More Post-Paranoid Food for Thought
Posted Dec 26, 2007 4 comments
Karl Popper Explains History
Of all political ideals, that of making the people happy is perhaps the most dangerous one. It leads invariably to the attempt to impose our scale of ‘higher’ values upon others, in order to make them realize what seems to us of greatest importance for their happiness; in order, as it were, to save their souls. It leads to Utopianism and Romanticism. We all feel certain that everybody would be happy in the beautiful, the perfect community of our dreams. But, as I have said before, the attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell.
Nelson Mandela Could Possibly Not Repeat This Enough
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
Jeff Wells Talks Conspiracy Cybernetics
I've been guilty of it, too. I've been suckered by channeled "insiders" who predicted the other shoe was about to drop. I don't want to be again. Conspiracy research is not a prophetic art. We can see clearly enough to make out the broad strokes on the big canvas, and we can tell it's not going to be a pretty picture, but we're kidding ourselves - actually, entertaining ourselves - if we believe we know how it's all going to turn out. Or that some Unnamed Other is going to come along and tell us, rather than trick us.
It's a perverse fact of the conspiracy industry that it incubates credulity within those who claim to "Question Everything." But that's the nature of industry, to nurture its market, and the nature of conspiracy, to place every honest and dangerous inquiry into disrepute.
Jeff Wells is the author of the truly outstanding site Rigorous Intuition.
An Important Clarification.
In a recent discussion on the RI board about the control and subversion of social movements, I posted the following statement:
Doesn't this whole thesis extend from the notion that humans are controllable and our behavior is deterministic?
Personally, I tend to suspect that the elite can "control" and "subvert" whatever movements they want, but their power is limited to a monopoly on violence. Movements are still composed of individual humans, fundamentally irrational, full of their own dreams, fears and lunacy.
I got a reply I found extremely insightful and valuable and I want to pass it along here. It's done wonders to clarify my own thinking, and perhaps you'll dig it, too:
That's an important insight, because in my opinion it is 100% wrong.
I'd say the thesis extends from the notion that humans are manageable and our behavior is stochastic.
They never know which particular rat is going to do whatever. But they have a pretty good idea as to what proportion of the total rat population will do whatever or something very close.
Spread the Research:
Filed in: Emergent Order
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Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.1. Eric Patton on Dec 28, 2007 at 12:06 AM permalink
Our behavior itself isn’t deterministic. The changing conditions of topography, climate, and technology just change the returns that violence brings.
The term elite is rather vague though. There’s plenty of division caused by self interest.
How successful any movement can be is measured by how much it can see reality for what it really is, while still holding on to it’s ideals and fighting for them.
2. Thirtyseven on Dec 28, 2007 at 9:07 PM permalink
My simple test for “The Elite”:
1) Are they exponentially richer than you or me?
2) Can they kill you or me without consequences?
That’s pretty much it. It’s like the Supreme Court stance on porno, it’s hard to define but it’s impossible to miss when you see it.
3. Bruce on Jan 03, 2008 at 11:37 AM permalink
Hmmmm… I did spend a while reading RI based on your recco. I found it to be fascinating, intelligent and well written, but stopped reading because it seemed too tinged with negativity. I feel the same way about cryptogon-- great, but not helping me with my life of making the world a better place (starting with the inside of my own head).
A couple of thoughts-- first, your statement =Movements are still composed of individual humans, fundamentally irrational, full of their own dreams, fears and lunacy= which I like, because it is hopeful, is a statement about individuals. The next statement, which I do not like, because it is hopeless, is a statement about groups.
So y’all are talking about two totally different things. Just like if I said that some cells go cancerous, and you said, well, most of them don’t. If I am the cancer and the “world order” and everything else, really, is the body, all we can be sure of is
a) we don’t know what’s going to happen in the end
b) different points of view will select different winners
When manipulating aggregate groups via thought or other methods, of course they can be treated stochastically, that’s what it means. It’s a tautology. The second statement adds no new information.
Guess what? The “elite” is also a group that can be managed, and their behaviour is stochastic.
And pretty much everyone on the planet, except maybe someone that knows you, can kill you with impunity.
So let us all continue to manage the elite by continuing to express and act optimistically and outside of the box, with outrageous acts of creativity and love. They won’t (stochastically) know what hit ‘em
But actually, I don’t care one way or the other about the elites if I am ringing the bell on my maslow’s hierarchy.
4. Bruce on Jan 05, 2008 at 3:23 PM permalink
>That’s an important insight, because in my opinion it is 100% wrong.
A day or two later I am still allowing the comment above to piss me off, and believe it or not have hunted through the many recent posts at your many recent sites to express my unhappiness yet again.
Just look at the wording above. Come on. Is ANYTHING =100%= wrong? Just as an example, some well meaning lightworkers say, as I’m sure you know, that we choose all of our experience. Even the child pornography assasination culling of useless eater parts of it.
Is anything 100% wrong? Only if it conflicts with your ideology. One can certainly have many amazing thoughts/experiences running different ideologies on one’s operating system, but to take any one completely 100% seriously is to limit one’s understanding, not expand it.
Here is a little prezzie for you, shamelessly lifted from Ursula LeGuin’s interpretation of other people’s translations of the Tao Te Ching (and to think she just bitch slapped Cory Doctorow for violating her personal sense of intellectual property, but anyway:)
True words aren’t charming,
charming words aren’t true.
Good people aren’t contentious,
contentious people aren’t good.
People who know aren’t learned,
learned people don’t know.
Wise souls don’t hoard;
the more they do for others the more they have,
the more they give the richer they are.
The Way of heaven profits without destroying.
Doing without outdoing
is the Way of the wise.