Thanks for getting back to me.
I hope you didn’t take offence at my Pfffft!! It’s just such a lovely sound to make. “Pfffft!” Nicholas Thompson Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology Clark University <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected] <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/ From: Friam <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Steve Smith Sent: Tuesday, January 12, 2021 8:30 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Poetry Slams vs biologic Percean Logic Machine Emulator Nick - I suppose my "Pffft!" intended point is that "intention matters". I know we have argued about my use of the term "inform" in some contexts, but do you insist that I *never* say or do something to "merely" inform you, but rather all utterances/actons have a persuasive intent? If I look at my indoor/outdoor thermometer and tell you "it is 22F outside right now" I might be doing it to convince you not to go outside without a coat, or I might do it to persuade you that I am a data/scientific oriented kinda guy, or I might do it because you indicated that you had an interest even if I don't have much if any idea what your plan for using that knowledge might be. If it so happens your own plan was to go outside and my telling you the thermometer reading persuaded you to wear a coat, then you could claim I had "persuaded" you when in fact, the most you could claim is that you "were persuaded by the data"? [NST===>This is a lovely example because it may reveal that we just have a word problem. Surely you agree that to inform me is to convince me of something, no? That the temperature is 22oF, for instance. But for you, the meaning of convince is not invoked until you have some ulterior motive for convince me that the temperature is 22oF. So, convincing, on your account, does not occur until some fact is used to get me to change my behavior, and does not apply to the fact itself. It reminds me about an old argument about the danger TV commercials pose. I have always insisted that the worst consequence of the “wing awound the cowah” commercials was not that they convinced one to buy Tide, but that they convinced one that “wing awound the cowah” was something we all should worry about. (I have never understood why they used an actress with a speech impediment, but it must have been effective, because they ran it for YEARS!) If I accepted your definition of “convince” I would have to agree with you, but I think that definition carves nature in a very odd place.<===nst] On the same token if you visited me and I asked you to tell me what you thought my resident Raven's were going on about, you would tell me your "story" about Raven communication and if I didn't believe some aspect of it, you would be inclined to try to "persuade" me, but if I simply insisted I "didn't understand" some point, I don't think you would try to persuade me, you would more likely try to understand what aspect of this I didn't understand and repeat or restate it to help me come in alignment with your understanding. Is this latter soem soft form of persuasion? [NST===>Well, first I would send you out to buy all of Berndt Heinrich’s books on Ravens. Neither of these answers your questions, but they are interesting reads, all the same, and give you a sense of what, if the ravens are talking about something, they might be talking about. I have thought for years, and done some research on the similar calls of the American crow and the best I can come up with is those rhymical, repeated, numerical calls that both species make have something to do with announcing who belongs to whom for territorial purposes. But I digress. I think there are places in the country where it is bad manners to convince somebody to do something but ok to provide them with information to make their own decision. Both, to me, are instances of persuasion, and the distinction is in service of some odd notion of the privacy of the mind. The distinction breaks down if I try to convince you of a fact that has an obvious implication. If I try to convince a Trumper that the temperature is 57, they might take me as merely informing them; if I try to convince that same person that Trump’s I.Q is 57, they would surely see me as persuading them. [nst] I dunno, persuade me? Pfffft! [NST===>YEH. Pffffft! Indeed. <===nst] - Steve [NST===>Nick<===nst] Nah! No, you are doubling down on the idea that some communication is not persuasive because it is to our emotions. Remember. I believe that all emotions are rational. (Just based on low probability data.) “Pfffft!” as Glen has taught me to say. I love to say it. “Pfffft!” “Pfffft!” “Pfffft!” Nicholas Thompson Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology Clark University <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected] <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/ From: Friam <mailto:[email protected]> <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Steve Smith Sent: Tuesday, January 12, 2021 1:53 PM To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Poetry Slams vs biologic Percean Logic Machine Emulator Colleagues; I want to recommend the dialogue below for all who read. What is the probative value of a narrative? What is the probative value of a photo of demonstrator beating a policeman with a flag? Well, narrowly, if the narrative is accurate and the photo is not faked, they prove that such a thing COULD happen, because, you can plainly see, it has happened. What IS the probative value of a poem? Nothing? Then why are people sometimes convinced by them. Nick - I think you are doubling down on Glen's implication that a poem is intended to be persuasive ("convincing" in your term)? While an apt poem (or joke, or song, ) offered with good timing can be persuasive in the context of an argument, it can also/instead be *illuminating* in the context of a generative dialog. I'm much more interested in a generative and synthetic dialog than in analytical and/or rhetorical one. In your pursuit of publishable results from all our rattling on here, I understand the need/value of doing very careful analysis and then build a rhetorical EricS's recent invocation of the Albatross and Mariner images from Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" sent me back to that text which I chose to listen to, read to me (thank you Alexa) by a practiced reader. I was primarily interested in Eric's revised analysis of Trump as Mariner/Democracy as Albatross and whatever embodied wisdom/perspective this "told story" had to offer. I was drawn quickly to the image of "Rime" which I will leave the analysis to others here who might have dipped their beak (or earholes) into this bit of Coleridge. I wasn't inclined to be persuaded by Eric to any particular moral judgement, just to add (if I didn't already have it) the offered allegory to my quiver of perspectives on this big mess we are trying to find our way out of (deeper into?) Not to miss the chance Nick, I *do* agree with you that the photos/clips of the insurrection/coup-attempt last week represent a "possibility by example" proof. Context matters (hugely) (sad how traditional media AND internet media have normalized everything to be taken out of context?) and with modern mediocre (well edited by a clever human) and "deep" fakes, I'm rarely inclined to take any image, video or sound recording as an absolute objective fact, even if it doesn't carry any obvious (even to careful technical analysis) evidence of spoofing/construction. But as with good fiction (storytelling), I don't have to believe that there were literally two naked modern humans named Adam and Eve in a Garden of Plenty who became the progenitors of all human kind to learn something useful from the story. This leads us full circle back to the question of what is "really real"? And by correlation, can fictional narrative speak a qualitatively superior truth to factual narrative? I'm not nearly PoMo literate enough to know if this has all been Derrida'ed and Foucault'ed thoroughly. The competing narratives on the topic seem to be at an impasse, which I probably can't even characterize well. Others may feel they are making headway in coming to a better understanding of the question, or perhaps each faction (is there more than 2?) are stuck in the (IMO fruitless) exercise of trying to persuade the other. While I think I now recognize and appreciate Glen's use of the terms Strawman/Steelman, they seem to reflect the idiom recently (re)Popularized by the Poet-Philosopher Rudi Guilliani with "Trial by Combat!". Joust on! - Steve PS(ssst!)... my more-aggressive-than-usual style here is probably just me sublimating my frustration with not being positioned well to "break up the bar-fight" that is our national politics today. I grant Marcus' strategy of "ducking out the back and let them kill one another" plenty merit when it is a "brawl" or another episode in a "gang war", but most bar/street fights I've been (even obliquely) aware of had an element of a bully and a victim, and I'm still proud of stepping between the two and facing down the bully while the (potential) victim gets a chance to collect themselves and either withdraw or wait for someone (bully's friends, bartender wielding a pool cue, or maybe the cops) to remove the bully from the equation. If I miss my cue and turned my back to the real bully, I risk getting blindsided by the faux-victim and having possibly just made things worse. The Capitol insurrection/coup-attempt was some many thousands of bullies trying to intimidate our elected representatives who had to first bully a few hundred capitol police to get access. If I'd been on site (could anyone there have been truly an innocent bystander?) I'd have been more likely to throw myself on one of the grenades (metaphorical) than to "duck out the back"... I understand why many would "duck out the back" to (not?) "fight another day". I'm glad few if any of the Capitol Police chose that option, but then that was what they were (self?) selected (and paid) for. Unsurprisingly, the Right (from hard-core Radical Extreme to more recentTrump-Radicalized) uses an obvious but still effective tactic that all bullies play from time to time which is pretending to be the victim: "what are YOU looking at, huh?" I really hope that those who are true (little c) conservatives can see how their crypto-cousin high-T, grievance-shouting radical-rabble are as dangerous to them and their idealized way of life (if not more) than their presumed complement of (little l) liberals. </ramble> - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. . FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/ FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
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