Steve Smith wrote at 01/15/2013 05:43 PM: >> a fatally wrong assumption underneath: that "we" can be distinguished >> from "technology". I'm pretty sure we've covered this ground as well. >> I can sum it up with the aphorism: >> >> "The problem with communication is the illusion that it exists." > > My turn to be puzzled. Is this a non-sequitur?
Well, _I_ don't think so. But many others have accused me of committing non sequiturs on a regular basis. That's the trouble with thoughts (including logic), you could rightly accuse me of the fallacy if the progression in your own head is missing some pieces. But that does not mean the progression in my head is missing any pieces. In the end, it all boils down to the axiom of choice (the discretization of concepts). In any case, my point is that communication is supposed to occur by the reification of the thoughts of the sender into a medium and the reconstruction of those same (or similar _enough_) thoughts inside the receiver. The reification into the medium is _invention_, specifically the creation of a tool. But I'm arguing that an inventor's tools are merely abused if used by another who is dissimilar enough. The conclusion is that communication between dissimilar people does not exist. The application is that guns and 3D printers are natural to some and unnatural to others. [*] > I do agree that since Homo Habilis (or even earlier) that our phenotype > has been extended by the technology which we have developed and/or > mastered. We can only separate ourselves from our technology in that we > *can* choose what technology we pursue development of and what > technology we adopt once developed. We can choose it for ourselves, but > I contend, not for each other (the crux of gun control). I try to be empathetic when I read e-mails. But I am driven to point out that the way you use that language picks at me. You say "our phenotype has been extended by the technology". But I mean "we are our technology". I.e. technology is as much a part of us as, say, eyeballs or arms. > I don't follow this entirely, but I do agree with the gist of it. While > I may sound like a Luddite of the highest order, I'm not. I'm merely > caught in what I perceive to be a paradox which I think effects us all > once we consider it. Perhaps a more formal statement of the paradox would help? > This is precisely what I'm trying to illuminate: > > 1. To make and use tools is irreversibly our nature. Agreed. > 2. Our tools and toolmaking is on the verge of facilitating our > self-extinction. I disagree. I would agree to a softer, more neutral statement, though ... something like this: Our tools and toolmaking can and do participate in both positive and negative feedback loops that inhibit and facilitate our survival. > 3. We have choices in *how* we extend our phenotype but no methodology for That seems unfinished. Perhaps you mean "...for choosing"? I think I disagree to some extent, as I'll address below. > The last century has shown a quantitative and perhaps qualitative (with > the introduction of stored code/data computing machinery) acceleration > in our toolmaking. Our "tools" for addressing items 2 and 3 above are > fairly limited. They appear to be combinations of religious zealotry > and corruption fueled lobbying and lawmaking. I definitely disagree with this. I don't see any acceleration. (I don't buy the "singularity" or "Abundance" rhetoric either.) What I do see is an accelerating _awareness_ of the effects of our infestation of the earth. Our toolmaking should (and I think does, though I have no serious evidence) track tightly with our biological evolution. So, if there is an acceleration, we should see a correlate in the acceleration of our biological evolution. A more likely speculation is that, as we increase in population density, it becomes more and more (combinatorally) obvious what effect any one of us (mostly others, but ourselves for the more reflective amongst us) has on their environment. E.g. the fact that my neighbors' houses are so damned close to my house makes me very aware of when they use their leaf blower. The acceleration in toolmaking you perceive is really caused by collective behavior, an order or more beyond the making of tools. In other words, these collectively produced artifacts are not tools (by my definition) because they don't really serve any pass-through purpose. In many cases, they have become ends in themselves. This can be considered a pathology. E.g. A CEO whose objective is simply to _grow_ a company. If that's the case, the company (a human created artifact) is no longer a tool. It's now an end in and of itself, at least to that CEO. But it might also be considered healthy in some circumstances. In any case, I don't see an increase in our toolmaking so much as an increase in our awareness of the impacts of our toolmaking. > Ultimately, what technology we develop and use is a personal choice, > even if we want to dictate or legislate it for others, the nature of > technology is no longer easy to control and in many cases, the > *individual* is becoming capable of developing and executing amazing > technological feats without the aid (permission) of society at large. As I said after #3 above, I disagree somewhat. The extent to which we have a choice in our toolmaking is debatable. I think Nick's been the champion of evidence showing that our feelings are are really the after effects of our behavior. Analogously, we can the same way about free will and the choices we actually have or don't have. To what extent do we really have a choice in which tools we develop? [*] The problems come when we have unrealistic impressions of ourselves. Most of the yahoos I met at the gun show two weekends ago _think_ guns are natural for them. But I think they're wrong. My guess is that a large percentage of those people are completely incompetent handling guns. -- glen ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
