Dakryn's Batshit Theory of the Week

[Einherjar86]

In the spirit of political debate (this is a short and fairly un-researched post; just for fun mostly...):

http://borrowingfromthefuture.blogspot.com/2015/09/absolute-informational-transparency-in.html

 

[Dak]

Negatives: I don't see any qualitative difference in the political rhetoric from the non-GOP side of politics, but you seem to indicate you think there is. secondly and separately, your theme/font choice/size now is much less easily readable for some reason.

You end the post on a positive note on the potentially emancipating power of technology (and at this point, the web is going to be a part or parcel to any future tech developments), but I coincidentally just read an article that suggests the opposite - and this is without the web turning into an openly weaponized/defended turf war between nationalities:

http://www.theverge.com/2015/9/17/9338963/welcome-to-hell-apple-vs-google-vs-facebook-and-the-slow-death-of-the-web

 

[Einherjar86]

Ah, I used Garamond instead of TNR, didn't even think about it showing up worse online. I like the way it looks in Word.

I do suggest there's a difference between GOP rhetoric and non-GOP rhetoric, you're right. I'm biased. I find GOP rhetoric on the verge of intolerable probably 85% of the time. I can tolerate liberal rhetoric even if it makes its fair share of equivocations and prevarications. It's just a matter of values. I wasn't interested in making a full-fledged critique of political speech in general. I really don't like conservatism, so that's what I'm saying.

I'm fully aware of the potentially exclusionary and restrictive power of technological development. This is something Luhmann speaks to, even if he isn't explicit about it - his general theory has to do with how individuals are secondary to the processes of large-scale systematic change.

I just figured I'd end with a self-proclaimed Marxist (Benjamin) who decided to go against the dominant grain in Marxism at the time, which was to bemoan industrial/technological growth as an alienating and disabling force. Instead, Benjamin argued that there was a revolutionary potential in new media forms in a long essay titled "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproducibility." Rather than call doom, I decided to lean the other way.

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

Garamond looks like shit on the web, though it's beautiful in print (Garamond Premier Pro is one of my favorite physical typesetting fonts of all time). Yeah, switch back to TNR when you get a chance.

Signed,
Your local graphic designer

 

[zabu of nΩd]

Great read, Pat. I like how you conclude by describing media as a technological force capable of democratizing the "means of production" and running a course independent of political control.

My optimism for a more democratic political environment is still mainly contingent upon economic outcomes, though, so that optimism tends to lie outside the US. The US seems to embody the "heart and soul" of capitalism, and as long as that's the case, I expect the motive of economic progress to take precedence over democratic motives here.

Also, despite being a liberal I'll throw a bone to conservatives by saying I like their emphasis on the principle of small government, even if they don't put that principle to practice very well. I think the size of the federal government is an important issue, and undervalued by liberals.

Sorry I haven't finished your other blog post, I've been contemplating a lot of random stuff lately and have to be careful about throwing more fuel on that fire lest my productivity at work collapse.

 

[Dak]

@Pat:OK I'll bite: What or where is there a qualitatively differential in presidential candidates right now between R/D?

 

[Einherjar86]

Great read, Pat. I like how you conclude by describing media as a technological force capable of democratizing the "means of production" and running a course independent of political control.

My optimism for a more democratic political environment is still mainly contingent upon economic outcomes, though, so that optimism tends to lie outside the US. The US seems to embody the "heart and soul" of capitalism, and as long as that's the case, I expect the motive of economic progress to take precedence over democratic motives here.

Also, despite being a liberal I'll throw a bone to conservatives by saying I like their emphasis on the principle of small government, even if they don't put that principle to practice very well. I think the size of the federal government is an important issue, and undervalued by liberals.

Sorry I haven't finished your other blog post, I've been contemplating a lot of random stuff lately and have to be careful about throwing more fuel on that fire lest my productivity at work collapse.

Thanks Grant! No worries at all, that last post was long and I'm just happy you found it interesting in the first place.

I take your point on economic concerns over democratic ones; but I also think that capitalism is a finicky term and contains contradictions, so that capitalist development may result in the tools for a potentially democratized community. Technology and industry are inextricable from capitalism, and these have arisen because of capitalism despite its tendency to restrict the democratization of information.

Deleuze and Guattari have written on this complication in their work, especially in Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, in which they identify a contradiction at the core of capitalist development between what they call "deterritorialization" and "reterritorialization." They argue that capitalism (in its general, historically modern form) serves a deterritorializing function, as evidenced by its dismantling of feudal hierarchies and older forms of social order, as well as its continuing efforts to break borders and transgress limits; but it is also a reterritorializing force, meaning that it also wants to delimit and compartmentalize, specifically through privatization. This would be the politico-economic aspect of capitalism, and is more specifically tied to an ideology of individualism.

Basically, for D&G, capitalism tends toward schizophrenia but tries to ward off schizophrenia. They claim that the eventual breakdown will come from within, and the insinuation is that it will emerge via communications technology (new media and cybernetics).

@Pat:OK I'll bite: What or where is there a qualitatively differential in presidential candidates right now between R/D?

I'm not really sure I entirely know what you mean by "qualitatively," or that I ever insinuated there is a "qualitative" difference between the left and right. I said it's a matter of values. The left supports continued funding of Planned Parenthood, with which I agree; the right generally does not. The left tends to put pressure on gun laws; the right practically fellates the gun lobbyists. The left doesn't place as much emphasis on religious freedom; the right consistently appeals to and incorrectly defines religious freedom.

I just get frustrated with conservative strategies and values. I don't agree with them.

 

[Dak]

I'm not really sure I entirely know what you mean by "qualitatively," or that I ever insinuated there is a "qualitative" difference between the left and right. I said it's a matter of values. The left supports continued funding of Planned Parenthood, with which I agree; the right generally does not. The left tends to put pressure on gun laws; the right practically fellates the gun lobbyists. The left doesn't place as much emphasis on religious freedom; the right consistently appeals to and incorrectly defines religious freedom.

I just get frustrated with conservative strategies and values. I don't agree with them.

I mean that it's all basically the same thing. Pandering to a base promising mostly things they won't do and a couple they will halfway do at best. These things basically revolve around more money in the constituent's pockets (either handouts or lower taxes) and punishing the Other (Iran et al or "rich people").

I don't understand what it is about guns that has you seeing the issue crosseyed.

Conservative strategies do frustrate me as well, because they are goddamn inept most of the time. I wouldn't care except that certain values that the GOP purports to hold intersect with my own. Fortunately, gun control has been one issue where they have not been inept.

 

[Einherjar86]

I mean that it's all basically the same thing. Pandering to a base promising mostly things they won't do and a couple they will halfway do at best. These things basically revolve around more money in the constituent's pockets (either handouts or lower taxes) and punishing the Other (Iran et al or "rich people").

Where did I mention results? I'm talking about rhetoric. I said that liberal rhetoric doesn't bother me because it aligns with my own values. I never said I thought they could make affirmative changes. In fact, I mention (I think in the first paragraph) that one response to all of this is to bemoan the futility of "the system." And even if they don't accomplish what they propose to, why should that convince me to disagree with them if the other camp promotes values that I definitely do not want to see acted upon? I can agree with the sentiment even while acknowledging the probable futility of action.

My contention is that bemoaning the system has become a cliche and boring thing to say. Sure, it's unlikely that the elected party will actually accomplish half of what it sets out to. Why is it news to keep reminding everyone of this? The comment itself is stale, even if it's correct. This is what I mean by a sense that there is "nothing left to say." Criticizing politics has actually become annoying and nauseatingly pointless, which is a fascinating result when you think about it.

I don't understand what it is about guns that has you seeing the issue crosseyed.

I don't understand what you mean, especially in light of this:

Conservative strategies do frustrate me as well, because they are goddamn inept most of the time. I wouldn't care except that certain values that the GOP purports to hold intersect with my own. Fortunately, gun control has been one issue where they have not been inept.

You fall in line with conservative rhetoric here because you don't think there should be regulations on gun ownership or the selling and purchasing of guns (or, there should be minimal regulation, maybe). You fall in line because you perceive this to be correct in a certain functional (maybe even ethical) sense. I don't agree, so the rhetoric looks (to me) more like skulduggery. This happens to be how I feel about most conservative rhetoric. I'm not sure how any of this is "cross-eyed."

 

[Dak]

Criticizing politics has actually become annoying and nauseatingly pointless, which is a fascinating result when you think about it.

Well I can agree with this. Oversaturation - and yet no change is affected. One has to wonder if this was be design or just happened.

You fall in line with conservative rhetoric here because you don't think there should be regulations on gun ownership or the selling and purchasing of guns (or, there should be minimal regulation, maybe). You fall in line because you perceive this to be correct in a certain functional (maybe even ethical) sense. I don't agree, so the rhetoric looks (to me) more like skulduggery. This happens to be how I feel about most conservative rhetoric. I'm not sure how any of this is "cross-eyed."

Well in theory I don't have a problem with some minimum regulation. Basic criminal background check and age restrictions, which already exist. But it doesn't/hasn't appeared that those restrictions accomplish all that much - but they don't seem to cause too much harm either other than more bureaucratic bloat.

But obviously those regulations aren't enough for the Brady Campaign and all its satellites. The demand for any further gun control, or even more myopically, the focus on particular types of guns (or worse, magazine capacity), is purely - and I do mean purely - irrational. I've read the stuff challenging the works of guys like John Lott, and even if you give the challengers the benefit of the doubt, all that emerges is a fuzziness from the clarity, which is hardly worthy of the "anti-gun-nut" rhetoric. All the "If only there were no guns, my child would still be here" is too ignorant to be skullduggery or I would charge it as such in return.

 

[Baroque]

I watched part of the republican debate and it honestly felt like one big clown show. A parody of an actual political debate. There was smack talking, personal jabs and jokes, and very little actual substance. I feel like this is all just rigged to get a democrat elected. Maybe we've moved from a two party system to a one party system which is even worse. Like we have the guise of a two party system but one is always royally screwed up on purpose so we're led to favor one candidate..

 

[Dak]

It has been suggested that the current Republican strategy is to control Congress and state legislatures and leave a Democrat in the WH as a relatively powerless scapegoat.

 

[Einherjar86]

But obviously those regulations aren't enough for the Brady Campaign and all its satellites. The demand for any further gun control, or even more myopically, the focus on particular types of guns (or worse, magazine capacity), is purely - and I do mean purely - irrational. I've read the stuff challenging the works of guys like John Lott, and even if you give the challengers the benefit of the doubt, all that emerges is a fuzziness from the clarity, which is hardly worthy of the "anti-gun-nut" rhetoric. All the "If only there were no guns, my child would still be here" is too ignorant to be skullduggery or I would charge it as such in return.

Actually, the logic of the sentiment is sound, even if the statement itself is contextually and pragmatically pointless: "My child was killed by a gun; had there been no guns, he/she wouldn't have been killed by one."

I'm a firm believer that an increase in the number of guns will result in more gun-related incidents. Notice I don't say "crimes," because I believe that plenty of those incidents would claim self-defense; but this raises as many problems as it purports to solve because then it becomes a matter of trying to delineate between offensive acts and defensive ones. The knowledge that there are more guns will not necessarily dissuade people from behaving criminally; it could be argued that it would have the opposite effect by encouraging people to simply act more swiftly than their potential aggressors (i.e. "I'm positive he was going to attack me, so I shot him.").

In my opinion, the fewer guns in circulation, the fewer gun-related incidents. Of course, we have the problem that there are lots of guns in circulation, and unregistered firearms cannot be accounted for. This is an issue, and ignoring it is inexcusable. That doesn't mean that I think injecting more firearms into circulation is a solution - but then, that isn't what all conservatives insist upon, although some do.

And as far as ignorance goes, the right has it's fair share of equally ignorant positions. I'm currently very frustrated by the whole "religious freedom" stance in opposition to gay marriage. This borders on intolerable for me.

 

[Dak]

Actually, the logic of the sentiment is sound, even if the statement itself is contextually and pragmatically pointless: "My child was killed by a gun; had there been no guns, he/she wouldn't have been killed by one."

Phrased explicitly like that sure. But as you noted, it lacks any context. But even this phrasing is problematic in ways I am assuming you didn't consider based on this:

I'm a firm believer that an increase in the number of guns will result in more gun-related incidents. Notice I don't say "crimes," because I believe that plenty of those incidents would claim self-defense; but this raises as many problems as it purports to solve because then it becomes a matter of trying to delineate between offensive acts and defensive ones.

In my opinion, the fewer guns in circulation, the fewer gun-related incidents.

Why are gun incidents, gun crimes, gun-whatever more concerning than any other sort of potentially bad whatevers? This is really what I am getting at. If someone wildly acts out and kills people with pretty much anything other than a gun, the object or tool used gets little more than a mention (ok, AXE MURDERER gets a little more). But if it's a gun, the actor takes a backseat to the 3 ring circus around the weapon. There's no legitimate excuse for the circus, and no I don't consider defense against Brady et al to be "equally responsible".

The knowledge that there are more guns will not necessarily dissuade people from behaving criminally; it could be argued that it would have the opposite effect by encouraging people to simply act more swiftly than their potential aggressors (i.e. "I'm positive he was going to attack me, so I shot him.").

More guns will not necessarily dissuade criminal acts, but the lack of them definitely won't. What you are referring to here is the commonly referenced "Wild West" rhetoric that has been trotted out every time open carry is expanded in a new state or municipality, and so far this has not been an issue. There have been some isolated cases of "questionable preemptive action" or whatever you want to call that, but hardly a national emergency.

Of course, we have the problem that there are lots of guns in circulation, and unregistered firearms cannot be accounted for. This is an issue, and ignoring it is inexcusable. That doesn't mean that I think injecting more firearms into circulation is a solution - but then, that isn't what all conservatives insist upon, although some do.

It is a little over the top to think throwing guns at a problem will fix it, but in terms of rhetorical excess, I understand the reflex in light of the previously mentioned 3 ring circus. I don't see why "unregistered firearms" are such an emergency, especially since it is a synonym of the discredited "gunshow loophole".

And as far as ignorance goes, the right has it's fair share of equally ignorant positions. I'm currently very frustrated by the whole "religious freedom" stance in opposition to gay marriage. This borders on intolerable for me.

Yeah, I support the right of private business and individuals to be discriminatory in the sorts of relations they choose to have with other businesses and individuals. However, as a functionary of the legal system, one can either go along with the legal system or resign. If Davis feels that strongly about gay marriage, she should have resigned, very publicly even if she wished. She doesn't have the authority to write or counterinterpret the law. The bakers were screwed over, Davis is just being a ****.



On the schizophrenia of Capitalism, saw this today:

 

[zabu of nΩd]

Thanks Grant! No worries at all, that last post was long and I'm just happy you found it interesting in the first place.

I take your point on economic concerns over democratic ones; but I also think that capitalism is a finicky term and contains contradictions, so that capitalist development may result in the tools for a potentially democratized community. Technology and industry are inextricable from capitalism, and these have arisen because of capitalism despite its tendency to restrict the democratization of information.

Deleuze and Guattari have written on this complication in their work, especially in Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, in which they identify a contradiction at the core of capitalist development between what they call "deterritorialization" and "reterritorialization." They argue that capitalism (in its general, historically modern form) serves a deterritorializing function, as evidenced by its dismantling of feudal hierarchies and older forms of social order, as well as its continuing efforts to break borders and transgress limits; but it is also a reterritorializing force, meaning that it also wants to delimit and compartmentalize, specifically through privatization. This would be the politico-economic aspect of capitalism, and is more specifically tied to an ideology of individualism.

Basically, for D&G, capitalism tends toward schizophrenia but tries to ward off schizophrenia. They claim that the eventual breakdown will come from within, and the insinuation is that it will emerge via communications technology (new media and cybernetics).

I agree with that assessment of capitalism, though I think there's evidence that the deterritorializing effect on national borders remains somewhat limited. The European Union's increasing regulation of Google is the most recent example that comes to mind, and I'd also point to other features of certain European countries (i.e. higher taxes on the wealthy, shorter work weeks, better public school performance, stronger press freedom, and restrictions on campaign ads) as evidence that there are democratizing forces at work in some parts of the world independent of the democratizing (or de-democratizing) forces of capitalism.

At any rate, I did not mean to speak in contradictions by calling the US the "heart and soul" of capitalism. It's just that I see economic priorities as exceptionally high on the US national agenda.

 

[Einherjar86]

Well said. I'll have to read more about this, rather than the purely theoretical stuff.

Came across this tonight, really awesome piece:

http://aeon.co/magazine/science/the-universal-constants-that-drive-physicists-mad/

But some constants involve no dimensions at all. These are so-called dimensionless constants – pure numbers, such as the ratio of the proton mass to the electron mass. That is simply the number 1836.2 (which is thought to be a little peculiar because we do not know why it is so large). According to the physicist Michael Duff of Imperial College London, only the dimensionless constants are really ‘fundamental’, because they are independent of any system of measurement. Dimensional constants, on the other hand, ‘are merely human constructs whose number and values differ from one choice of units to the next’.

Perhaps the most intriguing of the dimensionless constants is the fine-structure constant α. It was first determined in 1916, when quantum theory was combined with relativity to account for details or ‘fine structure’ in the atomic spectrum of hydrogen. In the theory, α is the speed of the electron orbiting the hydrogen nucleus divided by c. It has the value 0.0072973525698, or almost exactly 1/137.

Today, within quantum electrodynamics (the theory of how light and matter interact), α defines the strength of the electromagnetic force on an electron. This gives it a huge role. Along with gravity and the strong and weak nuclear forces, electromagnetism defines how the Universe works. But no one has yet explained the value 1/137, a number with no obvious antecedents or meaningful links. The Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman wrote that α has been ‘a mystery ever since it was discovered… a magic number that comes to us with no understanding by man. You might say the “hand of God” wrote that number, and “we don’t know how He pushed his pencil”.’

 

[Dak]

Interesting piece. Was there some specific related topic you had in mind to apply this to?

On a different note, read this in the reactionary blogosphere on why both the "right" and "left" believe things are moving against them:

He [the leftist] ignores the fact that actual public policy is increasingly left because he’s only looking at outcomes and he’s not getting the outcomes he thinks should happen.

 

[Einherjar86]

Interesting piece. Was there some specific related topic you had in mind to apply this to?

No, just thought it was worth posting. I consider this thread to be more of a philosophical/theoretical materials depository (along with abstract political discussion).

On a different note, read this in the reactionary blogosphere on why both the "right" and "left" believe things are moving against them:

This seems to suggest that things have moved measurably "left," and so attempts to describe why the leftists still pretend to underdog status. Didn't see anything about why the right feels things are moving against them... or is he suggesting that the right is accurate in perceiving things moving against them?

Additionally, I'm skeptical of any accurate qualitative measurement of society moving either left or right, even in comparison to fifty years ago. As new issues become politically relevant I think this distorts the spectrum, and makes it really difficult to tell whether the country or the political sphere is moving either left or right.

 

[Dak]

If you're a traditional "family oriented, small government" conservative, it's pretty obvious things haven't gone your way in a long time.

 

[Einherjar86]

That assumes a generally accepted measurement of government that has remained static over a long period of time, and that our government has increasingly departed from. The ideology of "small government" is a very new idea, going back probably only to the '80s or so, and it doesn't reflect any agreed-upon standard of government size. There were no "family oriented, small government" conservatives in the late nineteenth century. In fact, most conservatives believed in central government until Ronald Reagan came along and a new brand of conservatism composed itself along with him.

In other words, many of the "family oriented, small government" people today only hold those beliefs because of a rapidly growing ideology within right-wing conservative politics that has championed small government. The irony is that, according to the corporate liberalist theory, strong centralized regulations on business may have originated with entrepreneurs and businesspeople in the early twentieth century.

The current ideology of "family oriented, small government" is very much a construct of recent political trends, not a longstanding resistance to increasingly expanding government.