SalonCast003 ::: Transcendental Time Machines

Wassim Z. Alsindi; Martina Cavalot; Max Hampshire; Paul Seidler; 0x Salon

We held a 0x Salon conversation under Chatham House Rule on the history, politics, philosophy and technology of timekeeping. This is an audio report based on that discussion.

Hosts: Wassim Alsindi, Martina Cavalot, Max Hampshire and Paul Seidler. Audio from CF303 Acid Futures Vol 2 by 0dan and Jodey Kendrick.

Stream (via Soundcloud) or download as mp3 // are.na research archive

SalonCast003 - Transcendental Time Machines by 0x Salon

Notes:

History & evolution of timekeeping

Sun / water clocks > Mechanical (macro-gravity) > Electronic > Atomic / Nucleonic
Miniaturisation / diversification -> batching, replaceable/machined parts, assembly line
Solar > calendar > clock > electronic > laser > orbital (GPS)

Temporal domains & regimes

Classical > quantum time
Newton, Kant, Deleuze, Einstein & Relativity, CCRU, Rovelli
Quantum conjugates -> stat mech -> loop gravity
Entropy & the arrow of time / von Neumann discorrelates

Different conceptions of time

Chronos & Kairos and the idea of the “epochal shift”
Geometric subsumptions of time: line, circle, spiral >> deja vu, reincarnation
- Repetition of the same (cosmos)
- Non-repeatability (capital)
- Repetition of the non-same (Ubermensch)
- Bidirectionality
- Recursion & the feedback loop
Xenotemporalities
- Black Quantum Futurism and retro-causality

Time & Power

Temperance & virtue through the ages
Church / curfew / factory / curfew / trading restriction
Capital <> precision timing -> trading (regulation / asymmetry)
Imperial time, racist time, chauvinist time
- Naval timekeeping (Harrison), GMT, timezone diplomacy,
- Semiotics: master-slave, white-red-blue
- Talking clocks (UK ‘Golden Voice’ Stephen Tallents & Ethel Cain)

Greenspan on cyberspace-time

cannot be considered humanistic
machines of simulation >> clockwork universe
transglobal or postglobal, as cyberspace is nonlocalisable
an immanent machinic culture in which time measures nothing outside
Calendar vs the clock -> abstract time / “empirical time”
UNIX time as a last vestige of the calendar in the domain of abstract time
Putnam identity theory - nature of mental states (1967)

Notes On The Poverty of Blocktime

Polychronicity: continuous (cyber-clock) <> discrete (block-clock)
Temporal slippages, arbitrage, discontinuities at this membrane

Proof-of-work - a lottery and a bingo game, burning energy to play
- difficulty adjustment as probabilistic limbo to keep block-clock ticking regularly
- PoW time<>capital<>energy -- PoS less energy/more capital
- Centre of economic gravity as penalty for leaving earth
Forks, orphans - parallel chronologies & schisms
- Time is out of joint (Hamlet, Shakespeare)
- I am separated from myself by the form of time (Deleuze on Kant)

Nakamoto Consensus & 51% Lyfe
- Pure formalisms of canonicity (longest / strongest chain) <> money as social bargain?
- An arrow of time, that goes both ways if you pay enough (determinacy-as-a-service)
- Selfish mining as attenuated case (deviation from ‘fair’ behaviour)
MTP - miners as unreliable chroniclers of time, no clock oracle inside the network
- Time-warps - fake timestamps, game difficulty, game 51% condition
Front-running & MEV - due to temporality mismatch, miners can ‘look into the future’ and choose the one they prefer
Computation <> storage arbitrage through time
- Gastoken making a ‘futures’ market out of congestion?
PoS - long-range attacks due to no penalty for re-historicising
Year 2038/2106/292277026596 bug - when computers run out of time