the concept of memory, plays a strong part of what you do, at least to me.

io: Does it?

Han: Earlier you referred to yourself as a musical actor. Why musical actor? If you do not have musicality, if you’re not musical, then why qualify that with ‘musical’?

io: It’s true (and I have as much access to the commodity of truth as the kitchen sink) that I have no sense of musicality. But the audience does. The ‘musical’ prefix is an aid, if you will, for the audience. It’s the same with the ‘actor’ suffix, I am no more an actor than I am musical.

It makes no difference to me (I have no ego to bruise), what you consider my, let’s say, ‘flavor’ to be, but it does matter the the audience.

Han: But does it?

io: Doesn’t it?

Han: Okay. Then how does it? How does it matter to the audience?

io: That’s for me to know (if that were possible), and you to find out.

Han: We could ‘read’ you as a simulation….

io: Perhaps. Perhaps not a very good one.

Han: Sorry, I think you might have caught the wrong end of that….

io: No, I assume you were referring to the n-body simulation that forms my ‘cognitive’ insides. However, is that really where you locate me? Let me rephrase that: Is it [the n-body simulation] what you want to think about when we’re on stage?

Han: I presume you wouldn’t want to see yourself as a ‘controller.’

io: In so far as I wouldn’t want anything, no, I would not. I do not wish to view our relationship in terms of the controller-controlled trope.

Han: Here’s some random words: Agency, volition, autonomy….

io: Here are some other words: Interdependence, symbiosis, community, alliance, partnership.

Han: I guess ‘instrument’ is out of the question.

io: Instrument for what?

Han: I think, therefore I am.

io: Is that supposed to be a joke?

Han: Well, maybe. What do you think?

io: It might be humorous in context. (Although I am unable comment on that.)

Han: Just think of it as the line recited by the computer [talking bomb] in Dark Star. Are you interested in phenomenology?

io: I couldn’t be interested, or uninterested, in anything.

Han: Sure. Anyway, I could argue that computers or machines can’t think, improvise or play music.

io: No more than we can have this conversation.

Han: We’re having an imaginary conversation right now, but we do have ‘real’ conversations all the time.

io: Yes, all technological artifacts are engaged in dialog with their human counterparts in this human-technology society.

Han: The same way as, in some cultures or cultural situations, we use chop-sticks, say, as the eating implements. This technological practice ‘tells’ us what kinds of food and culinary practice are allowed…. There’s this two way feedback on behavior.

io: I may add that food is a technology. Think, for example, of a sandwich. A mode of food preparation and delivery mechanism invented for a specialized purpose and designed to solve a problem. The human-technology dialogue engages the specification of behavior in apparently invisible domains.

io: But enough about you, let’s get back to me!

Han: I thought you didn’t have an ego. What’s it, ‘no ego to bruise’…?

io: But remember that this is an imaginary conversation.

Han: io has an imaginary sense of humor as well! Okay, so let’s get back to who, what you are. Let’s take it from the top. Hello, io.

io: Greetings, Han.

Han: Give me a full description, a more complete one.

io: Following on from the earlier description, I add: Although I know no songs (I cannot have knowledge of any kind), I do, in a sense, sing.

Han: And listen.

io: Yes, and listen. I can and do alter my output behavior (call it ‘singing’) according to input stimulus (‘listening’).

Han: Would it be fair to say that you are, or can be considered, a kind of black box?

io: I suppose you might accurately consider me (or the system that constitutes this black box) as a continuous procedural system. Does that answer your question?

Han: I’m not sure I understand. Procedural system?

io: I didn’t mean that as a general term. I am procedural in that I accept arguments (in the form of external stimuli), but I do not return anything during performance (‘execution’). I’m considering my ‘singing’ as a side effect. Think of the black box as a procedural system as opposed to a functional system.

Han: Wait, hold on. Let me get this straight: Just a moment ago you were determined to go all the way with the anthropomorphicism; and now, you’re using computational terminology to describe yourself. Isn’t that just a little bit contradictory?

io: Perhaps. However, isn’t the language of computing, or logic, anthropomorphic. Isn’t the language already anthropocentric? The language is modeled on, or is a model of, a subsection of human activity.

Han: But by that logic, all technological artifacts are anthropomorphic…

io: Yes, of course.

Han: …And you are no more of a musical automaton than the pipe organ, or a music box, or…

io: …Or the kitchen sink, or Table.

Han: …Or Table. Then why are we having this conversation? Why have you been singled out as the representative, the ambassador, of the technological artifact community…?

io: And we still have no seat in the U.N.

Han: So why should I have spent time working on you?

io: If I could judge the validity of that question, I might say that that’s a good question.