'structural'

[luka]

I want to posit ideas as actors and agents in their own right but agents who are often co-opted by larger interests and made to serve and are corrupted in the process

But I also want to say ideas can co-opt individuals and make those individuals serve them and propagate them

 

[shiels]

No. I don't have a position. I'm trying to feel out the positions other people have come to and see if I like them enough to adopt them.

you ever look at systems theory. emergence? all that? systems and stuff

 

[craner]

But actors and agents create, sustain and adopt ideas.

Ideas as actors and agents in their own right is close to the use of the term 'structural, isn't it?

An impersonal social arrangement that sustains an unconscious worldview that implicates individuals whether they know it or not.

 

[luka]

You are reducing all basic human actions to acquisition and conquest, and then asking me to prove or disprove that ideas are only adopted by the people in control to disguise this?

I want to find out how Craner thinks it happens. The thing that worries me about your position is that you seem to wave away any notion of power and vested interests.

 

[version]

But I also want to say ideas can co-opt individuals and make those individuals serve them and propagate them

 

[luka]

But actors and agents create, sustain and adopt ideas.

Ideas as actors and agents in their own right is close to the use of the term 'structural, isn't it?

An impersonal social arrangement that sustains an unconscious worldview that implicates individuals whether they know it or not.

I'm not against a structural understanding of how it happens, if that's where we end up. I find it a seductive notion.

 

[luka]

Yeah, like that.

 

[craner]

It is related to Gramsci's Hegemony.

 

[luka]

It is related to Gramsci's Hegemony.

What is?

 

[craner]

I want to find out how Craner thinks it happens. The thing that worries me about your position is that you seem to wave away any notion of power and vested interests.

No, I say that they are multiple and contradictory, as are the results.

 

[version]

Maybe you should look at examples specific to yourself and extrapolate from there? Think of how you first encountered an idea then try to chart how you've interacted with it throughout your life.

 

[shiels]

Banning myself from this thread for the next six hours. When I come back somebody better have worked out how it happens

 

[luka]

No, I say that they are multiple and contradictory, as are the results.

Yes, no one would argue with that but theres something hiding behind that truism.

 

[craner]

What is?

The idea of a structural economy of ideas imposed on the masses by an anonymous and manipulative ruling class.

 

[craner]

Maybe you should look at examples specific to yourself and extrapolate from there? Think of how you first encountered an idea then try to chart how you've interacted with it throughout your life.

It happened by encountering different ideas to the ones I originally imbibed.

 

[luka]

The idea of a structural economy of ideas imposed on the masses by an anonymous and manipulative ruling class.

That's what Gramsci says?

 

[craner]

Banning myself from this thread for the next six hours. When I come back somebody better have worked out how it happens

How what happens?

 

[craner]

That's what Gramsci says?

More or less. That's what I'm saying until some lurking Gramsci scholar comes out of the shadows.

 

[craner]

Maybe the difference between us is that I think there is more chaos than control in the world.

 

[luka]

How what happens?

Reality