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I think Mr O'Reilly is largely incorrect. He is espousing a tech utopian vision. Underlying that idea is that politics is redundant. That is born out of the (no

I think Mr O'Reilly is largely incorrect. He is espousing a tech utopian vision. Underlying that idea is that politics is redundant. That is born out of the (not wholly unjustified) frustration around the failure of politics in the west. So what is politics replaced with? Some other system/s - computer networks, AI, 'the market'. The appeal there is that they seem apolitical. They are not - they have baked in political ideas. Moreover they allow people with power to take political actions and can credibly that they are not political. In essence they move people further away from having some say in issues that can significantly affect their lives. They lose power. They lose it directly - they have less say, and indirectly in that their arguments are harder against a supposedly apolitical non human entity. Moreover the default of any such system is to maintain stability. Which in general gives most benefit to people who are already satisfied by the status quo. Tech people quite like the status quo right now. Lastly and most importantly such systems have no vision of the future. That requires people. The end result is a stasis, and increasing frustration from the people who aren't benefiting. Much of this is covered well by the documentary 'All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace', which is now available on Amazon Prime.

Semiapies 6y ago
This argument has the baked-in premise that only government can change society and only government can have "people" with a "vision of the future".
- freddybobs 6y ago
  Politics != government. "Politics (from Greek: Πολιτικά, politiká, 'affairs of the cities') is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations between individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies politics is referred to as political science. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics
  - Semiapies 6y ago
    Politics is inextricable from government/the state. For that matter, what would it even mean to talk about "the failure of politics in the West" in a context beyond government?
    - elmomle 6y ago
      One might say, rather, that government is the apotheosis of politics. Much politics goes on without touching government, but a well-functioning government is the ultimate arbiter of disputes within a region, and is therefore the obvious final testbed (and most dramatic battleground) of political action.
    - athrowaway3z 6y ago
      Something like Trump's campaign is clearly politics and not government/state.
  - hitekker 6y ago
    That's a useful & intimate, definition of politics. I think a lot of folks are uncomfortable contemplating the power relations that rule their own social circles, so they unconsciously externalize that mess to outside, negative forces. They want to distance themselves from that unpleasant questions like "Who do I have power over? Have I ever abused my power? How have I abused it and who got hurt?" With enough gymnastics, "politics" becomes a scary game that faraway, bad people play to get ahead, whereas we, the good, close people who are all equal, have no need to think about power in our daily lives at all.
hitekker 6y ago
Quite an insightful comment. A tangential but classic science fiction story covers a similar theme https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops
- olivermarks 6y ago
  I read 'The Machine Stops' every few months, it's very often top of my mind as I see where society is heading
  - skinnymuch 6y ago
    Do you have a reference or anything for short sci fi stories/books to read? My attention span is pretty bad these days, but I enjoyed reading the first half just now.
Nasrudith 6y ago
Do you know what makes something not political? It not being in dispute - it says nothing about its value just like "X benefits from" and "status quo" means nothing without a context point of reference about what the changes are to say if it is good or bad, let alone slightly more nuanced situations like "too much of a good thing" or "a neccessary evil" or even different relative values. I find speaking only in vagueness like "status quo" and "good for <the elite>" major red flags - the first especially as implying the changes you want with no knowledge and impossible to reconcile across even two people. Essentially the same sort of lie of populists. The second is a warning sign for fallacious zero sum thinking - best succicently and snarkily refuted as "It is also good for rich people for the atmosphere to be breathable at all." The assertion that AI and networking are by default pro status quo and that is a bad thing looks like gibberish without any reasoning backing it. Not even "was funded by X" has been a guarantee that it would sustain a stasis. The arguments leave me with an uneasy feeling of superfically trying to sound good while lacking any substance.
sebastos 6y ago
I'd never quite thought about it in these terms before, but the way you laid it out makes it obvious: there's no replacing politics. At most, you can hide it. The reason it cannot be replaced is that there will always be resentment and dissatisfaction brewing among society's relative 'losers'. Eventually, society's "losers" will want to change things. Whether those people are right or not about which policies are hurting them is almost irrelevant. They will want the agency to make some change - any change. But: if you factor out all of the things that are still up for debate and start re-categorizing them as laws of nature or apolitical infrastructure, then there's nothing left to change! It will be cold comfort to them if all of human policy is "above changing". What they will hear is "Everything is fine. Stay where you are."
arminiusreturns 6y ago
In that same vein, one of my biggest career mistakes has been thinking I could "just do good technical work, and avoid the politics"... its not possible. In the end, if you take that stance, the people who do play politics will run roughshod over you. I appreciate your perspective on this.
- stcredzero 6y ago
  Robert Heinlein once said something like, "Politics is like your digestive tract. The end product is quite unpleasant, but it's still vital to your continued well being."
stcredzero 6y ago
The appeal there is that they seem apolitical. They are not - they have baked in political ideas. Moreover they allow people with power to take political actions and can credibly that they are not political. It sounds like something from a cyberpunk novel, but much of this baked in politics resides within powerful mega-corporations, playing within their moats and exploiting their walled gardens. People high up in those corporations have their own agenda. Much of this agenda is carried out with the aid of lobbying. Deep inside those mega-corporations, other strata of lower-level functionaries from an entirely different social class are carrying out their own agendas. Often these agendas clash with the higher-ups. Often, these agendas clash with those of the users and ordinary people. such systems have no vision of the future. That requires people. Many of the problems arise when people with some power have dehumanized other people in their minds, and start to mistreat them, within whatever level of power they may have. By their very nature, such mega-corporations tend produce many such opportunities. 'All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace' This title, as a phrase, describes The Culture in Iain M. Bank's books.
- freddybobs 6y ago
  > Many of the problems arise when people with some power have dehumanized other people in their minds, and start to mistreat them, within whatever level of power they may have. By their very nature, such mega-corporations tend produce many such opportunities. This is a good insight. That many efforts in the fairly recent past to alter the the situation have failed spectacularly, or at least not turned out in the way it was expected. As examples, 'communism' seems to degenerate into a strict hierarchy of authoritarianism and associated suffering (perversely such a hierarchy being an anathema to principals of communism). The Arab spring, something seen in a positive light in the west, seems to have in several cases failed. It could be argued the failure was in part because it didn't have a clear vision or the people in place to make the change happen - there was a power vacuum. These failures make us very wary of people talking about any significant change. They seem at a default that they could be dangerous. That predicting the future is hard. It is important to be wary. What really is a red flag is claims of a better future, when it's not explained clearly what that future is, and the policy changes that will need to be undertaken to get there. All that being said it seems to me important for a society to strive to be better, and to think of other solutions than just more of the same.
mkoubaa 6y ago
Whether we like it or not politics is trending towards becoming de facto redundant

Semiapies 6y ago

This argument has the baked-in premise that only government can change society and only government can have "people" with a "vision of the future".

freddybobs 6y ago
Politics != government. "Politics (from Greek: Πολιτικά, politiká, 'affairs of the cities') is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations between individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies politics is referred to as political science. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics
- Semiapies 6y ago
  Politics is inextricable from government/the state. For that matter, what would it even mean to talk about "the failure of politics in the West" in a context beyond government?
  - elmomle 6y ago
    One might say, rather, that government is the apotheosis of politics. Much politics goes on without touching government, but a well-functioning government is the ultimate arbiter of disputes within a region, and is therefore the obvious final testbed (and most dramatic battleground) of political action.
  - athrowaway3z 6y ago
    Something like Trump's campaign is clearly politics and not government/state.
- hitekker 6y ago
  That's a useful & intimate, definition of politics. I think a lot of folks are uncomfortable contemplating the power relations that rule their own social circles, so they unconsciously externalize that mess to outside, negative forces. They want to distance themselves from that unpleasant questions like "Who do I have power over? Have I ever abused my power? How have I abused it and who got hurt?" With enough gymnastics, "politics" becomes a scary game that faraway, bad people play to get ahead, whereas we, the good, close people who are all equal, have no need to think about power in our daily lives at all.

hitekker 6y ago

Quite an insightful comment. A tangential but classic science fiction story covers a similar theme https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops

olivermarks 6y ago
I read 'The Machine Stops' every few months, it's very often top of my mind as I see where society is heading
- skinnymuch 6y ago
  Do you have a reference or anything for short sci fi stories/books to read? My attention span is pretty bad these days, but I enjoyed reading the first half just now.

Nasrudith 6y ago

Do you know what makes something not political? It not being in dispute - it says nothing about its value just like "X benefits from" and "status quo" means nothing without a context point of reference about what the changes are to say if it is good or bad, let alone slightly more nuanced situations like "too much of a good thing" or "a neccessary evil" or even different relative values. I find speaking only in vagueness like "status quo" and "good for <the elite>" major red flags - the first especially as implying the changes you want with no knowledge and impossible to reconcile across even two people. Essentially the same sort of lie of populists. The second is a warning sign for fallacious zero sum thinking - best succicently and snarkily refuted as "It is also good for rich people for the atmosphere to be breathable at all." The assertion that AI and networking are by default pro status quo and that is a bad thing looks like gibberish without any reasoning backing it. Not even "was funded by X" has been a guarantee that it would sustain a stasis. The arguments leave me with an uneasy feeling of superfically trying to sound good while lacking any substance.

sebastos 6y ago

I'd never quite thought about it in these terms before, but the way you laid it out makes it obvious: there's no replacing politics. At most, you can hide it. The reason it cannot be replaced is that there will always be resentment and dissatisfaction brewing among society's relative 'losers'. Eventually, society's "losers" will want to change things. Whether those people are right or not about which policies are hurting them is almost irrelevant. They will want the agency to make some change - any change. But: if you factor out all of the things that are still up for debate and start re-categorizing them as laws of nature or apolitical infrastructure, then there's nothing left to change! It will be cold comfort to them if all of human policy is "above changing". What they will hear is "Everything is fine. Stay where you are."

arminiusreturns 6y ago

In that same vein, one of my biggest career mistakes has been thinking I could "just do good technical work, and avoid the politics"... its not possible. In the end, if you take that stance, the people who do play politics will run roughshod over you. I appreciate your perspective on this.

stcredzero 6y ago
Robert Heinlein once said something like, "Politics is like your digestive tract. The end product is quite unpleasant, but it's still vital to your continued well being."

stcredzero 6y ago

The appeal there is that they seem apolitical. They are not - they have baked in political ideas. Moreover they allow people with power to take political actions and can credibly that they are not political. It sounds like something from a cyberpunk novel, but much of this baked in politics resides within powerful mega-corporations, playing within their moats and exploiting their walled gardens. People high up in those corporations have their own agenda. Much of this agenda is carried out with the aid of lobbying. Deep inside those mega-corporations, other strata of lower-level functionaries from an entirely different social class are carrying out their own agendas. Often these agendas clash with the higher-ups. Often, these agendas clash with those of the users and ordinary people. such systems have no vision of the future. That requires people. Many of the problems arise when people with some power have dehumanized other people in their minds, and start to mistreat them, within whatever level of power they may have. By their very nature, such mega-corporations tend produce many such opportunities. 'All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace' This title, as a phrase, describes The Culture in Iain M. Bank's books.

freddybobs 6y ago
> Many of the problems arise when people with some power have dehumanized other people in their minds, and start to mistreat them, within whatever level of power they may have. By their very nature, such mega-corporations tend produce many such opportunities. This is a good insight. That many efforts in the fairly recent past to alter the the situation have failed spectacularly, or at least not turned out in the way it was expected. As examples, 'communism' seems to degenerate into a strict hierarchy of authoritarianism and associated suffering (perversely such a hierarchy being an anathema to principals of communism). The Arab spring, something seen in a positive light in the west, seems to have in several cases failed. It could be argued the failure was in part because it didn't have a clear vision or the people in place to make the change happen - there was a power vacuum. These failures make us very wary of people talking about any significant change. They seem at a default that they could be dangerous. That predicting the future is hard. It is important to be wary. What really is a red flag is claims of a better future, when it's not explained clearly what that future is, and the policy changes that will need to be undertaken to get there. All that being said it seems to me important for a society to strive to be better, and to think of other solutions than just more of the same.

mkoubaa 6y ago

Whether we like it or not politics is trending towards becoming de facto redundant