Last week we did a workshop about algorithms with M. Fuller & D. Antic,
I had great time and fun actually, doing what I like most, that means working
with different materials and see their interaction to build up structures,
shapes, builduing somehow a mechanic system for an expansion of territory.
Only this time I had to merely observe the evolution of it to write what was
supposed to be an algorithm.
Having an intuitive, empiric thus specific logic approach to volume, it was not simple to assimilate in my logic system the conception of what exactly an algorithm was. Or at least which application in life it would have. I always ended up into an ecuation structure which wasn’t wrong but not only or quiet exactly. I tried to recall what I learned in school in maths classes but my memory didn’t reach that file. I looked up into Wikipedia and see it wasn’t so easy to explain neither. I think the problem I encounter was to “accept” a logic where no unattendent variable is taking in count. To accept its linear descriptive procedure as a form (at it’s basic structure which of course can get more and more complex as to run a computer) As in Wittgensteins’ “Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus” “Truth Tables”, where for example,
a binary addition can be represented with the truth table without the use of logic gates or codes
A B | C R
1 1 | 1 0
1 0 | 0 1
0 1 | 0 1
0 0 | 0 0
where
A = First Operand
B = Second Operand
C = Carry
R = Result
This truth table is read left to right:
Value pair (A,B) equals value pair (C,R).
Or for this example, A plus B equal result R, with the Carry C.
The table does not describe the logic operations necessary to implement this operation, rather it simply specifies the function of inputs to output values. In this case it can only be used for very simple inputs and outputs, such as 1′s and 0′s, however if the number of types of values one can have on the inputs increases, the size of the truth table will increase. For instance, in an addition operation, one needs two operands, A and B. Each can have one of two values, zero or one.
The number of combinations of these two values is 2×2, or four. So the result is four possible outputs of C and R. If one was to use base 3, the size would increase to 3×3, or nine possible outputs.
So my problem was to take this position of a researcher describing onlythe procedures and results of an operation system. Without undestarding
what the purpose was,well…maybe I was just going too metaphysical with the question…
Back to mother earth (and thanks to stepmother web)
I finally found a very simply and playful display of an algorithm as if
explained to a 5 year old child, from people who know don’t take
themselves too seriously, which suited me perfectly.
Enjoy,
Jimena
