the ramble dump

As a sort of a continuation of this post, which was about the worth of stories beyond entertainment, and possibly linked to this post, which discusses what might and might not count as 'art', I was thinking about the complexity of some stories, with all the metaphors, inferences and allusions that they can be filled with. My main question, as I was reading all about this kind of thing in the introduction to Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway for the lecture and seminar next week, was: to what end?

Returning to all the talk in that first linked post of stories being able to suggest, the most obvious answer would probably be that all the figurative language and symbolic descriptions and motifs and so on can, obviously, be used beyond their simple function as poetic narrative to illustrate the kinds of things that a book or film or play is considering, using comparisons that may be effective enough to throw a new light or a different perspective on the subject matter.

Of course, there will always be some manipulation occurring here on the part of the author. This is why, for all the importance of receptivity and open-mindedness when it comes to art, the practice of literary criticism and the like can be a useful thing. The author is likely to be playing with the perceptions, preconceptions or ideas of the reader or audience to illicit a certain response -- this is one of the most powerful features of storytelling -- and it's up to the reader to be equally open-minded and rational enough to be able to identify where he or she might be the subject of this manipulation; and then to decide if the way in which the author is provoking this response might, as the author thinks it does, have something to it. As well as identifying manipulation, a critical approach can be used to mine the worth of a story. After consideration, you might feel that a certain comparison yields some truth; that the alternative perspective offered might just be of some value.

I've already mentioned my wariness of allegory. Allegory is the use of an extended metaphor to get a point across. But if I don't object to the potential philosophical value of figurative language in general, how can I object to allegory? What's the difference beyond levels of subtlety? Well, the extension of metaphor in this way, after representing something in a certain way as all metaphors do, then has the clear intention of drawing a conclusion from it for you. As Tolkien said in a passage I've already quoted, allegory is all about the 'purposed domination of the author' -- it sets out to make your mind up for you. The more subtle use of figurative language and symbology, as I've already said, is not without its potential for manipulation, but there's more freedom for the reader, more room for interpretation. The further you try to extend a metaphor, the less suggestive and the more controlling of the interpretation you're being, and it's much more likely that the comparison is then distorted or oversimplified as a result.

There are other ways in which inference can be abused. When I was thinking about Wilde's opinion of art, I mentioned pretentiousness. That could be applied here in the cases of those who will infer and allude and present empty motifs just for the sake of seeming clever. Poetic pretentiousness can often be found in the use of 'purple prose', by those who attempt to use over-elaborate and extremely flowery language to add prestige or suchlike to their work, and this can then be taken a step further by those who use similar methods to portray themselves as profound. When an author seems to think that the esotericism of a text is an indicator of how philosophically deep it is and rattles off some lengthy, convoluted metaphor supposedly, for example, penetrating the fundamental human condition (or something like that), we would have to question how someone could talk for so long out of their own arse.

Here's another form this pretence might take. For this next one, I'm going to use an example that could be argued either way. I seem to use these films as an example for a lot of things, but anyway: many have claimed that the Matrix films are very 'philosophical' in nature. The story is undoubtedly packed with a thousand inferences, references and allusions to all kinds of philosophers and different schools of philosophical thought in varying degrees of subtlety; but maybe all these things were dropped in merely to give the illusion that the films had philosophical depth (which would have been ironic, considering the subject of the films). Were the Wachowski Brothers trying too hard to make the films seem 'intelligent', or do the Matrix films really give us something to think about?

As fun a game as it might be for us to successfully identify all the various references and incorporated symbology in the films, and as clever as it might make the audience and the filmmakers feel, it may be an ultimately pointless activity. An argument often given in defence of the films is something along the lines of, 'You didn't enjoy the films because you haven't attempted to appreciate all the philosophy behind it', to which the retort is usually, 'You need to get out more.' It's hard to say how much genuine philosophy is involved in the Matrix films and how much is just there to give the impression of it (I'd say it seems a bit of both -- I think it illustrates a lot of philosophical ideas pretty well and gives us a lot to think about, but there are times when it feels like a bit of a symbological overload or philosophy for the look of it).

But in these films, and in many other films and books and so on, why require the audience or reader to have to look for these things? Why bury them so that they have to be dug out? This was already sort of answered by the allegory issue: this way, the 'answer' isn't being thrown at the audience. The fact that the readers of a book or the viewers of a film have to do more of the work invites them in and encourages them to think about it more for themselves. It encourages different interpretations and a more critical evaluation, meaning that, if it's there, the useful and relevant stuff can be properly discovered and appreciated. To use a Matrix analogy (which is, aptly, in itself a reference to something else), tumbling down the rabbit hole and having a thorough look around is surely preferable to having the rabbit come up and give you his potentially biased account.

Labels: allegory, cyberpunk, i am the ramblemaster, language, oscar wilde, philosophy, rabbit-hole theory, the matrix, tolkien

# posted by Chris @ 6:33 PM 0 comments

So I'm pretty much set to get going, academically speaking, here at Nottingham Uni. Here's the shape of my course for the first year:

CORE MODULES (FULL YEAR):
Language and Context (20 credits)
Studying Modern Literature (20 credits)
Beginnings of English (20 credits)
Introduction to Drama (20 credits)

AUTUMN SUBSIDS:
The Rise of the West: European Society, 1500-1789 (10 credits)
Human Nature and Evolution (10 credits)

SPRING SUBSIDS:
Gothic and Renaissance Europe, 1200-1500 (10 credits)
Freedom and Determinism (10 credits)

The Single Honours English Studies course, as comprehensive as it seems, left me with a lot of spare credits. I ended up picking two under History and two under Philosophy. The History ones weren't my first choices, but the majors in that subject had already filled the spaces for those. I think I'm mostly happy with it. We'll see how it goes.

Labels: philosophy

# posted by Chris @ 9:14 PM 0 comments

I've been reading The Power of Movies: How Screen and Mind Interact, by philosopher Colin McGinn. I discovered the book after reading one of his essays on the Matrix films, in which he mentioned he was working on something like it. In the book, McGinn discusses the reasons behind the immense appeal of films, first establishing their physical and metaphysical properties in relation (and as opposed) to different media such as novels, theatrical plays and small-screen TV, and discussing exactly what it is we are looking at, how we interpret it, how we are engaged by it and how this affects us. He goes into detail about the structure of the image presented: the psychological effects of close-ups of the face, of black-and-white, of dancing and movement and so on. It's all very interesting.

A significant portion of the book is based around the 'dream theory'. His main argument seems to be that our fascination with films is derived (at least partly) from our experiences of dreaming (he is not just merely suggesting that the appeal of films and the experience of dreams have the same psychological roots: he seems to be saying that the appeal of films is to a certain extent dependent on our dreaming experience). There is a lot of speculation and conjecture in McGinn's examination of the dream theory, but he acknowledges that this is so and attempts to ground it in analogy between dreams and films in a way that seems mostly successful.

McGinn's analogy draws on things like their audio-visual nature and how we interpret it; the role of movement; how we place personality and meaning in objects; the fact that both dreams and films have fragmented sequences or 'spatio-temporal discontinuity', meaning that we can suddenly jump from one time and place to the next without questioning it (usually led by a narrative drive in films, as opposed to a psychological drive in dreams); how both might be considered 'dreamlike' from an external point of view, but not while they are being experienced; the appeal to the 'base self', etc. Obviously all these things need elaboration, but for that you'll just have to buy the book.

Most of it proves to be enlightening, and for the most part I could at least see the reasoning behind his suggestions even if some of the more specific assertions felt like a bit more of a stretch than others (such as his reasons for dreaming of movie stars). There was only one statement I didn't really agree with, and that was one regarding films 'transcending their roots' that I may have misinterpreted. After half a dozen wistful (albeit probably tongue-in-cheek) exclamations about how he wishes films could be inserted into our brains to replace the 'usual crappy dreams we have', he comes to the conclusion that 'a film is really a dream as it aspires to be', which is a pretty big assertion. While it makes sense to acknowledge areas where films can exceed our regular dreams - for example, in story and spectacle - McGinn seems to be forgetting that dreams need neither story nor spectacle to be affecting because they are, as he had already said himself, by nature charged with emotion, irrespective of these things. I would argue that our own dreams can affect us more personally and emotionally than a film ever could, even if that film was inserted directly into our brain; and that it might be fair to say that a film aspires to excel in some areas where a dream cannot, but to claim that a film is essentially superior to the dream (which is what his statement seems to imply) is dubious. To be fair, he does arrive at this assertion in a section on films being art and dreams not being art, and I would agree that films do surpass dreams in that sense, but he does also seem to be speaking more generally. In the book's final section, looking to the future, he says of direct-to-brain films that they would 'precisely resemble the dream.' Technically, yes. But that's still neglecting the very personal nature and effects of the dreams our own brains make for us.

One of the most interesting points McGinn touches on is the shared ability of the dream and the film to absorb our minds and cause us to be completely caught up in the moment. This is less the case with films than with dreams because for their duration dreams erase everything else from our minds (otherwise they can't exist), and as McGinn points out, you can see a film and still let your mind wander. But what this leads on to is how this absorption can open you up to 'suggestibility'.

The movie watcher seems abnormally suggestible, open to persuasion and propaganda--which is why movies have often been used to this end. It is comparatively easy to arouse the viewer's emotions and convinctions. Again, if we ask why this is so, the dream theory has an answer: in simulating the dream state, the movie watcher enters a kind of heightened suggestibility. This state is not as extreme as the dream state, but it approximates that state; thus beliefs are easily encouraged, opinions shaped. [...] Perhaps there should be a new category added to the ratings system: B, for "liable to lead to beliefs in unsuspecting viewers." Once you have someone in a dream state, just as a hypnotic state, you have him where you want him, belief-wise.

Even before McGinn begins his discussion of the dream theory, he suggests something not entirely unrelated in his earlier talk of roused emotions during the film-watching experience. McGinn (quoting film theorist Dudley Andrew) draws an analogy between the experience of sitting in a movie theatre and watching the screen while music and sound blasts through the speakers, and sitting in a church or a cathedral with large, stained glass windows and organ music:

Those windows are super-bright patterns of light, typically telling stories of some sort, and receiving the upturned gaze of the devotee. They tell of a world beyond and give off an aura of the supernatural. They afford visual pleasure, treats for the eye. They transform the human body into a creature of light and radiance [...] You gaze enchanted at the glorious mosaic of the glass as the plangent organ music accompanies your vision [...] Psychologically, there is an emotional stirring, a sense of great themes, a moral focusing, and sometimes a state bordering on trance.

I'm not sure how effective that is as a direct analogy to film - I haven't personally ever been so affected by stained glass windows. But it's still a good point, and touches upon something I think about a lot. When the deep blare of the organ is shaking the ground beneath your feet, sometimes you can't help but feel some kind of awe of the at the power or majesty of it. And what about those congregations that get so caught up in that collective chanting, clapping and swaying, all the while praising God? Another example McGinn offers is of a polytheistic or paganistic tribe beating drums and dancing violently around a fire. In each of these cases, and when watching films, emotions are being stirred by a sensorial experience which the people experiencing it are getting caught up in. McGinn also makes some interesting points about the concept of transformation in both religion and cinema, but I won't go into that here - the main point of interest for me was how we can be susceptible to this kind of manipulation. It's something that might be useful, as a kind of emotional purging or catharsis or feel-good thing; but at the same time, it's something to be wary of too. To put it simply, as McGinn does of the film-viewing experience, it is 'a type of mind fucking.'

Anyway, before I go off on too much of a tangent, I'll end this post by telling you to go and read McGinn's book. It's a good, thorough and concise take on the subject of cinema. Lots of speculating, but it's all interesting.

Labels: dreams, films, i am the ramblemaster, philosophy, rabbit-hole theory, the matrix

# posted by Chris @ 9:32 PM 0 comments

Last month I read Oscar Wilde's The Soul of Man Under Socialism, and mentioned that I'd pick out one or two other interesting points of those that it raises. So here's another:

If a man approaches a work of art with any desire to exercise authority over it and the artist, he approaches it in such a spirit that he cannot receive any artistic impression from it at all. The work of art is to dominate the spectator: the spectator is not to dominate the work of art. The spectator is to be receptive. He is to be the violin on which the master is to play. And the more completely he can suppress his own silly views, his own foolish prejudices, his own absurd ideas of what Art should be or should not be, the more likely he is to understand and appreciate the work of art in question. [...] A temperament capable of receiving, through an imaginative medium, and under imaginative conditions, new and beautiful impressions is the only temperament that can appreciate a work of art.

Wilde's tone here, not surprising given the events of his own life, would seem to demonstrate a fair amount of scorn towards the attitudes of the general public. At a first read it might also come across as almost self-important, as no doubt Wilde viewed himself as one of these artists, with his dismissiveness of the idea of criticism. But Wilde makes a good point. In describing 'silly views' and 'foolish prejudices', he is not necessarily being dismissive of all the opinions a member of the public might have, but is identifying that such prejudices do exist.

This got me thinking about the way in which people do approach art: novels or films or paintings or whatever. To be 'receptive', do we have to accept absolutely anything as 'art'? Wilde never suggests that everything and anything can count as art, although for him it only seems to stop being art if it starts catering towards the wants of the population. Surely there's more to it than that, though. Is a person doing their own thing irrespective of the public, whatever it is, enough to qualify something as 'art'?

Wilde would seem to be referring to preconceptions and prejudices that might affect our appreciation of art that we have before we've even experienced it, which leaves it open whether or not he believes any kind of criticism can be applied to art (beyond for whom, or for what reasons, it was created) after the art has been experienced. He talks a lot about authority and how that has no place in matters relating to art, but what exactly does he mean by 'authority'? Does he mean that nobody can have an authoritative opinion on art, nobody can decide what counts or what doesn't, or just that any attempts to control art are unwanted?

We all approach things with our own ideas of what they should be, what it is that makes it good, and so on. For example, one might look with scorn upon the idea of techno or heavy metal as 'good music' because they define it in orchestral terms. One person might think that a good plot or realistic characters are important in a novel, whereas another might view the richness of the language itself as more important. I have a friend who gets set to rant every time Tolkien is even mentioned because it doesn't fulfill his own criteria of what makes a good story. An example Wilde uses is judging all literature by the standard of Shakespeare. We all appreciate different things. But that doesn't mean that other aspects of something, other qualities, aren't still there as something that can be appreciated by someone else. But what exactly counts as a 'quality'? This seems to depend on whether or not a person views a feature as something to appreciate. Is everything potentially something to appreciate?

Take, for example, a painting of a soup can. Or a steaming pile of shit. You might appreciate the simplicity, or maybe you could appreciate the irony of some kind of visual statement it's trying to make. In and of itself, it'd be hard to find a way to consider a pile of shit a work of art, but with context, maybe it could represent or show something else, and that would be its quality as art, whether everybody appreciates the statement made or not.

The point Wilde seems to be trying to make is that we should allow 'art' in all its forms, not seek to control it, not seek to define it in our own prejudiced terms. According to Wilde, it seems, everything is something to potentially appreciate, and what's where being receptive comes in. We should let art flourish, free from control through prejudices, so that we are enabling ourselves to truly recognise those things in art that ought to be appreciated.

But, of course, you can only appreciate something that's really there to appreciate. There's still some vagueness about what qualifies as something to artistically appreciate. How subjective is 'art' under Wilde's definition? Does objective quality come into it at all? Wilde's definition of what doesn't count as art is still hazy beyond his for-the-self/for-the-public distinction. What else might stop something being 'art'?

We might consider some so-called 'art' to be pretentious. If a supposed work of art is produced just to promote the artist's superficial image, for example, or if all the talk of irony or representation or whatever is really just about shocking the audience or being controversial in order to get a bit of attention, then maybe pretence is all that's there. While it isn't exactly catering to what the public wants, the art is still relying on the reaction of the public, in which case, according to Wilde, it ceases to be art.

So maybe, looking at it like that, Wilde's distinction is all that's needed in art's definition. Rather than including it in any kind of definition, however, maybe this distinction is put better simply in terms of avoiding anything that can affect our receptivity: for as long as we're attending to the public, more likely than not we're also attending to its prejudices and therefore restricting ourselves. Maybe art is mostly undefinable, or at least defining it is very difficult. There's a whole load of possible subjective and objective reasons for why a person might look at or experience a piece of art and find certain appreciable qualities in it. There's no reason why it has to be either-or. Maybe we shouldn't be trying to define it. The point Wilde is driving at with receptivity, and one that perhaps overrides all discussion of objectivity versus subjectivity, is that we need to be able to keep an open mind to truly appreciate anything.

The moment [the spectator] seeks to exercise authority he becomes the avowed enemy of Art and of himself. Art does not mind. It is he who suffers.

Labels: censorship, i am the ramblemaster, morality, oscar wilde, philosophy, shakespeare, tolkien

# posted by Chris @ 6:52 PM 0 comments

Today I had a farewell drink at the West Kirby Ring O' Bells with my philosophy teacher and a few other people from our philosophy classes.

Two years ago, I had to decide which subjects I wanted to take on for my A-Levels. English was a definite (although I foolishly took English Language), French and History were picked because they were strong subjects (at least, they were back then), and that left me with one other.

I already had a very vague interest in philosophy. Two years before that I'd chosen to do a Religious Studies GCSE because the kind of deep questions it discussed seemed interesting, although in reality it was a pretty dull, shallow course that only ever offered politically correct textbook questions. (I seem to have a knack for picking nothingness subjects based on interesting syllabus outlines, but fortunately philosophy proved to be different.) I'd also glanced at a few things on the internet during that summer, and a couple of articles on the school website, and although I didn't really understand them, something in their nature piqued my interest. What clinched it, however, was probably its section in the Sixth Form prospectus, in which it said: 'If you have a sense of the strangeness of life then you may well find Philosophy interesting.'

The course itself, as we've done it, has covered moral philosophy, theory of knowledge (epistemology), political philosophy and the texts of Plato, Aristotle and Nietzsche. By virtue of being based on an exam-orientated syllabus like any other subject, there was only so much we could go into any of the above, but the intellectual engagement needed to review them at all properly (i.e. not just throwing around vague R.S.-type questions) requires you to reshape, reorganise and clarify your thinking. However much my parents might accuse philosophy of being a wishy-washy subject (not that they ever tried to persuade me against it), and however broad the questions might get, philosophy requires a precise, analytical approach if you actually want to get anywhere. It's been enough to slowly take apart my brain and at least partially reassemble it. It's dusted off many of my previous assumptions and preconceptions and revealed them to be confused. Before I did philosophy, concepts like democracy and equality, for example, had been unquestionably good things. Now, I question everything.

And it's affected everything. Everything I read, everything I see, everything I do. I find myself trying to determine meaning in all my activities - if not to find importance, then at least to try and explain why I do these things, why I like the things I like, what exactly it is that I get out of them. Inevitably for me, this has encroached on writing and storytelling: the art, the aesthetics, the simple appeal of being emersed in a story, the deeper meaning of the subject in what it is I'm writing, reading or watching.

In many cases I've found that I'm able to connect and find some apparent coherence in the conscious and sometimes subconscious things I do in a way that I hadn't previously considered. These might themselves later prove to be fallacies. Philosophy throws everything up in the air, and in some things it's left me more confused than ever. But at least I know that I'm confused about it and not living my life under some illusion. I can't claim to be completely free of illusion, or enlightened or the fountain of all knowledge after taking philosophy, but it's still had a massive effect on me. I wouldn't have expected that from a school subject.

But then it's not just a school subject. The school subject of 'Philosophy' was just a small window into that whole swirling everything. And I think the fact that I got so much out of it also has a lot to do with the person who taught me. While I've had some very thorough and efficient teachers who will get me through the exams (which to many might be what matters) and who are not without their knowledge and enthusiasm, Mr B has treated the subject as it should be: a genuine appreciation of the subject matter, at the same time enthusing and thoughtful, not just dictating a stream of knowledge bites. While there's a lot more room for open discussion in Philosophy than there is in more straightforward subjects like English Language or History, Mr B could still have limited himself to the syllabus and given us a much more restricted overview, but in forsaking efficiency for occasional discussions of interest that might not be directly relevant (or, it has to be said, are often not relevant at all), he's made it a worthwhile subject, even if these meanderings are only the accidental result of a very philosophical mind. He's been often brutally honest and talked to us, not down to us. He's been a character. I personally really appreciate that.

So we had a lunchtime drink, all ten or so of us crowded around a small table in the beer garden. I had two pints of Guinness like the man I am. It started raining, Mr B had to get back to that pesky thing they call teaching, and the rest of us went home. Philosophy class is definitely something I'll miss.

Labels: i am the ramblemaster, philosophy

# posted by Chris @ 2:56 PM 0 comments

As part of some extra material I was been emailed by my philosophy teacher for the exam today, I read Oscar Wilde's The Soul of Man Under Socialism. It's full of interesting stuff. I'll probably pick out some other bits some other time, but here's a big fat one to start off with:

...I cannot help saying that a great deal of nonsense is being written and talked nowadays about the dignity of manual labour. There is nothing necessary dignified about manual labour at all, and most of it is absolutely degrading. It is mentally and morally injurious to man to do anything in which he does not find pleasure, and many forms of labour are quite pleasureless activities, and should be regarded as such. To sweep a slushy crossing for eight hours on a day when the east wind is blowing is a disgusting occupation. To sweep it with mental, moral, or physical dignity seems to me to be impossible. To sweep it with joy would be appalling. Man is made for something better than disturbing dirt. All work of that kind should be done by a machine.

And I have no doubt that it will be so. Up to the present, man has been, to a certain extent, the slave of machinery, and there is something tragic in the fact that as soon as man had invented a machine to do his work he began to starve. This, however, is, of course, the result of our property system and our system of competition. One man owns a machine which does the work of five hundred men. Five hundred men are, in consequence, thrown out of employment, and, having no work to do, become hungry and take to thieving. The one man secures the produce of the machine and keeps it, and has five hundred times as much as he should have, and probably, which is of much more importance, a great deal more than he really wants. Were that machine the property of all, every one would benefit by it. It would be an immense advantage to the community. All unintellectual labour, all monotonous, dull labour, all labour that deals with dreadful things, and involves unpleasant conditions, must be done by machinery. Machinery must work for us in coal mines, and do all sanitary services, and be the stoker of steamers, and clean the streets, and run messages on wet days, and do anything that is tedious or distressing. At present machinery competes against man. Under proper conditions machinery will serve man. There is no doubt at all that this is the future of machinery, and just as trees grow while the country gentleman is asleep, so while Humanity will be amusing itself, or enjoying cultivated leisure which, and not labour, is the aim of man - or making beautiful things, or reading beautiful things, or simply contemplating the world with admiration and delight, machinery will be doing all the necessary and unpleasant work. The fact is, that civilisation requires slaves. The Greeks were quite right there. Unless there are slaves to do the ugly, horrible, uninteresting work, culture and contemplation become almost impossible. Human slavery is wrong, insecure, and demoralising. On mechanical slavery, on the slavery of the machine, the future of the world depends. And when scientific men are no longer called upon to go down to a depressing East End and distribute bad cocoa and worse blankets to starving people, they will have delightful leisure in which to devise wonderful and marvellous things for their own joy and the joy of every one else. There will be great storages of force for every city, and for every house if required, and this force man will convert into heat, light, or motion, according to his needs. Is this Utopian? A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth even glancing at, for it leaves out the one country at which Humanity is always landing. And when Humanity lands there, it looks out, and, seeing a better country, sets sail. Progress is the realisation of Utopias.

To start with, I was surprised to read this just because it strikes me as a before-his-time kind of thing. The Victorians had made significant technological progress (at least so far as inventing the machines, even if, as he mentions, there were huge difficulties implementing the things), but this kind of stuff is the stuff of your modern-day science fiction. Presumably, if he's talking about abolishing human labour, he has to be talking about machines at the stage of automatons, because otherwise you'd still need humans to operate them.

What's really interesting, though, is the bit about the necessity of slaves. Somebody's got to do the work, after all. In all the accounts of moral philosophers that I've studied in any detail--namely Plato, Nietzsche and Aristotle--there's been a class of 'slaves'. They don't always mean it in the strict sense of labour; usually they mean it at least in part as those who are 'slaves' to their desires and instincts and who consequently can't live truly fulfilled lives or whatever. But Plato, at least, explicitly assigns them as the labouring class, and while I don't remember any specific mention of labour in the other accounts, I don't think that either Nietzsche nor Aristotle had menial tasks in mind for their nobles. It's something that, for me, has always sat uncomfortably. The idea of machines doing it instead is an interesting one.

Wilde has the romantic sort of notion that the future of the world depends on this mechanical slavery, because then in their 'delightful leisure' the freed humans will be able to excel and create wonderful things. But are we humans really so progressive? Maybe this view is too optimistic, and maybe most people will just eat themselves into grotesque and slovenly states. I don't think you need to go as far as Wilde does, though. You don't need to claim a utopia as the outcome. I think the important thing is that the choice is there and that people aren't condemned to the life of a machine. If you don't trust in the progressiveness of human nature, or want to give people the sense of responsibility or other moral benefits that come from work, then give everyone a good education to set them on the right path and then give them some work that's meaningful; something actually productive. This is, after all, about abolishing the kind of menial work that goes nowhere: not all work. We don't live in the same regimented class system that Wilde did, but the classes definitely haven't gone away, and if there are some in the middle-classes and above able to leisure their lives away, why shouldn't everyone have the same opportunity?

Anyway, these are just a few cogitations, and I don't know the ins and outs of the economy well enough to know the wider economic effects or just how radical a restructuring it would require, but it's an interesting thought. And something that's already happening in many ways. Maybe one day something like it will be possible.

As long as we don't make the machines too human, of course.

Labels: i am the ramblemaster, morality, oscar wilde, philosophy, science

# posted by Chris @ 11:39 PM 0 comments