I also wonder if Cybernetics is the correct term. What I am attempting to describe could be considered to be akin to Biopolitics, but I don't think has too much to do with the regulation of biological life. It's more of a way of regulating the flow of society so that it becomes organized in such a manner that secures and maintains this or that social order. The definition, "the science of communications and automatic control systems in both machines and living things", is somewhat apt, as well as that the field of study has been applied to social systems, but I wonder as to whether the existent field wouldn't serve to confuse matters. I have yet to come up with another term, though.

Can you try to describe it better? I'm still not getting what you're trying to explain. Not a criticism. I just need to understand it better.

The idea, I think, is that social control is primary to socio-political activity and that it is primarily maintained through the regulation of the rhythm of society. It's, of course, much more complex than that, but that is, perhaps, the best one sentence summary that I can give.

I haven't actually read this text by Giorgio Agamben, the text where this idea is outlined by Michel Foucault, and am somewhat hesitant to use Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari's terminology from the text that I have read, A Thousand Plateaus, but, I am willing to posit that social control is primarily secured and maintained through the utilization of various apparatuses. Agamben defines an apparatus well as "literally anything that has in some way the capacity to capture, orient, determine, intercept, model, control, or secure the gestures, behaviors, opinions, or discourses of living beings." You can think of one as an aggregated set of machinations that get people to act in a manner that is beneficial to the set of people who design them. What I am further willing to posit is that much of what is actually happening within both the realms of the political and the social is that such an automated form of control has been attempted to have been put into effect and more or less everyone else is attempting to render it inoperative. Though I would suggest that such ideas are fairly sapient, I would warn against believing in the machine metaphor too directly. There are actually people out there who set in motion the course of events which result in the attempt at subjugation and the attempt at liberation from it. Being said, I also think that there is something to the pathological interpretation of the concept of an apparatus. It is the utilization of such machinations that creates a certain degree of cult pathology within the sets of society who attempt to put them into effect. In a way, they believe in their grand designs. The London Psychogeographical Association was certainly idiosyncratic. Though it was to some extent, it was not entirely absurd. Liberating people from things like the cult pathology of what this or that statue or architectural landmark was supposed to produce in the world, though hazarding a certain degree of cult pathology in its own right, actually made a certain degree of sense, as there just as well might have been biopolitical operations that relied upon established cultural symbols. People often become lost in things like that, though.

In a way, the actions of the LPA were kind of like the Hippie plan to levitate the Pentagon. What, as theatre, such an act shows people is that suspending the rule of American militarism would let them create a more liberal and equitable society. What it also revealed was that the most effective way to do so was to liberate the American populace from the cult pathology of militarism itself, the easiest way to do so being to suspend its horizon of meaning. While in either jest or delusion, it did make a certain degree of sense.

Being said, because such forms of protest, through whatever is done in response to them, can so often produce a situation that is, at best, fairly quixotic, I would also warn against believing in only them.

To come back to my original idea, what I am suggesting is at stake, when there ought to be a generally agreed upon assumption that all parties ought to be attempting to bring about as liberal of a society as possible, in both the realm of the political and the social, is control. It is primarily secured and maintained through apparatuses. I stand by what I said before, which is that you can think of one as an aggregated set of machinations that get people to act in a manner that is beneficial to the set of people who design them.

That social relations and politics are predicated upon that social capital is accumulated, maintained, and wielded as a weapon of conquest, however, is precisely what the aforementioned "cult pathology" is. I would also warn against letting my nihilistic assessment of the Postmodern condition become a form of Nihilism. People ought to be so-called "idealists". They ought to think that social relations and politics ought to be predicated on that all parties agree to create as liberal of a society as possible.

In the meantime, however, I would suggest to continue to render apparatuses of social control inoperative.

That is all that I have to say about this for now. Feel free to proceed from there.

In the meantime, however, I would suggest to continue to render apparatuses of social control inoperative — thewonder

Sure. But as I explained to you on the other threads, you've got no chance in a million of achieving that as long as you don't understand what those apparatuses are, how they operate, and who controls them.

Fair enough, but I am just leaving this thread open to a conversation as to what I have highlighted as Cybernetics. As I don't think that anyone else will comment on it, I'll probably just be leaving. Cya later, I guess.

the text where this idea is outlined by Michel Foucault, and am somewhat hesitant to use Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari's terminology from the text that I have read, A Thousand Plateaus, but, I am willing to posit that social control is primarily secured and maintained through the utilization of various apparatuses. — thewonder

Foucault was often credited for the conception "apparatus", I think. So let's settle on that. What repulsed the readers, if not the scholars, of political philosophy is, the word itself is meant to be a warning, a sinister existence both physical and psychological. We're in a matrix, so to speak. And there is a network or networks of structures in place already planned and designed for you -- you believe you're thinking for yourself, you're a free agent, you plan for the future, the results of your hard work and time spent is all credited to you. But you don't see that there's an apparatus, a machination, running in the background that's already planned your actions and decisions. Look up the docile bodies.

If it sounds like a science fiction, it's because the apparatus narrative hasn't been already brought down to the common people narrative. The philosophy behind this is to blame. It's hard to articulate something that exists both in physical structures and in your psyche (your mind, soul, and spirit -- to borrow a dictionary definition) without sounding like a caricature, or worse, delusional.

You can think of one as an aggregated set of machinations that get people to act in a manner that is beneficial to the set of people who design them. — thewonder

This could be unintentional. We can argue that the intent of the apparatuses is to protect the establishment itself. Remember, the machinations relegates humans as subjects, including the ones operating the machines. This is a horrifying thing to say if we actually let this discussion go down that path.

What I am further willing to posit is that much of what is actually happening within both the realms of the political and the social is that such an automated form of control has been attempted to have been put into effect and more or less everyone else is attempting to render it inoperative. — thewonder

Too late. The machination is in place. I haven't read @Apollodorus post about this. But if he could post it here, that can help.

Maybe cybernetics is just a woman who will give birth to a Übermensch, as Nietzsche wanted. Nietzsche did not speak of the "meat" Übermensch.

The more things can be controlled, the more out of control things are. My position is that we live in an anarchy, and unfortunately there are no rules or governance to prevent folks from forming governments.

I follow your posts with interest and confusion, as I do several posters. But it seems to me that the desire to mechanise the human is doomed to frustration. Humans are subject to social control but the social is merely the generalised human. So social control acts like locking the handlebars on a bicycle; the direction is controlled but balance is lost. The human psyche as society can be reduced to the mentality of the dictator, but the mentality of the dictator cannot be stable. Social collapse is inevitable.

Self-control is all about letting go.

When nothing is done, then all will be well. — Lao Tzu

I haven't read @Apollodorus post about this. But if he could post it here, that can help. — Caldwell

I tend to be of the opinion that in order to render social control inoperative it would be necessary to identify what the apparatuses are through which control is exerted, how they operate, and who controls them. I haven't had the time to post anything on this yet. But I shall endeavor to do so at the earliest opportunity provided that there is genuine interest in it.

what the apparatuses are through which control is exerted, how they operate, and who controls them. — Apollodorus

Habermas calls such "steering media" - money and power for example:

which bypass consensus-oriented communication with a 'symbolic generalisation of rewards and punishments'. After this process the lifeworld "is no longer needed for the coordination of action". This results in humans ('lifeworld actors') losing a sense of responsibility with a chain of negative social consequences. Lifeworld communications lose their purpose becoming irrelevant for the coordination of central life processes. This has the effect of ripping the heart out of social discourse, allowing complex differentiation to occur but at the cost of social pathologies

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Theory_of_Communicative_Action

Habermas calls such "steering media" - money and power for example — Pantagruel

Yes, but it isn't entirely clear who or what is ultimately responsible or what the solution might be. And, at the end of the day, it's only a theory. I for one can't see much difference between Habermas and neo-Marxism. But I could be wrong.

I tend to be of the opinion that in order to render social control inoperative it would be necessary to identify what the apparatuses are through which control is exerted, how they operate, and who controls them. — Apollodorus

There is no "who", the apparatuses are automatic -- like I said, even the actors in it are unaware of the machinations.

I like your description of an apparatus. I've included my warning against believing in the metaphor too directly as I went quite mad a while ago and something that I had done was to have hallucinated machines that I became fixated on destroying. I even wrote a series of texts to create an assemblage for that specific purpose. It turned out to be some of the most arcane political philosophy ever written by that account.

I have chosen machination to describe an apparatus for its double meaning. It's difficult for me to express how it's as if there is an actual psychic machine that has been projected into the world and simultaneously that there are actual people who attempt to set things out so that the world gets controlled in some way or another. I both like and dislike the machine metaphor. It is as if there is a manifest collective psychic phenomenon that, in itself, has secured control. At the same time, I wonder if that doesn't hazard a certain madness. Ultimately, there are people out there who attempt to conscript others as their subjects. We can speak of an apparatus, but what is one, really? I do kind of suspect that it is as if they exist, though.

I don't know that I would say that apparatuses merely protect the establishment itself. They exist within the ultra-Left just as they do in mafias as they do within any system of law. There are establishments who have secured greater control, having been engaged in such things for longer, but it is not just they who either create or let them become created and are either utilized by them or put them to use. Felix Guattari once titled an article, "Everyone wants to be a fascist." In a way, I think that you can think of Fascism as an apparatus in itself. That people believe that everyone can only attempt to organize society so that it is to their liking creates a certain cult pathology in relation to control. I am not speaking of Fascism as it has come to be historically understood. I'm speaking of it more in the abstract. The Wilhelm Reich quote about the "fascist in our head", I think, is all the more terrifying if we can consider Fascism as an apparatus. There's a certain optimism to it as well, however, in that the battle is almost purely psychological. It's just something that I think about from time to time.

What I'm also positing of apparatuses is that, upon discovering their machinations, you necessarily are making an attempt to render them inoperative. A person's mind is the only that they have to live with at all times. You can only seek to liberate it. That's kind of a speculative theory, though.

There is no "who", the apparatuses are automatic -- like I said, even the actors in it are unaware of the machinations. — Caldwell

Yes, but nothing in human society is "automatic", everything is a product of human agency.

Though I am not trying to perplex anyone, I can understand that I might. I'm glad that they generate interest, though.

I think that social deviance kind of gets at what you've gleaned. You couldn't have a film like Scorpio Rising without there being further and further automation over social and political life. People often revel, or even celebrate such cultures, but I feel as if they're kind of a tragic expression of a lack of freedom.

A person's mind is the only that they have to live with at all times. You can only seek to liberate it. That's kind of a speculative theory, though. — thewonder

I don't think it's that speculative. As I said, "know thyself" is the start to any attempt to attain true knowledge and freedom. Self-knowledge is the only thing by which you can determine who or what you are, who the others are, and what the relation between yourself and the others is. Situational awareness is invariably based on self-knowledge. Without that you can't get anywhere.

I read some Habermas ages ago, but can't remember any of it as of right now. Maybe I should look back into it?

Situational awareness is definitely key. I know that I often forget that there are conclusions that I have drawn because of the thought I have felt a need to put into certain ideas or events that other people wouldn't have come to just by virtue of not having the same experience.

I'm not sure that I fully agree that everything is a product of human agency, however. There are always, of course, actors, but I will say that it is often as if some other emergent phenomenon is really in control.

I read some Habermas ages ago, but can't remember any of it as of right now. Maybe I should look back into it? — thewonder

You can if you want, but I doubt it's worth it. To me Habermas sounds just like neo-Marxism phrased slightly differently to the usual stuff.

For all of the critiques there are to make of Marxists, it's not as if they never have perceptive ideas.

For all of the critiques there are to make of Marxists, it's not as if they never have perceptive ideas. — thewonder

They may have perceptive ideas but less perceptive practical solutions. All Marxist states have ended up in abject failure.

What I'm also positing of apparatuses is that, upon discovering their machinations, you necessarily are making an attempt to render them inoperative. — thewonder

Could be. Good intuition.

You can if you want, but I doubt it's worth it. To me Habermas sounds just like neo-Marxism phrased slightly differently to the usual stuff. — Apollodorus

Habermas' theory of communicative action is much more anthropological.

Habermas' theory of communicative action is much more anthropological. — Pantagruel

Marxist thought seems to have spread to many other fields including anthropology, e.g. social anthropology, making it difficult in many cases to distinguish between one and the other.

It's been common practice since the time of G B Shaw to both criticize and defend Marxism along the lines of "Yes, this or that element of Marxism, e.g., economic theory is bad but its political philosophy or social philosophy is sound, etc." This seems to be Habermas' approach too. So, I wouldn't classify Habermas as too different from Marxism. More like a sub-current of Marxism.

there being further and further automation over social and political life. — thewonder

Well I question this automation idea.

There is no "who", the apparatuses are automatic -- like I said, even the actors in it are unaware of the machinations. — Caldwell

I question the mechanical metaphor.

Consider a river that has a course, and we see that the course changes by the oxbow lakes and so on, but the course is stable over a lifetime, most of the time. But there is a day of revolution when the bank is breached and the meander is short-circuited. There is no who and no apparatus either. The river operates on itself, and the river is the water and the course. A river is never broken.

Machinations are appropriate to political thought because thought is mechanical; but life is not.

I like the general sentiment of what you have expressed, but am not entirely sure that it applies.

In so far that there is social control, something or someone must arbitrate it. It is not as if life is literally automated. It's that various mechanisms are developed so that it becomes in some way or another.

I think that apparatuses arise within networks of influence, through the development of technology, because of legal systems, and even through philosophy in the creation of various ideologies. I think that the idea of an apparatus is that it becomes as if there is something else that comes to be what is in control. A network of social relations comes to create its own codes of conduct, internet access becomes integral to a person's capacity to find their place within the world, the concept of justice become a society of discipline and punishment, or a revolutionary political philosophy becomes a state-sanctioned orthodoxy. There are always still people involved, but I do think that apparatuses exist.

They don't just do so within political life. Consider the various symbolic orders, imagined hierarchies, and particular doctrines within the arts. I wish that what you have said is true, and life were merely to flow as a river, but the Postmodern condition, I think, exists because of cybernetic social control. There are always other ways of life, however.

The first message transferred over the Baltimore-Washington telegraph line was "What hath God wrought". This, to some, may seem as a historical curiosity, but I think that we ought to take the message of foreboding seriously. By granting people the potential to communicate over long distances, Samuel Morse had created the technology by which information warfare could be waged. Consider the catastrophic impact that propaganda has had on the world or even the cult pathology generated by the Cold War.

As much as I should like to believe that people just don't lose their humanity, the sheer number of genocides in the Twentieth Century would feign prove otherwise.

What has been said ought to be true, though. People ought never to become as machines of destruction. We ought to think that someday they won't. We only ought to, though.

That's what I think about this, anyways.

So as to leave off here, I'd say that an apparatus is akin to cult pathology. Pathology can be compared to a set of ideas that become as if they were true because they are believed to be so. Cult as an adjective refers to a confusion of obsession with reverence within any given venerated ideology or worldview. Earlier, I spoke of Fascism in the abstract. Yukio Mishima can be said to have embodied such an idée fixe.j His suicide was truly a subversive act. It was the culminate manifestation of such an idea, one that will result in its disintegration. There isn't just Fascism, however. Other forms of social control will also have to be destroyed, hopefully without such desperation.

It'd seem that living well outside of however we should like define systems of control will do us better than anything else, as it'd show people what they really want, which is to have the freedom to do so. That's just the trick, though: living well and having the freedom to do so.

I don't have anything else to say for now, and, so, will be off unless anyone comments on this. So long, I guess. 'Til we meet again!