[Hereford Eye]

It's odd to find myself agreeing with Katherine the Great. Well, not that odd, I suppose. But, it's almost as if she has been using language to brainwash me.

It is a tactic we have all of human history to examine for ways and means and relative effectiveness. Control the information flow and you control the behavior. Is there anyone out there upset that the ACLU, motivated by undisputed mis-management and gross outrages perpetrated in the asylums, managed to get all those patients released? Most of them are now living under bridges, in alleys, and in absolute terror of the world around them. But, they are free. We only have to worry about them when they do something anti-social that affects us personally. That's a whole lot better than never having to worry about them at all.

[KatG]

Hey, we agree on lots of things! But mental patients clogging up prisons at the rate of 1 in six, being put in solitary where they grow more psychotic and then getting paroled, does concern me. Also the ability to do more and more genetic design to babies, allowing people to try and reduce or eliminate homosexuality or various races, and cellular research where they are altering us at molecular level. Of course, the latter two also hold hope for birth defects, genetic and other diseases. Brain imaging, medically, is a good thing. But in uncaring hands, often government hands, the old sf chestnuts of super soldiers and genetic caste systems seem to be on the near horizon of possibility.

And those things worry me more than attempts to read brain scans and use them in ways to influence my tricky subconscious into buying something or liking a candidate. Not that I like that's what they're trying to do with brain scans, but the attempt is not unusual and its effectiveness is rather in doubt.

[Scott Bakker]

Somehow I missed all these replies. I thought this thread had petered out.

Every new discovery is incredibly dangerous and incredibly useful, and usually some of the people who can control the new discovery are very frightening. I'm just not sure that this particular development, out of all the other developments, is the one to be most scared about. There are other unconsious attempts and remaking attempts that are just as and possibly more scary to me.

Who said neuromarketing was the thing to be most frightened of? What frightens me most about that article is - frankly - what worries me most about this debate: the complacency. Our society's dominant institutions are taking the step toward treating us like out and out mechanisms, and the gamut of responses runs from TIME magazine's 'Hooray!' to you guys and your 'What's the big whup?' I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around it, so forgive me if I sound dismayed.

Creeping normalcy, I suppose. Combined with the illusion of marketing immunity that we all suffer simply because of our psychology. We are all stamped - profoundly so. The fact that you don't personally care about it doesn't make it any less true or less problematic. For me, it simply points to the effectiveness of that stamping.

Just pause and think of how many things - they call them 'created wants' - marketers have managed to instill into women for instance: obsessional cleanliness, chaetophobia (fear of hair), agism, and shame of one's own appearance or even the sound of one's own voice!

We don't notice it because it seems 'natural' - and that's the point. In in-house marketing videos they actually talk about engineering 'new cultural imperatives.' Because the clamour is so great, the majority of them fail, but some are enormously effective, and the ambient message gets drilled into our heads. Simply check out what's happened in big pharma since they hired politicians to rewrite the legislation restricting their ability to advertise.

Otherwise this argument seems to turn on a 'two frights' version of the 'two wrongs' fallacy. The fact that we have bigger fish to fry doesn't mean we should be less concerned about neuromarketing, no more than the fact that someone else runs red lights means it's okay for us to run red lights.

But even then, I think the hierarchy of fears you mention is misguided. Trust me, we are far closer to neuro-caste systems than genetic caste systems - if only because the social mainstream is aware of the threat posed by the latter, which is the only thing that'll make politicians care. Low-field fMRI technology is a burgeoning field, and at some point in the near future, we'll walking through neuroscanners at airports. The same way computers used to fill barns...

And as for the 'there's lots of things they don't know' argument, that's kind of like arguing that there's lots of rain forest left, so why should we worry about tropical deforestation, isn't it?

[Hereford Eye]

Very well, then, what reaction did you expect? Were we all supposed to join in with your hand-wringing, woe-is-us, end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it message? Were you expecting a volunteer brigade to man the ramparts, go charging down Madison Ave with our placards ablazing and have New York's finest required to clean up after us? Were we to say "damn, RSB, you're right! Time should not be so blatant rubbing our noses in our culture like that. They should have presented the case with more concern than this reporting the facts as they see them. That is so not objective. That is so...so...media-like! They're reporting that they are part of the problem and totally blase with the fact. The bastards!"

Are you getting up there in age, RSB? <I saw your photo from the recent con> You're beginning to sound like the elder generation of every generation, Seneca reincarnated. Anyway, that's how I know I'm old because I sit around complaining about the mess this next generation has made of my world. Even though they are merely carrying out the education my generation provided.

There are things amiss in our culture. There always things amiss in every culture. Chaos theory instantiated, I suppose. Changing those things requires action but action requires motivation. When I was young enough to have the energy to fight the good fight, I was on the other side of the fence. Now that I am straddling it good and proper, I lack the energy to take society on. I am perfectly willing to identify the problems but my energy goes to making up stories, not dreaming up solutions. Inertia may well be the most potent moral force around.

[Dawnstorm]

[quote]But even then, I think the hierarchy of fears you mention is misguided. Trust me, we are far closer to neuro-caste systems than genetic caste systems - if only because the social mainstream is aware of the threat posed by the latter, which is the only thing that'll make politicians care.

That's a good point.

Low-field fMRI technology is a burgeoning field, and at some point in the near future, we'll walking through neuroscanners at airports. The same way computers used to fill barns...

"Walking through neuroscanners at airports" is something I find infinitely more scary than their application in marketing. This is because - if they use those - they will have theories that they consider sufficiently tested. The people who'll use them (beaurocrats, most likely, with little scientific expertise) won't understand them and disrupt the lives of probably harmless invidiuals in a concrete and systematic way. Neuromarketing doesn't scare me that much because of almost certain application errors. The reverse is true for airport devices. Airport devices will lead to a systematic re-classification of passengers - on prematurely interpreted data. I can see this happen. This does scare me.

Edit: Added "for airport devices" to "The reverse is true."

[Scott Bakker]

I'm a spry and willowy 38, HE. I sincerely hope that you're right, that my hand-wringing has more to do with obligatory generational dismay than with the way things are actually going.

But, the fact is we are living through the most profound, most far-reaching social transformation in the history of the human race. Fairly every field of science is undergoing technical and theoretical revolution after revolution, the consequences of which we cannot hope to fathom before-the-fact. I literally belong to the first generation in history that cannot reliably predict that many cornerstone social institutions will exist in recognizable form by the end of my lifetime. Our power to manipulate nature grows ever more profound, while we remain just as shallow as our ancestors.

And I fear that complacency will kill us, the way it's killed so many civilizations before us. I apologize if I come across as evangelical at times, HE, but I can't help but see things in this larger context. I cannot but wish that others would too - especially since our fates are inextricably tangled. To me, the fact that our society's dominant institutions are beginning to relate to us more and more as mechanisms is self-evident cause for grave concern. This kind of social transformation burns complacency as its fuel.

The fact is, when the stakes are high, you take up arms one way or another, no matter what you do. As you say, inertia is a force...

[Hereford Eye]

I'll go with Dawnstorm's take on the problem. As a person who does fly routinely but not frequently, I find the "guilty-till-proven-innocent" airport routine extremely annoying while laughable. If I thought for a moment that the whole routine was anything more than a grandstanding act by the <insert your home country here> government, if I thought it was making us any more safe, I'd shut my mouth. But, I think it to be all noise and no substance.
Consider on the other hand how easy it would be to establish Dawnstorm's scenario without so much as a "by-your-leave" from the Congress or the people. TWA could make it happen under the auspices of Homeland Security and who would know it had been implemented?
Now that is scary!

[KatG]

And as for the 'there's lots of things they don't know' argument, that's kind of like arguing that there's lots of rain forest left, so why should we worry about tropical deforestation, isn't it?

Um, no, it's not kind of like arguing that. First, I would have to be arguing. I was merely pointing out that for all the time of great technical change, there's a lot we don't know how to change. Yet.

But that's not your big concern. Your concern is the viewpoint of the people trying to do the imaging -- the viewing of humans as out and out mechanisms that can be programmed. The point I've been trying to make is that this viewpoint is not new, and not particular to our time period. It's been historically constant. That's not complacency about it. I'm not happy about it. But it's in every aspect of life. And it's been there throughout history.

Your point on stamping is well-taken. But I'm not sure what you mean by the disappearance of social institutions. I'm pretty happy about some of the disappearances of social institutions, since they've raised women from third place status to second place status in some countries. Even if we are obsessed with leg hair and body shape. But then we've always, throughout history, been obsessed with body shape. And been stamped into it perhaps.

I'm just saying it's not a new thing. I'm not happy about these things, but these are old battles. As someone I'm reading likes to explore as a theme, what comes before is the source of what comes after. :)

[Scott Bakker]

The point about dissappearing institutions is simply about technologically mediated social change. Vinge and Kurzweil talk about the 'singularity,' for instance. Kosselleck talks of our 'collapsing horizon of expectation.' Ignatieff, the 'ingenuity gap.' I like to call it the imminent 'material postmodern.' It amounts to the same thing: we're entering a a period of unprecedented change, so profound in its implications, we're not even sure what concepts like 'human' will mean by the end of this century.

The point I've been trying to make is that this viewpoint is not new, and not particular to our time period. It's been historically constant. That's not complacency about it. I'm not happy about it. But it's in every aspect of life. And it's been there throughout history.

This was part of Dawnstorm's original argument, I think. Before they treated us like animals, which is not quite the same as treating us like mechanisms - though in practical terms, it renders us equally abject. But that - training audiences - is itself a mid twentieth-century elaboration. Before that, the same will to exploitation existed, but they did treat us like people - to be convinced and to be deceived. Mostly the latter.

As I said earlier, think of this will to exploit combined with the present and potential power of neuroscientific tools. Since I think I have a good sense of the latter, this scares the hell out of me. That's my future fear.

My present fear has to do with the ignorance, complicity, and complacency required for a mainstream publication to represent marketers use of neuroscience 'to bypass the logical mind' as a positive. :eek:

As I say, I see us standing on a brink, and it seems pretty clear that we're holding a bottle of whiskey!

[Hereford Eye]

we're not even sure what concepts like 'human' will mean by the end of this century.
That seems to beg the question do we know what it means to be human today? Is it not the case that our humanity is defined by the culture we adhere to? Is it not the case that “being human” is defined differently in Africa below the Sahara, the Middle East, the Far East, and Europe?
Consider the tribes living in the caves of Europe drawing their graffiti on the walls. Did they realize that “being human” meant being manipulated by the shamans, bosses, and fertile women of the tribe?
Consider the families living in Ur. Did they realize that “being human” meant being manipulated by the king, the court, the priests, and the good looking women of the city?
Consider the families living in England in the time of Shakespeare. Did they realize that “being human” meant being manipulated the queen, the court, the church, and the good looking women of the city?
Consider the families living in Boston in the 17th century. Did they realize that “being human” meant being manipulated by the governor, the church, and the good looking women of the city?
Consider the families living in the U.S. today. Do they realize that “being human” means being manipulated by the government, the marketplace, the church, and the good looking women?
If our humanity is defined by the culture we live in, then it is a given that that definition will evolve as the culture evolves. While the view from our bias may indicate a much poorer definition, the view from that culture’s bias will be just fine.
In the historical samples, the situation endured till folk became tired of it. Then, the situation changed to a new situation that endured until folk got tired of it. I think Orwell wrote a hell of a story, but I also think he underestimated the ingenuity and determination of the common man. Montana isn’t all that far away.

Ohmigod, did I just agree with Katherine the Great…again? :) :rolleyes:

Okay, so I think women have been in control longer than most folk credit. What can I say? :rolleyes: