Reading 2: Wayfinding to Signal to Noise

In "A Brief History of Wayfinding," It explains how ants take mental snapshots of their nest and along their path take note of landmarks to help trace their path back to their nest. Now knowing this I was very surprised and oblivious to the nature of something so small. But I also have a similar mind set when it comes to finding a place I've been to before, like someone's house or a certain restaurant. When I begin my drive, I would try and remember certain things that I've once seen before the last time I went to a certain destination.

Through the reading, a method sailors would use to compute distance traveled at sea was known as "knots." I never knew that this was how they determined their speed: The use of an 18 inch chip wood had a rope tied to it and it would have a knot tied every 47 feet 3 inches. This would trail the boat and the number of knots that would pass over, were counted until thirty seconds of sand from an hour glass was counted, thus producing the amount of knots a boat is going. This method helped sailors in their navigation in mapping out their direction through the seas and one of many tools to support nautical exploration.

While reading "Signal to Noise," one of the large foot notes read, the free temporal flux of television signals convinced Cage and other artistes that life processes could now turn into art. Not knowing what they were meaning of free temporal flux, I looked it up: it is used to lubricate the time applied durning a timing operation. What ponders me is, in what way or how does Cage and other artist use lubricate T.V signals as a means of "art"?