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EdenicFaithful

Dark Wizard of Ravenclaw

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joined 2022 September 04 18:50:58 UTC 

				
User ID: 78


				
				
				

			

		

	














	


		


			



	

		

			

			

				

					

						

							
						

						

							
							

								
EdenicFaithful


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
Dark Wizard of Ravenclaw

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 04 18:50:58 UTC
				


				
					

					
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User ID: 78


					
					
					
				

			


					

						
					



		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
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				Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 24, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's on the list now, thanks.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for November 26, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
No worries.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 25, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
There's probably a lot of confusions in my mind as to what historical greatness really is, so this will likely be a jumble. I apologize if none of this seems to cohere:


I suppose I've landed on the side of those who feel that suffering is in some sense an illusion, and that a state of health and wisdom is in some sense normal. It's the whole "people are fundamentally good" thing, where problems are said to be caused more by a poorly organized environment than by innate problems of the original sin variety. In other words, yes, you can suffer horribly, but when you're back into everyday life, there's probably a way to shake yourself off and carry on as if nothing truly debilitating happened.


The way I see it, the reason that "black box" solutions like AI are popping up is because we're on the cusp of more explicit solutions. I don't think the future is everyone augmenting themselves with ChatGPT, I think the future is us finding a way of spreading knowledge by human hands alone which can compete with ChatGPT in its ability to bring forward implicit knowledge to those who would otherwise take years to learn it. It's probably not even that complicated.


I've rejected the Jungian style of imagination-as-history, where our thoughts stretch back through the ages. It's something more immediate- the feelings of complexity which arise from stories often originate from (universal) structures already existing in the mind, rather than some evolutionary buildup seeking release. So I think what I'm looking for isn't so much an understanding of lost possibility, so much as the state of mind which generates possibility, in the hopes that the stories were intended to be read in such states of mind, and that the message can be heard once I attain it. And I feel as if it can be found in the idea of "character," or in its most reduced form, one's actions. I suppose in this sense I've been studying more the desire to do great works than the great works themselves. The stories seem to be dripping with motive force, and I need to know what that is. Maybe a structure of mind is waiting to be discovered.


I suppose it boils down to a pseudo-gnostic theory that, yes, the goal is to liberate oneself from one's fallen state, but it's probably unusually easy and even normal to do so. One just needs the right knowledge, and nothing will seem so difficult anymore. So the question becomes "what is discipline and thoughtfulness?" and I have a feeling that the price of wisdom is far lower than any of us realizes. The difficulty is in getting it exactly right.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for May 7, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So, what are you reading?


I'm still reading Sargant's Battle for the Mind. Can't say I find him very reliable, but I do wonder if I can find some similarity between the models of the mind which he has laid out and tropes about how humans behave.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for March 19, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
In the end, it's a crime story. The jargon, infighting and dubious motives honestly makes it feel like a good novel to read on vacation to me. Trying to analyze it deeply would lose the momentum. Neuromancer only seemed different because it pulled you into Case's mindset so deeply that one only notices at the end that the story had little intrinsic drive beyond being a crime story. Of course, that was also where the greatness lay.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Wellness Wednesday for February 22, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'm happy to ignore Are You Smarter than a Large Language Model? Seems better to turn off the TV. Priorities, man.


As long as the world isn't exploding, I don't think I need that kind of pointless dialectic.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 25, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
1D protagonist and generic isn't what I remember about it at all, so I'm sure you won't regret sticking with it for a little longer. However it was incredibly long and the author evidently didn't care about any pace other than her own, so I never actually finished it. It switches from intensely emotional stretches to lulls as if there's no difference between the two in the author's mind.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 11, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Munro's translation is highly regarded and I haven't had a reason to regret the choice. I tried a poem form and while it was striking it didn't keep me interested. There's just too many ideas in there, and the essay format is perfect.


I don't know what the best poem version is, but I do remember that Anthony Esolen's version was regarded well.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for October 7, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Down with Zelda! Yes, this was an official ad.


Also, Zeldaaaa!


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 18, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Expression generally.


I think you're not right about the history of Star Trek. Roddenberry was very much a progressive (admittedly, I may be using the word incorrectly; it is at least liberal-international). Look at how the cast of the original Trek was based on racial/national diversity. TNG was a society of people who were so enlightened they moved beyond cash.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 18, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The progressive convictions combined with the overwhelming longing for expression were quintessential Sisko. Sometimes people take the scaffold they were given and turn it into something remarkable, and in this case the politics were just a springboard for Sisko's vision.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 18, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Didn't really care about the politics one way or the other. Sharp writing and a culmination of everything that Sisko was puts it far above any other episode to me. I suppose it wouldn't be as interesting to people who aren't as fascinated by Sisko's visionary nature.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 2, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So, what are you reading?


I'm picking up Kendi's How to Be an Antiracist. It has been on the backlog for a while as an influential book, but a careless thought has finally given me a reason to be interested: I wonder what impact wokeness has had on highly successful minorities.


Paper I'm reading: Thiele's Things Fall Apart: Integrity and Visibility in Democratic Liberal Education.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yeah, Gladwell's monologue near the end was an incredible display of compartmentalism. He really didn't seem to realize what he was saying.




I don’t mean to make light of it at all, but it is one that makes me a little uncomfortable. Because I don’t think that you can ultimately say that trust in institutions is reserved solely for institutions that perfectly match the characteristics of the general population. It is like saying that we don’t trust kindergarten teachers, because kindergarten teachers are over-represented with people having an enormous amount of patience for the temper tantrums of four year olds. I mean they are an extraordinary and very specific subgroup of the population that performs very well in that particular task more generally.




Murray's objections about the disorderly manner they conduct their thoughts was spot on.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Morality is Accidental & Self-Congratulatory
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
This assumes that we generate fictions after the fact, rather than as a primary task. Our sentiments may have some canonical form, of which our various religions are variants of, created in lieu of the real thing. We want to believe, whether in spiritual beings or something like authoritative ethical codes.


It might be that justice has a structure, along with many somewhat-functional counterfeits, and the longings for a justice whose existence was either intellectually intuited or implicitly present in our biology were what first animated us. Materialistic opportunism (as well as viewpoint) would then be an influence applied after the fact which distorts the picture, but perhaps only in relative terms depending on which motive demands dominance (eg. killing for your family's survival). Besides, so long as one doesn't have full understanding, many things may seem plausible which will later be labelled as objectively evil.


Edit: I would add that viewpoint might also be a positive influence, in attempting to harmonize our moralizing (which can easily go off the rails given the lack of a clear standard) with social reality. I think it fits with history: morality has often been an art form which emerges out of dream-like correlations, measurements, and hard-won revitalizing efforts. It goes without saying that small errors in cohesion can lead to terrible consequences- I do not see this as a clear cause for disillusionment.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 11, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So, what are you reading?


I'm starting Laslett's The World We Have Lost. The only thing I know about it is that Yarvin suggested reading it. Seems to be about English life before the Industrial Revolution.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 04, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So, what are you reading?


I'm starting Minsky's Society of Mind, a classic AI text about building minds from smaller, mindless components. The current zeitgeist seems to be moving away from classic AI, but eventually we'll need better understanding of where precisely our machine-learning models fit in the broader scheme of knowledge. "Shut up and scale" doesn't seem entirely satisfactory. Maybe going over some slightly dust-covered ideas might spark some useful thinking. The book itself seems like a mix of aesthetic quirks and precision, and I seem to be in the mood for that.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for February 18, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
In The Public and its Problems, Dewey argues that government is the outgrowth of people observing each other and noticing the consequences of their actions. Officials arise when people try to indirectly control consequences of behaviour which go beyond the immediate people involved. This is in contrast to "original impulses" claimed to be found in people, like some mystic force which drives us towards an ideal form of government. There's something about this book which makes one pause.




Even yet, however, toleration in matters of judgment and belief is largely a negative matter. We agree to leave one another alone (within limits) more from recognition of evil consequences which have resulted from the opposite course rather than from any profound belief in its positive social beneficence. As long as the latter consequence is not widely perceived, the so-called natural right to private judgment will remain a somewhat precarious rationalization of the moderate amount of toleration which has come into being. Such phenomena as the Ku Klux and legislative activity to regulate science show that the belief in liberty of thought is still superficial.




Now, when I read Kant saying Sapere aude! I wonder how his words might seem if viewed in Dewey's framework. I'm not sure that the world needs more disillusionment, but a more realistic appreciation of principles, or rather the origin of arguments which seem principled, might do us some good in evaluating those who argue that they had no choice but to use heavy-handed means to control people. One must become familiar with his tools if he is to use them effectively. And perhaps the people who we hate are sometimes not so different in all their thought processes from the people who we revere.




The Master and his Emissary continues. In McGilchrist's framework, the left hemisphere is more explicit, the right more implicit, and this sometimes manifests in the terms "verbal" and "non-verbal." However, these words themselves seem inadequate, because metaphor, which is ultimately verbal, is in his account the right hemisphere's domain. McGilchrist might say (I can't remember if he did) that our thinking in these terms is itself a left-brain phenomena. In other words, our very idea of "non-verbal" interaction might be subtly misleading us from something profound.


Being myself, I naturally try to shortcut the investigation of this profundity, and have begun to wonder if the internet needs a passive-aggressive quip system. Imagine a smaller italics label on posts, something like a flair on the bottom, one which says EdenicFaithful did not find it necessary to respond to this commenter.


Do we need more room to praise or display aggression in less direct means? We normally think of this in terms of "body language," but this too might be missing the mark.


Of course my first suggestion seems likely to pour gasoline on the fire, but maybe there's a recognizable format which would allow more implicit expression using the mediums available to the internet, including text. Likes and dislikes are, after all, black-and-white, which is in McGilchrist's account a left hemisphere phenomena. Something obvious may be eluding us.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 24, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's the only Kafka I've read, but A Country Doctor is a must-read.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 29, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So far, mixed feelings on The Wretched of the Earth. After reading Sartre's haphazard preface, which bounced from discreditably vicious to euphorically well-written (and admittedly thought-provoking, disconcerting in its assurance of the reader's guilt), Fanon's somewhat more restrained tone is welcome.


Fanon had actual experience in the matters he wrote about, so I'm sure there's some insight here, but I must admit some mild surprise that this often reads like just another pseudo-socialist psychoanalysis. There's so many assumptions involved that one wonders if it ever coheres outside of a narrow interpretation in the context of academic tropes.


In its most basic level, it seems to be arguing that 1. The colonized need a space free from the colonizing culture which purports to be supported by universal values, 2. Various dehumanizing (emasculating?) neuroses take root so long as violent impulses are displaced away from rather than focused towards the colonizer where (he claims) said violence originated, and 3. Since the sole and overriding goal is decolonization, whatever furthers that, even violence, is legitimate. There's a lot more going on that I haven't wrapped my mind around yet, such as his thoughts on how to prevent a revolution from reaching a "reactionary" end, or his analysis of native superstitions.


Unless I'm misinterpreting it, there isn't a one-to-one match with what he writes about and what's going on in Israel. If anything, one wonders what Fanon would say about a permanent state of independently reinforced anger with a theological bent. Furthermore, the question of a realistic endgame can't be ignored if one wishes to invoke Fanon's arguments.


I had the impression before reading that this book was about something like "reclaiming psychological dignity through violence," and while that aspect is present, it definitely isn't a sufficient summary. Fanon's belief in the power of a resistance which faces a seemingly superior force was based on a theory of the colonizer's motives and material needs which constrains his possible reactions, not on psychological factors alone, and it is unclear to me what a similar analysis would say about Israel.


For now, I'm withholding judgement, and wondering what Fanon might say were he alive.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 29, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So, what are you reading?


Still on The Wretched of the Earth. Thoughts below.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 8, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So, what are you reading?


Still on Paradise Lost. It's incredibly boring whenever the good guys are talking.


Paper I'm reading: Csiszar's Seriality and the Search for Order: Scientific Print and its Problems During the Late Nineteenth Century


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 3, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Gundam is about the psychic Newtypes, and the fate of empathy which transcends the factions of war.


If you're short on time, Char's Counterattack is the quickest way to get the flavour of it, however, you will be spoiling the original series. I don't know if it would meet your standards of intellectual, anyways.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for August 6, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So, what are you reading?


I'm still on Herzog's Citizen Knowledge. I haven't read far enough to say much, but some opposing intuitions have started to surface. How she deals with the independence of expertise will make or break the argument.


Her overall approach is insightful, so this may be a good read regardless.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 25, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's just the entire thing, it's all just a large enterprise, and to what end? I guess with all that's been going on with AI (tired subject by now, but), the idea of putting effort into things like evidence standards, law, morality, intrigue, culture, has seemed a little surreal despite myself. And yet the work might be important.


It always seems like people in the past were moved by something that mattered to them. Perhaps I'm wondering what that might have been. I've always been interested, but now it's become a little more personal, and questions of salience have taken on a Promethean quality- the attempt to steal fire.


I don't mean that there's an overt seriousness, just that there's a quasi-superstitious feeling that there's something waiting at the end of the ride (or the read), if I can just pay the minimum necessary fee of discipline and thoughtfulness.