#anathem — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #anathem, aggregated by home.social.
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Can't stop thinking about the world building exercise/setup in Stephenson's Anathem where the "avout" (aka intelligentsia) were forced to live in gated monastic communities isolated to varying degrees (and by rank[1]) from secular society. This setup was decided on for a number of self-serving reasons (by the avout), but also largely imposed on them due to a long history where technology & academic pursuits led to several catastrophic events, incl. periodic civilizational collapses triggered by knowledge/research either being weaponized, irresponsibly commercialized and/or unleashed at a rate which society simply couldn't culturally/ethically/politically handle...
He (Stephenson) termed these events "Praxic crises" to emphasize that these kinds of disaster happen when purely theoretical insight is employed as real-world technology (praxis) without any restraint. In reality, there obviously isn't such a clear-cut separation between "purely theoretical knowledge" and its applications (POSIWID etc.) and that also forms part of the basis of this book's premise... I think we also very well know all the causes for such crises: From extreme short-term incentives (profit, war, perceived control/power), lack of ethical/philosophical grounding among decision makers (amplified by political power hierarchies), first-to-market pressures vs. deep understanding & balancing of impacts, but also severe lack of institutional regulation & memory (partially due to cyclic collapse and social amnesia)...
Food for thought...
[1] Monastic rank influenced degree of isolation: Unarians were allowed a few days outside each year, Decenarians every 10 years, Centenarians every 100 years, Millenarians only opened every 1000 years...
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Can't stop thinking about the world building exercise/setup in Stephenson's Anathem where the "avout" (aka intelligentsia) were forced to live in gated monastic communities isolated to varying degrees (and by rank[1]) from secular society. This setup was decided on for a number of self-serving reasons (by the avout), but also largely imposed on them due to a long history where technology & academic pursuits led to several catastrophic events, incl. periodic civilizational collapses triggered by knowledge/research either being weaponized, irresponsibly commercialized and/or unleashed at a rate which society simply couldn't culturally/ethically/politically handle...
He (Stephenson) termed these events "Praxic crises" to emphasize that these kinds of disaster happen when purely theoretical insight is employed as real-world technology (praxis) without any restraint. In reality, there obviously isn't such a clear-cut separation between "purely theoretical knowledge" and its applications (POSIWID etc.) and that also forms part of the basis of this book's premise... I think we also very well know all the causes for such crises: From extreme short-term incentives (profit, war, perceived control/power), lack of ethical/philosophical grounding among decision makers (amplified by political power hierarchies), first-to-market pressures vs. deep understanding & balancing of impacts, but also severe lack of institutional regulation & memory (partially due to cyclic collapse and social amnesia)...
Food for thought...
[1] Monastic rank influenced degree of isolation: Unarians were allowed a few days outside each year, Decenarians every 10 years, Centenarians every 100 years, Millenarians only opened every 1000 years...
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Can't stop thinking about the world building exercise/setup in Stephenson's Anathem where the "avout" (aka intelligentsia) were forced to live in gated monastic communities isolated to varying degrees (and by rank[1]) from secular society. This setup was decided on for a number of self-serving reasons (by the avout), but also largely imposed on them due to a long history where technology & academic pursuits led to several catastrophic events, incl. periodic civilizational collapses triggered by knowledge/research either being weaponized, irresponsibly commercialized and/or unleashed at a rate which society simply couldn't culturally/ethically/politically handle...
He (Stephenson) termed these events "Praxic crises" to emphasize that these kinds of disaster happen when purely theoretical insight is employed as real-world technology (praxis) without any restraint. In reality, there obviously isn't such a clear-cut separation between "purely theoretical knowledge" and its applications (POSIWID etc.) and that also forms part of the basis of this book's premise... I think we also very well know all the causes for such crises: From extreme short-term incentives (profit, war, perceived control/power), lack of ethical/philosophical grounding among decision makers (amplified by political power hierarchies), first-to-market pressures vs. deep understanding & balancing of impacts, but also severe lack of institutional regulation & memory (partially due to cyclic collapse and social amnesia)...
Food for thought...
[1] Monastic rank influenced degree of isolation: Unarians were allowed a few days outside each year, Decenarians every 10 years, Centenarians every 100 years, Millenarians only opened every 1000 years...
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Can't stop thinking about the world building exercise/setup in Stephenson's Anathem where the "avout" (aka intelligentsia) were forced to live in gated monastic communities isolated to varying degrees (and by rank[1]) from secular society. This setup was decided on for a number of self-serving reasons (by the avout), but also largely imposed on them due to a long history where technology & academic pursuits led to several catastrophic events, incl. periodic civilizational collapses triggered by knowledge/research either being weaponized, irresponsibly commercialized and/or unleashed at a rate which society simply couldn't culturally/ethically/politically handle...
He (Stephenson) termed these events "Praxic crises" to emphasize that these kinds of disaster happen when purely theoretical insight is employed as real-world technology (praxis) without any restraint. In reality, there obviously isn't such a clear-cut separation between "purely theoretical knowledge" and its applications (POSIWID etc.) and that also forms part of the basis of this book's premise... I think we also very well know all the causes for such crises: From extreme short-term incentives (profit, war, perceived control/power), lack of ethical/philosophical grounding among decision makers (amplified by political power hierarchies), first-to-market pressures vs. deep understanding & balancing of impacts, but also severe lack of institutional regulation & memory (partially due to cyclic collapse and social amnesia)...
Food for thought...
[1] Monastic rank influenced degree of isolation: Unarians were allowed a few days outside each year, Decenarians every 10 years, Centenarians every 100 years, Millenarians only opened every 1000 years...
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Can't stop thinking about the world building exercise/setup in Stephenson's Anathem where the "avout" (aka intelligentsia) were forced to live in gated monastic communities isolated to varying degrees (and by rank[1]) from secular society. This setup was decided on for a number of self-serving reasons (by the avout), but also largely imposed on them due to a long history where technology & academic pursuits led to several catastrophic events, incl. periodic civilizational collapses triggered by knowledge/research either being weaponized, irresponsibly commercialized and/or unleashed at a rate which society simply couldn't culturally/ethically/politically handle...
He (Stephenson) termed these events "Praxic crises" to emphasize that these kinds of disaster happen when purely theoretical insight is employed as real-world technology (praxis) without any restraint. In reality, there obviously isn't such a clear-cut separation between "purely theoretical knowledge" and its applications (POSIWID etc.) and that also forms part of the basis of this book's premise... I think we also very well know all the causes for such crises: From extreme short-term incentives (profit, war, perceived control/power), lack of ethical/philosophical grounding among decision makers (amplified by political power hierarchies), first-to-market pressures vs. deep understanding & balancing of impacts, but also severe lack of institutional regulation & memory (partially due to cyclic collapse and social amnesia)...
Food for thought...
[1] Monastic rank influenced degree of isolation: Unarians were allowed a few days outside each year, Decenarians every 10 years, Centenarians every 100 years, Millenarians only opened every 1000 years...
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Ho pre-ordinato l'ultimo libro di #NealStephenson (versione italiana) #TerminationShock
Dello stesso autore ho adorato alcuni libri, ma alcuni li ho trovati un po' mal riusciti. Molto belli #Cryptonomicon e il #Ciclobarocco ; simpatico #SnowCrash (IMHO sopravvalutato dalla critica) e #Zodiac, tra l'altro come l'ultimo è un eco-thriller, ma si vede che è un'opera giovanile.
Il suo migliore IMHO è #Anathem 👍Vediamo come andrà. Tengo le aspettative basse, così magari ci rimango meno male
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Global News BC: Vancouver developer seeks delay in paying $10 million owed to city https://globalnews.ca/news/9756941/anathem-10-million-delay-vancouver/ #globalnews #britishcolumbia #news #communityamenitycontribution #Vancouvercitycouncil #Vancouverdevelopment #Vancouverrealestate #anathemproperties #vancouerdeveloper #VancouverPolitics #CityofVancouver #vancouerhousing #Economy #anathem
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Trying, but failing, to knock myself out by reading Neal Stephenson's #Anathem
While it's got some good ideas (Time Monks! Meme Hygiene!), it's awfully kludgy and slow. Especially compared to #SnowCrash or #Seveneves which are both dense, but move along at pace.
