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At the end of the first draft of writing this thesis I finished a book I had never heard of and knew nothing about. It was The Archaeology of Knowledge by Michel Foucault. (1)
I was at the deepest point of my explorations, examining the strange relationship between the fields of ARCHAEOLOGY and ARCHITECTURE when this book, out of a recent era of French critical theory, landed an explanation point upon having an idea such as an 'ARCHITECTURE OF ELECTRICITY.' In a fundamental sense, it rationally validated my work when nothing else to date had. Foucault's text offered the key to deciphering the ELECTRICAL INFRASTRUCTURE as ARCHITECTURE, and enabled me to write the second and final draft of the Æ thesis which I publish online today after ten years of work. Yet, only to say that in Foucault's discursive practice the idea of needing a "preface" to proceed a thesis is deemed unnecessary, and grounds for its irrelevance with regard to pure knowledge. (2n) This is because a preface often harbors a single author or finite authority which acts critical to decoding the text, yet is structurally unnecessary for the plurality of the enunciative subject- the readership of I, you, me, and we- who infinitely reinterpret the fragmented patterns of statements for ourselves, helping establish some semblance of collective consistency, a rational foundation from which to read, write, and debate. In this I would agree, and I am at fault for needing to add a storyline to the ideas that follow. The reason I do so is to humanize them, and to explain to myself what it is that this thing is, because these very same ideas have had a rough and controversial evolution in this world, and continue to challenge the current paradigm of ARCHITECTURAL thought, even today. Just how does one go about writing a thesis from within Plato's ELECTRONIC cave? To reiterate, the ideas that follow are not about the knowledge of a single person. It is specifically believed that no single person, no superhero, could ever entirely know the INFORMATION outlined in this thesis. Nor could any institution consciously know what follows in the present sense. The INFORMATION contained herein is novel, yet ancient: a paradox woven by threads of theoretical yet mundane and commonplace INFORMATION, reliant upon the collective reasoning of independently-minded individuals. I, acting as an author, am more an outliner of INFORMATION, an INFORMATION ARCHITECT, a fashionable word here meant to represent one who designs a scaffolding or structure from which to build or reveal knowledge. Equally my role has been that of an INFORMATION archaeologist who has prepared one interpretation of the assemblage of INFORMATION contained in the realm of this ARCHITECTURAL thesis. It will be instantly clear upon beginning this thesis that surely someone knows the physics of ELECTRICITY perfectly, or the way the ELECTRICAL POWER SYSTEM works. I agree, almost anyone, actually, almost everyone knows more than I do about the subject of ELECTRICITY. But this is only half the thesis, the other half involves the subject of ARCHITECTURE of which i do not feel so strange with. In fact, I find ARCHITECTURE as my primary understanding of REALITY. This said, many scientific "experts" may denounce the ELECTRICAL details of this thesis for technical vagueness or even inaccuracy, often due to second-hand INFORMATION sources. Likewise, many artistic "experts" may denounce the ARCHITECTURAL details or the general thesis as being simply profane, with expert cavil. To all of these people, I challenge you to a PUBLIC debate. That is to say, find those points, line by line, that you disagree with or find are not truthful nor accurate, and let us debate. Hopefully a forum for such an open debate can be found through a sponsored listserver. In any case constructive and destructive or deconstructive critique in all forms is welcome and will be an integral part of this thesis' structure. Please send me your papers, essays, theses, and antitheses that challenge or extend the ideas of the Æ thesis and I will host them on this website. In the end it is hoped that the Æ thesis project will become a tool for a discursive practice between individuals and institutions regarding the relationship between ARCHITECTURE and ELECTRICITY, ultimately transforming the ELECTRICAL INFRASTRUCTURE into the common-sense ARCHITECTURE of our present-day ELECTRICAL CIVILIZATION. In any case, at this point, under these circumstances, this is the best I can do to rationally reason that the ELECTRICAL INFRASTRUCTURE is ARCHITECTURE. So please endure my dry and repetitive writing style and poor grammar and read on, if only the most general scan, because it is a subject, primary, but invisible in our everyday lives, and I am hoping we begin to talk about it, once again… |
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In memory of my grandmother, Irene Seiberlich. (1903-1997). you met me half-way when no one else could, saving me from madness and death. for this and so much more, i thank you. i am forever your friend...  you-me-we 
thanks to cipherwar.com, notype.com, cryptome.org, architexturez.net, voyd.com, and other individuals and sites for sharing this work with others... |
