The Other Side (2018)

The Other Side is a ritual performance of the mathematics of an artificial neural network with pre-digital technology. The performance references the rites and nomenclature of the modern spiritualist movement whose devotees held gatherings and séances across the western world around the turn of the 20th century hoping to communicate with spirits of the dead. By manually performing the neural network, the work frames deep learning as communion with an emergent intelligence, presenting black-box neural networks as divination and questioning contemporary narratives of machine learning as artificial intelligence.

The ritual is enacted on a large analog computer made of several concentric discs, a string of wooden beads and a book which holds the weights and biases of the network.

Strange as it may sound, to compute an “artificial neural network” you only need addition and multiplication. These operations are the same whether done with pen and paper, with a digital calculator, or in the case of this work; with a wooden slide-rule.

Comparisons between machine learning and magic are common even amongst experts and practitioners. Although the mathematics of neural networks are well defined, the models they produce are invariably complex and indecipherable. They work, but it is difficult to explain why or how. When used in this way, deep learning is a form of divination, an arcane set of steps that delivers answers without explanations. Without explanation, to trust the network is an act of faith.

The work was first performed for the CHI conference in Montreal in April 2018. It was performed for a second time for The Fig Tree exhibition at AD Space in September 2019.

Another performance made for youtube can be viewed below.