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Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

theguardian.com

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Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#131

Post by rottc0dd »

rottc0dd wrote: post #94
lolinder wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But, 1984 also features a great protagonist and an absolutely haunting language. While many of the other characters mainly serve to convey the broader ideas, it’s him who grounds the story emotionally. His suffering, his moral collapse, and the eventual loss of his ability was so tough to read and will forever haunt me. When he breaks, it feels like a loss for all of humanity. But, what I mean is characters are not…

I kind of think both are true. I will remember Winston as great thinker who is extremely aware his world. And the tragedy or death of him is death of his awareness. His ability to think. In all the protagonist I have seen in tragedies, he is peculiar. While reviewing one another writer's work, Orwell said > ‘... was a bad writer, and some inner trouble, sharpening his sensitiveness, nearly made him into a good one; h…

I meant to type, it was one of the tragic things I have read, but too late to edit.

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#132

Post by beAbU »

bawolff wrote: post #14

Huh, i guess i both agree and disagree with this article. I disagree that black mirror has to save the world. Art doesn't have to literally save the world to be useful, it just has to add to the conversation. The fact we are talking about it proves that it has. On the other hand, i've never really liked black mirror that much. It feels polemical to me. Its unrelenting pessimism robs it of nuance, which makes it feel…

I re-watched Community probably 5 times by now. It's one of my favourite television series in spite of it's flaws.

Sometimes I feel like Community is a more subtle Black Mirror than what we give it credit for. The writers came up with the weirdest ideas, and they just threw these at this world they created in Community to see what came out. /Everyone/ in that story finds themselves at Greendale because of some less-than-optimal circumstance, and the only thing they can do is react to the circumstances given to them.

Meow meow beans is a stand-out episode because it takes the absurdity of a social credit system all they way beyond the vale and straight to it's natural conclusion, where common sense failed to step in and take control.

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#133

Post by thinkingemote »

dmix wrote: post #87

Why does media and film even need to be about changing the world? It gives perspectives and exaggerates it for entertainment from which we occasionally draw cultural memes. Those can influence us as societies occasionally but ultimately they are just stories, personal visions. The exaggerations in media often defines our outward perceptions more than the boring reality of our actual lives. So it can equally do harm i…

I've given up on a lot of TV as much seem to be about pushing a message. The more I don't watch it, the more obvious it seems to be when I do. A much smaller bunch of shows seem explicitly designed to push a political/cultural message and we even have politicians talk about legislation based on the show that was on the screen the previous night!

Perhaps those whose job it is to push messages (e.g. journalists) see themselves and their mission in TV shows and so we have this view as shown in the article.

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#134

Post by epolanski »

kelseyfrog wrote: post #57
epolanski wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Me too I also dislike the cherry picked and wrongly built narrative, see the nuclear one. > In contrast, France ran from the past towards the future, overcoming public fears of nuclear disasters, now getting 70% of its electricity from nuclear power. France has put a single reactor online in the last 25 years, it has closed reactors and cancelled building new ones for some time. The problem has always been financial…

To be fair, the reason behind this was the arguably poor decision decades ago to overbuild reactor capacity.

France sells energy to it's neighbors.

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#135

Post by physicsguy »

noufalibrahim wrote: post #116
Animats wrote: post #91

It's not that Black Mirror is bad. It's that, as the article points out, we don't have a fictional vision of the future to use as a goal. The author mentions Jill Lapore's 2017 article in the New Yorker, which is sort of a survey paper of dystopian fiction from that period.[1] No alternatives are presented. For most of human history, the big problem was making enough stuff. There just wasn't any way to make enough st…

I remember an article, I think by Neal Stephenson, that described the change in the attitude of SF over the years. Things like 20000 leagues under the sea, off on a comet etc. were optimistic, adventurous and generally upbeat. Even the Asimov books were more about world building than doomsaying. There's quite a bit of dystopian pessimistic stuff that's in the market now and perhaps it's just because it's what sells o…

There's the whole 'solarpunk' genre of fiction that I'd say is more optimistic. Epitomised by stuff like Becky Chamber's books 'A Psalm for the Wild Built' and 'A Prayer for the Crown Shy' (which are both excellent by the way).

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#136

Post by GeoAtreides »

Animats wrote: post #91

It's not that Black Mirror is bad. It's that, as the article points out, we don't have a fictional vision of the future to use as a goal. The author mentions Jill Lapore's 2017 article in the New Yorker, which is sort of a survey paper of dystopian fiction from that period.[1] No alternatives are presented. For most of human history, the big problem was making enough stuff. There just wasn't any way to make enough st…

>we don't have a fictional vision of the future to use as a goal.

yes we do, it's called The Culture by Iain M Banks.

It's a series of books, and it's not easy-web-novels reading, so in the grand scheme of things is pretty niche

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#137

Post by lannisterstark »

I always go read a novel or two of Iain M Banks' Culture series whenever I want a Utopian future. It hits everything I want fairly perfectly.

Honestly there are way too many dystopian "omg this tech will do this" media as opposed to "this tech will do this good thing."

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#138

Post by anon-3988 »

dexwiz wrote: post #108
anon-3988 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arguably the only "you" that exists is the "you" right now. For how can you show that you are not in vat? Prove that yesterday was real? Even if a second ago was real?

Of course the only me that exists is right now. In no feasible reality would I ever shake hands with me from yesterday or me in the vat. Nor would I ever shake hands with me in a robot, just a robot that thinks it's me. Even if those other entities exist they are not me.

Except you don't treat them that way. You feel sorry about your old self. You feel sorry for other people, even though you cannot prove that they even "exist". You care about future you even though it doesn't exist.

Unless you don't.

I agree with your conclusion that because that is the reality of life, the only time worth spending is right now.

Re: Black Mirror's pessimism porn won't lead us to a better future

#140

Post by silvaring »

9283409232 wrote: post #7

Trying to replace everyone with AI and actively build a surveillance state also won't lead us to a better future. They say Black Mirror is dystopian but I would say we are on the dystopian timeline so it is just emulating reality a few years into the future.

Thats why we need a strong open source competitor to closed source AI.
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