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Death of John Davison–a little late

I guess I missed this last year:

John A. Davison obituary

For future reference, here is his hopelessly disorganized blog:

http://jadavison.wordpress.com/

which may eventually disappear, depending on WordPress.com policy. Then there is this page, which also will probably disappear:

http://www.uvm.edu/~jdavison/

I’m afraid John will leave no clear scholarly legacy, since his theories were never presented and disseminated in a way that would preserve them. However, he left a huge impression on the evolutionary debates, as arguably the most tenacious and prevalent commenter and the one who was most despised by all parties.

To me, the most interesting thing about him was his rhetorical position, which refused to align with established parties and maintained a stubbornly idiosyncratic viewpoint. I suppose I identified with that and envied his outspokenness.

His rhetorical position seemed to be a great example of what happens when someone combines various purely inductive insights without trying to apply any sort of metaphysical framework. That is totally contrary to the axioms of rationalistic thought as it has been practiced since the Renaissance; it is a sort of literal, pedantic understanding of inductive reasoning.

It also matches up perfectly with the stereotypical method of conspiracy theory construction, and not coincidentally, John was rather conspiracy-minded. That psychology has been an object of fascination for me for a long time.

I felt sorry for John because of his banishment from other sites, despite how well-deserved it was, considering how disruptive he could be for someone trying to manage large numbers of commenters and create coherent discussion threads. This is also consistent with the influence of conspiracy theory fans in politics, insofar as they tend to disrupt everyone’s attempts to shape the public narrative. Yet, if the tide turns and a particular conspiracy theory becomes a widespread belief, it can seem to drive a genuine sociological shift. I suspect that such a shift is actually the result of more tangible forces, though, and that the popularity of a particular cloud of anomalous ideas merely provides cover for intellectual rationalization on all sides, including historians writing narratives long after the fact.

I would characterize “evolution by natural selection” as just such an inductive fallacy (while acknowledging that this position is normally taken by evolution advocates against the “argument from design”).

For example, the Darwinian explanations for speciation and extinction would have had little impact on the world if not for the pre-existing 19th-century social trends of positivism, cultural imperialism, and racial purification. All three of these trends led to evident absurdities and atrocities in the 20th century, and Darwin nearly became a minor footnote in scientific history.

Then, “evolution by natural selection” was rehabilitated as a transcendent metaphysical system (“nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution”) by being incorporated within the real science of genetics in the middle of the 20th century. It became relevant as a political issue in the US by piggybacking on the “space race” era concern for total social mobilization in support of science, and then (paradoxically, I think) became attached to global environmentalist fanaticism.

Right now I think the pro-evolution rhetoric has degraded somewhat, and the only way it will make progress is if there is a consolidation into a pantheistic set of beliefs, or if there is a momentous technological breakthrough in transhumanism. There is also a remote possibility that evolutionary psychology could metastasize into a religious system. Otherwise, “evolution by natural selection” will become a meaningless political position with decreasing social relevance, as “free market capitalism” and “international communism” already have.

I considered John Davison’s theistic evolution to be a quirky example of how someone might consolidate evolution and ethics in order to make it relevant again. Of course, he had no hope of spreading his ideas, since he was personally too annoying and he never found a political niche for his position. Nevertheless, I valued his strident argumentativeness and his unwavering sincerity.

 

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You Can’t Handle the Truth

By the way, I’m not engaging in this race-baiting or cop-bashing free-for-all that O’Reilly criticizes. I know I’m insensitive, but the content of Dorner’s claim against the LAPD is not that interesting to me. It’s the sort of thing that’s true on its face because its expressing a human truth, so there will be a lot of people who believe it regardless of actual evidence; and even if it could be proved by statistical methods to be false, it would still be a widely held belief, which would thereby poison police-community relations and make it true in some anecdotal way. The same interactive truth happened when Dorner made his accusations and threatened police officers personally, causing police to pass summary judgment:

LAPD Chief Charlie Beck had called Dorner “a domestic terrorist,” and a $1 million reward, raised from public and private sources, was offered. [Detroit Free Press]

Officers lobbed canisters of tear gas into the cabin, first “cold” canisters, then pyrotechnic canisters that police refer to as “burners,” McMahon said. The cabin caught fire, and police reported hearing a single gunshot from inside. “We did not intend to burn down that cabin to get Dorner out,” McMahon said. [OC Register]

Right–it was an accident. Again, the facts are less important than the intuitive truth, because the intuitive truth is what people will believe regardless of facts.

One group of people is paranoid and constantly jumping at shadows, trying to profile and predict which of their millions of potential attackers will strike next; we call these conspiracy theorists “Homeland Security” or the militarized police. They are actually correct in assuming that the next person who will embarrass them and compel them to rain down heavy weapons fire will probably come from among the general populace (unlike Dorner) and will probably be socially maladjusted.

Then there’s another group of people who form opinions based on partial information filtered through official sources, but expressing their personal prejudices:

I might add here, in case you never read about it, that one of the interesting things the manifesto revealed is that Dorner endorsed Hillary Clinton for president in 2016, and he defends Pres. Obama and the Democrats’ current gun control push, plus he blasts the NRA. He also expresses a great deal of respect for many well known liberal media types.

Now, this might not seem important, and it isn’t, except for the fact that we all know if his manifesto had revealed him to be a supporter of the Tea Party, gun rights, and conservative media, THAT would have been the lede story on every mainstream media news program. That double standard needs to be pointed out every single time, so we understand we are not dealing with an objective media. [Texas Sparkle]

We call those people “journalists.” They don’t believe in conspiracies; they only believe in public opinion. That is, there is something the public already believes, or wants to believe, which can be reflected in the story so that when someone reads it, they will say to themselves, “Yeah, that’s right. That’s totally true. I’m glad they’re not afraid to print the truth.”

Neither the police nor the journalists have a set political viewpoint, despite the usual stereotypes. Their prejudices are not political as much as they are epistemological. They know what truth is when they see it, and if something doesn’t fit with that truth, they don’t see it. It’s a shortcut way of thinking that is kind of necessary in order to get by, but not as inductive as one would hope.

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Not in My Rights Mind

Man banned from Charlottesville Kroger after entering with loaded AR-15 – Daily Progress: News

An unidentified 22-year-old man carrying a loaded AR-15 semi-automatic rifle shortly after 5 p.m. Sunday was questioned and released by police at the Kroger at Hydraulic Road and Emmet Street.
Charlottesville police Lt. Ronnie Roberts said the man did not break any laws. Since he legally owned the rifle and it was not concealed, he was within his rights, Roberts said.

Virginia requires a permit to carry a concealed weapon, but has no such restriction on guns in plain view….

Though he was not arrested, store managers barred him from the property, officials said….

“It was most likely a demonstration of his Second Amendment rights,” he said.

Notice here that he had a “right” to carry a gun openly, but not a “right” to carry a gun openly on private property, nor even necessarily a “right” to carry a gun openly on state or municipal property (the remarks about state laws are ambiguous and there is no mention of other jurisdictions). The US Constitution was intended to specify the powers of the federal government, not to endow individuals (other than federal government officials) with special powers; the amendments were added to clarify the ways in which the federal government was supposed to interpret the use of its powers.

Interestingly, most of the so-called Constitutional rights (e.g., those pertaining to free speech, assembly, religion, guns, search & seizure, etc.) are suspended as soon as someone indentures themselves to another person, or even a fake person such as a corporation. Even if someone is not an indentured servant, merely being on someone else’s private property eliminates most of someone’s so-called federal rights. That is because the fundamental right assumed by the Constitution is property, not personhood, equality, employment, health care, sobriety, marriage, happiness, free trade, or a Christian nation. The original intent of the US Constitution was not to guarantee anyone life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness; the original intent was to cripple the federal government so that it would be less likely to prevent such things, insofar as they might naturally occur.

Because many Patriots, Galtistas, Conservatives, and Christians idolize federal power and fantasize about granting themselves special powers as private individuals, including special powers over other people, they miss the intent of the Constitution. They think that it grants them or others “rights” (that is, “mutant superpowers”) and that it should be altered to grant them or others more superpowers, since they hope that with great power comes less responsibility.*

That is why I am fundamentally pragmatic about government. In a democratic society, the government should do whatever 51% of the people want; in a democratic republic, it should do whatever 51% of the propertied class wants. In a healthy society, the government should do exactly what is necessary to maintain it; in a dead society, there is no government. If a government is oppressing a healthy society, then it should be overthrown; if a government is oppressing a dying society, then it is because they do not want to govern themselves, and they should be treated as children. In a decadent and corrupt society, there is no interest in governance as such, so instead people gossip pointlessly about politics and get the bad government they deserve.

That brings me to the fascinating connection between anarchism and determinism. A rational defense of anarchism implies that some innate quality can be liberated, or that some predetermined plan can be enacted, or that some fresh order will emerge. Pure anarchy is nothing less than insanity, which is not to say it is not understandable, but simply that it serves no apparent end; it could be placed in a larger context, perhaps, but then we would fall back into rational anarchism. I thought of this while listening to an interview with Robert Fowler: while discussing how Islamic militants are deliberately creating anarchy in order to enable God’s will to act in the world, he says this at around 28:20–

They hate everything we stand for. They hate government. They hate democracy. They hate freedom. They hate liberty. They hate equality. They hate free will. All those things, in their minds, are the province of God and not of men.

[Interview with Robert Fowler, 24:00-29:30]

So, this evoked thoughts about libertarianism, anarchism, Discordianism, totalitarianism, predestination, absolute sovereignty of God, free will, entelechy, order, chaos, and millenialism. I thought, well, that’s why absolute sovereignty of God is incompatible with democratic government: because the “stupid masses”, the unchosen, will never make the right decision. Or maybe, that’s why someone who believes in God’s absolute sovereignty has free will, in their mind: in order for them to clear the way for God to act. God’s absolute sovereignty is matched by His absolute restraint, His inaction indicating not impotence but the temporary intransigence of the Chosen towards His will, which they are called to impose on the unChosen.

Absolute sovereignty is oddly comforting, yet repulsive. It entails cosmic order temporarily suppressed and mutant superpowers expressed as rights.

From the same liberal perspective, here is Alaa Al Aswany, starting at 13:57–

…when you think that you are really religious and you are trying to apply the word of God by being in power, you are very close to being fascist. Because the rule, the base, of democracy is equal rights. Right?

[Interviewer]: Yes.

So, if I think that I am, I have the truth in my head and I have God supporting me, and you don’t have God, you are against God, right, yeah. So, accordingly, it’s very hard that I admit that you have equal rights with me, you see, because I am much better than you are. So, this, we have really here a kind of very clear example of how religious political group turns out to be fascist group….

[Interview with Alaa Al Aswany, 12:45-21:10]

See, when I hear stuff like this, I am sympathetic to the liberal atheists. I just don’t agree with religious totalitarianism, and the bottom line is that a quasi-secular system in the US style is the only kind of government I will support. There is a difference between using Jesus as an ethical standard or using the Bible for guidance, and using Christianity (or Islam) as a political standard. But the atheists are delusional when they reductively point to “religion” as the cause of human suffering; believing that requires a true ignorance of history. The problem is not religious ideas, but arrogance and greed in the hearts of men, which they can justify as right in their own minds by using any of an infinite variety of secular or religious ideas.

*The catchphrase of the Spider-Man comic book is, “With great power there must also come—great responsibility!” If this were applied to “rights”, popular support for them would evaporate. How many gays would get married without no-fault divorce laws? How many gun owners would provide unpaid mandatory annual military service? How many “right to live in an abortion-free country” advocates would financially support other people’s unwanted children for 18 years? For most people, rights-talk is code for justifying their irresponsibility.

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[Your Name Here] Publishes Manifesto

A name is more than just a noun, verb, or adjective. It’s your life, your legacy, your journey, sacrifices, and everything you’ve worked hard for every day of your life as and adolescent, young adult and adult. Don’t let anybody tarnish it when you know you’ve live up to your own set of ethics and personal ethos.

Manifesto of Christopher Dorner, 8 February 2013

I feel sorry for this guy, despite his stereotypical TL/DR manifesto. He has that old-fashioned obsession with honor, as typified in the focus on clearing his name at the expense of his life. It’s evident that he perceives all his homicidal behavior to be conditioned by training and morally justified in its object, which is what our society expects from military and police officers.

The people who think he is crazy are a little too far removed from actual life experience (especially military/police experience) to be fair; he is out of control, but not crazy. The journalists are, as per usual, stupid and shallow; it is not necessary for journalists to be that way, but when they become fascinated by their own mythology, they end up constantly searching for that juicy rhetorical hook. The fake appeals to racism and homophobia illustrate why most people who are not journalists, yet who must deal with journalists, despise journalists. [I felt that contempt dripping off of my more aware subjects, either as condescension or hostility.]

The doctrine of the name is an area of philosophical inquiry that doesn’t seem to go away, for me. I don’t like anonymity, because anonymity is fake, except when it is statistically significant, at which point it is no longer relevant to identity. I also don’t like fake authority, but I don’t know how to evaluate genuine authority. I favor pseudonymity in an existential spirit, something that precedes “postmodernism” yet sounds very postmodern to someone living in a postmodern society and yearning for the old modern society of 1961, when they could still believe that the perfectly rational order was just about to spring forth and shower everyone with non-psychedelic Edenic bliss.

The Davison Principle of Everyone’s True Names (if everyone used their true name they would all be civil and rational) seems like it would enable someone to accrue honor and reputation. Yet, in practice, I think it requires one to be comfortable with their real life as it is and desire to build on that, rather than trying to create some parasitic commercial or artistic appeal. Can any American be that integrated and confident? Surely, only someone regarded by others as hopelessly delusional.

Then there is the Sacred Mindset Principle of the One True Name. I know some of those people who believe that if you call God by the wrong name, then you are worshipping the wrong god, and you will suffer dire consequences. If you use the right name in the right language, along with a right heart, right actions, right clothing, and right diet, that might mean you have the right sacred mindset, and that might prove that you really love God, and maybe he’ll give you grace. Maybe, or maybe not. Sorry, but I’m agnostic about that god: I don’t know him and I don’t want to know him.

It is kind of stupid to declare war on the folks empowered to use deadly violence to keep order within society, and to be concerned with one’s name in the face of institutional neglect and opposition. Common sense means accepting defeat and keeping the peace; stupid means pretending that your name matters. I’ve been in the same emotional space as Dorner, and whereas I would love to tell off The Beast and The Whores of Babylon and The False Prophet, it isn’t really worth it in a society where work identity can be fungible and purely objective.

But all this merely proves that I believe in the opposite point, that there can be significance in a name and a reputation, that someone can have resolute character that is known to others and trusted, yet still integrated and consistent. If I didn’t believe that were possible, I wouldn’t argue against it.

The distinction to be made pertains to totalizing identity. If one’s total identity is subsumed by externalities, by visible evidences of one’s position relative to the world (as if such contained profound spiritual significance), then one may be consumed by externally driven factors:

“He collects injustices and never lets them go, and evidently they finally reached a tipping point that led to the series of violent acts the last several days,” Bratton said. “The last thing that he would want would be to be arrested by the LAPD and do a perp walk. That would be the last injustice, the most significant one.”  [Profile of ex-LAPD cop Dorner]

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Source, Please

The Internet Credo:

OUR VALUED CUSTOMERS: While discussing THE HOBBIT: AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY…

Skepticism is a good thing in a medium fraught with lies like the internet, but skepticism means finding out the truth for yourself. Sitting on your ass whining for a source is not learning for yourself. It’s just lazy.

You should only ask for a source after you try to learn the truth for yourself and come up empty handed.

It’s true that the Internet is full of falsity, but the reason that is tolerated is because it is mostly open to discovery. It is a huge social experiment in the free market of information, to see whether the most open and decentralized system humanity can invent will actually result in an ideal market for information, and thus for other things, such as economic goods, political stability, or social justice. More likely, it will simply result in a human-developed-but-not-directed version of evolution by natural selection.

The problem arises where there is an assumption that the “truth” is known or is easily discoverable, or will naturally emerge as the strongest contender, in a system full of struggling, non-omnipotent, non-omniscient, contingent entities. Web forums demonstrate how a kind of social truth develops, an assumption of basic knowledge that defines entry and status in the group. Blogs tend to demonstrate faith in emergent truth, unless the blogger is totally solipsistic and arrogant, in which case the truth of their soulless egoism emerges.

But the only absolute truths on the Internet are truths about its functionality and its hardware backbone, things that may be ignored or faked, but only for people who are so totally immersed in the system that it doesn’t matter to them, which doesn’t change the truth of it. In other words, there are truths that supervene upon whatever “facts” may be found in the Internet, because they are independent of it, being determined by forces that are independent of it, and directed by beings who think independently of it.

Curiously enough, this is a demonstration of why ideas do not have consequences, that is, why any particular intangible fact (an idea) does not necessitate a tangible event. If there arose an Internet meme that Martians are using Coca-Cola molecules to configure Web protocols, that “idea” might have massive social consequences as netizens structured their entire lives around it, but it would have no effect on the actual function of the Internet, unless some Martians were thereby inspired to try implementing it, or some Earthmen were inspired to implement countermeasures.

So, only by the will of someone acting in meatspace would such an idea have any consequence that is not imaginary. But, sure, there could be lots of imaginary consequences, or lots of “consequences” that happen only on the Internet.

For those who have ears to hear, let them hear: The wrath of the engineer is revealed from tech support against all un-nerdiness and non-spec usage of men who suppress the truth in non-spec usage, because that which is known about the engineer is evident among them; for the engineer made it evident to them. For since the creation of the Internet, the engineer’s invisible attributes, his technical power and nerd nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew the engineer, they did not honor him as the engineer or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

I Wonder Why

“Still,” said the poet, “I wonder why.

The frozen one, he lives a lie.

Nothing can disturb his sleep,

The gentle numbness, dark and deep.

Feeling for the lack of sensation,

See the emptiness, desolation.”

—-

Power acquired is emotion outcast,

Power sought-after is sought to the last.

Power beckons, so answer the call;

Attain the highest and take it all.

Then find the answer for the feeling

That knocks you down and leaves you kneeling,

Kneeling before the grace of your needs:

Love, upon which everyone feeds.

But, only man, you still deny it,

Steady yourself, and walk on by it.

Deny the savior of mankind,

That which the wisest yearn to find.

—-

Nothing else disturbs the sleeper,

Except the dark and subtle Reaper.

[1980]