Wiki World

A “wiki” is a collaborative website—it allows users to add and edit content.

In many ways, this is a wonderful development, one yet to be understood. Researchers have explored and are exploring how “group think” can yield better results than individuals. The idea is old—Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” of the market place, for example, presented similar claims. However, Smith’s model demanded perfect knowledge for all players, an ideal not likely realized. “Group think,” however, starts with the notion that even “primitive” creatures, like ants and bees, possess the ability to make collective decisions far beyond the ability of any individual insect, and that yes, humans also can exhibit this potential. Management theory, organizational behavior studies and more all offer similar accounts of the phenomenon.

“Wiki” is also Hawaiian for “quick,” though, and I fear that’s the main attraction.

I visit a couple of discussion boards regularly. One of them, a Gorean board, frequently gets versions of the same question over and over—What is Gor? (or various attacks on Gor). The board has a search function, as members repeatedly note, but this is too much trouble for many users. Some do try, and then complain that they couldn’t immediately get the answers they sought. Not wiki enough.

A few even claim to be well versed while admitting they’ve never read a Gor novel—kinda like the student who reads e-notes instead of the novel and then bitches the teacher doesn’t appreciate student “work.” Even better—the student who raises a hand in class and says, “Well, I didn’t read it, but I think the character meant that…”

On a blogging board, one member asked how fellow bloggers conduct research. The answers were sad—most said they don’t research at all, and those who did, relied on other bloggers (who, apparently, didn’t research either). Easy, but isn’t that just gossip? Several of those bloggers want to be serious writers—yet have missed that publication after publication stresses that they seek “well-researched” pieces. Not wiki.

I asked a class experimenting with blogs which ones presented the best writing. “The short ones!” insisted a few students. So Harry Potter would be better if just a few paragraphs?

They don’t even “wiki” well—I have to show them how to use Google to narrow searches, how to search for blogs, how to find out how to add advertising to their blogs, even though these links all appear on Google’s home page, the first place they go for information.

Another class, struggling with interpreting an assigned article in group sessions, clearly dragged its collective feet, finally admitting, “We’re just waiting for you to step in and make it all right.” Apparently, I have all the answers?

But that is what many people want. Problems abroad? Bomb ‘em. Economic woes? Just cut taxes (why don’t we eliminate them—then the government can magically fund itself with no money!). Hey, why even have government? Surely we don’t need those annoying police, firemen, road crews…

And on it goes, while people vote for politicians whose positions contradict their own, just because someone fed them the right line, pushed the right button, making it all easy. Reagan’s “shining city on a hill.”

Wiki World.

Writer

What I like about this political season

Sure, we have states fighting over one another to be first to have primaries, along with push-back from national parties, and yeah, we probably should stop pretending this is still the 18th century and institute national primaries. However, I like what I'm seeing.

What I see is both major political parties sorting out wide fields of arguably talented candidates. Messy? Sure. Goes with democracy, though, doesn't it? Kinda the point.

I'm not so wild about their lemming-like rush to bash each other rather than highlight their strengths--but one step at a time.

Writer

At what point is it just too bizarre?

While I'm politically active, President Bush just continues to stun me with statements so nuts and so fantastically disingenuous that I'm left with little else to say, other than endless repetition.

He announced his concern that Attorney-General Gonzalez's name has been dragged "through the mud for political reasons." Excuse me? Who would know more about how to do that than Bush? Just as the tip of the iceberg, remember Sen. John Kerry?

Remember "the uniter, not the divider"? Remember the guy who wasn't going to get into "nation building"?

And remember that MANY REPUBLICANS as well as Democrats have strongly indicated their complete lack of confidence in Gonzalez. Whether on his own, or as Bush's lap dog, or both, Gonzalez danced over the law, crushing it like grapes, drunk on the wine.

But Bush's stubborn stance--on Iraq as well as this--just leaves me speechless. What's left to say beyond the obvious?

I DO believe that many excellent public servants are among the Republicans in Congress. But they've also been rubber-stamping the destruction of the U.S. Constitution (not to mention the lives of American, Iraqi, Afghanistan and coalition force citizens) by this administration solely for the sake of the political power of their party, and I hope Americans in the next election will finish the job by sending the rest of them, however belatedly repentant, home.

Enough is enough. No, Democrats certainly aren't perfect--but they're the best chance we have in the short run.

One step at a time.

Writer

A Hatred of Silence

I went for my daily run this morning, choosing as usual to run through the state forest surrounding Stoney Pond—a useful strategy when running with a husky, as I do regardless of weather, including today’s cold drizzle.

I was not alone. Some kayakers also decided to visit the water, choosing to shout and howl at nothing, an annoying if not unusual addition to a generally peaceful exercise, the sound heard everywhere. After all, why not venture into nature if not to disturb it? Campers blare radios, college students leave broken bear bottles as a record of a raucous party—aside from the understandable (to a degree) screaming children.

Why do people oppose quiet? Car radios boom enough to deafen not only the occupants (dangerously), but also anyone in the vicinity. Isn’t life agitated enough to want a little peace? Apparently not.

I can think of meeting after meeting, with both business people and academics, featuring mostly people talking to hear themselves talk, ignoring that someone else has already raised that point. Why? Such a practice only keeps us at the meeting longer, without progress. Richard Russo, in his novel “Straight Man,” asks about the last time someone changed thinking after hearing a cogent argument. The answer is satirically clear. We think what we think, shouting too loud to hear other voices.

I’m reminded of the movie “Jarhead.” The two Marine snipers featured have an opportunity to take out a target when they are supplanted by an air strike. They beg to be allowed to shoot anyway, despite that their action would mean nothing overall. When the war (the first Gulf conflict) ends, they lament that they never got to fire their weapons. Winning wasn’t enough—they wanted to make their mark, even if pointlessly. Needless emotional noise.

Think also of the political accusations over the past few decades amounting to “They stole our issues!” This is distressing—public admissions that the issues were never the point, only the credit for them and the ensuing power. [For me, if you can take one of my issues and see it achieved—you go!] It’s just ego.

Shouting to hear ourselves shout. Not discourse, is it? Why do we so oppose peace?

Writer

An Interview with General Discussion

I had always wanted to meet General Discussion. His mere presence was overwhelming—he’s on practically every Internet forum. At the same time, he has no profile on any of these sites—a mystery. So, when I was granted an interview with the General (I’m sorry, but conditions of the interview precluded sharing specifics), I was understandably elated.

I decided to lead by asking about his path to such influence.

“Well, I’ve been known by many names,” he began. “I started as Private Chat, the identity under which I took Corporeal Form. As Sergeant-at-Arms I was able to Captain-my-Views until I had achieved the rank of Major Misunderstanding. And with a Colonel-of-Truth, I ascended to General Discussion.”

I expressed my reservations about such a questionable rise to power.

“What you don’t understand,” he explained, “is that most people don’t care about reasoning. It’s all about speaking your mind, laboring under the delusion that other people care and will listen. No. You have to FAKE debate.”

“Surely that’s unfair,” I protested. “I regularly see people vociferously debating a host of issues!”

“That’s where you’re mistaken,” he answered, implying via body language that you don’t get to be a General without good reason. “People don’t debate—they REACT.”

“I don’t think I can agree.” Frankly, I was quite taken aback.

“All right,” he answered. He thought for a moment. “Consider your favorite Internet discussion boards.” I considered. “Can you identify a few people who consistently seem the best debaters?” I could.

“Well,” he continued, “Look at their patterns.” I was confused. “They don’t just jump in and respond to any comment.” Now I was really confused. The General looked at me, a combination of bemusement and exasperation, then continued. “They wait,” he explained. I stared at him blankly.

“They wait,” he repeated. “They let people make their points. Then, they respond to the group, addressing the sense and content of all those posts.” I still didn’t get it.

“Look,” he sighed (I could tell he was patronizing me). “Presenting a thoughtful view supported by careful argument is difficult.” I listened, waiting. “So, people don’t bother. They throw out their opinions.”

“But others would just counter with their own opinions,” I interjected.

“EXACTLY!” pounced the General. “So experienced ‘debaters’ wait for other users to post first, and then attack those views in lieu of constructing their own arguments.”

I looked at him, stunned.

“This isn’t something new with the Internet.” He was right, of course—public discourse existed long before online discussion boards, and the General’s career predated such electronic advances. “People avoid presenting specific arguments. Doing so would leave them vulnerable.”

“Consider politics,” he continued. “People continually complain that politicians only speak in generalities. Know why? Ever heard of James Buchanan?”

“The 15th U.S. President?”

“No, the Nobel Prize winning economist.” I settled in for the lecture.

“He proposed the Theory of Public Choice. Essentially, he noticed that if a candidate for office presented specifics, opponents would then attack the details of those plans. Hence, savvy politicians avoid divulging such policy, preserving their standings in the polls—and the electorate.”

“But wouldn’t such a generalist approach just mean that voters would dismiss the candidate as superficial?”

“Apparently not.”

I looked at the ground, thinking, my head spinning.

“Look at what happens even in the primaries,” offered the General. “What happens to the front runner? Shot at from every side—within the same party! Often, someone else becomes the eventual nominee.”

I thought for a long rime before replying. “It doesn’t seem right,” was all I could offer.

The General looked at me kindly. After a while, he asked, “Do you know the story of Lieutenant Kijé?”

As a musician, I knew Prokofiev’s suite from the 1934 Aleksandr Fajntsimmer film, along with the basic plot, but not the 1927 Yury Tynyanov novella, the basis for the movie. I listened.

“Contradicting the Tsar was a crime, so when Paul I of Russia misunderstood an incorrectly copied military report, misreading it as ‘Lieutenant Kijé,’ his officers simply created the fictitious officer. The deceit expanded to include Kijé’s courtship, marriage, regular promotion—and when the Tsar finally asked to meet this man, his death and funeral with full military honors.”

I didn’t yet see his point.

“Your country,” he continued, “is based on rule by the people, is it not?” I nodded. “Well, your leader, the people, doesn’t like to hear views other than its own. So, your subordinates tell what the leader wants to hear. Recognizing that is how I rose through the ranks so quickly.”

I stared at him blankly.

"I'm your Lieutenant Kijé," he explained.

The General had pressing business elsewhere, so that had to be the end of our discussion. However, I encourage my countrymen to support this man in his bid for higher office. He has a plan to help build our nation.

Writer

Home Insecurity

[I wrote this during Bush’s first term. Considering the recent cases involving reading the government reading email and tracking Internet viewing, I thought it worth a second look.]

“Get back in your car!” came the angry order.

“I live here!” I answered, only to hear the angry order repeated.

I’d just returned from Thanksgiving dinner at a friend’s house, a bit after 8 p.m., and I was listening the to rest of an NPR story (I can’t get NPR inside my country home). I wasn’t even sure about the source of the order, since no lights were flashing, and I wasn’t entirely sure the truck I saw suddenly swing around belonged to the Sheriff’s department. I certainly couldn’t tell at the time, since the truck was parked at an angle in the nearest lane, lights shining in my face, all I could see. I had tried to get out to explain that all was well.

The eventual terse conversation clarified the officer’s stated position that he didn’t know if I needed roadside assistance (I certainly hope this isn’t his usual roadside manner) and that since he doesn’t know me, he’s safer approaching me (like I’m safe from an unknown driver spinning around and accosting me). I was saved further harassment primarily after pointing out to the officer that I had only been sitting there five minutes or so, as evidenced by my fresh tire tracks--clearly indicating I’d backed into my parking spot intentionally.

Technology probably saved me further difficulties that Thanksgiving evening. The officer twice asked me my name, and certainly he could from there check my story--the phone book would do, but the patrol car laptop would also suffice--as well as checking my registration, insurance, and any possible prior incidents.

But in short, I was accosted in my own driveway, way out in the country, for listening to the radio, and primarily because the officer in question found listening to the radio in a driveway foreign. Hence, I’m even more concerned than before about the surveillance measures the Bush administration has pursued so relentlessly. Will other people’s perception of what is normal and acceptable become, ipso facto, the law?

I fear that’s so. The Bush administration is constructing an information system to combine all available data in one central location. All activities, all purchases, all Internet queries and more will be available without a search warrant. And in charge of this data? None other than John Poindexter, convicted of conspiracy, lying to Congress, defrauding the government, and destroying evidence in the Iran Contra scandal, convictions later overturned during George H’s presidential tenure on the grounds that despite the truth of Poindexter’s testimony, he’d made an immunity deal in return for his testimony.

The information system is nominally a response to the “War against Terrorism,” an extremely unfortunate characterization. Certainly there’s a serious threat that needs serious consideration, but crediting the Bush administration for its response to this threat has serious problems: (1) such a broadly defined “war” will never have an end, leaving every president with broad and ambiguous power to do whatever in the name of national security forever, since such a war can never be declared “over” with certainty; (2) the Bush Administration could have prevented the 9/11 attacks by seriously considering instead of dismissing the Clinton administration’s reports about the growing threat; (3) naming Henry Kissinger, architect of the secret bombings in Cambodia and Laos to lead an investigation into the current administration’s failure to address 9/11 seems to have only one logical reason--Kissinger won’t embarrass the president (and replacing him with Tom Kean, a man with virtually no intelligence experience, underscores that the point of the investigation is to find nothing); (4) while Attorney General John Ashcroft insists the government needs greater powers to protect Americans against terrorists, he also refuses to allow tracking firearms as a violation of Constitutional rights, a bizarre contradiction in priorities (and does anyone really believe that a group of militia folk could hold off a hostile U.S. government with the state of weapons technology today? Should U.S. citizens be allowed to become nuclear powers?).

The truth is that technology will change multiple aspects of American life, and it probably can’t be stopped. Many of the consequences will be wonderful. Eventually, for example, people needing organ transplants will clone their own replacements, solving a current medical crisis. And, the unprecedented access to information by anyone with access to a computer and a modem is certainly beneficial. But this will come with costs. Further, given the current administration’s obvious disdain for Constitutional protections, it’s not hard to imagine that with or without official approval, illegal surveillance may already be in progress. Certainly, legal protections didn’t stop the Nixon administration.

The danger is that anyone in power can force a preconceived view of ethics on the public. There will be no escape, since any book purchase, any email, any documented action or position will be available for review. Given current political strategies of finding whatever fact can be spun and doing so negatively, America may be headed not for an era of truth, but for layers and layers of lies. Further, the electorate seems unconcerned. True, access to information is greater than ever before, but so relatively few people use this power, and even fewer evaluate that information before accepting it. Thus, although the danger from outside U.S. borders is real, the potential danger from the U.S. government is equally real.

And even if not, benignly collected data will always be in jeopardy from an outside hacker.

Consequently, everyone’s freedom--and perhaps life--is potentially in danger in the 21st century from anyone who finds any particular action or thought unsatisfactory--even listening to the radio in one’s own driveway.

George Orwell may have been correct--he just got the year wrong.

Writer

Clery in the Goat Line

During the 2004 U.S. presidential election, a group of Catholic bishops claimed that voting for John Kerry would be a sin. They cited his pro-choice stance on abortion in particular, along with his position on stem cell research.

The bishops’ stance was nothing more than voter intimidation and a thinly veiled foray into politics. The repercussions for both Americans and religion are, at the very least, troubling.

Start with the sheer arrogance. How is it that these particular bishops knew the mind of God when numerous other bishops felt these are matters of individual conscience (as Kerry stated his own view)? Why did this issue supposedly take precedence over all others, including the death penalty, war, and poverty?

It also took fantastic nerve to throw stones on top of the child sexual abuse scandal and the church’s cover up and enabling of the abusers. Hardly a strong position for children’s rights.

And what of the Bush Administration? Is it not a sin to lie to bring a nation to war, subsequently killing thousands of Americans and Iraqis, including innocent civilians?

Shouldn’t good Christians worry about clear moral problems, such as wrongfully executed citizens? Or that America is one of only three countries that executes children (the others are Iran and Pakistan)?

The bishops are trying to prevent thinking. No one is FOR abortion, only whether choice should be legislated. And the bishops don’t have a very good record obeying the law anyway. If the sanctity of life is truly important to them, how about saving newborns in China drowned because they’re female? How about saving thousands of innocent people from ethnic slaughter in Rwanda and the Sudan? How about saving millions of African children who die each year from diarrhea? Unfortunately, the key issue seems to be winning, ego, not the sanctity of life. Look at the rhetoric about Iraq--the Bush administration doesn't talk about peace or success, but winning and losing.

That Republicans embraced such end runs around thinking is also telling. The Republican National Convention stressed that “A vote for Bush is a vote for God,” perhaps the most sickening and baldly disingenuous statement to come from politics. Thankfully voters had enough and sent Republicans the message they deserved, that Americans think for themselves, and showed such outrageous Republicans the door. Maybe they should do the same for a few clergy.

If not, Americans won’t have to fear Islamic Fundamentalists--Christian Fundamentalists seem ready to do the job for them. After Osama bin Laden responded to the 9/11 attacks with “Not me, but thank Allah,” the Rev. Jerry Falwell added “I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the A.C.L.U., People for the American Way--all of them who have tried to secularize America--I point the finger in their face and say, ‘You helped this happen.’”

Matthew 25:31-46 explains that when the Son of Man comes in His glory, He will separate the sheep (those destined for heaven) from the goats, based on how each responded when the Lord was hungry, thirsty, a stranger, naked, or in prison. They will ask, “Lord, when did we see you hungry, thirsty, a stranger, naked, or in prison?” The Lord will reply, “Whenever you did this to (for) the least of my brothers, you did it to (for) me.”

Quite a few bishops may be in the goat line.

Writer

Apathy is a Learned Response

When I was a child, I noticed much more courtesy than people display today. Consider, for example, driving. School buses used to pull over when a few cars trailed behind. With only some exception, not today. “Hey, I’m doing my job. You’ll all just have to wait” is the apparent message. Or, consider farm tractors. My recollection of rural life includes farmers always driving to the side when a car approached. Not now. Some happily oblivious daydreamer plugs along at 10 mph, blocking traffic completely for a few miles on the way to the fields. Construction crews have also changed, replacing concern for the normal flow of commuter traffic with concern only for the construction job--travelers beware. Often several lanes are blocked for weeks although no one actually does any work there.

The change in driving habits is reflected elsewhere. Store clerks look up from their paperwork--or personal phone call--with annoyance aimed at the inconsiderate patron trying to give the business money. Newspaper deliveries often land in the mud, since apparently anywhere on the customer’s ground is close enough. Workers are even annoyed at customers for the workers’ mistakes--one sub shop, informed I had asked for Russian dressing, not mayonnaise, simply added a layer of Russian to the already thick coating of mayonnaise.

Where does this disregard for others originate? It’s taught, albeit unintentionally. “Why doesn’t my teenager respect authority, even mine?” you wonder, while speeding along at 75 mph in defiance of the law. “The government takes too much of my money as it is,” you lament as you fudge the numbers on your tax return to yield a more favorable, if dishonest, outcome. Even promises to the closest people in our lives seem to mean little, since half of U.S. marriages end in divorce. Television, society, the Internet or whatever scapegoat du jour isn’t the problem. No need to leave the comfort of your home.

So when commentators today note that political apathy appears to continually grow, I’m not at all surprised. I remember my parents and teachers speaking of leaders with respect. even though they often disagreed with those leaders. Today’s parents and teachers much more often mention leaders in glaringly disparaging tones. They are quick to attack, but they’re uninterested in the specifics of all those boring political topics like war, poverty, inadequate health care, unemployment and social justice. Sure, they’ll try and cover themselves with proclamations that the candidates for public office are all the same, that the ballot offers a poor selection, but those complaints never seem to spur participation in selection of those candidates. Judging is so much easier.

Today’s citizens aren’t discourteous or apathetic; they’re doing exactly what their elders taught them to do. What society needs instead is for those younger citizens to rebel--to reject their upbringing and do the right thing by taking an active, thoughtful, responsible role in the world. Maybe they can teach their elders a thing or two.

Writer