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Exactly. Great post! all arise from inaccurate models of the minds of others Inaccurate models not just of minds of others, but of the observers's environm

by mafribe 11y ago

Exactly. Great post! all arise from inaccurate models of the minds of others Inaccurate models not just of minds of others, but of the observers's environment, including non-minds. It's complexity reduction. Language is unable to represent the full complexity of what is being observed, the more so, the fewer words being used.

madaxe_again 11y ago
Yes, symbol set reduction can weigh in this too - that was the entire idea of orwell's newspeak, to reduce the available set of symbols and therefore thought - fundamentally providing a more malleable, more simplistic model. Were humans not capable of and in the habit of treating assumptions as axioms, we could not function nor develop beyond an infantile inquisitive state, as we rely on inductive learning to link the symbols through which we interpret reality - so one can only work with this particular axiom (or assumption? Hah.) to effect change. The Internet is damoclean in nature - at first flush it presents a divisive frontier of information, which leads to the behaviours we see today - but prolonged exposure could result in a general improvement in the models individuals and cultures carry, assuming auto-innoculation doesn't happen too quickly. It'll be interesting to watch pan out.
- mafribe 11y ago
  prolonged exposure could result in a general improvement That's certainly what happened after the previous two revolutions in communication: the invention of convenient writing and that of the printing press. So I have high hopes for the third! I doubt that will be part of the bright future though. It is antithetical to better communication.
  - madaxe_again 11y ago
    Eventually, yes, but at the time they'd have been bemoaning this bloody Luther guy and that gutenburg idiot. Progress doesn't always look like progress at the time. In fact, it rarely does - what we usually see and call progress is actually entrenchment.

by mafribe 11y ago

madaxe_again 11y ago

Yes, symbol set reduction can weigh in this too - that was the entire idea of orwell's newspeak, to reduce the available set of symbols and therefore thought - fundamentally providing a more malleable, more simplistic model. Were humans not capable of and in the habit of treating assumptions as axioms, we could not function nor develop beyond an infantile inquisitive state, as we rely on inductive learning to link the symbols through which we interpret reality - so one can only work with this particular axiom (or assumption? Hah.) to effect change. The Internet is damoclean in nature - at first flush it presents a divisive frontier of information, which leads to the behaviours we see today - but prolonged exposure could result in a general improvement in the models individuals and cultures carry, assuming auto-innoculation doesn't happen too quickly. It'll be interesting to watch pan out.

mafribe 11y ago
prolonged exposure could result in a general improvement That's certainly what happened after the previous two revolutions in communication: the invention of convenient writing and that of the printing press. So I have high hopes for the third! I doubt that will be part of the bright future though. It is antithetical to better communication.
- madaxe_again 11y ago
  Eventually, yes, but at the time they'd have been bemoaning this bloody Luther guy and that gutenburg idiot. Progress doesn't always look like progress at the time. In fact, it rarely does - what we usually see and call progress is actually entrenchment.