The “value neutrality” thesis has been discredited for over 60 years. Despite some fruitless attempts by Habermas, it was killed by the critique of the role technology plays in modern society by the Frankfurt School, Critical Theory in general, and by Herbert Marcuse in particular. Not to mention Ellul or Mumford well before that time. There is a well presented summary of the 60s debate in one of Feenberg’s early studies, called “Alternative Modernity” (U of C Press, 1995). He went on to far greater depths after this.
In any case, what we face today is what Foucault called “the major enemy”: universal fascism. Nothing more, nothing less. Until we start to understand the power relations of this monstrosity, there is little hope of redeeming ourselves and liberate us from “desiring the very things that dominate and exploit us”.
Amongst them, I’d say we should avoid grappling with the elusive, and dangerously toxic idea of “evolution”, which more often than not ends in the well known paths of Taylorism (E.B.) , Eugenics, Sociobiology and this new form of anthropogenic minimalism called “Longtermism”, whatever that is. It all sounds so plausible “to us” (once you ignore pretty much everything, of course), that’s why it keeps coming back.
When the Ngaju of South Borneo placed a corpse in a coffin that was built in the shape of a boat, this was neither a coffin nor a boat. It was a hornbill or a watersnake, it “was” the godhead, it “was” the Tree of Life and the primeval mountain. There was no representation of it, neither act of evolution, because the act was unboundedly creative, or more precisely “re-creative”. The only evolution that exists is that which has no limits. Nicholas of Cusa’s infinite circle, whose circumference is nowhere and centre is everywhere. (On Learned Ignorance, 1.Ch 20). This happens here and now. Nowhere else.
I agree with you that “the major enemy” is universal fascism, and that until we start to understand the power relations of this monstrosity — including its worldwide disinformation campaigns, its psyops, its false-flag ops, and its army of useful idiots — there is little hope. But I am not with you on evolution, which to me is the most salient aspect of the particular world in which we live.
You would certainly benefit from the great book by Jean Gebser, The Ever-Present Origin (Ohio UP 1985), at least the first 100 pages. Apart from Sri Aurobindo, Gebser has the most astute grasp of what it is and what it entails. Human consciousness in particular “mutates” through a series of “consciousness structures,” each of which passes through an initial “efficient” phase and a final “deficient” one. Longtermism and the mindset that brought it forth is a manifestation of the deficient phase of the “mental” consciousness structure, which is characterized by extreme atomism or fragmentation, by cold rationalism and the celebration of technology for technology’s sake (not to mention its usurpation by the aforesaid monstrosity). In every deficient phase, however, the subversive seeds of the next structure are at work, and are to a certain extent responsible for the chaos into which the previous structure appears to disintegrate. While the “mental” structure acts by an exploitation of the so-called laws of nature (not to mention the resources of nature), and therefore also depends on and is limited by them, the “integral” structure — which Gebser equates with the consciousness Sri Aurobindo calls “supramental” — does not depend nor is limited by these laws. It is the creative consciousness by which Reality has subjected itself to these laws (for the fun of the thing) and thus has the power to modify and even to abolish them.
What you place under the rubric of evolution — Eugenics, Sociobiology, and Longtermism — is precisely the misconstrual of the future evolution of human consciousness by the deficient mental consciousness structure, as a perpetual iteration of its own ways of representing and acting in the world.
Another phenomenon typical of the deficient phase of a consciousness structure is the tendency to lapse into an earlier consciousness structure, as a defense against the irruption of a new consciousness structure which threatens to upset the status quo. The “mythical” consciousness structure which preceded the “mental” had a cyclical perception of time, as against the linear, spatialized perception of the “mental” structure. The idolization of the Ngaju of South Borneo and other such folks is the sign of a regression to an earlier consciousness structure. What is needed instead is an opening to a consciousness whose time perception is neither cyclical not linear but aperspectival with respect to both space and time.
The “value neutrality” thesis has been discredited for over 60 years. Despite some fruitless attempts by Habermas, it was killed by the critique of the role technology plays in modern society by the Frankfurt School, Critical Theory in general, and by Herbert Marcuse in particular. Not to mention Ellul or Mumford well before that time. There is a well presented summary of the 60s debate in one of Feenberg’s early studies, called “Alternative Modernity” (U of C Press, 1995). He went on to far greater depths after this.
In any case, what we face today is what Foucault called “the major enemy”: universal fascism. Nothing more, nothing less. Until we start to understand the power relations of this monstrosity, there is little hope of redeeming ourselves and liberate us from “desiring the very things that dominate and exploit us”.
Amongst them, I’d say we should avoid grappling with the elusive, and dangerously toxic idea of “evolution”, which more often than not ends in the well known paths of Taylorism (E.B.) , Eugenics, Sociobiology and this new form of anthropogenic minimalism called “Longtermism”, whatever that is. It all sounds so plausible “to us” (once you ignore pretty much everything, of course), that’s why it keeps coming back.
When the Ngaju of South Borneo placed a corpse in a coffin that was built in the shape of a boat, this was neither a coffin nor a boat. It was a hornbill or a watersnake, it “was” the godhead, it “was” the Tree of Life and the primeval mountain. There was no representation of it, neither act of evolution, because the act was unboundedly creative, or more precisely “re-creative”. The only evolution that exists is that which has no limits. Nicholas of Cusa’s infinite circle, whose circumference is nowhere and centre is everywhere. (On Learned Ignorance, 1.Ch 20). This happens here and now. Nowhere else.
Adrian,
I agree with you that “the major enemy” is universal fascism, and that until we start to understand the power relations of this monstrosity — including its worldwide disinformation campaigns, its psyops, its false-flag ops, and its army of useful idiots — there is little hope. But I am not with you on evolution, which to me is the most salient aspect of the particular world in which we live.
You would certainly benefit from the great book by Jean Gebser, The Ever-Present Origin (Ohio UP 1985), at least the first 100 pages. Apart from Sri Aurobindo, Gebser has the most astute grasp of what it is and what it entails. Human consciousness in particular “mutates” through a series of “consciousness structures,” each of which passes through an initial “efficient” phase and a final “deficient” one. Longtermism and the mindset that brought it forth is a manifestation of the deficient phase of the “mental” consciousness structure, which is characterized by extreme atomism or fragmentation, by cold rationalism and the celebration of technology for technology’s sake (not to mention its usurpation by the aforesaid monstrosity). In every deficient phase, however, the subversive seeds of the next structure are at work, and are to a certain extent responsible for the chaos into which the previous structure appears to disintegrate. While the “mental” structure acts by an exploitation of the so-called laws of nature (not to mention the resources of nature), and therefore also depends on and is limited by them, the “integral” structure — which Gebser equates with the consciousness Sri Aurobindo calls “supramental” — does not depend nor is limited by these laws. It is the creative consciousness by which Reality has subjected itself to these laws (for the fun of the thing) and thus has the power to modify and even to abolish them.
What you place under the rubric of evolution — Eugenics, Sociobiology, and Longtermism — is precisely the misconstrual of the future evolution of human consciousness by the deficient mental consciousness structure, as a perpetual iteration of its own ways of representing and acting in the world.
Another phenomenon typical of the deficient phase of a consciousness structure is the tendency to lapse into an earlier consciousness structure, as a defense against the irruption of a new consciousness structure which threatens to upset the status quo. The “mythical” consciousness structure which preceded the “mental” had a cyclical perception of time, as against the linear, spatialized perception of the “mental” structure. The idolization of the Ngaju of South Borneo and other such folks is the sign of a regression to an earlier consciousness structure. What is needed instead is an opening to a consciousness whose time perception is neither cyclical not linear but aperspectival with respect to both space and time.