1 00:00:03,040 --> 00:00:06,119 Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how stopworks 2 00:00:06,120 --> 00:00:14,600 Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 3 00:00:14,640 --> 00:00:17,119 Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. We 4 00:00:17,160 --> 00:00:19,959 Speaker 1: are entering into Chinese New Year here, we're about to 5 00:00:20,200 --> 00:00:23,560 Speaker 1: enter the Year of the Dog, leaving behind the Year 6 00:00:23,600 --> 00:00:26,480 Speaker 1: of the Rooster. Yeah. So, you know, we we occasionally 7 00:00:26,480 --> 00:00:29,560 Speaker 1: touch on Chinese and Eastern topics throughout the year, but 8 00:00:29,560 --> 00:00:31,800 Speaker 1: this is always a good time to to really focus 9 00:00:31,840 --> 00:00:33,879 Speaker 1: on a couple of really good ones, and that's what 10 00:00:33,960 --> 00:00:36,000 Speaker 1: we have today. Yeah. So the Lunar New Year is 11 00:00:36,040 --> 00:00:39,680 Speaker 1: coming up on Friday, February, and this week we're doing 12 00:00:39,680 --> 00:00:43,479 Speaker 1: a couple of episodes related to Chinese culture and some 13 00:00:43,600 --> 00:00:48,400 Speaker 1: technological and scientific tie INDs. And so today's episode is 14 00:00:48,440 --> 00:00:50,560 Speaker 1: going to feature the bulk of it's going to be 15 00:00:50,560 --> 00:00:53,880 Speaker 1: an interview we did with the author of a book 16 00:00:54,080 --> 00:00:58,720 Speaker 1: about the history of the Chinese typewriter. The full title 17 00:00:58,760 --> 00:01:01,840 Speaker 1: of the book is The Chinese Typewriter, a History and 18 00:01:01,840 --> 00:01:05,720 Speaker 1: it's published by M I T Press in Yeah, it's 19 00:01:05,720 --> 00:01:07,759 Speaker 1: available wherever you get your books, so you can get 20 00:01:07,800 --> 00:01:11,160 Speaker 1: it in digital form or print. Now, Robert, you you 21 00:01:11,200 --> 00:01:14,120 Speaker 1: picked this book out, Well, what appealed to you about it. Well, 22 00:01:14,160 --> 00:01:16,960 Speaker 1: I basically received a release about it about this book 23 00:01:17,600 --> 00:01:20,880 Speaker 1: from Thomas S. Mulaney, who's Associate professor of Chinese History 24 00:01:20,880 --> 00:01:27,199 Speaker 1: at Stanford University and curator of the international exhibition Radical Machines, China, 25 00:01:27,480 --> 00:01:32,120 Speaker 1: Chinese and the Information Age. And I really hadn't thought 26 00:01:32,160 --> 00:01:34,360 Speaker 1: about this before, but I instantly thought, yeah, well, you 27 00:01:34,400 --> 00:01:38,920 Speaker 1: know the Chinese language, Mandarin, Chinese characters, how does that 28 00:01:38,959 --> 00:01:42,200 Speaker 1: fit into the information age? How has that fit into 29 00:01:42,240 --> 00:01:45,320 Speaker 1: the information age? And so I said, well, let's let's 30 00:01:45,319 --> 00:01:47,280 Speaker 1: get back to that. Let's let's read this book and 31 00:01:47,440 --> 00:01:49,000 Speaker 1: uh and see what it has to offer. And it 32 00:01:49,120 --> 00:01:52,880 Speaker 1: was a really mind blowing read. Yeah, really interesting and 33 00:01:52,920 --> 00:01:57,480 Speaker 1: thinking about the ways that technology formed the substrates on 34 00:01:57,600 --> 00:02:01,400 Speaker 1: which our languages evolved, and like, uh, this tension that's 35 00:02:01,440 --> 00:02:06,160 Speaker 1: constantly existing with information technology. Does the technology change the 36 00:02:06,200 --> 00:02:09,120 Speaker 1: way you use information? Or will the way you use 37 00:02:09,240 --> 00:02:14,160 Speaker 1: information shape the necessary features of technology? So we'll definitely 38 00:02:14,200 --> 00:02:17,600 Speaker 1: be discussing that with with Thomas Mullaney. But before we 39 00:02:17,639 --> 00:02:20,639 Speaker 1: get into that, I think we should just address the 40 00:02:20,760 --> 00:02:24,760 Speaker 1: issue behind the subject of the Chinese typewriter. Now, if 41 00:02:24,760 --> 00:02:29,200 Speaker 1: somebody isn't familiar with the written version of Chinese with 42 00:02:29,360 --> 00:02:33,119 Speaker 1: Chinese characters that it might not be immediately apparent to them. 43 00:02:33,600 --> 00:02:38,480 Speaker 1: Why the idea of a Chinese typewriter would be especially interesting. Yeah, 44 00:02:38,560 --> 00:02:40,720 Speaker 1: that's right, because you might just think, oh, well, we 45 00:02:40,800 --> 00:02:44,560 Speaker 1: have our letters, they have their letters wrong. Uh, Chinese 46 00:02:44,919 --> 00:02:47,720 Speaker 1: does not have an alphabet. Now, certainly you can you 47 00:02:47,760 --> 00:02:51,880 Speaker 1: can write Chinese and say opinion, which is a version 48 00:02:51,880 --> 00:02:55,320 Speaker 1: of our Roman alphabet with with with accent marks added 49 00:02:55,320 --> 00:02:58,239 Speaker 1: to let you know how the tones are to be pronounced. 50 00:02:58,760 --> 00:03:00,679 Speaker 1: But for the most part of any points that you 51 00:03:00,720 --> 00:03:06,280 Speaker 1: have this colonialism globalization of language that spreads around the world, 52 00:03:06,360 --> 00:03:09,200 Speaker 1: and it's based on that Roman alphabet. And then meanwhile 53 00:03:09,280 --> 00:03:13,280 Speaker 1: you have you have the Chinese with these these characters 54 00:03:13,280 --> 00:03:16,359 Speaker 1: that do not fit within that system. You can essentially 55 00:03:16,360 --> 00:03:18,840 Speaker 1: think of it as a system of pictograms, but they're 56 00:03:18,919 --> 00:03:22,280 Speaker 1: highly stylized pictures of what they represent. As many as 57 00:03:22,400 --> 00:03:27,600 Speaker 1: nine are compounds of a meaning element and a sound element. 58 00:03:28,040 --> 00:03:29,720 Speaker 1: So you can't just look at them and say, oh, 59 00:03:29,720 --> 00:03:33,160 Speaker 1: that's a river, that's a that's a robot, etcetera. They're 60 00:03:33,160 --> 00:03:36,760 Speaker 1: they're far more complex than that. And uh, I've read 61 00:03:37,520 --> 00:03:42,120 Speaker 1: that you need to know somewhere between twelve hundred and 62 00:03:42,160 --> 00:03:45,280 Speaker 1: fifteen hundred characters to get the basic gist of a 63 00:03:45,400 --> 00:03:49,000 Speaker 1: Chinese newspaper. But you need to know between two thousand 64 00:03:49,080 --> 00:03:52,360 Speaker 1: and three thousand characters to really get a sufficient understanding 65 00:03:52,400 --> 00:03:55,600 Speaker 1: of the information. Meanwhile, a well educated Chinese speaker in 66 00:03:55,640 --> 00:04:00,160 Speaker 1: today's world likely knows six thousand to eight thousand characters. 67 00:04:00,760 --> 00:04:02,800 Speaker 1: And if you're wondering, well, where does that stand in 68 00:04:03,160 --> 00:04:05,760 Speaker 1: terms of all the characters, Well, you can look at 69 00:04:05,800 --> 00:04:09,720 Speaker 1: some of the major Chinese lexicons out there and they're 70 00:04:09,800 --> 00:04:12,320 Speaker 1: numbering in the tens of thousands. One figure I saw 71 00:04:12,400 --> 00:04:16,280 Speaker 1: it was forty seven thousand Chinese characters. Now, that doesn't 72 00:04:16,279 --> 00:04:20,720 Speaker 1: necessarily mean that Chinese speakers would recognize forty seven thousand 73 00:04:20,920 --> 00:04:23,919 Speaker 1: characters when reading in the same way that you might read. 74 00:04:24,000 --> 00:04:28,080 Speaker 1: You know a book of specialized terminology that has specialized 75 00:04:28,760 --> 00:04:31,360 Speaker 1: words in English, and you wouldn't necessarily know what those 76 00:04:31,400 --> 00:04:34,280 Speaker 1: words mean, right, Yeah. I think of the thickest dictionary 77 00:04:34,400 --> 00:04:36,480 Speaker 1: English dictionary you've ever picked up, and think of all 78 00:04:36,480 --> 00:04:41,040 Speaker 1: the words that that instantly don't resonate with you, and 79 00:04:41,080 --> 00:04:43,400 Speaker 1: you'll have some sense of what we're looking at here. 80 00:04:43,600 --> 00:04:46,480 Speaker 1: But you do have this major difference in that in 81 00:04:46,880 --> 00:04:49,480 Speaker 1: a language like English, you can look at a word 82 00:04:49,760 --> 00:04:52,320 Speaker 1: and it's made out of letters that are familiar to you, 83 00:04:52,400 --> 00:04:54,479 Speaker 1: even if the word isn't familiar to you. So even 84 00:04:54,480 --> 00:04:56,719 Speaker 1: if you have no idea what our word means, you 85 00:04:56,760 --> 00:05:02,200 Speaker 1: could almost instantly transcribe the word on a typewriter, keyboard 86 00:05:02,320 --> 00:05:07,400 Speaker 1: or whatever with Chinese characters, not necessarily the case. That's right, uh. 87 00:05:07,480 --> 00:05:09,400 Speaker 1: And another thing I want to touch on here is 88 00:05:09,440 --> 00:05:12,800 Speaker 1: that in China you have eight major dialect groups, and 89 00:05:12,839 --> 00:05:15,400 Speaker 1: we call these dialects, but as Milani points out, there 90 00:05:15,440 --> 00:05:19,520 Speaker 1: as mutually distinct as Portuguese and French in some cases. 91 00:05:19,920 --> 00:05:22,640 Speaker 1: But Mandarin is the official language of course, but still 92 00:05:22,680 --> 00:05:26,360 Speaker 1: all these different dialects, they depend upon the Chinese character system. 93 00:05:26,480 --> 00:05:30,320 Speaker 1: So so whether you're talking about Mandarin or Cantonese, Uh, 94 00:05:30,440 --> 00:05:33,520 Speaker 1: it's the same characters, but in practice Cantonese ads I 95 00:05:33,520 --> 00:05:36,240 Speaker 1: think about three thousand specialized characters. On top of that, 96 00:05:36,360 --> 00:05:39,839 Speaker 1: but think about the unifying influence of having characters like that. 97 00:05:39,920 --> 00:05:43,159 Speaker 1: So you can have a country that is, you know, 98 00:05:43,200 --> 00:05:47,040 Speaker 1: it's considered a people, the Chinese people of the Chinese country, 99 00:05:47,200 --> 00:05:50,320 Speaker 1: and they share a government and in a sense they 100 00:05:50,360 --> 00:05:53,799 Speaker 1: share a language because they have these shared characters, even 101 00:05:53,839 --> 00:05:58,040 Speaker 1: though they speak very very distinct oral languages. That's right. 102 00:05:58,120 --> 00:06:01,920 Speaker 1: And then you enter this age where your internal system 103 00:06:01,920 --> 00:06:06,280 Speaker 1: of communication, written communication is at odds with the with 104 00:06:06,320 --> 00:06:09,159 Speaker 1: what's really becoming kind of a global standard. And it's 105 00:06:09,200 --> 00:06:11,960 Speaker 1: that tug of war that most of Mulaney's book focuses on. 106 00:06:12,480 --> 00:06:14,359 Speaker 1: All right, than, Robert, are you ready to go to 107 00:06:14,400 --> 00:06:20,000 Speaker 1: our interview with Thomas Laney. Let's do it, all right, Tom, 108 00:06:20,040 --> 00:06:22,240 Speaker 1: thank you for joining us on stuff to blow your mind. 109 00:06:22,800 --> 00:06:24,560 Speaker 1: It's it's a pleasure to be here. Well, we have 110 00:06:24,880 --> 00:06:28,480 Speaker 1: been reading your book, The Chinese Typewriter, A History. I 111 00:06:28,520 --> 00:06:30,279 Speaker 1: suppose the first question I have for you here today 112 00:06:30,320 --> 00:06:33,839 Speaker 1: is when you talk to people about your book, do 113 00:06:33,960 --> 00:06:37,720 Speaker 1: you encounter any of the key historic reactions to and 114 00:06:37,800 --> 00:06:42,240 Speaker 1: prejudices against just the idea the notion of a Chinese typewriter. 115 00:06:42,680 --> 00:06:46,440 Speaker 1: I would say all the time. It's what. One of 116 00:06:46,480 --> 00:06:51,120 Speaker 1: the things that was at first surprising and then I 117 00:06:51,240 --> 00:06:53,000 Speaker 1: and then I had more time to think about it 118 00:06:53,240 --> 00:06:57,120 Speaker 1: over the course of working on the book, was that 119 00:06:57,200 --> 00:07:02,279 Speaker 1: the consistency with which people would imagine in their minds 120 00:07:02,360 --> 00:07:07,279 Speaker 1: I what they assumed or expected a Chinese typewriter to 121 00:07:07,360 --> 00:07:13,000 Speaker 1: look like and um in essence, regardless of where I 122 00:07:13,080 --> 00:07:15,560 Speaker 1: was in the US or in Europe or An Asia, 123 00:07:15,600 --> 00:07:19,640 Speaker 1: including China. In many cases, the assumption kind of led 124 00:07:19,840 --> 00:07:24,200 Speaker 1: someone to the same expectation, which was a massive machine 125 00:07:24,960 --> 00:07:31,360 Speaker 1: with thousands of keys on this gigantic keyboard. And what's 126 00:07:31,360 --> 00:07:35,080 Speaker 1: surprising about this is that people arrive at this conclusion 127 00:07:36,080 --> 00:07:42,880 Speaker 1: without necessarily or almost never having seen such an image. 128 00:07:42,960 --> 00:07:47,760 Speaker 1: They just sort of created algorithmically in their mind. And 129 00:07:47,800 --> 00:07:50,760 Speaker 1: I think what I came to the kind of the 130 00:07:50,800 --> 00:07:56,880 Speaker 1: conclusion of is that the the what's going on in 131 00:07:56,880 --> 00:07:59,040 Speaker 1: in our minds when we when we think about a 132 00:07:59,120 --> 00:08:02,520 Speaker 1: Chinese typewriter, it's a kind of it's like a mental algorithm. 133 00:08:02,520 --> 00:08:05,600 Speaker 1: It's a it's a it's a very short computer program 134 00:08:05,640 --> 00:08:09,520 Speaker 1: that runs in our mind and it goes something like this. Well, 135 00:08:09,560 --> 00:08:12,880 Speaker 1: I know that by definition, a typewriter is a machine 136 00:08:13,360 --> 00:08:17,320 Speaker 1: with a keyboard and keys. I know that there is 137 00:08:17,360 --> 00:08:20,400 Speaker 1: one key per letter. I know that Chinese doesn't have 138 00:08:20,520 --> 00:08:23,040 Speaker 1: letters that has characters, and I know that there are 139 00:08:23,040 --> 00:08:26,200 Speaker 1: tens of thousands of characters where I've heard that. Ergo, 140 00:08:26,280 --> 00:08:29,680 Speaker 1: I've reached the conclusion about what in my mind's I 141 00:08:29,840 --> 00:08:33,000 Speaker 1: a Chinese typewriter looks like um. And in the book, 142 00:08:33,040 --> 00:08:37,240 Speaker 1: what I tried to do is say, now there is 143 00:08:37,320 --> 00:08:42,360 Speaker 1: a total equation set up between keyboards, keys and typewriters. 144 00:08:42,360 --> 00:08:46,560 Speaker 1: There's no such thing as a typewriter without keys in 145 00:08:46,559 --> 00:08:49,160 Speaker 1: in the market, uh, and also in our imagination. But 146 00:08:49,200 --> 00:08:51,560 Speaker 1: if we go back early enough in the history of 147 00:08:51,559 --> 00:08:55,440 Speaker 1: the typewriter, including the Western typewriter, we very quickly get 148 00:08:55,480 --> 00:09:00,360 Speaker 1: into this you know, sort of amazing and very verse, 149 00:09:01,080 --> 00:09:06,520 Speaker 1: kind of Jurassic ecology of typewriters, many different types of typewriters, 150 00:09:06,559 --> 00:09:10,760 Speaker 1: including typewriters that had no keys or keyboards themselves. And 151 00:09:10,840 --> 00:09:14,200 Speaker 1: that in essence, the Chinese typewriter, which is a key 152 00:09:14,320 --> 00:09:17,120 Speaker 1: which is a typewriter that has no keyboard and no keys, 153 00:09:17,960 --> 00:09:23,360 Speaker 1: is a descendant of a sort of early early species 154 00:09:23,360 --> 00:09:26,080 Speaker 1: of typewriter that in the West died out, the typewriter 155 00:09:26,120 --> 00:09:29,840 Speaker 1: with no keyboard, but in China, um, you know, lived 156 00:09:29,880 --> 00:09:34,480 Speaker 1: on and continued. It's it's it's it's evolution. Um. And 157 00:09:34,559 --> 00:09:36,760 Speaker 1: so now, when when the two meet again in the 158 00:09:36,840 --> 00:09:44,640 Speaker 1: year nineteen s two, Uh, when someone from the descendants 159 00:09:44,679 --> 00:09:47,760 Speaker 1: of the keyboard typewriter looks over and sees the descendants 160 00:09:47,880 --> 00:09:50,560 Speaker 1: of the non keyboard typewriter. They don't know what to 161 00:09:50,600 --> 00:09:52,200 Speaker 1: make of it. They don't know what they're looking at. 162 00:09:53,080 --> 00:09:55,319 Speaker 1: So there's a concept you talk about in the book 163 00:09:55,840 --> 00:10:00,760 Speaker 1: that you call the techno linguistic dimensions of a language. 164 00:10:00,760 --> 00:10:02,800 Speaker 1: And I was wondering if you could explain a little 165 00:10:02,800 --> 00:10:06,240 Speaker 1: bit about what you mean by the techno linguistic dimensions 166 00:10:06,280 --> 00:10:09,240 Speaker 1: of a language. And so, for example, what are some 167 00:10:09,400 --> 00:10:14,040 Speaker 1: of the techno linguistic aspects of modern American English? Has 168 00:10:14,080 --> 00:10:16,600 Speaker 1: a point of reference for our listeners, And then how 169 00:10:17,480 --> 00:10:21,280 Speaker 1: how do those same types of techno linguistic dimensions inform 170 00:10:21,400 --> 00:10:24,920 Speaker 1: the creation of the Chinese typewriter in history? In essence, 171 00:10:24,960 --> 00:10:33,600 Speaker 1: the techno linguistic dimension is every part of writing text 172 00:10:33,640 --> 00:10:40,880 Speaker 1: technology that is essential for writing to work and for 173 00:10:41,000 --> 00:10:46,120 Speaker 1: text technologies to function, but that are not uh simply 174 00:10:46,160 --> 00:10:49,040 Speaker 1: superficially on the page or on the screen the stuff 175 00:10:49,080 --> 00:10:52,679 Speaker 1: we read. And so, to give an example, I remember 176 00:10:53,640 --> 00:10:56,360 Speaker 1: earlier when I was in the early stages of working 177 00:10:56,559 --> 00:11:00,640 Speaker 1: on this project. I am a big believer in kind 178 00:11:00,640 --> 00:11:04,560 Speaker 1: of practice based theory. So take classes and things and 179 00:11:04,640 --> 00:11:08,199 Speaker 1: really try to understand the processes and machines you're thinking about, 180 00:11:08,280 --> 00:11:12,760 Speaker 1: because insight will emerge in that and so I I 181 00:11:13,120 --> 00:11:18,720 Speaker 1: enrolled in this intensive letter press practicum, so movable type 182 00:11:18,720 --> 00:11:22,679 Speaker 1: type setting and for for English, because I wanted to 183 00:11:23,320 --> 00:11:26,720 Speaker 1: step into you know, this space that there are obviously 184 00:11:26,800 --> 00:11:30,360 Speaker 1: many many practitioners of even today, but certainly over history, 185 00:11:30,559 --> 00:11:33,120 Speaker 1: and just see what it looks like. And there was one. 186 00:11:33,480 --> 00:11:35,200 Speaker 1: I mean, it's an amazing I took it at the 187 00:11:35,200 --> 00:11:37,880 Speaker 1: San Francisco Center for the book. It was just absolutely 188 00:11:38,160 --> 00:11:41,400 Speaker 1: tremendous um. But there's one thing in particular that stayed 189 00:11:41,440 --> 00:11:45,000 Speaker 1: with me, which is seems might seem incidental to someone 190 00:11:45,040 --> 00:11:47,320 Speaker 1: who is in that world for a long time, and 191 00:11:47,360 --> 00:11:50,680 Speaker 1: that is when when you or I looked at a 192 00:11:50,679 --> 00:11:55,400 Speaker 1: printed poster or a book or an article or whatever 193 00:11:55,440 --> 00:11:58,200 Speaker 1: it is, uh, and we see the you know, the 194 00:11:58,280 --> 00:12:00,199 Speaker 1: text block in the middle of the page each and 195 00:12:00,240 --> 00:12:02,320 Speaker 1: then we see the margins, the one inch margins on 196 00:12:02,320 --> 00:12:05,439 Speaker 1: the left and right to the top and bottom. I 197 00:12:05,440 --> 00:12:07,880 Speaker 1: would venture to guess that you, as as I, we 198 00:12:08,000 --> 00:12:11,800 Speaker 1: see emptiness, we see space. We see there is nothing there. Yes, 199 00:12:11,840 --> 00:12:14,960 Speaker 1: there's paper, but that's not where the text is. And 200 00:12:15,000 --> 00:12:18,120 Speaker 1: so if you, if you just stopped there, it would 201 00:12:18,120 --> 00:12:21,840 Speaker 1: be easy to imagine that that it really is made 202 00:12:21,920 --> 00:12:25,160 Speaker 1: up of nothingness. There's nothing there that's not where language happens, 203 00:12:25,200 --> 00:12:28,200 Speaker 1: and so forth. When you when you go through the 204 00:12:28,240 --> 00:12:32,240 Speaker 1: process of learning, in this case letter press, UH, you 205 00:12:32,320 --> 00:12:35,520 Speaker 1: realize that you actually have to build emptiness. You have 206 00:12:35,640 --> 00:12:38,520 Speaker 1: to build a space on the page quite literally, with 207 00:12:38,559 --> 00:12:42,120 Speaker 1: pieces of metal. So if you want there to be 208 00:12:42,640 --> 00:12:46,880 Speaker 1: spacing between the lines, you need you need letting union. 209 00:12:46,960 --> 00:12:49,040 Speaker 1: This is not just a digital term in our you 210 00:12:49,080 --> 00:12:52,160 Speaker 1: know abe platform. This is a this is a thin 211 00:12:52,360 --> 00:12:56,600 Speaker 1: sliver of metal whose whose dimensionality will will give you 212 00:12:56,760 --> 00:12:59,439 Speaker 1: so much space between the lines. And then you use 213 00:12:59,520 --> 00:13:04,080 Speaker 1: these various sized pieces of wood uh sometimes referred to 214 00:13:04,120 --> 00:13:08,920 Speaker 1: as furniture, that you build up around the block of 215 00:13:09,000 --> 00:13:11,880 Speaker 1: text that you're going to situate on the page. You 216 00:13:11,960 --> 00:13:14,200 Speaker 1: lock it in there really tight with these things called 217 00:13:14,240 --> 00:13:16,679 Speaker 1: coins that you kind of put in place, and then 218 00:13:16,760 --> 00:13:20,199 Speaker 1: kind of jack into position and hold it onto the 219 00:13:19,679 --> 00:13:22,800 Speaker 1: the type bed so it doesn't wiggle around when you're 220 00:13:22,840 --> 00:13:25,760 Speaker 1: printing UM. And then and then you put you know, 221 00:13:25,840 --> 00:13:27,839 Speaker 1: you you ink it, and you pull the paper through 222 00:13:28,400 --> 00:13:29,920 Speaker 1: and then it comes out on the other side, and 223 00:13:29,960 --> 00:13:31,760 Speaker 1: there you have it, a text block with one inch 224 00:13:31,840 --> 00:13:35,320 Speaker 1: margins and some much space and emptiness and so much 225 00:13:35,320 --> 00:13:38,959 Speaker 1: text like black on white, and suddenly your view of space, 226 00:13:39,040 --> 00:13:41,920 Speaker 1: or at least for me, the view of space changed radically. 227 00:13:41,960 --> 00:13:44,920 Speaker 1: It takes a lot of stuff to make nothing happen. 228 00:13:45,640 --> 00:13:48,080 Speaker 1: It takes a lot of And these and these pieces 229 00:13:48,120 --> 00:13:50,680 Speaker 1: of wooden furniture they don't have writing on them. I 230 00:13:50,679 --> 00:13:55,320 Speaker 1: can't read a piece of these, you know, these wooden blocks. Um, 231 00:13:55,480 --> 00:13:58,960 Speaker 1: So they're not operating in the same kind of heuristic 232 00:13:59,040 --> 00:14:02,280 Speaker 1: interpretive space as the actual Let's say it's a poem 233 00:14:02,360 --> 00:14:04,720 Speaker 1: by a you know, or or an essay or a 234 00:14:04,720 --> 00:14:07,120 Speaker 1: broadside that I can read and think about and debate, 235 00:14:07,200 --> 00:14:09,240 Speaker 1: and maybe it's a love letter or a wedding invitation. 236 00:14:09,320 --> 00:14:11,680 Speaker 1: All of this stuff that's so full of meaning in 237 00:14:11,720 --> 00:14:14,440 Speaker 1: the classic sense of the word. Well, there's all of 238 00:14:14,480 --> 00:14:18,760 Speaker 1: this meaninglessness, like these wooden pieces of things, like these, 239 00:14:18,920 --> 00:14:21,120 Speaker 1: these flats of metal that have to be you know, 240 00:14:21,280 --> 00:14:25,200 Speaker 1: for letting. Um, there's all of this meaninglessness that goes 241 00:14:25,320 --> 00:14:28,960 Speaker 1: into making that meaning work, whether whether it's a wedding 242 00:14:28,960 --> 00:14:34,520 Speaker 1: invitation or you know, or or an iconoclastic essay. Um 243 00:14:36,120 --> 00:14:40,480 Speaker 1: that would that metal is for me, part of this 244 00:14:41,040 --> 00:14:44,720 Speaker 1: admittedly very large category of techno linguistic It's all of 245 00:14:44,760 --> 00:14:48,920 Speaker 1: the the stuff, but also also all of the mental models, 246 00:14:49,120 --> 00:14:54,080 Speaker 1: categorization systems, workflows and processes and things that go into 247 00:14:54,120 --> 00:15:00,400 Speaker 1: making something work on the page. Experts, practition in ners. 248 00:15:00,480 --> 00:15:03,840 Speaker 1: People in these industries they know these things. I mean, 249 00:15:03,880 --> 00:15:06,320 Speaker 1: it's second nature for them. So it's it's not as 250 00:15:06,360 --> 00:15:10,800 Speaker 1: if I've discovered the Lost City of Atlantis. But um, 251 00:15:10,920 --> 00:15:13,640 Speaker 1: if they do their job well and and if they 252 00:15:13,640 --> 00:15:16,760 Speaker 1: succeed in their goal, their goal is to keep that 253 00:15:16,960 --> 00:15:20,600 Speaker 1: stuff invisible. You know, you don't want you don't want 254 00:15:20,640 --> 00:15:24,520 Speaker 1: a badly printed poem that kind of show, you know, something, 255 00:15:24,520 --> 00:15:26,440 Speaker 1: maybe maybe to get some ink gout on one of 256 00:15:26,480 --> 00:15:29,800 Speaker 1: those pieces of wood and an accidentally in the page. Well, 257 00:15:29,840 --> 00:15:32,080 Speaker 1: that's failure, you know that. That means it didn't work out. 258 00:15:32,120 --> 00:15:36,360 Speaker 1: You want that techno linguistic stuff to remain invisible. Um. 259 00:15:37,160 --> 00:15:42,800 Speaker 1: And but as for myself, as an historian of language change, 260 00:15:42,840 --> 00:15:49,920 Speaker 1: of text technologies, of especially of a family of text 261 00:15:50,000 --> 00:15:53,560 Speaker 1: technologies on the Chinese side, that, as I argue in 262 00:15:53,600 --> 00:15:58,200 Speaker 1: the book, has had been placed in this very asymmetric 263 00:15:58,320 --> 00:16:03,160 Speaker 1: unequal position in the global history of information technology. We 264 00:16:03,520 --> 00:16:06,160 Speaker 1: as the storians of information technology, we we really do 265 00:16:06,280 --> 00:16:11,680 Speaker 1: need to pay attention to that meaninglessness. Because oftentimes it's 266 00:16:11,720 --> 00:16:14,520 Speaker 1: in the space of the meaninglessness, not the not the 267 00:16:14,520 --> 00:16:17,800 Speaker 1: stuff that's on the page, the poem itself, where the 268 00:16:17,840 --> 00:16:20,760 Speaker 1: action is. Sometimes it is, but it's it's not necessarily 269 00:16:20,760 --> 00:16:23,320 Speaker 1: in the poem where the actions it might actually be 270 00:16:23,600 --> 00:16:28,480 Speaker 1: in the stuff around the poem that makes that poem 271 00:16:28,600 --> 00:16:34,640 Speaker 1: printapal transmittable, sabable in the first place. An example from 272 00:16:34,680 --> 00:16:40,080 Speaker 1: Asia that I really like to show actually comes from Japan. 273 00:16:40,920 --> 00:16:46,640 Speaker 1: There's this there's this wonderful YouTube video that shows a 274 00:16:47,120 --> 00:16:54,080 Speaker 1: turn of the century Japanese automaton, a calligraphy automaton. It 275 00:16:54,280 --> 00:16:59,360 Speaker 1: is constructed to look um like a Chinese woman with 276 00:16:59,480 --> 00:17:04,280 Speaker 1: a brush in hand, and when the gears move uh, 277 00:17:04,880 --> 00:17:10,440 Speaker 1: the the automaton composes a really beautifully wrought Chinese character 278 00:17:10,600 --> 00:17:16,080 Speaker 1: Kanji character. And the video shows I think it's newscasters. 279 00:17:16,119 --> 00:17:19,600 Speaker 1: It's part of a news broadcast in Japan contemporary maybe 280 00:17:19,600 --> 00:17:22,040 Speaker 1: a few years ago, showing people you know, like looing 281 00:17:22,080 --> 00:17:25,879 Speaker 1: and eyeing about this, and everyone is paying attention to 282 00:17:25,960 --> 00:17:29,960 Speaker 1: what's happening on the page, the character and what it 283 00:17:29,960 --> 00:17:33,320 Speaker 1: looks like as it comes out. But then in the back, 284 00:17:33,480 --> 00:17:35,439 Speaker 1: in the sort of the end of the video and 285 00:17:35,520 --> 00:17:40,120 Speaker 1: also behind the automaton for me, is where the actual 286 00:17:40,400 --> 00:17:48,040 Speaker 1: action is. They show the carefully carved series of really 287 00:17:48,080 --> 00:17:54,679 Speaker 1: woobily and wobbily wooden camshafts that are tucked away in 288 00:17:54,720 --> 00:17:58,720 Speaker 1: the back of the base of the automaton that when 289 00:17:58,800 --> 00:18:01,320 Speaker 1: this kind of it's kind of hard to describe. When 290 00:18:01,320 --> 00:18:06,000 Speaker 1: they's guiding almost almost like almost like a record a 291 00:18:06,000 --> 00:18:10,920 Speaker 1: record player, arm and needle is is tracing over these 292 00:18:10,960 --> 00:18:17,040 Speaker 1: camshafts as they turn. It's translating the machine is translating 293 00:18:17,040 --> 00:18:20,920 Speaker 1: the shape of those camshafts into the movement of the automaton, 294 00:18:21,359 --> 00:18:24,639 Speaker 1: which is then producing this perfect character on the page. 295 00:18:25,400 --> 00:18:31,040 Speaker 1: For me, those wooden camshafts uh at the construction of them, 296 00:18:31,400 --> 00:18:34,199 Speaker 1: the figuring out what shape each one needs to be 297 00:18:34,320 --> 00:18:36,560 Speaker 1: and what sequence and how do we build this device 298 00:18:36,640 --> 00:18:39,679 Speaker 1: that translates it into a character that to me is 299 00:18:39,720 --> 00:18:43,280 Speaker 1: actually the location of language. But if we were to 300 00:18:43,320 --> 00:18:47,000 Speaker 1: take those camshafts, you know, disassemble the machine, and I 301 00:18:47,119 --> 00:18:49,520 Speaker 1: just hand you a bunch of they look like you know, 302 00:18:50,440 --> 00:18:53,640 Speaker 1: they look like wooden plates, but they're not perfectly circular. 303 00:18:53,680 --> 00:18:56,080 Speaker 1: They've got a wobbly, wobbly kind of edge. If I 304 00:18:56,160 --> 00:19:00,679 Speaker 1: just handed them to you and said, what character is this? What? What? What? 305 00:19:00,680 --> 00:19:04,240 Speaker 1: What Japanese character is this? You couldn't read it. The 306 00:19:04,280 --> 00:19:06,520 Speaker 1: only way that it produces that character is in this 307 00:19:06,640 --> 00:19:10,399 Speaker 1: careful sequence. Um. So this is this is for me 308 00:19:10,480 --> 00:19:14,680 Speaker 1: at least, this is really interesting. Those those wooden camshafts, 309 00:19:14,720 --> 00:19:17,240 Speaker 1: you know, crafted by hand and at the you know, 310 00:19:17,280 --> 00:19:22,760 Speaker 1: in the late nineteenth late late nine or twentieth century. These, Um, 311 00:19:22,840 --> 00:19:27,439 Speaker 1: these camshafts are not a representation of that character, of 312 00:19:27,520 --> 00:19:30,280 Speaker 1: that Japanese character that comes out the other side. They 313 00:19:30,359 --> 00:19:35,640 Speaker 1: quite literally are that character when assembled in a particular sequence. 314 00:19:36,040 --> 00:19:39,960 Speaker 1: So that's that's to me is the techno linguistic. It 315 00:19:40,119 --> 00:19:45,919 Speaker 1: is this vast space of expert action and care and 316 00:19:45,960 --> 00:19:51,320 Speaker 1: attention and practice. Um. But it's not something you can 317 00:19:51,320 --> 00:19:54,840 Speaker 1: just simply read, uh, in a naked eye sense, the 318 00:19:54,840 --> 00:19:56,760 Speaker 1: way that we might be able to read an essay 319 00:19:56,840 --> 00:19:59,239 Speaker 1: or a poem and debate about it. But all of 320 00:19:59,240 --> 00:20:04,240 Speaker 1: this meaning business, this uninterpretability is what makes language work. 321 00:20:04,240 --> 00:20:09,960 Speaker 1: Without it, language just ceases to function in any language, Chinese, English, Japanese, 322 00:20:10,240 --> 00:20:13,639 Speaker 1: you name it. That explanation almost makes me think of 323 00:20:13,720 --> 00:20:17,360 Speaker 1: like the base pairs or the gene, the generator phenotype 324 00:20:17,359 --> 00:20:20,160 Speaker 1: in an animal that we only interact with the external 325 00:20:20,160 --> 00:20:24,359 Speaker 1: phenotype unless you're a genetic engineer researcher, but that the 326 00:20:25,040 --> 00:20:28,560 Speaker 1: thing in the external world is literally generated by this, 327 00:20:28,880 --> 00:20:31,440 Speaker 1: you know, behind the scenes code. I think that's right. 328 00:20:31,520 --> 00:20:35,800 Speaker 1: I think, I mean, I think that it's it's uh, 329 00:20:35,920 --> 00:20:37,840 Speaker 1: it's something that if you were just you just look 330 00:20:37,880 --> 00:20:40,320 Speaker 1: at it at the face of it, and this is true. 331 00:20:40,359 --> 00:20:42,159 Speaker 1: And you know, this is true in the realm of 332 00:20:43,119 --> 00:20:45,960 Speaker 1: certainly in the realm of early computing and contemporary computing. 333 00:20:46,680 --> 00:20:51,440 Speaker 1: The you know, if we we experience our MacBook prose 334 00:20:52,119 --> 00:20:54,760 Speaker 1: the way that we do because of the success of 335 00:20:54,840 --> 00:20:57,520 Speaker 1: a series of engineers and product designers who went out 336 00:20:57,560 --> 00:21:01,080 Speaker 1: of their way to conceal as much as possible what's 337 00:21:01,160 --> 00:21:03,920 Speaker 1: really going on. So when I type the letter, when 338 00:21:03,920 --> 00:21:07,000 Speaker 1: I when I depressed the key that has the symbol 339 00:21:07,080 --> 00:21:10,040 Speaker 1: that I recognize as F or G or H on it, 340 00:21:10,359 --> 00:21:13,840 Speaker 1: and then it appears on the screen. It happened so 341 00:21:14,040 --> 00:21:18,000 Speaker 1: fast that I can kind of live inside the fantasy, 342 00:21:18,080 --> 00:21:21,800 Speaker 1: live inside the fiction that in essence, this thing is 343 00:21:21,840 --> 00:21:24,080 Speaker 1: just like a digital typewriter. It's just I push it, 344 00:21:24,080 --> 00:21:26,320 Speaker 1: it translated some motion and then it put printed it 345 00:21:26,320 --> 00:21:29,320 Speaker 1: on the page. But of course that's not how it works. 346 00:21:29,359 --> 00:21:32,960 Speaker 1: I mean, there's there's all of these translations going on 347 00:21:33,080 --> 00:21:35,879 Speaker 1: to get from point A to point double Z. There's 348 00:21:36,520 --> 00:21:40,280 Speaker 1: there's regulations and coding standards and and then quite literally 349 00:21:41,119 --> 00:21:46,919 Speaker 1: you know, physical logic gates and and um. But and 350 00:21:47,000 --> 00:21:49,199 Speaker 1: so that space. If you were just to take away 351 00:21:49,359 --> 00:21:52,640 Speaker 1: the key that says F and take away the screen, 352 00:21:53,520 --> 00:21:56,919 Speaker 1: that that basically all the screen is doing is showing 353 00:21:56,920 --> 00:22:00,199 Speaker 1: you that the bit stream worked. But in men Gin, 354 00:22:00,280 --> 00:22:02,159 Speaker 1: what it looks like if you take away the screen 355 00:22:02,280 --> 00:22:06,040 Speaker 1: and take away the symbols on the keys, what exactly 356 00:22:06,200 --> 00:22:09,200 Speaker 1: is the letter s at that point? It's still there. 357 00:22:09,560 --> 00:22:11,520 Speaker 1: If you were to push the button and the computers 358 00:22:11,560 --> 00:22:13,960 Speaker 1: on it would still be doing what it's supposed to 359 00:22:13,960 --> 00:22:18,880 Speaker 1: be doing. But the the the kind of circuit of 360 00:22:19,080 --> 00:22:22,480 Speaker 1: interpretation that the human needs would not be complete. I 361 00:22:22,520 --> 00:22:25,119 Speaker 1: would not know whether or not I what letter I 362 00:22:25,160 --> 00:22:28,000 Speaker 1: had had had type. So what I'm interested in I 363 00:22:28,000 --> 00:22:31,040 Speaker 1: mean not to the exclusion of the surface parts of language, 364 00:22:31,040 --> 00:22:34,960 Speaker 1: but I think I want to include the spaces of 365 00:22:35,080 --> 00:22:40,359 Speaker 1: language which, like the genotype phenotype relationship, are happening in 366 00:22:40,400 --> 00:22:48,520 Speaker 1: this completely dark room. Um, you know, how how do 367 00:22:48,560 --> 00:22:52,000 Speaker 1: we think about the genotype without recourse to the phenotype 368 00:22:52,800 --> 00:22:54,480 Speaker 1: might be one way to put it, but I'm not 369 00:22:54,480 --> 00:22:57,679 Speaker 1: sure if that gets us any any further. All Right, 370 00:22:57,680 --> 00:22:59,280 Speaker 1: we're gonna take a quick break and when we come 371 00:22:59,280 --> 00:23:05,399 Speaker 1: back more with Thomas Mullaney. Alright, we're back, so too 372 00:23:05,440 --> 00:23:10,120 Speaker 1: many Westerners Mandarin Chinese present certain challenges. Chinese characters present 373 00:23:10,160 --> 00:23:12,800 Speaker 1: certain challenges, to say the least. But can you explain 374 00:23:12,880 --> 00:23:16,040 Speaker 1: some of the challenges that Chinese characters were seen to 375 00:23:16,200 --> 00:23:20,720 Speaker 1: pose to China itself in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Definitely, 376 00:23:20,760 --> 00:23:25,399 Speaker 1: there were there were many, um many that I would say, 377 00:23:26,320 --> 00:23:29,560 Speaker 1: many problems that were that that were sort of deservedly 378 00:23:29,800 --> 00:23:32,960 Speaker 1: laid at the feet of Chinese character writing, and some 379 00:23:33,680 --> 00:23:37,000 Speaker 1: that I think a sober analysis of history would say 380 00:23:37,000 --> 00:23:41,919 Speaker 1: it was an unfair thing to blame characters for. Um So, 381 00:23:43,760 --> 00:23:45,800 Speaker 1: I mean there's a there's a sort of it, there's 382 00:23:45,840 --> 00:23:49,600 Speaker 1: a series. One of them would certainly be that in 383 00:23:49,640 --> 00:23:54,240 Speaker 1: the late nineteenth century into the early twenty century, China 384 00:23:54,400 --> 00:23:57,760 Speaker 1: is undergoing, like many polities on Earth around this time, 385 00:23:57,840 --> 00:24:04,160 Speaker 1: is undergoing a uh a transition, and it's an uneasy one, 386 00:24:04,240 --> 00:24:09,760 Speaker 1: a transition between one form of organizing political power and 387 00:24:09,880 --> 00:24:13,119 Speaker 1: state craft so and it's kind of wrapped up in 388 00:24:13,160 --> 00:24:18,480 Speaker 1: the nutshell of the word empire U two a republic 389 00:24:19,440 --> 00:24:22,000 Speaker 1: and so you know, this is this This takes a 390 00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:24,760 Speaker 1: revolution to happen. It takes it arguably takes a civil 391 00:24:24,760 --> 00:24:27,960 Speaker 1: war to complete this transition. But one part of this 392 00:24:28,080 --> 00:24:36,639 Speaker 1: transition was a radical reconceptualization of where legitimacy for state 393 00:24:37,560 --> 00:24:42,399 Speaker 1: uh state rulers derives it, not the shift from the 394 00:24:42,480 --> 00:24:46,600 Speaker 1: derivation from heaven of the right to rule to a 395 00:24:46,600 --> 00:24:48,800 Speaker 1: a shift at least in people, you know, in the 396 00:24:48,880 --> 00:24:54,119 Speaker 1: argument to the people, whatever this word means. Well, one 397 00:24:54,160 --> 00:24:56,200 Speaker 1: of the issues, and this is this happens in many 398 00:24:56,359 --> 00:24:59,399 Speaker 1: of these sort of empire to nation state transitions, is 399 00:24:59,400 --> 00:25:02,800 Speaker 1: that people say, well, we need more of our people 400 00:25:02,960 --> 00:25:08,600 Speaker 1: to be involved or part of this political enterprise that 401 00:25:08,640 --> 00:25:10,840 Speaker 1: we're in where they're no longer subjects. They should now 402 00:25:10,880 --> 00:25:18,800 Speaker 1: be educated, literate, participating, economically participating, politically participating actors. And 403 00:25:19,440 --> 00:25:21,840 Speaker 1: one of the major barriers, and this is the argument 404 00:25:21,880 --> 00:25:24,359 Speaker 1: that's being made at the turn of the century, is 405 00:25:24,400 --> 00:25:30,080 Speaker 1: that Chinese character based writing places people in China at 406 00:25:30,119 --> 00:25:36,080 Speaker 1: such a comparative disadvantage to those in alphabetic contexts and 407 00:25:36,359 --> 00:25:41,600 Speaker 1: UM and so there's many, many reformers, education reformers, political 408 00:25:41,600 --> 00:25:46,480 Speaker 1: reformers that are are making this case. Some of them, 409 00:25:47,320 --> 00:25:49,680 Speaker 1: a very small number of them, I say, would arrive 410 00:25:49,800 --> 00:25:56,119 Speaker 1: at the extreme notion that what the solution to this 411 00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:59,360 Speaker 1: problem is simply getting rid of characters altogether and replacing 412 00:25:59,400 --> 00:26:03,960 Speaker 1: them with another scripted. A great many more within society 413 00:26:03,960 --> 00:26:08,440 Speaker 1: try to figure out new techniques, new pedagogies by which 414 00:26:08,520 --> 00:26:13,000 Speaker 1: to introduce more Chinese students and readers to what they 415 00:26:13,080 --> 00:26:17,120 Speaker 1: understood is the core vocabulary, the basics of Chinese. And 416 00:26:17,119 --> 00:26:19,600 Speaker 1: there's a lot of a lot of stuff that was 417 00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:23,720 Speaker 1: surrounding issues of literacy. For for a number of the 418 00:26:23,760 --> 00:26:26,320 Speaker 1: actors that I deal with in my in my book, 419 00:26:26,760 --> 00:26:32,120 Speaker 1: they care about they care about mass education, mass literacy, 420 00:26:32,240 --> 00:26:35,840 Speaker 1: uh very much. But they also care about things like 421 00:26:36,840 --> 00:26:43,760 Speaker 1: how do you design a card catalog system for books 422 00:26:43,760 --> 00:26:47,480 Speaker 1: in Chinese for our new public libraries that we're designing. 423 00:26:47,720 --> 00:26:49,639 Speaker 1: So if I walk up to a card catalog and 424 00:26:49,680 --> 00:26:51,800 Speaker 1: I want to find a book by a particular author 425 00:26:52,000 --> 00:26:57,240 Speaker 1: or particular title, what is the best way to sequence 426 00:26:57,359 --> 00:27:00,760 Speaker 1: or organized Chinese character writing so that someone can find 427 00:27:00,760 --> 00:27:03,720 Speaker 1: it as quickly as possible. They're often again comparing with 428 00:27:03,960 --> 00:27:07,040 Speaker 1: the alphabets. They say, look, how easy the alphabet. It's 429 00:27:07,080 --> 00:27:09,840 Speaker 1: a through z. There's no ambiguity about where you put, 430 00:27:10,000 --> 00:27:15,800 Speaker 1: you know, Alfred versus um Zimbabwe doesn't mean it's very simple. 431 00:27:16,240 --> 00:27:23,720 Speaker 1: In Chinese, there is no one set way of organizing dictionaries, 432 00:27:23,840 --> 00:27:27,480 Speaker 1: phone books and nameless and so forth. Until the nineteen twenties. 433 00:27:28,200 --> 00:27:31,560 Speaker 1: There is a kind of knock them down, knock em 434 00:27:31,560 --> 00:27:37,720 Speaker 1: sackem uh debate, which which involves library scientists and mass 435 00:27:37,800 --> 00:27:42,080 Speaker 1: education people, and it's like a full blown kind of 436 00:27:42,119 --> 00:27:46,560 Speaker 1: press event where they argue with one another about the 437 00:27:46,600 --> 00:27:52,640 Speaker 1: best way to organize telephone books and library card catalogs 438 00:27:52,680 --> 00:27:56,920 Speaker 1: and the indexes of books and name registers and all 439 00:27:56,920 --> 00:28:00,560 Speaker 1: of these things. Uh, and they they are coument is 440 00:28:00,600 --> 00:28:06,119 Speaker 1: made that because we because Chinese doesn't have a self 441 00:28:06,200 --> 00:28:12,800 Speaker 1: evident A through Z sequence, and because modern capitalist economies 442 00:28:12,840 --> 00:28:18,400 Speaker 1: and also modern republican states really require fast information retrieval, 443 00:28:19,640 --> 00:28:23,000 Speaker 1: we are that China is operating in kind of slow 444 00:28:23,119 --> 00:28:25,520 Speaker 1: motion as compared to the rest of the world, because 445 00:28:25,520 --> 00:28:30,399 Speaker 1: every time we need to recall a file from a database, 446 00:28:30,880 --> 00:28:33,560 Speaker 1: it takes us a few seconds longer than it does 447 00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:38,200 Speaker 1: to recover an equivalent from somewhere in the alphabetic world. 448 00:28:38,440 --> 00:28:42,640 Speaker 1: And if you take those thousands, tens of thousands, millions 449 00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:46,520 Speaker 1: of acts of information retrieval, and if each one of 450 00:28:46,560 --> 00:28:50,600 Speaker 1: them takes a few seconds longer then their counterpart, and 451 00:28:50,680 --> 00:28:52,800 Speaker 1: you add them all up, and suddenly we are we're 452 00:28:52,880 --> 00:28:56,320 Speaker 1: kind of operating in this slow motion um as compared 453 00:28:56,360 --> 00:28:58,120 Speaker 1: to the rest of the world. So it's a really 454 00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:01,680 Speaker 1: fascinating idea about that these theorists had about where China's 455 00:29:01,720 --> 00:29:04,640 Speaker 1: problems were coming from. Some people were arguing at the 456 00:29:04,720 --> 00:29:08,200 Speaker 1: scale of of war and scaling it, and arguing at 457 00:29:08,200 --> 00:29:12,600 Speaker 1: the scale of empire and colonialism. But there's this subset 458 00:29:12,800 --> 00:29:17,080 Speaker 1: of people who are arguing that in essence, China's problems 459 00:29:17,120 --> 00:29:23,160 Speaker 1: are derived from millions of like tiny increments of delay, 460 00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:26,960 Speaker 1: and that it's our job as reformers, as Chinese reformers, 461 00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:30,240 Speaker 1: to find a way to close that gap and speed 462 00:29:30,320 --> 00:29:32,760 Speaker 1: up the language so that we can operate in a 463 00:29:32,760 --> 00:29:36,320 Speaker 1: global you know, a global economy and so forth. Um. So, 464 00:29:36,640 --> 00:29:40,040 Speaker 1: there's there's probably twenty more examples of critiques of of 465 00:29:40,160 --> 00:29:44,520 Speaker 1: Chinese character writing, but that's probably a nice diet one 466 00:29:44,640 --> 00:29:48,320 Speaker 1: that is operating at the space of you know, the 467 00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:51,800 Speaker 1: ability to read and debate and argue and engage in 468 00:29:51,800 --> 00:29:55,240 Speaker 1: interpretation and read those poems and read essays. And then 469 00:29:55,240 --> 00:29:57,520 Speaker 1: the other side, which I think is more along the 470 00:29:57,560 --> 00:30:01,040 Speaker 1: lines of the techno linguistic discussion in in the book, 471 00:30:01,760 --> 00:30:06,600 Speaker 1: which is people fighting over how to organize this language 472 00:30:06,640 --> 00:30:10,640 Speaker 1: in space and time. So that's really interesting. It makes 473 00:30:10,680 --> 00:30:13,640 Speaker 1: me think about, um, the way that you talk about 474 00:30:13,640 --> 00:30:20,200 Speaker 1: the two different approaches to making Chinese characters compatible with 475 00:30:20,360 --> 00:30:23,640 Speaker 1: modern labor saving technology like the typewriter, but not just 476 00:30:23,680 --> 00:30:26,680 Speaker 1: the typewriter, these other things you mentioned card catalogs and everything, 477 00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:29,880 Speaker 1: and they're essentially two ways to go about it you 478 00:30:29,920 --> 00:30:32,000 Speaker 1: mentioned in the book. You can try to adapt the 479 00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:36,000 Speaker 1: technology to the language, like maybe Remington tried to do 480 00:30:36,120 --> 00:30:38,480 Speaker 1: in the example you give where they have this phonetic 481 00:30:38,480 --> 00:30:42,240 Speaker 1: alphabet for Chinese on their typewriter but no one would 482 00:30:42,320 --> 00:30:48,840 Speaker 1: use it. Or you could adapt the technology to the language. Um, 483 00:30:49,440 --> 00:30:53,800 Speaker 1: what are some examples you see of of the most 484 00:30:54,720 --> 00:30:57,120 Speaker 1: or maybe not most successful, but the major efforts in 485 00:30:57,200 --> 00:31:01,160 Speaker 1: both of these camps through the twentieth century. I think 486 00:31:01,200 --> 00:31:05,520 Speaker 1: that's exactly right. And and so these putting these attempts 487 00:31:05,560 --> 00:31:09,520 Speaker 1: to the debate for many was you know, who has 488 00:31:09,560 --> 00:31:12,320 Speaker 1: to change. Is it is it Remingtons that has to 489 00:31:12,360 --> 00:31:14,680 Speaker 1: come and meet Chinese or is it Chinese that needs 490 00:31:14,720 --> 00:31:20,080 Speaker 1: to meet Remington's. And the way that the history plays out, 491 00:31:20,120 --> 00:31:24,400 Speaker 1: and also the way it's still playing out is uh 492 00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:28,080 Speaker 1: that these two are locked in a a kind of 493 00:31:28,120 --> 00:31:32,720 Speaker 1: never ending a never ending cycle and never ending dialectic 494 00:31:32,840 --> 00:31:36,640 Speaker 1: that is still playing its way out, is playing itself out. 495 00:31:36,880 --> 00:31:40,440 Speaker 1: And so the example from the book that you mentioned 496 00:31:40,560 --> 00:31:44,840 Speaker 1: of basically just trying to bring the language into a 497 00:31:44,920 --> 00:31:47,640 Speaker 1: Remington's more or less with the Remington more or less 498 00:31:47,680 --> 00:31:52,200 Speaker 1: untouched is the case of the Chinese phonetic alphabet UM, 499 00:31:52,840 --> 00:31:57,200 Speaker 1: and it just simply doesn't It doesn't take off, it 500 00:31:57,240 --> 00:32:00,040 Speaker 1: doesn't work. Remington and many other companies have fun to 501 00:32:00,120 --> 00:32:04,360 Speaker 1: mentally misunderstood what the Chinese phenetic alphabet was supposed to do. 502 00:32:04,400 --> 00:32:06,880 Speaker 1: What it was made to do, UM since it was 503 00:32:06,960 --> 00:32:10,080 Speaker 1: invented by Chinese linguists, but it was never meant to 504 00:32:10,200 --> 00:32:13,080 Speaker 1: replace Chinese character based writing. But they kind of harbored 505 00:32:13,080 --> 00:32:17,200 Speaker 1: this dream that, yeah, maybe that's not why it was invented, 506 00:32:17,240 --> 00:32:20,560 Speaker 1: but we all know that Chinese characters will eventually disappear, 507 00:32:20,640 --> 00:32:22,640 Speaker 1: and we're hoping that this is the thing that puts 508 00:32:22,680 --> 00:32:24,840 Speaker 1: the final nail in the costant, which is not what happened, 509 00:32:25,560 --> 00:32:29,480 Speaker 1: but it's it's it's in the tension between those two, 510 00:32:30,200 --> 00:32:35,560 Speaker 1: those two more simple means of trying to solve the puzzle. 511 00:32:35,960 --> 00:32:40,040 Speaker 1: And one of the reformers put it really clearly when 512 00:32:40,080 --> 00:32:45,680 Speaker 1: he said that Chinese characters have are innocence, Chinese characters 513 00:32:45,680 --> 00:32:48,840 Speaker 1: are innocent, or Chinese characters have committed no crime. And 514 00:32:48,840 --> 00:32:52,520 Speaker 1: he goes on to say, this is an overseas Chinese 515 00:32:52,520 --> 00:32:55,640 Speaker 1: students in the nineteen who goes on to become an 516 00:32:55,640 --> 00:32:58,760 Speaker 1: engineer and and to develop the prototype of the first 517 00:32:58,800 --> 00:33:04,120 Speaker 1: mass manufacturer type writer for Chinese. And he says, and 518 00:33:04,320 --> 00:33:09,000 Speaker 1: more or less, any engineer worth the title would never 519 00:33:09,960 --> 00:33:13,400 Speaker 1: want or never expect the world to change to make 520 00:33:14,640 --> 00:33:19,400 Speaker 1: their job easier, Like that's not the engineer's role in existence. 521 00:33:19,440 --> 00:33:22,000 Speaker 1: It is to take the world as it is, or 522 00:33:22,040 --> 00:33:25,320 Speaker 1: at least start from that advantage point and then try 523 00:33:25,440 --> 00:33:29,680 Speaker 1: to think outside of preconceptions to to meet the world 524 00:33:29,680 --> 00:33:33,560 Speaker 1: where it is. So in this case, the Chinese language 525 00:33:33,560 --> 00:33:36,240 Speaker 1: can take part in the information in this newest iteration 526 00:33:36,280 --> 00:33:42,960 Speaker 1: of the information revolution um and the maybe one place 527 00:33:43,040 --> 00:33:48,400 Speaker 1: that is a good example of an attempt to meet 528 00:33:48,480 --> 00:33:53,440 Speaker 1: each other halfway was an experimental Chinese typewriter. It was 529 00:33:53,480 --> 00:33:58,560 Speaker 1: never mass manufactured, but it was fully conceived and prototyped 530 00:33:58,600 --> 00:34:03,160 Speaker 1: by another or overseas Chinese students who was working at 531 00:34:03,280 --> 00:34:07,480 Speaker 1: n y U in the nineteen teens. Uh and he 532 00:34:08,440 --> 00:34:15,800 Speaker 1: he develops a prototype Chinese typewriter in which the goal 533 00:34:16,200 --> 00:34:22,360 Speaker 1: was to figure out how to quote unquote spell Chinese 534 00:34:22,800 --> 00:34:26,640 Speaker 1: piece by piece on the page. And I put spell 535 00:34:26,920 --> 00:34:30,640 Speaker 1: in in scare quotes because he did not mean phonetically. 536 00:34:30,719 --> 00:34:33,839 Speaker 1: He did not mean okay. Instead of writing the two 537 00:34:33,960 --> 00:34:36,279 Speaker 1: characters for Baiting the city of Baiting, I mean the 538 00:34:36,440 --> 00:34:39,000 Speaker 1: righte b I J. He didn't mean that. What he 539 00:34:39,080 --> 00:34:46,480 Speaker 1: meant was, can we uh, can we subdivide all Chinese 540 00:34:46,520 --> 00:34:53,600 Speaker 1: characters into existence and discover the underlying, repeating modular shapes, 541 00:34:54,280 --> 00:34:58,279 Speaker 1: these little pieces of characters that continually show up in 542 00:34:58,360 --> 00:35:02,200 Speaker 1: every character that exists. And if we can reduce Chinese 543 00:35:02,239 --> 00:35:06,799 Speaker 1: to a set of these modular shapes and then put 544 00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:12,840 Speaker 1: those shapes onto UH keys or onto type bars, or 545 00:35:12,880 --> 00:35:15,279 Speaker 1: in this case, he makes it into a cylinder that's 546 00:35:15,320 --> 00:35:21,240 Speaker 1: inside the machine, then one could fit tens of thousands 547 00:35:21,280 --> 00:35:25,919 Speaker 1: of characters onto a machine. UH simply by shattering them 548 00:35:25,960 --> 00:35:29,239 Speaker 1: into pieces, and then the user would have to sit 549 00:35:29,280 --> 00:35:34,280 Speaker 1: down at the machine and compose the desired character module 550 00:35:34,600 --> 00:35:37,839 Speaker 1: by module. And so its it. It's it's a it's 551 00:35:37,840 --> 00:35:42,960 Speaker 1: an incredible idea, and it it's related to the Western 552 00:35:43,040 --> 00:35:47,040 Speaker 1: alphabetic notion of spelling a word. You know, the word 553 00:35:47,120 --> 00:35:49,840 Speaker 1: cat is not on our typewriter. We just we have 554 00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:52,120 Speaker 1: C and A and T, and therefore we do have 555 00:35:52,320 --> 00:35:54,680 Speaker 1: cat on our typewriter. It's the same kind of concept 556 00:35:55,320 --> 00:35:58,640 Speaker 1: that abandoning or leaving behind the phenetic part of that 557 00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:00,840 Speaker 1: and just saying okay, we're not hearing about the sound 558 00:36:00,840 --> 00:36:03,560 Speaker 1: of it. We care about the ability to build up 559 00:36:03,600 --> 00:36:05,840 Speaker 1: something on the page. So this if you, if you, 560 00:36:06,560 --> 00:36:12,240 Speaker 1: if you look at this, it's this is neither trying 561 00:36:12,280 --> 00:36:16,480 Speaker 1: to take the typewriter and make it serve or subordinated 562 00:36:16,480 --> 00:36:21,120 Speaker 1: to the Chinese writing. It's still it's still trying to 563 00:36:21,160 --> 00:36:24,200 Speaker 1: build a machine that looks like a Western typewriter. But 564 00:36:24,239 --> 00:36:28,880 Speaker 1: at the same time, it's also not simply taking Chinese 565 00:36:28,880 --> 00:36:33,200 Speaker 1: writing and subordinating it to uh to a Remington's. It's 566 00:36:33,320 --> 00:36:36,799 Speaker 1: trying to meet the problems somehow halfway and in an 567 00:36:36,920 --> 00:36:39,239 Speaker 1: essence saying okay, both parties are going to have to 568 00:36:40,560 --> 00:36:42,479 Speaker 1: give something up. I don't know if that's the right word, 569 00:36:42,560 --> 00:36:45,120 Speaker 1: or are going to have to be willing to really 570 00:36:45,760 --> 00:36:51,040 Speaker 1: uh reimagine what you consider to be canonical first principles. 571 00:36:51,280 --> 00:36:55,279 Speaker 1: So in Chinese, we have to give up the idea 572 00:36:55,680 --> 00:36:58,640 Speaker 1: that the character is the base of our language. But 573 00:36:58,719 --> 00:37:01,600 Speaker 1: the character is the fundamental unit of our language. It 574 00:37:01,640 --> 00:37:03,920 Speaker 1: isn't we're going to in this machine. It's going to 575 00:37:03,960 --> 00:37:07,120 Speaker 1: be the pieces of characters that are the fundamental units. 576 00:37:07,200 --> 00:37:10,160 Speaker 1: And if people are willing to accept that I learned 577 00:37:10,160 --> 00:37:12,520 Speaker 1: how to use this machine in this way, then you 578 00:37:12,520 --> 00:37:15,520 Speaker 1: can have all the characters you want. If you're unwilling 579 00:37:15,560 --> 00:37:18,080 Speaker 1: to think that way, that's another that's another issue. And 580 00:37:18,120 --> 00:37:21,040 Speaker 1: then in the on the you know, visa VI the 581 00:37:21,760 --> 00:37:24,960 Speaker 1: I mean this is sort of a diplomatic negotiation metaphor, 582 00:37:25,000 --> 00:37:30,680 Speaker 1: but visa VI the remington you know, delegation saying to them, listen, 583 00:37:30,880 --> 00:37:32,920 Speaker 1: you know, you're going to have to give up on 584 00:37:32,960 --> 00:37:38,080 Speaker 1: the idea of of of of sound and phonetics and 585 00:37:38,120 --> 00:37:40,680 Speaker 1: the sounding out of words. That's that's not how this 586 00:37:40,760 --> 00:37:44,640 Speaker 1: machine works. Um. It's these symbols are not going to 587 00:37:44,640 --> 00:37:48,080 Speaker 1: be letters of any alphabets, Uh, technically speaking, it's not 588 00:37:48,160 --> 00:37:51,360 Speaker 1: an alphabet we're talking about. It's a set of modular shapes. 589 00:37:52,239 --> 00:37:55,600 Speaker 1: But we can we can still you know, think of 590 00:37:55,640 --> 00:37:57,400 Speaker 1: the of the type R. We but there. But you 591 00:37:57,440 --> 00:37:58,799 Speaker 1: don't have to give up on your idea of a 592 00:37:58,840 --> 00:38:01,319 Speaker 1: typewriter as you know it more or less. It's kind 593 00:38:01,360 --> 00:38:05,799 Speaker 1: of the typewriter, you know. Um, and this this, this 594 00:38:05,880 --> 00:38:09,839 Speaker 1: machine in its day and age, uh, doesn't win the day, 595 00:38:09,880 --> 00:38:16,120 Speaker 1: It doesn't gain mass manufacturing support. But arguably this idea 596 00:38:16,160 --> 00:38:18,799 Speaker 1: of how to treat characters, how to quote unquote fit 597 00:38:18,880 --> 00:38:22,680 Speaker 1: them into digital spaces, is very much alive and well 598 00:38:22,960 --> 00:38:25,840 Speaker 1: even today. Um. In fact, it's kind of made a 599 00:38:25,880 --> 00:38:28,760 Speaker 1: comeback as one of the dominant ways of thinking of writing. 600 00:38:28,760 --> 00:38:33,000 Speaker 1: When when typeface designers those you know, when practitioners are 601 00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:36,200 Speaker 1: companies that are building a font, a digital font for Chinese, 602 00:38:37,280 --> 00:38:40,640 Speaker 1: they often the team that builds a Chinese funt often 603 00:38:40,719 --> 00:38:43,719 Speaker 1: thinks in these terms. They don't think, Okay, I'm gonna 604 00:38:43,840 --> 00:38:49,400 Speaker 1: draw every Chinese character from scratch, which would take you know, 605 00:38:49,480 --> 00:38:52,000 Speaker 1: would take years and years. I'm gonna scan them and 606 00:38:52,040 --> 00:38:54,040 Speaker 1: I'm going to create my basier curves and I'm going 607 00:38:54,080 --> 00:38:56,160 Speaker 1: to do all this sort of stuff. They say, what 608 00:38:56,239 --> 00:39:00,600 Speaker 1: are the pieces and modules that make up characters. Let's 609 00:39:00,680 --> 00:39:04,800 Speaker 1: let's focus to a certain extent at that level, and voila. 610 00:39:04,960 --> 00:39:07,440 Speaker 1: The work that we did on this piece has a 611 00:39:07,520 --> 00:39:11,760 Speaker 1: multiplier effect because this module shows up in fifty other characters, 612 00:39:11,840 --> 00:39:15,480 Speaker 1: or a hundred characters, or a thousand characters. So that's 613 00:39:15,600 --> 00:39:17,400 Speaker 1: that's one of the I mean, that's that's the fascinating 614 00:39:17,400 --> 00:39:20,200 Speaker 1: thing about history in general, but history of information technology 615 00:39:20,200 --> 00:39:23,680 Speaker 1: in particular is it is completely nonlinear, and something that 616 00:39:23,800 --> 00:39:27,640 Speaker 1: was laughed off the stage eighty years ago can suddenly 617 00:39:27,800 --> 00:39:33,160 Speaker 1: in a different ecology be the way to to do something. Um. Yeah, 618 00:39:33,160 --> 00:39:35,560 Speaker 1: and so I think that's that might be a good example. 619 00:39:35,600 --> 00:39:37,920 Speaker 1: That's that's that's the story of the Young the Young 620 00:39:37,960 --> 00:39:40,640 Speaker 1: overseas Chinese student. I deal with um in the early 621 00:39:40,719 --> 00:39:43,279 Speaker 1: part of the book. I love in the book how 622 00:39:43,360 --> 00:39:45,960 Speaker 1: you you explore this, uh, this sort of middle path 623 00:39:46,080 --> 00:39:48,680 Speaker 1: is attempt to find this compromise, and at one point 624 00:39:48,719 --> 00:39:52,360 Speaker 1: you compare it to aryptis and so the sea monster 625 00:39:52,400 --> 00:39:56,960 Speaker 1: in the whirlpool. Uh. I love this exploration of how 626 00:39:57,040 --> 00:40:00,840 Speaker 1: on on one end you don't want the machine to 627 00:40:01,120 --> 00:40:05,040 Speaker 1: change or limit the language and the culture, but then 628 00:40:05,080 --> 00:40:08,800 Speaker 1: On the other side, there's this reluctance to create something 629 00:40:09,040 --> 00:40:13,120 Speaker 1: that will look like the monster machine that some are 630 00:40:13,160 --> 00:40:16,440 Speaker 1: expecting a Chinese typewriter to be. I like thinking in 631 00:40:16,560 --> 00:40:19,799 Speaker 1: terms of agony, I think, and what I mean by 632 00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:23,759 Speaker 1: agony is something to the extent of I don't know. 633 00:40:23,880 --> 00:40:30,319 Speaker 1: Imagine you're an international trans oceanic pilot and and you 634 00:40:30,320 --> 00:40:34,080 Speaker 1: know you've got three passengers on board, and you know 635 00:40:34,160 --> 00:40:37,479 Speaker 1: you're you're going over the sea, and maybe you maybe 636 00:40:37,640 --> 00:40:41,640 Speaker 1: under certain circumstances, if you chose, you could just hit something. 637 00:40:41,680 --> 00:40:44,000 Speaker 1: You know, you don't feel well, whatever, you just hand 638 00:40:44,040 --> 00:40:48,399 Speaker 1: over controls to your copilot. Short of these two people, uh, 639 00:40:48,440 --> 00:40:51,040 Speaker 1: there's no one else to hand over controls too. There 640 00:40:51,160 --> 00:40:54,880 Speaker 1: is the space of having to stay within a condition 641 00:40:55,360 --> 00:41:04,120 Speaker 1: of anxiety, contradiction, irresolvability, and in essence those it's it's 642 00:41:04,200 --> 00:41:09,279 Speaker 1: that kind of staying in ambiguity, staying in uncertainty that 643 00:41:09,840 --> 00:41:14,880 Speaker 1: is probably the shared characteristic among the actors in the book. 644 00:41:15,480 --> 00:41:18,160 Speaker 1: In a certain sense, that's intentional, and it's also trying 645 00:41:18,200 --> 00:41:21,279 Speaker 1: to make an intervention because there are other actors, much 646 00:41:21,320 --> 00:41:25,360 Speaker 1: more famous actors in Chinese history who receive you know, 647 00:41:25,440 --> 00:41:28,000 Speaker 1: the Lion's share of attention when it comes to questions 648 00:41:28,040 --> 00:41:32,760 Speaker 1: of the Chinese language and modernity and technology and stuff. Um. 649 00:41:32,800 --> 00:41:34,879 Speaker 1: And these are these are figures that I talked about 650 00:41:34,880 --> 00:41:37,880 Speaker 1: in the introduction of the book. Who made these really 651 00:41:38,280 --> 00:41:42,120 Speaker 1: sweeping iconoclastic statements that we should just get rid of 652 00:41:42,200 --> 00:41:45,759 Speaker 1: characters altogether and use English or use French or use esperanto. 653 00:41:45,880 --> 00:41:50,160 Speaker 1: And they sound so iconoclastic and sexy and rebellious, and 654 00:41:50,200 --> 00:41:54,720 Speaker 1: really their naives the statements that they're making are completely 655 00:41:54,960 --> 00:42:02,080 Speaker 1: ridiculous at one level, uh, simplistic and in many ways naive. Um. 656 00:42:02,160 --> 00:42:04,400 Speaker 1: I mean, clearly, there are societies on Earth that have 657 00:42:05,320 --> 00:42:09,560 Speaker 1: undertaken massive transformations in their orthographies. But the idea that 658 00:42:09,719 --> 00:42:13,240 Speaker 1: China as a whole was going to just cut ties 659 00:42:13,760 --> 00:42:19,160 Speaker 1: with writing uh and uh was it sounds good on paper, 660 00:42:19,280 --> 00:42:22,799 Speaker 1: It gets the attention certainly of contemporaries and even more 661 00:42:22,880 --> 00:42:27,760 Speaker 1: so uh uh scholars of of China after the fact. 662 00:42:28,320 --> 00:42:32,279 Speaker 1: But what it what it obscures is that, hey, those 663 00:42:32,320 --> 00:42:35,520 Speaker 1: guys didn't win. You know, Chinese characters are with us, 664 00:42:36,760 --> 00:42:40,440 Speaker 1: Chinese I t is booming, you know. So the prognosis 665 00:42:40,480 --> 00:42:44,319 Speaker 1: that they were giving in the years twenty did not 666 00:42:44,360 --> 00:42:46,719 Speaker 1: pan out. And yet we still teach there, We still 667 00:42:46,760 --> 00:42:50,000 Speaker 1: assigned their essays in all of our classes. There is 668 00:42:50,040 --> 00:42:55,319 Speaker 1: this other kind of motley crew of individuals um you know, 669 00:42:55,400 --> 00:42:58,880 Speaker 1: most of them Chinese or Chinese descent, but also engineers 670 00:42:58,880 --> 00:43:02,680 Speaker 1: and linguists and entrepreneurs around the world. They're stuck and 671 00:43:02,760 --> 00:43:04,840 Speaker 1: they understand that they're stuck. We can't We're not going 672 00:43:04,920 --> 00:43:08,200 Speaker 1: to just get rid of Chinese and go the alphabet 673 00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:10,839 Speaker 1: and therefore we can all buy IBM s and that's 674 00:43:10,880 --> 00:43:13,200 Speaker 1: the you know, that's the benefit of us severing this. 675 00:43:13,360 --> 00:43:16,640 Speaker 1: We're not going to do that. But we want IBM s. 676 00:43:16,880 --> 00:43:21,080 Speaker 1: We want mainframes, we want microcomputers, we want telegraphy, we 677 00:43:21,120 --> 00:43:24,880 Speaker 1: want these things. Or in a more selfish way, we 678 00:43:24,920 --> 00:43:27,080 Speaker 1: want to be the company that gives this to the 679 00:43:27,160 --> 00:43:28,920 Speaker 1: Chinese market because we want to make money. You know, 680 00:43:28,960 --> 00:43:31,520 Speaker 1: that's that's there as well. But they're staying in this 681 00:43:31,640 --> 00:43:36,439 Speaker 1: space of agony between where there's no way out. They 682 00:43:36,480 --> 00:43:39,960 Speaker 1: have to stay in this and think in that space. 683 00:43:40,840 --> 00:43:42,960 Speaker 1: You know, I often don't think in terms of historical 684 00:43:43,040 --> 00:43:45,919 Speaker 1: success or like where's the you know, where's the when 685 00:43:45,920 --> 00:43:47,759 Speaker 1: did the strings come in? And when does when are 686 00:43:47,760 --> 00:43:51,200 Speaker 1: the lovers reunited? But the lovers reunited is in essence 687 00:43:51,239 --> 00:43:55,080 Speaker 1: at the end of the book because the practice and 688 00:43:55,080 --> 00:44:00,200 Speaker 1: the concept of input that is in that is is 689 00:44:00,440 --> 00:44:04,120 Speaker 1: baked in in an early form into the Utag's experimental 690 00:44:04,200 --> 00:44:09,000 Speaker 1: Ninettes typewriter. Than being quiet, that way of building a 691 00:44:09,040 --> 00:44:16,760 Speaker 1: typewriter is something that is born out of that that tension, 692 00:44:16,800 --> 00:44:21,280 Speaker 1: that that agony, that irresolvability that all of these individuals 693 00:44:21,320 --> 00:44:24,279 Speaker 1: are living in for for decades. I mean, arguably, I 694 00:44:24,280 --> 00:44:26,560 Speaker 1: mean not just any one individual, but as a cast 695 00:44:26,600 --> 00:44:29,359 Speaker 1: of characters, there are people that are living in that 696 00:44:29,400 --> 00:44:32,640 Speaker 1: space for a century and an ass. They're not giving 697 00:44:32,640 --> 00:44:38,520 Speaker 1: into easy, iconoclastic, flashy uh in statements, but neither are 698 00:44:38,560 --> 00:44:41,200 Speaker 1: they saying, well, I guess we should pack it up 699 00:44:41,200 --> 00:44:43,000 Speaker 1: and go home. We can't take part in the global 700 00:44:43,120 --> 00:44:46,279 Speaker 1: this new iteration of the global information revolution. They're just 701 00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:51,040 Speaker 1: staying in that space. And so I have admiration, not 702 00:44:51,200 --> 00:44:54,759 Speaker 1: not not because of what they build or that they 703 00:44:54,800 --> 00:44:56,120 Speaker 1: made money here, that they're you know, in a sort 704 00:44:56,160 --> 00:45:00,960 Speaker 1: of romantic sense, but that staying and that kind of 705 00:45:01,000 --> 00:45:07,000 Speaker 1: space is not a very rewarding thing. Um And but 706 00:45:07,520 --> 00:45:09,760 Speaker 1: you know, dozens and dozens, it's not hundreds of people 707 00:45:09,960 --> 00:45:13,440 Speaker 1: in the story are really in that space and that's 708 00:45:13,560 --> 00:45:16,279 Speaker 1: the that's that's where. And also, just to bring it 709 00:45:16,320 --> 00:45:19,239 Speaker 1: back a little bit to the discussion of techno linguistic 710 00:45:19,680 --> 00:45:24,120 Speaker 1: the techno linguistic space is where these this motley crew 711 00:45:24,600 --> 00:45:29,440 Speaker 1: is focusing most of their attention. They're saying to themselves 712 00:45:29,480 --> 00:45:33,800 Speaker 1: to the world, Okay, we want to keep Chinese characters. 713 00:45:34,000 --> 00:45:36,719 Speaker 1: What does that mean? Exactly what that means is that 714 00:45:37,480 --> 00:45:40,479 Speaker 1: when we pick up a book in twenty years in China, 715 00:45:40,560 --> 00:45:43,319 Speaker 1: we want to see Chinese characters. When someone sits down, 716 00:45:43,400 --> 00:45:46,000 Speaker 1: goes to the telegraph the post office and wants to 717 00:45:46,040 --> 00:45:50,560 Speaker 1: send a telegram, we wanted that the sender can write 718 00:45:50,560 --> 00:45:53,359 Speaker 1: this out in Chinese and that the recipient when they 719 00:45:53,360 --> 00:45:56,080 Speaker 1: receive it, can receive something in Chinese with Chinese characters 720 00:45:56,080 --> 00:45:58,759 Speaker 1: in it. Like, let's be very specific about what we 721 00:45:58,840 --> 00:46:02,040 Speaker 1: mean about preserve being the language. And then and then then, 722 00:46:02,080 --> 00:46:05,160 Speaker 1: and then the next kind of collective statement out of 723 00:46:05,160 --> 00:46:08,480 Speaker 1: their mouth is, Okay, what are we willing to blow 724 00:46:08,600 --> 00:46:13,400 Speaker 1: up and totally dismantle and rebuild in radical new ways 725 00:46:13,719 --> 00:46:17,720 Speaker 1: in order to achieve that effect? H and the stuff 726 00:46:17,719 --> 00:46:19,480 Speaker 1: that they're willing to blow up and build and be 727 00:46:19,600 --> 00:46:24,680 Speaker 1: iconoclastic with regards to is mainly the stuff that is 728 00:46:25,520 --> 00:46:27,279 Speaker 1: I use this metaphor in the book. It's like it's 729 00:46:27,360 --> 00:46:30,120 Speaker 1: under the street, it's in the sewage system, it's in 730 00:46:30,160 --> 00:46:32,560 Speaker 1: the walls and the electrical and the you know, the 731 00:46:32,880 --> 00:46:35,719 Speaker 1: air conditioning system. It's it's in the way that the 732 00:46:35,760 --> 00:46:38,480 Speaker 1: library card catalogs are organized. It's in the way that 733 00:46:38,520 --> 00:46:40,560 Speaker 1: we break down characters and we put them into pieces 734 00:46:40,600 --> 00:46:44,640 Speaker 1: inside a machine. It's lots and lots and lots of stuff. 735 00:46:45,000 --> 00:46:49,200 Speaker 1: But if we're successful, the user, let's say, or the 736 00:46:49,239 --> 00:46:53,480 Speaker 1: recipient of the message, won't necessarily have to worry about 737 00:46:53,520 --> 00:46:56,760 Speaker 1: that stuff. They'll still be able to experience the Chinese 738 00:46:56,880 --> 00:47:03,239 Speaker 1: character writing environment. Um. And it's not glorious work, you know. 739 00:47:03,360 --> 00:47:05,800 Speaker 1: It's it's not the space of poetry. It's the space 740 00:47:05,960 --> 00:47:11,560 Speaker 1: of the predecessor of arguing over the unicode, you know, 741 00:47:11,640 --> 00:47:15,640 Speaker 1: Unicode regulations and protocols and stuff. It's it's it's technical, 742 00:47:16,000 --> 00:47:20,880 Speaker 1: dogged work. But they're convinced, and ultimately they prove it 743 00:47:20,880 --> 00:47:23,480 Speaker 1: to be. So they're convinced that that's the place where 744 00:47:23,560 --> 00:47:26,640 Speaker 1: Chinese can be preserved and saved. All Right, we are 745 00:47:26,640 --> 00:47:28,520 Speaker 1: going to take a quick break and when we come back, 746 00:47:28,640 --> 00:47:33,880 Speaker 1: we will have more of our interview with Thomas mulaney. Alright, 747 00:47:33,920 --> 00:47:36,439 Speaker 1: we're back. Could you talk a little bit about the 748 00:47:36,520 --> 00:47:41,720 Speaker 1: relationship of politics and values to what could be written 749 00:47:41,880 --> 00:47:45,640 Speaker 1: on some historical incarnations of the Chinese typewriter, Like I'm 750 00:47:45,640 --> 00:47:49,680 Speaker 1: thinking of the machines with limited numbers of character slugs, 751 00:47:49,680 --> 00:47:52,600 Speaker 1: and how the inclusion and placement of the character slugs 752 00:47:52,719 --> 00:47:55,640 Speaker 1: could be influenced by anything. I guess whoever is designing it, 753 00:47:55,680 --> 00:48:00,120 Speaker 1: maybe Christian missionary zeal or Maoist ideology. And then is 754 00:48:00,160 --> 00:48:03,560 Speaker 1: a second part, do you think that's unique to the 755 00:48:03,600 --> 00:48:07,080 Speaker 1: history of the Chinese typewriter? Or there are are there 756 00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:10,719 Speaker 1: ways that politics and values influence what can be done 757 00:48:10,719 --> 00:48:14,960 Speaker 1: on other composition and printing devices, even alphabetic ones. The 758 00:48:15,160 --> 00:48:21,160 Speaker 1: Chinese typewriter that ends up being mass manufactured and becomes 759 00:48:21,760 --> 00:48:28,640 Speaker 1: the quintessential model for Chinese typewriters is the common usage 760 00:48:28,960 --> 00:48:33,200 Speaker 1: Chinese typewriter and for this machine, in essence that the 761 00:48:34,000 --> 00:48:37,839 Speaker 1: compromise at play is, Okay, how do we fit all 762 00:48:37,880 --> 00:48:40,640 Speaker 1: tens of thousands of characters on this machine? The answer 763 00:48:40,719 --> 00:48:42,799 Speaker 1: is we don't. The answer is what we should be 764 00:48:42,880 --> 00:48:49,360 Speaker 1: doing is a rigorous almost proto digital humanities, distant reading 765 00:48:49,400 --> 00:48:53,719 Speaker 1: analysis of as big of a corpus of Chinese text 766 00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:58,840 Speaker 1: as possible. We should be counting the number of times 767 00:48:58,880 --> 00:49:02,160 Speaker 1: every single one of our characters appears, and then do 768 00:49:02,280 --> 00:49:05,239 Speaker 1: a frequency analysis, and based on that frequency analysis of 769 00:49:05,239 --> 00:49:10,160 Speaker 1: tens of thousands of characters, we should figure out what 770 00:49:10,360 --> 00:49:13,040 Speaker 1: is the what is the minimum number of characters that 771 00:49:13,120 --> 00:49:16,799 Speaker 1: we would need for the maximum amount of utility, all 772 00:49:16,800 --> 00:49:19,319 Speaker 1: with the understanding that in this mode we can't have 773 00:49:19,400 --> 00:49:21,319 Speaker 1: it all. We can't have all of our characters on 774 00:49:21,320 --> 00:49:24,520 Speaker 1: the machine. So the outcome of this is the common 775 00:49:24,600 --> 00:49:29,399 Speaker 1: usage machine, which by the midpoint of the twentieth century 776 00:49:29,719 --> 00:49:33,440 Speaker 1: gives the user a trade bed with two thousand four 777 00:49:34,200 --> 00:49:38,920 Speaker 1: characters on it, so roughly, which is a small percentage 778 00:49:39,320 --> 00:49:41,600 Speaker 1: of the tens of thousands of characters that exist. But 779 00:49:42,120 --> 00:49:46,400 Speaker 1: as they figured out through these statistical analyzes, which are 780 00:49:46,400 --> 00:49:51,399 Speaker 1: all done by hand, uh, that these account for five 781 00:49:51,520 --> 00:49:53,840 Speaker 1: or more per cent of of everything that you're gonna 782 00:49:54,000 --> 00:49:57,640 Speaker 1: need it for. And then so now this raises um 783 00:49:58,360 --> 00:50:04,400 Speaker 1: interesting possibilities questions with regard to politics and politics of language, because, uh, 784 00:50:04,960 --> 00:50:07,480 Speaker 1: when once you start saying that not all characters get 785 00:50:07,480 --> 00:50:10,320 Speaker 1: on the machine, the question naturally emerges, well, who decides, 786 00:50:10,440 --> 00:50:13,040 Speaker 1: and what's the basis for deciding who's in and who's 787 00:50:13,080 --> 00:50:17,640 Speaker 1: out and if something is out, what does that do? Uh. 788 00:50:17,719 --> 00:50:20,400 Speaker 1: From the user's perspective in terms of what they write 789 00:50:20,920 --> 00:50:24,839 Speaker 1: so ay is that the politics are alive and well. 790 00:50:24,920 --> 00:50:28,359 Speaker 1: The the some of the One of my favorite examples there, 791 00:50:28,400 --> 00:50:31,080 Speaker 1: there's I guess two from the political realm, from the 792 00:50:31,160 --> 00:50:35,560 Speaker 1: perspective of early Chinese republicans, those who wanted to overthrow 793 00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:39,680 Speaker 1: the empire and sound a republic and revolutionaries. One of 794 00:50:39,719 --> 00:50:44,319 Speaker 1: the bad guys of Chinese history is the first Uh 795 00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:48,840 Speaker 1: de facto president of the republic after the revolution. UH. 796 00:50:48,920 --> 00:50:52,040 Speaker 1: This gentleman you and Chicai, who's a comes from a 797 00:50:52,080 --> 00:50:56,480 Speaker 1: military background, and he's understood as having betrayed the revolution 798 00:50:56,520 --> 00:51:00,759 Speaker 1: because shortly after the Revolution of nineteen eleven overthrows the 799 00:51:00,800 --> 00:51:05,000 Speaker 1: final dynasty in China establish as a republic. This this fella, 800 00:51:05,360 --> 00:51:09,640 Speaker 1: under the advising under the council of his of his 801 00:51:10,560 --> 00:51:15,279 Speaker 1: kind of entourage, decides to re establish empire and he 802 00:51:15,360 --> 00:51:19,480 Speaker 1: names himself an emperor UH. And it causes another more 803 00:51:19,560 --> 00:51:21,680 Speaker 1: or less kind of small scale civil war, and he 804 00:51:22,520 --> 00:51:25,040 Speaker 1: dies of a natural He dies a natural deaths and 805 00:51:25,040 --> 00:51:27,640 Speaker 1: then he leaves China, and this political vacuum that gives 806 00:51:27,760 --> 00:51:30,360 Speaker 1: rise to what's called the warlord period, where there's no 807 00:51:30,480 --> 00:51:32,920 Speaker 1: central authority. He's he's he's not a love he's not 808 00:51:32,960 --> 00:51:35,920 Speaker 1: a beloved figure by many revolutionaries. So it's interesting is 809 00:51:35,960 --> 00:51:39,800 Speaker 1: that when you get to trade beds of Chinese typewriters 810 00:51:40,160 --> 00:51:45,480 Speaker 1: in the early twenties, his name, the characters that make 811 00:51:45,600 --> 00:51:49,279 Speaker 1: up his name will are not on the trade bed. 812 00:51:49,320 --> 00:51:53,600 Speaker 1: They're kind of stuck in what's called the secondary usage 813 00:51:53,640 --> 00:51:56,719 Speaker 1: box of characters, which is a wooden box that contains 814 00:51:56,800 --> 00:51:59,880 Speaker 1: a few more thousand characters that the type is can 815 00:52:00,320 --> 00:52:03,400 Speaker 1: can can can can use. If they need a character 816 00:52:03,440 --> 00:52:05,040 Speaker 1: that's not on the trade bed, they just use a 817 00:52:05,080 --> 00:52:08,160 Speaker 1: pair of tweezers. They pluck it out of the wooden box, 818 00:52:08,160 --> 00:52:09,480 Speaker 1: they put it on the trade bed, and then they 819 00:52:09,520 --> 00:52:11,840 Speaker 1: go ahead and use it. You know, this could in 820 00:52:12,120 --> 00:52:15,040 Speaker 1: certain sense, this could be accidental. Not all the characters 821 00:52:15,080 --> 00:52:17,279 Speaker 1: in his name are as common as others, but some 822 00:52:17,600 --> 00:52:21,640 Speaker 1: are not uncommon um, but there is there are these 823 00:52:21,680 --> 00:52:25,360 Speaker 1: decisions that that the designers of these machines get to 824 00:52:25,520 --> 00:52:28,440 Speaker 1: make about what to include and whatnot, and often for 825 00:52:28,480 --> 00:52:32,920 Speaker 1: political reasons. So the same typewriter engineer who leaves this 826 00:52:33,239 --> 00:52:35,920 Speaker 1: man's name off the or the characters that make up 827 00:52:35,920 --> 00:52:40,120 Speaker 1: this man's name off the machine, puts his name hit 828 00:52:40,160 --> 00:52:42,840 Speaker 1: the characters that make his name onto the common usage 829 00:52:42,840 --> 00:52:45,120 Speaker 1: trade bed, even though the characters in his name are 830 00:52:45,200 --> 00:52:48,160 Speaker 1: very uncommon. So there's it's to me, that's kind of 831 00:52:48,200 --> 00:52:51,520 Speaker 1: like the nineteen eighties when computer programmers would leave little 832 00:52:51,560 --> 00:52:55,279 Speaker 1: messages in the common field of of of programs that 833 00:52:55,320 --> 00:52:57,800 Speaker 1: they were making. It's sort of it's sort of the 834 00:52:57,800 --> 00:53:01,480 Speaker 1: you know, the the designers prerogative to their signature as 835 00:53:01,520 --> 00:53:07,640 Speaker 1: they will. UM. A more extreme example comes from revolution, 836 00:53:07,680 --> 00:53:10,680 Speaker 1: the Communist revolution, and this one is a bit more subtle. 837 00:53:11,280 --> 00:53:14,920 Speaker 1: The so the trade bed, the two thousand characters that 838 00:53:15,000 --> 00:53:17,800 Speaker 1: the user has in front of him or her, they 839 00:53:18,000 --> 00:53:22,200 Speaker 1: are they're not. They're organized according to basically let's call 840 00:53:22,239 --> 00:53:25,799 Speaker 1: it dictionary organization, a way of organizing characters that would 841 00:53:25,800 --> 00:53:28,799 Speaker 1: have been familiar to anyone using them. But they were 842 00:53:28,840 --> 00:53:33,399 Speaker 1: also further subdivided into most most common characters, and those 843 00:53:33,440 --> 00:53:35,839 Speaker 1: were in the very center of the trade bed, and 844 00:53:35,880 --> 00:53:39,040 Speaker 1: then second most common characters, which were on the left 845 00:53:39,080 --> 00:53:43,040 Speaker 1: and right flank of this rectangular matrix. UM and the 846 00:53:43,120 --> 00:53:47,399 Speaker 1: idea quite simply was because you had to go from 847 00:53:47,400 --> 00:53:49,440 Speaker 1: one character to the next to the next to the next. 848 00:53:50,320 --> 00:53:53,480 Speaker 1: You want to group and cluster and clump together common 849 00:53:53,600 --> 00:53:57,080 Speaker 1: usage characters as close as possible. So you know, we 850 00:53:57,080 --> 00:53:59,839 Speaker 1: we we really want that center piece, that center part 851 00:53:59,840 --> 00:54:01,759 Speaker 1: of the trade bed to have as many of the 852 00:54:01,840 --> 00:54:06,280 Speaker 1: most frequent characters as possible. Well, in the nineteen twenties, 853 00:54:06,320 --> 00:54:11,400 Speaker 1: thirties forties, prior to the Communist Revolution, the character Mao, 854 00:54:11,920 --> 00:54:15,680 Speaker 1: which by itself means a follicle of hair like hair 855 00:54:15,760 --> 00:54:18,880 Speaker 1: on your head, is a very common character, and but 856 00:54:18,920 --> 00:54:21,719 Speaker 1: it's not the most common of characters, so it was 857 00:54:21,840 --> 00:54:25,600 Speaker 1: on the right flank of the trade bed. Well after 858 00:54:25,680 --> 00:54:31,680 Speaker 1: the revolution that character was promoted. Basically, it was moved 859 00:54:31,760 --> 00:54:35,400 Speaker 1: from the flanks of the machine to this center, most 860 00:54:35,600 --> 00:54:39,879 Speaker 1: most most common region. And for obvious reasons that this 861 00:54:39,960 --> 00:54:43,720 Speaker 1: is the surname of Malta Dong of chairman Mao, whose 862 00:54:43,840 --> 00:54:47,200 Speaker 1: name engineers rightly understood was going to be in lots 863 00:54:47,200 --> 00:54:50,000 Speaker 1: and lots and lots of texts, And so suddenly it 864 00:54:50,080 --> 00:54:53,680 Speaker 1: becomes easier for a type is faster for a type 865 00:54:53,680 --> 00:54:56,760 Speaker 1: of to produce his name. You know, the question often 866 00:54:56,800 --> 00:55:00,600 Speaker 1: comes I often encounter the question, do I think that 867 00:55:02,239 --> 00:55:07,280 Speaker 1: these dimensions cycle back into what the user is doing 868 00:55:08,239 --> 00:55:12,280 Speaker 1: and basically, you know, shape what it is that they're writing. 869 00:55:12,360 --> 00:55:17,160 Speaker 1: Does do our technologies shape what we write? And the answer, 870 00:55:17,239 --> 00:55:20,440 Speaker 1: I think, in a kind of first principles way is 871 00:55:20,560 --> 00:55:24,359 Speaker 1: undoubtedly yes. There it's it's it's undoubted that when you 872 00:55:24,480 --> 00:55:30,200 Speaker 1: create different levels of difficulty and and and time to 873 00:55:30,320 --> 00:55:35,120 Speaker 1: produce one word versus another word, that this kind of 874 00:55:35,160 --> 00:55:38,360 Speaker 1: an economics of energy send cycles back into how we 875 00:55:38,480 --> 00:55:41,759 Speaker 1: use those technologies. The real challenge is how do we 876 00:55:42,320 --> 00:55:46,799 Speaker 1: study that methodologically so that we don't simply, you know, 877 00:55:46,960 --> 00:55:51,680 Speaker 1: find in our in our research foregone conclusion. Um. That's 878 00:55:51,680 --> 00:55:53,520 Speaker 1: a very very very hard thing to think of as 879 00:55:53,560 --> 00:55:55,319 Speaker 1: in a story, and like how would I actually put 880 00:55:55,360 --> 00:55:59,640 Speaker 1: that hypothesis to the test um, you know, because then 881 00:55:59,680 --> 00:56:02,240 Speaker 1: you touch really build a research program that would allow 882 00:56:02,320 --> 00:56:06,080 Speaker 1: you to do that. One way that's possible is uh 883 00:56:06,200 --> 00:56:09,000 Speaker 1: is and it's a pretty it's it's actually pretty fun is. 884 00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:12,879 Speaker 1: In the nineteen fifties and sixties, Chinese typewriters were increasingly 885 00:56:13,040 --> 00:56:17,600 Speaker 1: used to publish books and articles. So someone would use 886 00:56:18,960 --> 00:56:23,240 Speaker 1: uh mimiograph paper produce a master copy of a text 887 00:56:23,360 --> 00:56:26,920 Speaker 1: and then with a mimiograph machine would create a run 888 00:56:26,960 --> 00:56:31,000 Speaker 1: those maybe anywhere from ten to a hundred fifty and 889 00:56:31,000 --> 00:56:34,279 Speaker 1: a hundreds. And this was a perfect kind of technology. 890 00:56:34,640 --> 00:56:37,239 Speaker 1: This is a niche that the typewriter plus mimiograph was 891 00:56:37,320 --> 00:56:39,920 Speaker 1: perfect for. Because if you're going to publish only a 892 00:56:40,000 --> 00:56:42,160 Speaker 1: hundred copies of a book, you don't want a printing press. 893 00:56:42,160 --> 00:56:45,280 Speaker 1: It's just too too much overhead for too little output. 894 00:56:45,400 --> 00:56:47,480 Speaker 1: But neither do you want to write that stuff by hand. 895 00:56:48,320 --> 00:56:52,920 Speaker 1: So anyway, on the in these books which I've amassed, 896 00:56:53,000 --> 00:56:57,040 Speaker 1: this collection of you can see that whenever the type 897 00:56:57,080 --> 00:57:00,480 Speaker 1: is encountered a word or a character or series that 898 00:57:00,560 --> 00:57:02,880 Speaker 1: was not on the machine, he or she would simply 899 00:57:02,960 --> 00:57:05,799 Speaker 1: skip ahead and leave spaces there and then write it 900 00:57:05,800 --> 00:57:08,680 Speaker 1: in by hand onto the memeo paper and then produce 901 00:57:08,760 --> 00:57:12,600 Speaker 1: the book. So you could actually see a which characters 902 00:57:12,640 --> 00:57:16,959 Speaker 1: were not on this person's machine, and how many, how 903 00:57:17,040 --> 00:57:20,320 Speaker 1: often or how willing the type ist was to do this, 904 00:57:20,400 --> 00:57:24,000 Speaker 1: to leave spaces and then enter a word. Um. Now, 905 00:57:24,000 --> 00:57:27,200 Speaker 1: the question would be is that over time are there 906 00:57:27,400 --> 00:57:31,000 Speaker 1: fewer of these handwritten insertions? Are there? Lets? Are there 907 00:57:31,000 --> 00:57:35,560 Speaker 1: more in handwritten insertions? And if there were fewer handwritten insertions, 908 00:57:35,600 --> 00:57:38,040 Speaker 1: over time. This is kind of building a research program 909 00:57:38,040 --> 00:57:40,880 Speaker 1: on the fly here. If there were fewer insertions over time, 910 00:57:40,920 --> 00:57:45,560 Speaker 1: it would be reasonable to hypothesize that that type ists 911 00:57:45,560 --> 00:57:50,200 Speaker 1: are using the strategy of basically synonym replacements. It's like, well, 912 00:57:50,240 --> 00:57:51,720 Speaker 1: I don't have that word which is not and then 913 00:57:51,760 --> 00:57:54,000 Speaker 1: let me just replace it with a synonym or leave 914 00:57:54,040 --> 00:57:57,360 Speaker 1: it out, uh, in favor of a character that is here. 915 00:57:57,960 --> 00:58:00,920 Speaker 1: Because we know that the typewriter itself ever changed size, 916 00:58:00,960 --> 00:58:03,880 Speaker 1: you only have two thousands five to deal with. It's 917 00:58:03,880 --> 00:58:05,920 Speaker 1: not as if they grew over time, and that's what 918 00:58:05,960 --> 00:58:09,600 Speaker 1: would account for the lack of insertions. So there's you'd 919 00:58:09,600 --> 00:58:11,960 Speaker 1: have to figure out how to actually submit this to 920 00:58:12,040 --> 00:58:14,640 Speaker 1: the acid bath of reason. But I do think that 921 00:58:14,720 --> 00:58:18,200 Speaker 1: on a first principles basis, it's undoubted that this that 922 00:58:18,280 --> 00:58:21,800 Speaker 1: this feedback loop exists. It's hard to imagine that it 923 00:58:21,840 --> 00:58:24,439 Speaker 1: could not exist. This is kind of silly, but I 924 00:58:24,560 --> 00:58:28,440 Speaker 1: kind of can't help but wonder if the availability of 925 00:58:28,480 --> 00:58:32,360 Speaker 1: emojis is shaping our language or the way we think, 926 00:58:32,520 --> 00:58:35,040 Speaker 1: Like what you have an emoji for and what you 927 00:58:35,080 --> 00:58:37,760 Speaker 1: don't have an emoji for. I think that's true, and 928 00:58:37,840 --> 00:58:41,080 Speaker 1: also animated gifts. If you think about someone who wants 929 00:58:41,160 --> 00:58:44,640 Speaker 1: to articulate something. I mean, think about Twitter and the 930 00:58:44,720 --> 00:58:48,919 Speaker 1: number of times that some political figure says something it's 931 00:58:48,960 --> 00:58:53,760 Speaker 1: so befuttling that instead of the person bothering to articulate, 932 00:58:54,280 --> 00:58:57,640 Speaker 1: what is it about this statement by said political figure 933 00:58:57,680 --> 00:59:00,480 Speaker 1: that is ridiculous or causes cognitive us an ins or 934 00:59:00,480 --> 00:59:03,960 Speaker 1: it's a contradiction, or it's illogical. Instead, it's a post 935 00:59:04,200 --> 00:59:09,400 Speaker 1: of two second clip of some famous actor, you know, 936 00:59:09,520 --> 00:59:12,760 Speaker 1: looking befuddled at the camera, and that's it. And that's 937 00:59:12,800 --> 00:59:15,840 Speaker 1: like as if that captures it. I think that's what 938 00:59:15,880 --> 00:59:18,400 Speaker 1: I'm getting in there with this, with economy of expression. 939 00:59:18,440 --> 00:59:22,080 Speaker 1: I mean, one is takes time and it's hard and 940 00:59:22,200 --> 00:59:24,160 Speaker 1: you have to and you're you're sticking your neck out 941 00:59:24,200 --> 00:59:26,160 Speaker 1: there to figure out how to put this into words. 942 00:59:26,280 --> 00:59:29,520 Speaker 1: And how do I get my feeling which is going 943 00:59:29,520 --> 00:59:32,240 Speaker 1: on in my mind that this is an illogical statement, 944 00:59:32,240 --> 00:59:34,080 Speaker 1: and how do I make the argument that it is. 945 00:59:34,680 --> 00:59:37,680 Speaker 1: That's that's like a that's an afternoon, you know, that's 946 00:59:37,720 --> 00:59:39,880 Speaker 1: a that's that's a that takes the whole day, a 947 00:59:39,920 --> 00:59:41,520 Speaker 1: whole week, a whole month to figure out how to 948 00:59:41,520 --> 00:59:43,160 Speaker 1: put it. And it's so fast and you've got to 949 00:59:43,160 --> 00:59:44,680 Speaker 1: get it out there, because there's going to be another 950 00:59:44,680 --> 00:59:48,360 Speaker 1: illogical statement any second now, so might as well just 951 00:59:49,600 --> 00:59:51,920 Speaker 1: take and now, of course the fact that these animated 952 00:59:51,920 --> 00:59:55,320 Speaker 1: gifts are preloaded into the technology. Let me just find 953 00:59:55,360 --> 01:00:01,120 Speaker 1: a preloaded one, uh that is spacious and and ambiguous 954 01:00:01,240 --> 01:00:03,760 Speaker 1: enough that I can encode my feeling in it, and 955 01:00:03,800 --> 01:00:06,400 Speaker 1: then I'll post that instead, and it takes me, you know, 956 01:00:06,480 --> 01:00:09,480 Speaker 1: all of five seconds. There's that dimension of it. So 957 01:00:09,600 --> 01:00:12,720 Speaker 1: that's one where it's cycling into expression and also the 958 01:00:12,760 --> 01:00:15,880 Speaker 1: capacity to express because it takes good you know, good 959 01:00:15,880 --> 01:00:19,320 Speaker 1: book isn't written, it's rewritten. A good writer is basically 960 01:00:19,360 --> 01:00:22,720 Speaker 1: a good editor is what they really are. And so 961 01:00:22,840 --> 01:00:24,960 Speaker 1: if you never learn how to edit and how to 962 01:00:25,000 --> 01:00:28,600 Speaker 1: revise and how to then can you become a good writer? 963 01:00:29,080 --> 01:00:32,120 Speaker 1: That's that's probably not, but it's open for question. I guess. 964 01:00:32,480 --> 01:00:37,160 Speaker 1: The other part is our chiveability. If someone takes the time, 965 01:00:37,720 --> 01:00:40,200 Speaker 1: even if they fail, you know, even if their argument 966 01:00:40,200 --> 01:00:43,960 Speaker 1: doesn't hold, if they take the time to express why 967 01:00:44,000 --> 01:00:47,000 Speaker 1: they found some statement theological or shocking or whatever it 968 01:00:47,080 --> 01:00:49,960 Speaker 1: might be, whatever the case might be, well it exists 969 01:00:49,960 --> 01:00:52,560 Speaker 1: in a textual form that can be attributed to a 970 01:00:52,600 --> 01:00:54,920 Speaker 1: person and a time and a place. How in the 971 01:00:54,960 --> 01:00:59,360 Speaker 1: world is an historian in the year to two thousand, 972 01:00:59,360 --> 01:01:03,960 Speaker 1: three hundred if exists going to cite Uh, I don't know. 973 01:01:04,440 --> 01:01:09,360 Speaker 1: The animated gifts a that was used seven hundred thousand 974 01:01:09,480 --> 01:01:14,440 Speaker 1: times in twenty different scenarios as as a way of 975 01:01:14,480 --> 01:01:19,760 Speaker 1: trying to articulate what people in the year whatever thought. 976 01:01:20,280 --> 01:01:24,440 Speaker 1: It almost you know, And these are the reverberations of 977 01:01:25,160 --> 01:01:28,520 Speaker 1: technologies of expression, technologies of writing that we don't have 978 01:01:28,600 --> 01:01:32,880 Speaker 1: to deal with, but of course someone will maybe. All right, Tom, 979 01:01:32,880 --> 01:01:34,400 Speaker 1: it looks like we're out of time here, but we 980 01:01:34,520 --> 01:01:36,840 Speaker 1: really appreciate you taking time out of your day to 981 01:01:36,920 --> 01:01:39,960 Speaker 1: chat with us. Uh really enjoyed the book. It's a 982 01:01:40,000 --> 01:01:41,720 Speaker 1: it's a great read for people that are interested in 983 01:01:41,800 --> 01:01:48,520 Speaker 1: Chinese history, history of technology, linguistic technology, linguistics itself. So 984 01:01:49,040 --> 01:01:51,360 Speaker 1: thanks for chatting with us. Yeah, thanks very much for 985 01:01:51,400 --> 01:01:57,920 Speaker 1: having me. I really appreciate it. Thanks a lot, all right, 986 01:01:58,000 --> 01:02:00,160 Speaker 1: so that you have it, Thanks again to Tom Us 987 01:02:00,200 --> 01:02:04,440 Speaker 1: mulaney for chatting with us about his book The Chinese Typewriter. Again, 988 01:02:04,480 --> 01:02:07,080 Speaker 1: it's out from M I T Press. You can get 989 01:02:07,080 --> 01:02:09,200 Speaker 1: that in print, you can get it as a digital 990 01:02:09,600 --> 01:02:12,560 Speaker 1: e book. However you like to consume your media. And 991 01:02:12,560 --> 01:02:15,440 Speaker 1: he's not stopping here. The next book in the series 992 01:02:15,520 --> 01:02:18,880 Speaker 1: is going to be The Chinese Computer. Oh yeah, and 993 01:02:18,920 --> 01:02:21,640 Speaker 1: he he teased it a little for us, kind of 994 01:02:21,640 --> 01:02:25,040 Speaker 1: off Mike, But it's gonna involve not only the some 995 01:02:25,120 --> 01:02:28,040 Speaker 1: of the the agencies that were involved in the first book, 996 01:02:28,040 --> 01:02:32,440 Speaker 1: but also UH like the US government and UH and 997 01:02:32,560 --> 01:02:35,400 Speaker 1: sort of the the the espionage world of the Cold 998 01:02:35,400 --> 01:02:38,120 Speaker 1: War as well. Yes, we will go deeper and deeper 999 01:02:38,160 --> 01:02:42,120 Speaker 1: into the realms of composition surrogacy. If you're curious what 1000 01:02:42,160 --> 01:02:45,360 Speaker 1: that means, check back in with The Chinese Computer in 1001 01:02:45,400 --> 01:02:47,800 Speaker 1: the future. In the meantime, be sure to head on 1002 01:02:47,840 --> 01:02:50,320 Speaker 1: over to stuff double your mind dot com. That's where 1003 01:02:50,320 --> 01:02:53,400 Speaker 1: you'll find all the podcast episodes, blog post links out 1004 01:02:53,400 --> 01:02:56,040 Speaker 1: to various social media accounts, etcetera, and the on the 1005 01:02:56,160 --> 01:02:58,920 Speaker 1: landing page. For this episode, we will be sure to 1006 01:02:59,120 --> 01:03:02,720 Speaker 1: link out to a place where you can buy Milany's book, 1007 01:03:02,720 --> 01:03:06,840 Speaker 1: as well as Molany's profile at Stanford. Thanks as always 1008 01:03:06,880 --> 01:03:10,600 Speaker 1: to our excellent audio producers Alex Williams and try Harrison. 1009 01:03:10,680 --> 01:03:12,240 Speaker 1: And if you want to get in touch with us 1010 01:03:12,240 --> 01:03:14,520 Speaker 1: to let us know your feedback on this episode or 1011 01:03:14,560 --> 01:03:18,120 Speaker 1: any other, or if you'd like to, you know, request 1012 01:03:18,120 --> 01:03:20,480 Speaker 1: a topic for the future, something that interests you you 1013 01:03:20,520 --> 01:03:22,919 Speaker 1: think might interest us and the other listeners as well. 1014 01:03:23,200 --> 01:03:26,400 Speaker 1: You can email us at blow the Mind at how 1015 01:03:26,480 --> 01:03:38,480 Speaker 1: stuff works dot com for more on this and thousands 1016 01:03:38,480 --> 01:04:00,000 Speaker 1: of other topics. Is it how stuff works dot com, 1017 01:04:00,360 --> 01:04:01,000 Speaker 1: ros my fa