Controversy over Web 2.0 - Habermas questions...

[gorski]

Btw, he has no special privileges, other than his tireless work and great capacities, emancipatory interests and willingness to participate at many levels.

He does not seek authority as such, since he has it by default [see above].

And that is the contradiction of authority, as someone remarked: "Which man who doesn't seek authority won't, then, have it?"

 

[Fruitloop]

The fact that he personally doesn't want power doesn't mean he is advancing emancipatory ideas though.

 

[butchersapron]

If you can't see it after this - then I give up.

The amount of stuff is rising exponentially. With it the junk.

Focusing on essential issues is being done by many individuals and organisations, as is logical.

Which part don't you understand? Say, from pre-net days, where one hadn't had much in this "democratising" sense at all.

And what does his opinion have with "getting hard"? How does that enter into this at all?

Jesus.

I think what the prof here (and maybe Habermas, hard to tell from that exceprt and the link for the speech is in some foreign lanuage) is getting dangerously close to is the idea that technical knowleldge = social knowledge. That social or political issues can be mastered by specialists and intellectuals in the same way as technical issues can, and so in the same way as you would naturally defer to an engineer whilst constucting a bridge, you should defer to the clever-clogs like him on a whole range of social questions. That's a very old and a very dangerous road to start down, especially for one who claims to be in the tradition of criticial theory.

(off out now prof)

 

[gorski]

Who on earth ever denied that there was dissent in the US media? I certainly didn't? I pointed out the opposite in fcat, but argued that this dissent was the exception rather than the rule. I know damn well how much dissent there is in the US population, i'm not saying they don't dissent. I'm saying that this dissent is based more on non-traditional media sources of information, due to the shit nature of the traditonal medias reporting of Iraq., thereby undermining Habermas' case with one very prominat and obvious example. You are trying to sneakily conflate the existence of this dissent at-large with the existence of the traditional media. That's a very lazy and very shabby trick to try and play.

Bull, you claimed that there is no trad media achievement of any sort in the current state of affairs and I do not agree. It is the rule, actually, for the US media - in all major cases. Count R. Meirdoch out and you will get a lot of that.

Trad media were initially involved in it, due to 11/9, as I said but that has changed.

From Vietnam onwards these things are not so easy and transparent in a pluralist society...

 

[newbie]

If you have no proper education, as most people do not, how does one search, by which criteria/principles etc.?

what difference does it make?

This is entirely predicated on the notion that an elite should hand down wisdom from the ivory tower and the rest of us should lap it up, because we're too thick to filter primary sources ourselves.

It's got nothing to do with web 2.0 as such, at the very start of the public internet him and those like him were out there demanding that information should be professionally indexed and filtered so that the proles didn't run around getting confused.

Heaven forfend that we might not study in sufficient depth, that our search methodology might be flawed, that we might not reach the right conclusion.

As I said, we already have a lot of that, the idea has been mentioned before, where in a free society getting to the really essential, important, vital information, through all the junk and garbage, is not easy for your average Joe and Jane. Fact! Well documented. The see of junk info - for many - is a nightmare to sift through to get to the stuff of real interest for them and so on...

I don't know whether the arrogance that equates average Joe/Jane with an inability to contend with a see (sic) of 'junk info' is yours or his, but either way it's a stunning failure of observation of the way we ordinaries can and do grasp and understand. That intellectuals look down on us for thinking the wrong thoughts is their problem, not ours. Fact.

 

[Fruitloop]

Gorski is completely conservative on social issues! I don't understand the surprise

 

[gorski]

The fact that he personally doesn't want power doesn't mean he is advancing emancipatory ideas though.

How did you put the two together?

 

[Fruitloop]

This is entirely predicated on the notion that an elite should hand down wisdom from the ivory tower and the rest of us should lap it up, because we're too thick to filter primary sources ourselves.

It's Plato's Republic

 

[gorski]

what difference does it make?

This is entirely predicated on the notion that an elite should hand down wisdom from the ivory tower and the rest of us should lap it up, because we're too thick to filter primary sources ourselves.

It's got nothing to do with web 2.0 as such, at the very start of the public internet him and those like him were out there demanding that information should be professionally indexed and filtered so that the proles didn't run around getting confused.

Heaven forfend that we might not study in sufficient depth, that our search methodology might be flawed, that we might not reach the right conclusion.

I don't know whether the arrogance that equates average Joe/Jane with an inability to contend with a see (sic) of 'junk info' is yours or his, but either way it's a stunning failure of observation of the way we ordinaries can and do grasp and understand. That intellectuals look down on us for thinking the wrong thoughts is their problem, not ours. Fact.

Right, you wanna abolish what we inherit by culture, then?

You wanna abolish, say, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Greenpeace and alike?

All "elitist", if you wanna be so "mindful". All campaigning.

He wasn't doing it from an ivory tower but working, with many others, on focusing the attention to some burning issues. He sees it better than most Europeans. Full stop. Non?

 

[Fruitloop]

How did you put the two together?

Well you seem to be advancing some kind of inverse ad hominem. I just wondered what the point was.

The 'Mother Teresa' fallacy....

 

[gorski]

It's Plato's Republic

It's anti-intellectual bullshit with a chip on one's shoulder, that's what it is!

 

[gorski]

Vietnam was a dispute between two factions of the ruling class, not the ruling vs working class - that was why it was allowed such a high profile.

In general, I have great faith in the ability of ordinary people to reason correctly in areas that are comparatively free of institutions and power structures, which is no doubt why the gradual spread of the internet to them proles exercises the great and the good to such a degree.

Wrong! Millions of Americans, before any Europeans, campaigned themselves into jails, beatings and whatnot of personal trouble. So, nonsense!

I do not have an uncritical mindset in general, which drives me to think through a bit more carefully the potential consequences of any new developments. Loadsa people do not have a proper education to think carefully. Xenophobic and similar shortcuts are well documented among all classes and the proles are not excluded. It's a binlered view that might be dangerous, indeed.

The only way out of that one is by proper, emancipatory education for all, which will not be "given from on high" only to those whose dads have loadsa money...

But that will take some time and serious egalitarian changes to the current power wetc. structures, especially in the Anglo-American world...

 

[gorski]

Jesus.

I think what the prof here (and maybe Habermas, hard to tell from that exceprt and the link for the speech is in some foreign lanuage) is getting dangerously close to is the idea that technical knowleldge = social knowledge. That social or political issues can be mastered by specialists and intellectuals in the same way as technical issues can, and so in the same way as you would naturally defer to an engineer whilst constucting a bridge, you should defer to the clever-clogs like him on a whole range of social questions. That's a very old and a very dangerous road to start down, especially for one who claims to be in the tradition of criticial theory.

(off out now prof)

But we are talking about economic, political, legal and other issues, too.

Besides, social issues are no less complex.

Habermas himself campaigns against the "jibberish constitution/treaty" with jargon galore...

So, you lost me again. He is arguing precisely for... Achhh, never mind...

 

[gorski]

Gorski is completely conservative on social issues! I don't understand the surprise

Wrong again. Buit this is ad hominem, for sure. Thinking carefully through the issues is conservative per se and there's no need to debate anything from then on? You are a Bolshevik and a proper little Stalin, sir!

And that's from the heart! From somebody who actually felt it on his skin...

[You like this shit "argument"?]

 

[newbie]

Right, you wanna abolish what we inherit by culture, then?

what? high intellectual 'culture' passes me by, I am that prole. You, and he, can inherit what you like, culturally, while me and my kind will cherrypick it, discarding most of the selfserving crap and we'll get just as close to the nub of any issue as you will, 'cept we'll do it in plain language and without giving each other awards.

You wanna abolish, say, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Greenpeace and alike?

All "elitist", if you wanna be so "mindful". All campaigning.

nonsense. Show me where any of them have had the breathtaking arrogance to claim that they know best and the ordinaries aren't capable of understanding the arguments.

He wasn't doing it from an ivory tower but working, with many others, on focusing the attention to some burning issues. He sees it better than most Europeans. Full stop. Non?

how should I know, why should I care- he's one bloke with a set of ideas and the time and resources to communicate them. Personally I think putting a value judgement ("better") on ideas is laughable, but that's the parameters of the ground he and you have chosen: that some people are better and the rest of us should know our place.

The internet is our revenge...

 

[Cid]

Wrong! Millions of Americans, before any Europeans, campaigned themselves into jails, beatings and whatnot of personal trouble. So, nonsense!

Which is hardly surprising given that the alternative was being conscripted and shipped out to a living hell or watching your child/spouse being shipped out to a living hell...

 

[gorski]

Right, anything goes, racism is no "better" than universalism Habermas advocates.

It takes all sorts, indeed...

 

[newbie]

It's anti-intellectual bullshit with a chip on one's shoulder, that's what it is!

nah there's no chip, but when those who consider themselves intellectually superior start telling the rest of us to shutup and listen it's hardly surprising if we take the piss.

 

[newbie]

Right, anything goes, racism is no "better" than universalism Habermas advocates.

It takes all sorts, indeed...

that count as putting forward a coherent argument in intellectual circles, does it?

 

[gorski]

Which is hardly surprising given that the alternative was being conscripted and shipped out to a living hell or watching your child/spouse being shipped out to a living hell...

So, then: nothing else but self-interest was in it?

Then, you are not surprised by apparent willingness to go to Iraq and no equivalent major dissent so far?

Cynical as it is, do you think that unless many more body bags come most Americans, regardless of time, will not do anything, from common Humanity grounds onwards, then?

 

[Fruitloop]

Wrong! Millions of Americans, before any Europeans, campaigned themselves into jails, beatings and whatnot of personal trouble. So, nonsense!

I do not have an uncritical mindset in general, which drives me to think through a bit more carefully the potential consequences of any new developments. Loadsa people do not have a proper education to think carefully. Xenophobic and similar shortcuts are well documented among all classes and the proles are not excluded. It's a binlered view that might be dangerous, indeed.

The only way out of that one is by proper, emancipatory education for all, which will not be "given from on high" only to those whose dads have loadsa money...

But that will take some time and serious egalitarian changes to the current power wetc. structures, especially in the Anglo-American world...

So you are advocating a social vanguard to lead the uncomprehending proles onto the correct path? And then calling me a Stalinist!

It is bad for me to be laughing out loud at work!

 

[gorski]

nah there's no chip, but when those who consider themselves intellectually superior start telling the rest of us to shutup and listen it's hardly surprising if we take the piss.

Crikey! Got me now... Uhhh...

 

[Fruitloop]

Wrong again. Buit this is ad hominem, for sure. Thinking carefully through the issues is conservative per se and there's no need to debate anything from then on? You are a Bolshevik and a proper little Stalin, sir!

And that's from the heart! From somebody who actually felt it on his skin...

[You like this shit "argument"?]

Your conclusions are (from what I have seen) socially conservative. Nothing to do with how they are thought through, in what manner they are justified, what my opinion of you personally is etc etc. Just the state of affairs as far as I have observed them.

 

[gorski]

So you are advocating a social vanguard to lead the uncomprehending proles onto the correct path? And then calling me a Stalinist!

It is bad for me to be laughing out loud at work!

You can only laugh out loud at your bad self...

I am advocating a complete and radical overhaul of the Anglo-American world if the world as a whole is to prosper. It's not possible without you, guys.

You have the arrogance beyond anything the world has ever seen and the least knowledge, in terms of proper, wide education levels in the industrialised world.

It's shambles in these countries and it shows, sadly... The adversarial model that props up these countries is an abomination and a regression, which most of us with any brains are campaigning against. Yes, only long term changes will work and education is the way forward.

But you ain't gonna get a good quality, Humanist education here. You'll have to go abroad, to the Continent. Sorry. And it might make you wanna sit up and listen to those who have deserved to be listened to, at least occasionally... Without a lot of hard work and great Humanist, emancipatory education Humanity as a whole is fucked, especially with attitudes like some exhibited here...

 

[gorski]

Personally I think putting a value judgement ("better") on ideas is laughable, but that's the parameters of the ground he and you have chosen: that some people are better and the rest of us should know our place.

The internet is our revenge...

Yeah, KKK boasts some 5 million members in the US alone. I'd say that's bad. And ignorant. On both of your and their behalf.

When I said racism is not better than universalism - that's what it meant. No, thanx to the quote above. If that's a "coherent" argument, then I want a rhapsodic one!

 

[Cid]

So, then: nothing else but self-interest was in it?

Then, you are not surprised by apparent willingness to go to Iraq and no equivalent major dissent so far?

Cynical as it is, do you think that unless many more body bags come most Americans, regardless of time, will not do anything, from common Humanity grounds onwards, then?

No, not nothing else, but it would be a massive factor in motivating those who might otherwise have complained in silence/felt antipathy. The shear numbers are on a scale far higher than Iraq and the techniques used that much more outwardly horrific. I didn't say that the American people are motivated by the scale of catastrophe (though I think to an extent everyone is), rather that those body bags cease to become statistics when it is you or someone very close to you.... 8,700,000 Americans served in Vietnam, there were 60,000 casualties and some 153,000 injuries. that is bloody hard to ignore and even the most conservative must have questioned that kind of commitment.

 

[gorski]

Your conclusions are (from what I have seen) socially conservative. Nothing to do with how they are thought through, in what manner they are justified, what my opinion of you personally is etc etc. Just the state of affairs as far as I have observed them.

And maybe you could at least try to be a bit fair on occasion and maybe consider it properly before spouting off... Like, ask Q's to clarify and debate and then maybe, just maybe it would become apparent to you that it is much better to be careful than unfair and arrogant in presuming so much with no proper effort at all, jumping to conclusions like that?

But why would you be bothered, eh?

 

[Fruitloop]

You can only laugh out loud at your bad self...

I am advocating a complete and radical overhaul of the Anglo-American world if the world as a whole is to prosper. It's not possible without you, guys.

You have the arrogance beyond anything the world has ever seen and the least knowledge, in terms of proper, wide education levels in the industrialised world.

It's shambles in these countries and it shows, sadly... The adversarial model that props up these countries is an abomination and a regression, which most of us with any brains are campaigning against. Yes, only long term changes will work and education is the way forward.

But you ain't gonna get a good quality, Humanist education here. You'll have to go abroad, to the Continent. Sorry. And it might make you wanna sit up and listen to those who have deserved to be listened to, at least occasionally... Without a lot of hard work and great Humanist, emancipatory education Humanity as a whole is fucked, especially with attitudes like some exhibited here...

I'm not from this country.

I have read plenty of the stuff that you reference, I just don't agree. These things are contentious, yours is not the one true path that any reflective person would arrive at.

If arrogance means I'm not gonna sit at your feet like the devotee of some guru, then yeah I've got it in spades.

 

[Fruitloop]

And maybe you could at least try to be a bit fair on occasion and maybe consider it properly before spouting off... Like, ask Q's to clarify and debate and then maybe, just maybe it would become apparent to you that it is much better to be careful than unfair and arrogant in presuming so much with no proper effort at all, jumping to conclusions like that?

But why would you be bothered, eh?

Well, I will do so. It would help sometimes if you were to explain yourself more fully the first time, so one isn't left with the choice of risking making unwarranted assumptions or having to extensively probe your point of view to work out what you are actually on about.

 

[newbie]

Yeah, KKK boasts some 5 million members in the US alone. I'd say that's bad. And ignorant. On both of your and their behalf.

When I said racism is not better than universalism - that's what it meant. No, thanx to the quote above. If that's a "coherent" argument, then I want a rhapsodic one!

do you really measure arguments by the number of people that agree with them? Is that what 'better' meant??. Anyway there's some 300m people in the US of A some 295m of whom reject the KKK. Does this prove anything to you, because to me it's entirely irrelevant to the point of this thread.