For quite a number of years I was an avid reader of Harry Turtledove's alternate histories--running out and grabbing the latest installment in his Timeline-191 series when it became available year in, year out. I enjoyed his rigorous working out of his scenarios, which, in contrast with so much alternate history, made the basis of his story a genuinely compelling counterfactual, in contrast with the flimsy "What ifs?" on which so many of his colleagues have relied. I also enjoyed the "big picture" emphasis of his narratives, presented through his large but still manageable and strategically arranged casts of viewpoint characters, and the briskness of his narratives, which seemed to have been worked out mathematically but effectually (Turtledove cutting among twenty viewpoint characters, each of whom got six four-page scenes by the end of the volume).
Turtledove's Ruled Britannia was a very differently structured book, less oriented to the big picture, and more narrowly focused on a mere two characters rather than twenty--in this case, William Shakespeare and Spanish Golden Age playwright Lope de Vega, brought face to face by a successful Spanish conquest of Britain in 1588 that had de Vega a soldier of the occupying Spanish army who, because of his predilection for the theater, is tasked with keeping an eye on a Shakespeare who has become drawn into a plot by old Elizabethan loyalists to stage a rebellion which will drive the Spanish out. The comparatively original premise (neither Civil War nor World War II!) intrigued me, as did the promise to depict these actual historical figures in this altered timeline, an approach which has always appealed to me. (Of the Timeline-191 novels my favorite was and remains How Few Remain, precisely because of its stress on actual personages.) Still, I wondered if Turtledove would manage to hold my interest with this approach through the nearly five hundred page narrative.
For my part I thought the book longer than it had to be, and I could have done without a good many bits. (I think we saw more of de Vega the self-satisfied womanizer than we needed to, for instance, and did not care for the usage of Christopher Marlowe either, or for that matter the final confrontation between these two figures, which seemed to me entirely pointless.) Still, in spite of the unnecessary or bothersome patches Turtledove pleasantly surprised me by carrying this more focused narrative. In doing that it helped not only that Turtledove displayed some adroitness in developing the cat and mouse game between Shakespeare and the Spanish occupiers, but that Turtledove presents Shakespeare, and de Vega, as both human beings rather than pedestal-placed literary titans--Shakespeare in particular a man whose talent may have marked him out for greater things but in the here and now a jobbing actor and writer trying to make a living and thrust less than willingly into high intrigue. Particularly commendable was Turtledove's not shying away from the difficult task his own plot presented him--taking seriously Shakespeare's enlistment to produce a propaganda play in aid of the rebellion (about the life of Iceni queen Boudicca), and letting us see just enough of it dramatized at the climax to give the project on which the whole plot rests some solidity. The closing lines of the play ("No epilogue here, unless you make it/If you want freedom go and take it") struck me as a bit more Brecht than Bard, but on the whole the pastiche worked, with that close entirely logical in the circumstances, and all this to the good of a climax, and denouement, that drew all the narrative strands together in very satisfying fashion.
Saturday, April 20, 2024
On Cryptohistory, the Paranormal and William Shakespeare
One of the oddities of contemporary culture is how persons who ordinarily find history dull suddenly become attentive when someone mentions "aliens"--in the sense of extraterrestrials having been a part of it.
The explanation of this seems to me to be that those persons' interest is still not in history, but the possibility that the claims for the existence of extraterrestrials visiting Earth has been validated.
But that raises the question of why precisely they should care to prove that such visitations have happened. Why should so many people be invested in this?
About that I am not at all clear, but I have noticed a similar interest in much more down-to-Earth, less world-shaking, subjects, such as the possibility of the authorship of William Shakespeare's plays by someone other than William Shakespeare. It seems that, just as with history, people who are not normally interested in Shakespeare, and not knowledgeable about Shakespeare, get interested when, for example, Edward de Vere or Francis Bacon or Walter Raleigh or somesuch is mentioned as the real author of his works. The result is that if some are quite invested in the controversy and make detailed claims on the basis of Shakespeare's plays (all the evidence is indirect in nature), a significant number of people far from capable of making or appreciating such arguments still find interest in the essential claim--which comes down to people being fascinated by the thought that productions they have not read or seen or cared about that have been attributed to one historical figure of whom they know next to nothing actually being attributable to another figure of whom they likely know even less.
Considering both obsessions it can seem symbolic that Roland Emmerich, who made the aliens-visited-Earth-in-the-past movies Stargate (1994) and Independence Day (1996) later directed a movie dramatizing Edward de Vere's writing the plays and using Shakespeare as a front, Anonymous (2011). Didn't see it? That's okay, pretty much no one did, and it would not seem that you or they or anyone else missed much in not doing so--certainly to go by David Walsh's take on the film some years ago (which, as may be expected of those who have read Walsh at his best, is most certainly attentive toward and insightful into the pseudo-controversy over the authorship of Shakespeare's works, which he went so far as to follow up in a second item on the matter).
The explanation of this seems to me to be that those persons' interest is still not in history, but the possibility that the claims for the existence of extraterrestrials visiting Earth has been validated.
But that raises the question of why precisely they should care to prove that such visitations have happened. Why should so many people be invested in this?
About that I am not at all clear, but I have noticed a similar interest in much more down-to-Earth, less world-shaking, subjects, such as the possibility of the authorship of William Shakespeare's plays by someone other than William Shakespeare. It seems that, just as with history, people who are not normally interested in Shakespeare, and not knowledgeable about Shakespeare, get interested when, for example, Edward de Vere or Francis Bacon or Walter Raleigh or somesuch is mentioned as the real author of his works. The result is that if some are quite invested in the controversy and make detailed claims on the basis of Shakespeare's plays (all the evidence is indirect in nature), a significant number of people far from capable of making or appreciating such arguments still find interest in the essential claim--which comes down to people being fascinated by the thought that productions they have not read or seen or cared about that have been attributed to one historical figure of whom they know next to nothing actually being attributable to another figure of whom they likely know even less.
Considering both obsessions it can seem symbolic that Roland Emmerich, who made the aliens-visited-Earth-in-the-past movies Stargate (1994) and Independence Day (1996) later directed a movie dramatizing Edward de Vere's writing the plays and using Shakespeare as a front, Anonymous (2011). Didn't see it? That's okay, pretty much no one did, and it would not seem that you or they or anyone else missed much in not doing so--certainly to go by David Walsh's take on the film some years ago (which, as may be expected of those who have read Walsh at his best, is most certainly attentive toward and insightful into the pseudo-controversy over the authorship of Shakespeare's works, which he went so far as to follow up in a second item on the matter).
"All Art is Propaganda," Somebody Said, Somewhere
Looking back it seems that many an early twentieth century literary great claimed that "All art is propaganda." George Orwell seems the one most associated with the phrase, which he states in his 1940 essay on Charles Dickens. However, Upton Sinclair said exactly the same thing in exactly those words in his epic 1925 history of art, Mammonart, with which Orwell might have been familiar given Orwell's praises for Sinclair's work.
That far more people seem to associate the phrase with Orwell than with Sinclair, I suppose, reflects the greater respectability of the former than the latter these days. Like Orwell Sinclair shifted away from his earlier political stances, but Sinclair's greatest work, fiction and nonfiction, is generally associated with his time as a committed socialist, whereas Orwell is best known for, and celebrated for, producing a work that, in spite of his much more complex attitudes and intentions, came to be regarded as the supreme piece of Cold Warrior literature, overshadowing all the rest of his work--which has been all the better for his memory given the prejudices of the tastemakers.
That far more people seem to associate the phrase with Orwell than with Sinclair, I suppose, reflects the greater respectability of the former than the latter these days. Like Orwell Sinclair shifted away from his earlier political stances, but Sinclair's greatest work, fiction and nonfiction, is generally associated with his time as a committed socialist, whereas Orwell is best known for, and celebrated for, producing a work that, in spite of his much more complex attitudes and intentions, came to be regarded as the supreme piece of Cold Warrior literature, overshadowing all the rest of his work--which has been all the better for his memory given the prejudices of the tastemakers.
Jane Austen and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
As I remarked once, for me the most worthwhile passage in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is the satirical dialogue about the idea of the "accomplished young lady."
Such accomplishment--if one goes by Thorstein Veblen's theory of the leisure class--is merely the leisured showing off their greater resources, and the supposed greater prowess which affords them that leisure, by having their young ladies display in a supposedly masterful fashion costly and time-consuming training in skills of no practical value in their lives for the sake of unsubtly conveying the message that "This is why we are here and you are there, plebs!"
Just as much as ever we are today bombarded with claims of such upper-class "accomplishment" (not least, by way of pop culture). Still, the precise skills in which today's young lady, and gentleman, are expected to display "accomplishment" are different, with one example the martial arts.
Lest this need be said I do not at all deny the validity of training in those arts for purposes of exercise, sport, self-defense and much else. However, if we are to be honest the reason we are so often (falsely and stupidly) given the impression that "everyone" is a black belt holder of some kind (preferably something fashionable at the moment) is because in the United States such training has acquired an association with upper classness. This is because the sustained commitment of significant disposable time and money required to complete such a training is likely to be beyond the reach of working persons and their children, with the association reinforced by the way that unthinking conformists imitate what better-off people do--and of course, many, many, many more lie about doing so--the more in as the persons in each and every one of these categories boast about their "accomplishment" ad nauseam, such that one is often left wondering if anyone has ever worn a belt of any color other than black. One sees just how much fakery is going on when hack thriller writers get away with having their heroes fight off attackers with a "judo kick," such an easy mistake and its complete failure to elicit comment--just one of those little proofs that, just as in Ms. Austen's time, the image of "accomplishment" is, much, much, much more often than not a façade, one as ridiculous as it is tiresome.
Such accomplishment--if one goes by Thorstein Veblen's theory of the leisure class--is merely the leisured showing off their greater resources, and the supposed greater prowess which affords them that leisure, by having their young ladies display in a supposedly masterful fashion costly and time-consuming training in skills of no practical value in their lives for the sake of unsubtly conveying the message that "This is why we are here and you are there, plebs!"
Just as much as ever we are today bombarded with claims of such upper-class "accomplishment" (not least, by way of pop culture). Still, the precise skills in which today's young lady, and gentleman, are expected to display "accomplishment" are different, with one example the martial arts.
Lest this need be said I do not at all deny the validity of training in those arts for purposes of exercise, sport, self-defense and much else. However, if we are to be honest the reason we are so often (falsely and stupidly) given the impression that "everyone" is a black belt holder of some kind (preferably something fashionable at the moment) is because in the United States such training has acquired an association with upper classness. This is because the sustained commitment of significant disposable time and money required to complete such a training is likely to be beyond the reach of working persons and their children, with the association reinforced by the way that unthinking conformists imitate what better-off people do--and of course, many, many, many more lie about doing so--the more in as the persons in each and every one of these categories boast about their "accomplishment" ad nauseam, such that one is often left wondering if anyone has ever worn a belt of any color other than black. One sees just how much fakery is going on when hack thriller writers get away with having their heroes fight off attackers with a "judo kick," such an easy mistake and its complete failure to elicit comment--just one of those little proofs that, just as in Ms. Austen's time, the image of "accomplishment" is, much, much, much more often than not a façade, one as ridiculous as it is tiresome.
In What Does Middle Classness Consist?
We hear about middle classness all the time, usually from commentators desirous of dissolving the reality of inequality in an image of generalized middleness. One approach to such dissolution is judging the matter not on the basis of material criteria actually having to do with the terms on which people live, but instead favoring educational levels, or the "values" they purport to espouse, and even self-identification (i.e. "If you think you're middle class, then you are!"). When they do acknowledge material criteria they often equate middle classness not with the income requirements permitting life at a middle class standard demarcated in some fashion (never mind the standard most seem to actually identify with middle classness), but the middle of the range of the income distribution, a very different thing that generally constitutes a far lower bar (depending on the context, one can be mid-income while being much less than middle class in any meaningful sense), in yet another shabby evasion of the sharp edges of social reality.
I tried to do better than that in my working papers on the subject. You can find these here.
I tried to do better than that in my working papers on the subject. You can find these here.
The Obscurantism of "Genius"
I recall encountering a lengthy discussion of the concept of "genius" in a popular news magazine a long time ago (TIME, perhaps).
The author of the piece chalked up the desire to believe in "genius" to a romantic desire for transcendence.
One may well grant an element of that existing within the contemporary cult of genius, but it seems to me far from being the whole of it. More important, I think, is the contradiction between the complexity and scale of modern life, and the prevailing individualistic intellectual and emotional attitudes.
Consider, for instance, scientific life. The scientific endeavor is old, vast, collective in spirit--sociologist Robert Merton, indeed, seeing the collectivist attitude toward scientific knowledge as in fact one of the key elements of the scientific ethos. Scientists build on the work of predecessors in conjunction with their colleagues, such that the individual efforts all flow into a common stream so much larger than any of them that it can seem foolishness to worry too much about whether this or that drop came from that particular tributary of the great river--with the depth and intricacy of the collective, collaborative, aspect getting only the more conspicuous to go by the sheer number of authors on single scientific papers today (a function of just how painfully specialized the work has become). However, a culture accustomed to individualism, indeed vehement about explaining results in terms of individual achievement, individual choice, individual contribution, is more likely to stress single, towering figures who, because so much more is credited to them than any one person ever actually did, or for that matter probably could have done (especially insofar as all the others who helped lead up to them fall by the wayside), can only seem superhuman, magical, in a word, "geniuses." Thus in a common view physics had that Isaac Newton guy who did it all pretty much by himself--and never mind those giants on whose shoulders he supposedly stood. And then not much happened until that Albert Einstein guy, who singlehandedly vaulted us into the relativistic era with a few papers. And so forth.
The tendency obscures rather than illuminates--which is plausibly just fine with those who prefer to see humanity as consisting of a tiny elite of superhumans who accomplish everything and a vast mass of dross who owe that elite everything and should accordingly be groveling before them in the dirt lest Atlas decide they are not worth the trouble, and shrug. Naturally the word is bandied about much in our time--and never more than in the case of persons who, one way or another, seem to amass a lot of money (in a reminder of what, infinitely more than knowledge, is really valued in this society).
Thus was Ken Lay a genius. And Jeffrey Epstein. And Sam Bankman-Fried. And Elizabeth Holmes. And many, many others just like them. In the haste to acclaim such persons such the real reasons for the desperate attachment of persons of conventional mind to the concept become all too apparent.
The author of the piece chalked up the desire to believe in "genius" to a romantic desire for transcendence.
One may well grant an element of that existing within the contemporary cult of genius, but it seems to me far from being the whole of it. More important, I think, is the contradiction between the complexity and scale of modern life, and the prevailing individualistic intellectual and emotional attitudes.
Consider, for instance, scientific life. The scientific endeavor is old, vast, collective in spirit--sociologist Robert Merton, indeed, seeing the collectivist attitude toward scientific knowledge as in fact one of the key elements of the scientific ethos. Scientists build on the work of predecessors in conjunction with their colleagues, such that the individual efforts all flow into a common stream so much larger than any of them that it can seem foolishness to worry too much about whether this or that drop came from that particular tributary of the great river--with the depth and intricacy of the collective, collaborative, aspect getting only the more conspicuous to go by the sheer number of authors on single scientific papers today (a function of just how painfully specialized the work has become). However, a culture accustomed to individualism, indeed vehement about explaining results in terms of individual achievement, individual choice, individual contribution, is more likely to stress single, towering figures who, because so much more is credited to them than any one person ever actually did, or for that matter probably could have done (especially insofar as all the others who helped lead up to them fall by the wayside), can only seem superhuman, magical, in a word, "geniuses." Thus in a common view physics had that Isaac Newton guy who did it all pretty much by himself--and never mind those giants on whose shoulders he supposedly stood. And then not much happened until that Albert Einstein guy, who singlehandedly vaulted us into the relativistic era with a few papers. And so forth.
The tendency obscures rather than illuminates--which is plausibly just fine with those who prefer to see humanity as consisting of a tiny elite of superhumans who accomplish everything and a vast mass of dross who owe that elite everything and should accordingly be groveling before them in the dirt lest Atlas decide they are not worth the trouble, and shrug. Naturally the word is bandied about much in our time--and never more than in the case of persons who, one way or another, seem to amass a lot of money (in a reminder of what, infinitely more than knowledge, is really valued in this society).
Thus was Ken Lay a genius. And Jeffrey Epstein. And Sam Bankman-Fried. And Elizabeth Holmes. And many, many others just like them. In the haste to acclaim such persons such the real reasons for the desperate attachment of persons of conventional mind to the concept become all too apparent.
Tom Clancy's Debt of Honor and Japanese Work Culture
Like the other major '90s-era American thriller writers who took up the then highly topical theme of Japanese-American relations Tom Clancy presumed to "explain" Japan to his American audience in Debt of Honor, retailing the clichés of the "experts," though perhaps less admiringly than others. In his account Japan's culture "demanded much of its citizens" in a way supposedly alien to even the Japanese-American character (Chet Nomura) through whose eyes Clancy showed his readers the country, with "[t]he boss . . . always right," the "good employee" the one "who did as he was told," and getting ahead requiring one to "kiss a lot of ass" and go the extra mile in regard to the display of loyalty to the employer ("sing the company song," come in "an hour early to show how sincere you were").
As is often the case with those who make much of "difference," all this was really much less "different" than Clancy made it seem--in America, too, the rules of getting ahead not so different. No more in America than anywhere else do bosses take unkindly to being wrong, and employees who do not do what they are told. And no less in America than anywhere else do "ass-kissers" get ahead, and those who refuse to play the game suffer for fighting to retain their dignity in the inherently degrading situation that is the personal subordination seen in the modern workplace.
Indeed, those familiar with what it takes to enter the more rarefied territories within the professions (like completing a prestigious medical residency), or the more prestigious firms of "Greed is good"-singing Wall Street and "Move Fast and Break Things" Silicon Valley--where many an employer is an insufferably smug idiot bully who considers themselves entitled to put anyone desirous of a position through sheer hell for the privilege of making money for them, or simply put having been an intern for their firm on their resume--will be less impressed than Clancy was by what he thought he knew about how different Japan was with regard to its exploitativeness and destructiveness of the minds and bodies of the ambitious "go-getter" that everyone is expected to take for their ideal.
Compounding the irony, this is generally to the approval of those who see things Clancy's way.
As is often the case with those who make much of "difference," all this was really much less "different" than Clancy made it seem--in America, too, the rules of getting ahead not so different. No more in America than anywhere else do bosses take unkindly to being wrong, and employees who do not do what they are told. And no less in America than anywhere else do "ass-kissers" get ahead, and those who refuse to play the game suffer for fighting to retain their dignity in the inherently degrading situation that is the personal subordination seen in the modern workplace.
Indeed, those familiar with what it takes to enter the more rarefied territories within the professions (like completing a prestigious medical residency), or the more prestigious firms of "Greed is good"-singing Wall Street and "Move Fast and Break Things" Silicon Valley--where many an employer is an insufferably smug idiot bully who considers themselves entitled to put anyone desirous of a position through sheer hell for the privilege of making money for them, or simply put having been an intern for their firm on their resume--will be less impressed than Clancy was by what he thought he knew about how different Japan was with regard to its exploitativeness and destructiveness of the minds and bodies of the ambitious "go-getter" that everyone is expected to take for their ideal.
Compounding the irony, this is generally to the approval of those who see things Clancy's way.
Are Bloggers Wasting Their Time Tinkering with Their Blogs in the Hopes of Getting More Readers?
I suspect at this stage of things that most of those who started blogging have been less than thrilled with their results--certainly to go by the vast number of bloggers who quit the endeavor, often after just a little while. They were given the impression that what goes online is necessarily seen by vast numbers of people, that they would not be crazy to expect the things they put up to "go viral," that they could end up web celebrities.
Instead they mostly found themselves ignored--and when not ignored often insulted. Indeed, many may have been disappointed to find that rather than persistence paying off they have got less and less result with time--finding the search engines less likely to index their posts than before, seeing less and less evidence of actual humans reading their blog by leaving a comment or posting a link, as they suspect that what page views they get are spam, bots, and the rest.
There is no great mystery in this. The reality is that online the ratio of people looking for attention is extremely high relative to those ready to pay attention. The reality is that the great majority of Internet usage is passive, with any kind of engagement a rarity (very, very few of those who do find anything likely to share it with others). The reality is that, where the blogger especially is concerned, the Internet has been moving away from full-bodied text toward shorter-form content (like microblogging) and audiovisual experience (the vlogger rather than even the microblogger). And as if all this did not suffice to mean that things were going from bad to worse the game is entirely rigged at every level in favor of big names, big money, those with legacy media connections, and the other advantages.
Alas, these obvious realities are something few are ready to admit--instead what prevails a stupid meritocratic-aspirationalist view that treats every outcome as the result of a tough but fair test of individual talent and effort. And even those who can see through that stupidity often do not simply shrug their shoulders, but strive instead for a better outcome. One way is by trying to get search engines to treat them more favorably (indexing more of their items, ranking them more highly in search results, etc.), the more in as many a would-be advice-giver claims to know what will do the trick.
Should they post more frequently, or less frequently? Should they go for longer posts, or shorter ones? Are there too many links in their posts, or not enough? Is it a mistake to have so many internal links--for instance, posts that provide handy collections of links to past posts? Should they be weeding out old posts that perhaps did not get looked at as much as others? And so on and so forth. They will hear a lot of advice (typically vague yet completely contradictory advice, supported by no evidence whatsoever)--and if acting on it, spend a lot of time on things that have nothing to do with actual blogging.
My experience is that all that hassle will not accomplish much for most of them, for many reasons. My personal suspicion is that the infrequency with which search engines "crawl" your blog means that it will be a long time before you get any positive result, even if you really do achieve one, which seems to me doubtful. I suspect that the search engines are simply overwhelmed by the amount of content out there, and the efforts to manipulate it--to the extent that they are not catering to the sponsors, demands for censorship, etc. that doubtless tie up much in knots even beyond the direct effect of such corruption of search results (and that half-baked experiments with artificial intelligence are likely lousing things up further). The result is that they probably ought to spare themselves the trouble--and, if they really think their blogging has any meaning at all, get on with that instead.
Instead they mostly found themselves ignored--and when not ignored often insulted. Indeed, many may have been disappointed to find that rather than persistence paying off they have got less and less result with time--finding the search engines less likely to index their posts than before, seeing less and less evidence of actual humans reading their blog by leaving a comment or posting a link, as they suspect that what page views they get are spam, bots, and the rest.
There is no great mystery in this. The reality is that online the ratio of people looking for attention is extremely high relative to those ready to pay attention. The reality is that the great majority of Internet usage is passive, with any kind of engagement a rarity (very, very few of those who do find anything likely to share it with others). The reality is that, where the blogger especially is concerned, the Internet has been moving away from full-bodied text toward shorter-form content (like microblogging) and audiovisual experience (the vlogger rather than even the microblogger). And as if all this did not suffice to mean that things were going from bad to worse the game is entirely rigged at every level in favor of big names, big money, those with legacy media connections, and the other advantages.
Alas, these obvious realities are something few are ready to admit--instead what prevails a stupid meritocratic-aspirationalist view that treats every outcome as the result of a tough but fair test of individual talent and effort. And even those who can see through that stupidity often do not simply shrug their shoulders, but strive instead for a better outcome. One way is by trying to get search engines to treat them more favorably (indexing more of their items, ranking them more highly in search results, etc.), the more in as many a would-be advice-giver claims to know what will do the trick.
Should they post more frequently, or less frequently? Should they go for longer posts, or shorter ones? Are there too many links in their posts, or not enough? Is it a mistake to have so many internal links--for instance, posts that provide handy collections of links to past posts? Should they be weeding out old posts that perhaps did not get looked at as much as others? And so on and so forth. They will hear a lot of advice (typically vague yet completely contradictory advice, supported by no evidence whatsoever)--and if acting on it, spend a lot of time on things that have nothing to do with actual blogging.
My experience is that all that hassle will not accomplish much for most of them, for many reasons. My personal suspicion is that the infrequency with which search engines "crawl" your blog means that it will be a long time before you get any positive result, even if you really do achieve one, which seems to me doubtful. I suspect that the search engines are simply overwhelmed by the amount of content out there, and the efforts to manipulate it--to the extent that they are not catering to the sponsors, demands for censorship, etc. that doubtless tie up much in knots even beyond the direct effect of such corruption of search results (and that half-baked experiments with artificial intelligence are likely lousing things up further). The result is that they probably ought to spare themselves the trouble--and, if they really think their blogging has any meaning at all, get on with that instead.
Never Underestimate the Suckerdom of Bosses
A while back Cory Doctorow rather nicely summed up what I suspect is (contrary to the past decade's Frey-Benedikt study-kickstarted hype, and the post-Open AI GPT-3.5 hype too) the real state of progress in applying artificial intelligence to the vast majority of tasks workers actually perform: "we're nowhere near a place where bots can steal your job," but "we're certainly at the point where your boss can be suckered into firing you and replacing you with a bot that fails at doing your job."
For the worker who gets fired, alas, that the bot they were replaced with fails to do their job is cold comfort. They remain fired, after all--and the odds of their getting a phone call asking them to come back (never mind come back and get compensated for what they were put through) seem to me very slim indeed.
Such is the reality of the relationship between power and responsibility, above all in the Market.
For the worker who gets fired, alas, that the bot they were replaced with fails to do their job is cold comfort. They remain fired, after all--and the odds of their getting a phone call asking them to come back (never mind come back and get compensated for what they were put through) seem to me very slim indeed.
Such is the reality of the relationship between power and responsibility, above all in the Market.
The Unusability of the Internet and the Taming of the Cyber-Space frontier
Back in the 1990s there was a good deal of cyber-utopianism. I think of most of it as having been hype for the web and the tech sector, and for Silicon Valley, as well as broader "market populist" justifications for the neoliberal age by way of their fantasies about the information age--but all the same the idea was there that those who had been shut out, marginalized, denied a chance to speak might have a chance to make themselves heard here.
I suspect that most of those who acted on such premises eventually discovered the cruel lie for themselves, that the Internet was less radical in these ways than advertised, and became less and less so as time went on. That it is a medium whose usership is essentially passive, and carefully gatekept, so that Big Money, legacy media help and well-resourced supporters make all the difference between whether one's message is noticed or not, all to the advantage of the rich and powerful, and disadvantage of the poor and weak. Now with the Internet the mess that it is one may imagine that ever more than before the only way to get a message out through it is to put ever more resources behind it--as those who cannot, whatever they have to say, are seen and heard by virtually no one but themselves.
I suspect that most of those who acted on such premises eventually discovered the cruel lie for themselves, that the Internet was less radical in these ways than advertised, and became less and less so as time went on. That it is a medium whose usership is essentially passive, and carefully gatekept, so that Big Money, legacy media help and well-resourced supporters make all the difference between whether one's message is noticed or not, all to the advantage of the rich and powerful, and disadvantage of the poor and weak. Now with the Internet the mess that it is one may imagine that ever more than before the only way to get a message out through it is to put ever more resources behind it--as those who cannot, whatever they have to say, are seen and heard by virtually no one but themselves.
The End of the Cyber-Frontier
Back in the 1990s the cyber-utopians, reflecting their ideological background, seemed inclined to portray the Internet as a new frontier for the taking. (Indeed, Thomas Friedman, in the midst of lionizing Enron for its business model that he was sure was a perfect symbol of how the twenty-first century would belong to America, exalted its activity as part of a great "cyberspace land grab.")
Today there is no sense of anything like that online, the cyber-frontier long since closed--and, just as with the frontier in American history rather than the version of it the mythmakers continue to promulgate to this day, the result has been less a mass enfranchisement of the many than the further enrichment of an already rich few, as we are reminded by how much, regardless of how Jim Cramer rearranges the letters in his acronyms, a handful of giant firms, the same ones for rather a long time now, have turned what (falsely) seemed an unclaimed continent ripe for the taking into their private domains, and that ever more fully as such of the small freeholders who had made a place for themselves find their situation less and less tenable.
Today there is no sense of anything like that online, the cyber-frontier long since closed--and, just as with the frontier in American history rather than the version of it the mythmakers continue to promulgate to this day, the result has been less a mass enfranchisement of the many than the further enrichment of an already rich few, as we are reminded by how much, regardless of how Jim Cramer rearranges the letters in his acronyms, a handful of giant firms, the same ones for rather a long time now, have turned what (falsely) seemed an unclaimed continent ripe for the taking into their private domains, and that ever more fully as such of the small freeholders who had made a place for themselves find their situation less and less tenable.
Nostalgia as Protest--and its Limitations
I suppose that where nostalgia is concerned we can speak of "pull" and "push." We may be pulled toward some aspect of the past by its apparent intrinsic fascination--but we may also be pushed away from the present by its repulsions, and this exactly why some frown upon nostalgia as they do.
Preferring the past to the present has historically been the preserve of the conservative and especially the reactionary, who really do want to bring back something of the past. But in a reactionary era the liberal might find comfort in looking backward. So have many liberals, faced with the '80s and all that came after, been nostalgic for the '60s.
It is a more awkward fit in their case. Those who believe in progress, if sincere about their belief, should expect that the best days lie ahead rather than behind them. Thinking otherwise is a reflection of the profound demoralization on their part that has played a far from inconsiderable part in moving the world further and further away from what they said they wanted it to be--while this nostalgia for the past, alas, has been far from the only expression of that sad state.
Preferring the past to the present has historically been the preserve of the conservative and especially the reactionary, who really do want to bring back something of the past. But in a reactionary era the liberal might find comfort in looking backward. So have many liberals, faced with the '80s and all that came after, been nostalgic for the '60s.
It is a more awkward fit in their case. Those who believe in progress, if sincere about their belief, should expect that the best days lie ahead rather than behind them. Thinking otherwise is a reflection of the profound demoralization on their part that has played a far from inconsiderable part in moving the world further and further away from what they said they wanted it to be--while this nostalgia for the past, alas, has been far from the only expression of that sad state.
Of "Optimism"
"Optimism" has always struck me as a slippery word whose usage often betrays a lightness of mind. To be optimistic, after all, always means being optimistic in relation to a particular thing--and unavoidably, being pessimistic about another thing. (I am optimistic about how "our team" will do, which means I am pessimistic about how "their team" will do when we go up against them in the competition, for instance.)
So which do we focus on, the optimism or the pessimism?
As is the case with so much else in life, Authority tends to decide what counts as "optimistic," and of course they identify it with unquestioning faith in the status quo and unswerving conformism, pessimism with the opposite attitude--even though optimism about what exists tends to go with pessimism about much else. (Thus the classical conservative is a believer in the wisdom of traditional social arrangements, and optimistic about adherence to them--but pessimistic about human nature, reason, the prospects for a more just social order. Whether they are optimistic or pessimistic, again, depends on who is doing the talking.)
Confusing matters further in doing the above those in charge often promote what they like to call "optimism" as a broad mental attitude--and a positive character trait, and a lack of such optimism also such an attitude, pessimism equally a broad mental attitude and a negative character trait of which one ought to be ashamed.
As if the way in which optimism and pessimism tend to be bound up, and one or the other emphasized in a shabbily manipulative way, were not enough, it is worth noting another great ambiguity within the term and its usage. There is, on the one hand, the optimism of the person who looks at a problem and says "I see a problem, but I think I can fix it." At the same time there is the person whose response is, instead, "I see a problem but I'm sure it will all work itself out somehow."
The former is the optimism of the problem-solver ready to work for a solution. The latter is the optimism of the person who thinks that they do not have to solve a problem--a response that can be genuine, but often bespeaks complacency, irresponsibility, callousness, in which case optimism is nothing but a lazy or cowardly dodge, with this still more blatant in the case of those who see a problem and then deny that they see any problem at all. These days, this, too, accounts for a very large part of what is said and done under the banner of "optimism."
Naturally we ought to be a lot more careful about how we use the word--and how we respond when others use it, not being intimidated or ashamed when they chastise us for failing in "optimism" according to whatever standard they presume to apply to us for their own convenience.
So which do we focus on, the optimism or the pessimism?
As is the case with so much else in life, Authority tends to decide what counts as "optimistic," and of course they identify it with unquestioning faith in the status quo and unswerving conformism, pessimism with the opposite attitude--even though optimism about what exists tends to go with pessimism about much else. (Thus the classical conservative is a believer in the wisdom of traditional social arrangements, and optimistic about adherence to them--but pessimistic about human nature, reason, the prospects for a more just social order. Whether they are optimistic or pessimistic, again, depends on who is doing the talking.)
Confusing matters further in doing the above those in charge often promote what they like to call "optimism" as a broad mental attitude--and a positive character trait, and a lack of such optimism also such an attitude, pessimism equally a broad mental attitude and a negative character trait of which one ought to be ashamed.
As if the way in which optimism and pessimism tend to be bound up, and one or the other emphasized in a shabbily manipulative way, were not enough, it is worth noting another great ambiguity within the term and its usage. There is, on the one hand, the optimism of the person who looks at a problem and says "I see a problem, but I think I can fix it." At the same time there is the person whose response is, instead, "I see a problem but I'm sure it will all work itself out somehow."
The former is the optimism of the problem-solver ready to work for a solution. The latter is the optimism of the person who thinks that they do not have to solve a problem--a response that can be genuine, but often bespeaks complacency, irresponsibility, callousness, in which case optimism is nothing but a lazy or cowardly dodge, with this still more blatant in the case of those who see a problem and then deny that they see any problem at all. These days, this, too, accounts for a very large part of what is said and done under the banner of "optimism."
Naturally we ought to be a lot more careful about how we use the word--and how we respond when others use it, not being intimidated or ashamed when they chastise us for failing in "optimism" according to whatever standard they presume to apply to us for their own convenience.
The Supposed End of Work, and the Drivel Spoken About It
A few years back, when the hype about automation anticipated more than glorified autocompletes, fashionable "thinkers" proclaimed the imminence of radical changes in day-to-day living. Completely misunderstanding the 2013 Frey-Osborne study of automation they thought we were looking at "the end of work" within a few years.
Thus did we have a little, mostly unserious, talk about how society could adapt to half of the work force being put out of a job, like what the relation of work to income would be.
Amid it all, of course, were those who assured everyone that work would still be part of people's lives, with these usually seeming to mean alienated labor done in the market for an employer for wages, the psychological and "spiritual" value of which presumably eternal arrangement they insisted were salutary, claims the media generally treated with the utmost respect.
Of course, few had anything to say about the fact that the media was usually quoting elite commentators whose ideas about what "work" is were remote from the lives of 99 percent of the public, whose experience and thoughts were, as usual, of no account. Many of these, for many of whom "work" has never ceased to mean the hell on Earth that we see in Emile Zola's Germinal, or Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, or Takiji Kobayashi's Kanikosen--and many more for whom work means far, far less but still considerable suffering--would disagree with those "tech" company vice-presidents who think that their sipping a cappuccino on the G6 as they fly home from Davos is "hard work" about whether work is the uplifting and necessary thing they say we cannot do without, instead hopefully looking ahead to the possibility of a different world.
Thus did we have a little, mostly unserious, talk about how society could adapt to half of the work force being put out of a job, like what the relation of work to income would be.
Amid it all, of course, were those who assured everyone that work would still be part of people's lives, with these usually seeming to mean alienated labor done in the market for an employer for wages, the psychological and "spiritual" value of which presumably eternal arrangement they insisted were salutary, claims the media generally treated with the utmost respect.
Of course, few had anything to say about the fact that the media was usually quoting elite commentators whose ideas about what "work" is were remote from the lives of 99 percent of the public, whose experience and thoughts were, as usual, of no account. Many of these, for many of whom "work" has never ceased to mean the hell on Earth that we see in Emile Zola's Germinal, or Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, or Takiji Kobayashi's Kanikosen--and many more for whom work means far, far less but still considerable suffering--would disagree with those "tech" company vice-presidents who think that their sipping a cappuccino on the G6 as they fly home from Davos is "hard work" about whether work is the uplifting and necessary thing they say we cannot do without, instead hopefully looking ahead to the possibility of a different world.
The Beginning of the End of the Cult of the Good School?
By "cult of the Good School" I refer to the profoundly irrational hierarchy that exists among institutions of higher learning in the minds of the conventional wisdom-abiding.
In speaking of that hierarchy as irrational I am not denying that schools differ with regard to the selectivity of their student intake, and the resources available to them for the fulfillment of their educational mission; or denying that that selectivity and those resources may make a difference in the quality of the education and/or training they impart to their graduates. Nor do I deny that these practical differences--or for that matter, the less rational reliance on institutional "reputation"--may make a difference to employers, with implications for their graduates' outcomes with regard to employment and income.
However, the truth is that very few making distinctions among those schools actually know anything about how the schools in question actually stack up against each other in even the more measurable, practical ways (for instance, the average quality of undergraduate instruction); or actually know anything about exactly what difference the school a student graduated from makes in the job market. Rather they just "know" that one school is "better" than others, with most carrying around an image of various strata in their minds--with the Ivy League "better" than others, and within that stratum Harvard better than Yale, all as private schools generally come in ahead of public schools, etcetera, etcetera, albeit with many exceptions all along the line. (Much as many desire to park their car in Harvard yard, the science major will not be looked down upon for choosing the Massachusetts Institute of Technology instead--while Berkley, UCLA, Chapel Hill, among others, in spite of being state institutions, are quite well respected indeed, more so than most private institutions.)
Those who think this way imagine that any young person of intelligence and ambition ought to aim as high as they can in the hierarchy--and if they do not their elders, and conforming peers, think there is something wrong with them. Should they question those elders' and those peers' presumption they will not get an intelligent answer--this "Just what people do."
The insistence on all this ultimately come down to simple-minded snobbery, especially insofar as the data that even the more rigorous sift tend to be flawed and even corrupt. Meanwhile a good deal of longstanding statistical data, confirmed again and again by more recent studies, calls into question the idea of some great wage premium deriving from going to the elite institutions, or even inherent employability. The "power elite" may disproportionately be associated with such colleges, but, even setting aside the fact that the advantages most of them had did not begin or end with the college they attended (where they are, after all, less likely to be going because they were exceptionally bright than because they were exceptionally privileged), the average is a different matter. Stupid writers for trash publications may make claims such as that one can major in somersaults at Harvard and still get a "good job," but as was reconfirmed by a recent study, your major is probably going to be a bigger determinant of whether you get a job in your line and what it will pay than the school to which you went.
However, this foolishness is now up against an era of tighter means, diminished prospects, and greater skepticism about the value of a college education generally, and specific avenues to getting a college education particularly--and as a result of weighing the actual dollars and cents return on their investment in a college degree, and finding that they will very probably be better off commuting to the nearest campus of the university system in their state (maybe after racking up as many credits as they can at the still closer closest campus of their community college) than selling themselves into lifetime debt slavery for "the college experience" of which so many college presidents pompously speak at a Brand Name School. Of course, considering that it is worth acknowledging that the people whose ideas are the mainstream ideas are the ones most remote from the situation of tightened means and diminished prospects; and have absolutely zero respect for the views of the majority. Still, their changing attitude in the face of the crass stupidities of the Cult of the Good School seem likely to increasingly expose those crass stupidities for exactly what they are over time.
In speaking of that hierarchy as irrational I am not denying that schools differ with regard to the selectivity of their student intake, and the resources available to them for the fulfillment of their educational mission; or denying that that selectivity and those resources may make a difference in the quality of the education and/or training they impart to their graduates. Nor do I deny that these practical differences--or for that matter, the less rational reliance on institutional "reputation"--may make a difference to employers, with implications for their graduates' outcomes with regard to employment and income.
However, the truth is that very few making distinctions among those schools actually know anything about how the schools in question actually stack up against each other in even the more measurable, practical ways (for instance, the average quality of undergraduate instruction); or actually know anything about exactly what difference the school a student graduated from makes in the job market. Rather they just "know" that one school is "better" than others, with most carrying around an image of various strata in their minds--with the Ivy League "better" than others, and within that stratum Harvard better than Yale, all as private schools generally come in ahead of public schools, etcetera, etcetera, albeit with many exceptions all along the line. (Much as many desire to park their car in Harvard yard, the science major will not be looked down upon for choosing the Massachusetts Institute of Technology instead--while Berkley, UCLA, Chapel Hill, among others, in spite of being state institutions, are quite well respected indeed, more so than most private institutions.)
Those who think this way imagine that any young person of intelligence and ambition ought to aim as high as they can in the hierarchy--and if they do not their elders, and conforming peers, think there is something wrong with them. Should they question those elders' and those peers' presumption they will not get an intelligent answer--this "Just what people do."
The insistence on all this ultimately come down to simple-minded snobbery, especially insofar as the data that even the more rigorous sift tend to be flawed and even corrupt. Meanwhile a good deal of longstanding statistical data, confirmed again and again by more recent studies, calls into question the idea of some great wage premium deriving from going to the elite institutions, or even inherent employability. The "power elite" may disproportionately be associated with such colleges, but, even setting aside the fact that the advantages most of them had did not begin or end with the college they attended (where they are, after all, less likely to be going because they were exceptionally bright than because they were exceptionally privileged), the average is a different matter. Stupid writers for trash publications may make claims such as that one can major in somersaults at Harvard and still get a "good job," but as was reconfirmed by a recent study, your major is probably going to be a bigger determinant of whether you get a job in your line and what it will pay than the school to which you went.
However, this foolishness is now up against an era of tighter means, diminished prospects, and greater skepticism about the value of a college education generally, and specific avenues to getting a college education particularly--and as a result of weighing the actual dollars and cents return on their investment in a college degree, and finding that they will very probably be better off commuting to the nearest campus of the university system in their state (maybe after racking up as many credits as they can at the still closer closest campus of their community college) than selling themselves into lifetime debt slavery for "the college experience" of which so many college presidents pompously speak at a Brand Name School. Of course, considering that it is worth acknowledging that the people whose ideas are the mainstream ideas are the ones most remote from the situation of tightened means and diminished prospects; and have absolutely zero respect for the views of the majority. Still, their changing attitude in the face of the crass stupidities of the Cult of the Good School seem likely to increasingly expose those crass stupidities for exactly what they are over time.
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