Dialogue with Rei Naito

I had a dialogue with the artist Rei Naito in the Bungeishunju building in Kioicho. The diaglogue will be published in "Bungakukai" (Literature World), the most respected literary monthly in Japan.
Rei Naito's artworks are going to be featured on the cover from the October issue of Bungakukai. The dialogue was intended to be a kick-off introduction of the artist to the readership of Bungakukai.
Rei Naito, a good friend of mine, is known for her exquisite arrangement of small things in a carefully prepared space. She believes, she said, that if you sincerely attend to one small thing in the world around you, that thing will reward you with a deep presence of beauty which makes you thankful for the very existence of the world as it is here and now. She has always lived with that particular sense of the appreciation of small things that be, without any specific reference to the already established religions or systems of thought. Her works are thankful depiction of the blessings that are apparent around us, sometimes buried in the busy goings of a modern world, but present all the same at any time. Like any great pieces of art Rei Naito's work makes us aware of what we've always known and unconsciously carried within us, but became oblivious in the busy daily execution of practical things.
After the dialogue we had a merry time in the "Pizza Mia" Italian restaurant near Bungeishuju building. The editor-in-chief Shigeki Okawa and Ms. Naoko Yamashita, who has edited my "Literature in the brain" essays in Bungakukai, were also present. The restaurant owner, the chef, and the waiter are all Italian. For strange and unknown reasons they do not speak a word of Japanese although the restaurant is situated in the heart of Tokyo and almost all the customers from local. The whole situation gave you a sense of traveling abroad, which was a nice little piece of midsummer's dream.


Rei Naito's "Pillows for the Dead" from the installation "Being Called"

My first download at the Apple iTunes Music Store

The long awaited Apple iTunes Music store opened here in Japan at last! I checked the site from my iTunes the first thing in the morning. They say there are roughly a million pieces on offer. I searched for some of my nostalgic numbers but could not find them. Maybe a million is not large enough to encompass the music universe that we all live in. The memorable first download was "Tounasuya- seidan" by the great Rakugo artist Kokontei Shinsho. Rakugo is the traditional Japanese art of comedy story-telling. A Rakugoka (Rakugo artist) sits on the floor to tell the comic story, so it is not a stand-up comedy, it is rather a sit-down comedy. "Tounasuya-seidan" is one of the most beloved masterpieces from the great Shinsho, about a delinquent son who repents and becomes a true man after some comic and yet heart-warming incidents in the ancient Tokyo of the Edo era (1603-1867).
I am happy to get this piece. Now I can listen to it on the Tokyo subway on my way to the lab.


My first download from the Apple iTunes Music Store was "Tounasuya-seidan" by Kokontei Shinsho, the famed Rakugo artist.

The taste of Guinness

I went to Dublin only once. I attended a conference organized by Tony Veale of the University College Dublin. When I and Yoshihide Tamori entered a pub on arrival, we were surprised to find ourselves in a dark room, with people's faces candle-lit in the many corners defined by chairs and tables. It was midday. The taste of our first genuine Guinness was quite impressive. In particular, the smooth and milky foam on top of the dark liquid really made one happy.
I have had some glasses of Guinness elsewhere, but never encountered that particular taste. So I concluded at that time that Guinness does not travel well. I thought that in order to taste the real one, you simply got to travel to Dublin.
Time passed, and modern technology made it possible to taste real Guinness on a daily basis here in Tokyo. I am not talking about the rapidly increasing Irish pubs here, I am referring to the canned beer on sale in the convenience stores. In the can, they have installed a special device called "floating widget", which produces the smooth creamy head that is the hallmark of Guinness in the Dublin pub. It is quite impressive.
So I don't have to travel to Dublin. I can just hop into one of the Tokyo convenience stores and by a can of Guinness. Then I think of the good times that I had we Tony Veale in Dublin, the musicality of the language, and feel a bit nostalgic.


The canned Guinness being sold in Tokyo

Piet Hut and the QRIO

Piet Hut came to visit our lab for the second time. Dr. Fumihide Tanaka of Sony Intelligence Dynamics Laboratories was also present. We discussed about Fumihide's experiment on robot-infant interaction going on in a San Diego nursery school. There are already some interesting aspects emerging from this ongoing research. Piet made some keen observations.
Shinichi Nozawa of Waseda University, and Nobuo Ishikawa of Tokyo Institute of Technology also participated in the discussion. They are most likely to join our lab starting next April.
After the serious talk, we continued our exchange of thoughts in a more relaxed environment of "Asari", a nice Izakaya in Gotanda area frequented by us. After some mugs of beer and glasses of sake, the border between robots and humans, or between sobriety and merriment, seemed to become even fuzzier.
After the merry but serious "symposium", Shinichi Nozawa and Takayasu Sekine walked Piet back to the hotel.


The Robot in question. Sony's Qrio

How science makes the feeling deeper for Penguins

The French film "March of the Penguins" directed by Luc Jacquet is being shown in Japan. I went to the preview show. Although the effort of the crew to shoot the breathtaking scenes through the harsh winter of the Antarctica is laudable, the film, in my perspective, was seriously flawed in two essential respects. The oversimplified impersonation of the emperor penguins and the cheap "poetic" narrative. These flaws made the wonderful scenes much less enjoyable than otherwise.
People sometimes don't realize how an objective and scientific understanding promotes a deeper appreciation of life, rather than dissecting it out of it vital force. Science is sometimes depicted as cold and impartial, but the most profound perception of what life involves actually comes from scientific understanding.
In these respects, David Attenborough's "Life In the Freezer" produced by BBC is far superior in depicting the trials of life faced by these magnificent creatures on the white earth. In this much-praised film, Attenborough describes the life of penguins in a dry, matter-of-fact way. The Penguins are not there to entertain us, they are there to survive, human sentimentalism having nothing to do with the daily overcoming of their trials.
The march of penguins was cheap poetry. Life in the freezer showed much deeper poetry, made possible only through a rigorous and objective appreciation of the life of a creature far removed from us like a distant star.


Much deeper poetry. David Attenborough's Life in the Freezer.

August!

When I was a kid, August was a special month. You had one month long vacation, in which you would go to places. Sometimes I would climb mountains with my parents. One year we went to Meshimori-yama in Nagano. I still remember the green slope, the gradual ascent to the top, and then the panoramic view. In those days you would follow somebody else's initiative, because you were small. There is a particular subjective feeling to following other's initiative. That is the hallmark of childhood. I sometimes miss the feeling. Nowadays I need to generate my own initiative and I do it in a matter-of-fact way. The long summer vacations are gone, and August is not a special month any more.


View of the Meshimori-yama mountain in Nagano.

Making "musical" out of the "Ring"

As a perfect Wagnerite I could not miss the New National Theater (in Tokyo) production of "Get back the Ring!". It was termed a "Kids Opera", so I expected some changes from the original work, Der Ring des Nibelungen. Actually the changes were substantial. What emerged from a substantial re-interpretation and arrangements from the original work was a "musical", with Brunnhilde portrayed as the beautiful princess and Siegfried as a suitor who would do bold things to win her love. Wotan is the King, who reluctantly, and then wholeheartedly, gives his daughter and the kingdom to the young hero.
All the music was from the original score, but the whole impression was that of a "musical", rather than a "music drama". I realized that the difference between a musical and an opera is not only in the music but also in the (con)text.
The musical format is well accepted in today's highly commercialism-oriented society, but it does not, in its prevalent style, really have a power to make one stop and think about deep issues such as death, life, and love.
The "musical" presented by the New National Theater probably left the kids and their well-meaning parents happy, but I wonder whether the audience were touched in a real sense either directly or indirectly by the greatness of the original work. In the original music drama, a man has to forsake love in order to win political power. There's incest and murder. One is bound by his own commitment in the past, and the space for free will is gradually diminished until one is led to the conclusion that the only way out is total self-denial. Then, when all the entangled elements appear to be just impossible to handle, the redemption by love gives a deeply satisfactory ending to the whole saga.
Although it is certainly a high order to depict all this in a "Kids Opera", I certainly think that it was possible to depict some elements, something that would inflict a benevolent "scar" on a child's heart. Every great work of art leaves a scar on one's mind, and the appreciation starts with the healing process.
"Get back the Ring!" failed to leave a scar, at least on this listener's heart. It was a great opportunity lost, for the kids in the theater and the well-meaning art directors of the New National Theater.

http://www.nntt.jac.go.jp/english/season/s266e/s266e.html


Poster advertising "Get Back the Ring!"

Piet Hut's hightlights.

Piet Hut's hightlights.

The famed astrophysicist Piet Hut, who recently came to visit me, has a log of the highlights of his life. He was kind enough to put a pointer on his blog. Here I put my pointer to Piet, so that people can surf in a closed loop if they wish.
http://www.ids.ias.edu/~piet/act/high.html


Prof. Piet Hut of the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton.

James Joyce's delirium.

I used to have a very beautiful copy of "Dubliners" by James Joyce. I purchased it in a second-hand bookshop in Cambridge, U.K., where I was studying as a postdoctoral fellow. The book came with lots of photos of the old Dublin, possibly from the time of Joyce. I was very fond of the book, and would read excerpts in my bed before I go to sleep. I somehow lost the copy and my favorite pictures are gone.
I think the first encounter with Joyce was The Boarding House. It was given as a reader for the summer vacation at senior high. I still remember one word; "delirium". It was in the phrase "They used to kiss. He remembered well her eyes, the touch of her hand and his delirium...."
The novel goes on to say "but delirium passes". In my case, somehow the delirium stuck with me, and I still read Dubliners from time to time. "Dubliners" for me represents the best in English prose.
I have not yet challenged the more intimidating pieces of Joyce. They should be good, coming from such a genius.

Earthquakes real and imagined.

We sometimes have earthquakes in Japan. In Tokyo, we have not had a really bad one in my personal history since birth. They say we may have the real thing at any time. Like any great earthquake centers in the world, such as California or Italy, it may strike today or tomorrow, but there is nothing you really can do about it.
Recently we've had some mildly bad earthquakes. There was no serious casualty, though. Yesterday there was yet another one. When I am in the middle of an earthquake, like recently, I sometimes wonder why I am not feeling that scared. Then I realize I have experienced worse ones in my dream.
From my childhood, probably because I grew up in an earthquake-rich region, I sometimes had earthquake dreams. In some of them, I would be in a building, and the building would swing to-and-fro, really slowly and with large amplitude. These imagined earthquake experiences left me bewildered and awed, like the very foundation of the world in which I exist is shuddered.
My dreams perhaps prepared myself for the really big ones, imagined or otherwise, so that the impression that actual earthquakes have on me is somehow diminished. In real life I have never experienced such an awful earthquake, swinging to-and-fro. But I surely have some idea what it would be like when it occurs.

Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman.

When I was at graduate school, I read this book 10 times. It was that good. Several years have passed since I last read it, but I still remember some of the funny stuff.
What is great about Richard Feynman is his refusal to take anything too seriously. Rather, he refused to take anything too seriously because he was damn serious. When you think of it, only people who are not really serious appear to be serious. Seriousness in appearance is different from seriousness in essence.
My girl friend at that time used to do private tutoring for students who wanted to do well in university entrance exams. She used to make the student read excerpts from Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman. She said the pupil liked the chapter on how to become friendly with women. Now, that was funny, with Richard Feynman trying out the instructions of the bar master, almost failing, but then sticking to his gun, and finally getting the reward. If you scratch your head and don't know what it is all about as you read this blog, then you should definitely read this book. I assure you that you would be laughing like mad before long.

Volcano Whales

The other day (30 June) I was attending the "Characters Forum" of Tokyo Foundation, and I started to draw illustrations on my notebook again.
They are supposed to represent my current mind-set. I want to be spacious and relaxed as a whale, and yet would like to "explode" like the volcano. Thus the "volcano whale" is born.



larger file
http://www.qualia-manifesto.com/volcanowhale2.JPG

The typhoon airplane.

I went to the southern island of Kyushu to give a lecture in Prof. Shigeki Watanuki's class. I talked about qualia, contemporary art, uncertainty and emotion. After the lecture, I hurried to the airport, as a major typhoon was approaching Tokyo. Every year Japan is hit by several typhoons. Sometimes we have serious disaster such as landslide and flood. Most of the time, the inconvenience due to disrupted traffic is the main concern. As the air service was vulnerable, I tried to get on an earlier plane than planned. I was lucky to get a seat on the ANA 14:10 flight. However, they mentioned that it was a conditional flight meaning they might return back to Hakata if the weather conditions in Tokyo were bad.
The plane landed without trouble, after making several turns above Tokyo. I went straight to Yomiuri Shimbun (the largest circulation newspaper in Japan) to attend the book review committee. After the committee, I met with some of my friends, including the famous journalist and T.V. commentator Yosihu Arita. We drank beer and sake and showed our perseverance in defiance of the storm.

The potentialities of children.

It is always good to look back on your childhood and re-experience the uneasiness and clumsiness that inexperienced life necessarily involves. We tend to think that as you get older you become wiser. If you measure wisdom in terms of achievements and storage, that may be right. However, when appreciated in terms of the potentialities for the unknown, childhood has a clear edge over adulthood. Some schools of Chinese philosophy maintained that you reach the pinnacle of your life at the age of 5. At around that age, you experience the world in a poignant twilight, with everything in principle possible, and yet bound to the earth through an undeniable sense of enshrinement within your flesh. You have not yet developed a convenient system of concepts and beliefs that would dispel the heavy feeling of existence. When I look back on that twilight age, I come back refreshed, with potentialities within myself for ways to look at the world from alternative and more interesting perspectives.

Fellow travelers in the platonic world.

One of the most interesting aspects of the world we live in is the coupling between individuality and universality.
When we think in terms of materials in space-time, individuality seems to be absolute. On the other hand, if we think in terms of the platonic entities, individuality becomes suddenly relative. In physical space-time, the distance between two objects assures the individuality. On the other hand, in the abstract conceptual space, there is no such a thing as a physical distance that requires a finite time to be traveled.
This rather abstract reasoning becomes important when one considers the individuality of personal experience. Our strong belief that each of us is enshrined in a private world of experience comes from the fact that we are separated in terms of real physical space. However, when we consider the platonic space to which we have access through our experience, we might not be separated in that absolute sense. For example, when there are two identical histories of brain processes in spatially separated locations in the universe, the platonic world accessed through the resulting mentalities would be identical.
In terms of practical wisdom, we should regard ourselves as fellow travelers in the platonic world, accessing the same set of platonic entities (qualia), no matter how distant we are in terms of physical space. Thereon you can base your compassion and co-suffering with your fellow men.

Ozu's Tokyo Story

The encounter with Ozu's Tokyo Story had a particular significance in my life.
I was in the graduate school in the physics department of the University of Tokyo, and would pass by a rental video store as I went to give lectures at a preparatory school for the University entrance exams. I was teaching part time in that school to pay my fees. One day I went into the store and chanced upon Tokyo Story. At that time, I was quite influenced by Western culture, appreciating Tarkovsky and Visconti. Although I enjoyed going to the traditional Japanese drama theatre such as Kabuki and Noh, as far as films were concerned, I was not really expecting that something of such a magnitude as to shatter my soul into pieces would come out of the Japanese film genre. Kurosawa for me was too dramatic and explicit. So it was just with a whimsical twist that I took up Tokyo Story and brought it to the rental counter on that particular day.
The first time I saw it, I was under the impression that I had just experienced something quite new and profound, but I could not verbalize what my soul received. A few months passed, and I had a growing desire to see Tokyo Story again. I went into the rental video shop and checked it out. The second viewing was dynamite. I was particularly gripped by the Noriko character (played by the great Setsuko Hara). The last scenes shot in Onomichi (a seaside town in western Japan) seemed to depict a spiritual tranquility and beauty beyond description. I knew I had to go to Onomichi. One week after the second viewing, I took the Shinkansen train from Tokyo station and made my homage to the small town. Although many things had changed, I could still recognize some spots shown in the film. In particular, the boat quay was the same as in the film. (If you have seen the film, you would remember the poignant passage of scenes as morning dawns in the town of Onomichi after the old mother passed away). I spent two wonderful days wandering through the small streets in Onomichi. It was the time of the cherry blossoms, and the view from the Senkoji-park was beautiful beyond description. To this day. the trip to Onomichi inspired by Tokyo Story remains one of the most sentimental and memorable in my life.

Shigeo Miki memorial symposium.

I gave a talk in the 14th Shigeo Miki memorial symposium held in Geidai (Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music). I talked about the importance of the unrecallable memories in cognition and life. The theme came from my personal experience.
The anatomist Shigeo Miki (1925-1987) had a huge influence over the students in Geidai with his philosophy of "life memory" combined with a detailed discussion of the anatomical structure of various life forms from the fish to the man. Although I had come across his name in passing on several occasions, I never read his book, and thought that my life and Miki had little in common so far.
Then I suddenly realized that I actually had an opportunity to listen to one of the two lectures that Miki gave in the medical school of the Todai (University of Tokyo). I was 22 then. I was walking with my girl friend in the Todai campus, when I glanced upon this notice of a lecture on the development of human fetus in the womb ("The World of the Fetus", it said). Without much awareness I went into the lecture room. The man in the podium talked about how the prenatal development of the human body went through the various stages that the life followed in the long history of evolution. His enthusiasm was electrifying. When the lecture was over, and the lights were on, there was a huge applause.
Then I noticed something strange. My jacket was
wet on my left shoulder. Turning my face, I discovered that my girl friend was weeping. We went out of the lecture room, into the refreshing breeze of May. I asked her what was wrong. She said, after seeing so many photos of human fetus, she wondered why humans couldn't stop fighting each other.
That was a precious moment in my life, but for one reason or another I completely forgot about it. After almost 20 years, after reading a magazine article on Shigeo Miki I had a most strange feeling. Maybe that particular lecture I attended with my girl friend so many years ago was actually given by Shigeo Miki himself. I made enquiries to Hideto Fuse, professor at Geidai, and he confirmed my speculation was almost certainly true.
The very foundation of how I think about human memory was shaken by this experience. In the many years that I was oblivious of the Miki lecture, I think I was unconsciously influenced by what he said on that particular day. For example, when I went to the island of Bali and sat on the beach at night, listening to the waves gently breaking, there were moments when I thought about how our ancestors came ashore from the sea to the land. When I overheard that somebody was pregnant, I unconsciously reflected on the long history of the evolution of life.
In a silent and profound manner, the lecture by Shigeo Miki left a deep impact on my mind, with the particular memory never consciously recalled


Anatomist and thinker Shigeo Miki (1925-1987)

Roll over the neural correlates

In our lab meeting Thursday I discussed the concept of the neural correlates of consciousness (NCC). Proposed in a series of papers by Francis Crick and Christof Koch, NCC has become the central issue in the scientific study of consciousness.
NCC is good in terms of providing lots of stuff to do. With the advancement of the brain activity measurement we are beginning to work out the detailed mapping between the brain's physical activities and our mental activities. There will be things to do for the next 10 to 20 years, at least.
On the other hand, just studying the neural correlates seems like an easy way out, with the heavy stone of the hard problem of consciousness left unturned. The very fact that you can do lots of things along a particular conceptual line is a testimony that it involves much of easy stuff.
In the discussion, I pointed out that the neural correlates as it stands today in neuroscience is not really pursued with logical rigor and relentless will to go to the finish line. The very concept of neural correlates is full of internal problems, which, if examined in detail and logical rigidity, would reveal some astonishing and non-trivial conclusions about the physical foundations of mentality.
Therefore, it is not wise to treat the neural correlates in a light-hearted manner. We need to take the neural correlates seriously.

Kuwahara Moichi's style of comedy.

It was Laurent Anzai Momy who introduced me to Moichi Kuwahara. Moichi produced the mega-hit album by Y.M.O. (Yellow Magic Orchestra) "Zoushoku". Moichi is famous for the "Snakeman Show" series broadcast on radio. Although quite successful, he is a quite unassuming person. After the first encounter, I got to know Moichi quite well, with my particular interest in his style of comedy stimulating a lot of thought.
Yesterday I went to visit the headquarters of his comedy kingdom and had a chat. There is something that Moichi has up his sleeves. In the northern Island of Hokkaido, there is going to be the hugely popular Rising Sun Rock festival. In that festival, Moichi is going to produce the "Black Hole" comedy tent in which there will be some comedy acts as well as other entertainments. I will be featured in the talk show on British comedy with Yasunari Suda, the well-know comedy critic.
I am very much looking forward to the festival. Summer in Hokkaido is something quite special, with long-lasting daylight and beautiful weather. Probably we will have an all-night party after the act.



Moichi Kuwahara, the Comedy King

Dialogue with Oriza Hirata

I had a dialogue with the famed dramatist Oriza Hirata in the Setagaya Public Theatre in Tokyo. Oriza is known for such pieces as "Tokyo Note". Our dialogue will be published in the Drama magazine of SPT.
Oriza and I are both concerned with how people from different contexts can try to understand each other. Many people satisfy themselves in staying in one context. Some people are under the illusion that accomplishments made in one particular context automatically translate into something universal. In actuality, relevance in one context does not always travel well in another. In particular, when people from different cultural backgrounds meet, there is a genuine need to go out of your own context and try to extend the self-- a demanding and often failing attempt, a food for the soul even so.
Myself, I would like to go out of my own context. I would like to understand the context in which other people live, to stretch out my short arm and embrace their private worries and ambitions. Without that kind of attempt, life is not worth living.


Oriza Hirata, the Japanese dramatist.