On the inevitability of it all

[alexander]

I'm interested in your thoughts on the inevitability of our doom.

I will be posing my question as a response to the article featured in this thread: https://anti-civ.net/showthread.php?tid=428

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Here is a short summary of the article (although it is worth reading in full):

A «[ n ]ew study argues that the greatest defining feature of our species
is not 'symbolism' or dramatic cognitive change but rather its unique
ecological position as a global 'general specialist'.»

These scientists suggest that «investigations into what it means to be
human should shift from attempts to uncover the earliest material traces
of 'art', 'language', or technological 'complexity' towards
understanding what makes our species ecologically unique.» Our «ability
to occupy diverse and 'extreme' settings around the world stands in
stark contrast to the ecological adaptations of other hominin taxa, and
may explain how our species became the last surviving hominin on the
planet.» Unlike the other species, «our species not only colonized a
diversity of challenging environments, including deserts, tropical
rainforests, high altitude settings, and the palaeoarctic, but also
specialized in its adaptation to some of these extremes».

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This raises the question: was this all inevitable?

In philosophy we often talk about the two extremes of technological thinking: instrumentalism (we use technology to accomplish stuff), and determinism (technology is in charge, and we can't stop it). Most (all?) thinkers are somewhere in between those extremes, balancing them. I think that Ivan Illich's insight about tools for conviviality are pertinent to how we think about this. Are we expressing ourselves with our "tool for conviviality", or are we mere expressions of the machine, like with Tolkien's ring of power? The problem is further complicated by the fact that even simple tools are inherently problematic. If I have a sufficiently simple hammer (i.e. anyone can make it without division of labour), and use it to hammer in something to express myself by hammering two sticks together somehow, I can then put the hammer down, or give it away—whatever. But what if I'm better at hammering two sticks together than everyone else? Why would they make their own hammer, when they can just get me to do it? Thus deskilling. And then specialisation. It all seems fundamentally inevitable.

Put succinctly—if perhaps overly dramatically—was behavioural modernity simply a death sentence?

[Liminal D]

I'm not convinced of inevitability. I'm more inclined to share the knowledge I have and allow for mistakes than become "specialist". I also feel inherently distrustful of everyone and all motivations; and thus prefer my own deficiency to the alienation gifted by an other's consistency.

Perhaps the delegation you describe is just the inevitability of a logic of submission rather than the the logic of the human species. I'm bold enough to posit myself against that behavioral modernity and to manifest as contention to any assumption of an inevitability. In this regard, I do not believe I'm unique.

[alexander]

I'm not convinced—nor trying to convince!—but it does strike me as a perspective that is worth investigating and thinking about, even if it may just end up in never-ending back-and-forths concerning free will or lack thereof.

To go forward with your suggestion about the inevitability of a logic of submission—what if this logic is inevitable to the human species?


It is here I must make a qualification which I failed to do in the opening post. I am against society, and against submission, as you are. And I have seen others be against those things too. So your point is well made.

Please afford me a digression, and a—perhaps convoluted—non-answer to your point. The Norwegian philosopher PWZ suggested that the tragedy of the human species was that we evolved the required intellect to ask questions, but not the intellect to get any answers (if there are any answers to be had in the first place). Side-stepping any deconstruction of meaning, I think that this is broadly correct. However, someone who has evolved the intellect to ask tormenting questions, may also (d)evolve the intellect to not ask questions. I know this because I have done this, and I have seen others do it. Thus PWZ's account does not accurately describe every single human being. My question then is: if PWZ is nonetheless, as I said, broadly correct—what does that mean? And what does that mean with regards to what you dub "a logic of submission"?

The vast majority of people seem to suffer from a logic of submission. The discipline culture instated by the biopouvoirs that be, doesn't allow for a lot of contemplation or silence. «Civilization is a conspiracy of noise, designed to cover up the uncomfortable silences.» The question I am asking in this thread is then: can there be silence and society? «The everyday activity of slaves reproduces slavery.»

(I am here taking for granted that there must be society, although this can certainly be challenged as well. The (first half of the) conclusion to Maurice Godelier's Infrastructure, Societies, and History is illuminating in this regard, although it doesn't emphasise ecology as much as I would have for our discussion.)