 The Punishmnent of Loki, Louis Huard Something I've never understood about conservatism has always been the way it seemingly embraces both a behaviorist/determinist, and at the same time a free-will view of human behavior.
Conservatives often talk about rewarding or punishing good or bad behavior, and yet at the same time speak of the importance of personal responsibility: people being "self-made" or only having themselves to blame. They often refer to social welfare programs as the "Nanny State", invoking dynamics of the citizen being treated as a child by a coddling, feminized government figure. Instead, they would presumably favor the strong hand of a masculine figure who performs tough love by forcing them to go it alone. This parenting metaphor relies on a theory of learning, more specifically, operant conditioning, in which bad behavior becomes habit through a process of reinforcement and is extinguished through punishment. Aside from the fact that behaviorism as public policy is far more complex than this simple equation, what is striking is how conservatism then throws this deterministic view out the window. When it valorizes the idea of "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps" as the morally justified way of earning one's fortune, or speaking of crime or poverty as being the result of poor personal choices that people could have made otherwise, they are relying not on a theory of learning but rather a notion of free will that requires only one's innate desires and reason to make good instead of bad decisions. The only way I can make coherent sense of this is if they follow a sort of compatibilism in which a behaviorist account is responsible for part of one's decisions, with free will making up the rest. The problem with compatibilism, apart from it not being based in any science or empiricism, is that it allows one to basically pick and choose how to establish the causality of any human action. Where do you draw the line between determinism and free will? Is there an age at which one gains this special innate efficacy unrelated to environment or learning history? Or does one gradually develop it until, maybe by adulthood, when it is fully formed? But then how much of it do you have? Under what conditions would you ascribe all or part of an action to free will, and not determinism? Rather, it feels like an arbitrary myth that, given the complexity of any one individual's environment and genetic learning history, you can sort of toss out as a reasonable hypothesis that you can get a free pass on to justify your particular justification as to why someone is deserving or not of any specific circumstance. A millionaire can have made his money through freely choosing hard work and sacrifice, and so deserves to keep it as property. A poor man chose not to work hard and thus deserves his poverty. But if the government provides welfare (using part of the rich man's wealth to pay for it), the poor man's bad behavior of sloth and vice will be reinforced. If a criminal is not punished he will not learn to change his ways. If the government allows a man to keep his riches, it will reinforce his strong work ethic, but if he is taxed, his behavior will be punished. The beauty of behaviorism is that it has decades of strong research supporting its conclusions about human behavior as determined by learning history. Sadly, it is poorly understood by the public, not just by conservatives but by liberals as well. However, because liberalism is far more concerned with fairness and equality than traditional and hierarchy, it is less allergic to being clear eyed about structural, environmental contingencies that undermine libertarian free will - if not in belief, at least in practical social policy.
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--- A: There is truth to the stereotype of philosophy majors being dickish. B: Greater reinforcement by emotional + intuitive thought leads to more empathy. C: Philosophy students find analytic thought more reinforcing than intuitive thought. If B and C, then A? -- Compared to me, my wife's emotional IQ is off the charts. She will spend literal seconds on a problem and come up with a better solution than I could in minutes. __ Interesting dynamic between Political Imagination and Political Speed, where influence is bi-directional. The Imagination becomes praxis through Passion and Pragmatic Analysis. Analysis can temper passion when it results in reduced Speed. Passion then tempers Political Imagination
For example, a high difference in Reality versus Imagined political order increases Passion, which is reinforced by values seen in reality. But then Passion is tempered by Pragmatic Analysis, which could lead to support either faster or slower Speeds. Speed then tempers Passion, as the frustration in extended length of moral distance. Passion then tempers Political Imagination, as it drives imagining behavior. (Analysis can be heavier or lighter but used as constant here for simplicity. Further models could develop relevant contingencies).   The trajectory of scientific progress over the past century is staggering. Barring catastrophic civilizational breakdown, it’s only going to increase, and with AI likely exponentially. But this means the gap between specialized knowledge and the layperson increases concordantly. This epistemological complexity presents a growing challenge for humanity. We're already seeing the exploitation of this gap within capitalist exploitative economy in which distrust is leveraged as a balm for the insecurity and indignities of modern life. To the extent that power is wielded over a populace feeling increasingly marginalized from democratic inclusion in cultural and economic trajectories, scientific ignorance will continue to be an exploitable resource. This power imbalance must be corrected for, but as we see with the rise of RW authoritarian and fascist ideology, epistemological uncertainties can be a powerful weapon of disinformation. Democratic and progressive solutions are hidden by a misdirection towards fear and isolation that serves to concretize systems of subjugation by traditional hierarchies that promise security and power for a few at the expense of the many. So, the problem is twofold, power must be reclaimed for pluralism and equity, while simultaneously scientific understanding must be democratized. Yet the ability for the layperson to understand the science will be increasingly limited. Thus, a core basis for democratic pluralism will hinge on legitimate trust of expertise, which is only possible in economic systems in which power is distributed fairly. As we push for such economies, science communication will be crucial in articulating an honest accounting to the public. This will require the establishment of science communication starting in public education and ongoing through government and media outreach. In coming decades, our lives will increasingly be lived in a world in which technologies proliferate in our daily experience. For this power to remain pluralistic and democratic, we must be able to bridge the epistemological gap between lay and expert knowledge. As the public will be asked to trust ever more in a science that will advance far beyond its cognitive grasp, our institutions must be able rise to that task.  I've come to realize that one way of dealing with the serendipity of Juju is to have a long term art project that allows for the juju spectrum to unfold and sequence itself into key elements of the design process.
To illustrate, on a recent art project I followed the basic timeline:
Depending on the level of art required at each level, Juju can be stored/spent accordingly. Of course, it doesn't always work out so neatly. But with overlapping tasks, juju can be pushed or pulled with greater flexibility. For instance, measuring panels or cleaning up scans require minimal Juju, while writing narrative prose or sketching out each panel required very high levels. These elements of the project thus circle one's juju as if in orbit. ***I came across notion of Juju as artistic energy from Kevin O'dell who tragically died of a stroke in 2022, leaving behind Sarah, the mother of his child. Their term originally refers to the Western African spiritual traditions. But I'm not clear on exactly they were used. (I got sidetracked perusing Wikipedia as I came across highly biased and outdated sourcing. One reference was from 1898 and used racist language "Uncivilized".) However, I believe Kevin, Asian American and worked in environmental social justice, would have been aware of his own appropriation of the term. When I met him he lived in a grand house with many roommates (one of them iirc was the son of Peter from Peter, Paul and Mary) and it was the kind of place you could just show up and hang out. The living room was messy with paint supplies and Kevin would often show up to work (we were care providers at a clinic for the Traumatically Brain Injured), his shirt covered in paint. He was a big man, dressed in boots and sometimes almost militarily baggy clothing hanging about him. He was deeply spiritual, in the sense that he seemed always to be peering behind the veil. He had a wicked sense of humor combined with compassion and enthusiasm. He liked to make big meals in which he spoke of learning recipe's from his Korean mother. His father was white and met her during the war. He grew up on military bases and moved to Portland after graduating from Chapel Hill. Kevin referred to his artistic ambitions as juju. It meant the powerful force that comes into you and makes you want to create transcendent things. I'm not sure I felt like he ever applied himself enough to make anything that interesting. But he did often speak of the juju as fleeting force in his life. I've come to use the term as I like the mystical/spiritual associations that give some sort of verbal language to the experience of making transcendent art. |
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