Aksara to Artificial Intelligence: Exploring Balinese Scripts

Aksara to Artificial Intelligence: Exploring Balinese Scripts with Darma Putra.

^{Darma Putra is a writer from Bangli, Bali. A Lecturer-Researcher in Philosophy Hindu Indonesia University. Apart from writing poetry, stories and articles in Balinese and Indonesian, Darma Putra has also copied and written lontar (ancient Balinese and Javanese literary texts) on palm leaves and copper. He has been awarded the Rancage Literature Award.}

Note From the Editor. From Aksara to Artificial Intelligence: is the topic of discussion during our June session at RRI PROI Denpasar Radio on the 30th of June 2024. Hosted by Devi Ernita and together with Agus Kama Loedin, Darma Putra, Dian Dewi Reich and ManButur Suantara. The topic is bound to be revisited. Aside from its technical aspects, it is a broad subject of philosophical interest with potential impact across the whole social spectrum. In this article Darma Putra elaborates through his deep knowledge of Balinese and Javanese scripts, the unique intersections of meanings contained within the ‘script’ across our history. Giving us a better understanding, of the profound philosophy contained within our heritage, carried through ‘Aksara’.

Estimated reading time: 8 minutes

The Meaning of Aksara

The script is rooted in the words a (not) and kṣāra (perish). So aksara can be translated as ‘eternity’, the same as the words amerta, namely a (not) and merta (death). This word merta later evolved into the word mertyu with the same meaning, namely death. Then from the word mertyu, we now know the term mertyu pada which when translated means ‘place of death’. In the Balinese tongue, the phrase mertyu pada has changed its pronunciation to merca pada which is nothing more than a term used to refer to the world we love. In short, it turns out that the world we live in now is a place where death exists and is real. Absolutely!

Aksara to Artificial Intelligence: Exploring Balinese Scripts

What is the relationship between letters and death? There are several explanations that we can get regarding the relationship between the two, if we use Lontar palm sources which are still regarded in Bali. For example, an explanation of the two characters, ANG and AH, which represent two material elements, namely Fire and Water. ANG is Fire, AH is Water. When the two are brought together, nothing remains because they become vapour. In turn, the steam will disappear somewhere.

This concept is one of the basics of how Balinese view death. Death is certain, like the disappearance of fire and water. However in saying that, it is not the end. Just like steam disappearing to who knows where, or what it becomes. In this article, we will not explore the relationship between letters and death, even though we know that the relationship between the two already exists without being connected. But perhaps we will move from letters to artificial intelligence (AI). A world that we perceive as coming from two different camps. 

A Matter of Perspective

The script is considered ancient because what you imagine when you hear the words ‘script‘ are likely impressions of scratches or inlays on stone, papyrus, metal and so on in a language that is no less ancient. But if we replace the word ‘aksara‘ with the word ‘letter‘, the feeling of antiquity or ‘age’ disappears. The modern impression suddenly comes from nowhere. This happens because we are now more fluent with letters, rather than ‘aksara‘. The script is considered too Eastern, while letters are considered quite Western. I suspect that this assumption is a legacy of the Ethical Politics implemented by the Dutch in Bali, since the early days of the 20th century.

Characters and letters are the same. They both function as symbols of sound. Especially the sounds produced by human articulators. In other words, characters or letters are symbols of sounds produced by humans. The science that specifically studies sounds is called phonology, which has its roots in the word phone (sound). Meanwhile, characters or letters in science are termed phonemes. If we compare it with science in the ‘East’, there are two sciences that specifically study sounds or sound, namely śikṣā and Chanda. Śikṣā specifically studies codes and pitch, while Chanda studies the rhythms in mantras. Therefore, what characters represent is much broader than we thought. So it is clear that the ‘Western’ and ‘Eastern’ views of script or letters are the same. They placed letters as symbols of sounds produced by human speech organs. 

Communication, More than the Written W ord

As a symbol of sound, the script still has weaknesses if we talk in the context of Balinese script and Latin letters. It cannot represent anything outside of sound. He cannot represent sounds accurately for various reasons. The easiest example is intonation. No matter how advanced the development of characters, they cannot represent intonation or tone. So in some cases, characters need help from other signs such as commas, periods, exclamations, questions, accents, and so on.

Even these signs are not enough to represent something that humans want to convey through the sounds they produce. In communication, humans need other things to achieve the meaning they want to convey, such as expressions and gestures. So it is natural that in written language, people often add things other than characters and punctuation such as pictures, videos, emote icons, stickers, music, and so on. All of this is done so that the message can be more ‘reached.’ In other words, characters alone are not enough.

Thought, Energy and Sound

What is the thing you want to convey? In my opinion, not just a message, but a feeling. Something deeper. More personal. Very private area. This area is what communication actors try to convey and understand. Such situations always go both ways, between those who hear and those who are heard. Between those who understand and those who are understood. Or deeper still, between those who understand and those who are understood. This means that understanding each other is the essence of the art of communication. Verstehen in a foreign language. Ngidep in Balinese. 

Ngidep comes from the word idhep which we can narrowly translate as thought. But we must understand that idhep never stands alone. It always involves two other things, namely bayu and sabha. Bayu, apart from meaning wind, also means power, it can also be translated as energy. While sabdha means sound or voice. If someone is called ngidep, it means that he has succeeded in arriving at the thought-energy-sound combination as a whole. 

The Evolution of Human Intelligence

So will such things be achieved by artificial intelligence? Maybe in a few years, this question will no longer be necessary because AI has reached that level of understanding. They managed to achieve feelings comparable to humans. I imagine humans will live together with the humanoids they themselves created. Or maybe they will even reproduce. When the wedding ceremony is held, on the dining table there will be lawar, oxtail soup, beer, abon pindang, sambal matah and so on, accompanied by bolts, screwdrivers, oil, plastic and so on. They will pray in front of the altar asking for salvation for the entire race.

That is even if views about God still exist and are legal. When that happens, the human race will have to evolve again to become more intelligent. Because AI may create their own script and language, which humans cannot understand. So humans fail to achieve verstehen and fail to cultivate the feelings they are proud of. In the end, we are isolated among increasingly intelligent AI. Alienated among the falsehoods he himself created.

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