{"id":2051,"date":"2016-07-11T13:11:09","date_gmt":"2016-07-11T20:11:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/?p=2051"},"modified":"2016-07-11T13:11:09","modified_gmt":"2016-07-11T20:11:09","slug":"today-in-mathiness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2016\/07\/today-in-mathiness\/","title":{"rendered":"Today in mathiness"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"six\"<\/a>Suppose I suggested that we can think about how the plot of a work of fiction is progressing according to whether the emotional valence<\/em> is rising or falling. I then asked you to think of what shape the overall plot could take, in terms of rising or falling emotional valence. You might suggest the following possibilities:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Rising throughout<\/li>\n
  2. Falling throughout<\/li>\n
  3. Rising then falling<\/li>\n
  4. Falling then rising<\/li>\n
  5. Rising then falling then rising<\/li>\n
  6. Falling then rising then falling.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Artsjournal.com<\/a> links to this story from the MIT technology lab<\/a>\u00a0where scientists loaded the plots of 1,700 works of fiction into a really, really big data set, then used ‘word windows’ to check on the changes in emotional valence, so they could find out how many, and what sort of emotional arcs are most often found in fiction. With their really big data set, you’ll never guess what number they came up with, or what they are.<\/p>\n

    Six. See above.<\/p>\n

    Coda: I am not<\/em> knocking digital humanities, and all the possibilities in the field. What I am<\/em> questioning is the notion that big data is always<\/em> helpful in understanding aspects of art, or any part of life, where the very definition of terms, and a bit of pondering, will lead you to exactly the same conclusions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Suppose I suggested that we can think about how the plot of a work of fiction is progressing according to whether the emotional valence is rising or falling. I then asked you to think of what shape the overall plot could take, in terms of rising or falling emotional valence. You might suggest the following […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2053,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2051","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-issues","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/good-will-hunting-1.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3dIW5-x5","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1673,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/11\/orchestras-and-cost-disease\/","url_meta":{"origin":2051,"position":0},"title":"Orchestras and cost disease (Updated)","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"November 4, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"At The Clyde Fitch Report Duncan Webb has an interesting piece that looks into the future, and he sees chronic cost disease: I first read Baumol and Bowen\u2019s The Economic Dilemma of the Performing Arts some 20\u00a0years ago, almost 30 years after it was first published in 1965. The theory\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"It's not lupus","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/cost-disease.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":910,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2013\/06\/cost-disease-wages-and-skills\/","url_meta":{"origin":2051,"position":1},"title":"Cost disease, wages and skills","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"June 27, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Cost disease is often cited as an economic phenomenon that poses particular challenges in the arts, especially the live performing arts. In a nutshell, here is the theory: productivity is defined as the value of output produced per worker. Rising income over time depends upon rising productivity: if the economy\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"the human touch","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/Floyd-300x209.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1325,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/06\/cutting-wages-is-hard-to-do\/","url_meta":{"origin":2051,"position":2},"title":"Cutting wages is hard to do","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"June 8, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Peter Gelb says New York's Metropolitan Opera will go broke within the next few years without wage cuts. The BBC reports: He proposed cutting 16% of its $200m (\u00a3119m) labour costs by changing work rules for the orchestra and chorus. Gelb also defended spending $169,000 (\u00a3100,000) on a poppy field\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"what goes up is tough to get down","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/ladder.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2195,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2017\/05\/cost-disease-in-the-arts-what-does-it-mean\/","url_meta":{"origin":2051,"position":3},"title":"Cost disease in the arts: what does it mean?","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"May 4, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Professor William Baumol, one of the greatest living economists, has died at the age of 95. Alan Krueger did an interview with him here, and Tyler Cowen has written often about him, here. Readers of artsjournal.com know him best for his conception of cost disease, done jointly with William Bowen.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"this costs *how* much?","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/barbershop.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/barbershop.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/barbershop.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/barbershop.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/barbershop.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1773,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/12\/explainer-how-do-costs-affect-ticket-prices\/","url_meta":{"origin":2051,"position":4},"title":"Explainer: How do costs affect ticket prices?","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"December 29, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Suppose the costs of putting on a show fall - this could be from falling rental rates for performance spaces, technological changes that reduce costs of lighting or sound, or falling labor costs (perhaps through policy changes that lower the cost of providing health insurance to employees). How will this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"When are those darn prices going to come down?","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/airplane-2.jpeg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1494,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/09\/local-arts-funding-and-urban-design\/","url_meta":{"origin":2051,"position":5},"title":"Local arts funding and urban design","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"September 5, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"In the United States, most public funding for the arts happens at the local, rather than the state or federal, government level. And there are good reasons for that; this is a big, diverse, dispersed country, and local arts councils are best placed to respond to residents' tastes and cultural\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"No services","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Detroit-empty-street.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Detroit-empty-street.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Detroit-empty-street.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Detroit-empty-street.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Detroit-empty-street.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2051"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2057,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051\/revisions\/2057"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}