Henrik Sinding-Larsen

Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2012). Natur- og miljøutfordringer i en flerkulturell bydel, I: Sharam Alghasi; Elisabeth Eide & Thomas Hylland Eriksen (red.), Den globale drabantbyen. Groruddalen og det nye Norge.. Cappelen Damm Akademisk. ISBN 9788202386559. 17. s 264 - 280

Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2008): “Externality and materiality in the history of the human sciences.” Fractal: Journal of Psychology; Volume 20.(1) s. 9-18 Nedlastbar pdf her: www.scielo.br/scielo.php

Henrik Sinding-Larsen (2007): ”Relativt frie ettertanker om frihet”. I: Thomas Hylland Eriksen og Arne Johan Vetlesen (red.): Frihet. Universitetsforlaget. ISBN 978-82-15-01202-5 s. 242-273

Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2006): ”Eksternaliserte og relasjonelle trygghetsregimer.” I: Thomas Hylland Eriksen (red.): Trygghet. Universitetsforlaget. ISBN 978-82-15-01060-1. s. 205-234

Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1993): ”Informasjonsteknologi, ansvar og jegets grenser.” I: Terje Rasmussen og Morten Søby (red.): Kulturens digitale felt - essays om informasjonsteknologiens betydning. Oslo: Aventura. s. 259-290

Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1991) ”Computers, Musical Notation and the Externalization of Knowledge: Towards a Comparative Study in the History of Information Technology” I: Negrotti, Massimo. (ed): Understanding the Artificial: On the Future Shape of Artificial Intelligence. Springer Publishing Company. ISBN 3-540-19612-9. s. 101-125

Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1984): ”Landskappleiken – nasjonalt rituale og lokalkulturell folkefest” i Klausen, Arne Martin (red.): Den norske væremåten. Oslo: Cappelen forlag. s. 117-139

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2019). Musical Notation as the Externalization of Imagined, Complex Sound, In Mark Grimshaw; Mads Walther-Hansen & Martin Knakkergaard (ed.),  The Oxford Handbook of Sound and Imagination, Volume 2.  Oxford University Press.  ISBN 9780190460242.  Chapter 10.  s 191 - 218 Show summary

  Henrik Sinding-Larsen analyses how new tools for the visual description of sound revolutionized the way music was conceived, performed, and disseminated. Early on, the ancient Greeks had described pitches and intervals in mathematically precise ways. However, their complex system had few consequences until it was combined with the practical minds of Roman Catholic choirmasters around 1000 AD. Now, melodies became depicted as note-heads on lines with precise pitch meanings and with note names based on octaves. This graphical and conceptual externalization of patterns in sound paved the way for a polyphonic complexity unimaginable in a purely oral/aural tradition. However, this higher complexity also entailed strictly standardized/homogenized scales and less room for improvisation in much of notation-based music. Through the concept of externalization, lessons from the history of musical notation are generalized to other tools of description, and Sinding-Larsen ends with a reflection on what future practices might become imaginable and unimaginable as a result of computer programming.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2015). Om dannelse av identitet og individualitet i antropologi og biologi, I: Harald Aspen; Malin Noem Ravn & Emil André Røyrvik (red.),  Det skapende mennesket : Antropologiske dialoger om tegn, ting og tolkning.  Scandinavian Academic Press.  ISBN 9788230401736.  kapittel.  s 307 - 324
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2014). How new theories of the major transitions in evolution may shed light on the human challenge of climate change, In Linda Sygne (ed.),  Transformation in a Changing Climate.  Universitetet i Oslo.  ISBN 978-82-570-2001-9.  Abstract.  s 291 - 291 Show summary

  The book “The major transitions in evolution” (1995) by J. Maynard Smith and E. Szathmary labels the start of a new trend in evolutionary biology where previously unique human achievements like language, advanced technology and cooperation are understood as evolutionary products of a different and more complex kind of transition than the transitions traditionally explained solely by Darwinian natural selection. The specific transformations brought about by human culture may be unique. But the kind of transformation may be sufficiently common to other evolutionary transitions that it will be useful to try to understand the exploitation of fossil fuel and dangerous climate change in the light of modern evolutionary theory, e.g. as a case of ecological niche construction turned into an evolutionary trap. To do this in a more than superficial and metaphoric way, there is a need for a radical, multidisciplinary cooperation between experts in human culture and society, evolutionary biology and several other disciplines from both sides of C.P. Snow’s “two cultures”. The paper will also report on one such initiative at the University of Oslo called “Beyond dualism” which is supported by the project “Overheating: The three crises of globalization” (climate/environment , finance/economy, culture/identity). An important activity within Beyond dualism is to try to agree on basic concepts with validity across culture and science disciplines. Candidates for important, encompassing concepts are found in the writings of, among others, Terrence Deacon. We believe that the current academic separation between natural and human science is an important obstacle to the endeavor of understanding what transformations are needed to face dangerous climate change.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2012). Natur- og miljøutfordringer i en flerkulturell bydel, I: Sharam Alghasi; Elisabeth Eide & Thomas Hylland Eriksen (red.),  Den globale drabantbyen. Groruddalen og det nye Norge.  Cappelen Damm Akademisk.  ISBN 9788202386559.  17.  s 264 - 280
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2008). Externality and materiality in the history of the human sciences. Fractal: Revista de Psicologia.  ISSN 1984-0292.  20(1), s 09- 18 Show summary

  This article presents and discusses some attempts to overcome the “Cartesian” dualism of “mind versus matter” and “interior versus exterior”, in particular the attempts of anthropologist Tim Ingold in his book “The Perception of the Environment” (2000). Central to Ingold’s argument is a shift in focus from structure to process (temporality), from design to growth, from the organism in a context to organism and environment as co-evolutionary and co-constitutive entities. Ingold builds on ecological thinking (Bateson and Gibson) and phenomenology (Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger). This article characterises Ingold’s position as a neo-romantic reaction to the “linguistic turn” in the human sciences and the “genetic turn” in biology and compares his position to historical romanticism.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2007). Relativt frie tanker om frihet, I: Thomas Hylland Eriksen & Arne Johan Vetlesen (red.),  Frihet.  Universitetsforlaget.  ISBN 978-82-15-01202-5.  11.  s 242 - 273
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2006). Eksternaliserte og relasjonelle trygghetsregimer, I: Thomas Hylland Eriksen (red.),  Trygghet.  Universitetsforlaget.  ISBN 978-82-15-01060-1.  9.  s 205 - 234
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1993). Informasjonsteknologi, ansvar og jegets grenser, I:  Kulturens digitale felt.  Aventura forlag.  10.  s 259 - 290
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1992). Eksternalisering. Norsk Antropologisk Tidsskrift.  ISSN 0802-7285.  (3), s 67- 78
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1992). Informasjonsteknologi og etikk. Forskningspolitikk.  ISSN 0333-0273.  15(1), s 16- 18
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1991). Computers, Musical Notation and the Externalization ofKnowledge: Towards a Comparative Study in the History of InformationTechnology, In Massimo Negrotti (ed.),  Understanding the artificial : on the future shape of artificial intelligence.  Springer Publishing Company.  ISBN 3-540-19612-9.  Kap. 7.  s 101 - 125
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1991). Information technology, In Bo Göranzon & Magnus Florin (ed.),  Dialogue and technology: Art and knowledge.  Springer.  ISBN 0387195742.  -.  s 119 - 130
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1991). La notation musicale et l'ordinateur. Chimères.  ISSN 0986-6035.  12, s 53- 71
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1990). Informasjonsteknologi og forvaltning av kunnskap - Et kulturhistorisk perspektiv, I: Arne Ketil Eidsvik (red.),  Telemedisin 90 Tromsø, 21-22 mai 1990.  Teledirektoratets forskningsavdeling.  ISBN 8242300968.  Del 2 kap 8.  s 198 - 202
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1990). Kunnskap til salgs - uberørt av menneskeånd. Om datamaskiner, kunnskap og kulturutvikling. Agora : Journal for metafysisk spekulasjon.  ISSN 0800-7136.  8(1-2), s 27- 42
• Bregenhøj, Carsten & Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1988). [Le Monde en Carnaval] En Scandinavie, I: Pier Giovanni D'Ayala & Martine Boiteux (red.),  Carnavals et mascarades.  Bordas.  ISBN 2040153659.  Del 3 kapittel 9.  s 110 - 111
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1988). Information Technology and the Externalisation of Knowledge, In Henrik Sinding-Larsen (ed.),  Artificial Intelligence and Language: Old questions in a new Key.  TANO.  ISBN 8251825504.  Kapitel 3.  s 77 - 89
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1988). Notation and Music: The History of a Tool of Description and its Domain to be Described, In Henrik Sinding-Larsen (ed.),  Artificial Intelligence and Language: Old questions in a new Key.  TANO.  ISBN 8251825504.  Kapittel 4.  s 91 - 114
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1987). Information technology and the mangagement of knowlede. AI & Society: The Journal of Human-Centred Systems and Machine Intelligence.  ISSN 0951-5666.  1(2), s 93- 101 Show summary

  The social sciences lack concepts and theories for an understanding of what new information technology is doing to our society. The article sketches the outlines of a broad historical and comparative approach to this issue: 'an anthropology of information technology'. At the base is the idea of externalisation of knowledge as a historical process. Three main epochs are charaeterised by externalisation of knowledge through a) spoken language and a social organisation of specialists, b) writing and c) computer programming. The impact of expert systems on learning is also discussed.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1987). Informationsteknologi och kunnskapsförvaltning. Dialoger.  ISSN 0283-5207.  (5), s 9- 19
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1986). Helsepolitiske realiteterversus "egentlig sykepleie" ved innføring avEDB. Sykepleien.  ISSN 0039-7628.  73(11), s 8- 13
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1984). Landskappleiken – nasjonalt rituale og lokalkulturell folkefest, I: Arne Martin Klausen (red.),  Den norske væremåten.  Cappelens forlag, Oslo..  7.  s 117 - 139
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1981). Et bilde sier noe annet enn tusen ord. Antropolognytt.  ISSN 0332-9429.  3(3), s 63- 75

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• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (ed.) (1988). Artificial Intelligence and Language: Old questions in a new Key. TANO.  ISBN 8251825504.  248 s.

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• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2020). Major transitions in cultural evolution in the light of major transitions in biological evolution..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2020). Om eksternalisering og forholdet mellom egosentriske og allosentriske rom..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2019). On the externalization of time, energy and information across biological evolution and cultural history..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2018). "Musical Notation as the Externalization of Imagined, Complex Sound" - a seminar about the co-evolution of instruments, notation and music practice, as a case study of cultural evolution..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017, 11. oktober). Hva er dannelse?. [Radio].  Verdibørsen NRK P2. Show summary

  Blant annet om betydningen av tverrfaglighet og det å vite hvor mennesket kommer fra evolusjonært som del av allmenndannelsen hvis vi skal oppnå et bærekraftig samfunn.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017). Identitet, individualitet og forskjellige kulturforskjeller..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017). Sustainability and Overheating in an evolutionary perspective.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017, 24. mai). Tankevekkende tekster del 1. Frihet og det ufullendte.. [Radio].  Verdibørsen, NRK P2.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017, 01. juni). Tankevekkende tekster del 2. Ydmykhet.. [Radio].  Verdibørsen NRK P2.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017, 08. juni). Tankevekkende tekster del 3. Konstruksjon av Gud.. [Radio].  Verdibørsen NRK P2.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017). The co-evolution of instruments, notation and music practice: a case of material and immaterial entanglement in cultural evolution. Show summary

  As far as we know, Pythagoras was the first to perform systematic experiments with music instruments to prove the relation between intervals and mathematical ratios. In particular he experimented with the length and tensions of strings on the Greek lyre (and a simplified version, the monochord), the lengths of tubes of a pan flute, and the weight of metal bells. He gave musical notes and intervals names based on their mathematical properties and location of strings on the lyre. A first musical notation based on Greek alphabetic letters (or variants of these) was also developed by the the Greeks. But notation and music theory remained largely a marginal philosophic speculation until Charlemagne in 789 AD proclaimed that all Christians in his newly re-established West Roman Empire should sing the same repertory of Gregorian chant. A new and more efficient system of notation was developed. But what was intended as a project of standardization and preservation became a major source of innovation. Precise notation of elementary pitches facilitated a new and larger scale orchestral and choral cooperation with an unprecedented harmonic complexity. However, this complexity hit a limit because the Pythagorean way of tuning instruments (based on simple mathematics) was not scalable in every harmonic direction. Naturally occurring overtones were simply not combinable and scalable the way the Enlightenment composers saw was possible from a notation point of view. So, they changed the instruments and created the equally tempered scale, first imposed on the piano and later dominating almost every instrument on the earth. Musical notation that was once describing what material musical instruments and voices could produce of “immaterial” music became a major driving force for a change of the material infrastructure of music. But standardized and scalable descriptions and prescriptions came with a price. Aesthetically, something was gained and something was lost in the change from a small scale oral tradition to a large scale written tradition. The presentation will provide examples (not least on what happened to Gregorian chant) of the co-evolution of notation as a tool of description and its domain to be described.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2017). The history of musical notation and harmonic music. A case of coevolution with possibly wide theoretical implications.. Show summary

  The lecture will summarize the theoretical argument in my chapter “Musical notation as the externalization of imagined, complex sound.” in The Oxford Handbook of Sound and Imagination (forthcoming 2018) and hint to how the argument, that in this chapter is mostly concerned with consonance and harmony, could be extended to rhythm. The critical moment in the history of notation was when the medieaval music theorists (aroung 1000 AD) changed from the ancient Greek use of tetrachords to the modern focus on octaves, and from a Greek version of alphabetic names and note symbols to note-heads on a staff. The octave-based symmetry and iconic graphic representation unleashed new combinatorial possibilities that gave rise to Gothic polyphony and later modern harmonic modulations. Central to the transition is the representation of pitch space as a grid (the staff), first only conceived with diatonic spacing and Pythagorean tuning, but later with a chromatic, equidistant spacing of 12 semitones. This involves more general theories about creating coordinates and maps of any kind which also are relevant for creating maps of time and rhythmic events.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2016, 06. februar). Kommentarer til boken "Naturen er hellig" av J.A. Herbener i Verdibørsen NRK P2.. [Radio].  NRK P2.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2016). Major versus ordinary transitions in cultural evolution: A conceptual discussion..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2016). Sustainability and flexibility. Selected findings from the research project SUSTAINABILITY..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik & Eriksen, Thomas Hylland (2016). Sustainability is not a Number - Climate Crisis and Human Cultural Evolution. Introducing the seminar theme..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2014, 17. mars). Deltagelse i debatt om rasisme knyttet til "Kongolandsbyen" i Jubileumsutstilingen i Frognerparken i 1914 versus situasjonen i 2014. [Radio].  Kulturhuset NRK P2.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2014). Domestication, endosymbiosis, and the relational foundations of life..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2014). Identity, continuity and change: An evolutionary perspective on two classes of cultural difference..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2013). Have humans lost contact with evolution because we are only adapting to ourselves?.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2013). How can theories of transitions within evolutionary biology shed light on the human challenge of climate change?.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2013). New levels of standardization as a precondition for speed and integration in cultural evolution. Show summary

  New levels of standardization as a precondition for speed and integration in cultural evolution. A Kenyan Masai on the savanna, exchanging information about the price of cattle through his mobile phone, may serve as a symbol of the historically unprecedented speed of communication in an ever more globally integrated human population. But it is easy to forget that at the base of all this busy economic progress and cultural change lie some equally historically unprecedented telecommunication standards with global scope. And if we look for other historical examples of transitions to new levels of human speed and integration, we find that they too are characterized by new levels of standardization and stability. The Egyptian hieroglyphs remained basically unchanged for 3000 years. And if we look even deeper, into pre-human history, modern biology tells us that all the major transitions in evolution were characterized by new standards of information processing (both within and between organisms) that facilitated the integration of previously independent or small scale entities into more complex and large scale entities. The paper will explore aspects of the relation between standardization and creativity, structure and process, spatiality and temporality in cultural evolution. One example used will be to show how the standardization of musical notation in the Middle Ages paved the way for an unprecedented musical creativity with polyphony and large orchestras as some of its hallmarks. The notation of the temporal aspects of music were the latest to be standardized but may be the most consequential for the subsequent complexity. The paper will also reflect upon the interest in temporality as part over a larger trend in science where the quest for elementary processes (or elementary dynamics) replaces the former prominence of elementary structures. The evolutionary anthropologist Terrence Deacon will be used as an interesting example of a radical “processualist” that traces fundamental aspects of “historicity” from thermodynamics all the way to human consciousness. Literature: Deacon, Terrence W. (2012) Incomplete nature - How mind emerged from matter. Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1991) Computers, Musical Notation and the Externalization of Knowledge: Towards a Comparative Study in the History of Information Technology. In: Massimo Negrotti (ed.): Understanding the artificial : on the future shape of artificial intelligence. Springer.

• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik & Khazaleh, Lorenz (2013, 04. september). An exercise in thinking differently. [Internett].  UiO Overheating project website.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2012). "Den enes død - den andres brød" Søppel i et økologisk perspektiv. P2-Akademiet.  ISSN 0808-6621.  (47), s 145- 157
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2012). Looking with what you are looking at: Gregory Bateson and Terrence Deacon as healers of the great divide between natural and human science.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik & Nordlund, Eva (2012, 05. februar). Intervjuet av NRK om P.W.Zapffes liv og filosofi. [Radio].  NRK P2 Søndagsavisa.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2011). Always looking with what you are looking at – Gregory Bateson’s radical interdisciplinarity.
• Hobson, Annette & Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2010, 26. mai). Den enes død den andres brød - Søppel i et økologisk perspektiv. [Radio].  NRK P2-Akademiet.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2009). Relativt hellig? - hellighet som tverrfaglig og tverrkulturell utfordring.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2009). Sekularisering, hellighet og paradokser - Om den nødvendige og umulige jakten på et fast punkt tilværelsen.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2008). "Den enes brød - den andres død: Søppel i et økologisk perspektiv.".
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2008). Krever nye sekulære fellesskap en ny teori om Gud?.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2008). Møter og relasjoner i et postrelasjonelt samfunn.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik & Khazaleh, Lorenz (2008, 25. april). Hvor er det blitt av holismen?. [Internett].  Forskningsprogrammets Culcoms nettsider.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2007). Externality and materiality in the history of the human sciences.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2007). Individets frihet og menneskets ansvar. Apollon : Forskningsmagasin for Universitetet i Oslo.  ISSN 0803-6926.  17(3), s 14- 15
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (2006). ”Eksternalisering” – et begrepsmessig bidrag til en beskrivelse av redskap ogkulturutvikling.
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1991). Informasjonsteknologi - en ny art i vårt kunnskapsøkologiske miljø. Noen tanker om etikk og teknologivalg..
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1988). Artificial Intelligence - a challenge to our understanding of language, cognition, and reality, In Henrik Sinding-Larsen (ed.),  Artificial Intelligence and Language: Old questions in a new Key.  TANO.  ISBN 8251825504.  Introduction.  s 1 - 9
• Sinding-Larsen, Henrik (1983). Fra fest til forestilling. Et antropologisk perspektiv på norsk folkemusikk og dans gjennom skiftende materielle, sosiale og ideologiske betingelser fra nasjonalromantikken og fram til i dag.

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