Author Archives: Peter

The Revolution Will (or Will Not) be…

I’ll get to some thoughts on the 7 Habits next week. Suffice it to say that I don’t hold to the Jester’s cynical assessment of the book. The principles in that book are fundamentally decent, the kind of truths that can change a person’s life. I’ll admit that some of the more hokey suggestions in there have not worked out particularly well for me. For the most part, though, Covey did a great job in presenting empowering material to a wide audience.

On an unrelated note,
I have heard the phrase “The Revolution will not be Televised” – it gets bandied about from to time. Removing the entries for “televised”, here are some amusing google search samples of peoples’ opinions on “The Revolution,” a collection of mutant memes.

 

(out of 185,000), The Revolution Will Be…
Downloaded, fictionalized, mobilized, Wikified, Digitized, blogged, Photocopied, Syndicated, Caramelized, Streaming, Litigated, Personalized, Twittered, Digitized, localized, Prosthetized

(out of a close second place at 135,000) The Revolution Will Not Be…
Socialized, Microwaved, Designed, Funded, Destabilized, Motorized, Advertised, pasteurized, Bolshevised, American, Invoiced, Podcast, T-SHIRTED, Theorized, YouTubed

My contribution: The Revolution will be poorly defined.

-Peter

our magical culture

Subrationedei brought my attention to this quote from Raymond Williams. In Culture and Materialism, p. 185:

It is often said that our society is too materialist, and that advertising reflects this … But it seems to me that in this respect our society is quite evidently not materialist enough, and that this, paradoxically, is the result of a failure in social meanings, values and ideals.

It is impossible to look at modern advertising without realizing that the material object sold is never enough: this indeed is the crucial cultural quality of its modern forms. If we were sensibly materialist, in that part of our living in which we use things, we should find most advertising to be of an insane irrelevance. Beer would be enough for us, without the additional promise that in drinking it we show ourselves to be manly, young in heart, or neighborly. A washing-machine would be a useful machine to wash clothes, rather than an indication that we are forward looking or an object of envy to our neighbors. But if these associations sell beer and washing machines, as some of the evidence suggests, it is clear that we have a cultural pattern in which the objects are not enough but must be validated, if only in fantasy, by association with social and personal meaning which in a different cultural pattern might be more directly available. The short description of the pattern we have is magic: a highly organized and professional system of magical inducements and satisfactions, functionally very similar to magical systems in simpler societies, but rather strangely coexistent with a highly developed scientific technology.

That seems highly salient to anyone who would like to live a simpler life or, indeed, merely a rational life. Our superstitious brains seem to be built to see magic even in the midst of a world crafted by our rationality. We buy objects of “value” for the same reasons and with no better justification than a cave man trading food to the witch doctor for a love amulet designed to attract affection from the prettiest cave woman.

Imagine I go buy a really nice car for a lot of money. Now, a car seems to have more value than a horse bladder pouch filled with herbs and teeth (a voodoo love amulet). You can drive the one, but the other you just hang around your neck.

But consider: the price difference between a Honda and a BMW doesn’t represent a real increase in functional utility – the one costs twice as much but it won’t get you to twice as many destinations. What are you buying with that extra money?

Social meaning. You’re buying others’ perception that you are a man (or woman) of means. Some people might even perceive themselves differently if they own a BMW. This might give them confidence. Confidence and conspicuous wealth (perceived according to our society’s measure of such things) may actually help a person get a mate… and within another society the material object that imbues its owner with those qualities might take the form of a magical charm. And it might, therefore, work.

So let me say it again: your expensive stuff is expensive because you are buying magic.

-Peter

The National Culture: News as Roman coliseum shows

 

I ran across an article that is pretty interesting. It’s a collection of speeches by Joe Bageant. He’s enamored with South American culture. That’s fine for him, but I don’t particularly identify with that culture. Too much touching. Joe may long for a “daily life in the flesh, belly to belly and soul to soul, lived out in the streets and parks and public places, in love and the workplace,” but that sounds like hell to me. God. The last thing I need is mutual public belly-touching.

However, his critique of American culture is well articulated:

Our daily news is the modern version of Roman coliseum shows. Elections are personality combat, chariot races, not examinations of solutions being offered. None are offered.

I happen to disagree with the implied solution he proposes (emulate the fuzzy tactile family structure of Belize), but I’m grateful that he actually goes so far as to offer up a solution to discuss. I have a different solution in mind. I think we could do a lot better if we spent more time and money on the work of craftsmen. I think it would be great if we were each others’ patrons when it came to individualized beautiful works of art and technology. The corporate, fad-oriented, marketed to death, planned obsolescence, throw-away culture is oppressive. But there’s no need to give up our comfortable “personal space.”

But my dream of a Neovictorian techno-utopia is far fetched. The blogosphere is my substitute for now, though. A place where people can engage intellectually with a little distance from the pervasive corporate interests… and there’s a great book on the subject over at Amazon.com on how to make money while blogging! Buy it through the link at right and support TBU!

(I’m only being half-ironic. Seriously, that button up top? You can buy that too! Know a designer who can spruce that up that design for me for a reasonable fee? Give me a yell.)

-Peter

Our senses lie. Are you sure you will believe it when you see it?

Hot Tipper Rob (after one year, our number 1 supporter!) sent us this amazing little piece about strange multi sensory illusions. There are lots of optical illusions – certain shapes fool our interpretive abilities. What is surprising is that visual stimuli can produce tactile illusions.

So it turns out that if you happen to look at a bunch of horizontal lines moving upward on a screen for a while, then feel a little vibrating line with your fingertip, the line will feel like it’s moving. Evidently, the visual lines predispose our tactile sense to interpret motion.

Here’s another one (via Wired) I found interesting. It’s called the hollow mask illusion and, evidently, it doesn’t work on people with schizophrenia.

I wonder if the Jester would see the mask, or the face?

-Peter

More about bottled water: it may sex you up

Via Wired, it seems that bottled water has some contaminant issues (like that whole scare about polycarbonate water bottles). I still think that leachates are not so great a concern as people think, but most things that will get people to stop drinking bottled water are good ideas in my book.

The study referenced used snails to measure the effects of sex hormone analogues (probably pthalates) that are used as plasticizers in all kinds of things these days. Snails grown in bottled water tended to have a lot more little snails. That is an indicator that there might be some hormone analogues coming out of the plastic.

I doubt the effects on humans will be so easily determined.

Cheers,

Peter