Re: What's the next paradigm shift?
- From: "A." <atalanta.brilliante@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 18 Apr 2006 15:25:58 -0700
JS wrote:
Seeing alot of posts about crap,
maybe somebody can post something
a little more interesting.
There's a rather large paradigm shift happening right in front of
our eyes. How old you are makes a difference in how you see it.
It started some time ago, and some of you were born just before
it began or just as it was beginning. Some of us have been
around longer, so we see it differently. It isn't that hard to see,
it's just very hard to describe. Without a description, it's hard
to explain.
This isn't a paradigm shift in exactly the Kuhn meant, but it
is closely related.
I can point to some historical and current events that show
something of the nature of the shift, but as Said said, where you
begin, in terms of explanation, is so highly prejudicial to how
you are understood or read, that it is nearly impossible to
begin anything.
In other words, there is no way to write the first topic sentence
of the first paragraph of the imaginary book about the shift.
Once you've written it, it will be wrong, out of date, misunderstood
or deliberately twisted. Hence, we cannot speak about it. This
is not because the sentence itself is necessarily wrong, but
because of the way many people read (or don't read) what you
are saying.
just one example, this has been said by lots of really goodFrom Adrienne Rich, we get another perspective (and she's
thinkers). There is no common language. Words do not mean
what you think they mean - or what I think they mean. Words
that have no meaning whatsoever to me are still used by
others, even if I have told them I don't know what they mean.
In one paradigm of language, a failure to understand what
someone else means is called "speaking a different language."
We are still calling it English, however. In one paradigm of
discourse, if someone doesn't speak your language, you try
to invent a new language that accomodates all parties in
the communication. People, historically, have used bits and
pieces of their own languages, pointing, gesticulating and
hopping about, when language fails. Part of the shift is that
we can't and don't do that any more and we pretend we're all
speaking the same language.
Rich also points to "other languages," such as silence.
The older paradigm insists that the way to find out about things
is, for example, to post on usenet about them, or to respond
to posts, as I am doing.
But, silence speaks too.
For me, the incredibly large number of stupid racist posts
on nearly every single ng, no matter what the topic ostensibly may
be, is another kind of "language." But I don't know what it means,
exactly.
Does it mean the guy next door is as likely to be an ignorant,
uninformed racist as he is to be a child-murdering cannibal?
It would seem to be much more likely that he's the former, rather
than the latter, but in the new paradigm, one really good piece
of advice I use is:
You just wait.
A.
And in my case, I do a lot of other things, like hoping the guy
next door (whom I like) is neither an ignorant, foolish racist
OR a cannibal. Is that so much to hope for?
Can you imagine what the hopes of a middle-aged Victorian
mom might have been? Do you think her hopes would be
like mine?
.
- References:
- What's the next paradigm shift?
- From: JS
- What's the next paradigm shift?
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