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Tag: psychology

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    Trapped into being hysterical or bureaucratic

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    1–2 minutes

    To stage the need for pathology is to be hysteric.

    The hysteric realizes the necessity for a manic release of the self: an energetic caring arriving as an amped self. This energetic, spastic hyper-concern actively deconstructs the normalized self and traditions, revealing an alternate self and new lines of flight.

    The premise is that spastic hysteria is pathology.

    Yet, the bureaucratic management that surrounds us stages (and maintains) a state of paranoia necessary for control. In this bureaucratic state of paranoic control, forcing normalization, inclrasingly any deviance is labeled pathological.

    Both of these modes extend themselves simultaneously creating a schizophrenic world: the less we can be controlled the more pathological we appear, and yet to be completely controlled is to repress the self unto death.

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    behavioral futures markets

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    1–2 minutes

    A product is an object or service, a one-time purchase, but a device is never complete and always engaged, reporting and tuning.

    We have moved from products to devices, which capture behavioral surplus, exhaust data, and enhance predictive models. These algorithmic extractions forecast futures but beyond anticipating, they actively manifest their predictions.
    All of this is traded in a new marketplace.

    Wealth is in the future, not so much predicted as shaped. This reduces risk: programmatic behavior does not anticipate what will come to pass, it assures it.

    ~ via Shoshana Zuboff

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    The reverse uncanny Valley

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    1–2 minutes

    Benjamin Bratton speaks of the reversal of the “uncanny valley.”

    The uncanny valley is when an artificial construct gets very close to looking or behaving as human; its proximity to the real thing is precisely why it becomes more disturbing, even evoking horror or disgust.

    As technology gets better and creates informational duplicates of us (digital persona) we now become disturbed when we see ourselves through the eyes of technology.

    Our digital double, the data construct, is perhaps too accurate to stomach; not a replicant of a human, but data’s exact portrayal stripped of our context and self-deception.

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    Remote Work: Deleting the third Place

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    1–2 minutes

    The problem with remote work is that it gives us what we want but fails to give us what we need.

    Most people understandably say they want to be away from pestering oversight and politics, be more productive with less hassle, and be allowed some personal indulgences.

    Yet, in collapsing the workplace into the home, we tend to delete the excuse for the “third place,” that social space of regularity between work and home. This additional location provided a social camaraderie without necessity or responsibility. It offered the comfort and novelty missing from work and home, which we didn’t know we needed.

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    Retroactive Insight to Real-Time Self-Construction

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    1–2 minutes

    Once, things could only be figured out after they occur: retroactively.

    This means the traumatic kernel that influences the behavior that creates the event is latent, and can only be witnessed (and examined) after the action.

    However, pattern prediction can map likely outcomes, foreseeing consequences. In therapy one may imagine a future based on current behavior, not like the result, and change to align with a preferred outcome.

    Yet, we once created the self both by practicing in private moments and performing socially. Today, technology (an external mediator) tells us who we are in a tightened feedback loop as we self-report to aid algorithms in shaping us. We no longer look to the traumatic kernel, we no longer must unearth the hysterical event that created our unique reactions; we are maintained in an ever-becoming state with little need to look back.

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    Society: solving Repression leads to Depression

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    1–2 minutes

    Freud would say our problem is repression. Byung-Chul Han says our problem is depression.

    Over 150 years ago, people knew who they were in society: a body with a job.
    Most of our work was labor, from which the body might suffer but could recover with a short break. Our stratified placement limited the mind, so ambition and possibility were limited, implying reduced cognitive anxiety and strain.

    People were likely to repress ‘delusions and abnormal behaviors’ under authoritarian control. Still, they were not responsible for self-optimization, perpetual fear of not meeting your potential, or the imperative to fulfill and achieve impossible dreams.

    Now that we are free of repression, we have burnout and depression.

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    the urge to restore

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    1–2 minutes

    Recognize the overwhelming compulsion to get back to the way things were.

    This is not only “loss aversion” in a behavioral economic sense but a desire for orderliness: as a vase shatters, we are already cleaning it up.

    We not only restore order but brush the sin away from sight.

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    Constructive / Destructive Paradox

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    1–2 minutes

    For all of our cleverness and rationality, our ability to build tools, create marvels, and harness the energy of Atoms, we also fall prey to cults and wish death upon ourselves to serve in-group demands.

    Despite all of our capabilities and rationality, we can be convinced to suicide ourselves.

    Our creative, constructive aspect is more than equaled by our delusional, destructive self. This begs the corollary question of these traits: are they inherently interdependent?

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    Replacing Lost Things

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    1–2 minutes

    Humans have loss aversion, where instead of considering wins and losses as equivalent, a loss feels more devastating than a corresponding gain.
    It is not strictly rational. However, if you extend your body to apply to your psychology, losing a limb can be the end of you, while not getting an extra meal (gain) will merely be a little bit painful.

    Daniel Kahneman has pointed this out: typically, our mammalian survival behaviors underlie our materialism and economic decisions.

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  • Theme:

    Egalitarian leveling

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    1–2 minutes

    The central tenant of egalitarianism is leveling. Specific traits are compensated for, artificially creating a more flattened state, whether positive, negative, or unique. In the process of creating egalitarian equality, naturally occurring differences are neutralized or homogenized.

    The neurotic soul, the mad genius, is normalized (neutered): the excessive traits that torment and produce are considered abnormal and must be subject to enhanced conformity.

    However, there is a more philosophical consideration that extreme difference produces equality without forced normalization: if each component/individual is utterly unique, there can be no hierarchy because there is no means for comparison. Ultimate difference produces ultimate equality, with no extraneous pressure needed for artificial leveling.

    However, the underlying problem is that leveling can only happen according to specific standards (an optimal goal), ensuring unfairness in attempting ultimate fairness.