Using Technology to Deepen Democracy, Using Democracy to Ensure Technology Benefits Us All

Monday, October 14, 2013

Know Nothingism

It pays to remember that the same macroeconomic illiterates who are ready to crash the global economy are also climate change denialists ready to crash the environment.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Robot cult grows ever stronger. I'm so thankful that Glenn Beck finds time to remind everyone about all the ever-pressing issues Americans face today, such as the second coming of the Robot Jesus and... all that other important stuff.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg6q36ZT8tY

Dale Carrico said...

I can't say that I agree that the fact that serially-failing fearmonger conspiracist prophet Glenn Beck is adding Ray Kurzweil to his bag of tricks is an indication of growing strength for the Robot Cult rather than representing its death-rattle. My more nuanced take is that there is indeed a lot of real money and organizational energy accumulating in some quarters of superlative futurology and I do think there is a lot of damage that these people can do when they frame technoscience policy debates and derange sensible deliberation on health, defense, environmental, development policy questions and so on. I worry more about the susceptibility of left wonks to this nonsense than the wingnuts, to be honest, tho' wingnuts definitely deploy futurological conceits in efforts to dismantle social security and fund military boondoggles, to be sure. However, it would be a real mistake to treat these developments as the whole picture. There is a rich vein of skepticism and incredulity about techno-hype and corporate-militarist marketing hype growing out there. Futurological conceits are receiving scientifically and historically literate critical pushback now in ways I despaired of ever seeing a decade ago. I think one can easily mistake the shoring up of an institutional presence for some singularitarian, eugenicist, and existential-risk futurology with an arrival at a prevalence which is actually more like the arrival at a permanently marginalized but self-sustaining subculture. I feel more optimistic than ever, believe it or not.

Unknown said...

I always forget a casual ";-)" at the end of my snarky posts. Indeed it is hard to imagine a more clownish and pernicious figure to get endorsement from. Bryan Fischer maybe, but I doubt I would strike it lucky twice.

Dale Carrico said...

I should have realized!