"dance and tech" is a field of theft and non-authentic invention continued...

[Julie N. Cruse]

On the "genre" of dance and technology, a comment was made that the people who use the tools in dance and tech are just feeding off of the creativity of the person who invented the tool.

Comments?


I orginally posted the above statement in a blog which I shared with some friends on this network. The statement ilicited many provocative responses and a heated discussion began to take place within a few hours. So we moved the discussion to the forum where there would be more room for the vast responses on this topic. The first 3 posts below are the statements made in the blog, copied and pasted here so that the discussion may continue in the forum - which turned out to be a more appropriate home for such reflective responses and debates.

[Julie N. Cruse]

At 5:49am on November 28th, 2007, Georg Hobmeier said…
I think that raises a question about the toolmakers creativity. Someone who makes a good brush is not per se a good painter. The tool is part of the creation of a form of art, yet might be seen as an art itself. Software can be made in a skillful way, but if it is used in another context then writing software, such as dance, the creativity of the programmer is facilitating something, that the programmer would never been able to create.
An interesting question could be as well: What is a tool?

At 6:29am on November 28th, 2007, Marlon Barrios Solano said…
I agree with Andy and Georg.
An important aspect to consider is in how tools (or dance) are used including an axis on innovation. Hoy do you use a code, a programming environment, an interface, a body, in innovative ways?
A dance training and choreographic method, can be as stiffening as a cinematopgraphic language,...
The other thing is that we teng to privilege this or that for many culturally constructed reasons...so the other thing to consider is: what is creativity...?
Something that I adminre about programmers is their capacity to "hack". To fing solutions.
Are there dance hackers?

At 7:49am on November 28th, 2007, Arthur Elsenaar said…
To see technology just as a tool is the problem in these type of discussions. The characteristics of a particular technology shapes the outcome. Simple question, how would contemporary imagery look like without the work of the brothers Knoll? Who is responsible for the outcome of a piece of graphic work, you as a Photoshop user or those that made the technology that shaped your ideas? Photoshop can be seen as the real artwork here and its users operators like musicians playing a score. (flame bate warning)

At 8:24am on November 28th, 2007, Tony Schultz said…
Lets take a risk here and look at the ways this is true. The technology does shape the work. In dancing-inventing we make the machines that shape the work. Building the tools and doing the dancing attacks the problem head-on. In reverse, understanding the machine and the mathematics at work kinesthetically is important. Tools are always made from other tools of course. All of the brush/writing/painting analogies here seem misplaced. New techniques of painting and their development are what is of value in a work. Pointillism is a tool. It is in the tool making where we find the art making.

At 8:52am on November 28th, 2007, Georg Hobmeier said…
I strongly object to the last comment. (for the discussion's sake)
First of all, I don't think the mathematics can be understood kinesthetically. Of course, if we look at artists such as Xavier LeRoy, then we know, that they can be represented by a moving body.
Secondly: of course technology shapes the work, but it is not the work. It seems now more of an ontological debate. We can understand certain aspects of an artform, by knowing certain aspects of the tools used within this discipline, but to me it seems, that the degree is different (to an extreme degree) in every art form. The statement that the tool making makes one understand the art making is therefore (for me) a generalization. I can learn how to make a brush, but that doesn't mean, that I can be a painter then. Or to be more focused on our field: I can learn how to write code for a programm, such as Supercollider, but it will not make me a musician or composer. It might lead to some understanding of how the programm that "makes the art" works, but that doesn't necessarily lead towards an understanding of the artform itself.Delete Comment

At 11:11am on November 28th, 2007, Tony Schultz said…
though undebatable, kinesthetic perception of mathematics worth debate. psychophysics tells us when we move a rigid object, like a bone, our perception of its weight distribution is determined by its second order density statistics (inertial moments) meaning in many ways we feel our bones as ellipsoids as we move them. bodies can be used as measuring devices for elaborating mathematical truths. we feel/know where we will land in a jump under constant gravity. the harmonic motion of bopping shoulders known as much as it is felt. the mystery of rotational precession (where the axis of torque and axis of rotation are not aligned) is illuminated from the inside a windmill. in programing (doing mathematics) people invoke this same kinesthetic sense. this pushes that which makes this then this happen. the steps of computational sequence are as physical as they are linguistic. the feeling and experience of our own body and ways in which mathematics is embodied are deeply entangled. the mode of production, (mechanical,digital etc) shapes them the same way. in times when mathematical proofs were reduced to hypothetical mechanisms that could render the solution the dominant metaphor for the body was machine. in the information age our bodies are experienced as information based (genomics, pharma, marketing programs etc) i would even take this to the end to say that mathematics can only be conceived and communicationed in our capacity to feel abstract bodies moving.Delete Comment

At 12:28pm on November 28th, 2007, G Hilton said…
Waitwaitwait. Hang on a while I create my own cleanroom reimplementation of tcp/ip in order to reply with sufficient integrity. Everything I was planning to say - the 'content' if you like - has already been said by better, smarter people, but if I had my own special new way of *publishing* it, I just know everybody would be interested...Delete Comment

At 1:08pm on November 28th, 2007, Arthur Elsenaar said…
@ G Hilton, can you then provide the original poster with references to what these 'smarter people' said, so she can learn? Which presumably was her intension?
@ Julie, satisfied with the discussion so far?

At 1:23pm on November 28th, 2007, G Hilton said…
Arthur - the smarter particpants were the previous posters, yourself of course, included :-)

I had a whole long reply typed here but then i realised i was falling into the same old trap of having 'content', (which I'm trying to unlearn, i promise) so instead I'll just mention that i'm posting this with Safari Version 3.0.4 (523.12), because surely that's all that really matters! :-)

At 1:48pm on November 28th, 2007, Julie N. Cruse said…
Admittedly I have been debating it within myself for a while, and when I heard this comment, I realized that finding a standpoint would best be accomplished through discussion - getting perspectives from other practitioners. It is a valid issue to take up, if not in defense of our work, then for the sake of clarifying possible arguments for ourselves, and for each other.
This statement is placing value on invention... not creativity, or technique. Necessity is the mother of invention - therefor the inventiveness of the inventor himself can always be questioned on those grounds (depending on how invention is defined). If invention is defined as some brand new idea unprecedented by others, then no one is really inventive (can't think of a one - even nature isn't that inventive). If invention is defined as being the first to create something, we have a lot of those, but that also relates more to timing than pure inventiveness. Most often the thing will eventually be created by someone, just out of need.
Techniques that are "invented" in arts using "tools" that were recently "invented", are also inventive - despite the fact that they could not exist without the creation of the said "tool" (which could also not exist without the whole social evolution which necessitated the creation of it). The creators of Electricity, Geers, Wheels, Switches, Engines, Isadora, Maya, Max/MSP/Jitter, LIVE, Digital Performer, etcetera have totally redefined the possibilities in the arts, but not without first being precedented by similar ideas - fire, stars, catapults, trebuches, moog synthesizers, first giant computers, etcetera. They were the next step in an ancient dialog as human-kind strives to communicate and exist.
Another question that can be derived from the first in order to answer the first was eloquently raised by Tony Schultz: what distinguishes a tool from art?
The makers of tools - or media used to create art - and art share some creative, problem solving characteristics. New techniques derived from new tools are often referred to as "isms" of some kind that seem to embrace a new philosophy or a ground-breaking approach to making art. So, a philosophy can be defined as an abstract tool then... as others can use this philosophy, or "ism" or "tool" to create something else that is new.
Invention is a quality that is evident in more than just a patented product, and even patented products were influenced from somewhere. I also think that this person had not considered that her own work - which is pure choreography, no multimedia - by her own argument would also be defined as non-authentic theft since the medium itself was born centuries before her.

[Julie N. Cruse]

At 1:53pm on November 28th, 2007, Julie N. Cruse said…
Hilton you are brilliant!

At 2:25pm on November 28th, 2007, Georg Hobmeier said…
@tony: i actually never felt my bones as ellipsoids, i just felt them. i think proprioception allows you to "just feel" it, everything else is a projection of the mind into the sensation, but not the sensation itself.oh, i think i'm stepping on dangerous ground here... i hope someone can lecture my on the latest research in cognitive science....
of course the body contains mathematical principles, and some of them, can include ideas of the body and so can philosophy. one might just think of the zeno's story about the turtle and achilles. but then a story or a thought about a body, is not a body.

At 2:50pm on November 28th, 2007, Julie N. Cruse said…
And actually if we think about mathematics as a simple language based on relationships, then in fact the "proprioception" that allows you to "just feel it" would also encompass the sensation of relationships between various parts of the body and between the body and external space. So if the body is able to sense and respond to relationships, then it is feeling the subject matter of mathematics as well (relationships).

At 2:51pm on November 28th, 2007, Marlon Barrios Solano said…
Hello networkers... this is picking up some speed here and it is a very important discussion that I suggest to continue in the forum...lets take advantage of the momentum and continue it there...who wants to throw the ball to the Forum?...in the bottom part of the page... you can name it something like:
Continuation from "dance and tech" is a field of theft and non-authentic invention. thread initiated by Julie Cruise...what doyathink?

At 3:01pm on November 28th, 2007, Georg Hobmeier said…
well... I don't see it in such a way. I think only a specialist in cognition and neurology can give the right answer. But I understand by "feeling" or proprioception the information I receive from my nervous system. "Feeling things as mathematics" (only one possible example, i could also feel myself as god, a chicken or french grammar) is already an interpretation of the information of my nervous system and a projection. I'm thinking mathematics using information given by my body.

At 3:25pm on November 28th, 2007, Julie N. Cruse said…
@ Georg, I think I understand what you are saying - just that we can overlay any conceptual interpretation on the information we experience as moving bodies. I am not disagreeing with you - in fact, I think you're right. I am only saying that math is about relationships, (as opposed to ideas, like spoken languages) and if the body perceives and responds to it's internal relationship to itself and its environment, which it does (pain signals, temperature, blood flow, contraction and stretch, breath, etcetera all respond to the degree of what is happening within and around the body), then it is inherently sensing the subject matter of math. I am not saying that the body feels or thinks in terms of numbers, but that numbers and the signals of the body operate on the same function - relationships

At 3:34pm on November 28th, 2007, Georg Hobmeier said…
I can't disagree with you. End of discussion. I'ld be curious to know the neurological facts of this matter. Or to discuss this with another, maybe more ancient, definition of the term mathematics.

At 3:37pm on November 28th, 2007, Marlon Barrios Solano said…
hey.....these is a great thread...pleeease continue in the forum....Andy...do you feel the call....

At 3:49pm on November 28th, 2007, Tony Schultz said…
@Georg The principle is called "Dynamic Touch". Here is a good introductory paper apparently used at MIT Media Lab
http://courses.media.mit.edu/2004spring/mas966/Carello%202000.pdf

At 4:00pm on November 28th, 2007, Tony Schultz said…
The point is that the "feel" of movement depends on its physics, fundamental dynamical principles that can be reduced to a mathematical expression. In as much as we feel the physics we feel the math behind it.

[Julie N. Cruse]

At 4:20pm on November 28th, 2007, Julie N. Cruse said…
I don't mind moving the talk - except for the fact that this space is easier on the eye than the forum and also linked on the main page. I also would think that new people would then not know which forum is most current, and there may be confusion as to which spot is best to post. It would suck to have two threads running at the same time, breaking up the flow of this talk. Solutions?

At 4:31pm on November 28th, 2007, Arthur Elsenaar said…
Just continue here I suppose and take it as a learning moment to start discussions in the forum and not as a blog entry.

Math in my opinion can describe much about nature, it doesn't necessarily mean nature operates on mathematical principles.

At 4:45pm on November 28th, 2007, Marlon Barrios Solano said…
cool!
I can move the forum to the top!!!
ya?

At 5:43pm on November 28th, 2007, Julie N. Cruse said…
That would be great! OK - click click click - to the forum we go! Please do not comment in this blog anymore!

[Arthur Elsenaar]

@ G Hilton, (just to see if we can revive the discussion now it has moved) I was really referring to the 'smarter people' that came up with the now classic Photoshop as symphony example. My guess it came from debate going on in the generative art scene, but have no pointers at hand.
Typing the message in Safari doesn't debunk that Photoshop argument does it!? Safari is not shaping your text in any way by its feature set. Maybe McLuhan should be brought to the rescue/ debate here..

[Arthur Elsenaar]

The more appropriate term used in this debate is 'end-user art'; art created by artists using existing software. Whether they consider themselves losers depends on how serious they take this theoretical nitpicking.
Do you take so called 'critical theory' serious? I don't, it seems a necessary evil to get a PhD in the arts, but still unnecessary for most other purposes.

[Marlon Barrios Solano]

Ok,
I have to reply to Tony's even if I am really tired. I think that there are very juicy topics in this thread that I will go back tomorrow or Sunday.
Tony, I think that its is hard to know if I agree with you because your statements are full of generalizations and we might have different notions about "dance" and its contex. or about Focault (beyond the panopticon), and specially about the negative connotation that you give to the word control.
I like to understand control from an eco-systemic and cybernetic perspective (third wave). Control as a part of the coordination of actions and the coupling of systems HAS to exist. Therefore, there is control in any coordinated action, control has to be in interplay with autonomy and agency. You can apply this to social systems, biological systems, etc (Varela, Marturana, and others), but I think that you are talking most of the times assuming that control is a negative thing from an anti hegemonic discourse.
So, I don't agree with that comment because there are many organizational and different hierarchical levels that have to be taken into consideration when we talk in such generalized way about "dance".
We dance phantasies, metaphors, choreographic instructions, impulses, we imitate, we seduce, we couple in actions and beliefs, we off-load cognitive processes in movement sequences and software. We modify our bodies with training, coffee and cellphones. We might dance because feels good or because it helps you to discover new territories in your anatomical system having a journey of "experiential anatomy"...many ways of trading metaphors and try to understand and very complex phenomena. The experience of a human that happens to move and and watch movement. and move in order to watch...
So, I think that "control" is a necessary aspect of being in the world, but I am not talking as a personality treat or a "power" and control in the social and political structures.
I think that " this project" as Tony call it, is about participation in order to expose and expand a vision of body, mind and culture (technology inter-penetrating all) that comes from a very intelligent and articulate community: artist, theorists, technologists working with a strong awareness of the importance of embodiment, an aesthetic commitment to composition and a shameless passion for science and technology. These platform is an experiment of pure emergent intelligence. So, it is not a Foucaltian pan-opticon. This is a system in which people is choosing to participate and also the platform allows you to set some privacy levels.
So, I am the admin and a user, to but I never think or feel it as a binary, it would be too simplistic.
This project is also part of my research on dance and technology, as web developer and as an educator.
I think that the exchange and the flow of knowledge has been very rewarding to motivate participation, but it is not a bad idea to get some sponsoring from apple, (Iphones are cooler? can you run processing in them...)
I invite the users of dance-tech.net to be active, intelligent, articulate, respectful, honest and responsible...our thoughts and our work will be generative.
Wild curiosity, and openness about our own creative process will raise the bar for the work and health of our community
"this project" is more bergsonian in a way that is in a "constant state of becoming"... that is what fascinates me...it autonomous growth generated by many agents thinking together...

[Julie N. Cruse]

at Marlon's statements on control as a necessary part of coordinated actions - I really wonder if that is entirely accurate. I say this because when I first read that sentence, I felt a sense of "woah, that's a good point, but totally opposite how I think of control in dance, specifically technique." All my training has been diverse and some professors have focused on control while others have focused on other things. I find that the most precision is not a result of control. But the result of transforming the idea of control into an idea of mutual listening and sensitivity between leaders and followers in the muscles while dancing. Just wanted to put that out there.

As for the initial topic, while I believe that artists using technology are still innovative, and programmers who make technology are still artistic - thus equally involved in the shared dynamic of influential systems of dialog - I also believe that there is a lot of repetitive trash going on out there. I think almost everything I see is interactive sound, interactive video, or real time motion capture or something. I get so sick of it. I'm like, "how many times do i have to see another live improvisation with interactive blah blah blah." It's not that the performers and artists can't bring something new to it - but it's that the concept of interaction in audio visual environments is regergitated, stale, not been contributed to. Even in situations where people are now doing the inverse - like, having electrodes or sensors control the muscles in some way, I still see a redundant theme being explored. It's the most obvious next step, and yes, while someone has to do it, so we can say it's been done... it's not unguessable. It's not a remarkable next step - it's just a slight degree off from the same thing.

I see this progression in dance and tech as having started with Nikolais and Cunningham, and even Lucinda Childs - with projections, moogs, and lights, and props. I think of John Cage, The Beatles, beat poets, and all forms of postmodernism and how ever since then the whole focus of the arts has basically shifted from being trained in an institutionalized form to the emphasis on form invention. I struggle to pinpoint where we are now, but definitely see something new appearing on the horizon - the acceptance of the fact that originality, real, authentic originality, is hard to come by. That maybe this is not only because so many people have the same idea at once, but also because everything is so available for plagiarism nowadays what with travel being so easy, compartaively, and the sheer expanse of the internet.

I see artists doing a lot of things in response to that. Some artists have given up on whether or not they'll ever be adding anything to the overall body of research that's been pioneered, and well-traveled by arts predecessors. They get a pt job, or they continue to make what they want to make and tend to ignore where the work fits on the spectrum of arts evolution. Other artists honestly try to be original and daring, and wind up mimicking the coolest thing they've recently seen. I've seen a lot of that and can't stand it. Still others attempt to read, study, and see as much as possible trying desperately to find a niche in the race.

But my stance recently, and especially recently, has been that my own work is thieved. I can not ever claim one hundred percent ownership of an idea. I can claim that I have been an integral part of the dialog which generated the seeds of the idea, and susequently the major component in bringing it to life - but never full credit ever. I have recently then relinquished my own role as author.

Instead of being on one extreme side or the other - on the issue of invention - like Merce (chance procedures instead of his own invention - which was an invention of his own) is to Nikolais (who favored his own invention quite intensely with multimedia dance) or Improvisation (which seems to say to heck with intentional structure -

I am admitting that I am a thief. I think that the most edgy art is informed, and responsive. It takes dialog, and close monitoring of the trends to get at the cliches governing them. It takes arduous reflection and introspection to realize the work that is both true and contributing to the larger arts picture in a way that moves the whole scene forward. The only way this can be accomplished is by listening with a careful ear and eye and ego to what is happening all around to understand what it is missing.

That said, on the issue of technology - well,

we're all thieves,
if we're any good.

it's just that the programmers don't get as bent out of shape about it.

[Georg Hobmeier]

i would like to add two rather unacademic stories to this discussion.

last summer, i found myself for mysterious reason and due to a series of coincides in an anarchist activist camp in the ukraine. led there by the conviction that is it some form of NGO meeting about migration i found myself in the middle of an eastern european gathering of anti-fascists, eco-activists and alco-vegans. however, there was plenty of interesting discussions with this rather radical persons, most of them being luddits when it came to technology. once i declared myself as an artist working with technology, i was being thrown in a series of discussions with those eastern luddits. a very comical statement came from a young british activist, who made the following statement: "technology, as a principle is evil, it is a system of power that corrupts and should therefore be rejected (...) tools are ok." well, i didnt really know what to say, but the young lady also insisted, that the supermarket is being a technological manifestation of evil. she was rather puzzled when i said, that there is only one true evil in this world and that is ballett. in other discussions there was the usual "the internet is evil", "television is evil" and "all cops are bastards". the indymedia people that attended the camp tried to avoid any discussion concerning technology, but kep on mentioning in an almost desperate way that they use linux. i escaped one morning at dawn from the camp, that, needless to say, didnt even have electricity. another important lesson about technology and ideology learned.
the second story is my own personal experience with electro-muscular induction. i happen to have a wireless muscle control apparatus, which i occasionaly use in my performance work. after working on an endurance installation called mymyomayhem, lasting several hours, where i was exposed to constant electrical contractions in my upper body and face, i had a rather bizzare incident. i wa cleaning up, picking up papers that were on the floor, i wanted to grap them and saw my very own hand not exactly following my will. it moved by itself. somehow, my hand followed its own will, it just happily twitched and turned by itself. a neurologist explained me, that i mostly likely instructed the body movement patterns and due to the extreme repetition, it just became automatic. i starred at my hand. it was my hand, i alone should move it. after some seconds, my hand stopped moving and obeyed the central control organ again.

so much for my personal accounts, i hope to have added a comical interlude to this serious discussion.

[Arthur Elsenaar]

Hi Georg, interesting experiences I must say. I happen to have experienced both as well. Strange anarchists group together, it defeats being an anarchist isn't it.. mind boggling those people.. and secondly their rejection of technology. My argument has been that if one is afraid of the devil one has to become one first. In other words if you're afraid of technology, get more of it. They don't like that.

Your second experience reflects muscle stimulus pieces I have done over the years. The issue is that embedded in the muscles are sensors "muscle spindles" that measure level of contraction and force or tonus. Their signal is directly fed back to the autonomous central nervous system. As with all biological systems, they adapt to new circumstances. Suddenly removing the electrical stimulus makes it want to compensate for something (external trigger) that's not there anymore. This adaption is slow and only manifests itself after long endured stimulus as what you have found. Temporary autonomous indeed. No reason for concern, but don't overload nerves, they can break. You won't find this in text books on the matter, they mostly talk about too high currents being damaging, but applying low frequency pulses with a current that is regarded safe can damage nerves. This is something I have found out myself, leaving half of my left hand numb for a long time. Neurologists in the hospital estimated the nerve regeneration (healing) process would take a couple of months, in reality it took about two years.

I am elaborate on this as people have to know the risks, I thought I knew and found conditions of failure not known before. The opposite is also true, doing stuff people regard as dangerous, but isn't. Below Johannes quoted Evel Knievel that just died. He said something along the lines of spending years in hospital was just part of being a dare devil for a job.

I regularly get questions from students that like to get into muscle stimulus experiments and ask about voltages and currents. My standard reply now is to buy off the shelve equipment (TENS is fine and cheap) and refrain from fooling around with electricity and the body if you're not an expert. Luckily some pursue and make work, progressing the arts.

[Johannes Birringer]

"People wanted to associate with a winner, not a loser. They wanted to associate with someone who kept trying to be winner"
(Evel Knievel)[1938-2007]

[Johannes Birringer]

(2) It's sad to hear that Evel died.

I enjoyed the discussion so far, the issue of control as debated by Marlon is quite central to what some are doing in the field (if we look at interactive work and interaction design, or all of the live coding and algorithmic processes that have been mentioned or alluded to in the chat on mathematics and software art/invention/creativity. Like Marlon, I tend to see "control" as something positive (valueless actually) or simply neceessary in a sense of the cybernetic anthropology involved here if you look at feedback processes, embodiment, metabolisms, interactions, relationalities, intersubjectivities, and machine-human interfaces., etc,.

now, without being disrespectful to Evel Knievel, a daring choreographer or movement artist, I am very intrigued by Julie and the way she has insisted on this discussion, insisted on being critical. I would love to hear more comments on her reply to the issue of control: (i think Julie thinks of the opposite of control as in "specifically technique" [.......of mutual listening and sensitivity between leaders and followers in the muscles while dancing......]

-- and here i would love to describe a performance by Toshiko Oiwa which I saw last week, which would be unimaginable without utmost control and precision...., in a sense in which i understand control as controlling (self controling) muscular energies or dispositions, movements, strillness, focus, concenhtration, expression, and so many aspects of the organisms/anatomy in action, i wonder whether one can actually even speak of cellular control and control functions, and such controlling, in my view, is not contricted at all by listening to the enviromment or to others.

I might write my description of the dance later. I want to end by congratulating Julie on her dire comments on n"interactivity"......

>>
As for the initial topic, while I believe that artists using technology are still innovative, and programmers who make technology are still artistic - thus equally involved in the shared dynamic of influential systems of dialog - I also believe that there is a lot of repetitive trash going on out there. I think almost everything I see is interactive sound, interactive video, or real time motion capture or something. I get so sick of it. I'm like, "how many times do i have to see another live improvisation with interactive blah blah blah." It's not that the performers and artists can't bring something new to it - but it's that the concept of interaction in audio visual environments is regurgitated, stale, not been contributed to. Even in situations where people are now doing the inverse - like, having electrodes or sensors control the muscles in some way, I still see a redundant theme being explored. It's the most obvious next step, and yes, while someone has to do it, so we can say it's been done... it's not unguessable. It's not a remarkable next step - it's just a slight degree off from the same thing.>>>>

hmmm. surely there are protests coming here, no?

regards, Johannes

[Julie N. Cruse]

I think the word "control" in and of itself carries a connotation that is a faulty description of the actuality of what evolves out of complex systems of coordination. I may be a nitpicker here, but in order for a director of action to have "control" it must have the permission of its subordinates - to know how to gain that permission when it is retracted. For example, in dance, when the dancer experiences stress signals from the muscles (this is going to far, this is too much weight) and decides to exert control by pushing the muscles to cooperate anyhow, the dancer will either be sore or injured. Its a natural consequence of exerting control without permission. When the dancer learns how to make adjustments to accomplish the movement in a way that decreases stress on the body, then he will experience the smooth synchronous dialog of a "happy body" on a journey with a healthy mind. Just my issue on the term control itself -

I believe that no control is had without permission of those being controlled in any system - "feedback processes, embodiment, metabolisms, interactions, relationalities, intersubjectivities, and machine-human interfaces., etc,.." Otherwise there would be chaos. So this term control is really - an agreement.

this is not to say that control is bad, just that the term itself is inaccurate - control is an illusion.

as paraphrased by my colleague, "control - in its most limited sense - is possible but is counterproductive to the whole system."