Yahoo Tuning Groups Ultimate Backup metatuning Joe Monzo's claims about math and music just don't make sense

In Message 7146, Joe Monzo remarks:

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Msg #
From: "monz" <monz@a...>
Date: Mon Apr 19, 2004 6:56 am
Subject: Re: Math and music

"my ultimate point is that you can use math to
describe / create / perform / analyze / etc. music"

Math cannot be used to describe music in any meaningful
way, any more than math can be used to meaningfully
describe poetry or sex. We can, for example, measure
the number of letters per sapphic hexameter line and count
the frequency of each letter...but is that any kind
of meaningful description of a piece of poetry? We
can obviously measure the blood pressure of a person
and the dilation of her pupils when s/he has an orgasm,
but is that any king of meaningful description of sex?
You guys have been sitting around your computers too
long. You need to get outisde.

Math _can_ be used to describe superficial epiphenomena
tangential to music -- namely, sound frequencies, spectral
components of acoustic impulses, dB sound pressure levels
of compression and rarefaction in the air, and so on.

But these epiphenomena tangential to music are not music
itself, any more than hydrogen atoms and carbon
atoms and nitrogen atoms are human beings. Frequency of
acoustic impulses is not pitch. Spectral components are
not tones. dB SPLs are not loudness. Humans do not
perceive frequency, we perceive pitch: humans do
not perceive spectral components, we perceive timbres.
Humans do not perceive dBs of sound pressure, we
perceive loudness...and most of these are not
mensurable by human senses, other than pitch. There
is, for example, no grid for ranking timbres on a
scale in any musically meaningful way:

"Innate cognitive constraints do not, however, segment
other paremeters of sound into discrete, proprotional
relationships. For isntance, there is no relationship
in the realm of dynamics that corresponds to say, say,
a minor third or dotted rhythm. And the same is true of
tempo, sonority, and timbre. Dynamics may become louder
or softer, tempi may be faster or slower, sonorities thinner
or thicker, and so on. But they cannot be segmented into
perceptually discrete relationships." [Meyer, Leonard
B., "A Universe Of Universals," The Journal Of Musicology,
Volume XVI, No. 1, Winter 1998, pg. 9]

The reason why humans do not perceive the superficial
epiphenomena tangential to music (amplitude, spectra,
frequency) is that the human senses process all that
stuff far below the level of consiousness and transform
that information beyond recogniztion. And then the
human brain processes the result some more, transforming
it once again...because humans have brains and a culture.

Tuning forks do not have brains. Tuning forks do not
have culture. Consequently the intervention of a
brain or culture is of no concern in determining
whether a tuning fork resonates to a given frequency
of sound. But humans are not tuning forks -- even though
the pseudoscientific kooks who now tyrannize the ATL
persistently try to treat humans (in musical terms) as
though they were tuning forks. The calculation of
"magic" numbers, whether called harmonic entropy or
TOPS, would be musically meaningful if people were
inanimate tuning forks with resonant frequencies
fixed by nature. But humans are not tuning forks,
and consequently magic numbers confected from
pseudoscience like harmonic entropy or TOPS prove
musically meaningless for humans.

Because humans are not tuning forks, they do not
process frequency and amplitude directly. Instead,
humans perceive the universe through band-limited
non-linear senses which throw out 99% of input information
and distort the rest. This also assures us that,
unlike a tuning fork, a human being cannot and will
not merely helplessly resonante to small integer ratios
sans intervention of mind and culture. A tuning fork
will, but a human will not and does not. Moreover,
once sensory percepts make their way through our
eyes and ears, percepts get filtered even further through
the human brain, and that is where the largest distortions
and omissions and additions occur by far.

Why does this matter?

Because music occurs precisely when human culture and
human emotions interact with artifacts of human
culture -- music is not a matter of mere acoustic impulses.
If it were, we would walk past a rockslide and
murmur, "Ah, listen to the beautiful music!" No
one does that. No one listens to the sound of rain
on a pond and rhapsodizes, "What magnificent melodies!
What sublime harmonies! What beautiful musical
themes!" Acoustic impulses alone are not music.
They must be organized within the context of human
emotions (musical drama, tension, expectation,
climax, peripeteia) and human culture (musical forms
like the sonata). And emotions & culture are not measurable
or quantifiable in any meaningful way. It is laughable
and inane to try to rank human cultures -- "Well, I
give the Mayan culture a 4, but Mohenjo-Daro definitely
rates a 9." Frequencies _are_ quantifiable and can be
mathematized -- but the pitch system of the Balinese gamelan
is _not_ mathematizable in any meaningful way and cannot
be reduced to an equation because there IS no "system,"
there is only what the Balinese gamelan maker describes
as "rasa"...the indefinable individual personal feeling
by which each gamelan maker descides for himself upon a
set of pitches for each particular gamelan. Some
gamelans have large gaps in their scales where other
gamelans have small gaps...other gamelans have widely
stretched octaves, while yet other gamelans have octaves
only slightly larger than 1200 cents. There is no
overall mathematical system to it. It is entirely a
matter of individual human feeling combined with deep
currents of Balinese culture.

Likewise there is no "musical equation" which
lets us take Monteverdi and Mozart as input variables
and gives us Ralph Vaughan William and Tod Dockstader
as outputs at a later point in time. There is no possible
mathematical way to predict what future composers will
do. The actions of humans (like composers) depend entirely
on unpredictable whims and random cultural currents and
fads and foibles like elections, wars, musical styles,
etc.

So Joe Monzo's claim that "music can be described...
by math" is as faulty and as obviously incorrect as
the equally laughable claim that "the stock market
can be described...my math." Only the most trivially
superficial epiphenomena of the stock market can be
described by math in any meaningful way -- the
prices of individual stocks, gross statistical
volume of stocks traded, etc. But measuring all that
tells you precisely nothing about what the stock
market will do tomorrow, and consequently such
a mathematical description is not even remotely
meaningful...and for a simple and obvious reason:

Because what the stock market will do tomorrow
depends entirely on the unpredictable irrational
behavior and emotions of human beings.

On Septermber 10 2001, no stock market analyst
predicted that the Dow Jones Index would collapse
and lose 50% of its value over the next 3 months.
The Dow Jones Index collapsed in the months
following September 11 because of the emotion-driven
irrational actions of a human being, Osama bin
Laden.

Stock markets, like musical compositions, are
completely unpredictable because they are not
produced by the unmediated activity of laws of
nature. Stock markets, like musical compositions,
are produced by irrational unpredictable human
beings, and are therefore subject to bizarre
human whims and caprices and foibles and fads
which no equation can possibly predict.

This is in contradistiction to gravitation or
electromagnetism. Whether the Andromeda galaxy
experiences a gravitational attraction to our
galaxy does not depend on what humans do or
believe. But the style of music in which
composers choose to compose 10 years from now
IS _entirely_ dependent upon what humans do
and believe.

Thus it is as completely false to claim that
"music can be described...by math" as it is
to say that "poetry can be described...by
math" or "art can be described...by math"
merely by measuring letter frequencies in poems
or using a spectrophotometer to get a reading
of the energy at each frequency of reflected
light from a painting.

Only superficial epiphenomena of poetry
can be described by math; only the most
superficial epiphenomena of a painting can
be described by math. But the superficial
epiphenomena are not the thing itself, any
more than a clipping from your fingernail
is you -- and we do not arrest and try
people for murder when they clip their
fingernails. So why should we make the
foolish error of mistaking superficial
epiphenomena (frequency, amplitude, spectrum)
for the whole when it comes to music?

That is the logical equivalent of arresting
a composer for murder because he has clipped
his toenails.

The energy per wavelength of light reflected
from a painting tells us exactly nothing of
any artistic significance about a painting,
and the proof is simple and obvious -- no
art critic has ever published a chart of
the reflected light frequencies of a painting
and used it to assert: "See? This is a good
painting, and the reflected light wavelengths
_prove_ it!"

Indeed, such a claim is on its face absurd.
This is the crassest kind of greedy
reductionism, and a classic logical fallacy.

Joe Monzo goes on to compound his fallacy of
greedy reductionism by claiming :

"You can use math to describe...music, just as you
can use math in way imaginable for any number of other
aspects of life and the universe..."

Joe Monzo's claim is on its face flatly false and
absurd, and depends on a gross abuse of the meaning
of the word "use." You can use a screwdriver to
eat soup. To abuse and misuse the word "use" by
saying, "I can use a screwdriver to eat soup by
dipping in the blade in and getting a drop of soup
at a time, and this proves that a screwdriver is
useful for eating soup" is unspeakably foolish.
Common sense tells us that a screwdriver is not
useful for eating soup, and the proof is obvious --
attempts to use a screwdriver to eat soup end
up in failure and no sensible person persists
in trying to use a screwdriver to eat soup. We
typically see people eating soup with spoons,
never screwdrivers.

Likewise, every attempt to use math to describe
music -- as embodied in mathematical music
theory -- has failed more badly than our hypothetical
attempt to use a screwdriver to eat soup. We see
virtually no composers using math to describe
music and essentially no musical performers
use math to describe music. For example, during
symphony rehearsals we _never_ see the musicians
poring over math textbooks in order to better
understand the music they are about to play.
It just never happens. Listeners never bring
math texts to concerts and read 'em beforehand
to help them appreciate the music -- that just
N*E*V*E*R H*A*P*P*E*N*S. It never happens because
the "use" of math to describe music is in actuality
a gross abuse, a heinous misuse, an insane aburdity
more counterproductive and more ridiculously pointless
than the "use" of a screwdriver to eat soup.

Monzo goes on to abuse and misuse the term "use"
out of all proportion from its ocmmonly
understood meaning by making the even more
absurd claim that "you can use math in way
imaginable for any number of other aspects
of life and the universe..."

Monzo is here playing contemptible word
games. You cannot use math in any sensible
or meaningful way to for "any...other aspects
of life and the universe." That's absurd on
its face. You cannot use math an any sensible
or meaningful way, for instance, to determine
the aesthetic quality of a painting. It just
doesn't work. You can't use math to propose
marriage -- it just doesn't work. You can't use
math to evaluate the aesthetic quality of a
poem -- it just doesn't work. You can't use
math to choose friends -- it just doesn't work.
You can't use math to decide which religion
to believe in -- it just doesn't work. You
can't use math to determine whether your
son will grow up to become a juvenile
delinquent or a Rhodes scholar -- it just
doesn't work. You can't use math to determine
whether a meal will taste delicious - it just
doesn't work. You can't use math to determine
whether a ballet performance was beautiful --
it just doesn't work. You can't use math to
determine whether you're going to have great
sex with a woman -- it just doesn't work.
In fact, when it comes to human experience,
you can't math for just about everything.
Math is useless and pointless and worthless
in just about every area of human experience.
Math is O*N*L*Y useful when applied to the
realm of nature unmediated by human activity.

So Joe Monzo's outrangeously foolish claim
you can use math "in way imaginable for any
number of other aspects of life and the
universe" is of course laughably false and
apodictically untrue. As cited in examples
above, there are so many instances in which
math fails in human affairs that just the
truth is precisely the opposite of Joe
Monzo's claim.

Joe Monzo's gross abuse of the word "use"
deserves some attention, for this is the
kind of weasel-word tactics we typically
get on the Alternative Lying List.

Math can be used to produce astrology charts. But
that does not prove astrology charts are meaningful.
The way we test whether a given use of math is
meaningful is by testing the output of the math
against reality.

If the output of the mathematical operation fails
the test of reality, then it's not meaninful --
it's just superstition with numbers tossed on
top...and numerology.

When we test Gene "Woolly-Headed Numerology"
Smith's claims about math and music against
reality, they fall apart. For example, Gene
"Woolly-Headed Numerology" Smith claims that

"A musician who hates math is like a painter
who hates canvas."

And as Jacob Barton has pointed out, this
claim fails the test of reality. For, as
we all know, many painters eschew a canvas.
Navajo sand painters have zero interest in,
or use for, a canvas, as do Zen buddhist
sand painters, as do those who arrange rocks
in an artiful manner (Zen rock gardens, which
can be considered a form of painting).
There exist an infinite range of beautiful visual
arts, and very few of them involve a canvas.
Accordingly, Gene Ward Smith's claim about
math and music fails the test of reality,
as usual for Smith's claims, and proves
laughably false and foolish under examination,
as well as showing us how shockingly uninformed
Smith is about the visual arts.

Joe Monzo continues:

"... or, you can choose to do or look at things in
a very intuitive or emotional non-mathematical way.

But this creates a problem for Monzo's allegation
of a connection twixt math and music. If
math is an optional element, than there exists
no causal connection twixt math and music.

But if there is no causal connection twixt math
and music, and as we have seen above math
by definition has no explanatory power for music
since music requires the crucial unquantifiable
components of human culture and human emotion
to exist, then what connection is there twixt
math and music?

If math has no causal connection with music
then music can easily exist without math -- and,
as we see from 80% of the world's population,
this is always the case with only two exceptions
(India and Europe/North America). Only in 2 of
the cultures of the world is math even spoken
about in the same sentence with music. The other
80% of the world's population laughs at the weird
idea that math has anything to do with music;
80% of the world's population creates and performs
and rhapsodically appreciates vividly memorable
music without using math at all.

But if music can easily exist without math,
and if math has no explanatory power for music,
then why even bother to discuss math in the
same sentence as music?

In that case, what material connection of _any_ kind
is there between math and music?

Of course we must use the qualfier "material
connection" because, as mentioned, logic-chopping
sophists from the Alternative Wanking List like
Carl Lumma and Graham Breed have shown us that they
can and will niggle and haggle about microscopic
grammatical quibbles to wriggle out of the inevitable
logical conclusion. We have already seen this kind
of shameful infantile logic-chopping by Carl
Lumma, who tried to argue his many lies out of
existence by playing word games with the
past tense, and from Graham Breed, who tried to
play peurile word-games to show that Gene Ward
Smith never lied when he called me "an imbecile."
This is the music-theoretic equivalent of Clinton's
infinitely despicable phrase "it depends on what
the meaning of `is' is," and it's beneath contempt.
Breed & Lumma could argue, for example, that math has
a connection with music because numbers have names
with sounds, and music also consists of sounds.
But this is the most absurd kind of meaningless
verbal calisthenics. Common sense assures us that
such a far-fetched contortion of reasoning does NOT
prove that math has any material connection with
actual music. A material connection is one that
is meaningful, substantive, non-trivial, non-frivolous,
more than the result of medieval word games and
infantile logic-chopping.

But when we try to discern what evidence
there might be that math has any meaningful,
substantaive, non-trivial, non-frivolous
connection with music, we find...

...Nothing.

Nothing at all.

The claim that math can be used to compose beautiful
music fails the test of reality. Indeed, as John
Chalmers has pointed out, algorithmic composition
is a devastating disproof of claims for the alleged
mathematical basis of Western music.

If music really _were_ based on math, then by removing
humans from the equation and letting the algorithms
rip, we would be producing the purest possible
kind of musical beauty.

But, as John Chalmers has remarked, "I was excited
by algorithmic composition -- until I heard the music."
And as I have pointed out, the only artistic contribution
of any significance made by wholly computer-generated music
was the contribution of the computer composers to the
art of essay-writing. Their ecstatic scribblings about
algorithmic composition often thrilled and tantaziled...
...but when it came time to listen to music composed
purely by mathematics sans human intervention, it
sounded like crap.

Music generated solely by math, without human
intervention, sounds so bad it's hard to describe
just how godawful it is. Such music accomplishes
a miracle -- something I thought impossible: it
sounds simultaneously boring and annoying.

Usually boring stimuli put you to sleep. Annoying
stimuli keep you awake but simmering with
detestation at the ingrate who created 'em.
Never would I have thought that the sensation of
unutterably wearisome triviality could be combined
with intensely irritating aural offense...

...Until I heard music produced directly from
mathematical functions.

This turns out to be a reaction virtually universally
shared. When people come in contact with music
generated purely by math, they flee. They describe
the music as "going nowhere," and "sounding
dead" and "trivial." Descriptions of music generated
purely from math functions include such gems as
"there's nobody home" and "it sounds like a
roomful of monkeys beating on pianos."

To become musical, sounds must not merely be
organized, but organizaed in humanly meanigful
ways. It is quite possible technologically
to compress and overlap the entire content of
a Beethoven symphony into a 10 second time-span
using DSP techniques. This is indeed a method
of organization. The result is organized
sound. But nobody has ever called this musical,
and if it were to be done, it would utterly
destroy all the musical meaning of a Beethoven
symphony.

Music from math fails so incredibly badly
because it does not have drama or a
discernible buildup and climax and
tail-off with emotional impact and
musical logic. In short, music generated
entirely by math has no distinctively
human elements -- which is to say, no
human logic and no human emotion and no
human purposeiveness. Music generated
exclusively from mathematical functions
does not sound like it's going anywhere
because it was not created by a human
whose emotions and physical sensations
offered a guide to the music's affect.
A mathematical function doesn't know what
things sound like and doesn't care and
can't change what it will do next to
accomodate the music. A human does and
can.

So music generated solely form math produces
the same aesthetic effect as a spoon stuck
in a garbage disposal.

It's either overly repetitive to no
purpose, like an obsessive-compulsive
mental patient obsessively counting the
number of times he flips a light switch
on and off...or it sounds incoherently
random, like glossolalia gibbering from
the mouth of a person with schizophrenia,
or from the internet connection of Graham
Breed.

In either case, the test of reality proves
that math fails as a meaningful
description of music, for if math actually
could describe and generate music,
then the music woudl get better as
we progressively removed the human
element and introduced more and more
math.

But in reality, just the opposite is
the case. The more math is introduced
into the process of generating music
and the more the composer is removed,
the worse the music sounds...until
eventually, when the music is entirely
generated by the bilnd grinding of a
robot's gears without a composer
at all, the music becomes unlistenable.

Joe Monzo continues:

"those who love math and the fascinating properties
of numbers will want to apply it to music in some
way (or perhaps many ways)."

So what?

Those who love eggplants and the fascinating properties
of eggplants will want to apply eggplants to music
in some way (or perhaps may ways). But does applying
eggplants to music produce anything other than a
ludicrous-looking musical score festooned with eggplants?

This is the fallacy of the non sequitur argument. "If
we do not re-elect George W. Bush, Americans would
have to pull out of Iraq." So what?

Why does that matter?

When we perform the test of reality, we find that adding
eggplants to music is as meaningless as adding math to
music -- it can be done, but there is no objectively
verifiable reason for doing so. There is certainly no
objectively verifiable improvement to be had from
using eggaplants (or math) to compose music. On the
contrary, the fetishistic mania for eggplants (or math)
typically hampers a composer rather than helping. Viz.,
the commposer sits down to compose and suddenly realizes
the grocery store is closed. "But where will I get
my eggplants?" the composer wails. "I can't compose!
I need my eggplant!"

No you don't. It's a fetish. It's a hindrance. Throw
out the delusional imaginary need for eggplants and
just compose...

That's what common sense tells us.

Joe Monzo compounds his scrambled reasoning with:

"the result may be use of math in a new composition, or
perhaps a new analysis of an old masterwork, or perhaps
some particular mathematical play would suggest a new
instrument, etc."

Here Joe Monzo tumbles into a logical contradiction,
for he has previously admitted that

"... [instead of using math] you can choose to do or
look at things in a very intuitive or emotional
non-mathematical way."

Therefore Joe Monzo has already admitted that there
is no necessary causal connection twixt math and music.
Math cannot be the cause of music if you can compose
music without it.

But logically this means that the use of math in a
for "...a new analysis of an old masterwork" is
nothing more than an idiosyncratic foible, just
another among many possible interpretations of
music, all equally valid, none more objectively
true than any other.

But the whole problem with touchy-feely woo-woo interpretations
as a basis for undertanding music is precisely that they are
not verifiable and therefore not necessarily meaningful:

"The besetting sin of interpretive approaches to anything --
literature, dreams, symptoms, culture -- is that they tend
to resist...conceptual articularion and thus to
escape systematic modes of assessment... Imprisoned in the
immediacy of its own detail, [an interpretation] is
presented as self-validating, or, worse, as validated by
the ssupposedly developed sensitivities of the person
who presents it..." [Geertz, Clifford, The Interpretation
of Culture, New York, 1973, pg. 24]

But math is the language of science, and the whole purpose
of science is to eliminate touchy-feely woo-woo interpretations
as a basis of understanding and replace these vague formless
wishy-washy feelings with objective numbers. Yet now Joe Monzo
proposes that we apply math to music precisely in order to
get just another interpretation...just another woo-woo wishy-
washy touchy-feelie personal interpretation. That's a complete
contradiction of the entire function of mathematics and
of the stated purpose of using math in music.

Worse: since math is notorious for its opacity to the
layman, using math to analyze music only worsens
the inherent problems of opacity and cabalistic
hermeneuticism already endemic in personal
idiosyncratic interpretations of art works.

Joe Monzo now gets into real trouble when he asserts:

"Partch's wonderful instruments might not exist
had he not developed his system of JI harmonic theory
("Monophony") from various properties of the ratio numbers,
and thence become `a composer seduced into carpentry'."

Coulda woulda shoulda, Joe. This is a claim without
proof. Prove your assertion.

Prove Partch's instruments "might have existed had
he not developed his system of JI harmonic theory."

Of course, Joe Monzo can't prove this, so it's
a vacuou assertion devoid of meaning. A dog might
fly to the moon if it had rocket propulsion in
its ass and could survive in vacuum. Coulda
woulda shoulda...vacuous tripe. Prove dogs
fly to the moon or cut the crap and stop
wasting our time. Prove your claim about
the Partch instruments, or we can dismiss
it as hot air and moonshine.

Joe continues:

"while i don't even come close to agreeing with
Brian's argument against the math/music connection,
i do recognize an element of truth in what he writes.

"music is perhaps the most abstract of all the arts,
in that a composer can so easily play with sounds which
bear no representational aspect, or just as easily play
with sounds which are meant to be entirely representational
and paying little or no attention to any of the mathematical
aspects of either pitch or rhythm. great musical improvisers
often play like that, just `feeling' the music without really
*thinking* about it."

The schism twixt improvisation and comopsition which
Joe alleges has no basis in reality. The distinction
Joe tries to make is plain weird. All the great composers
have been great improvisers, as far as we know,
and we have strong reason to believe that many famous
compositions started as improvisations. So why is
musical improvisation "just `feeling' the music' while
composition isn't?

Too, there's jazz. In jazz, composing the music *involves*
improvising. Ditto figured bass and the non-written-out
cadenzas in Baroque music. Weren't those composers `feeling'
the music?

And lastly, but perhaps most important of all, in what
sense is `feeling' not thinking? Antonio Damasio,
the eminent brain research scientist, has pointed out
in "Descrate's Error" that modern cognitive science
experiments show that all effective human reasoning
is based on emotion. The fantasy that the human
mind operates, or even can operate, purely by
modus ponens logic, has been conclusively debunked
not only by modern cogntiive science, but also by
the failure of Good Old Fashioned AI:

"One result of these upheavals [in the field of Artificial
Intelligence] has been to shatter established ideas about the nature
of human intelligence. A venerable tradition, going back to Plato,
regarded knowledge of abstract rules and the ability to apply the same
rules to many different kinds of information, as the hallmark of
intelligence... Plato had unlimited faith in the power of the
principles of mathematics to tame a disorderly world. (..)
"It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the story of the thinking
machine, and of cognitive psychology over the past decade, is the
story of a retreat from this Platonic creed of pure intelligence as
the essence of human rationality, and of formal rules as the road to
general understanding. The mind has been radically de-Platonized. The
emphasis has shifted away from rule-using, logical ways of thinking
and toward the importance of worldly knowledge. " [Campbell, Jeremy.
The Improbable Machine: What New Discoveries in Artificial
Intelligence Reveal About the Mind. Simon & Schuster Inc.: New York,
1990, pp. 33-37]

"What does it mean to be conscious? Scientists have been studying the
brain to find the answer to that question. Until now, their best
explanation has been that the mind is a thinking machine and
consciousness its operating system. But radical new research is
showing that the mind is no Macintosh, and, in fact, the key to
consciousness lies with feeling, not thinking." [Gysin, Catherine, "I
Feel, Therefore I Am: New Research Shows the Mind Is Emotional By
Nature," Utne Reader, November/December 1994, pg. 37]

Joe Monzo gets himself into even worse trouble by
averring:

"so to me it really seems to just be an individual's choice
as to how much or how little math will play a part in
his/her musical world.

This is a big huge self-contradiction. If math has
a meaningful connection with music, it _must_ either
have a causal connection or explanatory power for
music. But Joe Monzo has explicitly denied both.
So what's left? In that case, why bother with
math at all?

If math in music like this year's fall fashions, a
complete matter of person taste, why make a big
deal about math in music? Why even discuss it?

Does anyone write long treatises proclaiming and
justifying the allege necessity to wear Tommy
Hilfiger jeans? Of course not. No one bothers
if it's all a matter of personal taste.

If it's all a completely idiosyncratic personal
choice, no one pumps out websites filled with
numerology purporting to be related to why people
wear Tommy Hilfiger jeans. But Gene "Woolly-Headed
Numerology" Smith has generated a big website
chock full of impenetrable pseudoscientific
gibberish involving "vals" and "wedgies" and he
alleges this has some connection of some kind
to cmirotona music. Why bother if math in
music is optional? Why both to discuss it at
all? Does anyone waste time debating personal
choices, like whether or not to wear pantyhose
as opposed to panties?

The mere fact that Joe and other people put so
much energy and so much time into debating
and discussing and haggling over and squabbling
and quibbling about math in music tells us that
Joe Monzo and the other numerologists on the
ATL speak with forked tongues when they claim
that math in music is "just a personal choice."

Clearly they do not believe this. Clearly their
actions prove it. The numerologists are merely
saying "math is a personal choice" for the same
reason that members of the Dianetics cult
dishonestly present Scientology as "a personal
choice" -- in order to dupe the unwary bystander
and suck 'em into the cult, where they can be
browbeaten and programmed by the cult guru.

No cult wants to be known as a cult, obviously.
Reasonable people run far and run fast when
they sense a cult member approaching. Thus
every cult tries to present itself as a
reasonable belief system espoused by
sensible people, rather than a lunatic
fringe dementia gibbered by crackpots
and cranks.

The cult of numerology in music is no
different.

Joe has never given us a credible reason for
using math in music. Sure, we can use math in
music...just as we can use the bra sizes of
the female population of Ecuador. But why
bother? To what end? What's the logic?
What is the credible sensible reason?

Joe cannot give us a credible answer, for there is
no credible answer. The use of math in music is
a delusional mania with its roots in Greek
superstition. Like belief in astrology, belief
that math is deeply related to music is an
irrational system of belief deeply entrenched
in Western culture in the same way that voodoo
is an irrational system of belief deeply entrenched
in Haitian culture.

Math is music is just the Western form of voodoo.
Nothing more. Instead of loas, we have lattices.
Instead of Ogoun Badagris, we have the Diabolis
In Musica. Ask what the objective verifiable basis
of either irrational belief system is, and you
get hysteria and name-calling and lunacy and
lynch mob frenzy. Graham Breed has now stooped
to infantile lies by accusing me of "mental defect,:"
a lie so absurd it requires little discussion here.
People don't say tell thjose kind of crazy lies unless
they have a deep emotional commitment to a belief
system...and people don't have a deep emotional
commitment to a belief system if everyone recognizes
and agrees that the belief system is just a matter
of personal taste with no necessary connection
to reality. On the contrary -- people fight religious
wars precisely because many folks believe that
religion is NOT a matter of personal taste, but
actually determines who will go to heaven and
who will go to hell. So Joe Monzo's belief is actually
a pseudo-religious belief, as the hysterical reaction
fo the members of the Alternative Lying list to my
demand for proof proves so clearly. The ATL members
are reacting to me the way fundamentalists Baptists
would react to someone who walked into their church
and yelled, "Okay, give me hard evidence Jesus Christ
is the son of God." They go berserk.

Joe Monzo concludes:

"i personally place a lot of value on the integration of
visual and auditory perception of music, by modeling the
prime-factorization of the frequency relationships as
a lattice diagram which becomes in effect an instrument.
this involves a lot of math -- some of it quite interesting,
it simultaneously engages my aural and visual artictic
sensibilities, and it's loads of fun too."

Here Joe Monzo makes the flatly incorrect statement that
"the prime-factorization of the frequency relationships
as a lattice diagram...becomes in effect an instrument."

This statement is provably false.

As demonstrated, a ratio space lattice diagram does NOT
give frequency relationships between tones. It only
gives integer ratios, and since any given frequency
relationship of pitch audibly corresponds to an
infinte number of radically different integer rations,
there is no meaningful relatinship between any given
pitch (frequency relationship) or pitches in music
and any given point in ratio space. Even worse,
audible pitch is randomly distributed as we move
throughout ratio space. There is no fixed
rational relationship between pitch and integer
size in ratio space. On a usable musical isntrument
in the real world, when we want to move up in
frequency, we always have a unique preferred
direction -- and this (and only this) is what
makes it possible for musicians to play instruments.
The distribution of pitches on a piano keyboard
is not random. A piano would not be playable if
it were. If you want a higher pitch you _always_
move right as the performer faces the keyboard;
if you want a lower pitch, you _always_ move
left as the performer faces the keyboard on
a standard piano keyboard.

But if you want a lower pitch in ratio space,
where do you move?

The answer: in any direction.

There is always a lower pitch in any direction
outward from your current coordinates in ratio
space. But there is always a high pitch in
any direction outward from your current
coordinates in ratio space. Worse, there are
an infinite number of both higher and lower
pitches, and even worse, there are infinite
number of pitches audibly the same as the
current one.

This makes ratio space musically useless.

I also place "a lot of value on the integration
of visual and auditory [elements accompanied
by] music" by I do it the way Bill Wesley
does it -- by creating light shows. Moreover,
I don't kid myself that the light show
"represents" the music or is somehow "an
element of" the music. It's just something
else that might or might not add to the
music, in the way that program notes
might or might not give an added experience
depending on the listener'personal
taste for that sort of thing.

Look. Creative people are pragmatists. Composers,
like visual artists and playwrights and
sculptors, tend to do what works. If they
don't they don't create very much, so it's
a logical necessity that anyone who creates
any amount of artwork at all will go with
whatever gets the job done. Ratio space
lattices are a complete roadblock to
creating music, like numerology and
generalized keyboards. History shows
that people who spend a lot of time
ont hat stuff just don't create much
microtnal music.

By contrast, let's look at the creative
output of the poeople who deny the
value of ratio space lattices and
deny the value of numerology of the
crock-ola magnifico snake oil kind Gene
"Woolly-Headed Numerology" Smith purveys:

Bill Wesley emphatically denies there
is any musical utility in ratio space
lattices or musical numerology. Bill
Wesley has produced 10 CDs of microtonal
music and he appears as a performer
on 27 other CDs for a total of 37 CDs.

Jeff Stayton emphatically denies there
is any musical utility in ratio space
lattices or musical numerology. Bill
Wesley has produced 5 CDs of microtonal
music and he appears as a performer
on 22 other CDs for a total of 27 CDs.

Jonathan Glasier emphatically denies there
is any musical utility in ratio space
lattices or musical numerology. Jonathan
Glasier has produced 3 CDs of microtonal
music and he appears as a performer
on 19 other CDs for a total of 23 CDs.

I emphatically deny there is any
musical utility in ratio space
lattices or musical numerology. I
have produced 14 CDs of microtonal
music and I appears as a performer
on 27 other CDs for a total of 43 CDs.

Lydia Ayers emphatically denies that there
is musical utility in ratio space lattices
and musical numerology. Lydia Ayers has
produced 3 CDs of microtonal music.

Elaine Walker emphaticaly denies that there
is musical utility in ratio space lattices
and musical numerology. She has produced
3 CDs of microtonal music.

Jacky Ligon emphatically denies that there
is musical utility in ratio space lattices
and musical numerology. Jacky has produced
3 CDs of microtonal music.

Jeff Scott emphaticaly denies that there
is musical utility in ratio space
lattices and musical numerology. Soctt
has produced 5 CDs of microtonal
music.

Total number of CDs of microtonal music
for this group: 70 CDs of microtonal music.

Now let's look at the people who
claim there's value in ratio space
lattices and numerology:

Paul Erlich claims that there
is musical utility in ratio space
lattices and musical numerology. Erlich
has produced 1 CD of microtonal
music.

Joseph Pehrson claims that there
is musical utility in ratio space
lattices and musical numerology.
He has produced zero CDs of microtonal
music.

Carl Lumma claims that there
is musical utility in ratio space
lattices and musical numerology. Lumma
has produced zero CDs of microtonal
music.

Gene Ward Smith claims that there
is musical utility in ratio space
lattices and musical numerology. Let's
give Smith the benefit of the doubt
and says he's produced 5 CDs of
microtonal music. I don't know that
he has, but let's just guess at 5 as a
round number.

David Doty claims that there
is musical utility in ratio space
lattices and musical numerology. Doty
has produced 1 CD of microtonal
music.

Patrick Pagano claims that there
is musical utility in ratio space
lattices and musical numerology.
Pagano has produced 1 CD of microtonal
music.

Total number of CDs produced: 8.

Let's compare:

On the one hand, you have 69 CDs produced
by people who emphatically deny the musical
utility of ratio space lattices and
math.

On the other hand, you have 8 CDs produced
by people who claim ratio space lattices
and math are immensely useful in creating
music.

Okay. If ratio space lattices and math are
so goddamn useful in creating music, why
do the people who use ratio space lattices
and math create so little microtonal music,
while the people who avoid it like the
plague create so much microtonal music?

The refugees from the pseudoscience fringe
infesting the Alternative Lying List
can't provide a credible answer to that
question. But I can.

People who avoid ratio space lattices and
math create a lot of microtonal music
because ratio space lattices and math
are the single greatest obstacle to
producing microtonal music in the world
today aside from the ATL itself.

People who obsess over ratio space
lattices and math in microtonal
muisc create almost no microtonal
music because it's like ripping out
all the keys of a piano and rearranging
'em at random and then rewriting all
the music textbooks in pig latin
dreamed up by a gibbering lunatic.
Those kinds of antics just place
huge obstalces in the path of
a microtonal comopser -- so huge
that most erstwhile microtonal
composers give up and abandon
microtonalty.

Ratio space lattices have the same
effect on music that weighing a
ballerina down with boat anchors
has on ballet. Math has the same effect
on music that rat poison has on a
baby. Chuck 'em. You'll compose
a lot more and compose a lot
better. Math in music is voodoo.
Wake up. Clear your heads of
superstitions. Stop lowering yourselves
to hysterical name-calling and infantile
invective. Shut off the internet.
Stop wasting your lives screaming lies
at the people who have actually
accomplished something in microtonality,
and compose some microtonal music.

I'm now near completing a 61-limit
JI composition. How many of _you_
have comopsed a piece of microtonal
music in the last 3 days?
---------
--mclaren

Joe Monzo's claims about math and music just don't make sense

🔗xenharmonic <xed@...>

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