Seeds of the Remainder

(formerly paradoxEmergent)
post-left, post-politics, pro-human

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

I have migrated to Substack (for anyone still following me here). My profile icon here is terrible!

https://t.co/V17FvqYpXo

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

Socialism has only one essential meaning: that the power to determine and shape political economy ultimately is wielded by the masses of ordinary people. As such, it cannot be placed on the left-right spectrum (which now denotes a cluster of cultural values and preferences).

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

When you start hydroplaning on the road, your tires lose all traction and your steering wheel becomes useless - you just hope you don’t hit a tree or flip over. That’s our exact situation with AI. There is no slowing down or changing direction at this point.

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

@Paul_Heron_ Liberalism was always essentially a negative doctrine (rights etc). It has no positive vision and was always parasitic upon positivity generated elsewhere. When that source is exhausted, it truly has nothing, a virus with no host.

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

@Paul_Heron_ Also, the lack of connection to the internet means that your relationship is primarily with the machine itself, it's not just a tool to link you to others. It is an introvert's utopia. Kind of like the same feeling I get reading a book

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

@Paul_Heron_ There's something about being in a world of pixels where some thought was put into the aesthetic choices - even if they are mostly utilitarian, it all makes sense together, and these choices aren't designed to maximize clicks or sell you something. Screen zen missing today

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

There is a huge difference between naive progressivism and a progressivism which emerges from the other side of absolute negation and skepticism towards the entire paradigm of progressive thought. Arguably, only the latter has the right to call itself truly progressive.

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

https://t.co/6X1LTF1DvB

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

@Paul_Heron_ There is a left Hegelian trend (Todd McGowan) about embracing conflict, alienation, etc. This is a good development but ultimately flawed IMO. Trying to resolve conflict through harmony is also hardwired into the universe, there is a tendency or flow towards (imagined) resolution

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

The way forward is to construct a new unifying signifier which is inclusive of both positivity and negativity. Which is not so rigid that it cannot tolerate criticism, and not so loose that it becomes meaningless and ineffectual either.

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

The defining feature of the left is that they negate the signifier, "unifying" under an alternative signifier of negation, which conceals its lack of internal consistency by remaining in an oppositional stance. The right's negation of the left's negation is also empty

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

Which is not to place all blame on them. A dysfunctional system generates dysfunctional people. Disillusionment has a valid reason to exist when the illusions are no longer successful. But I think staying in that state is a choice, and not a helpful one from larger perspective

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

This means that the ultimate achievement of consistency in an ideology is simultaneously its death and failure. The Real moves on, the system becomes irrelevant. New systems are always in the process of emerging in the gaps of what remains unsaid and not yet symbolized

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

It is impossible for any system of signs which once pointed in the direction of the Real to continue to do so over time. That's because the logic of internal consistency takes priority, where what's missed is that it was inconsistency that allowed for any Real in the first place

[Seeds of the Remainder @paradoxEmergent]

@drumm_colin Marx is a poetic-romantic core surrounded by theoretical fluff - people become emotionally attached to the former while using the latter as invincible armor against other ways of thinking.

The only mystery is why we haven't progressed in our understanding of capitalism

[Total Philosophy @TotalPhilo]

When scientific Marxism just ain't scientific