Laws of Media

1
Laws of Media

• Part II
• (lom2.doc)

2
The Laws of Media
When pushed to the limits of its potential, the
new form will reverse what had been its original
characteristics. What is the reversal of the new
form?
What does the artefact extend or enhance or
intensify or make possible or accelerate?
What retrieval of an older, previously
obsolesced ground is brought back and inheres in
the new form?
If some aspect is enhanced the old condition
is displaced. What is obsolesced?
Laws of Media, p. 98-99
3
The Laws of Media
When extended beyond its limit, what does it
REVERSE INTO?
What does itEXTEND?
What does it RETRIEVE from the past that was
formerly obsolesced?
What does itOBSOLESCE?
Laws of Media, p. 98-99
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Tetrad Ratios

• ENHREV OBSRET
• Relation is beyond limits
• ENHRET REVOBS
• Relation is breakdown is breakthrough
• ENHOBS REVRET
• Relation is unclear to me!

A more useful approach is a sub-tetrad with
respect to a common ground being a fractal
instance of the mediums tetrad.
5
McLuhans Catholic Influence?
yieldingMedia Transubstantiation?
Christ is the ultimate extension of man. The
Medium and the Light
6
Existence of Hidden Effects
7
Application Brainstorming

• Fallacy of brainstorming ? recycled ideas

• Tetrad-enabled brainstorming ? identified
  grounds ? missed issues ? unasked questions

8
McLuhan Says

• Chains and clusters work through one or another
  law. A chain forms when, for example, one
  tetrad's reversal provides the subject of the
  next tetrad, or provides the enhancement of the
  next tetrad.
• Laws of Media, p. 130

Med 1
Med 2
Med 3
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McLuhan Says

• Clusters form where a group of tetrads has one or
  another of the four laws in common, as when
  several different media each obsolesce or
  reverse into the same mode
• Laws of Media, p. 130

Med 1
Med 2
Med 3
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Application Principle ofMedia Equivalency

• If the medium is the message, then two media
  with common messages (i.e. tetrad clusters or
  chains) can be considered (ground) equivalent,
  even if they appear to be different as figures.
• Thus, an observable effect in one may be a hidden
  ground effect in the other.

11
Application McLuhanisticsas a Political Project

• There is absolutely no inevitability as long as
  we are willing to contemplate what is happening.
• The Medium is the Massage, p. 25
• With awareness comes responsibility.

12
Application Become a Guruor Pundit

• Most people are well-trained in sequential
  causality ? extensions/enhancements
  obsolescences
• Recall Schopenhauer ? reversals and retrievals
  impress as insightful

13
Mark Says

• The notion of Cause and Effect is a useful
  fiction, much like Santa Claus its a nice way
  to maintain order.

from Latin nescius, ignorant, from nescìre, to
be ignorant.
the established system of social organization.
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This Business of Causality

• Aristotles Four Causes (Metaphysics I)
• Formal essence or essential nature
• Material matter or substrate
• Efficient motive force (conventional causality)
• Final purpose or function
• Message corresponds to formal cause
• Material and final causes are content

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Descriptors of Temporal Force(Punditry Made Easy)
Present force Effects unseen but felt (like the
wind) (Enhancement)
Future force Evolution, metamorphosis, not
noticed until we look backward through
time (Reversal)
Distant past force Societal precedent, cultural
memory (Retrieval)
Immediately previous force Ubiquitous and
obvious our theory of change (e.g. causality)
prevents perception of change itself. (Obsolescenc
e)
It is one thing to spot a new product but quite
another to observe the invisible new environments
generated by the action of the product on a
variety of pre-existing social grounds. (TT63)
Retrieval always seems to provide the keynote
or dominant mode of each tetrad, which may
explain why it is often the most difficult of the
four to discover. (LOM 228)
It is precisely because of the breakdown of a
form that it becomes understandable for the first
time. (TT 137)
It is characteristic of all social processes
that they become manifest and conspicuous at the
moment of their demise. (TT 206)
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Small Groups Exercise

• Begin with one of your groups blasts from the
  past. For what medium is this the retrieval?
  Develop the rest of the tetrad and make
  particular note of any new insights or secondary
  effects.

MEDIUM
Retrieves
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For Next Time

• Readings Weblog Conversation
• Laws of Media Excerpts from Chapters 4 and 5.
• (Opt) The Virtual Marshall McLuhan McLuhan as
  modern satirist. (Theall)
• (Opt) The Fifth Law of Media. (Federman)
• Show Tell
• Bring examples of advertisements that work,
  dont work, and huh?