Philippe Codognet response

In his article, Ancient Images and New Technologies: The Semiotics of the Web, Codognet talks about how hyperlinking serves as a system of reference and indexing, and how this concept has ancient roots and relationships to systems like ars memoriae, the I-Ching, and the history of binary notation and "the universal computer language". The article was interesting and well written, if a little top-heavy.

The article got me thinking about language mostly. I was initially surprised, for example, that he chose to reference the broken and obsolete "art of memory" when he could have used any pictographic language to reference an actual working model of indexing. Then I re-read the article and the part about binary notation started sticking out and it occurred to me how messed up this whole system really is. I mean, the point of language is to communicate right? But what are we communicating that requires a mediator in order for there to be understanding... We are communicating the abstract, and in doing so, we are the complete opposite of a computer on the most fundamental level. There is no "universal" human language, because the whole reason humans use language is to move closer to some sort of concept of universal... to take the chaos and abstraction in our heads and put some sort of form or shape to it that is able to be understood by another person... basically by reducing what we conceptualize and distilling it so that it can be expressed. A machine starts with that universality, that simplicity, and then makes it more complex by adding logic layers for increasing functionality. Just look at assembly code or even raw binary (despite that trying to make sense of it will make your brain melt and your eyes bleed). It is simple and direct and it is only AFTER humans need to 'use' it that it becomes complex. We need to have tiers of languages to program in because there is no such thing as universal understanding to a human...

I feel like computers are this total ironic thing. We invented them and use them in order to be more efficient and help us simplify organization and communication, but our very presence in the system pushes that simplicity farther and farther away as we try to make it more "universal"/easy or simple... Just look at the computer profession. The programmer/hardware designer/user all used to be the same person. Now we have specialist programmers for everything, people who only work on hardware but don't have anything to do with designing it, people who design it but have nothing to do with implementing it, people who use it but have no understanding of anything about how it works aside from the top-most human interface, and then even a whole profession of people who are meant to assist in understanding and mitigating any sort of issues that may arise during THAT part. Eventually we are going to have people who specialize in making the letter "G" key on the keyboard, and another person who decides each time it is going to be pressed.