September 21, 2023, 7:28
"There is no ideal society, because there are no ideal men or ideal women to make it. If a woman believes she finds the ideal man in a man, we can say that she lacks both experience and imagination, the latter depending on the former. For a woman, the ideal man, for a man, the ideal woman, can only be, by definition, an imaginary construction, limited to their knowledge, locked in their "culture" (Henri Laborit, Éloge de la fuite)
Locked in their "culture"...
Today is September 21, 2023, 7:28 a.m. The sun rises on the East...
Nothing better evokes the immediacy of experience to be lived than this idea of leaving before dawn, looking for the best point of view, and waiting for IT... Nothing counts then but this present moment!.. . And yet, even if we, humans, were to disappear, even if there were no longer anyone to bear witness to it... The statement "The Sun rises in the East" would remain true every morning, at every point (almost, we agree) of this planet, as long as it revolves around its Star.
"The Sun rises in the East", pure present instant, and moment of timeless truth...
Locked in their "culture"...
Last Friday, August 25, the European Regulation on Digital Services, or Digital Services Act (DSA) came into force... Nothing to "make a cheese out of it" (as we say in French), you might say. As things currently stand, this regulation only concerns platforms and search engines with more than 45 million monthly active users in the European Union... And it is only about providing better protection of European Internet users against illegal, dangerous and harmful content...
Certainly... As a major national media outlet said, we must accept the fact that it is sometimes necessary to limit our freedoms, to prevent us from misusing them (sic). The world is unfortunately filled with so many dangerous people... We must be reasonable (which seems to be the case for the majority of our fellow citizens, and for all of our media)!... I must have the mind really gone wrong so that this sentence "it's for your security" makes me irresistibly come close to the Godwin point... And why this concept of "illicit content" (without precise definition) and the assertion that (among other things) the platforms must give priority to reports from organizations recognized for their competence and expertise, called "trusted reporters"... makes me think much more of (so-called) "independent fact-checking media" than of "alert launchers", to which our states still refuse any legal protection...
Locked in their "culture"...
September 1st was "Knowledge Day" in Russia, which enthusiastically celebrates the start of the school year. Here, one of the subjects whose echoes passed from teachers' rooms to social networks was this year the curiously named ChatGPT, wrongly described as AI, when at most it is an SA (Sophisticated Algorithm), no intelligence there... What seems to worry a lot of teachers, from what I have heard, is the possibility of "cheating" for students who could use this tool (moral argument, this should attract attention ). I suspect that what upsets them most is the fact that they worry about the risk of finding themselves unable to recognize and distinguish the work of the machine from that of the student who hands it to them. Injury to self-esteem in fact, coupled with the fear of loss of authority that would ensue... Panic at finding yourself ridiculed in this way!...
It's human, obviously, but is it really rational? Since our ancestors stood up to free their hands, we have never stopped improving our tools and inventing new ones, to simplify the tasks of all kinds that fall to us. Why would it be different in this case? In all areas of production, inventing and using a more efficient tool is appreciated as added value. Why would it be any different in the case of "intellectual" production? Because it's a private preserve, perhaps? Last refuge of a cultural aristocracy which suddenly feels dispossessed? Dispossessed of what? Of his power, of course! That the artisan is dispossessed of his work by the industrialist who condemns him to disappear, it is "a little bit unfortunate" one will say. Well, it's life. If he was really that good at what he did, somehow, he would be irreplaceable, right? Recognized as a Master, a "Living Treasure"!
The object produced is judged according to its own qualities. Not depending on the tool used to make it. This seems reasonnable to me. Imagine that your students use this famous ChatGPT to write the work that you ask of them... Or, after examining the manufactured object, you discover all kinds of defects that you sanction, fairly, and it will be a great learning for the student, who next time will be more attentive and critical towards what the machine offers them. Either you find nothing wrong with what is presented to you. Attributing sole merit to the machine seems naive to me, and we can reasonably assume that this means that the SA in question was used... with intelligence... Knowing how to use the tools available intelligently is also what we expect of a student, right? Where is the problem ? Don't worry unnecessarily. Take the opportunity to tackle more complex and interesting questions... The real dangers that this technology poses to humanity, for example...
September 1st was "Knowledge Day" in Russia, which enthusiastically celebrates the start of the school year. For us, one of the subjects that hit social networks this year was EVRAS! The clash!... Between parents concerned about the happiness of their children, worried about the idea of the depravity into which our schools were going to lead their offspring, not hesitating to demonize national education and its minister responsible for the turpitudes of the wef ... And parents concerned about the happiness of their children, worried about the idea that their offspring will not be adequately prepared for the new techno-socio-cultural realities, not hesitating to insult the former : psychorigid religious extremists, reactionaries of extreme right, conspiracy theorists (probably anti-vax and Putinists too... Besides!)
In this matter as in many others (I am thinking for example of the recent comeback of climate skepticism, renamed climatorealism, among others...), the scenario that is playing out is a clash of narratives which has the main effect to ensure the absence of debate of ideas, and the tranquility of "business as usual"...
No, they are not going to teach your children to masturbate in primary school... No, the minister, even if she is contaminated by the neoliberal virus which pushes her to believe that her role is to impose the recommendations of "specialists" (I will return in a future post to the role of these) to the people who do not have, according to the doxa, neither the means nor the information to know what is good for them, is not "Satanist". She, like you and me, does what she thinks is best for our children. On the other hand, yes, there is a serious and worrying ideological problem in certain documents coming (for example) from the WHO... But it seems there is no question of talking about that, simply between human beings gifted with reason. Having a real debate, argued and constructed in an epistemologically valid way, is no longer fashionable...
Which brings us back to teaching.
September 1st was "Knowledge Day" in Russia, which enthusiastically celebrates the start of the school year. For us, the common point between the two aforementioned events is, it seems to me, a crisis of confidence.
These words from Hannah Arendt come to mind: "When everyone lies to you constantly, the result is not that you believe these lies but that no one believes in anything anymore. A people who can no longer believe anything can't form an opinion. He is deprived not only of his capacity to act but also of his capacity to think and judge. And with such a people you can do whatever you want." Note that independently of the notion of "lying", which assumes intentionality, the simple permanent and simultaneous dissemination of indiscriminate and contradictory information produces the same effect.
September 1st was "Knowledge Day" in Russia, which enthusiastically celebrates the start of the school year. And I hear so many people who yearn, with a certain nostalgia, for those good old days when we too could celebrate knowledge, and when society and schools were bearers of true values and respect... These same people who criticize "the Russians" for not revolting to overthrow an order which, seen from (and through), our medias, seems to us to be oppression... A very human paradox.
I am of course not exempt of paradox. I who, as a good anarchist, remain convinced of the relevance of Ivan Illich's implacable observation:
"What do we learn at school? We learn that the more hours we spend there, the more expensive we are on the market. We learn to value the staggered consumption of programs. We learn that everything produced by a dominant institution is worth and costs a lot, even what is not visible, such as education or health. We learn to value hierarchical advancement, submission and passivity, and even standard deviance that the teacher will interpret as a symptom of creativity. We learn to seek without indiscipline the favors of the bureaucrat who presides over daily sessions, at school the teacher, at the factory the boss. We learn to define ourselves as the holder of a stock of knowledge in the specialty in which the we have invested our time. We learn, finally, to accept without flinching "one's place" in society, namely the precise class and career which correspond respectively to the level and field of educational specialization."
And I, however, know only too well that it is precisely by spending more time there than the average that I acquired my ability to do quite the opposite...
This is a paradoxe ? Of course!... So we're touching on something interesting... "Then, what do we do?" As Albert Doutreloux, my dear anthropology professor, said almost systematically at the end of each lesson, with a mischievous smile in his eyes... "Well, just humanly try to find a way..."
As Erwan Castel recalled in one of his excellent chronicles "When the young Gilead in the German version of the Arthurian cycle ("Parzifal" by Wolfram von Eshenbach), frightened by the failures of his seasoned elders, asks the wise Merlin what are the qualities allowing one to reach the Grail, the latter answers: only one, the sense of measure!
* * *
Otherwise... There is an International Day that absolutely no one has talked about... (But why doesn't that even surprise me?...) Last September 21 was International Peace Day! In the West, we prefer to think about something else, apparently...