Crypto Sapiens

Art is as fundamental to human life as language, and as something so inextricable it seems we can barely express our understanding of it. Much like the human brain, we can recognize it and give general input regarding what we think is happening, but there's no real agreement about the inner workings and solid definitions within either field of study.

We see art as a subcategory of artifact, but in a way, any artifact can be considered art. In fact, naturally occurring objects (not artifacts) could be considered art. One would be hard-pressed to successfully argue that mountain ranges and complicated tree systems don't qualify. So if creator, intent, function, and content don't specifically define art, then what does? Art is maybe anything in the past, present, or future that could be viewed by any potential observer and qualified as art. Sneaky, here. We're not supposed to use the word in the definition of that word, but this is so hard-wired into us that we can't properly define it. Like love. What is love? It's what you have for something you love. 

An art collection is just a series of objects tied together in the mind of the observer(s), much in the same way that speech only makes sense when you know the language, or love only makes sense when you know what it feels like. By this train of thought, we can view art as a fundamental urge that exists only within the observer and in the presence of some context. As a species that has this urge hard-wired, we partake in art very differently from person to person, often disagreeing on what qualifies as art.

A banana duct-taped to the wall of a museum or a Banksy piece freshly sold at auction being shredded immediately post-sale may seem like travesties of capitalism more than art-- but couldn't such a travesty also be considered art? The banana is an arrangement of items within context, and the Banksy shredding could prove a simple act of destruction to be art within appropriate context. So art can be a moment? Would it then follow that art can be a personal record of action providing context to an outstanding moment?

Yes I am leading up to something here, and that something is digital art. Is it "real" if I can't hold it? Does viewing it on a phone or TV screen or projector wall qualify as experiencing it, and does holding it in a blockchain wallet qualify as ownership? Digital art may just be the ultimate art form combined with an also ultimate form of ownership. Blockchain storage is by no means fool-proof, but its quite secure when secured properly. And while our first concern may lean toward thievery of expensive art pieces, the list of concerns is actually much, much longer.

When we store conventional art pieces, we have to worry about damage from light, sound, humidity, and vandals. To move pieces from one place to another requires tedious care and tremendous resources. To display them we need the perfect angle and color of lighting. To create them we need expensive materials that are potentially toxic and harmful to us and our surroundings, and in order to know the context properly we have to rely on long-standing lists run by people or businesses verifying that the art is what we think it is- and we all know how reliable humans tend to be. 

Digital art is degradation free, instantly transferable anywhere in the world, displayable on any medium to match lighting conditions or purpose, only produces as much waste as the blockchain on which it exists, and proves its own provenance having been traced its whole life immutably by the software & hardware on which it is also stored. No, you can't technically hold digital art in your hands, but I would argue that very few pieces of art require such, and if they do, then i say continue on and do not convert to digital for these instances. This isn't an either-or situation, and I'm not trying to argue for the triumph or either. Physical and digital art can co-exist happily and absolutely ought to.

Art is not a thing, it's a viewpoint that we get to share with others. It seems we may gain clarity by recognizing that art is in our minds, not out in the world, and its inherent subjectivity is what makes it such a captivating topic. Could digital art be paving the way for a revolution in the way that we interact with this primal urge within us?

Don't Say NFT ep. 11

Art [dsNFT]

Onchain Poetry Digest

Welcome to this edition of our bi-weekly Onchain Poetry Digest, where creativity merges with the blockchain in a symphony of words. Every edition, we dive into the vibrant ecosystem of decentralized and digital arts, exploring the fresh, innovative, and soul-stirring poetry etched permanently into the blockchain. From haikus that capture the essence of DeFi, to epics unfolding within the cryptoverse, our mission is to illuminate the poetic beauty being birthed in this groundbreaking field of the arts with you every two weeks. 

This month at Cryptopoetry community, we're celebrating the wordsmithing prowess of our new Cryptopoet of the Month: Emanuel Souza. His innovative poetry has brought a fresh perspective to this literary space. You'll find some of his newest work listed below, but for a deeper dive, we highly recommend visiting the 

 where you can explore engaging conversations around his and others' works."

Don't forget that you can become a member of the Onchain Poetry Digest Community, with an NFT to prove it. Check out the 

"ᴅᴀʏ ʙʏ ᴅᴀʏ ɪᴛ'ꜱ ᴍᴏʀᴇ ɪᴍᴘᴏꜱꜱɪʙʟᴇ ᴛᴏ ᴄᴏᴘᴇ ɪ ꜰᴇᴇʟ ʟɪᴋᴇ ɪ'ᴍ ᴛʜᴇ ᴏɴᴇ ᴛʜᴀᴛ'ꜱ ᴅᴏɪɴɢ ᴅᴏᴘᴇ ᴄᴀɴ'ᴛ ᴋᴇᴇᴘ ᴀ ꜱᴛᴇᴀᴅʏ ʜᴀɴᴅ ʙᴇᴄᴀᴜꜱᴇ ɪ'ᴍ ɴᴇʀᴠᴏᴜꜱ ᴇᴠᴇʀʏ ꜱᴜɴᴅᴀʏ ᴍᴏʀɴɪɴɢ ɪ'ᴍ ɪɴ ꜱᴇʀᴠ...

ꜱᴄᴀʀꜰᴀᴄᴇ | Foundation

When West visits East, what do we come in with? And what do we leave outside?

WOVE - West on Visiting East

Summer is extended here in the Northern Hemisphere. And as it seems there is no end to it, so I'd like to see the onchain summer going on for a bit. For that, a poem: As summer / is extended here, we / embrace the opportunity to / keep doing what we love: / build onchain.

Onchain indian summer

Them - Ndoro | Exchange Art

More fresh poetry and a Cryptopoet of the Month

The Onchain Poetry Digest XIV

All Things Web3

Here to demystify the world of Web3, reduce the noise and remove the confusion. Web3 for everyone.

Now that you own a crypto wallet and have some funds on it, what can you do with it?

Similar to the non-crypto world, you can use your wallet to buy things in the Web3 world. 

The answer is, it depends. It depends on what you are looking to do. Are you looking to buy some crypto in the hope that the bull market returns and prices go up? Are you an artist looking to create your art as NFTs and sell your pieces? Are you a writer looking to support other writers out there in the space and learn from them? 

NFTs are Non Fungible Tokens. Clear as mud, I'm sure.

Therefore, Non Fungible means the opposite. It cannot be changed or substituted.

"A non-fungible token (NFT) is a unique digital identifier that is recorded on a blockchain, and is used to certify ownership and authenticity. It cannot be copied, substituted, or subdivided;"

It just depends. But, the answer to the "what do I do with my crypto wallet" question is pretty standard in all scenarios. You 

 your wallet to the sites that you engage with. 

 your wallet it will ask you to sign the transaction. Obviously, you need to make sure that you are connecting to a legitimate, reputable site. Just like in Web2.0, you need to be wary of scammers wanting you to connect to their site.

When you're signing the transaction you are telling the wallet 

"it's fine, it's me, and it's ok to connect to this site."

Let's look at example. I will connect to 

When you have successfully connected your wallet you will see something similar to below:

You are now ready to go shopping for anything that takes your fancy. 

Artwork. Profile pics. Music. Photography. Writing.

It's a new world. We'll explore more of this in coming newsletters.

Issue #003 - Lets go shopping!

Web3: What can I do with my wallet?

epicdylan.eth

The official newsletter for the philosophy of T. Dylan Daniel.

The Runaway Species is a great entry point into the ecosystem from which Worldview Ethics is arising. David Eagleman and Anthony Brandt present a wide and deep array of examples, each of which brings the reader a bit closer to the goal of understanding the sorts of things human minds and brains are. The pairing of a neuroscientist and a musician is a non-traditional one, but sometimes such combinations are the best way to generate new perspectives. New perspectives, Eagleman and Brandt argue, are a major component of what we do.

 shortly after graduating from Texas State University with my Master’s degree. It may have been given to me in a goodie bag I received when I went back in 2018 to present 

 to the Philosophy Dialogue Series but I do not remember for sure. The reason I had received the gift was because the philosophy department was to begin teaching it in undergraduate courses as a way of rapidly getting freshmen up to date with the sorts of things thinking makes possible these days. I took it home and though a few months went by before I read it, when I did I was immediately drawn to the delightful tension between the sheer volume of ideas the authors share and the singular subject matter of human consciousness’s manifold outputs.

 (2017) is a celebration of what it is to be a human being, indeed of what it has been over the preceding period from which we have history. We frequently do not see the future as it will play out over time, but that doesn’t stop us from guessing. Our minds are wonderfully creative and the insights they produce at scale, over the body of the human species as a whole, are without limit or prespecified form. We can do the most amazing things, when we put our minds to it! Worldview Ethics is about taking the time and energy to really see what’s going on in the world and, to whatever extent possible, understanding why things are the way they are.

From the anatomy of the body to one of the most abstract descriptions of rationality ever written, this book review series will guide the reader through a series of ten books. Review #1 was 

(2023) by Dr. Peter Attia & Bill Gifford, and it focused on health and mood as pertain to the good life. 

is a way for us to take that basic understanding of biology up a notch — what kinds of goals do we have? What makes us happy? As Eagleman and Brandt observe in our behavior at scale, one strategy that has worked over and over again is to iteratively connect with our world. 

is far from the most difficult book on the list (probably either 

 could take that title), but it is a great entry level starter book for a layperson to read to get a feel for what it is we’re looking at.

Just as Dr. Attia acknowledges the importance of the hands to the body’s interaction with the world, Eagleman and Brandt bring our attention to the imagination. Creativity is a process that benefits us greatly, indeed a process that it is almost impossible to keep us away from. The reason for this is given early in the text: our neurons are not like a bee’s neurons, which are more or less fixed and married to particular functions. Instead, we have an eleven or twelve figure number of them and they not only move around over time, but continuously shift to reflect the shortest path for a signal.

Our brains pull in information from our environment, develop goals for that environment, and then motivate our bodies to achieve said goals. This causes gratification, but also fatigue, and so something new needs to be found for the next run. The drive to novelty is described early on as a fundamental component of human consciousness, a survival instinct at heart which has helped us to learn to thrive in a difficult and unforgiving natural environment.

As a basic description of what we are as people, a physiological understanding of the body is a good place to start. Understanding some about hormones and hematology and the lightning-fast chemical reactions taking place inside our cells is important. But what do all those cells 

If we want to answer questions about where consciousness comes from, it seems likely that there will be many layers in our explanation. Physiology is a start, and the reason it is a start is that many physiological attributes of our bodies such as the heart rate or level of cortisol in the blood have direct relationships with how we feel. The level of explanation occupied by 

, reaching up from the individual body to the social network and its outputs, but nonetheless the continuous motion and oscillation of our culture is presented to us as evidence of the way the biological elements work together at scale.

I find it particularly pleasant that Eagleman and Brandt manage such a creative approach to a book about creativity, and an astute reader will already have guessed that respect for the individual person’s ability to create is a consequence of the view of self that will be presented in 

The most contentious component of WVE is the idea that scientific thinking and moral philosophy can work together, yet in 

 we already have a quite successful example of the sort of thinking WVE intends to spotlight.

What is creativity, if not a healthy body’s way of relating to its environment?

Eagleman and Brandt provide many beautiful pictures to break up the text of the work and nail down their myriad examples. A few high points to look out for include the discussion of innovation in Chapter 1, the discussion of language in Chapter 2, and Chapter 6 in general from Part 1. Parts 2 and 3 respectively aim to provide the reader with information about how to take up and use the creative mentality and how to apply our ideas about creativity to business, school and more.

Creative thinking is best seen in language. Linguistic anthropology argues that all languages are well-adapted to their own place in the world, at the cutting edge separating what came before and what will come after. Some parts of language fall away over time, and some get added each and every day. How? It’s quite natural, Eagleman and Brandt argue, because “We take the raw materials of experience and then bend, break and blend them to create new outcomes,” (Eagleman, 2017. Page 51). Taking the raw materials of experience in is simple enough to understand, but the bending, breaking, and blending that our minds put our experience through is perhaps a bit more challenging to understand as a newcomer to this school of thought.

What the authors mean is that we remember things that have happened before. Some of this uses memory in our brains, some of it can be written down or stored in art or photographs. The reason language changes so much is because we shape it to our desired outcome each time we use it. New words being created is one path this can take, but new grammars, new stories, and new verbal experiences are all equally valid and important. When any of these occur, Eagleman and Brandt would argue, people have bent, broken, or blended bits of experienced life and memory to produce something new. This process happens all the time with language and is perhaps one of the most fundamental parts of being human.

Pushing their point further, Eagleman and Brandt dive into language a bit in Chapter 3: “Language meets the needs for conversation and consciousness not just because it is referential, but also because it is mutable — and that’s what makes it such a powerful vehicle for transmitting new ideas. Thanks to the creative possibilities of language, what we can say keeps pace with what we need to say,” (Eagleman, 2017. Page 72). There’s something absolutely spellbinding to me about the way our language changes in response to changing conditions in the world. The interaction between human minds and the environments we engage with is on display in studies such as lexicography in a way it can scarcely ever be seen anywhere else.

Creative thinking, for Eagleman and Brandt, is a higher level of scope than mere language or mere art or mere culture. It’s a collective process we all participate in that yes, has outcomes in language, arts, and culture; but creativity is something more for the authors. These outputs are simply byproducts of human creativity. Creativity itself is a raw instinct in human minds, a survival instinct we never could have lived without. When we are creatively engaged with our environment, any number of different outcomes are possible. This unpredictable activity is how human minds reshape the world.

Eagleman and Brandt move from explaining what creativity is and why to sharing strategies about how to boost it and studying history to provide us with myriad examples of creative forces at work at various levels of organization, from individual minds to entire cultures. There is a constant turnover in the world of ideas, and though some ideas never really go anywhere, it’s very important to have the freedom they need to develop in new directions so that the few that do take off can get their chance. Napoleon III may have created an overly restrictive art show, but eventually popular pressure forced him to open the Salon de Rèfusès and let all of the 400+ rejected pieces be shown anyway. It’s almost like there’s a blow-off valve that has to be opened if things become too resistant to novel cultural expression.

There emerges, in the text, an insight into a circular social creative process: individual creators need society, and society needs individual creators — especially the ones who think differently and do new things. The lone genius is a myth because “creativity does not emerge out of thin air: we depend on culture to provide a storehouse of raw materials,” (Eagleman, 2017. Page 134), but likewise the starving artist is capable of pushing society forward with great power and should thus not be overlooked.

The creative process itself, at any level we choose to examine, is a whirlwind of change. Ideas are created and many are discarded but some have a profound impact upon the world. Many are much simpler, like trying a new restaurant, but creativity shines through a kaleidoscope of options and is not a simple or linear process.

If you’re trying to do something creative and want to improve, strategies listed in the book include a variety of different approaches. Creating many options is a thing most of us mentally do to one extent or another, but many of the great innovators from Hemingway to George Washington Carver and Mother Nature have found their success in what the authors call a proliferation of options. Many investments of time, energy, money, and effort yield the few amazing novel ideas, products, and creatures that thrive.

Open frameworks that are subject to iteration are also worth considering, when one is in the process of deciding what to do. Once the decision has been reached, risk enters the equation because innovators have to choose only one ending for the novel, one project to build, and there is always a cost to creation. Our ability to tolerate risk long enough for an idea to catch on can often determine the success or failure of an idea.

The process Eagleman and Brandt lay out for us, simply, is to open up the environment, create many different options, explore different possibilities for each of the options, then finally choose one and be willing to accept risk to bring it to life. Our creative process should operate something like this: we decide to write a novel, think openly about what it could be about, explore many possible story arcs, then choose the best way to tell the story and sell it as hard as we can.

is one of the books being reviewed for my Worldview Ethics project is simple: it uses art, business, and school, along with history and many many examples to give the reader who does not completely understand the need for openness and creative thinking the opportunity to connect with these concepts in a deep way.

It seems very important to establish something like a historical track record, which Eagleman & Brandt do exceptionally well, for the open creative process. Many people look to a subject such as ethics with the intention of discovering the “one true” way to live. Insofar as it is possible to give an account of the “one true” anything, it seems more and more to be the case that the thing in question must be described as a tool that can be used or not.

This insight into how to give an account of the “one true” process has been thoroughly examined by philosophers throughout the twentieth century and is currently being examined as pertains to artificial intelligence and open source software, blockchain technology, and other platforms upon which eager developers and entrepreneurs intend to build the future. It was wonderful to see the clear and compelling arguments Eagleman and Brandt mustered up for our collective support of open systems. For my part, Worldview Ethics is a project in the discipline of moral philosophy that aims to give something along the same lines, a philosophical exploration of an open ethical system.

infinite auction: 1ST MAY 2023 Chain: POLYGON Architects Description Enter the first knowledge base hypergraph, to be constructed around Worldview Ethics, a primary source philosophy text by T. Dylan Daniel, author of Formal Dialectics. This Crypto-Novel will represent an experiment in scientific discourse, with an auction mechanic governing the community's ability to add to the essay, creating an entirely new work.

Worldview Ethics

No matter who you are or what your background is like, if you choose to read 

 you will find a wealth of great stories, a beautiful presentation, and some of the most important insights of our time into what it means to be human. From the way our minds are geared toward the creation and destruction of systems of logic at a biological level to the way our culture seeks continual renewal via creative iteration and reinterpretation, human creativity is foundational to what we are.

The Runaway Species: How Human Creativity Remakes the World [Eagleman, David, Brandt, Anthony] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. The Runaway Species: How Human Creativity Remakes the World

The Runaway Species: How Human Creativity Remakes the World

David Eagleman & Anthony Brandt show us the creativity in the world, and explain it.

Review of The Runaway Species

Tanmay Shah 🚀 Rocklaz

Bringing smiles through Art, Conversations & Observations.

I trust you are doing well! I feel very thrilled (& bit nervous) to share the first Rocklaz Newsletter with you. Through newsletters like this, I want to share my observations and update you on Rocklaz episodes, tips and tools, Art competitions/exhibitions and featured Artists. Fun fact this newsletter is a Digital Collectable (NFT)!

What's blue and smells like RED paint? 🤔 (You will find out soon) 

has published over 66 episodes with guests from diverse backgrounds and expertise. Now, we are on a mission to have guests from every country of the world. It's not an easy task, we need your support, find how in 'Join the Movement' below. 

On #Rocklaz next week we have with us guests from very interesting &amp; Large countries: Greenland and DR Congo!

Drop your burning Questions to get featured!🚀😊

​https://thekiss.art/?ref=NSGHFERRZ ​

Rocklaz Made history by hosting one of the World's Oldest and most significant Museums. Watch The 300-year-old and Gustav Klimts Kiss NFT. Mr. Wolfgang, the Director of the world-renowned Belvedere Museum (Vienna, Austria) takes us on an exclusive behind-the-scenes tour. See Gustav Klimt's Famous The Kiss Painting brought to us as NFT. Join us as we go through Austrian history, culture, and culinary delights while engaging in thought-provoking discussions on theology, religion, and spirituality. Uncover the dark influence of World War II on this Museum, and gain insights into the flourishing art scene in Vienna. Get ready to be inspired and captivated by the hidden treasures of the Belvedere Museum.

All new ways and tools for displaying your Art and Creating experiences. Embark on an exclusive tour of the Museum of Crypto Art, the cutting-edge museum, guided by its visionary founder, Colborn Bell, a former New York fund manager. Discover MoCA's remarkable features and offerings to artists and collectors. Delve into the fundamentals of NFTs, IPFS, and the Metaverse, while exploring the intricate relationship between art and museums. Uncover the capitalist culture of New York and its impact on social inclusivity. Prepare to be inspired by profound insights into entrepreneurship. Don't miss out on this extraordinary episode. Check the chapters for specific timestamps.

Rocklaz Schedule & Update: Spaces, New episodes, Newsletter

You can now be part of the Rocklaz Movement: by becoming a Rocklaz Club member, buying Merchandise like T-shirts, Mugs, Hoodies etc, becoming a Patreon, direct donations, becoming a sponsor, and to the very least Sharing this!

You can also work with us! Currently, we have an opening for 

Make the best out of Twitter and save time. You can make lists of specific people and categories to watch focused tweets. No need to scroll endlessly through your timeline. Tweet Deck helps you watch everything at a Glance: all your notifications, messages, home, timeline, Lists etc.

Pro Tip: In the Tweet deck put different lists in different columns.

Beijing Exhibition After Movie and Media News: Colours of Joy.

We had a grad exhibition, here is an after-the-move of that. Many thanks for participating and sharing your awesome work!

The winners have also been listed on the 

 top Selected artists were featured in Chinese media.

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/h4Nvf4lITZ0p5Hs1YcS26Q​

 Try VPN or Tor browser if you can't access this link.

Biggest Tezos Art Contest. Brought to us by Kato, Rohit & Kato Krew.

🔥9K TEZOS ART CONTEST is LIVE🔥
#blametezos 

💥 OVER 9000 $XTZ PRIZE POOL
💥 11 ART CATEGORIES 
💥 20 LEGENDARY CURATORS

🔥 BIGGEST TEZOS ART CONTEST EVER 🔥

#blamekato

LINK for INFO ⬇️ https://t.co/Wlug37pJpg

SuperRare Onboarding and Physical Exibition in China:

OPEN CALL for @SuperRare Neal Space Curation

Curated by @MigratingLines &amp; @ellenxu980601 

Submission Link in Next Thread👇 https://t.co/JkNYbyMPCk

I can't end this newsletter with a Joke so here we go:

You are amazing if you have read so far! Please drop a comment, I would love to hear your thoughts.

Lets Gooo!

Rocklaz Newsletter #1

jelca thinks

about mostly fintech, crypto, and other tech-related stuff, but is obsessed with her Westie & French Bulldog, murasaki potatoes, her pufferfish, pummelos, oreo ice cream, and cooking.

Gouche Painting

Howl's Moving Castle 

NFTTALKS.NFT

At NFTtalks, we are dedicated to delving deep into the world of NFTs, covering all types of artists and projects. Our mission is to bring you exclusive interviews and insights from the minds behind these revolutionary works, as well as informative content about the NFT ecosystem

Sharing Artistic Vision and Inspiration with AnaNFT: A Journey into Creativity and Expression

AnaNFT TALKS

Gouache

Sophie's Gift

The Write3 Newsletter

I sit at the intersection of writing & web3.  A space I call Write3.  Each week, I deliver 1 tip for writers, 1 Write3 opportunity & 1 literary NFT worth collecting. 

A question I often receive: "What's the difference between Mirror and Paragraph".  I'm working on a long-form piece that explores the similarities and differences in depth, I'd like give you a quick overview for today's newsletter:

 - Is like a web3 Substack.  It excels in offering users a great newsletter platform, while also offering web3 tools.  Highlights include: 

 - Is like a web3 Medium.  It excels in offering users a blogging platform that turns your writing into NFTs.  Highlights include: 

• Web3 Brand Awareness (companies like Optimism, Coinbase and Zerion use the platform)

• Embed & Mint NFTs Directly In Your Post 

Both platforms enable the creation of writing NFTs on Layer 2 blockchains - with Paragraph operating on Polygon and Mirror on Optimism. This feature makes the process of acquiring NFTs cost-effective and efficient, aspects I've discovered to be crucial in the creation and selling process.

I love both platforms and will continue to create and explore on each!

I want to bring your attention to a writing contest being hosted by Temple, my go-to Tezos wallet. This contest is particularly exciting because it's for the writing NFT platform, FxText, which I love. I don't discuss FxText frequently, but it stands as a strong competitor alongside platforms like Mirror and Paragraph, especially considering how it utilizes the cheap & efficient Tezos blockchain.

I receive numerous invitations to participate in various writing contests and contribution platforms. However, it's rare for me to accept these offers. This contest by FxText is an exception. Why? Because I genuinely appreciate FxHash, the parent company of FxText, and I'm passionate about writing NFTs. Without a doubt, I'll be participating in this contest!

If you'd like to enter as well, join us in the 

, I'll be creating a sub-server dedicated to the contest.  Learn more here 👇🏻

1/4

Are you a writer in the @tezos community?

 Here's your chance to win awesome prizes!  

Temple Wallet × @fx_hash_  are proud to launch Web3 Writers, an article contest with the following rules: 👇 https://t.co/q6CwbZh0Zb

3. A Literary NFT Worth Collecting - FxHash Poetry NFTs

Speaking of FxHash, several of my favorite literary NFTs were created on that platform.  A few of my favorites:

 - Sasha Stiles & Nathaniel Stern - Fun fact:  The audio of my Binary Ode was the intro/outro track for Write3 Podcast.

**Reminder:  Collectors of today's newsletter will mint this piece of Write3 art.  Thank you for your support of my writing. It's patrons like you who allow me to continue doing what I love! Happy Collecting! 