A Skeuomorph is a material metaphor. It's a term which has devolved from the Ologies: Archaeology, Anthropology, Sociology, Psychology - as well as from Communications Theory thru McLuhan. Skeuomorph derives from two Greek words which mean 'vessel' and 'shape.' According to the devil worshippers at Wikipedia, the word is a "history of design" term and "refers to a derivative object which retains now useless design elements which were necessarily present in the original." Necessary elements are by nature Functional - they are systemic and help make things happen. McLuhan pointed out that when one medium replaces another medium the parts of the old medium go thru a kind of Apotheosis - they become lifted from their primary function and exhalted to the merely Decorative - they are literally "kicked up stairs." Notice how I had to use a metaphor to realize the abstraction. So in the Photo-Visual-Electronic medium of the Postmodern, Print has abstracted, lost its function of being the primary information bearer in the transformation process which leads to meaning and now celebrates itself - a Skeuomorph - while the Emotional and unmediated Image becomes alpha male and attaches itself to the message. How do you say in Logico-Deductive that the Rose and the Skull do not arise from each other - they are each other? Huh?

While the Captain made his ascent and prepped the cordage for the complicated trick of lifting a weight higher than the connecting point of the Drop, the Ground Crew finished bolting the two halves of the Rose together and reattaching the monkey. Fuckin' Monkey. Then everyone held their breaths while we block and tackled the Rose up to the Captain hovering above. That's the Captain's Son on the line while Slag, Bruno, and Iwojima right the Rose for its installation above the Nave in the Cathedral Our Lady of the Ligne.

Metal tableware became the optimal before the age of mass-production. Metal tableware had rivets, which enjoyed a systemic function: to keep the parts of the vessels together. When quickly produced ceramics replaced the Metal tableware often the old rivets were modeled in the clay - now no longer functional, there being no separate parts to hold together in the pottery renditions - but now turned decorative. Kind of easing the transition by including the old and the familiar but the no longer necessary elements of the originals.

The Original Stonehenge was Woodhenge and the Stone Trilithons which now grace the Salisbury Plains have replaced the first uprights which had been made from timber, from wood. Those had been connected thru the woodworking functions of Mortice and Tenon Joints. When Woodhenge was Exhalted into Stonehenge they kept the features of Mortice and Tenon but without the now unnecessary function. They're just decorative. Skeuomorphs. If you're wearing Jeans reach down and hook your thumb into your watch pocket on the right side. What's that for? Human Toenails are Skeuomorphs too.

Then there's QWERTY and Gutenburg

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