[FRIAM] Curmudgeons Unite!

[Steve Smith]

On 8/21/20 9:58 AM, glen∉ℂ wrote:
> Hm. I want to confirm that this post is commentary and you're not
> expecting a response. 
I'm always *hoping for* responses, but don't usually expect that my
style or even content is something others care to or feel able to
respond to.  
> But maybe it's push-back for me to be *more* explicit about the
> problem? Just in case, I'll throw more words/gestures at it.
Yes, I definitely meant to invite that if not *expect* it.   And I
appreciate it.
> The problem is that we expect our representation to be, somehow,
> faithful/accurate. We can see this in microcosm with the false
> equivalence between household budgets and national economies (or in
> comparing the USPS to a corporation, or in approval rates for our
> representative vs Congress as a whole, or in thousands of other
> individual vs collective contexts).
And I take this to be strongly related with your issue with metaphor... 
metaphors can be used thoughtfully to help explain or understand one
system in terms of another, but they can also be used to *generate* or
*exploit* conflations for various purposes misaligned with understanding
or explanation. 
> As I've tried to exhibit re: guns, I am unabashedly two-faced.
> Personally, I think anyone ought to be able to destroy the world.
> Politically, socially, that's madness and we ought to ban handguns
> entirely.
I appreciate this span.   I experience it more *generally* in the sense
that my extreme awareness of Libertarian ideals unto Anarchism is that I
can do anything I *can*.   But as you imply (I think), I *choose* to
live within the context of a culture where I have to constrain many of
the things I *could* do, as a participant in shaping the society/world I
want to live in.   I *want* to live in a world where there are very few
people suffering acutely from any of the implied needs in what I've
referred to as neo-Maslowian...    I don't want to be deluded into
thinking that my simple acts of commission/omission actually directly
*cause* the world to be a better place, but I also think it is a
delusion that I can operate acutely *counter* to the ways of the world I
want to live in and still expect it to manifest in that way.  In your
example, I believe that by owning, carrying, brandishing firearms I help
to create a world where my only sense of security is likely to come from
owning, carrying, and brandishing more and better firearms.  So I don't
and live with the paradox that *others* do choose that path, and thereby
have the opportunity to impress-by-force on me and mine with those in
ways that might be blunted if *I* chose their path as well.   My house
could become the sight of a  national news-headline-worthy firefight
with friends, neighbors, criminals, law enforcement, military, etc...
depending on the scenario.
> As the Carter paper on Collective (Telic) Virtue Epistemology tries to
> tease out, fidelity/accuracy in representation is a huge problem, one
> exhibited across all scales and domains (tech included). Clinton
> famously demonstrated *she* understands the difference when she
> expressed that she has different private vs public positions about
> Wall Street. Of course! We all should have individual vs. social
> distinctions. The problem is the map (or lack thereof) between them.
>
> We can even use the virus and the fact that personal psyches have
> trouble with large numbers, exponential growth and statistics. E.g.
> that everyone was surprised by how "wrong" the polls were about
> Clinton being X% likely to win.
>
> Any tool designed to accurately hone in on that tiny little wiggle in
> the popular vote will continue this false equivalence between
> individual and collective, increasing the us-vs-them tribalism that
> produced Trump's win.
And in some way perhaps magnify it, or make it something the likes of
Parscale/Bannon could exploit into a (slim/faux but qualitatively
signifcant) win.
> Voting and polling are simply symptoms. I'd welcome tools that target
> the disease rather than making it worse. In the meantime, I'm with
> Nick. Transparency means paper ballots and some human connection to
> the tabulation and aggregation process. If Jon thinks that position
> helps him understand how Republicans win elections, then it's useful
> to go into a little more detail about the actual problem like I'm
> trying to do, here.

And so, explicitly, can you elaborate yet more on this abstraction? 
What I think you introduce (well) above is the conflation between the
personal/collective, private/public conceptions.  I could (as I often
do) riff on *my* apprehension of what that looks like or how it goes
wrong, but I would welcome your's and other's thoughts on this.  In
particular I'm interested on "just what is it" we are trying to achieve
with our representative democracy and how well are we and where might
there be room for improvement?

Mary and I have been discussing the details of how (mechanically) we
will participate in this November 2020 election.  As denizens of a
fairly strongly blue state, I don't worry that my vote will make or
break the "Blue Tide", but it feels like there are lots of
meta-narratives implied in if/when/how/who we vote.   I'm torn between
wanting to help prove/exercise the mail-in voting system and wanting to
engage/enjoy the implied spirit of in-person voting and contrasting it
with my father's admonition of "vote early, vote often" by taking
advantage of generous early voting here and avoiding being part of "the
rush".    I think I have settled for simply "voting vert early" and
paying close attention to the dates/times/location so that I'm not
scurrying at the last minute like Mary had to for the Democrat Primary
(I'm "unaffiliated").  

Paralleling your schizm on guns, I'm fantasizing about taking a
paintball gun to (the perimeter of) my polling place and "marking" any
poll watchers who think they need to show up exercising *their* open
carry rights at that perimeter.   I am sure I will not do such a thing
for myriad reasons, but I enjoy considering the irony of the various
ragtag "Militias" that have chosen to involve themselves in other things
in a disruptive/intimidating fashion being confronted with a mock
shooting.   For the faint of heart here, I re-iterate "I am sure I will
not",  just like I don't actually go around cutting the truck-nuts off
of pickups even though I tell my friends who are likely to sport them
that I *do* carry bolt-cutters for precisely that purpose.  I just can't
resist the cognitive dissonance of the image.

- Steve