Member-only story
The Ontological Primacy of Parasitism: Re-thinking the Digital/Analogue Divide in Contemporary Music and Art. An essay in Speculative Parasitology (i).
In this paper (based upon a Rébus/Har$ presentation at the PoM ((Politics of the Machines)) 2024 conference in Aachen, Germany, on April 25 2024), we analyse the re-evaluation of parasitism in art and contemporary music as a crucial catalyst for creativity and evolution, emphasizing ideas on the ontological anteriority of the continuous over the discrete, as articulated e.g. in mathematics by René Thom. A deeper understanding of the mechanisms that drive such parasitism may eventually lead to more robust and adaptable AI systems and artistic approaches.
14 min readFeb 4, 2025
“The parasite makes possible what norm-ally is deemed to be im-possible.
The parasite is a noise that opens doors.”