What were to happen if we did have the ability to know everything about something? What if the possibility of knowing everything existed?
Say for instance, I know I need to get to Kanjur station quickly because a usual, I'm running late. It's 6:30 pm, and
the traffic is a mad, ravaging beast of screeching horns and savage wheels, a growling, yelling, vicious, anxious metallic beast, with its guts spilling out in all directions on the road, and
I know I'm going to get frustrated by the fact that the BMC/BEST has shifted the bus stop farther away from Main Gate, and built a road divider in between the lane going towards Kanjur/Eastern Express Highway, in an effort to create a separate lane for buses, but because bikers and company buses choke this lane, BEST buses usually take the other lane meant for everybody else, while I do an angry, dangerous dance from one lane to the other, and
I know that as a result of the frustration and lack of time, I'm going to hitch a bike-ride to Kanjur.
While reading the paper yesterday, I chanced upon an article by Jaron Lanier. He wrote a paper called One-Half of a Manifesto (2000), on opposing "cybernetic totalism". I quote Wiki -
Say for instance, I know I need to get to Kanjur station quickly because a usual, I'm running late. It's 6:30 pm, and
the traffic is a mad, ravaging beast of screeching horns and savage wheels, a growling, yelling, vicious, anxious metallic beast, with its guts spilling out in all directions on the road, and
I know I'm going to get frustrated by the fact that the BMC/BEST has shifted the bus stop farther away from Main Gate, and built a road divider in between the lane going towards Kanjur/Eastern Express Highway, in an effort to create a separate lane for buses, but because bikers and company buses choke this lane, BEST buses usually take the other lane meant for everybody else, while I do an angry, dangerous dance from one lane to the other, and
I know that as a result of the frustration and lack of time, I'm going to hitch a bike-ride to Kanjur.
It is so defeating to know everything. Surprises are lost. The kick you get out of doing something differently is lost. The exquisite angst of an existential crisis is lost, the overwhelming brightness and warmth of an epiphany is lost. The wonder at your abilities to do something you never imagined you could, is lost.
While reading the paper yesterday, I chanced upon an article by Jaron Lanier. He wrote a paper called One-Half of a Manifesto (2000), on opposing "cybernetic totalism". I quote Wiki -
At the end he warns that the biggest problem of any theory (esp. iedology) is not that it is false, "but when it claims to be the sole and utterly complete path to understanding life and reality." The impression of objective necessity paralyzes the ability of humans to walk out of or to fight the paradigm, and causes the self-fulfilling destiny, which spoils people.
Isn't it amazing that we don't know everything, yet here we are, living life, making mistakes, celebrating, waking up everyday?
I thought you were saying that you were "fighting paradigms" by hitching a ride. And then I realised that's not what you meant at all.
ReplyDeleteWhat you meant was that if you knew everything, life wouldn't be as worthwhile. Taking that lift wouldn't have been so much fun. I can't believe I almost misunderstood something you just wrote. >.<
Were you replying to someone's comment, Vini?
ReplyDeleteNah, I was commenting on Vini's post. I couldn't believe I almost misunderstood what she just wrote! I thought it was the height of absent-mindedness and needed to be recorded. Plus I thought that despite the obnoxious vanity, it was a cool postmodernish idea to comment on your own post. :P
DeleteI was resistant to the idea of using tags because I felt they were limiting in some way. And that I would forget what they meant. :P But I always liked how they worked as a lovely way of shelfing posts for later. So I've decided to use song names. If I ever forget what they mean, I can just listen to the songs and hope to feel that way, or a bit of it, considering time never stops for anyone and all that shit. :D
Also, can a theory ever be "false"? In that, the purpose of ANY ideology is to say, "This is what we propose" -- people who believe in that have obviously reasons to adopt that ideology. But this is why so many ideas exist, I think the claim that "we are right" is one that accompanies any ideology -- but that shouldn't discount the ideology itself, should it? I mean, there are people who believe in Marxism, and people who don't, who believe something else. They're two different ways of "understanding life" for two different kinds of people. I don't know if that necessarily counts as a self-fulfilling destiny; people will make mistakes and be surprised regardless. To blame having an opinion (which is basically what following an ideology is) in the first place is a bit narrow-minded, I think. If I have understood Lanier correctly.
ReplyDeleteThe tags intrigue me. Will you explain them? :)
In the quote, Lanier has written what is in the quote marks. The rest is Wiki's paraphrasing.
DeletePerhaps what is being addressed when a theory/ideology is called 'false' is its nature, not its content. That is, if an ideology proposes to be the one and only way to understand life and reality, then it is false not for what it stands for, but false in that claim of absoluteness.
'False' could also mean someone's subjective opinion on a theory - this ideology is 'false' for me because I don't believe/agree with it. Now since to each her own, this isn't a problem which can be attributed to the theory in question. It isn't ideology/theory's fault if you happen to disagree with it. :)
No, that's not the issue. The issue is any ideology claiming, 'this is it.' Because by default, you are negating everything else that theory doesn't stand for.
One may say, but it's not the theory which proposes that, it's the believer who chooses to interpret it that way. Perhaps that's true. The theories, the knowledge existed, we chose to make atom bombs and chemotherapy treatments. But then if a particular ideology has then been propagated as absolute, say Catholicism in Texas, then that claim is false.
Honestly if you ask me, I think Wiki has done some clumsy paraphrasing. :P One kind of software or technology, let's say Virtual Reality, cannot be the best way to understand life around us. But when we are taught to believe that it is, we also believe that nothing better exists. This is possible because there aren't too many people who are knowledgeable enough about AI or Virtual Reality, and from experience may know that these aren't it. For you and me, it may be a different story. We may never want to find out or go beyond what is being given/taught to us.
To put things in context, this is the 'theory' and 'ideology' that Lanier refers to:
"More important, I'm hoping the reader can see that artificial intelligence is better understood as a belief system instead of a technology."
The original essay is here: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.12/lanier.html?pg=3&topic=&topic_set=
I think I need to go back to my text. :D
But see, that's the thing -- ANY theory by default of BEING a theory will say that it is the right way of endorsing life. This is why philosophies in plural exist -- Kant will say deontology is the way to live life, someone else may disagree and say no, THIS. The point is, this claim of absoluteness exists by way of making a theory/religion; it is an inherent quality. It's all very well to say no absolute truth, but everyone knows that -- the point is, if you believe in say, Marxism, the interesting/important thing is WHY, because once we start telling people, oh but it's just another way, we are addressing a point that is kind of irrelevant to content: everyone is AWARE that it is another way. That hasn't stopped anyone from saying, "This is RIGHT" -- one may disagree, but may lay claim to another way of thinking which may also be RIGHT, outside of their own opinion.
DeleteAll ideologies do claim, "This is it" in one way or another. This is why marxism refutes capitalism and vice-versa. If they accepted each other, the dispute wouldn't exist today. It's a very fundamental premise, but to make any decent/meaningful conversation about it, I guess one should look beyond that, because ammoral preaching can go on forever.
There are opinions and there are facts. Facts were once opinions until they were established using factual evidence which was once..you get the point.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful. Loving the new look. Love this piece of brilliant writing (I don't know why I haven't seen this before?!) Love YOU!
ReplyDelete:)
ReplyDeleteI love the font. Blogger has finally activated web fonts! I'm so happy. For a long time, it offered those fonts but didn't really activate them - you couldn't preview them, or activate them, you had to directly fiddle around with the html. Try some of them, they're quite nice. :)