nettime Re: nettimespace entangled - part 321
hi John, thanks for sharing your perspective. it is not uncommon (criticism) and appreciated as such. your post (and its seconding) could have been responded to in a nanosecond though a pause was necessary for me to remember that sharing ideas should be fun and not simply a laborious task and dealt with in terms of tedium, and overly seriously, etc. in any case it was good to reflect on these issues once again. I will offer another view of this same situation you critique, not to negate the validity of your viewpoint (too long, nonsensical) and instead to engage your criticism in the context of sharing complex ideas which are viewed from various perspectives. in particular, your observations as they are related to your role as an observer, and how this may play a part in what you are observing and attribute to me. 1) While your writings make frequently interesting points, they are too verbose. Extended length is acceptable if the author writes on exceedingly complex topics or for audiences with backgrounds outside of the subject matter under discussion. what I write is often equivalent to 'heresy' on many levels, and to back up these ideas, oftentimes novel arguments have to be built-up which can take a lot of words to do. for instance, previously I have written (for years) about the materiality of the supposedly 'immaterial' Internet as it is grounded in infrastructure, which is totally against the trend. and requires a lot of work to address ongoing views which are the default consensus. as it happens, sharing ideas in an ideological saturated environment requires both addressing the ideology and its dynamics and placing these in relation to the new ideas and comparing their models, etc. it is not so simple as just sharing one's model, it also involves active engagement of known beliefs which must also be addressed, which makes up the basis for anyone to challenge statements made, contrary to the overriding view. the burden of proof is on the writer to make a case, and if that case is not being made, it should be pointed out where in the text that there is a break in the logic or reasoning that refutes the argument. (note: this is not what is happening with my work in the critique, which is not about the ideas and instead about their formal presentation.) if everyone agreed to the same view, or there was a high-level of shared understanding about ideas, then i could write the same thing in 1 paragraph, yet that would be easy to refute. so, these writings function more as logical arguments and in that, equations which enable the thoughts to exist in an environment of peer-review which any ideas could be discredited by peer review- as to the ideas themselves- which is not happening. it is not necessarily because people are not reading the works, it is because there are solid arguments (most times) which can stand up to substantive criticism, and all it would take is someone to perform that role to make this more publicly self-evident than it now is. i.e. it would take others to place their ideas on the line, to risk their own modeling and challenge views so to gain a better (shared) understanding. that this is not happening cannot necessarily be pegged to the length of text, nor that it is non-sensical because if it were non-sensical or hazy then someone should be able to point out where, how, and why it is so, and thus disprove or refute the argument. note: without any examples as to such claims, it is impossible to review that the text 'does not make any sense' etc. if you provide examples, that is where the fun begins, and would open up the ideas to many views and that is the entire point of sharing these ideas, at least for me. so to improve the ideas themselves. now if the ideas can be said in a better format, with improvements- that I totally can accept and agree with, yet this is not the point of the text itself, the ideas. the ideas themselves are what is important and while they may be imperfect, they can be improved by others and are free to do so. if you or anyone can boil the text down to one page and retain the same meaning, while attributing ideas to their sources, then that is fine. though I would argue that because of the nature of these ideas, in this context, that, with the writer that exists (me) this is the best they can do in presenting these ideas and that role of the writer is both of creative limits and liberty to do one's best in sharing ideas as best they can. I do not need to be policed on my writing style, for while it may be valid as a critique about the form, it does nothing to refute the ideas themselves and stands only as a complaint about the form. it may be hard to read so much text- though it is not unfamiliar if reading philosophy, and it is almost funny if considering sharing grounded ideas that hold to a common shared
nettime nettime as idea
* is it possible that 'ideas' that are now institutionalized are part of the problem, in that they do not lend them- selves to building up shared views, and instead dividing ideas into categories, which narrows down potentials for building greater knowledge/understanding thru discourse? (i.e. maybe the thinking/conceptualization is rather weak for and detached from the actual situations, and that *silence* may be a testament to irrelevancy/inadequacy of academic systems of thought to engage situations as they now exist. and thus this could be an indictment of, say, theory itself?) * years ago i proposed Nettime as if a medium, by which to take on the New York Times, and would add that with all the tech/computer skills, the Listserv model itself should be hacked and modified and expanded to experiment with the _list as a functioning idea, by which to allow discourses to occur beyond the original designs, such as loops in which offlist discussions may still live, (go on), in the archives as live events, even if not on list, such as tying a BBS or RSS comments feed in with the List, whatever dimensions could be woven (that deal with technology assisting the content, and not simply becoming the content itself, meaningless. this is what i do not understand about the whole situation: there is probably more diverse talent on this list in terms of culture, knowledge, geography, social awareness, technology and yet there seems to be difficulty in sharing a focus or what is actually of greater value, to the larger organism of nettime. -- why, with all this potential is the list itself as a mechanism not a shared focus by which to transform this situation and not be reliant on the default configurations -- or, for instance, why is it that the issues of philosophy cannot become a focus by which to figure out a way to gain a shared ground by which to build up relations between the various systems of thought, by more than linking to websites or projects, and instead get into these dynamics, on list and in the list as a machinery, in which these issues could in/form the shape of nettime itself? it would seem it has to do with what is seen as important and how it is approached: in terms of ideas, nettime itself is itself an idea that seems to be passed over, and is said to limit other ideas, yet maybe it is more complex and more simple than this. maybe it is that the 'project' has yet to be nettime itself, as a larger idea, by which to focus shared action on building up a better medium for the things people want to do, via listservs, via e-mail (including attaching small graphic/diagrams so as to communicate ideas, literally, inaccessible without images, which could and would require moderation, image server, etc). * maybe what is most troubling is that nettime is standing still, and has not evolved as a medium all that much, when there is all the potential for taking it on as a shared project, technical, cultural, social, etc. and making it into something that has yet to exist, and that is DiY from the networks and the ground-up. maybe nettime risks not surviving because it does not know what it is adapting to, or this is not even a question, and that the assumption that its content (discourse) is somehow going to save it may be mistaken-- that its content may be part of the reason it is dying: the cause of its deterioration, looking into the mirror of the vital lack of insight bred in Universities today with regard to how things are actually working, even. that is, the mental modeling may be insufficient, and yet the nettime-model does not necessarily have to rely on failures of ideology, for its own development. it could challenge the institutionalization of methods and forms of inquiry, linearism, all the stuff that is critiqued, and actually experiment and go into questioning mode of the assumptions that are propping up this wasteland of imagination, and bring it all back down to earth, by making the list real, making it relevant, based in common sense and peer review and checks and balances of ideas, as a public forum, which redefines the very questions that all the expertise supposedly existing, fails to account for. that is, relevance, realism, idealism, action, shared agendas. maybe it is psychological, even, a predisposition, based upon academic assumptions, sacred cows, in need of slaughtering. bc architecture, education, electromagnetism http://www.mnartists.org/brian_carroll http://www.electronetwork.org/bc/ # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL
nettime BLACKFLAG OPS [outside.US] Part3
many of the problems in the Middle East relate to failures and biases of .US FOREIGN POLICY which has been proven to be detrimental to .US interests in that these are the very problems generating the need for a 'War of Terror.' i.e. the catastrophic decision-making of the .US 'War of Terror' is an extension of failed .US policies in the Mideast by which to secure victory for one-side of the mideast conflict, at world-scale. fighting this war only generates more opposition to the basic policies underlying all decision-making, which is an unjust, biased, and distorted view of the situation between .IL and Palestine. and continuing to fight this war only compounds the basic situation further, becoming entrenched in the polarized binary ideological worldviews, which can only create more war, death, and destruction by taking such a path. for this reason .US BLACKFLAG OPERATIONS become necessary because the .US GOVERNMENT is no longer effective in its decision-making by which it could transform this situation in the interests of .US citizens and the .US STATE. that is, via POLICY which takes into account these well-known * facts * about the basic situation underlying the ideological struggle now underway. if anything, it could be said that the POLICY is based on an anti-enlightenment philosophy in which public reason has no role in .US decision-making, and only a private reasoning which is largely irrational if taken in terms other than those it can control. it is in this way that an INSURRECTIONIST agenda has found its way into .US POLICY via Neoconservatives who have subverted .US GOVERNMENT for an agenda that makes no sense for the .US citizens to pursue, including the .US military, because it is against the self-interests of the .US itself. instead of governance in a constitutional democracy in which the public will is being represented -- this has been short-circuited by PRIVATE POLICIES which are dictated, one-way, via MASS MEDIA which bypasses the public checks-and-balances of democratic governance, which then distorts the representation of issues and thus the reality of issues as they exist to .US citizens as represented in the mass media of magazines, newspapers, television, radio, etc. what is being represented in the .US is a violent right-wing perspective of the Mideast situation, by default. that is, an agenda that is based on fighting and winning one-side of the Mideast conflict, is the status quo position for all reporting and all representation of the issues in the .US with regard to issues between Israel and Palestine. thus, American citizens are only getting one-side of the story, and this is considered the only side of the story. this basic compromise of objectivity has led to the 'War of Terror' as being a legitimation of pursuing such a strategic extension of this basic idea, in that the 'War of Terror' POLICY further secures this narrow point-of-view (of Israel's right-wing) in the .US as its FOREIGN POLICY agenda, its geostrategic purpose and planning for its development in the world. the very fact that the narrow POLICY goals of an external state have become the sole geostrategic agenda for the .US is an indication of external forces interfering in the internal affairs of the .US, which is unacceptable. it accounts to treason, if not total subversion. this is to say that, because of the way the .US GOVERNMENT is short- circuited by special interests and corporate-machinery, the situation in the mideast has been 'misrepresented' by a one-sided and BIASED approach, which feeds the mideast conflict which scales up to the 'War of Terror' -- and that for those who are being represented by .US FOREIGN POLICY, are INSURRECTIONISTS both internal (Neocons) and external (Likud) to the .US affairs of state. in this way, the .US has taken on an agenda by which to fight and die on behalf of external forces, under the .US FLAG and by contorting the original intent of the .US CONSTITUTION, to place American lives and treasure in service to a foreign agenda and its self-interest -- a fatally unwise to pursue as .US POLICY, because it does not serve the .US self-interest. instead it is only automatically generating more and more terrorism which is naturally balancing this unequal situation. so, the POLICY which is a failure for .US interests actually becomes a business model which creates a supply of 'terror' by which the corporate dictatorial state can continue to destroy the constitutional state in pursuing such circular logic. that is, TERROR is an ecosystem by which corporate machines are making PROFITS off of this human oppression, via dehumanizing policies which are unfair and unjust, which create the very problem that the 'War of Terror' is supposedly to solve, yet this only creates more and more terror, as a commodity, by which to trade and extend this
nettime BLACKFLAG OPS [outside.US] Part2
* BLACK FLAG OPERATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA *
(General Policy Direction in Middle East and Southeast Asia)
[Continued - Part 2]
{{ .US BLACKFLAG temp.online @ www.electronetwork.org/temp/
blackflagUSv.gif }}
Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands,
hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats.
-- H. L. Mencken, US editor (1880 - 1956)
*
{{ rewiring the Mideast circuitboard via .US BLACKFLAG OPERATIONS
reference MAP temp.online @ www.electronetwork.org/temp/MAP.gif }}
3. .US policy inversions -- Syria and Iran
the absolute hypocrisy of current .US foreign policy positions, under
the influence of Neoconservative operatives, must be recognized and
nullified immediately for they are both un-American and only
perpetuate the problems that, supposedly, are seeking resolution in
the war of terror - though it is more likely that the existing
approach is designed with this very fact in mind.
that is, the .US battle planning and 'order of battle' driven by the
Neoconservatives, and dictated by those violent extremists in the
Israeli government associated with the Likud, had spoken of 'first
Iraq' then 'Iran and Syria' would be next-in-line for .US military
aggressions, including invasions, in this ongoing 'War of Terror'.
let's make this very clear: a foreign power, Israel, has publicly
spoken of internal .US military planning in both the lead-up to the
Iraq war and subsequent military actions (follow-on) after this,
which has been placed outside of democratic control of citizen
governance. i.e. a foreign power is influencing the choice of
sending .US citizens, spouses and children, into battle on its
behalf, and to sacrifice themselves for the designs of .US and .IL
Neoconservatives, fascists, and 'violent extremists' (Judeo-
Christian, if not simply satanists - calling it like it is) and that
this is a betrayal of the public trust and oath of office as to who
is actually 'commander-in-chief', of .US foreign policy, or domestic
policy for that matter. this is to say that that in itself is an act
of treason at the highest levels, which has plenty of spy stories
associated with it in the press, yet the conclusions have yet to be
heard of what this all adds up to.
it is proposed that this is more evidence of a coordinated
Insurrection, both by internal forces (who are aligned with the
Whitehouse of George H.W. Bush (1), whose son has now crashed the
country in a latest act of private recklessness over the public state
of affairs.) -- and by external forces in .IL and elsewhere who act
by proxy of the special-interest groups and lobbies, whose power has
coalesced over this same last period of 40 years in the formation of
the GOP-Neoconservative alliance which has handed over the decision-
making of the .US government to private powers who are outsourcing
their foreign policy using the blood of .US soldiers, citizens, and
their families suffering, in addition to raiding the public coffers
to pay for their own policies, by government heist.
to say this is not the case, on its face, consider how .US
Presidential hopefuls like Hilary Clinton have traveled to Israel to
announce their run for .US President, announcing their intentions in
another country - by which to try to get elected in the United States
of America. no matter the demographic challenges of a particular
locality, when this race begins 'offshore' so too do the policies
that will be driving such candidates in their governance. make no
mistake: this is selling out America to a particular influence that
has some relation to those now subverting .US government ends other
than those good for Americans. and that this is traitorous,
treasonous, and despicable if ignoring the 'cost' of continuing this
business-as-usual without fixing the problematic dynamics that are
now undermining constitutional democracy and installing a corporate
dictatorship in its place.
again: this is not anti-semitic nor is it anti-Israeli (whether
Palestinian or Jew, Orthodox or atheist) -- it is instead an issue of
foreign-interference and manipulation of internal .US affairs and
external .US policies and foreign affairs which have undermined
the .US government, and those doing this are both in the .US and .IL
and elsewhere, and their modus-operandi is 'violent extremism' other-
wise known as 'terrorism' by which they pursue their agenda: and this
is to take a stand against this movement, which is to take a stand
against FASCISM itself, and Judeo-Fascists in the .US and .IL and the
Christian Fascists who also partake in this 'crusade' against Muslims
in .US imperial policy. it is so _un-American_ that it is hard to
reconcile how such policies could have been
nettime BLACKFLAG OPS [outside.US] Part 1
[note: currently weathering a major propaganda storm whereby the film United 93 submerges everything in its heavy and impenetrable ideological fog via uncritical distribution by mass media, which vanquishes whatever light might have existed by which to navigate, into a submersed state of lost sense of direction, distance, and general confusion, just as it was designed to do. so too, the addition .US patriotism raining heavily down upon this wayward ship of state, in having the President standing on the side of reciting of the National Anthem in English, is thoroughly twisted and disorienting as to the actual nature of these events. that is, as if defending traditional values when in fact having undermined and exploited them as political camouflage. for instance, the FBI being on the lookout for Terrorists, who are defined as: Defenders of the U.S. Constitution, against federal government and the UN, Those who make numerous references to the U.S. Constitution, Lone individuals, Rebels etc.* thus, in hoisting the .US BLACKFLAG over this existing deck strake, it will be to symbolically invert this pirated ship of state *by recognizing it as such* so as to reclaim and retake our constitutional democracy, so to immediately navigate/steer/govern in a more enlightened direction...] --- simultaneous and coordinated activation of BLACKFLAG OPERATIONS outside the .US will engage and transform existing policy fiascos into a shared general direction that is in-line with constitutional democracy and the right of citizens to peacefully co-exist on this planet together... from this present day, the overall goal will be to engage issues generating the 'War of Terror' worldwide, with a laser-focused emphasis on resolving the Mideast conflict via a 2-state solution between .IL and .PS, a goal of which the .US will be in service to, and accord all sides respect and a balanced perspective by which to resolve the ongoing conflicts. this would include protecting the human rights of those in the region, and bringing large resources into .PS to help in building the state, if such assistance were acceptable, and also larger regional development based upon a 'long- term truce' whereby Islamic and Judeo-Christian and other countries can work together on building a shared prosperity while respecting sovereignty, cultural autonomy, and governance independent of external control, manipulation, influence in internal affairs. thus, the ultimate goal of .US BLACKFLAG OPERATIONS will be to establish Mideast Peace, and to end the Neoconservative 'War of Terror' which is itself only an endless reign of terror. in doing so, a basic shift in dynamics will recontextualize policy options and decision-making in the region and world, between states and peoples, which could become the foundation for building new peace at the world scale, beyond nationalism, along with revitalizing global institutions so as to prevent that which the .UN is now unable to prevent, via a more representative, balanced, fair, and just world organization that is based on multipolar ecological relationships in a shared world, with issues that need to be addressed in our lifetimes, if our children are ever to live... all of this hinges upon the legal, moral, ethical, democratic and constitutional actions of those in the .US military and .US citizens to take on their responsibility to take back control of the state from Insurrectionists, so as to make such a future, indeed, possible. without this sacrifice, it is predictable that such actions cannot and will not happen, by ideological predisposition and an inability to govern on behalf of the interests of the human state itself. and thus, until such actions are taken, there is not a chance-in-hell of such a direction being undertaken. and the world is watching, and waiting, and it is in such a dire hour and haunting hour that the .US will be judged, for having taken on the mantle of responsibility for leadership, and working with all others in the world for a shared agenda to which we all benefit, or to leave behind all obligation for shared improvement and destiny, to pursue a divisive and dehumanized and base agenda which is a travesty of the original moral cause of the state and its future principled development. if truly American, there is no choice: the collective and individual will has already been cast into history, that the true America is in service to our human development and sharing this story, not in a particular history and mankind and limited view to which all are supposed to obey as slaves. though this happens in a context of confusion, of disinformation, of chaos and confusion, which only strengthens the deception over the true aims of the existing agenda, and will cast doubt on pursuing the true course of America, through tumultuous events, into an altogether
Re: nettime Network, Swarm, Microstructure
regarding hierarchies and networks, with regard to protocols, etc: is it possible that network interactions can be 'weighted' with regard to different variables, as to how they function (in terms of vertical/horizontal management of flow or routing of interactions through some kind of decision-tree or charting of the way the interaction exists in the network itself, between nodes? this is an attempt to say, could 'the router' or 'hub' in some way be a physical modeling of this same questioning of hierarchy and how decision-making exists with regard to certain dynamics? and thus a star network may interact differently than a linear bus network topology, etc. Network Topologies http://www.delmar.edu/Courses/ITNW2313/network.htm http://fcit.usf.edu/network/chap5/chap5.htm (i am not exactly sure what i am trying to get at here, only that it would seem that there are many 'dimensions' involved, and in this, it would seem possible that there is a different weighting of a given situation, in terms of its dynamic relationship within/without a given network and its mediation, which would seem to be dynamically addressed -- i.e. as it is related to how the network itself constitutes/models/governs itself and its interactions -- it also makes me wonder if it is somewhat akin to 'layers' as Pit Schultz once wrote about on nettime, etc. that is, some things happen on one layer and there may be multiple higher/lower level things going on (dimensions) simultaneously, though I am not sure if this is how IP actually works or not...) brian brian thomas carroll: research-design-development architecture, education, electromagnetism http://www.mnartists.org/brian_carroll http://www.electronetwork.org/bc/ # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
nettime note on nuclear treaty
[originally sent to the electronetwork-list, 2-6-06. post relates to background for the 'war of terror' as seen as the mid-east war as world-scale. thus the cartoon issue (which, imo, should be considered in terms of racism...), nuclearism, war of terror, surveillance, and other issues can be placed in a single context. posts preceded these with diagrams, which modeled this situation yet nettime does not allow infographic attachment so they were not sent, though they will be compiled when the larger essay is finished: human techn=E9 and the cybernetic estate. bc] --- as evidenced over the weekend, the decision made to ratchet-up nuclear dysfunction into nuclear conflict is still just beginning to impact, and makes it impossible to try to reason another option during diplomatic fallout. it is incredible how these automated mechanisms could make things even worse, on ideological grounds, which is in the realm of nuclear - nuclear - conflict, while during a supposed endless 'war of terrorism', which this type of decision-making helps to support and make it inevitable. there was a very simple matter-of-fact about this situation i was going to write about, yet now cannot, as it is too hard to reason in such an environment. though i will mention it, in brief, without an essay, just because... it was that it is more than evident nuclear diplomacy now exists in a binary situation, as an Iranian representative had mentioned that it was either to 'resist' or 'surrender'. that is a binary decision. so too, Israel's now being either to 'attack' or 'surrender' could also be seen in such terms. which, to me, offers now good choices for anyone involved. as a way to get to engagement, to talks, to security pacts, a treaty, which would be necessary to establish a larger regional peace treaty (such as, first between .IL and .IR, on nuclear security and a showing of cards, transparency on all sides =3D thus absolving the hypocrisy which is now distorting fair-judgement and good-will because of tricks and imbalances in existing (binary) frameworks). then, to get .SY and .IR and .LB and other primary opponents in ongoing hostile conflicts to build on this for a peace treaty for ending the mid-east conflict, with .UN resolution 242 as a solution for stopping all hostilities between countries now in (foreseeable) armed conflict, which would allow a way of creating a basis for a long-term truce, while also inverting the ideological polarization, and addressing the Palestinian relations with Israel, which could enable a non-hostile state to rise next to Israel with what appears to be an organization capable of building up a state, in the quick, with the support of funds. likewise, such efforts were going to be mentioned in relation to drawing-down .US troops in a general truce, in which .US troops and equipment may be useful so to jumpstart some of the engineering work or whatever may be helpful to stand between forces now in chaos, if it were to be towards stabilization of the middle-east, accepted by all sides, say under a .UN flag. in any case none of this is now possible to mention because of what are extremist- approaches, imo, to very fragile situations which then make it impossible to pursue such reasoning because 'sanity' is not a basis for decision-making, and calm, cool, collected thinking is replaced by the fervor of people who want war. it is not possible to 'write out of' such overwhelming idiocy, and the lack of judgement is epic -- this is nuclear strategy which is written on a cocktail napkin, and is true madness. it should now be very clear that there has to be some 'slack' involved in such a polarized situation, to make more options available (instead of taking them away, which is what has now happened-- IAEA inspectors, cameras, now enrichment begins, etc. all for an ideological necessity to pursue a course which has been a total failure, and which now results in even greater losses, because it is not based on .US interests, nor on protecting .US citizens, and instead is putting others views at the forefront of .US global strategy, narrowing it down to a very small consideration of the issues/impacts, and has put the nuclear scenario backwards from how it should be, and who should be calling the shots with regard to this conflict. * it would be to demand that .IL stay within the .UN Security Council, and under no circumstances be allowed to act out- side of sanctioned international law - for its own safety and for the wold's safety with regard to the seriousness of the use of nuclear weapons. Russia has made a similar point, explicit. * the .US/.EU and .RU and .CN should step in and step up in talks about resolving the issues in a treaty framework, where .IR and .IL are not left to decide how to resolve this situation themselves, when it impacts everyone, and is
nettime on nuclear diplomacy / d.1
[this post is seeks to provide a framework by which to consider 'paradoxical logic' as a basis for reasoning and modeling complex issues in non-linear/multi-linear environments, which can be conceptualized in terms of circuits, ecological relationships, and decision-making. the context in which this is written provides a preface, so as to demonstrate the traditional viewpoint of these same issues in relation to an upgraded common sense, and the stakes of pursuing such ideas in the .US 2006, which becomes a competition of realities, old vs. new...] --- a duel of realities is now taking place, and it is how the issues of current events will be conceptualized, which in turn shapes what decisions can be made to address them. it has been explicitly stated that the existing rhetoric with regard to the global conflicts now underway, has never yielded to greater clarity or realism, with regard to what exactly the global 'war of terror' is, who a 'terrorist' is, etc. the role of reasoning in public debate has been absent in regard to fundamental issues of definition, which shape a reality of events, how they are portrayed, and represented by the mass media, which is a one-way presentation of the views about these very same issues. the existing situation is such that the 'rhetoric' of the 'war of terror' so far seems to be detached from a 'reasoned reality' which can stand on its own, by way of argument, in an open public debate. thus, in the competition of ideas about what is going on, a public debate about an endless global war being waged on behalf of a democratic state and its citizenry would be able to provide checks-and-balance upon what is proposed to be the 'public' basis for governmental decision-making by way of testing the rigor and logic of the arguments used. failure to do so, to test ideas for their substance, accuracy, and truth-value, would be to risk having a private point of view of complex events, which is sustained in the private infrastructures of mass media aligned with a certain view- point, yet which exists outside of democratic checks-and- balances with regard to the larger public issues involved. in other words, what is said to be the 'war of terror' is in no way obliged to answer to its public critics who question this argument, and petition government to clarify its position in regard to actually clarifying the war now being waged on be- half of its citizens- so that what is said to represent a public view of events, actually does represent a public viewpoint, unbiased from special interests, including foreign influences. for not providing such public checks-and-balances could in extreme cases allow a government to exist beyond its own people, without need nor reason to answer their petitions, because as a machinery-of-state, a short-circuit has been able to cut the public out of the private operation of state, which is further reinforced and buttressed by mass media, which creates a privatized 'reality, inc' which is a one-way broadcast of a particular relativistic point of view of events. in such a case, what was once constituted some 200 years ago as a public government would be then devolve into its own antithesis by the exploitation of Constitutional coding, in which what were once ideas by which to govern began to transform into ideologies, by which to control a machine- of-state which serves purposes other than its core citizens. in this case, the argument has been that the .US is now in the process of devolving from a democracy of mankind, to a democracy of the cybernetic machinery of this populace, whereby citizenship is a survival of the fittest competition between human citizens and corporate citizens, which the corporations has now won in terms of public representation in government, in terms of decision-making and issues and the reigning ideology, while also controlling the means of 'public' representation by way of the private mass media, which supposedly is to provide checks-and-balances upon democratic government by way of acting as its own oversight. thus, there is a functioning government which is ideologically believed to be a functioning democracy carrying on the will of its public citizens in its policies, as rhetoric attests to in terms of faith and allegiance and patriotism to such a view, yet in actuality there is no interaction between public citizens and this .US government with regard to addressing issues in which the machinery of state and its people are brought into war, around the world and within their own civilian population, and questioning the logic, truth, and validity of the arguments being promoted in one-way mass media and by government 'representatives' -- which in these same terms are equivalent to private positions on public issues which are distorting the actual issues, for
nettime on establishing a long-term truce / c.1
(this could be considered follow-up to B. Geer. thanks...) -- [the previous two posts* on public/private realities were written to help establish terms in which the 'war of terror' could be engaged as the mid-east war at the world-scale. unfortunately it is not satisfactory or adequate in describing a new context, due to several limitations, though it may be able to function as a 'sketch' by which to continue with an- other view of current events and suggest ways to proceed. ((* post 1+2: http://groups.google.com/group/electronetwork-l/ browse_thread/thread/1770b729458c3913/c152911846d9a538#c152911846d9a538 http://groups.google.com/group/electronetwork-l/browse_thread/ thread/d586674c9a230b2a/d61514468053b94f#d61514468053b94f )) thus, it may be in some way equivalent to looking at a huge night-sky, and all the stars, unmapped, and to talk about the constellations (connected ideas) and the stories of how they relate, with one another, by way of such a reasoning. such that, it may be our human conflicts today could be, in part, related to the machineries as they exist, and that it is in the nature of a changed reality, with electromagnetism for instance, that a new context for a sharing of ideas may be established, with all are on the same side of questioning. looking at an immense cosmos, and trying to figure out our human place in this public scale which we share on earth. thus, while there surely is the need to acknowledge that a Muslim reality exists, and an American and Western reality, that what may be conflicting between them may actually be not the humanity they share between them (and the truth of a human reality we share between us at the world scale) as it is reasoned-- and instead, what may be of conflict be- tween peoples may have something also to do with what has become an inhuman development, brought about with science and technology, which now lacks moral and ethical universalism to restrain its automatic global development from becoming an oppressive force, against all people in the end, though some more than others may be effected, so as to wage a war against its unthinking dehumanization, in the name of 'enlightened' western and global progress. if such were approximately the case, that what is going on may have something to do with people and their machines, running amok on and for other people, in a survival of the fittest contest of global superpower (versus a balancing of world order, at world scale, by world reason organization), it would then be to take current events of the 'war of terror' and recontextualize them; from one that is largely based in irrationalism and founded upon the fight of good vs. evil, in which, in the name of Gods and Devils., an endless war is to be fought to the death, versus something else going on... (note: in the .US context, this becomes like the Salem witch- hunts, looking for terrorists, in addition to a statement by a 'high-government official' equated this as fighting Satanism). by placing an enemies viewpoint 'in league with the Devil', it is to allow all the abstractions of humans-fighting-humans on behalf of cosmic forces and divine truth, which becomes separated from 'reason' which brought about democracy as a western tradition, which no longer functions in governance, and instead 'faith' and 'trust' in divine leadership has taken its place. and the litmus test becomes one of obedience to such a worldview, either you take it or you are the enemy of the people as they are thus represented, by a divine dictator. what is the most important point of this is that what has been a tradition of human 'reason' has been lost in .US governance, and, to wage a global war on behalf of ideas that are based on secrecy, which exist within opaque agendas, and beyond democracy and its checks and balances with regard to truth. reason does not exist, anymore. and any war that is to be waged in such terms is suspect as to its ulterior motivations, because 'truth' becomes the greatest enemy, as does reason. for otherwise, why would the 'war of terror' be waged in such terms, if it is actually a false-flag operation for fighting one-side of the middle-eastern war, with .US/western forces as a proxy? to view current events as such would change everything, for it would not simply be about a fight of God versus the Devil, or of goodness versus evil, and lightness against the 'darker' forces... and it would help to explain the xenaphobia, the racism involved, the bias and hatred and unfairness, the lies and untruths and of manipulations, of hypocrisy-- which ultimately brings to bear the realization that something else is going on here than what is now being presented by mass media and its virtual representations... for how, 'in the name of God', could the greater good legitimate a torturing of human beings
nettime .US duped nukem
// my apologies for not prefacing the nettime version which // makes no sense without stating this has been sent to a // list that previously dealt with .US Energy Policy, both the // electricity-list/electronetwork-list and also the PEN-list, in // which the below-stated maps of oilfields were referenced. // i send out of a request for distribution of this general view, // which i fear will not be considered and thus state it publicly // as reporters are often close-to-the-vest as to where these // ongoing investigations of the .US miasma may actually go. // also, of concern for safety. the more who know the better... // the more who question along such lines, the more helpful... this e-mail was sent from the electronetwork-list: http://groups.google.com/group/electronetwork-l --- (check - check, 1 - 2 - 3 -, testing - testing. can you hear me? check check, testing. are you ready? check check...) over the years on this list a general premise has been that electromagnetism is a realm where politics operates today, and to offer some examples of this, whether by way of the use of media, focus of topics such as nuclear or I.T., or the issues that becomes central during current events. it has thus been surprising how this electromagnetic context has provided a single view of the last few years, in that the issues of energy and oil, war and weapons, media and ideas have coalesced in such a way as to potentially offer insight in the cohesiveness of events though they may otherwise be seen as disconnected by division of topics, viewpoints, etc. it is a critical time here in the .US, these next few weeks will change the direction of the world, most certainly, and which way it is still unknown --- one aspect is the .US investigation into the leaking of an undercover CIA agent's information in retaliation for challenging the cause for the war going in Iraq. the agent was versed in WMD, the case for war was nuclear, the fabricated evidence from aluminum tubes, satellite images, and yellowcake uranium, to the Vice President and Condi Rice referencing a NY Times story by Judith Miller, justified such a view of nuclear 'mushroom clouds' if the .US does not enter into a pre-emptive war with Iraq, outside the .UN's own IAEA (atomic energy agency) which, as with others, raised serious doubts about the claims being made (and Mr. El Baradei and the IAEA was just awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last week), while there is still more to go on the agenda, it would appear... the big question may be where this ends up, as an investigation as it could either be contained into a certain segment of inquiry or it could go far and wide into situations preceding the present. and this would be a major concern, where it will be stopped and if it will be obstructed from actually getting to earlier connections. by this I mean that this situation, from the 2000 election forward, provides plenty of questions for the issues now at center stage, and thus it is curious if the connections which were at the time questioned, such as the Energy Task Force led by VP Cheney, Enron's Ken Lay, and Halliburton, and held off-record by Judge Scalia, a VP Cheney friend confidant during a Supreme Court challenge to public access to these records, and the subsequent distancing of Enron and its plans for global domination of the oil and broadband markets - and the billions in bankruptcy while he remains living in a Houston penthouse - at the same time a role of Halliburton being handed contracts for the rebuilding of Iraq, and hurricane redevelopments, in no-bid contracts, would seem to indicate a conflict of interest in writing public energy policies-- which have left the .US in strategic and security limbo as a direct result of these same conflicts of interest realized in other events. For instance, documents of the Energy Task Force led by VP Cheney had somehow included maps of the oilfields of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, and other places in regards to planning out .US energy policy - potentially also in relation to the .US war in Iraq - and it was Dan Bartlett (if memory serves) or it may have been Andrew Card who could not explain how such documents were involved in the meeting, or why James Baker, the Bush family liason, was involved in moving these maps of oilfields between Cheney (oil executive), Bush (oil executive), and others (Rice, Baker, Bush Sr., others). such maps of the oilfields were, at the time, speculated and feared as being of some larger design for the invasion of several countries to take over the oil-fields, yet such a strategy would be hard to imagine, given that there was no reporting going on, nor any basic oversight into the private energy meetings or the WHIG (White House Iraq Group) and likely other 'groups'. such as any involving energy policy and planning related to Iraq and oil fields and their possible connection to Enron, Halliburton, and the .US military as a tool of private corporate strategy. 2,000 dead .US
nettime .US nuclear pols
(check - check, 1 - 2 - 3 -, testing - testing. can you hear me? check check, testing. are you ready? check check...) over the years on this list a general premise has been that electromagnetism is a realm where politics operates today, and to offer some examples of this, whether by way of the use of media, focus of topics such as nuclear or I.T., or the issues that becomes central during current events. it has thus been surprising how this electromagnetic context has provided a single view of the last few years, in that the issues of energy and oil, war and weapons, media and ideas have coalesced in such a way as to potentially offer insight in the cohesiveness of events though they may otherwise be seen as disconnected by division of topics, viewpoints, etc. it is a critical time here in the .US, these next few weeks will change the direction of the world, most certainly, and which way it is still unknown --- one aspect is the .US investigation into the leaking of an undercover CIA agent's information in retaliation for challenging the cause for the war going in Iraq. the agent was versed in WMD, the case for war was nuclear, the fabricated evidence from aluminum tubes, satellite images, and yellowcake uranium, to the Vice President and Condi Rice referencing a NY Times story by Judith Miller, justified such a view of nuclear 'mushroom clouds' if the .US does not enter into a pre-emptive war with Iraq, outside the .UN's own IAEA (atomic energy agency) which, as with others, raised serious doubts about the claims being made (and Mr. El Baradei and the IAEA was just awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last week), while there is still more to go on the agenda, it would appear... the big question may be where this ends up, as an investigation as it could either be contained into a certain segment of inquiry or it could go far and wide into situations preceding the present. and this would be a major concern, where it will be stopped and if it will be obstructed from actually getting to earlier connections. by this I mean that this situation, from the 2000 election forward, provides plenty of questions for the issues now at center stage, and thus it is curious if the connections which were at the time questioned, such as the Energy Task Force led by VP Cheney, Enron's Ken Lay, and Halliburton, and held off-record by Judge Scalia, a VP Cheney friend confidant during a Supreme Court challenge to public access to these records, and the subsequent distancing of Enron and its plans for global domination of the oil and broadband markets - and the billions in bankruptcy while he remains living in a Houston penthouse - at the same time a role of Halliburton being handed contracts for the rebuilding of Iraq, and hurricane redevelopments, in no-bid contracts, would seem to indicate a conflict of interest in writing public energy policies-- which have left the .US in strategic and security limbo as a direct result of these same conflicts of interest realized in other events. For instance, documents of the Energy Task Force led by VP Cheney had somehow included maps of the oilfields of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, and other places in regards to planning out .US energy policy - potentially also in relation to the .US war in Iraq - and it was Dan Bartlett (if memory serves) or it may have been Andrew Card who could not explain how such documents were involved in the meeting, or why James Baker, the Bush family liason, was involved in moving these maps of oilfields between Cheney (oil executive), Bush (oil executive), and others (Rice, Baker, Bush Sr., others). such maps of the oilfields were, at the time, speculated and feared as being of some larger design for the invasion of several countries to take over the oil-fields, yet such a strategy would be hard to imagine, given that there was no reporting going on, nor any basic oversight into the private energy meetings or the WHIG (White House Iraq Group) and likely other 'groups'. such as any involving energy policy and planning related to Iraq and oil fields and their possible connection to Enron, Halliburton, and the .US military as a tool of private corporate strategy. 2,000 dead .US soldiers tens of thousands of dead Iraqis later, and the failure to secure any of the original objectives of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, save its 'democracy', and yet talk remains of the original agenda, as it was stated by another country of .US battle planning, that Syria and Iran would be next in line after Iraq. and once again the nuclear context is a pre-text, and the .US is to potentially isolate itself by continuing the same policy agenda without any insight into the earlier justifications - with no real understanding of how it fits together at a time when the .US President was elected- on election day, no less, the lowest prices for gasoline in the .US on that day, while the electrical grid was being turned off by Enron in California, and other such 'conspiring' events.
nettime oh New Orleans...
[i am sending this to nettime to pose a question about the role of the .US constitution as code, and how it may relate to hurricane Katrina, before, and reconstruction efforts after. it is based on a series of posts relating people to transistors which is linked at the end, based on some previous writings. this is more of a rant than anything else, yet i send it out in case others have comments or ideas about this aspect... it is part of the electronetwork site electronetwork.org and a list http://groups-beta.google.com/group/electronetwork-l which was were this post originated, forwarded here. brian] i've been wanting to write something hopeful about the most recent cataclysmic disaster in New Orleans, yet it has been hard to sustain hope, the deluge is complete. it would seem that there are so many problems of such a scale, and in my opinion - no one - in government or public life who is capable of handling any one of these, less the dozens that concurrently are going on at once. they all relate to policy, in one way or another, decision- making and ideas of planning. excepting that 'planning' is considered rather retrograde for the current managers of the machinery of state, the political 'managerial' class has a different philosophy about how things really work, which may be split from a reality others may share, live. in other words, ideologies do not match issues we face. [**correction: the following is a misstatement/mistaken way of trying to say: that energy policy (in the .US) is unrelated to economic policy, is unrelated to transportation policy, is unrelated to housing policy,... national security,... etc.] for instance, in policy many are compartmentalized into industrial methodologies, which are unconnected with other areas in which these same things interact: such as with energy policy and its role in inflation or raising costs of living, in turn, bankruptcy of industries not adapting to changing patterns (airlines), else raising of fees (UPS), else the cost of some smoked almonds at a grocery store and running machinery, materials, packaging, shipping. there is so much that could be approached through this situation and yet words are almost too difficult a way to frame ideas which are so vast. i was going to draw the bubble diagrams in an attempt to enter into aspects of perception, reality, media, representation, cyberspace, and then issues of race, logic, language, psychology- and to reference why, when this is happening in New Orleans it is perceived as different from elsewhere in the world, such as Africa, which have been in states of despair for decades. what is going on with issues of representation? why is the crisis and responsibility perceived one way in one instance, and another in another instance? i believe it is another indication of the role of a conceptualization of how we are trained to think about things (perceiving, judging reality, even) that goes to the core of 'the constitution' of the self, in the sense previously written about on list, with regard to the individual as a state and a state of individuals. if one looks at the 'source code' which in the .US has been programming relations between individuals in this state, it was composed by minds which were, in the time of its writing, slave owning white americans who, as a public group of men, decided to declare a common public which could be open to evolving of the principles beyond their limitations, including the ideas of equality, rights, justice, liberty, privacy, etc. the .US constitution created a framework with bugs, which are evident in any .US city and which has often been ignored or disregarded as a structural necessity to keep and maintain the current system working as is. that has been an accepted 'moral' and 'ethical' lapse of a utopic vision, which if only everyone followed ideas of certain political managers, all would be redeemed and it is the people who are imperfect, not the ideas. no need to demythologize issues of race or class in relation to the issues New Orleans, in relation to the issues of policy - programming of how individuals are interacting in making the larger state function, how and why, where and who-for. it is only limited by imagination how things could work, for what purpose, by reasoning. thus why after 200 years of a constitution could there be such a difference between what is said to be real, and what actually exists? how can there be multiple views of what is going on, and yet no agreed upon 'reality'? the news media (at least this once) brought multiple perspectives to bear upon a situation in which aspects of the panoptic prison of media representations finally had to square with views outside agreed-upon constructs. it is one of the few times when having multiple television news organizations
Re: nettime commercial communism
hi Dave, my apologies for being slow in responding to your interesting observations. what surprises me is that everyone has a different perspective about the questions and i had not considered these points of view, so it is exciting to consider it further... one difference i tend to see between views is that of making them tangible in examples which could/can be related to everyday experience. whereas it is a bit hard for me to realize a literal manifestation, as it is still an abstraction for me and it may not correspond 1:1 to more developed views of culture in which the economics/politics/sociality are more clear, or less fuzzy. i don't know so i am going to put some more ideas out here in case others have a better idea of what this really is as a questioning. for me it is not traditional categories of commerce, and political organization which bounds the ideas of commercial communism or social capitalism. it does not seem to be a thing, possibly it is more of some kind of process, a manifestation of proceeding in a certain way, regardless of mission statements, etc. maybe it is a type of organization of effort, work, though, and maybe this appraisal is confused as it is only a sketch whereas others who know structures that relate to these concepts, inside and out, could bring greater fidelity to the domain of these ideas. i.e. a given corporation can function with a type of governance, even to succeed as a model of governing, and yet there would still likely be a dynamic which could pursue social capital vs 'communal commerce' or commercial communism (to me it is close to being equivalent and neutral, to this idea). i guess what i am trying to get at, as an idea, is that it may not be 'traditional', rather conceptual, possibly, in relation to superstructural relations with these ideas as they are usually contextualized. it may be a function of bureaucracy vs individualism, or of a type of cultural determinism, which is also not one or the other as a static choice and pathway, rather a shifting switch for cultural manifestations. for instance, if placing the ideas in a traditional bureaucratic organization, two examples might show a similarity and difference in the way these ideas seem to exist in the macro-sense... Thomas P. Hughes (STS, science-technology-culture) is a historian of technological systems and i believe in one of his works he looks into NASA as an innovational organization of large systems. to me NASA is emblematic of a 'social capital' approach to ideas in which the role of the individual and ability to change, question, review, adjust and to invest in long-term exploration, research and development, and to make it break-even in some cultural sense - shows the potential and a unique value system which harnesses human goals, imaginations, and translates this way. a bureaucracy could not come up with the idea of hitting a comet on the 4th of July and the social value as an event, and real scientific value, etc. there is something about NASA that is in some way a counterpoint to most everything else, in the corporate world, maybe DARPA too (though possibly less altruistic), the national park systems, etc. an aspect that ideas have an overriding value and guide decision-making and ideas of how profit is evaluated. as such it may be how it interacts with the 'frontier' and this makes it a necessity, avant-garde bureaucracy. the opposite approach could be seen in something like the World Trade Center redevelopment efforts where the bureaucracy functions as a giant automatized machinery which 'develops' by way of a process that is fixed and unable to change, to question, as it has an answer of its own design that requires that it does not need to ask particular questions, or special values, as it is a monolithic approach to, say, business-as-usual. it may be a functionalism, a pragmatism that this is how things get done and all that needs to be done is to get out of the way. maybe this is how countries are terraformed over time, developed by fixed processes, like programming code for a 'suburb' as an idea, in which the variables are figured out by earlier tests (in social capital ideas/investments) then to later become steamrollered as a prefigured solution, which may have its profit and economic value in not opening up the processes to questioning (as it would lose its efficiencies this way, reinventing the wheel at every junction, or reinventing the suburb at every city). in this way it may be considered the rear-guard and may function within a simple uninterrupted agenda. the thing about it, is that it would not necessarily have to be a judgment (social capital good, commercial communism bad), as it could feasibly exist as the same time within an organization or approach, in that some problems could
nettime world design
[this is a post i am submitting for nettime publication
not because it is to spread some mistaken notions and
beliefs, but to provoke discussions as it cover a wide
variety of views and it is a contribution towards any
advancements / clarifications / alternative views that
may be more insightful from the larger nettime. brian]
Date -- Sat Jun 25, 2005 3:12:14 PM US/Central
To -- open discussion design-l.v2)(architexturez.net
Subject -- [design] re: world design
[this is an emptying of my brain of angst of the current
situations that i needed to let out, and it may be in-
comprehensible, it probably is, and yet i send it anyway...]
hi Cheryl, you remind me of a friend who was an artist and teacher who
opens things up and keeps imaginations moving and exploring ideas. very
nice.
about emerging art in china - present day artists - and my inital
impression from this art in america slick magazine article was that
freedom to be western artists was supposed to be a positive step
forward for them? my question is - is it just a matter of time before
this brilliant explosion of creativity mellows into the spiral of
western mundane?
these are huge questions and i think worthwhile to enter into further
as i think the .US reality-distortion mechanism is part of a doctrinal
world-view that no longer reflects the situation accurately.
culturally, China could probably swallow the world whole, compared to
the .US which has grafted itself into infrastructures of other
societies. yet China would also likely have to eject the world just as
it swallowed it as no matter how big a nation-state gets and tries to
become a world-state/the world-estate, it would likely have to survive
and succeed beyond the same situations the .US finds itself in now,
with a particularized universalist ('modern') rhetoric yet a finite
view of what that is and a rigidity that does not scale as well as it
is locally believed.
for instance, consider the .UN global organization that attempts to
politically represent the world today. it is a type of consensus based
on appointed bureaucrats (not elected) who mediate international,
regional, and issue-based affairs and policies. yet whole segments of
the world are outside of its current workings, the representation is
modeled in a type of nationalism that is to become global consensus of
competing views, when or if it can work. the idea of rhetoric is often
of 'world community' that this .UN is said to represent or to call to.
and yet, what 'united nations' are actually represented of the world as
a community? is the United Nation an organization that scales
internationalism beyond specific states and into another scale of
interactions, or does it reside operating within separated statehoods,
a finite multidimensional chess games that gets stuck over time, and
begins to wind-down in its ability to function, to represent 'nations'
and instead 'nationalism' in the world-scale, ... the point being that
there is a United Nation today and its name is the USA. not nations,
nation. what the .UN is trying to do, the USA cannot do, and that is
represent the World Community beyond competing nationalisms, as a
cooperative and collaborative state based on shared principles. yet if
looking at, say, .UN websites, much of the middle-east is not
represented online in the way western countries are in the .UN
structure. if memory serves, Palestine does not even have an official
website, other states lack them or choose to not represent themselves
in this way, which reflects something amiss in the even distribution of
such organization.
why are their ghettos and ghosttowns in .UN webspace, or wars in
certain .UN districts while others play 3D Nukem games about killing
everything and anything that moves while living in a hothouse suburban
world theater complex.
the inability of the .UN to function beyond nationalism, considering
the goals of the .UN to be some kind of ideal beyond the nation-state
yet bounded by nation-states- yet the next level of evolution may have
been solidified in its workings for the past 50 years, the constant aim
of achieving 'world community' as a common reference/referent. world
community as an idea begs for peace, common interests, shared policies.
'united nations' begs for competition, war, leverage, ideological
struggles of the centuries, and unshared assumptions and goals and
issues of power, weak and strong, dominance and submission, etc.
with this in mind, the role of China's development in a broken .UN
context would be a further reeling back of advances into a hyper
competition, world war, machined ethics for automated state, and
ideologies battling for the portrayal of the better of horribly worse
situations as an extension of this decrepit situation of ill-governance
which is pseudo-representative of the nation as world-state, with
contenders, defenders, and issues of misguided empires, etc. it is
Re: nettime The New Middle Ages
i think you point at a crux, this is the ongoing bet and from my point of view it seems like even more disciplining eating away even more personal space, but from the prisoners point of view there is always a finger you can move and if they immobilize that, well you can still click your tonguealthussers 'hey you' is now commodified in the dutch smokingpole [...] it is so strange to me that these two structural lines are so visible, one towards this selfdisciplining, and one towards this selfrealization, as if the default has become the schizophrenic. i wonder about the choices of perspective available in observing these issues and effects, as to me it seems generate something fundamental about a given outcome, or conclusion. the smoking pole thing made me laugh, actually, as i was thinking in terms of revolutionaries and political prisoners and assassinations and such. about the issue of perspective, i had a great teacher once who changed my view of perception/observation as a result of making the case that 'scientific' observation not only means counting, but also being counted, and in including this perspective in one's own analyses. that is, the perceiver is perceived, and thus grounded in the observation by an outside accounting, to an extent. therefore, it is not just 'look over there' at event X, but that the looker at place Y is part of that event X in perceiving it, e.g. from a place and point of view Z. and this is where the universal is more readily sensed about local and particular events, more universal subject. X --- Y ^ Z the philosophy it is from is part of the nettime archive: http://amsterdam.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-0104/msg00140.html 'The objective plane is the space of science. It is, above all, a public space, but existentially apart and quite literally Over There. When a person can perceive the world in that plane, (s)he has become a scientist. When a person can perceive him(her)self in that plane, (s)he has become self consciously public, perfectly anonymous and truly modern; -- the voyeur and the scientist's dream. A state constituted about the objective plane is rationalized around anonymity rather than belief. This defines the dilemma of education.' (it would seem to be common sense and yet few arguments get beyond X, usually by editing out points of Y that may challenge thinking, and never even accessing Z... to me it has to do with a question of scale in which logical approaches can effectively limit possibilities, which is reflected in assumptions and contingent reason. there is a paradox of observation, it would seem, that needs to at least be recognized if not accommodated...) as such the 'anonymous' point of view (POV) would be able to be assumed, it could be a smoking pole or executions, in the same questioning, and both have relevance if it is in the realm of Z, where interpretations can co-exist...* it is the basis for the smoking pole, it would seem if it is to include social behaviorism and pressures, by way of some Pavlovian dog-training exercise to humiliate smokers and treat them like dogs, and while this may seem to be a prison it may be considered also of one's own making, at a certain point, that the absurdity is more than just an abstract event, but that it is purposeful to produce some desired outcome. like, lung disease and controlling the environment from events and those who produce them, from another perspective it prisoners make prisoners of others (non-smokers, etc.). whether or not one smokes, in either case there seems to be something shared about the aspect of behavioral manipulation (of a state, say) and its right to pursue this, for its own good, up to a point (ethics, law, morality). it may be for its long- term survival, at one scale, and yet may make some very miserable and uncomfortable and oppressed at another. maybe this is okay, though, actually, at some line in the cosmic sand, in order to change and adapt to change. such as, smoking kills people and costs enormous sums of money in lives, lost productivity, and problems. if the smoking pole is the worst persecution for smokers, they'd be glad they're not committing crimes in Rome, where i recently read they'd throw people in sacks with an angry dog, snake, or ape, and toss them in the sea. standing by a smoking pole may not be the worst option, and subsequent fears are more to do with passive killing neighbors, 'slow motion suicide' of cigarette death-tax. paranoia, fear, persecution may be real for a smoker, or trouble-makers, and to what extent is it based on promotion of fears and issues of security, in certain contexts, or upon taking risks and then getting burned because you lose the bet and have to face the situation. i tend to think it is more likely the latter, and
nettime The New Middle Ages
hi Rob. enjoyed reading your essay/thoughts. one thing came to mind about the issue of 'fear' versus peace. is it possible that it is assumed to be 'fear' and may indeed be fear that is translated by the actions, and yet it is possibly also a new context of risk, risk-taking, and that this is the ongoing bet? that in this arena risk and reward again go at it, war and peace too, though recontextualized? i do not know but you have me contemplating it. brian bc -- http://www.mnartists.org/brian_carroll # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
