Klarinet Archive - Posting 000224.txt from 2009/02

From: Michael Wnight <michaelwhight@-----.uk>
Subj: RE: [kl] Brahms quintet
Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2009 05:16:49 -0500

Yes of course the idea of boundaries enabling a framework for possibilities=
is an old and well known subject and one that I do not disagree with. Howe=
ver within that framework there are all sorts of solutions.

Whether we play on the Bb or A is actually of little consequence to the mus=
ic and just because Muhlfeld did it doesn't mean its the right solution for=
all.

Michael Whight=20

-----Original Message-----
From: Alexander Brash <brash@-----.edu>
Sent: 10 February 2009 22:44
To: klarinet@-----.org
Subject: RE: [kl] Brahms quintet

> Jonathan...there is no such thing as should in music...only infinite
> possibilities

I rather disagree with this sentiment...the fact that some "shoulds" must
exist does not limit possibility in any way. The existence of a basis
doesn't bound a space. I've pasted parts of an essay on just this topic
below, which you can read in full in my upcoming book. I've pasted the
actual LaTeX code since the pdf comes out with strange code characters, so
it may read a little weird - it's also still a work in progress:

chapter{Free Will and Interpretation}

Most people would tell you that free will is the ability to discern, to
reject outside influences and have the ability to decide and act - that
it's the ability to make a choice. Even the dictionary definitions boil
down to this. Translation? ``People can do stuff." No shit. As for whether
it actually exists in some sort of religious, cosmic sense, who cares?
Under any observable experiment, in thought or reality, people are going
to behave AS IF they have it. It's a relativity and context problem,
nothing more. You can believe whatever gives you the most comfort, I
choose (or do I?) to believe it does, because otherwise I can't imagine
that anything really matters. Whether that's ``true" free will, or it's
the way people act day to day that everyone calls free will, it makes no
difference.

The problem is, it's the wrong term to use. That thing up there, that
``People can do stuff," is only part of the concept, the less important
part. I call this instead ``free capability." In separating capability
from execution, we can see the wrinkle, the beauty and nuance that has
terrorized the inquisitive mind for millennia: free will is not the
ability to make a choice, it's KNOWING that just because we can do a
thing, it does not mean that we must. Free will is not the fact that we
chose one of several paths, it's in our ability to accept that none of
those paths is inevitable, and to know not WHY we chose the one we did,
but why we re

[The entire original message is not included]=

------------------------------------------------------------------
The 2009 Woodwind.Org Donation Drive is going on right now - see
https://secure.donax-us.com/donation/ for more information.
------------------------------------------------------------------