Dave,
What would not be bizarre, then?
I would hesitantly suggest only those brave enough to believe in absolute human
freedoms, free-wills untouched by history or outside influence can posit the
structures you are suggesting.
Good academic, analytic, marxists like Prof. Lessig and Mr. Magaziner assume
that the economic and productive relations resulting from new technology
determine the form of social organization, and by implication, in the long
term, government. Reducing their argument to a quintessential nub, this would
imply that the need for geographical government sloughs away as communications
make distance irrelevant and bandwidth makes complexity a pointless defence.
This is, admittedly, regarding government as a self-constituted limitation
where a given group self-organises for its own defence and purposes against
some perceived outside threat. Also, government, regarding itself as an effect
of society, will be sensitive.
However the models for this activity must be shared, it is too complicated to
agree a new form of governance with a large group, we have to refer back to
some kind of shared model to reach agreement.
It is arguable that few new shared models of governance have been developed,
checks-and-balances (duties, rights, freedoms) democracy being the most
pragmatic doctrine to achieve wide currency since sovereignty (I have the
weapons, do what I say and I will not kill you) and the idealistic worlds of
perfection (people like us will be in change when everything is changed) that
were not achieved.
The most sophisticated bureaucracies, self-replicating, do not produce
innovation, results, change, etc. They use the latter as food. I would argue
that designing a global model is to incorporate the complexities, limitations
and political uncertainties of all into a series of unknown strictures, the
workability of which will be moot. Surely better to take an existing model
(whatever that may be) which has agreed functionality and is well-understood.
Noting the death of Christopher Cockerell, who died recently, and is known in
the UK for having invented the hovercraft (it may have been someone different
in the rest of the world, such is culture), it is remarkable to note that in
legend he was merely the first man to have been allowed to carry on blowing
bubbles through pipes into cans in the bath up to the age of at least thirty,
if not ninety, a principle every child knows instinctively, but which is
drummed out of. Perceived as a useless activity for several thousand years by
society in general, nurses and mothers in particular, the model had been
ignored. One casn only hope that the bravery of Mr. Magaziner's brief will be
recognized in the long term in the same way.
If Mr. Magaziner, in researching historical models, came across the industrial
revolution as one of the watersheds where technology, however derived or
accounted for, appeared to drive history in a certain direction, he will also
have come across the abstractions that it created that were so much
misunderstood later, particularly in 19th century German philosophy. Here was a
painful effort to account for the new self-awarenesses caused by social
dislocation and industrial change. Muddled understanding of this of course lead
other apologists to believe that industrial solutions for human problems could
be found, a belief eroded over the last half century as the cynicisms of
utilitarianism were uncovered
However, whilst the futurist manifesto and riding to hounds can easily coexist,
it does seem a little naive (in the sense that we still believe in some
betterment through abstraction) to assume that there should be multiple SMTP
protocols and multiple internet administrations to satisfy the consumer. It may
be possible for future European generations to abandon ASCII for dominant Urdu,
Canton and Kanji charactersets, it may be desirable, it may not be good
analysis in our lifetimes. It is important that the strongest and most
recognisable model be used. Anyway, according to Mssrs. Lessig and Magaziner,
it is all done by the blind watchmaker.
Even for those who believe there is some room for individual manoevre, as we
all do in our actions if not words, there is no global model, only
hypothesised variants of lived examples, nation states, international
agreements, freemarket lore, etc. Wasn't the global model the trap into which
the philosophers of the industrial revolution fell?
So, is it a design problem or is it driven merely by the blind egoisms of
economic participants? Do we know any more that say fifty years ago?
MM
Dave Crocker wrote:
> At 01:15 AM 6/4/99 -0400, Jay Fenello wrote:
> >"This is bizarre for a democracy," said Lessig. "Why not just carve up the
>
> what is even MORE bizarre is to impose a U.S. model on a global service.
>
> d/
>
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> Dave Crocker Tel: +1 408 246 8253
> Brandenburg Consulting Fax: +1 408 273 6464
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--
Mark Measday
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