Aunt Pittypat, my smelling salts! A debate has grown contentious!
Look, I quite realize that decent folks feel discomfort rather than pleasure at the sight of a train-wreck and that similar sensibilities often flow at the sight of a debate grown personal -- especially where one sees that some participant in a debate who is likely a nice enough person otherwise is saying intemperate things they are sure to regret afterward.
Over at Accelerating Future the inevitable call for calm has been issued from among the disputants to my Superlative Technology Critique, and probably a good thing too in some respects. But as questions of tone and propriety come to the forefront in this moment, it is important that the calls for good sense not function to obscure the actual substance revealed in these exchanges.
It seems to me that deeply felt debates really often are contentious and it makes as little sense to bemoan the fact as to bemoan the fact of gravity. Why shouldn't real stakeholder differences express the actual stakes that differ? Indeed, for my part, where apparent easy unanimity and proprieties prevail in a discursive setting I usually become a bit uneasy, assuming either that I have found my way into an airless and dead orthodoxy or, worse, a superficial controlled calm beneath the surface of which there are sure to be ugly violences in play that keep real differences of opinion and experience submerged for the sake of the comfort of the privileged.
To draw on recent experience elsewhere, we have all grown wary of mainstream media narratives in which a dedication to "balance" falsely equates outrageous lies and lawlessness with those who would combat them, as likewise we have all grasped how often calls for "propriety" among the grey eminences of incumbent interest in the Washington and New York machine-political and media establishments function to police majority protest at wrongdoing into silent acquiescence.
It would be foolish to deny the obvious truth and power at the heart of calls for respectfulness and decency and "raising the tone" -- since we all would rather live in a world where respect, decency, and sense prevail. The actual truth at the heart of such appeals derives from the emancipatory capacity of every human being to be sensible and critical in the face of shared problems. But it would be exactly as foolish to mistake the truth and power of such calls as a matter of something good for its own sake (conservative propriety for propriety's sake) rather than good as a means to an end (progressive propriety for the facilitation of collective problem solving and free expression).
The fact is that the content, let alone the tone, of some discussions cannot be "raised," except to expose what is low in them. To content oneself with a falsifying propriety in which low things get said while all the participants dance a nice stiff minuet is the sort of pretense I don’t have much stomach for.
I must admit that if I were Michael Anissimov, though, I would certainly use this moment as the excuse to shut the current contentious discussion of Superlativity down — inasmuch as the longer it continues the more reactionaries and True Believers will be exposed among his readership, very much to the cost of the contrary impression he needs to make given his long-term goals. (Needless to say, in his coping with the demands of a sometimes unruly readership I find that I can't help but rather sympathize with him.)
What follows is the text of a response to an e-pistle I received earlier this morning, which was the proximate inspiration for this morning's post. I won't reveal the author of the original nor quote the text to which I respond, due to my uncertainty of that author's intentions in the matter. But the response does expand on some of the issues in play in today's post, for those who are interested in my argument here and in the larger context of the ongoing debates at hand:
ReplyDeleteTEXT OF MY LETTER:
I disagree that ridiculing the ridiculous is incompatible with making a more "legitimate" sort of case elsewhere and otherwise.
I do both; it's quite easy to do both; different contexts demand different responses and so it may well be perfectly appropriate to do both, and more.
I simply and strongly disagree with your overgeneral assertion that it is more important to "raise the debate" by pretending indifference to actually existing pathological discourses or potentially pernicious movements (in my honest estimation -- if you have reason to disagree with that estimation then you and I can have a serious exchange on that question of the kind you claim to prefer) rather than simply exposing them to the costly and marginalizing ridicule they deserve early rather than being forced to cope with them later.
It seems to me that it is only because I have indeed made a sustained case for my position that I occupy the place from which I can comfortably ridicule some particularly extreme and symptomatic expressions like Wang's and, similarly, it is only because he fails to respond to my case in any kind of actually responsive way that he has opened himself to my ridicule in the first place.
Do such contextual details figure at all into your rather Olympian assessment of the exchange at hand?
Sometimes arguments take these more energetic forms -- do you imagine every debate is a tea party?
My critique of Superlative Technological Discourses began as and consists mostly as a general case: that's how I formulated it, I am perfectly content to do so. If Brian Wang or other Singularitarians or transhumanists or whatever they want to call themselves want to come forward and exemplify the attitudes I critique in the case I have made then you can expect I will treat them as such examples: it is clarifying, it is enjoyable within limits, it may even provide a wholesome pedagogical instruction to the educable, ignorant, or underexperienced among the partisans of these attitudes and movements I critique.
I must say I am a bit suspicious of your framing of the exchange, which pretty much ignores any substantial differences in the positions being expressed in this exchange, as well as ignoring the expressed stakes that drive the exchange, while instead you seem to assume a perspective from which you can pretend to the "balance" of a caricature in which two cartoon "bullies" or "elitists" duke it out in a mammalian hierarchical struggle or what have you.
Indeed, in putting the case this way aren't you exhibiting the sort of argumentative hanky-panky you presumably so disapprove that you took the trouble to write this letter to me in the first place?
I have enormous respect for the skills of scientists, and regularly testify to that fact in my teaching and writing, far more so than some colleagues of mine that I know of. To the extent that Brian is engaging in legitimate testable publishable scientific practices I have no interest at all in suggesting his efforts are "hogwash." What on earth gave you the contrary impression?
If he is making untested, even untestable, and indeed uncaveated claims about "transcendence" through technology, he is no longer speaking as a scientist, even if he is one in his workaday life and even if he uses the word "technology" rather than God or consciousness or what have you in making his Superlative case. In such circumstances I can argue with him (or if the circumstances warrant it, ridicule him) on those terms -- just as I would argue as a theorist concerning Einstein's writings on nonviolence or socialism (I wouldn't, since I happen to admire Einstein's positions on these questions, but that is beside the point), even though I would not do so concerning his physical theories.
As it happens, Brian Wang regularly disdains the sorts of skills to which I am devoted, but ultimately this is neither here nor there (although it is another way in which your "balance" and "parity" is a falsifying one here). The truth is that there are plenty of skilled scientists who understand my position perfectly well on its own terms and approve of it.
You won't gain much insight about the conflict at hand by attributing it to Snow's Two Cultures and then assigning Brian Wang the status of exemplary scientist according to that model.
I think it is much easier to understand what is afoot here to see it politically, either as a typical clash between a diversity democrat (me) with a elite technocrat (Brian), or between a secularist (me) and a True Believer (Brian). These analogies aren't perfect fits, but I venture to suggest they capture more than the analogy of schoolyard bullies grunting in the sun. Perhaps you would need to actually know me to understand how far off the mark you likely are here.
I strongly disagree that transhumanists wedded to Superlative and Sub(cult)ural formulations can be expected to "come along" on the own to a more reasonable way of thinking in the fullness of time -- any more than I would think that Scientologists or Randian Objectivists will inevitably do so (though, no doubt, some will).
In fact I think any number of bright people who might otherwise make a real contribution to a secular democratic consensual technoscientifically literate and empowered planetary civilization, peer to peer, are instead caught up in an idiotic self-marginalizing cul-de-sac from within which they are generating verbiage that perniciously disseminates deranging and hyperbolic formulations into public deliberation about technoscientific change (to the cost of all) and at once providing any number of rationalizations for incumbent interests who would use emerging technologies to exacerbate injustice (to the benefit of elites).
It is wrong for you to pretend that my exchange with Brian constitutes a kind of violence (to do so frankly denigrates actually-existing violence in the world that we must all abhor), and it is likewise wrong for you to suggest that progressivism and liberality are so timid and innervated that they can't call spades spades and expose pernicious anti-democratizing idiocy for what it is before it has a chance to do real harm.
I respect that as a matter of style, however, you appreciate these acerbic moments of mine less than you would my more analytic ones. You can certainly expect more of both to come, and I would suggest you should skip over the ones that don't appeal to you. Or, if you really think I am wrongheaded, post a response and we can begin a conversation on the matter, as I have tried to do honestly here.
Thanks for your attention and interest, and my best to you, Dale
> The fact is that the content, let alone the tone, of some
ReplyDelete> discussions cannot be "raised," except to expose what is
> low in them. . .
>
> I must admit that if I were Michael Anissimov, though,
> I would certainly use this moment as the excuse to shut the
> current contentious discussion of Superlativity down — inasmuch
> as the longer it continues the more reactionaries and
> True Believers will be exposed among his readership, very much
> to the cost of the contrary impression he needs to make given
> his long-term goals.
"Extropians became an offshoot of transhumanism, finding philosophical
homes in _The Fountainhead_ and _Atlas Shrugged_. Like Ayn Rand,
they were tired of being held back by nannying government and
worrywart religionists. There is some debate within Extropianism and
transhumanism about just how libertarian the movements are but
they believe in the Heinleinian concept of glorifying brain power. They
think that only a few people are smart enough and daring enough to
accept the Extropian challenge and they will be the ones who are
saved. The uninitiated, the retrograde Volk trapped by religious superstition
and fear of the new, well, they will be left behind."
-- Brian Alexander, _Rapture: How Biotech Became the New Religion_
Chapter 4, "Arise, Lazarus Long"
"Ultimately, something in me rebels against the extremity
of Extropian-style political and ethical philosophy. Perhaps
it’s just my biological heritage, but I can’t shake the idea
that there’s a core of ethical truth going beyond the
cultural and biological relativity of moral codes? I posed
this question once on the Extropians e-mail list, 4 or 5
years ago. I posited that compassion, simple compassion,
was an ethical universal, although it might manifest itself
in different ways in different cultures and different species.
I suggested that compassion, in which one mind extends
beyond itself to feel the feelings of others and act for the
good of others without requiring anything in return, was
essential to the evolution of the complex self-organizing
systems we call cultures and societies. Basically, I
expressed my disbelief that all human interaction is, or
should be, economic in nature.
The deep intellectual and ethical discussion that I was
awaiting – well, no such luck. There was a bit of flaming,
some impassioned Ayn Rand-ish refutations, and then
they went back to whatever else they’d been talking
about, unfazed by my heretical position that perhaps
transhumanism and humanism could be compatible,
that technological optimism wasn’t logically and irrefutably
married to libertarian politics. At that time, you could only
belong to their e-mail list for free for 30 days; after that
you had to pay an annual subscription fee [!! Before my
time.] After my 30 days expired, I chose not to pay the
fee, bemused that this was the only e-mail list I knew
of that charged members money, but impressed by their
philosophical consistency in this matter.
My final impression of the Extropians? I admire their
courage in going against conventional ways of thinking,
in recognizing that the human race is not the end-all of
cosmic evolution, and in foreseeing that many of the
moral and legal restrictions of contemporary society
are going to be mutated, lifted or transcended as
technology and culture grow. Like them, I’m outraged
and irritated when governments stop us from experimenting
with our minds and bodies using new technologies --
chemical or electronic or whatever. I find their writings
vastly more fascinating than most things I read. They’re
looking far toward the future, exploring regions of
concept-space that would otherwise remain unknown,
and in doing so they may well end up pushing the
development of technology and society for the better.
But yet, I’m a bit vexed by their vision of themselves as
supertechnological proto-Ubermensches, presiding over
the inevitable obsolescence of humanity.
It’s simultaneously attractive, amusing and disturbing.
Nietzsche. . . was generally an exemplary human being
in spite of the inhuman aspects of his philosophy. Yet
many years after his death, Nietzsche’s work played a
role in atrocities, just as he’d bitterly yet resignedly foreseen.
In the back of my mind is a vision of a far-future hyper-technological
Holocaust, in which cyborg despots dispense air at fifty
dollars per cubic meter, citing turn-of-the-millenium Extropian
writings to the effect that humans are going to go obsolete
anyway, so it doesn’t make much difference whether we
kill them off now or not. And so, I think Extropians should
be read, because they’ve thought about some aspects
of our future more thoroughly than just about anyone else.
But I also think that the key idea that makes their group
unique -- the alliance of transhuman technology with
simplistic, uncompassionate libertarian philosophy –
must be opposed with great vigor.
No philosophy can do justice to the full richness of human
experience – philosophies are abstractions, and the role
of abstractions is not to replace the specifics from which
they emerge, but rather to guide the development of these
specifics. But some philosophies capture more human
richness than others, and it seems to me that Extropianism
ranks fairly low on this scale. Extropian philosophy is a
sufficiently inaccurate abstraction of the course of human
and technological progress that it can’t be trusted as a
guide for the evolution of the cyberworld. And in this light,
the “fringe” nature of the Extropian group seems quite
fortunate. There seems to be very little risk of the ideas
of this cabal of Californian would-be supermen dominating
our future. All signs indicate that they will continue to
contribute to our collective conversation on techno-cultural
evolution, but are very unlikely to acquire the power to
impose their ideas on the rest of us. And this is a very
good thing."
-- Ben Goertzel
"The Extropian Creed: Can High Technology and
Libertarian Politics Lead us to a Transhuman Golden Age?"
(September, 2000)
http://www.goertzel.org/benzine/extropians.htm
Dale wrote:
ReplyDelete> I won't reveal the author of the original nor quote the text
> to which I respond, due to my uncertainty of that author's
> intentions in the matter.
>
> TEXT OF MY LETTER:
>
> I disagree that ridiculing the ridiculous is incompatible
> with making a more "legitimate" sort of case elsewhere and
> otherwise. . .
>
> I simply and strongly disagree with your overgeneral assertion
> that it is more important to "raise the debate" by pretending
> indifference to actually existing pathological discourses or potentially
> pernicious movements. . .
>
> Do. . . contextual details figure at all into your rather
> Olympian assessment of the exchange at hand?
>
> . . .
>
> I am a bit suspicious of your framing of the exchange. . .
> [Y]ou seem to assume a perspective from which you can pretend
> to the "balance" of a caricature in which two cartoon "bullies"
> or "elitists" duke it out in a mammalian hierarchical struggle
> or what have you.
>
> Indeed, in putting the case this way aren't you exhibiting the
> sort of argumentative hanky-panky you presumably so disapprove
> that you took the trouble to write this letter to me in the first
> place?
>
> . . .
>
> You won't gain much insight about the conflict at hand by attributing
> it to Snow's Two Cultures and then assigning Brian Wang the status of
> exemplary scientist according to that model. . .
>
> I strongly disagree that transhumanists wedded to Superlative and
> Sub(cult)ural formulations can be expected to "come along" on their
> own to a more reasonable way of thinking in the fullness of time --
> any more than I would think that Scientologists or Randian Objectivists
> will inevitably do so. . .
>
> . . .
>
> It is wrong for you to pretend that my exchange with Brian constitutes
> a kind of violence (to do so frankly denigrates actually-existing
> violence in the world that we must all abhor), and it is likewise wrong
> for you to suggest that progressivism and liberality are so timid and
> innervated that they can't call spades spades and expose pernicious
> anti-democratizing idiocy for what it is before it has a chance to do
> real harm.
>
> I respect that as a matter of style, however, you appreciate these
> acerbic moments of mine less than you would my more analytic ones.
> You can certainly expect more of both to come, and I would suggest
> you should skip over the ones that don't appeal to you. . .
I'm gonna make a (pretty plausible, I think) guess at the identity of your
interlocutor here: Dr. James J. Hughes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Hughes
Keep up the acerbity, Miz Scarlett! (Aunt Pittypat, don't you **dare**!)
Well, I don't mean to fan the flames of a guessing game, but, no, it definitely was not James Hughes who wrote that letter.
ReplyDelete> Well, I don't mean to fan the flames of a guessing game,
ReplyDelete> but, no, it definitely was not James Hughes who wrote
> that letter.
Well, I'm out of guesses in that case, but more curious than
ever, I must admit.
The clash is between an self-admitted ill-mannered "debator" whose primary satisfaction is from trying to put his opponents on emotional tilt. I believe verbal bully is accurate. You always want to "raise the tone" and the discomfort. Again you have said this yourself. I can answer it with the same level of vitriol without getting aggitated because I know your real objectives and know that there is not there to anything that you say.
ReplyDeleteJust calling something ridiculous does not make it ridiculous. We are both talking about the future. Thus there are two predictions. One view of the future is more right than the other.
Which goes to the bet I suggested in the prior post. This would be a public way for one of us to be proven right and one to be proven wrong.
So do you really believe you are right? Then prove it.
Look, when your Robot God lays waste to the earth, or Nanosanta brings cornucopia, or you have found your way to your immortalized superbody you will have "proved" you're right even to my satisfaction. Good luck with that.
ReplyDeleteYou claim I worship the technology, but I am willing to put out falsifiable positions. And I believe that I am right sufficiently to risk money on it.
ReplyDeleteYour are unwilling to test your "faith" in your guaranteed minimum income, or progressive taxes or universal healthcare or greater democracy. Probably because you know that your causes do indeed have less chance in happening. So which is more ridiculous ? Steady and increasing improvements in life expectancy, increasing usage of AI (already influencing the financial markets and billions of dollars), 4.5 million robots in the united states (vacuuming and building product), technology that is driving productivity growth at steadily increasing rates OR causes that have no chance of happening. The United States will not turn socialist or adopt the levels of progressive tax or socialized medicine that you want and espouse.
Yours is the fringe element represented in milder form by Kucinich. He only is pushing for the $300 people's dividend. Democrat Mike Gravel proposed a $5000 minimum income. Mike is less popular than Kucinich.
More people are modifying and trying to enhance themselves. 3 million in the US use steroids. Millions use cognitive enhancing drugs for academic tests (1 in 10) probably that level at your university of Berkeley. You are encountering more people who have chosen enhancement and will use improved versions as they become available than who will support your extreme socialist agenda.
None of you really believe america will turn socialist. So you are the ones who are supporting causes that are less real. And your support and belief in your cause is weak. You fear having it proven to be wrong.
Yes technology will increase production and profits mostly will go to those who own the technology via shares. Because you (and your kind) are useless then you have to try to steal from those who are productive. The very system of Democracy (which you love so much) ensures that little gets passed and what does gets compromised. Climate change bills may get passed but the biggest polluters coal will probably get most of the money (as they do in the UK). Tax bills get passed but with massive loopholes carved out by the high priced lawyers. Without technology making the pie bigger, you would have Africa.
> Because you (and your kind) are useless then you have
ReplyDelete> to try to steal from those who are productive.
I believe the approved Ayn Randian technical term is
"looters".