Precognition is almost here. Minority Report conditioning?

[Justin of Flavia Neapolis]

The future is now, old man.

 

[Pionart]

Whoever wrote those Georgia Guidestones is stupid on a really deep level.

I have written a new law to be followed.

1. herp de derp de flippity flerp
2. derpa derpa derpa, derpa derp
3. wing wing!
4. huzzup
5.
6.
7.
8.
9. derp
10.

Let us all unite under the new law.

 

[Abcdenfp]

We are closer to this that people think, the data they are collecting from our pulses , heart rate, search engines etc.. they are working don't you ever think they are doing NOTHING will all this information when in a time information is power.. everyone is gathering in order to use it in a way to have control.
privacy is dead

 

[Tomb1]

Heh. Sign me up.

 

[Lark]

We are closer to this that people think, the data they are collecting from our pulses , heart rate, search engines etc.. they are working don't you ever think they are doing NOTHING will all this information when in a time information is power.. everyone is gathering in order to use it in a way to have control.
privacy is dead

If this where true though, if surveillance was as total and perfect as a lot of people tend to make out then there would be no crime that goes undetected (if not unpunished), there'd be no information problems in the economy and perfect competition, allocative efficiency and true post-scarcity would be the norm but they arent.

So while it could be true that greater and greater information and data is being farmed, harvested, produced I think there's way more junk than anything else.

 

[Abcdenfp]

If this where true though, if surveillance was as total and perfect as a lot of people tend to make out then there would be no crime that goes undetected (if not unpunished), there'd be no information problems in the economy and perfect competition, allocative efficiency and true post-scarcity would be the norm but they arent. So while it could be true that greater and greater information and data is being farmed, harvested, produced I think there's way more junk than anything else.

I agree there is a lot of junk but I also think that we are not aware of what they are harvesting and why they are harvesting it.
So because we don't have all the information our scope of understanding is very limited.
The next 10-15 years are going to be the equivalent of the dark ages in my opinion we are going to witness some set backs and some trials and then the new rebirth will occur our technology renaissance will occur

 

[Virtual ghost]

The next 10-15 years are going to be the equivalent of the dark ages in my opinion we are going to witness some set backs and some trials and then the new rebirth will occur our technology renaissance will occur

This presumes that democracy will triumph over totalitarian ideologies on the global stage ... and that is very questionable idea at this point.

 

[Lark]

I agree there is a lot of junk but I also think that we are not aware of what they are harvesting and why they are harvesting it.
So because we don't have all the information our scope of understanding is very limited.
The next 10-15 years are going to be the equivalent of the dark ages in my opinion we are going to witness some set backs and some trials and then the new rebirth will occur our technology renaissance will occur

Well that's true, although who are they could tell why and what they are harvesting.

I dont think that there's a secret Bena Geserit aiming to produce a Kasen Haddarak like Paul Atreides or anything (badly spelt Dune references galore).

If you use Amazon a lot like me you'll be surprised how even their best AI can make strange suggestions for products based on their faulty or broken algorithms, when I hear people say that AI will fly planes and drive cars I just laugh because I've seen what huge mistakes otherwise decent AI can produce.

Plus, since a lot of it is over simplified logic a lot of AI has become unintentionally hugely prejudiced (or rather reflects actual prejudice), people talk about criminal profiling being the principle case but I think there's more interesting and much more simple examples of the harvesting of existing data and self-fufiling prophecies. Like the serious reproduction of social ills as social preferences and unintentionally "engineered" outcomes, lots of classical conditioning and reinforcement, an unplanned behaviourist nightmare.

 

[Lark]

This presumes that democracy will triumph over totalitarian ideologies on the global stage ... and that is very questionable idea at this point.

I think democracy will definitely prevail at least the ritual or sport of democracy, its a pretty pale imitation of what it was conceived as being in the first place already, more like reality TV than anything its founders imagined.

Demagogery rather than totalitarianism to be honest, or at best perhaps technocracy, which is pretty likely.

There's a lot of good books on how limited democracy actual is in practice and whether this is a good idea or not, Schumpeter was a major conservative advocate of democracy as a limited kind of elite sport or contest, probably the best book I read on it was Participation and Democratic Theory. Its a classic now, I managed to get an old torn cover ex-library copy.

 

[Virtual ghost]

I think democracy will definitely prevail at least the ritual or sport of democracy, its a pretty pale imitation of what it was conceived as being in the first place already, more like reality TV than anything its founders imagined.

Demagogery rather than totalitarianism to be honest, or at best perhaps technocracy, which is pretty likely.

There's a lot of good books on how limited democracy actual is in practice and whether this is a good idea or not, Schumpeter was a major conservative advocate of democracy as a limited kind of elite sport or contest, probably the best book I read on it was Participation and Democratic Theory. Its a classic now, I managed to get an old torn cover ex-library copy.

First of all totalitarian system disguised as a democracy is still a totalitarian system. So for me these aren't really two separate concepts since the bottom line is deficit of democracy. How exactly will that be put in practice is secondary question basically.


However even with that in the mix I am actually placing bets on totalitarian future: democracy is melting away across the world, basically all major democracies in this world are in huge debts and they are outsourcing concrete industry/production of goods 24/7 (many even have serious demographic problems), pilled up environmental problems will surely create more drama and dystopia through less options, next world super-power seem to be the country that doesn't even officially have the instrument of elections, a new number of regions and countries are facing social collapse upon those that already are there, military robots are reality for quite some time now and they are getting more sophisticated .... and all of that will chip away the democracy (aka normal life). Which was always vulnerable to "permanent crisis".



As someone said: Dammit people, 1984. was a warning not the instructions manual !

 

[Virtual ghost]

The problem is that democracy and normal life can't survive when access to information is tainted and manipulated. However in that regard the world is falling apart.
This came out recently.

In a way with this you don't even need mind reading technologies. Since you can just install "the proper" mindset and misinformation into people. Especially when it comes to their early years.




But that is a topic for some other thread.

 

[Lark]

The problem is that democracy and normal life can't survive when access to information is tainted and manipulated. However in that regard the world is falling apart.
This came out recently.

In a way with this you don't even need mind reading technologies. Since you can just install "the proper" mindset and misinformation into people. Especially when it comes to their early years.




But that is a topic for some other thread.

Ha! ROI is supposed to be fine, shows what they know.

I agree with you BTW.

Most of the research done by behaviourists like BF Skinner was exploited by the ad industry and governments, psychologists were writing about this a long time ago with books like The Hidden Persuaders talking about it, subliminal messaging what the moral panic back then.

People are skeptical about all the wrong things, like the people think they are better informed than others are often the ones more heavily invested in some fabricated message put out by someone.

 

[Lark]

First of all totalitarian system disguised as a democracy is still a totalitarian system. So for me these aren't really two separate concepts since the bottom line is deficit of democracy. How exactly will that be put in practice is secondary question basically.


However even with that in the mix I am actually placing bets on totalitarian future: democracy is melting away across the world, basically all major democracies in this world are in huge debts and they are outsourcing concrete industry/production of goods 24/7 (many even have serious demographic problems), pilled up environmental problems will surely create more drama and dystopia through less options, next world super-power seem to be the country that doesn't even officially have the instrument of elections, a new number of regions and countries are facing social collapse upon those that already are there, military robots are reality for quite some time now and they are getting more sophisticated .... and all of that will chip away the democracy (aka normal life). Which was always vulnerable to "permanent crisis".



As someone said: Dammit people, 1984. was a warning not the instructions manual !

I think Huxley's Brave New World is more likely than 1984 to be honest, Orwell wrote 1984 because he didnt think Huxley was right about two things, total regimes being violent even when it wasnt necessary any longer and containing the seeds of their own destruction (driving all the intellectuals crazy was their doom, even if a lot of people didnt get that) but Huxley's triumphant social engineers with a hedonistic, servile drug dependent masses looks more likely to me.

Maybe not everywhere but in the more privileged places I think.

I've also read about the idea that democracies are totalitarian, I used to think it was more credible than I do now.

Totalitarianism requires a state of permanent crisis but also a state of permanent mobilization with everyone who wasnt the enemy involved and I think that's unlikely, regimes with limited democracies, elite contests run periodically to confirm their legitimacy, are happy to keep a lid on participation or mobilization. They love apathy. They love it even better if their populations of "surplus people" are all just staying home, watching TV or online, eating and drinking themselves into an early grave, theoretically costing them less in taxes.

The other dystopia that I think people dont take as seriously as they should is Idiocracy, its slightly different from the classic "the poor are too many" of Malthus if you properly understand it, more to do with the deadening and dumbing down effect of contented consumerism.

 

[Virtual ghost]

Ha! ROI is supposed to be fine, shows what they know.

I agree with you BTW.

Most of the research done by behaviourists like BF Skinner was exploited by the ad industry and governments, psychologists were writing about this a long time ago with books like The Hidden Persuaders talking about it, subliminal messaging what the moral panic back then.

People are skeptical about all the wrong things, like the people think they are better informed than others are often the ones more heavily invested in some fabricated message put out by someone.

Yes, people have their mouth full of conspiracy theories but they ignore the obvious ones, like the one presented in that map. I mean that map is surely much more correct than wrong at this point and it didn't come from nowhere. Someone made things to be like that.


Regarding ROI - actually no. The green countries at this point make barely 2% of the world's population. Plus even if you add yellow "Satisfactory situation" into the mix you shouldn't get more than 10%. What means that democracy, freedom of speech and right to information is getting outnumbered and outgunned in the from of numbers, guns and economy. Not to mention that it is hard to do good and detailed reporting on a country/region that is hiding and twisting all the data about itself. Plus this is a trend, maybe in a few years ROI will not be green anymore, after all this is I think first year that US is downgraded to orange.

So more and more people are being feed with BS and education is getting worse and worse in the terms critical thinking ... and that can crash democracy to the point that it doesn't even formally exists anymore. Therefore this may actually be the trend that defines into what 21th century will turn out in the end. You can be critical thinker as much as you like but without proper information this doesn't mean anything.

 

[Lark]

Yes, people have their mouth full of conspiracy theories but they ignore the obvious ones, like the one presented in that map. I mean that map is surely much more correct than wrong at this point and it didn't come from nowhere. Someone made things to be like that.


Regarding ROI - actually no. The green countries at this point make barely 2% of the world's population. Plus even if you add yellow "Satisfactory situation" into the mix you shouldn't get more than 10%. What means that democracy, freedom of speech and right to information is getting outnumbered and outgunned in the from of numbers, guns and economy. Not to mention that it is hard to do good and detailed reporting on a country/region that is hiding and twisting all the data about itself. Plus this is a trend, maybe in a few years ROI will not be green anymore, after all this is I think first year that US is downgraded to orange.

So more and more people are being feed with BS and education is getting worse and worse in the terms critical thinking ... and that can crash democracy to the point that it doesn't even formally exists anymore. Therefore this may actually be the trend that defines into what 21th century will turn out in the end. You can be critical thinker as much as you like but without proper information this doesn't mean anything.

I'm not sure schools teach critical thinking, its not necessarily a feature of higher levels of education either, not in my experience. I learned it at home, what I know if it and my own reading.

The reason I laughed at ROI is that I dont think their reporting is particularly unbiased but its not policed and probably not as much manufacturing of consent goes on apart from a couple of cliches which are common the western world over.

It is good points about the information supply, if its messed up enough, that sort of confusion was described as "hypernormalization" when it was the Soviet union doing it and perhaps its the next big idea in crowd management for post-cold war limited democracies now too.

 

[Justin of Flavia Neapolis]

This presumes that democracy will triumph over totalitarian ideologies on the global stage ... and that is very questionable idea at this point.

I hope and believe autocratic ideologies will make a come back on the global stage.

 

[Lark]

I hope and believe autocratic ideologies will make a come back on the global stage.

Holy Crap man, NO! :O

I'm pretty traditionalist in many respects but I'd sure as hell not want that and I'm sure as hell that it would not resemble anything that anyone living today could really consider desirable.

No matter how undesirable what they would legitimately want to subvert by this means is. These sorts of things are definitely the Utopianism of the right.

 

[Justin of Flavia Neapolis]

Funny thing about Utopia’s: they’ve never been done before in history nor will they ever happen as long as men remain in their fallen state.

Funny thing about autocracies: they existed up until 1917.

I assume you meant the "Kingdom of Heaven" as being the Utopian ideal, and not a system of government per se.

 

[ceecee]

I hope and believe autocratic ideologies will make a come back on the global stage.

I look forward to your "Franco had some good ideas, fam!" essay.

 

[Justin of Flavia Neapolis]

I'm not even sure if AI programs can truly look forward to anything in the most human sense.