HUMANS AS MACHINE TOOLS

The NBC News story you see linked below is another reminder of not only how we are expected to become more machine like, but the matter of fact manner in which this expectation is expressed. An acceptance almost as cold as the further expectation that, no matter how deeply in debt you are for the last turn at skills improvement, you must pay anew for the next round.

In this do we blithely dismiss so many parts of human nature that it is astonishing.

It used to be said that lucky is the individual who can find work where their passion lies. Perhaps now we can see that for the ugly lie that it has become. I say that because you have to ask yourself: Which is more cruel, people who are unable to work their passion and make do with the least offensive alternative, or those who do, for whatever period of time, only to have it rendered superfluous at some point so that they have to shuck that skill cloak and don another; usually so far from any kind of passion, or comparable compensation, that it can erase nearly everything they thought they had become, or achieved.

No one bothers to question what we do to ourselves when we think of work as simply interchangeable skill cloaks that can be put on and taken off as casually as one exchanges one mask for another. The relationship of organic connection to our tools, which used to be real extensions of our senses, and our reach, and the expressions of affect, both practical and emotive, that those tools used to provide.

No. There can be no mention of this precisely because we are tools now in a factory oriented mode of living. We are nothing more than multi-spindle (that which keeps churning in mind and body, behavior and attitude) tools for which the snapping on and snapping off is simply a new fact of life. And never mind that the pace of this inhuman exchange knows only acceleration.

The train that "Old Charlie" stole the handle from (Jethro Tull) is now a linear accelerator. Jumping off, in whatever fashion, becomes ever more an act of terrorism because of relativistic mass in a relativistic matrix of information flow and hard copy output; so much of which, of course, is simply collateral.

This is what happens when an organizational model from one type of mind space becomes mutated by another mind space model. The wonder is not that there is so much insanity swirling around us any more, but that there isn't a great deal more.

Old habits die hard I suppose, even when the inmates are in control of the asylum.

The nbcnews.com article:

http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/in-plain-sight/highly-educated-unemployed-tumbling-down-ladder-n219451

CORRUPTION AS THE EXERCISE OF COMPETITIVE INFLUENCE

From a coldly logical perspective of how Capitalism works, one might argue that the excessive influence that power elites enjoy in this country is simply life as it should be. Decisions at the highest levels should be made by those who have already demonstrated success in the marketplace of ideas. Social management should be based in the practicalities of how to most efficiently apply all of the factors of production, integrated with distribution, so that needs are supplied with a reasonable cost benefit ratio, as well as the incentive of net gain.

That antiseptic description, of course, hardly begins to encompass all of the irrational factors that make up human nature. There is also the less than precise application of the word "corruption" when it comes to how power is abused in this country.

The real problem here arises with the differences between Capitalism and Democracy. At the risk of stating the obvious, they are quite simply two very different decision making systems. A great deal of what we see as corruption now occurs precisely because that's the only way the two can work an interface of conflicting priorities.

The statement in the first paragraph above makes perfect objective sense for a market base decision system. It runs into trouble, however, the moment it has to translate the strategies of market leaders, with their quite specific priorities, with the priorities of the other management group. A group that comes into being at the behest of a quite schizophrenic collection: namely the citizens who both vote as "the people", but who are also those beholden to the other managers for their livelihoods.

It is in this absurd duality that "the people" make precise definitions of such words as "corruption" a bit more complicated than it would otherwise be. This is so because "buying influence" isn't always the bad thing it ought to be. How can it be when such influence brings home the "bacon" that gets a representative reelected.

I make this distinction for the sole purpose of suggesting that the two systems are inherently at odds with each other. Most especially as Democracy maintains this notion that "the people" cannot govern themselves directly. 

It is easy to see how that notion has stayed so entrenched, at least from my perspective. With "the people" so sucked into the demands of their one special skill, how could they hope to also find time to stay informed enough to make day to day governing decisions. But again, that's just another aspect of why Capitalism, with its emphasis on the segmentation of all production into skill specialties, keeps the citizenry tied down as employees. Obviously, in that scenario, they can't be expected to govern. 

The electrification of skill retrieval, however, has changed all of this. On the one hand, skills can no longer be commodities, but on the other, we no longer have to suffer within a factory oriented mode of social organization. We can change everything around so that we are no longer employees who have direct bosses, but also a body politic with a supposed vote for another group of bosses. We can be our own government and production supervisors; even as we share the maintenance of our productive systems. 

Automation. Three D printing. Modular sub-components mass produced so that an array of end use items can be made. All of the sites on the internet now that illustrate the "do-it-yourself" movement. These are all examples of the free flow of information. And isn't it also interesting that, if information wasn't a commodity, how much easier it would be to live in the know so that we could actually have a fair chance of being able to govern ourselves.

What a concept! Right?

Please think about this. Give it serious thought. The corruption spoken of in these kinds of articles is, at least in significant portion, structural on a fundamental level. It cannot be addressed with any more reforms. We need to start over with how we organize ourselves so that Democracy has a chance to work a balance between individual liberty and the needs of the whole. 

Salon Article: They won, we lost: How corruption became America's national pastime.

 

http://www.salon.com/2014/10/11/they_won_we_lost_how_corruption_became_americas_national_pastime/

The Genesis of Genius is no singularity of thought

You think
you thought
that thing you believed
you realized;
the idea 
of creating anything,
of or about, 
whole cloth.
But can you bare
to ask within 
what space these links,
where all these gaps, 
or associations missing
meanings that might
reconnect,
were made by you?
Was it just
a place for your mind
to see it all without
any channels crossing,
over the top and
under the bottom
of every level?
Couldn't other lines
and minds to draw
upon a larger fabric,
coming and going,
doubling or reducing,
from so may perspectives,
for a larger voice,
have called it out
to as many you 
as there are
of others?
Whose to say
what an infinite
of potential, posing
questions that speak
of answers whose voice
is just a new chorus
of questionable minds
asking for more
recognition, as well
as more perception,
might find
in a way 
to deliver
that message that makes
us all to wonder
where the real
thought of genius lies.


#genius #GenesisofGenius #genesis

AMPLIFICATION FROM THE DARK SIDE

It is bad enough that money amplified speech has been miraculously equated with individual free speech. Now, it seems, amplification can come from the pit of any groups darkest fantasies, and nobody has to worry about accountability.

Yes. That should really help our political process find common ground and consensus.

They used to say that money was the way to grease the skids in order to get things done in countries where Baksheesh was was a way of life. Leave it to our form of money politics to redefine Baksheesh as a slide into a black hole that nothing of value can come out of. At least, of course, if by "value" you want it to have a connection to something meaningfully related to human need.

Information as money, or commodity, has made representational Democracy virtually impossible now. The only information that flows in the new dark of electrified Capitalism is that which has been sharpened on the ax all of the special interests have to grind. In this is the edge, engineered for maximum gain against opposing interests, that is used to chop away at how they want the opposition to be viewed. As such facade becomes both brutally disfiguring, as well as embellishment beyond mere fantasy; such sharp edges, after all, can also remove even the most ugly of truths.

If you think that this can in any way be sustainable in the long run than you are whistling in the dark. Their dark to be more specific, and it is a tune that they approved of. Something has already been cut out of you and it is unlikely you will ever get it back. I sincerely hope that this is not the case because we're going to need everybody we can get to help with climbing out of this singular darkness. 

An alternative to Capitalism is possible. Each and every one of us needs to start taking action.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/09/millions-in-dark-money-has-taken-over-the-airwaves-in-kansas.html