[p2p-research] Was Re: P2P Medicine -- Making Your Smart Phone / Now P2P and Futurism

[Ryan Lanham]

Hi Michel, Marc,

I'd see visioning as teleological.  Engineering requires
visioning...visioning is teleological.  At some juncture what we implement
is what we imagine as feasible and good--a purpose.  Yes, accidents and
black swans are major factors, but you've got to plan for some end---and
having a vision is necessarily ideological.

But planning isn't done well by spontaneous organizations...they react.  P2P
either is a worldview, or it is a description of certain social phenomena.
If it is a description, it is planning neutral.  If it is a worldview, its
vision is to reach normative states of high trust and sharing.  It doesn't
try to reach some defined end.

So, isn't p2p divergent from a planning culture?  Isn't it inconsistent with
progressive theories?  It might be a mode of interacting, but not a
philosophy that reaches for a purpose other than ideas surrounding its mode
of interaction.

Maybe you have to combine pragmatism with p2p, or some utopian model--like a
mutualist or socialist utopian model.  Does p2p stand by itself as a
worldview, or does it complement existing worldviews?

(All above is at least half-baked...maybe wholly so.)

Ryan Lanham


On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 8:49 PM, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>wrote:

> Hi Marc, Ryan,
>
> beautifully said Marc,
>
> of course, vision, and thinking about the future, even utopia, are all
> legitimate
>
> my problem with superlative transhumanism is its lack of any social
> awareness, its technological determinism, and scientific reductionism
>
> of course, today, most h+ is no longer right-libertarian, but as the WTA
> is, rather social-democratic in approach, so by all means, I'm in favour of
> dialogue around areas of common concern
>
> but the relentless imagining that what we wish for is already there, or
> just around the corner, I find cumbersome; as is the focus on technological
> promise above everything else
>
> what I try to do, perhaps imperfectly is to distinguish clearly between
> facts (they must  be correct, not imagined), moral interpretation (what
> aspect do we like in these facts) and a praxis (how can we strengthen what
> we like). To the degree that futurism and visioning inspires such action,
> and does not distort the facts, I see no problem at all.
>
> Michel
>
>
> On Fri, Apr 24, 2009 at 8:37 AM, marc fawzi <marc.fawzi at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I think Michel is referring to the ideology in a vacuum, i.e. in the
>> absence of anything real.
>>
>> You can have a vision in the absence of something real to substantiate it
>> and that is called futuring or visioning and it's part of human nature.
>>
>> But you cannot have an ideology in the absence of something real to
>> substantiate it.
>>
>> So the issue, IMO, is vision vs ideology.
>>
>> Ideology that is there before there is any supporting reality is delusion.
>>
>>
>> Vision is different, as it foreshadows what is to come and does not
>> pretend that it is already here.
>>
>> Marc
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 12:09 PM, Ryan Lanham <rlanham1963 at gmail.com>wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Michel Bauwens <
>>> michelsub2004 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Sam,
>>>>
>>>> as you perhaps know, I studied for a number of years the implications of
>>>> the  transhuman promises, when making TechnoCalyps,
>>>>
>>>> my problems are:
>>>>
>>>> 1) people like kurzweil and other superlatives go seemlessly, and
>>>> unwarrantedly, from actual research, to the promise of the research, to
>>>> imagining that everything is done already
>>>>
>>>> I wonder if the follow-on from your position, Michel, is that evangelism
>>> and futurism are inconsistent with P2P systems, which are more focused on
>>> deployment and solutions?
>>>
>>> I find the distinction of p2p to be its moral tones.  Its pervasive
>>> political economic view is trust and responsibility--much more than any
>>> brand of socialism or libertarianism, for example, I am aware of.
>>>
>>> It may be those ethical traits which remove it from evangelism and,
>>> especially, futurism.  Futurism must be speculative, rhetorical and
>>> visioning.  Perhaps the risks associated with those veins makes futurism
>>> inconsistent with p2p's moral/ethical tone.
>>>
>>> Ryan
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> p2presearch at listcultures.org
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>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>> Marc Fawzi
>> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/people/Marc-Fawzi/605919256
>> LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/marcfawzi
>>
>
>
>
> --
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>
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