errors and absurdity in Lucytune reference materials

Here is an email I sent a few months ago:

---------------------------------------------------------

Thomas Dent <********@****.com>
to info@lucytune.com
date 17 November 2008 12:58
subject Error in Smith quotation

Hi, on searching for 'Robert Smith harmonics' I came across your websites

http://www.harmonics.com/lucy/lsd/rsmith.html
http://www.lucytune.com/academic/r_smith_notes.html

where you have notes from the British Library copy.

Now that the book (Smith's 'Harmonics') is online at
http://www.archive.org/details/harmonicsorphilo00smit
one can look at the full text and check things out...

You have in your transcription
"It follows from Mr. Harrison's assumption that his IIId major is
tempered flat by a full comma. (...)"

but this cannot be right anyway - and in fact the correct text is

"It follows from Mr. Harrison's assumption, that his IIId major is
tempered flat by a full fifth of a comma. (...)"

I think this may be a significant enough change to correct your pages!
Best,
Thomas Dent
--

---------------------------------------------------------
Unfortunately the incorrect transcription of Smith is still there and
even now at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucy_tuning we have the
(totally inaccurate) sentence

"While Smith himself interpreted this somehow to mean that Harrison's
major thirds were a comma flat, it does seem to say that the
proportion of third to octave is 1:O ..."

The Smith book is fully available online. When can we expect a
correction?

Also, the first table of 'interval size' in the Wikipedia page doesn't
make sense to me. One can indeed choose various steps of 88-ET for
whatever purpose one wants, but the steps chosen (ie 15 for the 'whole
tone' and 43 for the 'tritone') don't correspond to any sort of
meantone mapping, let alone 'Lucy'.

And this is both pompous and absurd:
"Harrison clearly states in his writings that he believed that the
most harmonious intervals were at positions other than at integer
frequency ratios. He expressed contemptuous regard for just
intonation. Competition between these two opposing paradigms continues
into the twenty-first century."

- There is no Lucy or Harrison 'PARADIGM' of musical acoustics or
harmony. Because there is no coherently explicable theory. You cannot
call an alleged theory that only one or two people on Earth claim to
understand, or have ever understood, or will ever understand, a
'paradigm'.

For one thing, how can you start your 'paradigm' with a just, rational
2:1 octave, then immediately reject all other just ratios and claim
that harmony arises uniquely from irrationals?

~~~T~~~

Thanks Tom;

Sorry for the neglect Tom. This is the first time that I have seen
your email. It may have got eaten by spam filters at my end.

I am grateful to you for "nit-picking". Attempting to proof-read or
edit your own work is infuriatingly difficult, as you tend to ignore
or compound your own errors

I'll check out the Smith writings. I had handwritten that on "the back
of an envelope" more than 20 years ago, on actually finding Smith's
book at the British Library, in the vast circular reading room where
Karl Marx and others used to write.

Since I am currently in London, I'll go to The British Library within
the next week or so, find the original which will have been moved to
the new British Library by Kings Cross, and get it verbatim, from the
"horse's ink/mouth".

Despite what Carl Lumma may wish you to believe, I had nothing to do
with the quotes or comments about Smith on Wikipedia, although I did
comment that the controversy continues into the 21st century.

The wiki entry on Lucy Tuning has had many fingers in the "pie" as you
will see if you check out the history.

A few years ago I used to regularly make corrections, but recently
have found better uses for my time, although I do occasionally take a
look to see how it has been corrupted and attempt to correct obvious
errors.

Combining LucyTuning and 88edo was not my idea, and due to the
"democratic nature of Wikipedia, some unknown person (Carl?)
eventually managed to get the two wiki subjects combined.

It seems that using 88edo, the Large interval of LucyTuning = 14 steps
of 88

the small interval = 9 steps.

see:

http://www.lucytune.com/tuning/equal_temp.html

I agree with your observation.

I am not sure what you consider to be the tritone; probably the
interval C to F# i.e. #IVth.

This therefore in LucyTuning is equivalent to 3 Large intervals

i.e. 3L (3*14) = 42 steps. i.e. in 88 edo = 1200*(42/88) = 572.7273
cents.

The comparable LucyTuned value is (3*190.9858) = 572.9574 cents.

Just because the octave ratio is two does not imply that the system is
rational.

You may criticise the wording as "pompous", yet if you read what
Harrison wrote (The originals are in The ClockMakers Library in the
City Of London) you will find the statements to be true.

from Mac Dictionary application
paradigm |ˈparəˌdīm|
noun
1 technical a typical example or pattern of something; a model : there
is anew paradigm for public art in this country. See note at model .
• a worldview underlying the theories and methodology of a
particularscientific subject : the discovery of universal gravitation
became the paradigm ofsuccessful science.
2 a set of linguistic items that form mutually exclusive choices in
particular syntactic roles : English determiners form a paradigm: we
can say “a book” or “his book” but not “a his book.” Often
contrasted with syntagm .
• (in the traditional grammar of Latin, Greek, and other
inflectedlanguages) a table of all the inflected forms of a particular
verb, noun, or adjective, serving as a model for other words of the
same conjugation or declension.

I'd say it is a new paradigm. You may not understand it, but that
doesn't change the fact that it is a new paradigm.

Jettison your pre-conceptions, forget about your integer ratio
harmonics, assume an octave ratio of 2.0000, and dig a little deeper
Tom and you might begin to understand ;-) and even appreciate what I
have found.

Thanks Tom,

When I have done my research I shall make the appropriate
"corrections", and post a notice to the tuning list if I make changes.

Even the Titian entry on Wikipedia gets changed with malicious intent
- reference House of Commons this week.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7884121.stm

Hence I tend to consider the lucytune.com site or my postings to the
tuning lists, as the most reliable (horse's mouth?) source for
information on LucyTuning.

On 13 Feb 2009, at 15:12, Tom Dent wrote:

>
> Here is an email I sent a few months ago:
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------
>
> Thomas Dent <********@****.com>
> to info@...m
> date 17 November 2008 12:58
> subject Error in Smith quotation
>
> Hi, on searching for 'Robert Smith harmonics' I came across your
> websites
>
> http://www.harmonics.com/lucy/lsd/rsmith.html
> http://www.lucytune.com/academic/r_smith_notes.html
>
> where you have notes from the British Library copy.
>
> Now that the book (Smith's 'Harmonics') is online at
> http://www.archive.org/details/harmonicsorphilo00smit
> one can look at the full text and check things out...
>
> You have in your transcription
> "It follows from Mr. Harrison's assumption that his IIId major is
> tempered flat by a full comma. (...)"
>
> but this cannot be right anyway - and in fact the correct text is
>
> "It follows from Mr. Harrison's assumption, that his IIId major is
> tempered flat by a full fifth of a comma. (...)"
>
> I think this may be a significant enough change to correct your pages!
> Best,
> Thomas Dent
> --
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------
> Unfortunately the incorrect transcription of Smith is still there and
> even now at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucy_tuning we have the
> (totally inaccurate) sentence
>
> "While Smith himself interpreted this somehow to mean that Harrison's
> major thirds were a comma flat, it does seem to say that the
> proportion of third to octave is 1:O ..."
>
> The Smith book is fully available online. When can we expect a
> correction?
>
> Also, the first table of 'interval size' in the Wikipedia page doesn't
> make sense to me. One can indeed choose various steps of 88-ET for
> whatever purpose one wants, but the steps chosen (ie 15 for the 'whole
> tone' and 43 for the 'tritone') don't correspond to any sort of
> meantone mapping, let alone 'Lucy'.
>

>
>
> And this is both pompous and absurd:
> "Harrison clearly states in his writings that he believed that the
> most harmonious intervals were at positions other than at integer
> frequency ratios. He expressed contemptuous regard for just
> intonation. Competition between these two opposing paradigms continues
> into the twenty-first century."
>
> - There is no Lucy or Harrison 'PARADIGM' of musical acoustics or
> harmony. Because there is no coherently explicable theory. You cannot
> call an alleged theory that only one or two people on Earth claim to
> understand, or have ever understood, or will ever understand, a
> 'paradigm'.
>
> For one thing, how can you start your 'paradigm' with a just, rational
> 2:1 octave, then immediately reject all other just ratios and claim
> that harmony arises uniquely from irrationals?
>
> ~~~T~~~
>

>
>
>
>

Charles Lucy
lucy@lucytune.com

- Promoting global harmony through LucyTuning -

for information on LucyTuning go to:
http://www.lucytune.com

For LucyTuned Lullabies go to:
http://www.lullabies.co.uk