Awe thanks Mick! I had to go back and add a paragraph or two at the end... feels like I missed an opportunity to really bring the meaning/violence relationship home.
Several of your essays have put me in mind of two authors. First is the Sci-Fi writer Ian M. Banks. His series of books about "The Culture" posit a post-scarcity, post-money, galaxy-spanning, sort-of-pacifist culture in which humans and (remarkably benign) AIs collaborate while engaging with other cultures which are typically expansion oriented and violent. It is an interesting look into, among other things, the question of just how much of a pacifist one can be in the face of violent neighbors.
The second is Clifford Geertz, and his book "The Interpretation of Cultures." I do not recommend this book because at 547 pages in length it is frequently mind-numbing. The author is as much engaged in disputing his fellow anthropologists as he is in explaining his own views on culture. That said, if one can force one's self to complete the read, his theory of culture has a great deal of appeal. Paraphrasing, it comes to this - culture is a collection of shared (and openly referred-to) symbols tied to concepts and explanations about the underlying substance and mechanics-of-action of reality. He argues that humans developed culture as a mechanism for replacing the loss of instinctive behaviors as our brains became more flexible and "plastic." He discusses the fundamental role of culture (as he defines it) in a) creating meaning and b) enabling trust and collaboration at all levels of society.
Well-written article, though I'd add that meaning is not a necessary precursor to violence - violence can give us meaning as well. Along the lines of the idle youth you mentioned, there are plenty of young folks who have joined wars in the absence of ideological motivations, either for the unifying/belonging aspects of group violence or merely for license to commit violence. Violence can also be an end in itself, a la A Clockwork Orange. So even if we completely expunge other loyalties and sources of meaning from this techno-utopia, there's no logical reason to think we'd be free of violence.
Another great piece. Thanks Heather.
Awe thanks Mick! I had to go back and add a paragraph or two at the end... feels like I missed an opportunity to really bring the meaning/violence relationship home.
Several of your essays have put me in mind of two authors. First is the Sci-Fi writer Ian M. Banks. His series of books about "The Culture" posit a post-scarcity, post-money, galaxy-spanning, sort-of-pacifist culture in which humans and (remarkably benign) AIs collaborate while engaging with other cultures which are typically expansion oriented and violent. It is an interesting look into, among other things, the question of just how much of a pacifist one can be in the face of violent neighbors.
The second is Clifford Geertz, and his book "The Interpretation of Cultures." I do not recommend this book because at 547 pages in length it is frequently mind-numbing. The author is as much engaged in disputing his fellow anthropologists as he is in explaining his own views on culture. That said, if one can force one's self to complete the read, his theory of culture has a great deal of appeal. Paraphrasing, it comes to this - culture is a collection of shared (and openly referred-to) symbols tied to concepts and explanations about the underlying substance and mechanics-of-action of reality. He argues that humans developed culture as a mechanism for replacing the loss of instinctive behaviors as our brains became more flexible and "plastic." He discusses the fundamental role of culture (as he defines it) in a) creating meaning and b) enabling trust and collaboration at all levels of society.
Well-written article, though I'd add that meaning is not a necessary precursor to violence - violence can give us meaning as well. Along the lines of the idle youth you mentioned, there are plenty of young folks who have joined wars in the absence of ideological motivations, either for the unifying/belonging aspects of group violence or merely for license to commit violence. Violence can also be an end in itself, a la A Clockwork Orange. So even if we completely expunge other loyalties and sources of meaning from this techno-utopia, there's no logical reason to think we'd be free of violence.
Really great thought process, Heather! Thank you for this!