Ah, Steve. I might have known that Feynman would have something to do
with it. Wikipedia, /ob cit: /
//
/The metaphorical use of "cargo cult" was popularized by physicist
Richard Feynman <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman> at a
1974 Caltech <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caltech> commencement
speech <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commencement_speech>, which
later became a chapter in his book Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surely_You%27re_Joking,_Mr._Feynman%21>,
where he coined the phrase "cargo cult science
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult_science>" to describe
activity that had some of the trappings of real science (such as
publication in scientific journals
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_journal>) but lacked a basis
in honest experimentation. Later the term cargo cult programming
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult_programming> developed to
describe computer software <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software>
containing elements that are included because of successful
utilization elsewhere, unnecessary for the task at hand.^[22]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult#cite_note-22> ///
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/>
*From:*Friam [mailto:[email protected]] *On Behalf Of *Steven
A Smith
*Sent:* Saturday, November 18, 2017 9:23 PM
*To:* [email protected]
*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Postmodernism for Rationalists
Nick -
What, for instance, is a cargo cult ideology? Praying to
whatever might cause useful stuff to fall out of the sky?
I tend to think of Cargo Cult thinking as (naively) conflating form
with function, of invoking the "form" of something with the
hope/assumption that the function will follow.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult
I think I hear in this presentation that it is being used mostly to
describe the rhetoric of *some* PoMo followers who might salt their
language with erudite sounding terms, hoping the results won't be
challenged. Similar to the way Newage practitioners use "laser",
"vibrational energy", "crystal", etc. to try to imply scientific
foundations for their ideas. Or closer to home the way our extended
group can be accused of "Complexity Babble" for lacing our explanation
of things with words like "emergent" or "chaos" or "attractor" for
similar purposes.
I think the key concept is to invoke something you have seen to be
effective in one context without understanding it's mechanism and
thereby completely missing the mark in your own application.
I was surprised to find that there was a style of computer programming
named after this term as well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult_programming
- Steve
And, what is the relation between PoMo and Existentialism? I
take existentialism to be the doctrine that all meaning in life,
if human life has any meaning, is generated or asserted by the
humans that live it.
N
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/>
*From:*Friam [mailto:[email protected]] *On Behalf Of
*Frank Wimberly
*Sent:* Saturday, November 18, 2017 5:53 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
<[email protected]> <mailto:[email protected]>
*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Postmodernism for Rationalists
This stimulated a memory. When I was a sophomore at Carnegie
Mellon one of my classmates, FM, was one of the most enthusiastic
fraternity boys ever. I transferred to Berkeley that year. When
I returned to CMU as a graduate student 5 years later he was also
a grad student and a florid Hippie. I recently did a search and
discovered that he is a prominent member of a folk-dancing group
for elders. Some people are like chameleons; I am not being
judgmental.
Frank
Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918 <tel:%28505%29%20670-9918>
On Nov 18, 2017 5:44 PM, "Prof David West" <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
I believe Frank is generally right. However,when I was in
college in the late sixties hippies were in full bloom but
Maynard G Krebs (Adventures of Dobie Gillis) was a TV icon and
Lord Buckley was on the pop radio.
dave west
On Sat, Nov 18, 2017, at 05:39 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:
In my experience, growing up in n the Bay Area, Beatniks
had come and gone before the Hippies emerged.
Frank
Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918 <tel:%28505%29%20670-9918>
On Nov 18, 2017 11:15 AM, "Steven A Smith"
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Glen ☣-
A Postmodernist trying to Rationalize Postmodernism to
Rationalists?
Actually I found it somewhat interesting... and was
(nicely?) put off by the formatting... the ragged use
of bullet points... a "bulleted list of one" seems
very symbolic of my caricature of PoMo aesthetic.
As for the summary you included here from the
presentation:
Best of Times:
A) my introduction (informal) to PoMo
presented significantly as both dogmatic and
ideological... but that may have been partly
projection and partly the selectivity of what I
*recognized as* PoMo.
2) The "focus on human values" is a
tautological statement? PoMo seems to be centered
(to the exclusion of all else) on a subjectivity
that is intrinsically "human" and maybe even more
acutely "self" as in "self-centered"? I'm not
trying to say that I don't find the PoMo
perspective useful and even appealing in many
ways, but in it's purest form, it would seem to
degenerate to pure narcissism (without judgement
of that)?
c.) Definitely seems to help "expand the mind"
in roughly the same manner that hallucinagens do?
I also don't mean that to be acutely dismissive,
but the mechanism seems to be similar to this,
and/or maybe "annealing" with repeated
(arbitrary?) randomizing of the smallest elements
with thermal excitation?
IV) This one feels like the most useful (or
least challenging?) of his observations.
Worst of Times:
0.0 My earliest introduction to PoMo was
exclusively (selective hearing?) used to push
shoddy agendas... I observed it being used as a
turd in the punchbowl more than anything. I think
I'm (well?) past judging it by that early
introduction, but I think the author cited here is
(in other text) pointing at the abuses of the
Alt.Right these days.
II.) I like the allusion to Cargo Cult... and
it fits the superficial approach of PoMo as I
apprehend it... elevating correlation (free
association) to the level of causation. Ignoring
the implicit commutativity in the Form/Function
duality. I don't mean PoMo is intrinsically
superficial, but rather that it is often invoked
in that mode and perhaps (too) often apprehended
that way in an attempt to dismiss it's
confrontational style (nature?).
c.a) 0.0 above exhibited in this way more than
not... it was the tool of self-styled "young
Turks" who, in some ways, like the Anarchists of
early c20, recognized that it is easier (and can
be more satisfying) to toss a bomb into things
than it is to try to deconstruct/reconstruct
thoughtfully.
Zed ☣) The existential loneliness of PoMo
seems to associate it with Nihilism and may drive
the worst aspects of it's presentation in culture?
PoMo seems "mature" enough now that it, itself is
wanting to be received seriously (trying to
rationalize itself to rationalists?). It's
(unfortunate) association with the Beat culture (my
experience growing up was that the Beats were mostly
the over-30 dropout men who were trying to horn in on
the youth culture of the Hippies, especially
(surprise!) the girls) and aspects of the (subsequent)
drop-out culture exemplified by the Merry Pranksters.
But what comes after/follows-from PoMo?
Post-Postmodernism? MetaModernism? A plenitude of
*modernisms (as suggested by the PoMo aesthetic?)
From the Wikipedia Post Postmodernism entry:
/Salient features of postmodernism are normally
thought to include the ironic play with styles,
citations and narrative levels,^[6]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism#cite_note-6>
a metaphysical skepticism or nihilism
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nihilism> towards a
“grand narrative
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_narrative>”
of Western culture,^[7]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism#cite_note-7>
a preference for the virtual at the expense of the
real (or more accurately, a fundamental
questioning of what 'the real' constitutes)^[8]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism#cite_note-8>
and a “waning of affect”^[9]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism#cite_note-9>
on the part of the subject, who is caught up in
the free interplay of virtual, endlessly
reproducible signs inducing a state of
consciousness similar to schizophrenia.^[10]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism#cite_note-10>
/
All I know about PoPoMo I just read in Wikipedia (how
non-PoMo of me?) but recognize some of the ideas and
names referenced there. Eric Gan's PostMillenialism
struck me for it's dismissal (judgement?) of PoMo as
"victimary thinking"... a corollary of nihilism? I
don't really take Gan's Generative Anthropology
seriously (though it has interesting ideas) and DO
(against my personal convenience) believe in a
postCapitalist/postDemocracy (r)evolution on the cusp
of happening (perhaps even in my lifetime?).
I also find something interesting in this description
of metaModernism (same source):
/As examples of the metamodern sensibility
Vermeulen and van den Akker cite the 'informed
naivety', 'pragmatic idealism' and 'moderate
fanaticism' of the various cultural responses to,
among others, climate change, the financial
crisis, and (geo)political instability./
/The prefix 'meta' here refers not to some
reflective stance or repeated rumination, but to
Plato's metaxy
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaxy>, which
intends a movement between opposite poles as well
as beyond.^[25]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism#cite_note-25>
/
Fire away!
- Sieve
HTML:
https://palegreendot.net/rrg_notes/2017/10/09/rrg-reading-notes.html
PDF:
https://palegreendot.net/assets/2017-10-09/postmodernism_for_rationalists.pdf
I appreciated these 2 slides:
• Postmodernism at its best
· Not dogmatic and ideological
· Focuses on human values
· Allows you to approach and understand other
subjects and viewpoints
· Acknowledges that the territory might require
multiple maps
• Postmodernism at its worst
· Used to push shoddy political agendas
· Cargo cult ideology
· Used to rationalize and excuse asocial behavior
· Results in existential loneliness
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