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WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

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Nick Thompson

WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Russ,

It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really disagree
on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.

On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.

We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to accumulate
in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree that
dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our society,
right now?

OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
think it is in governments. Still on board?

Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization of
our disagreement.

Nick

Still ok?

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Russell Gonnering <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
CoffeeGroup <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/15/2010 1:39:10 PM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] What you can do.
>
> Nick-
>
> Why not have both Fox and the BBC? Or more to the point, why not Fox and
PBS?
>
> Fox is not like a government in the following ways: It can't tax me, it
doesn't redistribute my wealth, it can't imprison me, it can't execute me
or otherwise control me and I can turn them off. If they do not satisfy
their viewers and their shareholders, they go out of business. Unless they
are "too big to fail", which is a whole other discussion.
>
> I have this innate dislike for government censorship, and a very strong
distrust of politicians.
>
> I like the fact that government is limited, and so did the framers of the
Constitution. I can see no historical evidence of a political entity, that
when granted absolute power over the flow of information to society for an
unlimited period of time, used that power to increase or even merely insure
the liberty of its citizens. Can you? If ever there is a situation of
giving megaphones to people to yell "Fire" in the theater, it would be
that.

>
> To each his own, I guess.
>
> Russ #3
>
>
>
> Russell Gonnering, MD, MMM, FACS, CPHQ
> [hidden email]
> www.emergenthealth.net
>
>
> On May 15, 2010, at 1:45 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
>
> > Russ,
> >
> > The thing I have never understood is why libertarians do not see
> > corporations for what they are: HUGE governments.
> >
> > Is it really the case that you would rather get your news from Fox than
> > from the BBC. It seems to me that the question about whether we are to

be
> > subject to government control is water over the dam. The question is
only
> > WHICH government are we going to be controlled by. I would prefer to be
> > controlled by the government with the most responsible governance
> > structure. I am no socialist, but I will take the BBC over Fox ANY
TIME.

> >
> > Gotta Run,
> >
> > Nick
> >
> > Nicholas S. Thompson
> > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
> > Clark University ([hidden email])
> > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
> > http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

Russ Abbott

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Let's be clear about which Russ you are talking to. This was Nick to Russ G.

-- Russ A

On Sat, May 15, 2010 at 7:30 PM, Nicholas Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Russ,

It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really disagree
on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.

On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.

We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to accumulate
in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree that
dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our society,
right now?

OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
think it is in governments. Still on board?

Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization of
our disagreement.

Nick

Still ok?

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Russell Gonnering <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
CoffeeGroup <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/15/2010 1:39:10 PM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] What you can do.
>
> Nick-
>
> Why not have both Fox and the BBC? Or more to the point, why not Fox and
PBS?
>
> Fox is not like a government in the following ways: It can't tax me, it
doesn't redistribute my wealth, it can't imprison me, it can't execute me
or otherwise control me and I can turn them off. If they do not satisfy
their viewers and their shareholders, they go out of business. Unless they
are "too big to fail", which is a whole other discussion.
>
> I have this innate dislike for government censorship, and a very strong
distrust of politicians.
>
> I like the fact that government is limited, and so did the framers of the
Constitution. I can see no historical evidence of a political entity, that
when granted absolute power over the flow of information to society for an
unlimited period of time, used that power to increase or even merely insure
the liberty of its citizens. Can you? If ever there is a situation of
giving megaphones to people to yell "Fire" in the theater, it would be
that.
>
> To each his own, I guess.
>
> Russ #3
>
>
>
> Russell Gonnering, MD, MMM, FACS, CPHQ
> [hidden email]
> www.emergenthealth.net
>
>
> On May 15, 2010, at 1:45 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
>
> > Russ,
> >
> > The thing I have never understood is why libertarians do not see
> > corporations for what they are: HUGE governments.
> >
> > Is it really the case that you would rather get your news from Fox than
> > from the BBC. It seems to me that the question about whether we are to
be
> > subject to government control is water over the dam. The question is
only
> > WHICH government are we going to be controlled by. I would prefer to be
> > controlled by the government with the most responsible governance
> > structure. I am no socialist, but I will take the BBC over Fox ANY
TIME.
> >
> > Gotta Run,
> >
> > Nick
> >
> > Nicholas S. Thompson
> > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
> > Clark University ([hidden email])
> > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
> > http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Steve Smith

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Nick,

Thanks for changing the thread and trying to lay the groundwork
carefully here.
> Russ,
>
> It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
> disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really disagree
> on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.
>
I take a slight exception to your use of the term argue, but concede
that many call "argument" what I call "discussion". I use argument to
be entirely a device of rhetoric rather than of logic. I am interested
in rhetoric (my own or others) only insomuch as can be a compelling
method for constructing alternative hypothesis to consider logically.

I therefore believe that when people disagree significantly on an
important topic, they are bound to argue as an alternative to logical
discussion, each simultaneously trying to persuade the other while
maintaining self-persuasion in the face of what might very well be a
persuasive alternative argument from the other.
> On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
> party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.
>
I'm relatively facile with e-mail and threads myself so I find it only a
minor burden when threads get hijacked, but in the interest of clarity
and thoughtfulness, I think you have done a good thing here.
> We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
> absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to accumulate
> in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
> leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree that
> dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our society,
> right now?
>
I would "argue" that power *is* corruption. "power" has a dualism
which we seem often to ignore, where we use the term "personal power" as
if it is the same thing as the power you are describing. We speak of
our innate, inherent ability to make decisions and take action as
"power" and we then notice that we grant others the right or ability to
persuade (or intimidate) us in our decisions and (therefore) actions.
We call that "giving others our power" or more euphemistically,
"asserting our power". I believe a qualitative thing happens at this
point and "power" is not equal to "power" even though it seems to be the
same thing. There is something alchemical that happens when we grant
others the "use" of our personal "power".

My point is, that all "dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power"
are the consequence of this alchemical transformation which we all
volunteer for at some level. What if they held a war and nobody came?
What if labor simply refused to serve capital. What if capital simply
refused to serve labor? What would Ghandi do? What if we could all
stayed home and tended our gardens well?

I believe the rhetoric of our modern political and social discourse is
flawed to the core on the topic of "power". We treat it with the same
reverence that we treate "emergence". Most of us aspire to power in
some way at some time in our life, wanting to be "the boss of other
people" in some way. Most of us benefit from the power that we inherit
from the collective we have given over to. We are members of a class
(many or most of us professional class) in a first world, nominally
free-market, nominally democratic, nominally representative
society/culture who benefits significantly from the labors and deference
of the third world. We enjoy the use of their hands and their raw
materials (minerals, fuels, plant products) in return for (at best) a
modest taste of our lifestyle (pop culture, junk food, throw-away
consumer-goods).
> OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
> accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
> think it is in governments. Still on board?
>
I'm not Russ (any of them) but I want to hijack your argument at least a
little bit, to remind us all that governments (superpowers or 2-bit
temporary juntas) and corporations (large or small) are precisely
creatures of collective power and that there is not a magic threshold
where power starts to corrupt. There may be thresholds where we begin
to notice, or we begin to be offended (or scared or obviously harmed) by
the accumulations, but I submit that our conception of power is flawed
and that Pogo said it all in "We have met the enemy, and they is us".
We not only submit to these constructions/accumulations of power, we
aspire to them, we cheer hysterically when our candidate wins, or the
companies we invest in succeed in hostile takeovers or major deals to
exploit (gently, cleanly, greenly of course) some newly recognized
resource in some previously un(der)exploited region of the world.

We think we "must" give over our power because in our vernacular, the
only way to meet/blunt/turn/reject power is *with power*. Even when we
seem to be taking our power back, we are being profligate and arbitrary.
Power to the People! Black Power! Brown Power! White Power!
GynoPower! PowWow Power! Pow Pow Pow!... Power! Back off, I'm a
Scientist Power ("I can solve world hunger, I'll just turn them all to
green glass!")!

We have at least one Aikido practicioner on this list and I think there
are critical perspectives to be offered by that practice on this topic
relative to the many other martial arts. For those with an affinity for
Jui Jitsu or Tae Kwon Do or Kung Fu Fighting (fast as lightning!) or
Shotokan or ... you know how to use the opponent's power against
herself, how to focus your power, how to apply your power most
advantageously... or is there another way? What is the power of "not
being there" when power is directed at you? Is there a different
question to which these methods of managing/using power are not relevant?
> Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization of
> our disagreement.
>
Apologizing for adding a 3rd (and long-winded) voice to what might be a
complicated enough argument (discussion), I submit that this discussion
will be served by more clarity about power. The argument of who to
blame (Gov't or Corp) for our powerlessness has some strong motivation
(even for me who is trying to offer a different question) but it might
be moot if we can ask (and answer) the more fundamental questions of how
(and more key why) we give our power up so thoughtlessly (yet
self-righteously and with utmost confidence in its effectiveness).

As product consumers we throw our "buying power" around like there is no
tomorrow... we seek the cheapest price or the "best value" (by some
arcane measure or another) without (much if any) regard to the hidden
(social, ecological, ... ) costs. As ideology consumers, we throw our
"mind share" into the pool even more profiglately. We give over to
"git er' done" and "hope and change" like sugar or caffiene or nicotine
or crack cocaine. We demand little of our political candidates except a
good PR department who can hand us sound-bites, photo-ops, and bumper
stickers crafted for our degenerate palates. We leave our TV running
24/7 on Fox News (or PBS or BBC) and the programmed radio stations in
our cars (and on our streaming internet radio) are set to various
Right-Wing Shock-Talk Dipstick (Rush, Savage, O'Reilly, Imus ...)
stations or alternatively to Pacifica or Air America or NPR and PRN and
BBC. We know what we believe before we even start talking which we do
before we start thinking which we do before we start listening which we
do before we start observing which we do only grudgingly when we think
we are bored because we have no TV or Radio or Newspaper or Blog (or
Mail Discussion List) to focus on.

What if we have this entirely backwards? What if we create (we are) our
own oppressors (Gov't and Corp) only to rail at them (ourselves and each
other, thinly disguised as "Them!") and use one as the excuse to dump
our power (economic and political) into the other rather than take the
excruciatingly simple yet difficult path of seeking to hold our own
power close and use it wisely within the scope of our limited and frail
human ability. Gov's and Corp's have no magic answers, they know
nothing we do not, and are ignorant, unrighteous and unwise by their
nature. We cannot construct a better Gov or Corp, we can at best, only
mitigate their worst flaws, serving only to seduce us into believing in
their wisdom and righteousness (again, some more, forever).

It is always easier to rail (or rant) than it is to think which is
always easier than to act with deep care. See *me* here ranting and
railing and thinking. It is Sunday... perhaps I should go and act in my
life with whatever care and perspective I can muster this day. (Isn't
there a game on? Shouldn't I be going to church? Don't I need
something at the mall? I'm sure I haven't checked all my favorite blogs
yet! I need another cup of coffee, maybe a cigarette, or maybe even
something juicier!)

Carry On,
- Steve

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Russell Gonnering

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

My answer to Nick didn't make it to the whole group. I agreed with everything he said. Now Steve's post really has started me thinking: the "power is corruption" is starting to resonate with me. Also the "power of not being there".

I think there is something really, really important in what Steve is saying. There is a tension in the power equation. The Aikido metaphor is an apt one.

Russ #3
On May 16, 2010, at 9:26 AM, Steve Smith wrote:

> Nick,
>
> Thanks for changing the thread and trying to lay the groundwork carefully here.
>> Russ,
>> It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
>> disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really disagree
>> on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.
> I take a slight exception to your use of the term argue, but concede that many call "argument" what I call "discussion". I use argument to be entirely a device of rhetoric rather than of logic. I am interested in rhetoric (my own or others) only insomuch as can be a compelling method for constructing alternative hypothesis to consider logically.
>
> I therefore believe that when people disagree significantly on an important topic, they are bound to argue as an alternative to logical discussion, each simultaneously trying to persuade the other while maintaining self-persuasion in the face of what might very well be a persuasive alternative argument from the other.
>> On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
>> party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.
> I'm relatively facile with e-mail and threads myself so I find it only a minor burden when threads get hijacked, but in the interest of clarity and thoughtfulness, I think you have done a good thing here.
>> We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
>> absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to accumulate
>> in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
>> leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree that
>> dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our society,
>> right now?
>>
> I would "argue" that power *is* corruption. "power" has a dualism which we seem often to ignore, where we use the term "personal power" as if it is the same thing as the power you are describing. We speak of our innate, inherent ability to make decisions and take action as "power" and we then notice that we grant others the right or ability to persuade (or intimidate) us in our decisions and (therefore) actions. We call that "giving others our power" or more euphemistically, "asserting our power". I believe a qualitative thing happens at this point and "power" is not equal to "power" even though it seems to be the same thing. There is something alchemical that happens when we grant others the "use" of our personal "power".
>
> My point is, that all "dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power" are the consequence of this alchemical transformation which we all volunteer for at some level. What if they held a war and nobody came? What if labor simply refused to serve capital. What if capital simply refused to serve labor? What would Ghandi do? What if we could all stayed home and tended our gardens well?
>
> I believe the rhetoric of our modern political and social discourse is flawed to the core on the topic of "power". We treat it with the same reverence that we treate "emergence". Most of us aspire to power in some way at some time in our life, wanting to be "the boss of other people" in some way. Most of us benefit from the power that we inherit from the collective we have given over to. We are members of a class (many or most of us professional class) in a first world, nominally free-market, nominally democratic, nominally representative society/culture who benefits significantly from the labors and deference of the third world. We enjoy the use of their hands and their raw materials (minerals, fuels, plant products) in return for (at best) a modest taste of our lifestyle (pop culture, junk food, throw-away consumer-goods).
>> OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
>> accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
>> think it is in governments. Still on board?
> I'm not Russ (any of them) but I want to hijack your argument at least a little bit, to remind us all that governments (superpowers or 2-bit temporary juntas) and corporations (large or small) are precisely creatures of collective power and that there is not a magic threshold where power starts to corrupt. There may be thresholds where we begin to notice, or we begin to be offended (or scared or obviously harmed) by the accumulations, but I submit that our conception of power is flawed and that Pogo said it all in "We have met the enemy, and they is us". We not only submit to these constructions/accumulations of power, we aspire to them, we cheer hysterically when our candidate wins, or the companies we invest in succeed in hostile takeovers or major deals to exploit (gently, cleanly, greenly of course) some newly recognized resource in some previously un(der)exploited region of the world.
> We think we "must" give over our power because in our vernacular, the only way to meet/blunt/turn/reject power is *with power*. Even when we seem to be taking our power back, we are being profligate and arbitrary. Power to the People! Black Power! Brown Power! White Power! GynoPower! PowWow Power! Pow Pow Pow!... Power! Back off, I'm a Scientist Power ("I can solve world hunger, I'll just turn them all to green glass!")!
> We have at least one Aikido practicioner on this list and I think there are critical perspectives to be offered by that practice on this topic relative to the many other martial arts. For those with an affinity for Jui Jitsu or Tae Kwon Do or Kung Fu Fighting (fast as lightning!) or Shotokan or ... you know how to use the opponent's power against herself, how to focus your power, how to apply your power most advantageously... or is there another way? What is the power of "not being there" when power is directed at you? Is there a different question to which these methods of managing/using power are not relevant?
>> Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization of
>> our disagreement.
> Apologizing for adding a 3rd (and long-winded) voice to what might be a complicated enough argument (discussion), I submit that this discussion will be served by more clarity about power. The argument of who to blame (Gov't or Corp) for our powerlessness has some strong motivation (even for me who is trying to offer a different question) but it might be moot if we can ask (and answer) the more fundamental questions of how (and more key why) we give our power up so thoughtlessly (yet self-righteously and with utmost confidence in its effectiveness).
>
> As product consumers we throw our "buying power" around like there is no tomorrow... we seek the cheapest price or the "best value" (by some arcane measure or another) without (much if any) regard to the hidden (social, ecological, ... ) costs. As ideology consumers, we throw our "mind share" into the pool even more profiglately. We give over to "git er' done" and "hope and change" like sugar or caffiene or nicotine or crack cocaine. We demand little of our political candidates except a good PR department who can hand us sound-bites, photo-ops, and bumper stickers crafted for our degenerate palates. We leave our TV running 24/7 on Fox News (or PBS or BBC) and the programmed radio stations in our cars (and on our streaming internet radio) are set to various Right-Wing Shock-Talk Dipstick (Rush, Savage, O'Reilly, Imus ...) stations or alternatively to Pacifica or Air America or NPR and PRN and BBC. We know what we believe before we even start talking which we do before we start thinking which we do before we start listening which we do before we start observing which we do only grudgingly when we think we are bored because we have no TV or Radio or Newspaper or Blog (or Mail Discussion List) to focus on.
> What if we have this entirely backwards? What if we create (we are) our own oppressors (Gov't and Corp) only to rail at them (ourselves and each other, thinly disguised as "Them!") and use one as the excuse to dump our power (economic and political) into the other rather than take the excruciatingly simple yet difficult path of seeking to hold our own power close and use it wisely within the scope of our limited and frail human ability. Gov's and Corp's have no magic answers, they know nothing we do not, and are ignorant, unrighteous and unwise by their nature. We cannot construct a better Gov or Corp, we can at best, only mitigate their worst flaws, serving only to seduce us into believing in their wisdom and righteousness (again, some more, forever).
>
> It is always easier to rail (or rant) than it is to think which is always easier than to act with deep care. See *me* here ranting and railing and thinking. It is Sunday... perhaps I should go and act in my life with whatever care and perspective I can muster this day. (Isn't there a game on? Shouldn't I be going to church? Don't I need something at the mall? I'm sure I haven't checked all my favorite blogs yet! I need another cup of coffee, maybe a cigarette, or maybe even something juicier!)
>
> Carry On,
> - Steve
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Nick Thompson

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Steve,

re: argument vs discussion

Point taken. I guess the distinction between the two is that in an
argument, each protagonist knows in advance where he hopes to come out,
whereas in a true discussion, nobody knows where they are going to come
out.

I like to be a realist, as you know, and I think people mostly argue, in
the sense that their highest motive is to protect their own minds against
having to change. Changing one's mind on anything important is HARD, NASTY
work, and we all resist it. However, the moment AFTER we have changed our
minds, when we suddenly see the world in a different light and some things
fall into place that didn't before, is like a revelation. It's almost
sexy. Definitely a bifurcation, here.

The trouble with calling these things "discussions" is that it allows us to
pretend to ourselves that our deepest selfprotective instincts are not
engaged, whenever we talk about something important. There is nothing
worse than arguing with somebody who is pretending to be (or worse,
actually is) disaffected. Sophists should be shot!

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Steve Smith <[hidden email]>
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/16/2010 8:27:45 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress
>
> Nick,
>
> Thanks for changing the thread and trying to lay the groundwork
> carefully here.
> > Russ,
> >
> > It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
> > disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really

disagree

> > on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.
> >
> I take a slight exception to your use of the term argue, but concede
> that many call "argument" what I call "discussion". I use argument to
> be entirely a device of rhetoric rather than of logic. I am interested
> in rhetoric (my own or others) only insomuch as can be a compelling
> method for constructing alternative hypothesis to consider logically.
>
> I therefore believe that when people disagree significantly on an
> important topic, they are bound to argue as an alternative to logical
> discussion, each simultaneously trying to persuade the other while
> maintaining self-persuasion in the face of what might very well be a
> persuasive alternative argument from the other.
> > On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
> > party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.
> >
> I'm relatively facile with e-mail and threads myself so I find it only a
> minor burden when threads get hijacked, but in the interest of clarity
> and thoughtfulness, I think you have done a good thing here.
> > We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
> > absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to

accumulate
> > in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
> > leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree
that
> > dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our
society,

> > right now?
> >
> I would "argue" that power *is* corruption. "power" has a dualism
> which we seem often to ignore, where we use the term "personal power" as
> if it is the same thing as the power you are describing. We speak of
> our innate, inherent ability to make decisions and take action as
> "power" and we then notice that we grant others the right or ability to
> persuade (or intimidate) us in our decisions and (therefore) actions.
> We call that "giving others our power" or more euphemistically,
> "asserting our power". I believe a qualitative thing happens at this
> point and "power" is not equal to "power" even though it seems to be the
> same thing. There is something alchemical that happens when we grant
> others the "use" of our personal "power".
>
> My point is, that all "dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power"
> are the consequence of this alchemical transformation which we all
> volunteer for at some level. What if they held a war and nobody came?
> What if labor simply refused to serve capital. What if capital simply
> refused to serve labor? What would Ghandi do? What if we could all
> stayed home and tended our gardens well?
>
> I believe the rhetoric of our modern political and social discourse is
> flawed to the core on the topic of "power". We treat it with the same
> reverence that we treate "emergence". Most of us aspire to power in
> some way at some time in our life, wanting to be "the boss of other
> people" in some way. Most of us benefit from the power that we inherit
> from the collective we have given over to. We are members of a class
> (many or most of us professional class) in a first world, nominally
> free-market, nominally democratic, nominally representative
> society/culture who benefits significantly from the labors and deference
> of the third world. We enjoy the use of their hands and their raw
> materials (minerals, fuels, plant products) in return for (at best) a
> modest taste of our lifestyle (pop culture, junk food, throw-away
> consumer-goods).
> > OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
> > accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
> > think it is in governments. Still on board?
> >
> I'm not Russ (any of them) but I want to hijack your argument at least a
> little bit, to remind us all that governments (superpowers or 2-bit
> temporary juntas) and corporations (large or small) are precisely
> creatures of collective power and that there is not a magic threshold
> where power starts to corrupt. There may be thresholds where we begin
> to notice, or we begin to be offended (or scared or obviously harmed) by
> the accumulations, but I submit that our conception of power is flawed
> and that Pogo said it all in "We have met the enemy, and they is us".
> We not only submit to these constructions/accumulations of power, we
> aspire to them, we cheer hysterically when our candidate wins, or the
> companies we invest in succeed in hostile takeovers or major deals to
> exploit (gently, cleanly, greenly of course) some newly recognized
> resource in some previously un(der)exploited region of the world.
>
> We think we "must" give over our power because in our vernacular, the
> only way to meet/blunt/turn/reject power is *with power*. Even when we
> seem to be taking our power back, we are being profligate and arbitrary.
> Power to the People! Black Power! Brown Power! White Power!
> GynoPower! PowWow Power! Pow Pow Pow!... Power! Back off, I'm a
> Scientist Power ("I can solve world hunger, I'll just turn them all to
> green glass!")!
>
> We have at least one Aikido practicioner on this list and I think there
> are critical perspectives to be offered by that practice on this topic
> relative to the many other martial arts. For those with an affinity for
> Jui Jitsu or Tae Kwon Do or Kung Fu Fighting (fast as lightning!) or
> Shotokan or ... you know how to use the opponent's power against
> herself, how to focus your power, how to apply your power most
> advantageously... or is there another way? What is the power of "not
> being there" when power is directed at you? Is there a different
> question to which these methods of managing/using power are not relevant?
> > Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization

> > our disagreement.
> >
> Apologizing for adding a 3rd (and long-winded) voice to what might be a
> complicated enough argument (discussion), I submit that this discussion
> will be served by more clarity about power. The argument of who to
> blame (Gov't or Corp) for our powerlessness has some strong motivation
> (even for me who is trying to offer a different question) but it might
> be moot if we can ask (and answer) the more fundamental questions of how
> (and more key why) we give our power up so thoughtlessly (yet
> self-righteously and with utmost confidence in its effectiveness).
>
> As product consumers we throw our "buying power" around like there is no
> tomorrow... we seek the cheapest price or the "best value" (by some
> arcane measure or another) without (much if any) regard to the hidden
> (social, ecological, ... ) costs. As ideology consumers, we throw our
> "mind share" into the pool even more profiglately. We give over to
> "git er' done" and "hope and change" like sugar or caffiene or nicotine
> or crack cocaine. We demand little of our political candidates except a
> good PR department who can hand us sound-bites, photo-ops, and bumper
> stickers crafted for our degenerate palates. We leave our TV running
> 24/7 on Fox News (or PBS or BBC) and the programmed radio stations in
> our cars (and on our streaming internet radio) are set to various
> Right-Wing Shock-Talk Dipstick (Rush, Savage, O'Reilly, Imus ...)
> stations or alternatively to Pacifica or Air America or NPR and PRN and
> BBC. We know what we believe before we even start talking which we do
> before we start thinking which we do before we start listening which we
> do before we start observing which we do only grudgingly when we think
> we are bored because we have no TV or Radio or Newspaper or Blog (or
> Mail Discussion List) to focus on.
>
> What if we have this entirely backwards? What if we create (we are) our
> own oppressors (Gov't and Corp) only to rail at them (ourselves and each
> other, thinly disguised as "Them!") and use one as the excuse to dump
> our power (economic and political) into the other rather than take the
> excruciatingly simple yet difficult path of seeking to hold our own
> power close and use it wisely within the scope of our limited and frail
> human ability. Gov's and Corp's have no magic answers, they know
> nothing we do not, and are ignorant, unrighteous and unwise by their
> nature. We cannot construct a better Gov or Corp, we can at best, only
> mitigate their worst flaws, serving only to seduce us into believing in
> their wisdom and righteousness (again, some more, forever).
>
> It is always easier to rail (or rant) than it is to think which is
> always easier than to act with deep care. See *me* here ranting and
> railing and thinking. It is Sunday... perhaps I should go and act in my
> life with whatever care and perspective I can muster this day. (Isn't
> there a game on? Shouldn't I be going to church? Don't I need
> something at the mall? I'm sure I haven't checked all my favorite blogs
> yet! I need another cup of coffee, maybe a cigarette, or maybe even
> something juicier!)
>
> Carry On,
> - Steve
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Steve Smith

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Nick -
>
> re: argument vs discussion
>
Perhaps we should "rethread" again. Owen is our strongest advocate for
thread hygiene, I will defer to his opinion, if this is enough of a
discursion to warrant re-threading.
> Point taken. I guess the distinction between the two is that in an
> argument, each protagonist knows in advance where he hopes to come out,
> whereas in a true discussion, nobody knows where they are going to come
> out.
Precisely. Well stated. I was not poking at you with this disctinction
by the way... I was poking at precisely what you elaborate nicely below...
> I like to be a realist, as you know,
I've seen you on both sides of this one, but I acknowledge your capacity
and interest in such ;)
> and I think people mostly argue, in
> the sense that their highest motive is to protect their own minds against
> having to change.
I agree that this is a common experience around argument... one I've
often succumbed to myself.
> Changing one's mind on anything important is HARD, NASTY
> work, and we all resist it. However, the moment AFTER we have changed our
> minds, when we suddenly see the world in a different light and some things
> fall into place that didn't before, is like a revelation. It's almost
> sexy. Definitely a bifurcation, here.
>
You have nailed something very important here. It *can be* hard, nasty
work. It can also be glorious, freeing work.

As I have aged, I have gone through phases of more or less receptivity.
An Annealing Schedule perhaps, for the machine learning types here.
The times when I had come to a point in my well-earned opinions were no
longer serving me so well, and I found a new paradigm or a new mentor
(too often by reading, not in-person) I was astounded at the shifts in
world-view possible, and the rewards in them. Once the tectonic plates
of my crustal mind gave up their stress and found a new configuration,
there was a period of wonderful self-awareness and adventure in coming
to understand the new landscapes of my mind. Then the ambiguities,
contradictions and such would begin to build again, leaving me to
stubbornly ignore other's differing opinions and advice and to choose
arguement over discussion for the reasons you give above.

And then another shift would take place. A few times, my massive
missives here represent some kind of "come to realize" that the
discussions here have spurred in me. I'm not sure I always give credit
to the numerous folks here who have helped to lead me out of my
stubbornness... the nature of this forum is that I can listen (lurk) a
lot and only chime in when I have a "come to realize", often pretending
that I perhaps "knew this all along". Not that I don't sometimes chime
in arbitrarily with low quality signal/noise.

> The trouble with calling these things "discussions" is that it allows us to
> pretend to ourselves that our deepest selfprotective instincts are not
> engaged, whenever we talk about something important. There is nothing
> worse than arguing with somebody who is pretending to be (or worse,
> actually is) disaffected.

> Sophists should be shot!

This is why I carry a soda straw in my pocket... you can most always find a bit of paper to chew on and make a glorious spitwad. One good puff and the Sophist is rewarded for his or her disaffected style!

This perhaps is one reason I don't attend FRIAM often (a question left to the reader as to whether I don't want to be faced with smacking some of you with spitwads, or fearing that one of you will take the same tactic with me).

All arguments are more fun when they involve appropriately benign but irritating projectiles. Just go watch the monkeys in the zoo.

- Steve

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Vladimyr Burachynsky

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Okay, The problem I have is that I find something agreeable with each side
and yet find it necessary to add my two cents Canadian ( Nearly on par)

Power is not actually a corruption since it has deep coupling with basic
biology, it is not a degenerate form of some other behavior but more of an
elaboration or grotesque of something relatively innocuous even beneficial.

I have struggled with the various interpretations individuals place on power
and how frequently Power / Control are coupled as ideas. There was an
interesting note I ran into discussing the differences between male and
female interpretations of Control. Most females believe control implies
controlling the behavior of other human beings or animals, Males think more
frequently that control is about understanding and manipulating the world of
things to achieve a goal.

Oddly both are coupled with fear. A belief is established in the brain that
fear can be assuaged with power or control. The appearance of control in a
situation seems to diminish fear. This belief results in some extraordinary
absurd behavior. Like striking up a choir to sing God fearing songs during
an aerial bombardment or a sinking ship. We used to call it displacement
behavior in the old days. Like shaving and putting on a tie before facing an
execution squad. Demanding and getting a last cigarette from the
executioner.

Now then boys, it is still just a discussion but it clearly reminds me of
Marxist philosophy called thesis + antithesis = synthesis.
The point of which is to begin to play out your cards and see what new
creation is possible from the original bits and pieces. I read Marx in high
school just to look like a cool guy and pick up chicks.

But going back to the shifting dynamics of power , It does not matter how
much power one has accumulated since the brain is not capable of measuring
the quantity directly. Instead we seem to monitor our fear levels and when
these are too high we seek more power. So if an entity has dominance it can
be driven into mania simply by convincing it that it has something to be
fearful of. The more fearful the greater need for power, in the end the
highest level of satisfaction comes from bloody theatrical displays of human
torment. The sight of pain and misery inflicted upon another convinces us
all that we have maxed out our power meter. Killing someone gives us the
sense of power. Hence we used scapegoats throughout history to take the
blame for tsunamis, earthquakes and eclipses. Now the more fearful the
population the more interesting methods the groups find to acquire some
imaginary control to suppress the fear they are living with. Bullying serves
well for many simple folks. Cross burning for the more articulate.
Deployment of nuclear weapons on distant continents serves a different
clientele.

The current state of affairs is not about who has more power or where is it
being transferred, but rather who has the greatest need to quell the fears
in their hearts. The power to rant makes some feel less fearful, the power
to send trained soldiers into a Bangkok community to shoot protesters
between the eyes make some politicians feel less fearful. Human beings will
commit horrendous atrocities simply because they were fearful. This is not
about shifting power systems but the advent of mass panic and hysteria, very
similar to Germany Poland and Western Ukraine in the 1930's. The Germans
were so fearful that they constructed and enormous military and that still
did not completely quell their fear, The Polish saw the accumulati0ns of
Military equipment and became fearful and Pilsudski talked about defeating
the German menace. The Poles extended power over the western Ukraine to make
themselves feel less fearful a complete diversion from the real threats
about them. The madness that propelled all the nations was simply FEAR.

One way to subdue a panicked population is to execute ring leaders publicly
or similar grotesqueries. This is about the politics of fear and the need
for imaginary control or power.

Look at the situation from the perspective of fear and it stars to fall into
place. Power is a psychological drug addiction that suppresses fear as may
brandy vodka or heroin. My Father confessed to spending the entire War Drunk
as a Skunk on whatever was at hand. And that every other soldier and officer
was suitably intoxicated. No one could stand the reality they were forced to
endure. Intoxicants and war go way back to ALEXANDER'S Campaigns, Alexander
was pissed nearly every day and it is hard to find an exception according to
Arrian.

Our current disturbing socio-political climate has much to do with Mass
media pumping fear scenarios into the global community for the sake of
audience ratings. The consequence is a small profit for share holders and a
global citizenry prepared to die or kill for ridiculous causes.

Fear makes people behave like animals, We each sit upon our own time bombs
of basic fears but in spite of that terminal reality we still can discuss,
argue drink beer and joke a bit with eachother. Perhaps the most notable
value in this dialogue is that we suppress some small amount of fear without
struggling for imaginary power.

Every significant work of literature concludes that the pursuit of power is
self destructive and that good generals must control that compulsion in
their subordinates. Machiavelli, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, Russell have wrote
extensively on the quest for power and its absolutely ruinous consequences.

Power is not In itself corrupting but the belief that power can displace
fear is disastrous. Only enlightenment can do that. It is odd that one
writer , Voltaire, commented on this difference by saying," I would rather
be ruled by one mighty Lion than by a hundred rats of my own kind" I hope I
did not mangle him too much. I suspect that Voltire trust the power of a
King more easily than the nervous fearfull rats about him. I greatly enjoy
Voltaire but he was no devottee of democracy, For that matter neither was
Socrates or Plato.All dreaded the consequences of fearful populations making
hasty decisions.

Essential to enlightenment is discussion. Perhaps discussion is also a
direct threat to those that believe control is meaningful.

One can see that the belief that power suppresses fear is a failure as it
was imaginary in the first place, the fear keeps escalating and the demand
for power keeps rising until everyone is innured and death seems desirable .
No amount of power can deter a man already spiritually dead. Power does not
corrupt as much as it obliterates even annihilates the landscape. I regret
that once someone believes that power is the solution to their problems that
they create a scenario that inevitably leads to violent confrontation. The
quest for more and more power forces others to surrender or die fighting.
Beleiving in power is to create War.

Stalin and Beria as well as Dershinski understood that for power to be
effective it had to be applied intermitantly and dramatically. The NKVD
studied terror and realized that too much would eventually negate the
control over the subject. The nightime knock on the door was a holdover fom
Tsarist days.

So power politics was a fine line between small hope and absolute terror. I
suspect that mass media has created a miserable mess of frightened groups. I
am amused at the prevalence of doomsday video material. Historically this
silly phenomenon has occurred every time the calender years took on some
unusual pattern. It was funny when the Julian and Gregorian calender were
present across arbitrary boundaries. I guess the doomsday cults somewhat
confused on which date the world would end. In that scenario the power to
control the fears of others was very profitable. Papal indulgences were just
another great scheme to convert fear of the after life into wealth and
power. Martin Luther and his rants just upset established business patterns.
Fear has always been good for business and politics. In some manner or
another fear is what shapes society. Fear of others makes us trust those
most like us ( Hence Bernie Madoff's affinity scams ).

We shoud ask Baby Doc DuValier, Idi Amin, Manuel Noreiga and Bernie Madoff
about their opinions regarding power. You guys can argue or discuss where
power is moving when personally I don't think it exists but for specific
events , the real issue is where all the Fear is coming from?

Let's see how adding fear to the discussion changes our focus.
"The fear of Peasants can overwhelm the might of Kings"
. My words but probably inspired by Sun Tzu.

I have started enjoying Irish Stout and recommend it for the digestion.

Dr.Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky
Ph.D.(Civil Eng.), M.Sc.(Mech.Eng.), M.Sc.(Biology)

120-1053 Beaverhill Blvd.
Winnipeg, Manitoba
CANADA R2J 3R2
(204) 2548321 Phone/Fax
[hidden email]

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Steve Smith
Sent: May 16, 2010 7:59 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Nick -
>
> re: argument vs discussion
>
Perhaps we should "rethread" again. Owen is our strongest advocate for
thread hygiene, I will defer to his opinion, if this is enough of a
discursion to warrant re-threading.
> Point taken. I guess the distinction between the two is that in an
> argument, each protagonist knows in advance where he hopes to come out,
> whereas in a true discussion, nobody knows where they are going to come
> out.
Precisely. Well stated. I was not poking at you with this disctinction
by the way... I was poking at precisely what you elaborate nicely below...
> I like to be a realist, as you know,
I've seen you on both sides of this one, but I acknowledge your capacity
and interest in such ;)
> and I think people mostly argue, in
> the sense that their highest motive is to protect their own minds against
> having to change.
I agree that this is a common experience around argument... one I've
often succumbed to myself.
> Changing one's mind on anything important is HARD, NASTY
> work, and we all resist it. However, the moment AFTER we have changed our
> minds, when we suddenly see the world in a different light and some things
> fall into place that didn't before, is like a revelation. It's almost
> sexy. Definitely a bifurcation, here.
>
You have nailed something very important here. It *can be* hard, nasty
work. It can also be glorious, freeing work.

As I have aged, I have gone through phases of more or less receptivity.
An Annealing Schedule perhaps, for the machine learning types here.
The times when I had come to a point in my well-earned opinions were no
longer serving me so well, and I found a new paradigm or a new mentor
(too often by reading, not in-person) I was astounded at the shifts in
world-view possible, and the rewards in them. Once the tectonic plates
of my crustal mind gave up their stress and found a new configuration,
there was a period of wonderful self-awareness and adventure in coming
to understand the new landscapes of my mind. Then the ambiguities,
contradictions and such would begin to build again, leaving me to
stubbornly ignore other's differing opinions and advice and to choose
arguement over discussion for the reasons you give above.

And then another shift would take place. A few times, my massive
missives here represent some kind of "come to realize" that the
discussions here have spurred in me. I'm not sure I always give credit
to the numerous folks here who have helped to lead me out of my
stubbornness... the nature of this forum is that I can listen (lurk) a
lot and only chime in when I have a "come to realize", often pretending
that I perhaps "knew this all along". Not that I don't sometimes chime
in arbitrarily with low quality signal/noise.

> The trouble with calling these things "discussions" is that it allows us
to
> pretend to ourselves that our deepest selfprotective instincts are not
> engaged, whenever we talk about something important. There is nothing
> worse than arguing with somebody who is pretending to be (or worse,
> actually is) disaffected.

> Sophists should be shot!

This is why I carry a soda straw in my pocket... you can most always find a
bit of paper to chew on and make a glorious spitwad. One good puff and the
Sophist is rewarded for his or her disaffected style!

This perhaps is one reason I don't attend FRIAM often (a question left to
the reader as to whether I don't want to be faced with smacking some of you
with spitwads, or fearing that one of you will take the same tactic with
me).

All arguments are more fun when they involve appropriately benign but
irritating projectiles. Just go watch the monkeys in the zoo.

- Steve

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Chris Feola

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Hey Nick,

I'm a libertarian; I hope you don't mind me taking a crack at it.

Most small L libertarians I know (I'm distinguishing us from the Libertarian
Party, which is another thing altogether) are deeply cynical people. It's
not that we believe corporations are good; it's that EVERYONE gets that
corporations operate on special principles, but many miss that same strain
in politicians and political parties. In general, people don't root for
corporations the way they root for politicians -- with the exception of the
Apple fan boys, natch.

So here's the thing: it's not so much that libertarians favor corporations
over government; it's that we fear history has shown over and over that
corporations USE government to solidify their positions, crush competition
and prevent innovation.

Note the activities in my old field: media. Do you think it coincidental
that the major media companies favor laws like that struck down by the
Supreme Court, which outlaw corporate speech but exempt media companies?
Notice there is no choice on the table for NO corporate speech, which I
guess would be your position; the only discussion is which corporations get
to speak. Shockingly, The New York Times et al are in favor of a system
where they get free reign and all those pesky internet startups and
such...do not.

So that's it, in a nutshell. We don't favor corporations over government. We
think that people are rightly suspicious of corporations, and should be more
suspicious of government. We oppose as the worst thing the melding of
corporations and government. And we see little to choose from between Sen.
Mary Landrieu (D-British Petroleum) and Dick Chaney (R-Haliburton).

cjf

Christopher J. Feola

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Nicholas Thompson
Sent: Saturday, May 15, 2010 9:30 PM
To: Russell Gonnering
Cc: [hidden email]
Subject: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Russ,

It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really disagree
on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.

On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.

We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to accumulate
in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree that
dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our society,
right now?

OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
think it is in governments. Still on board?

Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization of
our disagreement.

Nick

Still ok?

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Russell Gonnering <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
CoffeeGroup <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/15/2010 1:39:10 PM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] What you can do.
>
> Nick-
>
> Why not have both Fox and the BBC? Or more to the point, why not Fox and
PBS?
>
> Fox is not like a government in the following ways: It can't tax me, it
doesn't redistribute my wealth, it can't imprison me, it can't execute me
or otherwise control me and I can turn them off. If they do not satisfy
their viewers and their shareholders, they go out of business. Unless they
are "too big to fail", which is a whole other discussion.
>
> I have this innate dislike for government censorship, and a very strong
distrust of politicians.
>
> I like the fact that government is limited, and so did the framers of the
Constitution. I can see no historical evidence of a political entity, that
when granted absolute power over the flow of information to society for an
unlimited period of time, used that power to increase or even merely insure
the liberty of its citizens. Can you? If ever there is a situation of
giving megaphones to people to yell "Fire" in the theater, it would be
that.

Chris Feola

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Sorry; brain cramp. 2nd sentence should read: "it's that EVERYONE gets that
corporations operate on SELFISH principles" not special principles.

cjf

Christopher J. Feola
President, nextPression
Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/cjfeola

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Chris Feola
Sent: Monday, May 17, 2010 10:21 AM
To: [hidden email]; 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
Coffee Group'
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Hey Nick,

I'm a libertarian; I hope you don't mind me taking a crack at it.

Most small L libertarians I know (I'm distinguishing us from the Libertarian
Party, which is another thing altogether) are deeply cynical people. It's
not that we believe corporations are good; it's that EVERYONE gets that
corporations operate on special principles, but many miss that same strain
in politicians and political parties. In general, people don't root for
corporations the way they root for politicians -- with the exception of the
Apple fan boys, natch.

So here's the thing: it's not so much that libertarians favor corporations
over government; it's that we fear history has shown over and over that
corporations USE government to solidify their positions, crush competition
and prevent innovation.

Note the activities in my old field: media. Do you think it coincidental
that the major media companies favor laws like that struck down by the
Supreme Court, which outlaw corporate speech but exempt media companies?
Notice there is no choice on the table for NO corporate speech, which I
guess would be your position; the only discussion is which corporations get
to speak. Shockingly, The New York Times et al are in favor of a system
where they get free reign and all those pesky internet startups and
such...do not.

So that's it, in a nutshell. We don't favor corporations over government. We
think that people are rightly suspicious of corporations, and should be more
suspicious of government. We oppose as the worst thing the melding of
corporations and government. And we see little to choose from between Sen.
Mary Landrieu (D-British Petroleum) and Dick Chaney (R-Haliburton).

cjf

Christopher J. Feola

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Nicholas Thompson
Sent: Saturday, May 15, 2010 9:30 PM
To: Russell Gonnering
Cc: [hidden email]
Subject: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Russ,

It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really disagree
on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.

On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.

We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to accumulate
in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree that
dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our society,
right now?

OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
think it is in governments. Still on board?

Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization of
our disagreement.

Nick

Still ok?

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Russell Gonnering <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
CoffeeGroup <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/15/2010 1:39:10 PM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] What you can do.
>
> Nick-
>
> Why not have both Fox and the BBC? Or more to the point, why not Fox and
PBS?
>
> Fox is not like a government in the following ways: It can't tax me, it
doesn't redistribute my wealth, it can't imprison me, it can't execute me
or otherwise control me and I can turn them off. If they do not satisfy
their viewers and their shareholders, they go out of business. Unless they
are "too big to fail", which is a whole other discussion.
>
> I have this innate dislike for government censorship, and a very strong
distrust of politicians.
>
> I like the fact that government is limited, and so did the framers of the
Constitution. I can see no historical evidence of a political entity, that
when granted absolute power over the flow of information to society for an
unlimited period of time, used that power to increase or even merely insure
the liberty of its citizens. Can you? If ever there is a situation of
giving megaphones to people to yell "Fire" in the theater, it would be
that.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Nick Thompson

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Chris,

Thanks. See my last rather garbled note about the fact that treating
coporate vs government power as a zero-sum game might be a serious thinking
error. We all seem to fear most corporate AND government power. That is a
huge point to agree on. I think that if we can keep that agreement in mind
we can move TOGETHER beyond slogans. But i am not sure how.

n

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Chris Feola <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/17/2010 9:21:00 AM
> Subject: RE: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress
>
> Hey Nick,
>
> I'm a libertarian; I hope you don't mind me taking a crack at it.
>
> Most small L libertarians I know (I'm distinguishing us from the
Libertarian
> Party, which is another thing altogether) are deeply cynical people. It's
> not that we believe corporations are good; it's that EVERYONE gets that
> corporations operate on special principles, but many miss that same strain
> in politicians and political parties. In general, people don't root for
> corporations the way they root for politicians -- with the exception of
the

> Apple fan boys, natch.
>
> So here's the thing: it's not so much that libertarians favor corporations
> over government; it's that we fear history has shown over and over that
> corporations USE government to solidify their positions, crush competition
> and prevent innovation.
>
> Note the activities in my old field: media. Do you think it coincidental
> that the major media companies favor laws like that struck down by the
> Supreme Court, which outlaw corporate speech but exempt media companies?
> Notice there is no choice on the table for NO corporate speech, which I
> guess would be your position; the only discussion is which corporations

get
> to speak. Shockingly, The New York Times et al are in favor of a system
> where they get free reign and all those pesky internet startups and
> such...do not.
>
> So that's it, in a nutshell. We don't favor corporations over government.
We
> think that people are rightly suspicious of corporations, and should be
more

> suspicious of government. We oppose as the worst thing the melding of
> corporations and government. And we see little to choose from between Sen.
> Mary Landrieu (D-British Petroleum) and Dick Chaney (R-Haliburton).
>
>
> cjf
>
> Christopher J. Feola
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On

Behalf

> Of Nicholas Thompson
> Sent: Saturday, May 15, 2010 9:30 PM
> To: Russell Gonnering
> Cc: [hidden email]
> Subject: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress
>
> Russ,
>
> It is my deepest belief that if our country is to survived, people who
> disagree need to learn to argue with each other. You and I really

disagree

> on this one, so on my account, we are obligated to argue.
>
> On the other hand, I DON'T believe that others should unwillingly be a
> party to such arguments, so I changed the thread.
>
> We obviously agree that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts
> absolutely. So, we are both made nervous when power starts to accumulate
> in small numbers of hands And I bet we believe, both, that having power
> leads to the accumulation of more of it. .And, we both seem to agree that
> dangerous, irreversible accumulations of power are occuring in our

society,

> right now?
>
> OK, so far? Where we seem to disagree is where the dangerous power is
> accumulating in our society. I think it is in large corporations; you
> think it is in governments. Still on board?
>
> Why don't I stop there, and see if you agree with this characterization of
> our disagreement.
>
> Nick
>
> Still ok?
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
> Clark University ([hidden email])
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
> http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]
>
>
>
>
> > [Original Message]
> > From: Russell Gonnering <[hidden email]>
> > To: <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
> CoffeeGroup <[hidden email]>
> > Date: 5/15/2010 1:39:10 PM
> > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] What you can do.
> >
> > Nick-
> >
> > Why not have both Fox and the BBC? Or more to the point, why not Fox and
> PBS?
> >
> > Fox is not like a government in the following ways: It can't tax me, it
> doesn't redistribute my wealth, it can't imprison me, it can't execute me
> or otherwise control me and I can turn them off. If they do not satisfy
> their viewers and their shareholders, they go out of business. Unless

they
> are "too big to fail", which is a whole other discussion.
> >
> > I have this innate dislike for government censorship, and a very strong
> distrust of politicians.
> >
> > I like the fact that government is limited, and so did the framers of
the
> Constitution. I can see no historical evidence of a political entity,
that
> when granted absolute power over the flow of information to society for an
> unlimited period of time, used that power to increase or even merely
insure

> the liberty of its citizens. Can you? If ever there is a situation of
> giving megaphones to people to yell "Fire" in the theater, it would be
> that.
> >
> > To each his own, I guess.
> >
> > Russ #3
> >
> >
> >
> > Russell Gonnering, MD, MMM, FACS, CPHQ
> > [hidden email]
> > www.emergenthealth.net
> >
> >
> > On May 15, 2010, at 1:45 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
> >
> > > Russ,
> > >
> > > The thing I have never understood is why libertarians do not see
> > > corporations for what they are: HUGE governments.
> > >
> > > Is it really the case that you would rather get your news from Fox

than
> > > from the BBC. It seems to me that the question about whether we are
to
> be
> > > subject to government control is water over the dam. The question is
> only
> > > WHICH government are we going to be controlled by. I would prefer to
be

> > > controlled by the government with the most responsible governance
> > > structure. I am no socialist, but I will take the BBC over Fox ANY
> TIME.
> > >
> > > Gotta Run,
> > >
> > > Nick
> > >
> > > Nicholas S. Thompson
> > > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
> > > Clark University ([hidden email])
> > > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
> > > http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]
>
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Nick Thompson

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Chris,

Correction noted and appreciated;

====> It's not that we believe corporations are good; it's that EVERYONE
gets that
corporations operate on SELFISH principles, but many miss that same strain
in politicians and political parties.<====

That's really interesting. But i think it's one of those "enemy you love
to hate" positions, and there may not be as many of us as you suppose. I
stipulate that everybody is selfish, but would argue (tentatively) that as
voters we have more potential access to the control loops of Mary landrieu
than we do to those of British petroleum, particularly if British petroleum
is prevented from giving mary landrieu unreasonably large sums of money.

the standard argument that "If I don't like BP's politics, I don't need to
buy their oil," seems a non sequetur to me.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Chris Feola <[hidden email]>
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
<[hidden email]>; <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/17/2010 9:24:53 AM
> Subject: RE: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress
>
> Sorry; brain cramp. 2nd sentence should read: "it's that EVERYONE gets
that

> corporations operate on SELFISH principles" not special principles.
>
> cjf
>
> Christopher J. Feola
> President, nextPression
> Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/cjfeola
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On

Behalf

> Of Chris Feola
> Sent: Monday, May 17, 2010 10:21 AM
> To: [hidden email]; 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
> Coffee Group'
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress
>
> Hey Nick,
>
> I'm a libertarian; I hope you don't mind me taking a crack at it.
>
> Most small L libertarians I know (I'm distinguishing us from the

Libertarian
> Party, which is another thing altogether) are deeply cynical people. It's
> not that we believe corporations are good; it's that EVERYONE gets that
> corporations operate on special principles, but many miss that same strain
> in politicians and political parties. In general, people don't root for
> corporations the way they root for politicians -- with the exception of
the

Behalf

disagree

society,

Chris Feola

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Hey Nick,

I agree -- it's huge that we are in agreement about this key point.

I think the Founders provide insight as to how to proceed. It's interesting
how many people -- especially the young -- are impatient with the
inefficiency of our system of government. Yet that's how it was designed to
work, and for just this reason -- it's hard for any one group to concentrate
power. Even corporations -- do you remember the Nifty Fifty? How are they
doing now?

This is why libertarians believe in divided government. The donkeys and
elephants both steal and abuse power, but they have somewhat different
constituencies. Keeping the government at least partly divided between them
guarantees the honesty of thieves. That's why I'm hoping our president will
soon be blessed with a worthy opponent, the way Clinton had Gingrich and
Reagan had Tip O'Neil. And I think Bush -- and all of us -- would have been
much better off if Pelosi had taken the Speaker's gavel in 02.

cjf

Christopher J. Feola

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Nicholas Thompson
Sent: Monday, May 17, 2010 11:09 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Chris,

Thanks. See my last rather garbled note about the fact that treating
coporate vs government power as a zero-sum game might be a serious thinking
error. We all seem to fear most corporate AND government power. That is a
huge point to agree on. I think that if we can keep that agreement in mind
we can move TOGETHER beyond slogans. But i am not sure how.

n

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: Chris Feola <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/17/2010 9:21:00 AM
> Subject: RE: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress
>
> Hey Nick,
>
> I'm a libertarian; I hope you don't mind me taking a crack at it.
>
> Most small L libertarians I know (I'm distinguishing us from the
Libertarian
> Party, which is another thing altogether) are deeply cynical people. It's
> not that we believe corporations are good; it's that EVERYONE gets that
> corporations operate on special principles, but many miss that same strain
> in politicians and political parties. In general, people don't root for
> corporations the way they root for politicians -- with the exception of
the

Behalf

disagree

society,

glen e. p. ropella-2

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Nicholas Thompson wrote circa 10-05-17 09:08 AM:
> We all seem to fear most corporate AND government
> power. That is a huge point to agree on. I think that if we can keep
> that agreement in mind we can move TOGETHER beyond slogans. But i am
> not sure how.

Chris Feola wrote circa 10-05-17 10:05 AM:

> I think the Founders provide insight as to how to proceed.
> [...]
> This is why libertarians believe in divided government. The donkeys
> and elephants both steal and abuse power, but they have somewhat
> different constituencies. Keeping the government at least partly
> divided between them guarantees the honesty of thieves. That's why
> I'm hoping our president will soon be blessed with a worthy opponent,
> the way Clinton had Gingrich and Reagan had Tip O'Neil. And I think
> Bush -- and all of us -- would have been much better off if Pelosi
> had taken the Speaker's gavel in 02.

This is the most interesting direction this discussion/argument could
take, I think.

Nick points out the dialectic. Chris points out the process of refining
the semantic content of the terms. And eventually we move from talking
merely about that abstract nonsense term "the government" into talking
about the concrete term "types of government".

In order to do that, though, we can't stop at the 1st refinement
iteration (from "the government" to political parties, branches of
government, or corporations). We need the 2nd, 3rd, ..., and Nth
refinements as well.

In particular, as a libertarian myself, I think the non-partisan offices
are WAYWAYWAY more important than the partisan offices. Local
government, note the lack of any quotes around the word means I think
it's _actual_ government... the governing of some specific thing, like a
water table or a forest, is the most important type of government.

Both "the government" and "corporations" (aka the federal government and
_large_ corporations) are corrupt in the sense of Steve's
power/corruption duality. They are so because they over-generalize,
stereotype, and abstract away from the human (or the pine tree or e.coli
... whatever organism you pick). The power/corruption lies in the
abstraction.

We see this in biological models, as well. Why is Fick's law
_powerful_? Why are these equational laws more powerful than
agent-based models? On the flipside, why is Fick's law (by itself)
insufficient for a specific treatment protocol for a specific condition?
And why is (something like) an ABM necessary for any explicit, fully
concrete, situation.

It seems that to take the next step from what the "founding fathers" set
up for us, we need to apply what we've been working on all this time to
government. Where is abstraction necessary, sufficient, and good?
Where is concreteness necessary, sufficient, and good?

--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://agent-based-modeling.com

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Nick Thompson

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Glen,

This sounds like a problem for complexitists and control system theorists.

I====>t seems that to take the next step from what the "founding fathers"
set
up for us, we need to apply what we've been working on all this time to
government. Where is abstraction necessary, sufficient, and good?
Where is concreteness necessary, sufficient, and good?<=====

nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

> [Original Message]
> From: glen e. p. ropella <[hidden email]>
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
> Date: 5/17/2010 11:46:40 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress
>
> Nicholas Thompson wrote circa 10-05-17 09:08 AM:
> > We all seem to fear most corporate AND government
> > power. That is a huge point to agree on. I think that if we can keep
> > that agreement in mind we can move TOGETHER beyond slogans. But i am
> > not sure how.
>
> Chris Feola wrote circa 10-05-17 10:05 AM:
> > I think the Founders provide insight as to how to proceed.
> > [...]
> > This is why libertarians believe in divided government. The donkeys
> > and elephants both steal and abuse power, but they have somewhat
> > different constituencies. Keeping the government at least partly
> > divided between them guarantees the honesty of thieves. That's why
> > I'm hoping our president will soon be blessed with a worthy opponent,
> > the way Clinton had Gingrich and Reagan had Tip O'Neil. And I think
> > Bush -- and all of us -- would have been much better off if Pelosi
> > had taken the Speaker's gavel in 02.
>
> This is the most interesting direction this discussion/argument could
> take, I think.
>
> Nick points out the dialectic. Chris points out the process of refining
> the semantic content of the terms. And eventually we move from talking
> merely about that abstract nonsense term "the government" into talking
> about the concrete term "types of government".
>
> In order to do that, though, we can't stop at the 1st refinement
> iteration (from "the government" to political parties, branches of
> government, or corporations). We need the 2nd, 3rd, ..., and Nth
> refinements as well.
>
> In particular, as a libertarian myself, I think the non-partisan offices
> are WAYWAYWAY more important than the partisan offices. Local
> government, note the lack of any quotes around the word means I think
> it's _actual_ government... the governing of some specific thing, like a
> water table or a forest, is the most important type of government.
>
> Both "the government" and "corporations" (aka the federal government and
> _large_ corporations) are corrupt in the sense of Steve's
> power/corruption duality. They are so because they over-generalize,
> stereotype, and abstract away from the human (or the pine tree or e.coli
> ... whatever organism you pick). The power/corruption lies in the
> abstraction.
>
> We see this in biological models, as well. Why is Fick's law
> _powerful_? Why are these equational laws more powerful than
> agent-based models? On the flipside, why is Fick's law (by itself)
> insufficient for a specific treatment protocol for a specific condition?
> And why is (something like) an ABM necessary for any explicit, fully
> concrete, situation.
>
> It seems that to take the next step from what the "founding fathers" set
> up for us, we need to apply what we've been working on all this time to
> government. Where is abstraction necessary, sufficient, and good?
> Where is concreteness necessary, sufficient, and good?
>
> --
> glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://agent-based-modeling.com
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Steve Smith

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Vladimyr Burachynsky

Vladimyr -

I appreciate your $.02 Canadian as well as the uniquely Russian
perspective you seem to have, especially on the application of political
power/might/will against the individual. I also appreciate your taste
for Irish Stout... I have no idea what it might do for the digestion of
food, but I myself find it aids in the digestion of exotic opinions and
differing ideas. I find, however, that Irish Whiskey works even better
for this purpose. I also appreciate your eloquence here... while I
appreciate those here who are brief and to the point, I often feel
conspicuous in my own elaborations... and it is good to have what I
consider somewhat of a kindred spirit in your willingness and ability to
write large volumes on the topics you choose to engage in.
> Power is not actually a corruption since it has deep coupling with basic
> biology, it is not a degenerate form of some other behavior but more of an
> elaboration or grotesque of something relatively innocuous even beneficial.
>
I will admit to being deliberately provocative in my claim that "power
is corruption", however I do hold that this is literally true and that
what seem like counter-examples are degenerate cases where the level of
"corruption" is below some threshold. It is also inevitable, I believe
that to be intentional is to be corrupted... any intentional act is an
assertion of control over the world outside of oneself, possibly other
people... what we have been calling power. The mere lifting of a
lever, placing it over a fulcrum and moving something with it is
"corrupt" by my extreme definition. There are unintended consequences
to be had at each turn. The lever can damage the fulcrum or the thing
being moved and the thing being moved can fall or roll somewhere not
quite planned. This does not mean that we should not act, just that we
should not to act with perfect righteousness. The "original sin" of
the bible (and other origin myths) would seem to me to be willfulness.
> I have struggled with the various interpretations individuals place on power
> and how frequently Power / Control are coupled as ideas. There was an
> interesting note I ran into discussing the differences between male and
> female interpretations of Control. Most females believe control implies
> controlling the behavior of other human beings or animals, Males think more
> frequently that control is about understanding and manipulating the world of
> things to achieve a goal.
>
I find this to be a common gender alignment as well. Without skirting
too close to the line of misogyny (I hope), I often find myself
suspecting that some of the greater abuses of power are linked to the
female psyche. This is not to say that women are common overt
perpetrators of the abuse of power (for the sake of control?) but rather
a corollary to "behind every great man is a great woman". I suspect
that women, in their often circumstance of limited direct control/power
are lead to arrange for power/control to be exercised on their behalf.
As a youth, I remember it to be common for the young women to covertly
enjoy the fights started by jealousy among their suitors while all the
while admonishing them for their violence. I fear our more adult
selves, even in the context of national and international politics are
guilty of similar acts of power/control mediated or moderated by fear
and a tendency to use proxies for our power... to incite others (law
making bodies, corporations, law enforcement bodies, etc...) to act on
our behalf in ways that we might never act personally. I believe that
women (and others in relatively limited power/control situations) are
more prone to indirect and proxy means (for what should be obvious reasons).
> Oddly both are coupled with fear. A belief is established in the brain that
> fear can be assuaged with power or control. The appearance of control in a
> situation seems to diminish fear.
Yes, this is of which I speak above... I suspect (again, courting
accusations of gender bias) that women are prone to a qualitatively
different kind of fear than men, leading to qualitatively different ways
of asserting control. I believe that asserting control over others is,
in fact, a specific type of power as opposed to asserting control over
the material world. Men and women are capable and have interests in
both, but there does seem to be a bias there, either explaining or
illuminated by the relative number of women participating in the social
sciences vs men participating in the natural sciences.
> This belief results in some extraordinary
> absurd behavior. Like striking up a choir to sing God fearing songs during
> an aerial bombardment or a sinking ship. We used to call it displacement
> behavior in the old days. Like shaving and putting on a tie before facing an
> execution squad. Demanding and getting a last cigarette from the
> executioner.
>
My favorite absurdist lyric from a song perhaps is the _They Might Be
Giants_ ditty named appropriately _Whistling in the Dark_.
> The current state of affairs is not about who has more power or where is it
> being transferred, but rather who has the greatest need to quell the fears
> in their hearts.
I think this position has some merit, however, I also think that the
coupling between fear, power, control is circular. When we feel
fearful (as you point out), we seek more (real or apparent) control.
We may seek that by trying to control others behaviour (charisma,
intimidation, persuasion) or we may seek that by trying to control the
physical world around us (patch our roof, dig a well, cut some
firewood). If we seek to control others (assert power) we are likely
to also seek to establish a power-relationship that ensures that we can
control others more easily in the future. We also might seek to control
others en-masse, by establishing persuasive, intimidating or charismatic
rhetoric that supports our control over groups of people. One
technique for establishing this type of control is the stimulation of
the very fear we are trying to assuage in ourselves but in others. By
convincing others they have something to fear (those scary, horrible,
awful immigrants or those *men* or those *women* or this or that
*disease*!) we establish an opportunity to convince them that *we* can
help them reduce that fear (pass a law, sell a product, etc.).
Particularly if they sign over their power to us, if they pledge their
allegiance to us (our party or our gov't or our flag or our manifesto or
our product or our logo). Or similarly, if they invest their capital in
our enterprise, they will feel safer (their economic future will be more
sound).
> Look at the situation from the perspective of fear and it stars to fall into
> place. Power is a psychological drug addiction that suppresses fear as may
> brandy vodka or heroin.
I wish to re-assert my original position that "power is corruption".
Addiction may be part of the mechanism through which this happens, but
for the purpose of my argument I will claim once again, that the instant
one begins to execute power over others, corruption has entered the house.
>
>
> Our current disturbing socio-political climate has much to do with Mass
> media pumping fear scenarios into the global community for the sake of
> audience ratings. The consequence is a small profit for share holders and a
> global citizenry prepared to die or kill for ridiculous causes.
>
I think the demonized mass-media are complicit, but they do not act
alone. Those in power seek to maintain and grow that power while those
not in power seek to gain more power and the best leverage for gaining
power over others as you so eloquently explain above, is through the
promise to assuage fear. So what if the very people who promise to
reduce your fear are the very ones who just tweaked it up?

And we are complicit. We feed on our own fears... we love a good
conspiracy theory, we love a good threat from "the other" to feed our
xenophobic instincts.
>
> Fear makes people behave like animals, We each sit upon our own time bombs
> of basic fears but in spite of that terminal reality we still can discuss,
> argue drink beer and joke a bit with eachother. Perhaps the most notable
> value in this dialogue is that we suppress some small amount of fear without
> struggling for imaginary power.
>
I think we are both endorsing Nick's original thesis here... that it is
important, even valuable to argue... even if I split some hairs toward
calling argument strictly a device of rhetoric. The ability to
disagree openly and to use a wide range of methods to persuade each
other is important "practice" for the times when the decisions have to
be made quickly, sometimes unilaterally and often under the pressure of
many differing opinions.
> Every significant work of literature concludes that the pursuit of power is
> self destructive and that good generals must control that compulsion in
> their subordinates. Machiavelli, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, Russell have wrote
> extensively on the quest for power and its absolutely ruinous consequences.
>
And I (re) submit that there is not a magic threshold above which power
becomes corruption... I appreciate that in it's most degenerate forms,
power (over others) can seem benign... it *seems to be* that the desire
or quest for power is the problem, not the power itself. Using your
analogy from earlier, that power is addictive... power is the gateway
drug to Power.

- Steve

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Steve Smith

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Chris Feola

Chris -
> Hey Nick,
>
> I'm a libertarian; I hope you don't mind me taking a crack at it.
>
> Most small L libertarians I know (I'm distinguishing us from the Libertarian
> Party, which is another thing altogether) are deeply cynical people.
I'm sure you are not alone here as an 'l'ibertarian. I could possibly
be labeled that, though I do not believe I am as cynical as many 'l' or
'L'ibertarians seem to be. I *am* a very strong believer in personal
liberties (which has a dual of personal responsibilities). I like
"anarchist" myself (not "Anarchist") but the term has a very bad
rep/rap... it sounds like rape, pillage and plunder, even though it
means nothing more than "without ruler". My anarchy is a bit more like
the Quakers than the Anarchists (any of them)
> So here's the thing: it's not so much that libertarians favor corporations
> over government; it's that we fear history has shown over and over that
> corporations USE government to solidify their positions, crush competition
> and prevent innovation.
>
I think this is a very important point. I also am a fan of "free
markets" which means (among other things) that, exactly as you point
out, that some corporations (or individuals) should not be allowed to
use government to create unfair competition. One way to prevent this
is to say that government cannot interfere with free enterprise.
Those opposing such radical interpretations of free market and free
enterprise and government control of same might argue that *someone*
must provide checks and balances against economic agents to prevent
their exploiting others (including the commons such as the global
climate, economy, biosphere) by ignoring (or creating) hidden costs.
> We oppose as the worst thing the melding of
> corporations and government. And we see little to choose from between Sen.
> Mary Landrieu (D-British Petroleum) and Dick Chaney (R-Haliburton).
>
And I agree, seeing only lesser of evils to choose from on most ballots,
and probably all corporate investments.

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Steve Smith

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Chris Feola

Chris -
> This is why libertarians believe in divided government. The donkeys and
> elephants both steal and abuse power, but they have somewhat different
> constituencies. Keeping the government at least partly divided between them
> guarantees the honesty of thieves.
> That's why I'm hoping our president will
> soon be blessed with a worthy opponent, the way Clinton had Gingrich and
> Reagan had Tip O'Neil. And I think Bush -- and all of us -- would have been
> much better off if Pelosi had taken the Speaker's gavel in 02.
>
And I would like more division, not simple (bi)polarity. I want
Libertarian and Green and ??? candidates on the ballot and in the
offices. I want the Dems to spin off a Progressive branch and the Pubs
to spin off a Hard-Core Conservative branch. And I want our election
rules to support this, not suppress it. I want run-off elections so we
can vote for OUR favorite candidate first, then vote for OUR lesser evil
candidate second, making it obvious when there is no "mandate", when
there is strong opposition to the lesser of evils when finally
installed, etc.

I'm not that up on other forms of election rules in the world and how
well they work, but I have to believe there is a better mode than ours
which seems to guarantee wild oscillations between polar opposites (or
worse yet, the illusion of this while the opposites are merely
brightly-differently colored variants of the same damn thing).

- Steve

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Russ Abbott

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

From a complexity perspective libertarianism is aligned with favoring a diversity of autonomous agents -- as in a complex system.

It seems to me that a complex system can reasonably be characterized as one in which there are many autonomous agents, and there is a reasonable diversity among them with respect to how they act.

Libertarianism in effect argues that political and economic systems that have such a structure are both most open and most robust.

On the other hand, we know that complex systems are not invulnerable to catastrophic failure. It may be that the global ecosystem is approaching one because one species has become too powerful. The desire for regulation is an attempt to mitigate this problem by modifying how the system as a whole works, e.g., not let any one agent get too powerful.

Theoretically, it's probably impossible to erect a system that is completely invulnerable to failure--unless it is so rigid as to be essentially dead anyway. But the regulatory impulse is to do what one can do stretch out the periods between failures, to make the inevitable failures as tolerable as possible, and to ensure to the extent possible that the system will regenerate some reasonable facsimile of itself after such failures.

-- Russ A

On Mon, May 17, 2010 at 2:46 PM, Steve Smith <[hidden email]> wrote:

Chris -

This is why libertarians believe in divided government. The donkeys and
elephants both steal and abuse power, but they have somewhat different
constituencies. Keeping the government at least partly divided between them
guarantees the honesty of thieves.
That's why I'm hoping our president will
soon be blessed with a worthy opponent, the way Clinton had Gingrich and
Reagan had Tip O'Neil. And I think Bush -- and all of us -- would have been
much better off if Pelosi had taken the Speaker's gavel in 02.

And I would like more division, not simple (bi)polarity. I want Libertarian and Green and ??? candidates on the ballot and in the offices. I want the Dems to spin off a Progressive branch and the Pubs to spin off a Hard-Core Conservative branch. And I want our election rules to support this, not suppress it. I want run-off elections so we can vote for OUR favorite candidate first, then vote for OUR lesser evil candidate second, making it obvious when there is no "mandate", when there is strong opposition to the lesser of evils when finally installed, etc.

I'm not that up on other forms of election rules in the world and how well they work, but I have to believe there is a better mode than ours which seems to guarantee wild oscillations between polar opposites (or worse yet, the illusion of this while the opposites are merely brightly-differently colored variants of the same damn thing).

- Steve

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Vladimyr Burachynsky

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Steve Smith

Steve,
Thanks for the response,
I note two things have shifted in the discussion,

First that now you have placed greater weight on the fact that Power over
others is corruption and
Second that one of my previous arguments has returned to bite me in the ass.
Namely I advocated that corruption is any process that subverts the original
intention of a system. So having previously made that argument I have to
admit that power over others is fundamentally Corruption (but I previously
argued that corruption is neither bad or good).

Looking closer at our arguments there may exist a dividing line.
Power over others is power over another complex system which is by both our
arguments a corruption.

"Power over nature" is arguably not a coherent interactive system at least
the rock and lever are not complex systems. So does that imply that power
over nature is Not Corrupt (but something else entirely)?. The key element
being whether or not the Entity is a complex system.

This now introduces a new dimension, Ethics, I believe. The displacement of
a rock seems clearly outside of any ethical discussion but the displacement
of Peasants is a different matter. Perhaps I just turned your argument
inside out and presented as my own?

I'll give the Irish whiskey a fair test next time I have the opportunity.

Dr.Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky
Ph.D.(Civil Eng.), M.Sc.(Mech.Eng.), M.Sc.(Biology)

120-1053 Beaverhill Blvd.
Winnipeg, Manitoba
CANADA R2J 3R2
(204) 2548321 Phone/Fax
[hidden email]

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Steve Smith
Sent: May 17, 2010 4:15 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

Vladimyr -

I appreciate your $.02 Canadian as well as the uniquely Russian
perspective you seem to have, especially on the application of political
power/might/will against the individual. I also appreciate your taste
for Irish Stout... I have no idea what it might do for the digestion of
food, but I myself find it aids in the digestion of exotic opinions and
differing ideas. I find, however, that Irish Whiskey works even better
for this purpose. I also appreciate your eloquence here... while I
appreciate those here who are brief and to the point, I often feel
conspicuous in my own elaborations... and it is good to have what I
consider somewhat of a kindred spirit in your willingness and ability to
write large volumes on the topics you choose to engage in.
> Power is not actually a corruption since it has deep coupling with basic
> biology, it is not a degenerate form of some other behavior but more of an
> elaboration or grotesque of something relatively innocuous even
beneficial.
>
I will admit to being deliberately provocative in my claim that "power
is corruption", however I do hold that this is literally true and that
what seem like counter-examples are degenerate cases where the level of
"corruption" is below some threshold. It is also inevitable, I believe
that to be intentional is to be corrupted... any intentional act is an
assertion of control over the world outside of oneself, possibly other
people... what we have been calling power. The mere lifting of a
lever, placing it over a fulcrum and moving something with it is
"corrupt" by my extreme definition. There are unintended consequences
to be had at each turn. The lever can damage the fulcrum or the thing
being moved and the thing being moved can fall or roll somewhere not
quite planned. This does not mean that we should not act, just that we
should not to act with perfect righteousness. The "original sin" of
the bible (and other origin myths) would seem to me to be willfulness.
> I have struggled with the various interpretations individuals place on
power
> and how frequently Power / Control are coupled as ideas. There was an
> interesting note I ran into discussing the differences between male and
> female interpretations of Control. Most females believe control implies
> controlling the behavior of other human beings or animals, Males think
more
> frequently that control is about understanding and manipulating the world
of
> things to achieve a goal.
>
I find this to be a common gender alignment as well. Without skirting
too close to the line of misogyny (I hope), I often find myself
suspecting that some of the greater abuses of power are linked to the
female psyche. This is not to say that women are common overt
perpetrators of the abuse of power (for the sake of control?) but rather
a corollary to "behind every great man is a great woman". I suspect
that women, in their often circumstance of limited direct control/power
are lead to arrange for power/control to be exercised on their behalf.
As a youth, I remember it to be common for the young women to covertly
enjoy the fights started by jealousy among their suitors while all the
while admonishing them for their violence. I fear our more adult
selves, even in the context of national and international politics are
guilty of similar acts of power/control mediated or moderated by fear
and a tendency to use proxies for our power... to incite others (law
making bodies, corporations, law enforcement bodies, etc...) to act on
our behalf in ways that we might never act personally. I believe that
women (and others in relatively limited power/control situations) are
more prone to indirect and proxy means (for what should be obvious reasons).
> Oddly both are coupled with fear. A belief is established in the brain
that
> fear can be assuaged with power or control. The appearance of control in a
> situation seems to diminish fear.
Yes, this is of which I speak above... I suspect (again, courting
accusations of gender bias) that women are prone to a qualitatively
different kind of fear than men, leading to qualitatively different ways
of asserting control. I believe that asserting control over others is,
in fact, a specific type of power as opposed to asserting control over
the material world. Men and women are capable and have interests in
both, but there does seem to be a bias there, either explaining or
illuminated by the relative number of women participating in the social
sciences vs men participating in the natural sciences.
> This belief results in some extraordinary
> absurd behavior. Like striking up a choir to sing God fearing songs during
> an aerial bombardment or a sinking ship. We used to call it displacement
> behavior in the old days. Like shaving and putting on a tie before facing
an
> execution squad. Demanding and getting a last cigarette from the
> executioner.
>
My favorite absurdist lyric from a song perhaps is the _They Might Be
Giants_ ditty named appropriately _Whistling in the Dark_.
> The current state of affairs is not about who has more power or where is
it
> being transferred, but rather who has the greatest need to quell the fears
> in their hearts.
I think this position has some merit, however, I also think that the
coupling between fear, power, control is circular. When we feel
fearful (as you point out), we seek more (real or apparent) control.
We may seek that by trying to control others behaviour (charisma,
intimidation, persuasion) or we may seek that by trying to control the
physical world around us (patch our roof, dig a well, cut some
firewood). If we seek to control others (assert power) we are likely
to also seek to establish a power-relationship that ensures that we can
control others more easily in the future. We also might seek to control
others en-masse, by establishing persuasive, intimidating or charismatic
rhetoric that supports our control over groups of people. One
technique for establishing this type of control is the stimulation of
the very fear we are trying to assuage in ourselves but in others. By
convincing others they have something to fear (those scary, horrible,
awful immigrants or those *men* or those *women* or this or that
*disease*!) we establish an opportunity to convince them that *we* can
help them reduce that fear (pass a law, sell a product, etc.).
Particularly if they sign over their power to us, if they pledge their
allegiance to us (our party or our gov't or our flag or our manifesto or
our product or our logo). Or similarly, if they invest their capital in
our enterprise, they will feel safer (their economic future will be more
sound).
> Look at the situation from the perspective of fear and it stars to fall
into
> place. Power is a psychological drug addiction that suppresses fear as may
> brandy vodka or heroin.
I wish to re-assert my original position that "power is corruption".
Addiction may be part of the mechanism through which this happens, but
for the purpose of my argument I will claim once again, that the instant
one begins to execute power over others, corruption has entered the house.
>
>
> Our current disturbing socio-political climate has much to do with Mass
> media pumping fear scenarios into the global community for the sake of
> audience ratings. The consequence is a small profit for share holders and
a
> global citizenry prepared to die or kill for ridiculous causes.
>
I think the demonized mass-media are complicit, but they do not act
alone. Those in power seek to maintain and grow that power while those
not in power seek to gain more power and the best leverage for gaining
power over others as you so eloquently explain above, is through the
promise to assuage fear. So what if the very people who promise to
reduce your fear are the very ones who just tweaked it up?

And we are complicit. We feed on our own fears... we love a good
conspiracy theory, we love a good threat from "the other" to feed our
xenophobic instincts.
>
> Fear makes people behave like animals, We each sit upon our own time bombs
> of basic fears but in spite of that terminal reality we still can discuss,
> argue drink beer and joke a bit with eachother. Perhaps the most notable
> value in this dialogue is that we suppress some small amount of fear
without
> struggling for imaginary power.
>
I think we are both endorsing Nick's original thesis here... that it is
important, even valuable to argue... even if I split some hairs toward
calling argument strictly a device of rhetoric. The ability to
disagree openly and to use a wide range of methods to persuade each
other is important "practice" for the times when the decisions have to
be made quickly, sometimes unilaterally and often under the pressure of
many differing opinions.
> Every significant work of literature concludes that the pursuit of power
is
> self destructive and that good generals must control that compulsion in
> their subordinates. Machiavelli, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, Russell have wrote
> extensively on the quest for power and its absolutely ruinous
consequences.
>
And I (re) submit that there is not a magic threshold above which power
becomes corruption... I appreciate that in it's most degenerate forms,
power (over others) can seem benign... it *seems to be* that the desire
or quest for power is the problem, not the power itself. Using your
analogy from earlier, that power is addictive... power is the gateway
drug to Power.

- Steve

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glen e. p. ropella-2

Re: WARNING: Political Argument in Progress

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Nicholas Thompson wrote circa 10-05-17 11:13 AM:
> This sounds like a problem for complexitists and control system theorists.

Right. And although Russ A has come closest to an "evidence-based"
proposal for CU vs. FEC, with the following two injections:

Russ Abbott wrote circa 10-05-15 02:02 PM:
> It seems to me a similar problem happens with free speech. When some
> of the speakers get so loud that they effectively drown out the rest,
> free speech does not work as intended.

Russ Abbott wrote circa 10-05-17 03:09 PM:
> From a complexity perspective libertarianism is aligned with favoring
> a diversity of autonomous agents -- as in a complex system.
>
> It seems to me that a complex system can reasonably be characterized
> as one in which there are many autonomous agents, and there is a
> reasonable diversity among them with respect to how they act.

I don't think that takes us far enough. A diversity of autonomous
agents is a bit too vague, especially given the dialog about fear,
power, corruption, selfish vs. common (obfuscated selfishness), etc.

I think there is something to be gained by examining the CU vs. FEC
decision in the context of a scale-free network of "freely" speaking agents.

I've heard effective rhetoric that claims that most businesses don't
engage in political speech AT ALL because it's not good for business.
Like all simplifications, this has a lot of truth to it. Go into a
local business and ask the manager whether s/he advocates for gay
marriage and see what type of response you get. But there's also plenty
of anecdotal evidence that many (smaller) businesses regularly engage in
political speech (like the doctor who put the sign in his window telling
people who voted for Obama to find another doctor).

Ultimately, I think we might design a study that sampled organizations
(profit and non-profit), with investigations of things both inside and
outside their specific domains, all across the spectrum, from huge
multinational corporations down to mom-and-pop shops, to try to find out
a little more about how "free speech" really plays out in such
organizations.

My guess is that "corporations as we the people" has little to do with
it and the controversy is really about "organizations _designed_
specifically _for_ rhetoric." Perhaps a good example might be the likes
of the National Milk Producers Federation and the International Dairy
Foods Association. The purposes of groups like these seems to be pure
rhetoric.

Again, on the one hand, the abstraction provided by professional
persuaders like those at the NMPF is a good thing because it is
difficult and expensive to develop rhetoric good enough to persuade
bunches of lawyers (especially all the way up to the SCOTUS). No single
dairy farmer, no matter how bright or wealthy, can develop that
rhetoric. So, accumulation of resources is systemically _necessary_ to
construct the salient rhetoric.

I.e. we _must_ have organizations at this level of abstraction. It's
the only way to do it in a byzantine rule of law system like the one we
have. And, hence, such organizations _must_ be able to spread their
rhetoric freely, otherwise, we'd be defeating our own purposes, working
against the system of law we claim to facilitate.

On the other hand, such accumulation of resources and the sophisticated,
arcane, knowledge it takes to generate such rhetoric presents a risk
that, as RussA says, can produce rhetoric so LOUD that it drowns out any
"little guys" who may have a rhetoric-busting point to make.

My conjecture would be, then, that a robust organization for "free
speech" would target a scale-free network of rhetorical agents, many
small quiet agents and only a few big loud agents. This is a bit more
refined than RussA's conjecture that it might consist of a simple
diversity of agents. I guess I'd also want to specify that the
diversity exists in all dimensions, not just which rhetoric (political
party), purpose (branches of gov't), size, or power.

--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://tempusdictum.com

--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://agent-based-modeling.com

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