Full Submission: The Primary Distinction- Corewave Game 1 Posted by Narada on October 08, 1998 at 00:36:28:
TITLE: The Primary Distinction. Corewave Game One
DEFINITION:- I am playing the whole of Game 1 as a move in game 2. Its corewave
was "The Primary Distinction Between Inside and Outside."
CREATOR: Robert Cohen & friends
PRIMARY CATEGORY: learning
SECONDARY CATEGORIES: art, tribe
RELATIONSHIP TO THE CORE WAVE Ancient Ideas in Modern Times or Time
Transcendent Ideas.
What is "inside" the limits of acceptable moves in game2 and what is "outside" them?
How has our perception of the distinction between inside and outside changed over
time. What is "ancient" and which ideas DON'T "transcend time"?
QUOTES: What we wish to explore with this Game are those artifacts of human
experience that have the qualities of endurance and/or recurrence over long periods of
time. Things that last, things that have high quality, things that are very often
archetypal.
ENCAPSULATION: The idea kept growing on me that game 1 should not be allowed
to die, that the game would benefit from an ongoing continuity over the years, and
also that game one in itself was but one move in a larger game. Then I came up with
the idea of playing the whole of game 1 as a move in game 2, and the idea became
irresistable!
MAIN SUBMISSION: The Corewave for game 1 was "The Primary Distinction
Between Inside and Outside". This provoked 40 odd moves on the theme, with
subjects as varied as- jazz, advertising, X-men, the cross, madness, and so on.
Perhaps it was just beginners luck, but it seemed to work quite successfully as an
interesting process for all concerned. As the first experiment in a public yearly GBG I
think it was pretty good.
This brings up the rather urgent question for me of what is inside and what is outside
the realms of acceptable material for a submission, as I think it is obviously less clear
in game 2 what is supposed to be going on.
Perhaps I should point out I myself only stumbled across game 1 at about halfway
through its year, and that I am not in anyway involved in the creation and
administration of corewave. I would actually like to thank them for being inspired to
provide this experience for us as a way of sharing their own fascination with the
possibilities of the Game. There's a LOT of work gone into this, and I think the
players should respect this, and try to make their submissions add to the artwork
being created. Check out the Fish map of game 1 below if you havent already. :-)
DEEPER: It seems that many of us do not have a great deal of time and energy for
playing games of little consequence to our busy lives. The vision of the Glass Bead
Game, of which Corewave is an interesting variation on the theme, is that it should be
THE ultimate artform, more satisfying to its players than music is to musicians for
instance. Now that's a big ask! But that's what I'm here for really, ultimately I would
want to see a change in my life for the better from playing this game!
I played 4 moves in game 1, each of which represented a passionate interest of the
moment, but I have noticed since that they continue to haunt my life in unexpected
ways. I have seen 2 movies and listened to one audio recording that I probably
wouldnt have otherwise, through deliberately taking an interest in the moves of other
players. But more surprisingly, I was contacted by someone who read my "Alchemical
Gold" move, and had a very interesting correspondance that continues to prove
fruitful. I even ended up taking a particular herbal medicine through a contact made
in this way.
I also find my interest in the subject of my other moves has proved more induring
than I would have expected- for instance, as a musician, I have arranged and learned
to play the whole of Dark Side of the Moon on acoustic guitar, and discovered it to be
the very best album for playing on late night cab shifts to mellow out drunken
revellers!
I would love to hear whether any of the other players from game1 have noticed it
effecting their off-line lives?
CONNECTIONS:
"The Infinite Game" and "Fuetility"- In the hope that we are not just playing an
irrelevant game.
"The Meru Project"- Through self-embedding, recursion, playing games with
symbols, and also as another bridge between games.
"Alien Dreamtime"- Because Terrance McKenna brings up the questions, what is
inside and outside of acceptability regarding use of psychoactive substances in
different cultures at different times, and what is real insight and profound truth, and
what is psuedo scientific mystical rambling?
GEOGRAPHIC LOCATION: Somewhere in Arizona I believe?
IMAGES AND CLIPS: The Fish. The final visual map of game 1
ACCESS AND DISTRIBUTION: click on URL below
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: There are an endless variety of discussion boards on
the web, perhaps people could be more careful to be sure they are contributing to the
game and not just indulging in a frivolous impulse to kibbitz. I would actually like to
see the words of the corewave embedded in the background tiles of the pages, or at
least gloriously emblazoned in large type more than once on the submissions page!