[FRIAM] Motives - Was Abduction

Thu Jan 10 17:26:13 EST 2019

Steve,

First, why *Win Bigly* recommend. Adams' book is his attempt to
understand, to deconstruct and analyze, why he "knew" with complete
certainty that Trump would win simply by observing one of his first
political rallies. From where did that conviction arise? Why was it so
absolute? Adams eventually comes to the conclusion that he was so
certain because he non-consciously, at first, recognized a master
communicator. Most of the book is a series of anecdotal 'experiments'
that fleshed out and confirmed his instinctual reaction at the first
rally. Ultimately it is a cautionary tale: if you can't (my own
editorial position, if you won't) recognize why — despite all the
negatives — he won, you will not be able to defeat him next time.
As to the ethics dimension; you quoted one of Adam's reviewers: *"**But,
when I was in school, we always discussed ethical responsibility of the
persuader and Adams does not. As long as Trump was persuasive he was
going to win and that’s what matters."* This misconstrues what Adams,
who is definitely NOT a Trump fan or even apologist, is saying. A
different metaphor: I am standing on a hill watching as a Tanker truck
filled with, but leaking, 5,000 gallons of gasoline rushing headlong
towards a family minivan and state the obvious, "that truck gonna crush
that minivan and immolate every person nearby," and "the truck outweighs
the minivan by 5 tons, it has no breaks and the truck driver is slumped
over behind the wheel," and "there is nothing the minivan can do about
it unless it is a Transformer in mufti." I am not saying that the truck
crushing the minivan is "what matters." I am in fact saying that
avoiding the disaster is _what matters_ and we might have prevented the
disaster if we had recognized and addressed the factors that made it
inevitable instead of wailing and gnashing teeth about the driver being
a drunk sex offender working for a company that skipped safety
inspections ...
Trump's communication skills ensured that he would win as long as the
opposition focused on the cretin instead of the policy.
Second, Individualism. The list recently struggled with the idea of
labeling (categorizing) people and my response to your question and
observations about individualism will echo some of the labeling
conversation.
I will resist being labeled an "individualist" because every
characterization I have seen on this list is grounded, in one way or
another, on "individual rights." I do not believe that indivdiual's have
"rights," even the inalienable ones, that are not derived entirely from
"individual responsibility."
I am ultimately and absolutely responsible for, not only myself, but,
labeling again, all sentient life. While this seems absurd on its face,
it is directly analogous to the Bodhisattva. (A goal, not an
achievement!)
Corollaries follow: 1) absolute responsibility also means absolute
accountability, including if a mistake is made ("do the crime, do the
time"); 2) a critical dimension of responsibility is acquiring the kind
of 'omniscience' that assures non-attachment; 3) every act (behavior) I
exhibit is both informed and intentional; and 4) the necessary
assumption that everyone else is an "individualist" of this same stripe.
In the above I am an admitted fundamentalist fanatic. However, the
culture I grew up in, both secular and religious, strongly echoes these
ideas. Growing up, I was exposed, pretty much constantly, to the
"Paradise Built in Hell" kind of individual, group, and social behavior.
(Obviously, that was not the only thing to which I was exposed.)
A Geography professor at Macalester College sparked a lifelong interest
in Utopian communities. In addition to the physical environment,I was
interested in the 'mental' environment of values, principles of social
organization, etc.. I have found a lot of other 'echoes' of my concept
of individualism in those that managed to survive multiple generations
(a rarity).
Hope this was on point to what you asked about.

davew

On Thu, Jan 10, 2019, at 9:28 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
> Dave -

> This contribution (Adam's "Win Bigly") and Roger's offering of the
> John Boehner (apparent?) endorsement of the American Cannabis Summit
> helps to remind me of the underlying struggle I am having with some of
> the conversation here, and most of what passes for public conversation
> at large (in and out of the media).> Donald is pretty clear, for example, that even when he is claiming
> moral high-ground, that his primary (singular?) goal is to WIN.
> While I've only read summaries and reviews of Adam's "Bigly", I sense
> that his topic is truly (and singularly?) about being persuasive (aka
> Winning?), up to and including hypnotism (or NLP techniques?).> The American Cannabis Summit video Roger linked suggests that there is
> "wealth" to be had by jumping on the Cannabis bandwagon, comparing it
> to Tobacco, among other things.   The message seems to equate "wealth"
> with "leverage over others"...  without much more than a passing nod
> to the actual enrichment of lives (individually and collectively).
> Without debating whether the widespread legalization and
> commercialization of Cannabis implies/supports some "greater good"> I happen to be reading Rebecca Solnit's "A Paradise Built in Hell"
> which is a deep dive into the theme of how people (sometimes) show
> their best while suffering great disasters.   Particularly in the area
> of community spirit and synergistic cooperation.  She anecdotally and
> analytically reviews disasters from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake
> to Katrina, focusing *mostly* on the positive examples of people
> stepping up individually and collectively to show demonstrate/discover
> their "best selves".   In this, she speaks of the tension between
> "Seeking a better life" and "Seeking a better world".   It is
> suggested that in the face of disaster, the latter is evidently the
> most efficient route to the former, and on the whole, the behaviour of
> individuals in those contexts suggests that such is self-evident.
> She acknowledges that there are plenty of opportunists who *do not*
> apprehend that their "best interests" are supported by cooperation,
> but instead notice that the fragility of their context allows them to
> "exploit" that fragility, and in fact seem convinced that it is not
> only an opportunity but an unction.   In their zero (or negative) sum
> model, the only way to get what they need is to take it (or hoard it)
> from someone else, and *sharing* is deeply suspect at best and> ON the topic of "persuasion" vs "ethics", one of Adam's reviewers
> reflected: "But, when I was in school, we always discussed ethical
> responsibility of the persuader and Adams does not. As long as Trump
> was persuasive he was going to win and that’s what matters."   I
> suppose this is the tension I often experience... between that which
> is "efficacioius" in a (deliberately?) limited context, and that which
> has a larger context and is nominally discussed in terms of ethical
> and moral frameworks.> I was raised in various cultures of "rugged individualism" which
> biases me toward what I perceive to be a *natural/instinctual*
> state of "me first".   I would claim that *fortunately*, I grew
> (over many decades now) into an awareness that while that might be
> the default position to retreat to when all available strategies
> for a larger collective (family, neighborhood, tribe, etc.) seem
> hopeless or negative, that those collectives are a deeply adaptive
> aspect of life's evolution.   Many organisms are capable of living
> in relative isolation from members of their own group, but do seem
> to thrive in groups of their own type but also enhanced by modest
> diversity (forests, savannahs, blooms, pods, hives,  tribes,
> schools, flocks, etc.).> I'm rambling/rattling on (as usual) here, but I'd like to hear your
> (DaveW) perspective on this topic, since you have spoken fairly
> directly to the ideals of individualism.> What is the case (from your perspective) to the complement to rabid
> individualism?   Does the individualists bogeymen of collectivism or
> in the (relative) extreme Globalism have *any* redeeming qualities, or
> is the very idea of participating in larger and larger collectives
> (hierarchical or heterarchical) completely antithetical to the
> survival and enrichment of the individual?> - SteveS

> On 1/10/19 6:40 AM, Prof David West wrote:
>> Trump is coming up frequently in this "abduction" thread, especially
>> with regard communication and rhetoric.A very good, quite
>> enlightening, book about this is Scott Adams' (yes, the Dilbert
>> cartoonist) *_Win Bigly_*.>> 
>> davew
>> 
>> 
>> On Wed, Jan 9, 2019, at 9:03 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
>>> Steve Smith wrote:

>>>  

>>> I sense frustration in many of us when we try to talk about our
>>> various topics of specialty (as amatuers or professionals) with our
>>> significantly educated (but in other (sub)disciplines) lay-
>>> colleagues.   It seems that in the attempt to be more precise or to
>>> make evident our own lexicons for a particular subject that we end
>>> up tangling our webs in this tower of Complexity Babel (Babble?) we
>>> roam, colliding occasionally here and there.>>> Right, Steve.

>>>  

>>> I wouldn’t have it any other way.  It is one of the few places on
>>> earth where, fwiw, people are struggling with the problem.  Fighting
>>> the good fight against semantic hegemony.>>>  

>>> Nick

>>>  

>>> Nicholas S. Thompson

>>> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

>>> Clark University

>>> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

>>>  

>>> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] *On Behalf Of
>>> *Steven A Smith *Sent:* Wednesday, January 09, 2019 12:20 PM *To:*
>>> friam at redfish.com *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Motives - Was Abduction>>>  

>>> 

>>>> Nick writes:

>>>>  

>>>> < Ok, Marcus, I am standing my ground as a realist here: ():-[) >>>>>  

>>>> There you go trying to claim semantics for terms in a public
>>>> dictionary again.   (That’s an example of taking ground, like in my
>>>> Go example.)    Doing so constrains what can even be *said*.   It
>>>> puts the skeptic in the position of having to deconstruct every
>>>> single term, and thus be a called terms like smartass[1] when they
>>>> force the terms to be used in other contexts where the definition
>>>> doesn’t work.   A culture itself is laden with thousands of de-
>>>> facto definitions that steer meaning back to conventional (e.g.
>>>> racist and sexist) expectations.   To even to begin to question
>>>> these expectations requires having some power base, or safe space,
>>>> to work from.>>> I think this is the "genius" of Trump's campaign and tenure... he
>>> operates from his own (and often ad-hoc) Lexicon and that reported
>>> 39% stable base of his seems happy to just rewrite their own
>>> dictionary to match his.   That seems to be roughly Kellyanne's and
>>> Sarah's only role (and skill?), helping those who want to keep their
>>> dictionaries up to date with his shifting use of terms and concepts
>>> up to date.>>> It has been noted that Trump's presidency has been most significant
>>> for helping us understand how much of our government operates on
>>> norms and a shared vocabulary.   He de(re?)constructs those with
>>> virtually every tweet.   While I find it quite disturbing on many
>>> levels, I also find it fascinating.   I've never been one to take
>>> the media or politicians very seriously, but he has demonstrated
>>> quite thoroughly why one not only shouldn't but ultimately *can't*.>>>> In this case, you assert that some discussants are software
>>>> engineers and that distinguishes them from your category.  A
>>>> discussant of that (accused / implied) type says he is not a member
>>>> of that set and that it is not even a credible set.  Another
>>>> discussant says the activity of such a group is a skill and if
>>>> someone lacks it, they could just as well gain it while having
>>>> other co-equal skills too.   So there is already reason to doubt
>>>> the categorization you are suggesting.>>> I took Nick's point to be that the Metaphors that those among us who
>>> spend a significant amount of time writing (or desiging) computer
>>> systems is alien to him, and that despite making an attempt when he
>>> first came here to develop the skills (and therefore the culture),
>>> he feels he has failed and the lingua franca of computer (types,
>>> geeks, ???) is foreign to him.   Here on FriAM, I feel we speak a
>>> very rough Pidgen (not quite developed enough to be a proper
>>> Creole?) admixture of computer-geek, physics, sociology, psychology,
>>> linguistics, philosophy, mathematics, hard-science-other-than
>>> physics, etc.>>> I sense frustration in many of us when we try to talk about our
>>> various topics of specialty (as amatuers or professionals) with our
>>> significantly educated (but in other (sub)disciplines) lay-
>>> colleagues.   It seems that in the attempt to be more precise or to
>>> make evident our own lexicons for a particular subject that we end
>>> up tangling our webs in this tower of Complexity Babel (Babble?) we
>>> roam, colliding occasionally here and there.>>> - Sieve

>>>>  

>>>>

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Links:

  1. https://www.foxnews.com/politics/kellyanne-conway-embarrasses-cnns-jim-acosta-during-heated-exchange
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