Arts: "Reflection on a sofa" Hodges' model as a 'memory palace' I

Prior to the New Dynamics in Ageing Showcase this Monday (a great event) I travelled down to London on Sunday morning. I wasn't 100% that morning, nothing specific.

I arrived at noon dropped the bags at the B&B and then took the nine stops from Kings Cross to South Kensington. A few minutes walk brought me to the Victoria and Albert Museum. I was early to collect my timed ticket for the Sky Arts Ignition: Memory Palace exhibition.

After queuing for ten minutes (we Brits eh!) at the proper sign to be told I just had to approach the entrance at the allotted time. I went to check the cafe. This was very nice, on the pricey side and rather busy. It's not easy to find a seat, do self-service and be secure. Anyway it was time for a walk, find somewhere else. Before doing so I went to shop and bought the exhibition book, not a huge tome and quite interesting.

Not far away around the corner I found the Brompton cafe. There were seats here. I ordered a cappucinno. There was a large communal table so I sat there. I was ok for about twenty minutes and then came over all hot and increasingly dizzy. I realised I had to move and quickly so took my jumper off and walked around to the right where there was a bookshop.

It was empty and there was sofa with 'LOVE' emblazoned on it - three times - if I registered this correctly. I could hear the cafe and just see one table through the passage way. At that moment I'd had enough of the individual-group axis and the humanistic-mechanistic took over as I went semi-horizontal.

After a couple of minutes I recovered myself and was able to get up - yes the gyro functions - and carry on my way. I am really grateful for that little space and rest. I was still determined to visit the exhibition and attend the showcase. This was fortunate timing with Sunday the 20th the last day of the exhibition and I wanted to keep it that way.

In the post-apocalyptic world of British author Hari Kunzru’s specially commissioned 10,000 word novella, London has been ravaged by a magnetic storm; all memory, art, writing, and recording has been banned. As one man attempts to remember, alone in his cell, the narrative unfolds.
Zoe Pilger, The Independent - Art review.

“misremembered” ambulance by London-based illustration collective Le Gun

“Once there were great palaces called Hospitals.” In contrast to a dystopian future when the NHS and indeed all medical knowledge has been erased, the idea of basic public services appears miraculous. “It was a time of great wonder,” he writes, referring to the present. This fragment of text is accompanied by a fabulous sculpture of a “misremembered” ambulance by London-based illustration collective Le Gun. A ghoulish figure brandishes a whip and pulls a cart filled with potions that promise ad-hoc, alchemical healing.
Zoe Pilger, The Independent - Art review and image

See page 18-19 of Kunzru’s book.

I started in a memory palace, a book shop. I left to visit another, carrying my own memory palace in my mind.

Hodges' model is a memory palace, vacant, awaiting occupancy by patient, client, or carer. The model acts as a great prompt past, future and the here and now.

Thanks Gerry for pulling some strings

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-20847151

Today it was Gerry Anderson's funeral. I am a child of that generation Thunderbirds, Joe 90, UFO - great TV.

In 2008 I found myself back in my old home town and an old friend from junior school got in touch. One of John's memories regards my dad who passed away in 2003 was the fact that when John came around in the very early 70s my dad would watch Thunderbirds with us too.

It really was family entertainment. Visionary, innovative, humane in its messages and delivery; and like the web today the stories counted. There was humour and human frailty on display too, a great primer for a future mental health nurse.

http://gerryanderson.wikia.com/wiki/Thunderbirds_Are_Go

There are favourite episodes - that featuring Fireflash, the Sidewinder, Sunprobe and Zero X from the film Thunderbirds Are Go that I saw on first release at the cinema.

I acquired a love of film soundtracks from the marriage of music and the action in Thunderbirds. Fusion existed in the 60s. Even before Star Trek arrived in the UK there was hope and optimism for the future.

Thanks Gerry!

SF, health, criminality and justice

"The Dehewwoff system of punishing by disease; graded capital punishment; the more serious the crime the more serious the disease the culprit is infected with. For minor crimes a mere fever, loss of livelihood and medical expenses; for more damaging misdeeds a bout of something lasting perhaps months, with pain and long convalescence, bills and no sympathy, sometimes marks to show later on. For really ghastly crimes, infections with diseases rarely survived; near certain death but possible divine intervention and miracle cure. Of course, the lower one's class, the more virulent one's punishment, to allow for the hardier constitution of the toilers. Combinations, and recurring strains, provide sophistications to the basic idea." p.181.

Use of Weapons, Iain M Banks, 1990, Orbit.

Amongst other reading and snorkeling, I read Use of Weapons on holiday. Consider Phlebas was the better read to me. I've come across this disease - justice idea before. As I read the above paragraph in the book you can see the many limitations with this, the physical, psychological and ethical dimensions. This is SF of course, but are the assumptions about the toilers accurate? As a health care professional and thus exposed to more bugs what impact would that have? You also wonder to what extent personalised medicine could physically level the sentencing field? The point about divine intervention seems to suggest a way to gauge - balance that uncertainty element. Is this left to a surface protein or something else? Are the diseases as punishments all to be physical?


My copy (see inside back cover) is now sitting on a shelf in the secondhand book section of the supermarket across from the Zante Park Hotel in Laganas, Zakynthos - the quieter end of the resort. I bought two Camus paperbacks, my book was donated - I suppose you could also say it was shop-dropped - and I'd washed my hands. ;-)

Image source: Goodreads.com

IPONS 2012 Leeds: Dementia and Robots - SF and Isaac Asimov ruined me, what about you?

Just before I disappear for 11 days holiday...

In the 1970s I could go into (the old) Smiths in Wigan with £1 and buy three paperbacks. I built quite an SF library that includes Heinlin, Clarke, Smith, Aldiss, Van Vogt, and Asimov, all a bit musty now and boxed.

Robots featured in many of those old books and Issac Asimov in particular with his Three Laws of Robotics. As a result I've tended to take robots for granted, not just in fiction and film but health care too. Big mistake!

It's almost as if every decade we should watch Blade Runner again and reflect. Take our bearings, triangulating them with these other things-beings. ...

The demographic time bomb is proving quite an incentive for developments in leading edge robotics. 

One of the IPONS keynotes with Dr Susan Barnes and Dr Theodore Metzler presented Three Dialogues Concerning Robots in Elder Care.

We were introduced to general developments including Asimo, which I remember seeing on QI:



- and a specific nursing example:


Through their three dialogues ranging through the developments of artificial intelligence and consciousness, Drs Barnes and Metzler also introduced Paro a Therapeutic Robot, which is modeled after a baby harp seal. For many years dolls of various sorts have been used in residential and nursing homes to provide comfort for selected residents. This is an example of personalised care. I know because there are times when it has seemed not quite right. The paradox is that this arises not necessarily from the client's response to the doll, but sometimes that of the other residents. The response of relatives and visitors can also vary, especially when efforts are ongoing to find ways to help someone settle. Seeing - and hearing someone who is agitated is distressing for all.

Needless to say the keynote prompted many robot related questions. Are we deceiving people who are cognitively impaired? Is this a variation of covert administration of medicine? It was later afternoon 1500 hours or thereabouts, which had me thinking about the phenomena of sundowning. A time of day when some residents can feel they need to be elsewhere. Former responsibilities and roles come back to the fore with what can be chaotic results.

This excellent keynote also made me think about how care needs are matched to technologies. What is the ethical spectrum of telecare, of remote care, of robotics (surgical, locomotion, dementia care)?

A person living with dementia at home may benefit from have a robotic carer / assistant who can respond to the repetitive questions that often follow. A robot is not going to get frustrated, angry (Asimov's Laws?) by such behaviour, unless it were conscious?

On the other hand don't we need the frustration of a family member, a carer, a human to alert society at large to this local crisis - situation? What are the reporting capabilities of the robot system?

I realised many years ago the notion of windows of opportunity in terms of supporting independence - delivering care. There may be an optimum period in a person's health career to introduce day care, respite care, care at home, a robot ...?

Nursing (like me) needs to wake up.

The next twenty - thirty years are going to be a real challenge in all sorts of ways and for many reasons. Throughout that time and beyond a good dose of philosophical thought will be the order of the day. IPONS got me thinking anew: perhaps you too? The society are planning changes to the website, membership and journal options.

Back at month end.
P.S. ICN abstract submitted. Prospect of a public health presentation next month.