I also enjoyed reading this. It's reassuring to hear echoed back the same ideas I've been working on and expressing for almost ten years now. My thesis was essentially about this just within the context of art "Networks [in art] are not about technology".
I share, however, Gretta's skepticism that we have all woken up or to extend that metaphor a little further that we have realised we are asleep but we have chosen to not wake up because the dream is preferable, more profitable, to reality. Generally, networks have become integral to systems of power/control/money and now, just like with climate change, there is a willful denial that they are or ever were more than technology by those that wield the technologies. Unlike many artists who turned away from Cybernetics in the 60s because of these issues we don't have this option we must work through these problems. On Thu, Sep 26, 2019 at 3:30 PM <[email protected]> wrote: > Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2019 20:52:57 +0000 > From: Max Herman <[email protected]> > > History is indeed a nightmare, but fortunately we have now all woken up! > > Networks are not about technology. They are about living things, first > and foremost. Plants, people, coral reefs, polar bears. These are the > real networks of value. > > The purpose of the technology networks is to serve and support the > life-networks, not to be ends in themselves and certainly not vice-versa. > Life-networks are both individuals and groups. > > Now that the nightmare is over we can focus on individual wellness via > mindfulness, natural-intelligence-positive neuroplasticity, and a new birth > of genius across all nations to save the planet and ourselves. > > It's a great time to be a living intelligence! > > Date: Thu, 26 Sep 2019 09:55:23 +0200 > From: Gretta Louw <[email protected]> > > I enjoyed reading this / hoping for this, though a big part of me is not > buying the idea that we?ve woken up nor that the nightmare is over. > > I meditate myself (mostly starting out as a coping mechanism that helped > me deal with anxiety-insomnia), but also see a lot of truth in criticisms > that the mindfulness obsession of today is very much about relocating angst > about the state of the world and legitimate discontent with political, > environmental, and social injustices to tensions going on within the mind > of the individual. i.e. the system is not broken -> you?re broken. Here?s > one article I dredged up on short notice but I think not the best one: > https://theconversation.com/mcmindfulness-buddhism-as-sold-to-you-by-neoliberals-88338 > < > https://theconversation.com/mcmindfulness-buddhism-as-sold-to-you-by-neoliberals-88338> > > > I think often about a talk I happened to hear by a buddhist meditation > teacher who explained that he first got into meditation - in the 60s - as a > way of dealing with his fear of dying while he was protesting the Vietnam > War. He went on to talk about how people often consider meditating an > apolitical act, or wonder how ?just sitting? can affect change in the > world. He said meditating is just sitting, but it matters *where* you sit. > > Some morning thoughts? > > take care all, > Gretta > -- regards Garrett Lynch (IRL) _________________ [email protected] http://www.asquare.org/
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