[MD] Problems with Intellectual control of Society

[John Carl]

Will, thanks for that link to the interview with the founder of Wikipedia.
 Most informative.
I will posit a solution that will help expose your intellectualism
conundrum:

Wikipedia is better than an encyclopedia BECAUSE of its orientation toward
DQ.

An encyclopedia seems better to you because of its higher intellectual
value, but it is the very static nature of reliance upon single-source,
authoritative expertise that makes it less good from an MoQ perspective.

A questing young mind that comes to a body of information with the attitude,
"I'll see what the experts say and trust in that." will find more happiness
in the most expert publication.  And then this mind will latch and attach
the information obtained in a very rigid and dogmatic way.

But a mind that approaches the text with doubt and openess will absorb the
knowledge provisionally and dynamically, using it but not attaching dogmatic
fixitude will in the long run be the better informed individual.

Of course, I guess you could take this to an extreme and say, "well why not
read something completely ridiculously wrong.  You'll even be less likely to
attach dogmatically."

If you say that, then I'll say,  "well..., ummm...., errrrr...."

Sometimes Quality is more difficult to define than others, but I KNOW good
(and bad) when I experience it.







On Sun, Oct 18, 2009 at 5:36 PM, markhsmit <markhsmit at aol.com> wrote:

> Hey John,
> Don't get me wrong, I like to read Wikipedia as well.  It is yet another
> source
> for knowledge.  I feel that I need to cross-reference much of what I read,
> but
> often it is a good starting point.  And, no, not all expertise belongs to
> the
> encyclopedia, and often unsupported claims are made even in those
> Halls of Knowledge.  What surprises me is how Wikipedia has become
> a source for reference for the younger generation.  We don't even know
> who wrote the articles.  Otherwise, it's all good.
>
> I don't think we are in an anti-intellectual crisis, and I appreciate you
> putting the Mao purging into context.  It would appear that
> anti-intellectualism
> is just another word (like PC) which really has no meaning except as
> a tool to insult someone or to get one's way.
>
> Cheers,
> Willblake2
>
> On Oct 18, 2009, at 11:25:02 AM, "John Carl" <ridgecoyote at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> From:   "John Carl" <ridgecoyote at gmail.com>
> Subject:    Re: [MD] Problems with Intellectual control of Society
> Date:   October 18, 2009 11:25:02 AM PDT
> To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
> I like Wikipedia because not all expertise belongs to the encyclopedia
> companies. The more you care about any given topic, the more you're likely
> to know about it and wish to comment or inform your fellows.
> Keeping the whole thing dynamic and open and evolving gives us the
> opportunity to keep it sharp and accurate, if "we the people" want it so.
>
> If you really think that there is anti-intellectualism going on
> > in the US at this time, by all means, convince others, and rage
> > against it. Unless of course you think it is good thing. Take sides
> > create a movement, what's happening now with anti-intellectualism
> > could result in another purging like in China after the second world war.
> >
>
>
> I got a different perspective on China last week. There's this guy I know,
> known him a long time from the SDA church. We were working together
> trimming the leaves off my brother's crop, a communal activity with lots of
> time for gab, and I got to know stuff about him I never knew before. He
> speaks fluent Mandarin. He used to teach Formosan villagers english and
> he's an enthusiast of Mao's Red Book.
>
> All stuff that I never knew. People can be so much more rich and
> complicated than you observe on the surface.
>
> Anyway, he made a point about Mao's massacre of intellectuals that it
> wasn't
> "anti-intellectual" per se, rather it was following in the tradition of
> thousands of years of Chinese history when one dynasty wipes out the
> intellectual classes of the former so that it's own new intellectual
> evolution takes over. Thus it wasn't society wiping out the intellectuals
> so much as one intellectual pattern dominating society by wiping out
> competing intellectual patterns.
>
>
> How did we let our society get so anti-intellectual, where did we go
> > wrong, where will it lead?
>
>
> I think the anti-intellectualism you and Arlo see is born of a good
> instinct, a collective, albeit ill-informed rejection of a value-free
> metaphysical outlook which society blames upon intellectualism. But without
> a more comprehensive metaphysical outlook to guide it, is in great danger
> of
> making the mistakes of any reactionary, tossing babies all over the place
> in
> its effort to get some clean bath water in the tub.
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