[MG] Come together or reach out - was cascading etc.

[Michael Allan]

> > ... Less obvious is what to choose in regard to one's *physical*
> > disposition in public space:
> >
> >    (i) Converge, come together with those who agree.
> >
> >   (ii) Diverge, spread out amongst others.  Reach out to those who
> >        agree across the intervening distances.
 
Thomas von der Elbe wrote:
> Both are interrelated, are they not? ...

I do not think so.  In every case I can think of, (i) and (ii) are
distinct personal choices.  Other choices are available aside from
these, such as non-participation, or participation in private space.
But those have no bearing on the rule below.)

> ... We reach out in order to come together. In the end we want 6
> billion people to come together. (Come together in the public spere
> as a whole. If this happens to be in a single forum or platform
> ... fine, but it probably will exceed even the internet as a whole.)
> To all come together we have to reach out to each other. So I agree,
> that (ii) is very important to achieve (i).

I still think we're trapped in an unfortunate misunderstanding. (!)
Either I do not speak precisely enough, or you do not answer to
precisely what I say.  I say that the physical distances that enable
us (as people) to permeate a complex society are valuable and cannot
be traded for technical or administrative convenience without
impunity.  The kinds of proximity to avoid are physical.  I say
nothing of mental states.  When I say that (as a rule) we should not
"come together", I do not mean we should not "agree", "understand" or
"tolerate" each other or anything like that.  To illustrate, I make my
corrections in paraphrase:

  Both are [distinct choices], are they not? We reach out in order to
  [not] come together. In the end we want 6 billion people to [remain
  physically separate]. ([Remain separate] in the public spere as a
  whole. If [it] happens ... [that a few must unite] in a single forum
  or platform ... fine, but it [would be better if they could avoid
  that].)  To all [remain separate] we have to reach out to [those who
  agree].

Again, I claim this as an absolute rule.  Mutatis mutandis, any choice
of (i) when (ii) is available will have two detrimental consequences:

  * Loss of personal freedom.
  * Lessening of prospects for collective action.

Is this not correct?  Can anyone think a case where a person could
choose (i) when (ii) was available, and not suffer these consequences?
Thomas?  Anyone?

> And these are the most efficient means I see atm (so imo not a
> separate topic):

This is only because you misunderstand the choice I am speaking of, or
I misunderstand what you mean by tagging.  I am trying, but I cannot
see how tagging relates to the choice between (i) and (ii), or offers
an exception to the rule of always favouring (ii).  It still looks
like a separate topic.
 
> > > about tagging: Individuals expressing on their pages, what
> > > topics they are interested in, what communities they are in,
> > > what polls they are active in. And the same for each of the four
> > > aspects. Now this seems very helpfull for iii.  and iv. (and
> > > much more) because its kind of hard to get this info out of
> > > plain textual positions. A fifth category comes to my mind:
> > > Personal values ... very expressive and a bit different than
> > > topics, are they not? I remember DemocracyLab had this
> > > integrated.

BTW - I enabled tagging in the wiki: http://zelea.com/w/Property:Topic
The design of the tooling that Thomas speaks of was floated here:
http://metagovernment.org/pipermail/start_metagovernment.org/2011-May/004015.html
http://metagovernment.org/pipermail/start_metagovernment.org/2011-May/004029.html

Still curious.  Am I the only one unable to reach those 2 URLs?

-- 
Michael Allan

Toronto, +1 416-699-9528
http://zelea.com/



Originally posted to the mailing list of the Metagovernment Project:
http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_metagovernment.org