Why We Might Augment Reality: Art’s Role in the Development of Cognition - Augmented Reality Art - page 199

Noise must be potentially interesting before the brain determines that it is music
and worthy of a fuller assessment (Humphrey and Gutwill 2005 ). The role of some
music theory is similar to Chomsky's deep structure, as revealed in his famous
“Colorless green

” quasi-sentences (Chomsky 1957 : 15).
Babies make nonsensical babbling en route to becoming children, who invent
nonsensical stories before growing into eloquent adults. Manipulation of symbols,
graphic, vocal, and otherwise, is an essential technique to learn, in order to
communicate, but communication is not at all the manipulation of symbol systems,
otherwise identified as aesthetics (this issue is discussed further, regarding 'pic-
turesque' written languages such as Egyptian hieroglyphs, Chinese and particularly
Mayan script Coe 1999 : 17-33). Recall that in a biological view even noise serves
a function, unlike most sciences where 'signal noise' is disregarded with the
unrealistic the desire to eliminate it. In recent neurological work, what we might
be tempted to disregard as a baseline of noise may also serve an intrinsic global
networking effect (Sporns 2011 : 149-169, 174-175). Both Vygotsky ( 1978 )and
Piaget ( 1929 , 1971 ) further point out that at about four, the child will recite a
narrative, described as egocentric speech as that child approaches a problem (Crystal
2005 : 83).
“For example, a four-and-a-half-year-old girl was to get candy from a cupboard
with a stool and a stick as possible tools. [The] description reads as follows: (Stands
on a stool, quietly looking, feeling along shelf with stick.) 'On the stool.' Glances
at experimenter. Puts stick in other hand.) 'Is that really the candy?' (Hesitates.)
'I can get it from that other stool, stand and get it.' (Gets second stool.) 'No,
that doesn't get it. I could use the stick.' (Takes the stick and knocks at the
candy.) 'It will move now.' (Knocks candy.) It moved, I couldn't get it with the
stool, but the stick worked.' In such cases it seems both natural and necessary for
children to speak while they act; in our research we have found that speech not
only accompanies practical activity but also plays a specific role in carrying it out”
(Vygotsky 1978 : 25).
It would also be reasonable to say that the child is actually always attempting to
use linguistic ability as an initial step in problem solving. However, infants initially
lack conceptually, and hence 'babble' (Eliot 1999 : 370-371). Importantly, Piaget
also writes that children undergo a crucial transformation in distinguishing between
internal and external worlds. Vygotsky's observations, quoted above, are all the
more poignant when taking into account Piaget's nominal realism , the belief that
words themselves are concrete substances, which are initially intrinsic 'appendages'
of the objects named. Then the words are located in the environment and, finally,
conceptualized in the mind. At an early age, the word “lamp” is usually thought
to be located initially in the young speakers' mouth (Piaget 1929 : 71-72). A year
or so later, the child may deduce that it is within the lamp (pp. 72-75). By about
9-years-old the word is seen as in the mind (pp. 78-80).
It has been theorized that the cave paintings of Lascaux were the remnants of
a belief in magic, where these symbolic images were thought to influence hunting
expeditions (Campbell and Moyers 1988 : 79-81; Solso 2003 : 52, 86-87). This is
obviously an AR, simply long before the invention of computers. A hunt too can be

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