Very thoughtful and meaningful piece. Or are they pieces? From the part about McLuhan to the maelstrom – great metaphor – to the “Providence of mammon” – another perfect phrase that expresses it all – not to mention the quote from the Tao te Ching (one of many transliterations) – this is one beautiful and valuable, and useful, article. T…
Very thoughtful and meaningful piece. Or are they pieces? From the part about McLuhan to the maelstrom – great metaphor – to the “Providence of mammon” – another perfect phrase that expresses it all – not to mention the quote from the Tao te Ching (one of many transliterations) – this is one beautiful and valuable, and useful, article. Thanks for writing it! One thing about diving into the maelstrom – its rugged individual solution is never as good as what you touched on in the piece that followed, that we do need to form human alliances within that maelstrom to pool our solutions and cooperate a collective out of it. Noah did not ship out alone, and neither should we. But how do people taught it’s every one for himself form alliances? There’s a difference between one small off the coast maelstrom that threatens some lives and a global maelstrom that threatens humanity wholesale.
Good eye. There are indeed two pieces here. My intention was to connect them by a slender thread, and not make explicit what that connection is. Whether I succeeded or not is another question. What that connection is, or could be, is I think the conversation we all need to have, or to deepen. In this could be a different kind of practical focus. That is my hope. I need to learn it at least as much as anybody.
"One thing about diving into the maelstrom – its rugged individual solution is never as good as what you touched on in the piece that followed, that we do need to form human alliances within that maelstrom to pool our solutions and cooperate a collective out of it."
Amen, and well said. The unprecedented global maelstrom will call forth from us a response perhaps just as unprecedented. I fear anything less will be insufficient.
Thanks, Jack, for your thoughtful reply; I really appreciate your eloquence, humility, and clarity. Also, I’ve noticed numerous ppl on the internet are expressing similar ideas but have yet to figure out how to bring that energy together.
Siham- I think we are all caught in a performative contradiction, i.e., we are trying find a way to come together via a medium that intrinsically prevents it. For example, I am in the US and have a beloved friend in England. We can talk via video chat--which I am grateful we can do. But the experience is simultaneously one of being very close...and yet we are still some 5,000 miles distant from each other. It is a form of radical dislocation.
Or more simply: if this can be solved at all it will not be solved on the internet. At some point we need to step outside of it and build something in the real world.
Thank you for your comment and for your kind words. -Jack
Very true. And it’s hard to bring those distance-relations together, although some of them I value greatly and have helped me in practical real-world ways. But there comes a point when the distance is truly a felt thing, the zoom meetings aren’t doing what needs to be done but it’s all we have. It’s a kind of poverty that’s all the worse for being undefinable.
Very thoughtful and meaningful piece. Or are they pieces? From the part about McLuhan to the maelstrom – great metaphor – to the “Providence of mammon” – another perfect phrase that expresses it all – not to mention the quote from the Tao te Ching (one of many transliterations) – this is one beautiful and valuable, and useful, article. Thanks for writing it! One thing about diving into the maelstrom – its rugged individual solution is never as good as what you touched on in the piece that followed, that we do need to form human alliances within that maelstrom to pool our solutions and cooperate a collective out of it. Noah did not ship out alone, and neither should we. But how do people taught it’s every one for himself form alliances? There’s a difference between one small off the coast maelstrom that threatens some lives and a global maelstrom that threatens humanity wholesale.
Siham-
Good eye. There are indeed two pieces here. My intention was to connect them by a slender thread, and not make explicit what that connection is. Whether I succeeded or not is another question. What that connection is, or could be, is I think the conversation we all need to have, or to deepen. In this could be a different kind of practical focus. That is my hope. I need to learn it at least as much as anybody.
"One thing about diving into the maelstrom – its rugged individual solution is never as good as what you touched on in the piece that followed, that we do need to form human alliances within that maelstrom to pool our solutions and cooperate a collective out of it."
Amen, and well said. The unprecedented global maelstrom will call forth from us a response perhaps just as unprecedented. I fear anything less will be insufficient.
Thank you for your comment. -Jack
Thanks, Jack, for your thoughtful reply; I really appreciate your eloquence, humility, and clarity. Also, I’ve noticed numerous ppl on the internet are expressing similar ideas but have yet to figure out how to bring that energy together.
Siham- I think we are all caught in a performative contradiction, i.e., we are trying find a way to come together via a medium that intrinsically prevents it. For example, I am in the US and have a beloved friend in England. We can talk via video chat--which I am grateful we can do. But the experience is simultaneously one of being very close...and yet we are still some 5,000 miles distant from each other. It is a form of radical dislocation.
Or more simply: if this can be solved at all it will not be solved on the internet. At some point we need to step outside of it and build something in the real world.
Thank you for your comment and for your kind words. -Jack
Very true. And it’s hard to bring those distance-relations together, although some of them I value greatly and have helped me in practical real-world ways. But there comes a point when the distance is truly a felt thing, the zoom meetings aren’t doing what needs to be done but it’s all we have. It’s a kind of poverty that’s all the worse for being undefinable.