On 9/6/22 7:57 AM, glen wrote:
Well, Steve's targeting of "feeling included" does target
"understanding". I'd argue that the spies don't understand the
communities they infiltrate. Even deep undercover or method acting
doesn't provide understanding. I argue that any bad faith actor like a
spy or "acting while cynical" has a reductive objective as their
target. What was interesting about the concept of bad faith was
Sartre's suggestion that the deep undercover operator who finally
*does* begin to identify with the community they've infiltrated is the
interesting edge case. That's the cusp of understanding.
Gone native, as it were...
I'll admit to struggling most of my life with the desire to
"understand", and an intuitive awareness that I at least have to "act as
if" something is true, or I am a member of a community, and it is the
_cynical girding_ that I instinctively/habitually use to protect my
(current) self that on one hand *allows* me to "act as if" whilst
keeping me from actually "understanding" in your sense of the word.
Sometimes the cynical girding softens and in some cases (eventually?)
falls away. Some of the *very best* Catholics I know were
converts-by-marriage who ended up learning about and embracing the
better angels of that heritage without some of the worser demons. Most
escaped/reformed/recovering Catholics I know have a never-ending
struggle with the blame/shame/guilt holy trinity.
Anyone who has tried to drop or acquire a habit (e.g.
nicotine/alcohol/opiods - dental-hygiene/exercise/meditation) will know
the approach which is to simply *change the behaviour, and the rest will
follow". One day you ARE a person with good dental hygiene or a
*former* smoker or an AA/NA person with a pin with a double-digit number
of months sober. You will never be a lifetime abstainer, it's too late
for that.
It is, of course, never that easy, but for myself the spectre of
procrastinion is one thing I know well that works well in this mode.
If I go ahead and *do the thing* I would otherwise avoid/delay, I *can*
get in the groove of doing things at the _earliest possible moment_
rather than the _latest_ or _never_. Mantras like "I can always
procrastinate later" and "the best way to get something done is to do
it" help draw and keep me back in that mode, but the very fact of them
suggest that I am not "there yet". In some parts of my life I am, in
fact, no longer a procrastinator using this "method"... it started as
an actor, and eventually I *became* that character, it inhabited me.
I've gone native.
I suppose I'm making a similar argument to EricC's argument for
"belief", which I call "dispositional". If you don't act on your
belief, then you don't actually believe that thing. So, an undercover
cop who infiltrates a drug cartel but refuses to Necklace a local
do-gooder just doesn't understand what it means to be in the cartel.
They can't understand. And they shouldn't understand. The spy is there
for a more specific objective, not understanding.
I have watched a number of undercover cop stories in my life and a (very
few) of them addressed this *very well*, sometimes with the undercover
cop truly *going native* and sometimes finding some kind of *righteous
bad guy* role to play where (s)he models a new moral system (i.e. honor
among thieves). These are fictions of course, but possibly
instructive or illuminating of the "edge cases". Also, it is typecast
required that the intimates/relationships of these undercover people
suffer from the ambiguity/paradoxes of "playing it both ways".
One of those more specific objectives might be *prediction*. In
simulation and [x|i]ML, there's a stark distinction between predictive
versus explanatory power. Ideally, strong explanatory power provides
predictive power. But practically, 80/20, reductive prediction is
easier, faster, and more important. The excess meaning is swept under
the rug of variation or noise. At raves, a reductive objective is harm
reduction. Sure, it would be fantastic to teach all the kids
pharmaco[kinetics|dynamics] and chemistry ... as well as psychology
and neuroscience. But the harm reduction tent is not really there to
get into the kids' minds. The objective isn't understanding. It's a
reductive focus on dampening the edge cases.
This yields a tangent in my mind (really?) about episodic vs
diachronic, realism vs impressionism, show vs tell in narrative,
etc. But I'll save that for another post (or not).
On 9/3/22 08:47, Marcus Daniels wrote:
The claim is that there is all this diversity in subcultures and that
the only way to understand them is to participate in them. If it is
possible to fake it, and I think it is, then that raises doubts about
the claim. That is what spies specialize in.
On Sep 2, 2022, at 7:17 PM, Steve Smith <sasm...@swcp.com> wrote:
I have spent most of my life avoiding "acting while cynical"... I
have *felt* cynical about a lot of things, and Marcus' description
of a lot of things speaks to my "inner cynic" but I haven't spent
much time being *harmed* by engaging in "performative activities
while feeling cynical about them". If I dig a hole it is either
because *I* need a hole, or someone else *needs* a whole, and only
rarely do I help someone dig a hole as a team/trust/affinity
building exercise unless the There are too many holes in the world
that *want* digging to spend much effort en-performance.
I've never felt particulary "included" in any social circle and I
have seen that a little bit of "Performative Grease" might have
helped this square peg fit more-better in the round holes it
encountered, but generally I simply avoided those activities and
drifted further and further out. That is not to say I haven't
*tried* to be a good sport and do what others were doing on the off
chance that it would actually be something that worked for me, but
generally not.
BTW... there seems to be some inverted general usage of
"square-peg/round-hole", drilling a round hole and then driving a
square(ish) peg into it guarantees a good tight fit... it is
preferred to round peg-round hole in traditional joinery.
On 9/2/22 8:17 AM, glen wrote:
OK. But the affinity and "inner self" alluded to by the phrase
"faking it" is nothing but a personality momentum, a build-up of
past behaviors, like a fly-wheel spun up by all the previous
affinities and faking of it. We faked it in our mom's womb, faked
it as babies, faked it as children on the playground or in class,
etc. all the way up to the last time we faked it digging ditches or
pair programming in Java.
The only difference between feeling an affinity and engaging in a
new faking it exercise is the extent to which the new collaboration
is similar to the previous collaborations. As both Steve and Dave
point out, spend enough time living in a world and you'll grow
affine to that world (and the world will grow affine to you).
I suppose it's reasonable to posit a spectrum (or a higher dim
space) on which some people have particularly inertial fly-wheels
and others have more easily disturbed things that store less
energy. Of the Big 5, my guess would be neuroticism would be most
inertial. Perhaps openness and agreeableness would be the least
inertial.
On 9/2/22 05:35, Marcus Daniels wrote:
There are many common tasks that parties could direct their
attention toward. This happens at companies, prison cafeterias,
and churches. That it is grounded in a particular way doesn't
make it any truer, or anyone more committed to it. We are often
forced to participate in cultures we don't care about, and faking
it is an important skill. Just because someone sweats or gets
calluses or tolerates others' inappropriate emotions in some
circle of people, doesn't mean there is any affinity toward that
circle. Oh look, he dug a hole. I dug a hole. Sure, I'd do
those kind of performative activities if I were a politician, as I
bet there are people who think this way.
-----Original Message-----
From: Friam <friam-boun...@redfish.com> On Behalf Of glen
Sent: Friday, September 2, 2022 12:06 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
<friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] more structure-based mind-reading
And, of course, there is no such thing except appearance. What
could it possibly mean to say that an appearance of a bond exists,
but no actual bond exists?
On September 1, 2022 7:29:45 PM PDT, Marcus Daniels
<mar...@snoutfarm.com> wrote:
If you want to create the appearance of a bond where none exists,
get to work. Once one recognizes the nature of work it is easy.
On Sep 1, 2022, at 6:25 PM, Prof David West
<profw...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
From glen: "If you want to share values with some arbitrary
shmoe, then get to
*work*. Build something or cooperate on a common task.
Talking,
communicating, is inadequate at best, disinfo at worst."
This is kinda the whole point of Participant Observation at the
core of cultural anthropology. The premise is you cannot truly
understand a culture until you live it.
Of course, there is still a boundary, a separation, between the
anthropologist and those with whom she interacts, but sweat,
calluses, blood, and emotions go a long way toward establishing
actual understanding.
davew
On Thu, Sep 1, 2022, at 12:30 PM, Steve Smith wrote:
On 9/1/22 11:21 AM, glen wrote:
Inter-brain synchronization occurs without physical co-presence
during cooperative online gaming
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0028393222001750
There's a lot piled into the aggregate measures of EEG. And the
mere fact of the canalization conflates the unifying tendencies
of the objective (shared purpose) with that of the common
structure (virtual world, interface, body, brain). But overall,
it argues against this guru focus on "sense-making" (hermeneutic,
monistic reification) and helps argue for the fundamental
plurality, openness, and stochasticity of "language games".
If you want to share values with some arbitrary shmoe, then get
to *work*. Build something or cooperate on a common task.
Talking, communicating, is inadequate at best, disinfo at worst.
I agree somewhat with the spirit of this, however a recent
writer/book I discovered is Sand
Talk<https://www.harpercollins.com/products/sand-talk-tyson-yunkaporta?variant=32280908103714>
by Tyson Yunkaporta and more specifically his references to
"Yarning" in his indigenous Australian culture offered me a
complementary perspective...
I definitely agree that the "building of something together" is a
powerful world-building/negotiating/collaborative/seeking
experience. The social sciences use the term Boundary
Object<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_object> and
Boundary Negotiation Artifact. Jenny and I wrote a draft
white-paper on the topic of the SimTable as a "boundary
negotiating artifact" last time she visited (2019?). A lot of
computer-graphics/visualization products provide fill this role,
but the physicality of a sand-table with it's tactility and
multiple perspectives add yet more. The soap-box racer or fort
you build with your friend as a kid provides the same. The bulk
of my best relationships in life involved "building something
together" whether it be a software system or a house...
-. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. .
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom
https://bit.ly/virtualfriam
to (un)subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
archives: 5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
1/2003 thru 6/2021 http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
