Comments on: The Revolution Will Be Tweeted http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/ The official blog of the Skeptologists Fri, 12 Mar 2010 18:34:23 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: rubber wrist bands http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-18525 rubber wrist bands Sun, 28 Feb 2010 19:24:29 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-18525 Well, your article is actually the best on this worthy topic. I agree with your conclusions and anxiously await your upcoming updates. Saying thank you will not be sufficient, for the great lucidity in your writing. I will immediately subscribe to your rss feed to stay informed of any updates. Solid work and much success in your business endeavors! Well, your article is actually the best on this worthy topic. I agree with your conclusions and anxiously await your upcoming updates. Saying thank you will not be sufficient, for the great lucidity in your writing. I will immediately subscribe to your rss feed to stay informed of any updates. Solid work and much success in your business endeavors!

]]> By: John Draeger http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13727 John Draeger Thu, 08 Oct 2009 04:32:54 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13727 "In the long run, no dictator...will be able to control...the economy." Is anyone else skeptical of that prediction? What about the free trade of harmful ideas and substances - like intolerant religious beliefs, or illicit drugs? There are problems with Dr. Shermer's utopian global economic model. Humans feel the need to control other humans, and most humans alive today hold mutually exclusive religious beliefs. Free trade does not reduce resource scarcity (a cause of war) because people tend to be greedy, as we've seen recently with the collapse of under-regulated global financial markets. It's as if Shermer has ignored this valuable history lesson. Seems to me that Shermer is emotionally invested in old economic ideas (they are not new, as others have noted). What I got from his book was an attempt to blend evolutionary theory with economics - a non sequitur in my opinion. Due to strong emotional investment in the these libertarian ideals we should continue to expect sales of his economics book to be pushed in future posts. To admit the thesis of the book is erroneous would be a giant horse pill of cognitive dissonance to swallow. "Big gov't is the root of all evil" is the conspiracy theory of most libertarians it seems - if one can even define libertarianism (see Dr. Massimo Pigliucci's blog, Rationally Speaking, for an essay on that). And regulations are evil too. If you go back and read Shermer's posts from a few months ago, that was the free trade/markets he himself defined. Well, both socialism and capitalism have failed when tried alone. What most developed countries are doing is employing some combination of both. “In the long run, no dictator…will be able to control…the economy.”

Is anyone else skeptical of that prediction?

What about the free trade of harmful ideas and substances – like intolerant religious beliefs, or illicit drugs? There are problems with Dr. Shermer’s utopian global economic model. Humans feel the need to control other humans, and most humans alive today hold mutually exclusive religious beliefs. Free trade does not reduce resource scarcity (a cause of war) because people tend to be greedy, as we’ve seen recently with the collapse of under-regulated global financial markets. It’s as if Shermer has ignored this valuable history lesson. Seems to me that Shermer is emotionally invested in old economic ideas (they are not new, as others have noted). What I got from his book was an attempt to blend evolutionary theory with economics – a non sequitur in my opinion. Due to strong emotional investment in the these libertarian ideals we should continue to expect sales of his economics book to be pushed in future posts. To admit the thesis of the book is erroneous would be a giant horse pill of cognitive dissonance to swallow.

“Big gov’t is the root of all evil” is the conspiracy theory of most libertarians it seems – if one can even define libertarianism (see Dr. Massimo Pigliucci’s blog, Rationally Speaking, for an essay on that). And regulations are evil too. If you go back and read Shermer’s posts from a few months ago, that was the free trade/markets he himself defined. Well, both socialism and capitalism have failed when tried alone. What most developed countries are doing is employing some combination of both.

]]> By: Gary Sloan http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13716 Gary Sloan Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:40:35 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13716 A retired English professor, I sometimes find myself more attentive to the style of what I read than to the content. Shamefully, what I will probably remember best about "The Revolution Will Be Tweeted" is the delightful parade of words with the suffix "ification"--e.g., "eBayification," "MySpaceification," "YouTubeification." (I am still mulling why "Tweeterfication" lacks the initial "i" of the suffix. Facebook fans may lament the absence of "Facebookification" and Yahoo patrons "Yahooification.") I pondered the use of "obsoletes" as a verb in "obsoletes the necessity." Though I don't recall having previously seen "obsoletes" employed as a verb, such usage creates a handy neologism. The standard verb form of "obsolete" is "obsolesce," but it is traditionally intransitive. That is, doesn't take a direct object: "The machines will eventually obsolesce," but not "Time obsolesces all machines." Actually, I prefer "obsolesces the machines" to "oboletes the machines. Don't ask me why. Non gustibus disputandum. There's no disputing taste. The phrase "principle steps" (as opposed to "principal steps") is, I assume, an instance of Homer (or Michael) nodding--unless an exceedingly subtle pun is afoot. "Whoe'er thinks a faultless piece to see / Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor e'er shall be" (Alexander Pope, "Essay on Criticism"). I, myself, long ago abandoned all hope of writing a faultless piece. Michael, I concur with your thesis. A similar point about trade vis-a-vis war was made by Thomas Paine in the run-up to the American Revolution in his influential pamphlet "Common Sense." In my estimation, Michael, you are one of the most engaging, intelligent, and, yes, stylistically savvy writers in the contemporary freethought camp. A retired English professor, I sometimes find myself more attentive to the style of what I read than to the content. Shamefully, what I will probably remember best about “The Revolution Will Be Tweeted” is the delightful parade of words with the suffix “ification”–e.g., “eBayification,” “MySpaceification,” “YouTubeification.” (I am still mulling why “Tweeterfication” lacks the initial “i” of the suffix. Facebook fans may lament the absence of “Facebookification” and Yahoo patrons “Yahooification.”)
I pondered the use of “obsoletes” as a verb in “obsoletes the necessity.” Though I don’t recall having previously seen “obsoletes” employed as a verb, such usage creates a handy neologism. The standard verb form of “obsolete” is “obsolesce,” but it is traditionally intransitive. That is, doesn’t take a direct object: “The machines will eventually obsolesce,” but not “Time obsolesces all machines.” Actually, I prefer “obsolesces the machines” to “oboletes the machines. Don’t ask me why. Non gustibus disputandum. There’s no disputing taste.
The phrase “principle steps” (as opposed to “principal steps”) is, I assume, an instance of Homer (or Michael) nodding–unless an exceedingly subtle pun is afoot.
“Whoe’er thinks a faultless piece to see / Thinks what ne’er was, nor is, nor e’er shall be” (Alexander Pope, “Essay on Criticism”). I, myself, long ago abandoned all hope of writing a faultless piece.
Michael, I concur with your thesis. A similar point about trade vis-a-vis war was made by Thomas Paine in the run-up to the American Revolution in his influential pamphlet “Common Sense.”
In my estimation, Michael, you are one of the most engaging, intelligent, and, yes, stylistically savvy writers in the contemporary freethought camp.

]]> By: Vie http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13704 Vie Wed, 07 Oct 2009 15:00:47 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13704 That's an excellent point. Wars are seldom predicated on a careful analysis of "mutual benefits", as O'Neal put it. Wars are costly, both in economic terms and human lives. Yet they happen anyways. How many genuinely, truly productive wars can you name? For every war that results in an undisputed victory where some concrete and significant goal is achieved, there is a hundred wars where nothing is achieved except a death toll and a new collection of rubble. Wars don't always occur over resources- there are ideological skirmishes, religious jyhads, and nationalistic campaigns. Is it being implied that these types of wars happen just because party A couldn't exchange ideas with party B? Of course that isn't why! In most cases, all parties in a conflict are well aware of what the other parties think and believe. "Free trade" of ideas has already occurred. What you're really proposing is some magical metamorphosis that will somehow disable the capacity of one human group to disagree with another, to murderous ends. That won't happen. It's a fantasy. Freely exchanging ideas will not necessarily make any group more tolerant of those ideas. It won't necessarily make people rational or peaceful. The Taliban used the internet to circulate their ideas. White Supremacist groups have websites. There are anti-gay blog rings. Technology is not a solution to the ugliness in human nature, maybe because there simply isn't one. Since the internet, the best vehicle for "free trade" as Shermer describes it, has been around people have not become more enlightened. They've just watched Midget Mud Wrestling and grainy porn. Let's not forget the Fat Jedi or "the Count Censored" on YouTube. Just because an individuals may have the capacity and the opportunity to better themselves doesn't mean they will. Nature seeks to conserve energy and effort. An organism will generally not do more than what is necessary to perpetuate itself. In other words, most people will do the thing that requires the least effort for the most gain. Reality has proven this rule. The new crop of kids are generally simpletons, not Einsteins. Why? Because there is no real imperative to be anything else. As far as the Yanomamo... If you thoroughly familiarize yourself with Chagnon's work, you'll quickly discover that alliances among the tribes are notoriously fickle and that the tribes are in a near-constant state of war. In fact, Chagnon characterizes the people as chronically aggressive. He states "The Yanomamo are still conducting intervillage warfare, a phenomenon that affects all aspects of their social organization, settlement pattern, and daily routines. It is not simply 'ritualistic' war: at least one-forth of all adult males die violently." In fact, Yanomamo society is structured to facilitate war, not peace. Wife beatings and solving disputes with clubs duels (resulting in broken bones, scars, and occasional death) are also Yanomamo traditions. Shermer, are you really suggesting we use Yanomamo tactics to improve our society? A human cannot overcome the condition of being human. There is no philosophy, religion, book, science, technology, political party, or economic system that can fix the human tendency to manipulate those things for perverse reasons. As humans we will always be vulnerable to our weaknesses: greed, selfishness, intolerance, irrationality, cruelty, deceitfulness, just to name a few. Shermer, I think you need to let go of the very 60's idea that some Age of Aquarius will dawn and make us a new, better species. It's as silly as the beliefs you try to debunk. Oh... one more human vice... imprudent obstinacy. That’s an excellent point. Wars are seldom predicated on a careful analysis of “mutual benefits”, as O’Neal put it. Wars are costly, both in economic terms and human lives. Yet they happen anyways. How many genuinely, truly productive wars can you name? For every war that results in an undisputed victory where some concrete and significant goal is achieved, there is a hundred wars where nothing is achieved except a death toll and a new collection of rubble. Wars don’t always occur over resources- there are ideological skirmishes, religious jyhads, and nationalistic campaigns.
Is it being implied that these types of wars happen just because party A couldn’t exchange ideas with party B?
Of course that isn’t why! In most cases, all parties in a conflict are well aware of what the other parties think and believe. “Free trade” of ideas has already occurred.
What you’re really proposing is some magical metamorphosis that will somehow disable the capacity of one human group to disagree with another, to murderous ends.
That won’t happen. It’s a fantasy. Freely exchanging ideas will not necessarily make any group more tolerant of those ideas. It won’t necessarily make people rational or peaceful. The Taliban used the internet to circulate their ideas. White Supremacist groups have websites. There are anti-gay blog rings.
Technology is not a solution to the ugliness in human nature, maybe because there simply isn’t one.
Since the internet, the best vehicle for “free trade” as Shermer describes it, has been around people have not become more enlightened. They’ve just watched Midget Mud Wrestling and grainy porn. Let’s not forget the Fat Jedi or “the Count Censored” on YouTube.
Just because an individuals may have the capacity and the opportunity to better themselves doesn’t mean they will. Nature seeks to conserve energy and effort. An organism will generally not do more than what is necessary to perpetuate itself. In other words, most people will do the thing that requires the least effort for the most gain.
Reality has proven this rule. The new crop of kids are generally simpletons, not Einsteins. Why? Because there is no real imperative to be anything else.
As far as the Yanomamo… If you thoroughly familiarize yourself with Chagnon’s work, you’ll quickly discover that alliances among the tribes are notoriously fickle and that the tribes are in a near-constant state of war. In fact, Chagnon characterizes the people as chronically aggressive. He states “The Yanomamo are still conducting intervillage warfare, a phenomenon that affects all aspects of their social organization, settlement pattern, and daily routines. It is not simply ‘ritualistic’ war: at least one-forth of all adult males die violently.” In fact, Yanomamo society is structured to facilitate war, not peace. Wife beatings and solving disputes with clubs duels (resulting in broken bones, scars, and occasional death) are also Yanomamo traditions. Shermer, are you really suggesting we use Yanomamo tactics to improve our society?
A human cannot overcome the condition of being human. There is no philosophy, religion, book, science, technology, political party, or economic system that can fix the human tendency to manipulate those things for perverse reasons. As humans we will always be vulnerable to our weaknesses: greed, selfishness, intolerance, irrationality, cruelty, deceitfulness, just to name a few.
Shermer, I think you need to let go of the very 60’s idea that some Age of Aquarius will dawn and make us a new, better species. It’s as silly as the beliefs you try to debunk. Oh… one more human vice… imprudent obstinacy.

]]> By: kenn pappas http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13703 kenn pappas Wed, 07 Oct 2009 14:47:32 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13703 There are times when I have believed Michael Shermer carries logic and scientific critical thinking into the wrong areas in politics and religion. This is not one of those times. This essay is brilliant and thought provoking, perhaps the best short essay I've ever read from him. There are times when I have believed Michael Shermer carries logic and scientific critical thinking into the wrong areas in politics and religion. This is not one of those times. This essay is brilliant and thought provoking, perhaps the best short essay I’ve ever read from him.

]]> By: Anthony O'Neal http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13698 Anthony O'Neal Wed, 07 Oct 2009 05:23:17 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13698 In WWI all of the actors had far, far more to lose by going to war than they had to gain... and they did it anyway. Mutual benefit will never overcome the virus of nationalism. I think that's probably the main reason WWIII is impossible in Europe today. Not because of free trade. Britain had completely free trade with any nation before WWI. But WWII completely and totally destroyed German nationalism. In WWI all of the actors had far, far more to lose by going to war than they had to gain… and they did it anyway. Mutual benefit will never overcome the virus of nationalism.

I think that’s probably the main reason WWIII is impossible in Europe today. Not because of free trade. Britain had completely free trade with any nation before WWI. But WWII completely and totally destroyed German nationalism.

]]> By: JPCaetano http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13697 JPCaetano Wed, 07 Oct 2009 05:19:37 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13697 Even before reading Shermer's post I was reminded, by the bumper sticker, of the title of one of Joe Trippi's books: "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: Democracy, the Internet, and the Overthrow of Everything". I haven't read it but I know it focuses on how the internet has affected politics. Also, when I read the bumper sticker my mind saw Twitter as a symbol for the internet. The Iranian incident is really just the tip of the iceberg. For the first time I actually connected with the people from that part of the world. Simply by what I was seeing and how similar they were to me. And the Twitter part of it, it was like seeing people reaching out from behind iron bars. I know subjects can be a lot more complicated than what Shermer makes them seem, and that some people might disagree, but still, the things he says, and many other factors pointed out by others like Jimmy Wales and Chris Anderson, they at least give me, my generation, a little bit of hope, even if on the naive side and even if just for a moment, that things can be better, that the pieces are there, people just have to realise they're playing a different game. Old routines are being shed. And the ones who get it the most are the young people. If I died tomorrow and survived that, to reminisce and think about my life on earth, I would think "What a pleasure it was, to have glimpsed humanity at that moment, bursting at the seams with potential and freshness". Even before reading Shermer’s post I was reminded, by the bumper sticker, of the title of one of Joe Trippi’s books: “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: Democracy, the Internet, and the Overthrow of Everything”.
I haven’t read it but I know it focuses on how the internet has affected politics.

Also, when I read the bumper sticker my mind saw Twitter as a symbol for the internet.
The Iranian incident is really just the tip of the iceberg. For the first time I actually connected with the people from that part of the world. Simply by what I was seeing and how similar they were to me. And the Twitter part of it, it was like seeing people reaching out from behind iron bars.
I know subjects can be a lot more complicated than what Shermer makes them seem, and that some people might disagree, but still, the things he says, and many other factors pointed out by others like Jimmy Wales and Chris Anderson, they at least give me, my generation, a little bit of hope, even if on the naive side and even if just for a moment, that things can be better, that the pieces are there, people just have to realise they’re playing a different game. Old routines are being shed. And the ones who get it the most are the young people.

If I died tomorrow and survived that, to reminisce and think about my life on earth, I would think “What a pleasure it was, to have glimpsed humanity at that moment, bursting at the seams with potential and freshness”.

]]> By: Beelzebud http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13696 Beelzebud Wed, 07 Oct 2009 04:10:41 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13696 And how did that Twitter revolution work out for Iran? Once again, nothing but free-market/libertarian evangelism dressed up as scientific skepticism. And how did that Twitter revolution work out for Iran?

Once again, nothing but free-market/libertarian evangelism dressed up as scientific skepticism.

]]> By: Max http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13695 Max Wed, 07 Oct 2009 03:27:29 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13695 Iran could take down Twitter by holding their next election via Twitter, a la the Skeptoid Twitter survey clusterfuck. http://skepticblog.org/2009/09/17/the-semi-great-twitter-experiment/ Iran could take down Twitter by holding their next election via Twitter, a la the Skeptoid Twitter survey clusterfuck.
http://skepticblog.org/2009/09/17/the-semi-great-twitter-experiment/

]]> By: Tuffgong http://skepticblog.org/2009/10/06/the-revolution-will-be-tweeted/#comment-13694 Tuffgong Wed, 07 Oct 2009 01:33:42 +0000 http://skepticblog.org/?p=4668#comment-13694 What really makes me admire Shermer here is the level of dedication he has in responding to commenters on a blog. He doesn't have to do any of this, he can just go on his business. Instead he repeatedly posts, replies, argues, counter-argues because proper intellectual and skeptical discourse is important to the man. Not bad at all. The biggest shame surrounding Shermer's posts are that they are naturally devoid (being in blog format) of the context that will more times than not shut up a lot of unreasonable outcry against his posts. Over time it is slowly supplied but it is very much seen in other places. It's like Carl Sagan posting and responding to commenters on a blog, it's amazing (and I'm not saying Sagan = Shermer). How awesome is that! Like I've been saying, agree or not, Shermer and all the Skeptologists deserve some credit in that way. What really makes me admire Shermer here is the level of dedication he has in responding to commenters on a blog. He doesn’t have to do any of this, he can just go on his business. Instead he repeatedly posts, replies, argues, counter-argues because proper intellectual and skeptical discourse is important to the man. Not bad at all.

The biggest shame surrounding Shermer’s posts are that they are naturally devoid (being in blog format) of the context that will more times than not shut up a lot of unreasonable outcry against his posts. Over time it is slowly supplied but it is very much seen in other places.

It’s like Carl Sagan posting and responding to commenters on a blog, it’s amazing (and I’m not saying Sagan = Shermer). How awesome is that! Like I’ve been saying, agree or not, Shermer and all the Skeptologists deserve some credit in that way.

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