People

[goDel]

Perhaps it helps to understand Baudrillard better as some criticaster on the system of, for instance politics. Politics ( or society for that matter) makes decisions based on discussions about " some reality". While its decisions has real implications on the real reality, the funny thing is there's always a discrepancy between that real reality and the "some reality" which was used to come to the decision. Baudrillard delves into this discrepancy. Why it's there. How it evolves. Refers to the effects of technologies. What its consequences are. And where he sees developments going ( given the technological developments).

 

He's a bit more practical, ironically, than the brain-in-a-bottle discussions regarding the matrix.

 

At least, thats my take on it.

[goDel]

And before I forget, Baudrillard obviously also warns against this "some reality" taking over actual reality.

[doorjamb]

Well, not to totally sidetrack the thread, my understanding is that for Baudrillard, "reality" is natural actuality as opposed to actualities of artificial origin. His point is that the natural world & its component systems/structures have little to do with the modern individual's experience, since we today exist and interact purely in the latter artificial spheres. For example, one generally goes to work/school regardless of weather conditions; the visceral reality of weather is mostly irrelevant to our central concerns, which are increasingly artificial (money is the best example). And artificial systems grow and serve, themselves, as bedrock for other artificial systems; the layers of abstraction pile up, and the natural becomes increasingly obsolete for the purposes of the modern individual. Despite being a soft, wet, living thing on a rock orbiting a star, my own perceptual experience is mostly defined by things like traffic, political/economic conditions, and other things only tangentially (if at all) linked to the core actuality of my existence.

I will also point out that, though we are of course unable to literally create (or destroy) matter/energy, imagination & inference, invention & synthesis are human specialties. We excel at assembling/rearranging materials to produce results greater in significant ways than the sum of their parts. This ability, this tendency, is I think likely what will save us from simply embracing meaninglessness & frivolous waste indefinitely. Ultimately, believe it or not, even the seemingly infinite pleasures of inanity (like net humor) lose their novelty, and the mind finds itself craving more authentic spheres of reality in which to experiment & explore. That being said, the human experience does still seem irreconcilably absurd, and humor is our most powerful tool for expressing and enduring this universal truth, so absurdist/inane humor isn't likely to fall out of style any time soon. [/philosoraptor]

[SR4]

Well, not to totally sidetrack the thread, my understanding is that for Baudrillard, "reality" is natural actuality as opposed to actualities of artificial origin. His point is that the natural world & its component systems/structures have little to do with the modern individual's experience, since we today exist and interact purely in the latter artificial spheres. For example, one generally goes to work/school regardless of weather conditions; the visceral reality of weather is mostly irrelevant to our central concerns, which are increasingly artificial (money is the best example). And artificial systems grow and serve, themselves, as bedrock for other artificial systems; the layers of abstraction pile up, and the natural becomes increasingly obsolete for the purposes of the modern individual. Despite being a soft, wet, living thing on a rock orbiting a star, my own perceptual experience is mostly defined by things like traffic, political/economic conditions, and other things only tangentially (if at all) linked to the core actuality of my existence.

 

I will also point out that, though we are of course unable to literally create (or destroy) matter/energy, imagination & inference, invention & synthesis are human specialties. We excel at assembling/rearranging materials to produce results greater in significant ways than the sum of their parts. This ability, this tendency, is I think likely what will save us from simply embracing meaninglessness & frivolous waste indefinitely. Ultimately, believe it or not, even the seemingly infinite pleasures of inanity (like net humor) lose their novelty, and the mind finds itself craving more authentic spheres of reality in which to experiment & explore. That being said, the human experience does still seem irreconcilably absurd, and humor is our most powerful tool for expressing and enduring this universal truth, so absurdist/inane humor isn't likely to fall out of style any time soon. [/philosoraptor]

 

 

yes!

[chenGOD]

We're at crossroads. Despite a vast accessibility to knowledge and information, and the immediate archiving of all of it, cultural hegemony (I mean these broadly, not the marxist term necessarily) is stronger than ever. *(Most) people, including intelligent individuals, are currently talking about Yeezus instead of the NSA leaks. I have not read it yet, but I was very much struck by the arguments made by Lanier in You_Are_Not_a_Gadget.

 

 

 

In his book You Are Not a Gadget (2010), Lanier criticizes what he perceives as the hive mind of Web 2.0 (wisdom of the crowd) and describes the open source and open content expropriation of intellectual production as a form of "Digital Maoism".^[14] Lanier argues that Web 2.0 developments have retarded progress and innovation and glorified the collective at the expense of the individual. He criticizes Wikipedia and Linux as examples of this problem; Wikipedia for what he sees as: its "mob rule" by anonymous editors, the weakness of its non-scientific content, and its bullying of experts. Lanier also argues that there are limitations to certain aspects of the open source and content movement in that they lack the ability to create anything truly new and innovative. For example, Lanier argues that the open source movement didn't create the iPhone. In another example, Lanier claims that Web 2.0 makes search engines lazy, destroys the potential of innovative websites like Thinkquest, and hampers the communication of ideas like mathematics to a wider audience. Lanier further argues that the open source approach has destroyed opportunities for the middle class to finance content creation, and results in the concentration of wealth in a few individuals—"the lords of the clouds"—people who, more by virtue of luck rather than true innovation, manage to insert themselves as content concentrators at strategic times and locations in the cloud.

I just had to comment on this: Perhaps open source didn't explicitly create the iPhone, but iOS is derived from OS X which is derived from an open source OS. The iPhone is not the first smartphone, so to claim it is some miraculous "new and innovative" product is quite the stretch. Perhaps if Thinkquest was run by an open source collaboration, it would still be in existence, as opposed to being shut down by Oracle. And anyways there are a raft of open source choices for educators to use now.

As for the cloud "destroying opportunities for the middle class to finance content creation" (cause that's what always happened in the past, right? content was never controlled by corporations), one need look no further than kickstarter to see how inaccurate that statement is.

Does open source have limitations? Of course it does. But relying on closed, corporate sources offers far more limitations, in my opinion, especially if they are concerned with profit.

And yeah sure some people are lucky with their timing, but those people are rarely able to stay long in the business world.

Finally, to conflate the "cloud" with "open source" is a gross inaccuracy.

[MadameChaos]

"I fucking love keyboard cat me" - Ferdinand de Saussure

 

[DerWaschbar]

lol 'banal'.

[Uniret]

Posting in a metaartificial thread

[MisterE]

all i know, is that everything sr4 said in this and every other thread, is wrong. but hes my brother so i have to love the guy. only person who manages to be wronger is godel.

[joshuatxuk]

 

 

@Adam: Finally, someone tells it like it is!

 

But with the internet, as with any large-scale communication, ultimately the closed-minded and uninformed people are the ones who make themselves the most vocal, because people who've accumulated a bit of wisdom and common sense are more likely to think before they speak and be willing to hold off on engaging in a conversation about a complex topic that requires a bit of prior research. This is why so many online conversations about politics devolve into a troll-fest, because it's easier for someone to bounce in and say 'OMG OBRAMA IS AN COMMUNIST!!11' than to take the time to research the area and recognise that many of these topics are highly complex and nuanced, with many shades of grey. On the internet, there's equal access for the person who's spent years working on a PhD on political economy, and the person who thinks Zionist conspiracies are totally fo' reals. Of course this access is a good thing, but it does mean that a great deal of internet culture is throwaway and ill-thought out.

 

tl;dr LOLOL 10,000 LIKES TO CURE CANCER!, etc

Yup. I'm ashamed to say this, but I also rush any type before putting enough thought into it on way too many occasions.

 

 

I think everyone does, but on the other hand not every post can be a masterpiece of poststructuralist empirical dialogue. Plus, it's an enormous pain in the arse to type a measured, considerate response, which is why the really in-depth debate goes on in books and academic journals and stuff. I'd say there is plenty of creative and original thought on the interwebz, but you have to be willing to seek it out. In the same way that you're unlikely to find any hardcore investigative journalism in, say, the Daily Mail, you're probably not going to find a mature debate on political shenanigans in the Youtube comments section. Maybe one day I'll find a gem of philosophical thought in the comments of a Taylor Swift video, but I doubt it.

 

 

I lurk at Reddit often, it's about as close to a democratic and worthwhile discussion model but it'll never be perfect. I briefly started commenting myself but quickly gave up, because I was pulling hair from this thread: http://www.reddit.com/r/dubstep/comments/nyzl8/bassnectar_explains_dubstep_in_under_3_minutes_my/

 

It was just a clusterfuck. Quora seems cool but again, my own personal apathy (apathy trumps all huh?) has preventing me from going there in awhile, but I feel that's a promising model, aiming to bring a true "expert" oriented collaboration when it comes to providing answers - in other words, the anti-Yahoo Answers.

 

Misinformation has been a perpetual aspect of human history and society - even when you take away particularly heinous things like hostile nationalism, propaganda, and historical revisionism we had things like urban legends and widely-accepted and disseminated misconceptions before the internet. Now such things often emerge and are quickly disproved and clarified in hours or days, but not before the damage is done. That's where the apathy and absurdity comes in - the harmless form is that of memes, the dangerous form is when it decides things like elections. It's often inconsistent and random how much it can affect those involved too.

 

 

We're at crossroads. Despite a vast accessibility to knowledge and information, and the immediate archiving of all of it, cultural hegemony (I mean these broadly, not the marxist term necessarily) is stronger than ever. *(Most) people, including intelligent individuals, are currently talking about Yeezus instead of the NSA leaks. I have not read it yet, but I was very much struck by the arguments made by Lanier in You_Are_Not_a_Gadget.

 

 

 

In his book You Are Not a Gadget (2010), Lanier criticizes what he perceives as the hive mind of Web 2.0 (wisdom of the crowd) and describes the open source and open content expropriation of intellectual production as a form of "Digital Maoism".^[14] Lanier argues that Web 2.0 developments have retarded progress and innovation and glorified the collective at the expense of the individual. He criticizes Wikipedia and Linux as examples of this problem; Wikipedia for what he sees as: its "mob rule" by anonymous editors, the weakness of its non-scientific content, and its bullying of experts. Lanier also argues that there are limitations to certain aspects of the open source and content movement in that they lack the ability to create anything truly new and innovative. For example, Lanier argues that the open source movement didn't create the iPhone. In another example, Lanier claims that Web 2.0 makes search engines lazy, destroys the potential of innovative websites like Thinkquest, and hampers the communication of ideas like mathematics to a wider audience. Lanier further argues that the open source approach has destroyed opportunities for the middle class to finance content creation, and results in the concentration of wealth in a few individuals—"the lords of the clouds"—people who, more by virtue of luck rather than true innovation, manage to insert themselves as content concentrators at strategic times and locations in the cloud.

I just had to comment on this: Perhaps open source didn't explicitly create the iPhone, but iOS is derived from OS X which is derived from an open source OS. The iPhone is not the first smartphone, so to claim it is some miraculous "new and innovative" product is quite the stretch. Perhaps if Thinkquest was run by an open source collaboration, it would still be in existence, as opposed to being shut down by Oracle. And anyways there are a raft of open source choices for educators to use now.

As for the cloud "destroying opportunities for the middle class to finance content creation" (cause that's what always happened in the past, right? content was never controlled by corporations), one need look no further than kickstarter to see how inaccurate that statement is.

Does open source have limitations? Of course it does. But relying on closed, corporate sources offers far more limitations, in my opinion, especially if they are concerned with profit.

And yeah sure some people are lucky with their timing, but those people are rarely able to stay long in the business world.

Finally, to conflate the "cloud" with "open source" is a gross inaccuracy.

 

 

Good reply. I was struck by Lanier's arguments (especially in my own observations of false knowledge and misinformation becoming widely accepted and shared online) and not so much convinced by them completely, especially in those specific examples - appreciate these clarifications and retorts. When I think of Thinkquest's demise I think of how successful Khan Academy has become.

 

I am also optimistic that despite the gall of many people and the utter mess of apathy, irony, meta discussion, trolling, and every other and superficial and bullshit trend on the internet, ultimately they are called out. Truth and sincerity prevails, even if quietly. Reasonable and logical and thoughtful people flourish on in their own communities, regardless of the lack of influence they have.

 

Kickstarter is a perfect example - there have been some blatant abuses of the site, the dubious fundraising of Deakin (Animal Collective member who used money to tour but has not delivered promised rewards to donors) and the debate over Amanda Palmer's fundraising, small film project being revealed as a plagiarized work. There's post-Veronica Mars Zach Braff effort (lampooned here brilliantly), which is my opinion (and many others) begs the question of what kickstarter should be used for. He has every right to do so, but he should also be called out for it, and it's frustrating that he succeeded (on the other end, 90s tv star Melissa Joan Hart came no where near her $2 million goal). Apathy seems to be working toward preventing other rich and/or successful people from unfairly taking advantage of kickstarter, a band called Eisley is only halfway or so to their 100k goal and this "musical" duo that includes one of the actresses from Girls became a joke almost immediately. So unlike Lanier, I feel crowd-funding, and crowd-souring as a whole, is a double-edged sword.

[cruising for burgers]

shit's got electrolytes!!!!