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You can fool some of the people, all of the time

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Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#221

Post by Animats »

whatshisface wrote: post #173
Animats wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See current article on HN about Facebook leaks. Lying at scale without consequences seems to be becoming more prevalent. The inventor of that is generally considered to be Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propaganda minister. He used radio and film technology, which were new at the time, plus large rallies, to present a consistent but bogus view of reality. After WWII, that sort of thing had such a bad reputation that it wa…

Lying at scale? Humans have had organized religion for millennia. You don't need radio, you just have to have an organization of priests to keep the fires burning in the temple and tell people about Jupiter when they visit. Even if you only count directly political lies, we have records of ancient historians expressing their doubts about various stories. I mean, come on, is the claim that the high water mark of truth…

Organized religion doesn't scale fast. Growth is measured over centuries.

The impact of radio was huge. For the first time, entire populations of large areas could hear their leaders. For better or worse.

Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#222

Post by HBKXNCUO »

aglavine wrote: post #199
leppr wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you positive western democratic republics don't murder and/or start wars for profit ? Last I heard the USA's army and secret services were pretty active. What's different about their armies and ours ? I mean when was the last time citizens of a democratic republic gave their input on what assassination to carry out or war to wage ? There is definitely a point about overt, extreme abuse against their own citizens…

A lot of differences: - No eternal leaders. - Freedom of expression - Separation of powers that limit each other

>No eternal leaders.

Oh? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_monarchy_referendums

>Freedom of expression

Oh? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ursula_Haverbeck

Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#223

Post by lostphilosopher »

randcraw wrote: post #107

I think the rise of lies has little to do with humans being hardwired to resolve questions using emotions over reason. We prefer lies because we want a complex world to be simple, predictable, and manageable. Obviously it's not, so the only way that powerless people can believe their lives aren't spinning out of control is for authority figures to tell them what they want to hear: 1) every problem is simple and 2) a…

This is the power and appeal of virtually every conspiracy theory.

Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#224

Post by guenthert »

randcraw wrote: post #138
kerakaali wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are these mutually exclusive ideas? I feel there's overlap between them. Acting based on emotional pull can also reduce cognitive overhead compared to the expensive process of making decisions predicated on logic. On the other hand, lies don't necessary simplify worldviews either. We shouldn't forget that a significant part of the population is willing to engage in conspiracy theories that all too often draw lines be…

I think belief in conspiracies serves the same end as wishful thinking -- we can blame others for creating the evils of the world. Us-vs-them thinking also serve our need for being surrounded by 'friends', something you can do only if you have enemies. So inventing conspiracies and enemies are great ways to give yourself comfort amid a messy largely random world you can't control. If only we could get rid of our enem…

I think there's a conspiracy attempting to discredit alternative explanations. In the end they want you to belief there's no such agency.

Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#226

Post by PavlovsCat »

disintegore wrote: post #212
PavlovsCat wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'll invoke him if he's relevant. No, you're trying to speak for him. Consent to, say, physical assault being illegal, is a whole different ball game than manufactured consent to the Vietnam War, and all that is entailed in this wishy-washy stuff about "consent" in this context. Not to mention "democracy reacting by force to protest" -- as opposed to what, exactly? Non-democracies? Companies? People clicking button…

Get off your high horse. Chomsky speaks for himself. We interpret his words differently. I still don't see the obvious difference between consenting to "typical" law enforcement (read: "physical assault being illegal") and consenting to imperialistic wars all over the globe. In both cases the government employs its monopoly on legal violence and is empowered to do so by our consent. Of course the distinction between…

Yes, but you don't have to "manufacture" consent to, say, assault being illegal in anyone but sociopaths. That's the differnce. It's like saying "discussing in good faith and bashing our skulls in are actually both chemical and physical processs, I fail to see the obvious difference".

> Is the officially accepted purpose of a private enterprise specifically and exclusively to create wealth for its owners, or have we just resigned ourselves to that reality? Isn't this supposed to be the most effective mode of production?

Maybe you did, but then make the argument.

Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#227

Post by rzmnzm »

lordnacho wrote: post #35
smoll wrote: post #12

If most people are hard-wired to be duped, why does it feel like only recently people are getting even more conspicuously duped by their political leaders (a la Trump and Johnson)? Presumably this effect should have had a more uniformly distributed effect throughout history. Is it solely due to the weaponization of technology for this means? Or are there other reasons for “why now”?

> Or are there other reasons for “why now”? Now because it's only been a short time since people could decide anything. Or at least were told that they could. How long since real parliamentary democracy, where say half of people who can currently vote were allowed to do so? And in that time, the major outlets were few and gated by a journalistic system where you had to at least say something sensible and be judged by…

I don't agree. 'Yellow journalism' has been around for almost 150 years. The major differentiator was who had the money to print, and an audience to read.

It would be nice to think that a news organisation's respectability would translate into a greater audience, but you only have to look at the Sun, Fox, et all to see that is not the case.

An interesting story is more appealing than one that is not, even if it is not true. And the cost of reporting false information is a small retraction printed weeks later on page 10.

The decline of news media profitability has led to the state of journalism today, which mainly consists of twitter gossip mongers, producing content not much better than the crazies at speakers corner (and often worse).

Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#228

Post by disintegore »

PavlovsCat wrote: post #226
disintegore wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get off your high horse. Chomsky speaks for himself. We interpret his words differently. I still don't see the obvious difference between consenting to "typical" law enforcement (read: "physical assault being illegal") and consenting to imperialistic wars all over the globe. In both cases the government employs its monopoly on legal violence and is empowered to do so by our consent. Of course the distinction between…

Yes, but you don't have to "manufacture" consent to, say, assault being illegal in anyone but sociopaths. That's the differnce. It's like saying "discussing in good faith and bashing our skulls in are actually both chemical and physical processs, I fail to see the obvious difference". > Is the officially accepted purpose of a private enterprise specifically and exclusively to create wealth for its owners, or have we…

Going back to what spawned this discussion.

> There are plenty of people who don't consent on a daily basis. The actions range from peaceful protests to traitorous acts. How does a democracy deal with them? Force.

Let's say for the sake of argument that I am an American citizen and that I do not consent to the tear gassing and pepper spraying of college aged young adults, nor do I consent to Chelsea Manning being jailed and Snowden being in exile. Does that make me a sociopath? I'm only scratching the surface here.

In any case, I recall saying that "much" of the consent was manufactured and not "all" of it.

Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time

#229

Post by Xelbair »

patentatt wrote: post #72
Xelbair wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The only problem is that the warring factions know this and will do everything they can to conceal the reality of the situation so that the people do not exercise the power that they have. And they have been very successful at it. The amount of people who believe that democracy is somehow inherently good for the people is beyond my belief. Democracy is neither evil nor good. It is just a popularity contest. Merit…

Surely you can see some causal relationship between the two though? On a “whole society” scale, how is merit defined? If you come up with some rigid concrete definition, someone else may disagree. So democracy stands for the proposition that the most reliable way to define merit is to trust the majority of people’s consensus. How else would you propose that merit be defined and evaluated, long term, on the scale of a…

Counterpoint - rise of populism.

It is popular, but useless.

I do not have a better system, but i do not lie to myself that democracy is perfect.

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