William Davies touches on a number of important topics included in debates or discussions of our current epistemological crises, but somehow, he still doesn't, in a way I think Arendt would be forced to, confront the power dynamics inherent in the problematic he himself lays out. Davies does well to point out the combination of financial priorities with those of speed, early in his discussion. And this is of obvious importance, when the scale and intensity of these priorities are so dominant. But while he talks about the importance of consensus, pragmatism and how these and other things factor into decision-making, he doesn't really even bring up what the decisions bear on in the real world until towards the end of the talk, when he brings up climate change at 35:19, and the COVID controversy (I forget when, here). In both of these hugely impactful crises, despite the fact that there has been a great deal said and published about them, in one case,(climate change) media conglomerates control the flow of information so that it is still conceivable that there are large parts of the population that are unaware of the nature of the problem. There is no involvement of a democratic response, because information is not being shared in proportion to its importance or its significance for a democratic population. So, as in a mathematical equation, the signs or markers for "democracy" cancel or are cancelled out, and we are left with Arendt's totalitarian world, which is some sense, just an elaboration of Gramsci's hegemony. With COVID, where 4 per cent of the world's population experienced 20 per cent of world COVID deaths, it can be said that much of the population simply wished to stay ignorant of science and medical expertise, and so there were not fertile or adequate roots in the population for an appropriate response. It must be added, however, that even the government's responses were often inept, misinformed, or ill-timed, and occurred within a business context of high-stakes pharmaceutical marketing and distribution. All in all, Davies does a good job of speaking to the limits both of expertise and discourse in what are non-democratic and even anti-democratic contexts.
Thank you for posting. Didn’t Freud say all thought Is based in emotion ? To be given neuro scientific evidence to support this making it more respectable. Or indeed Nietzsche say similar ? I like the point about the parallel state and the central banks. Great talk. Fast thinking -,impulsive - reminded of the two systems fast and slow.
William Davies touches on a number of important topics included in debates or discussions of our current epistemological crises, but somehow, he still doesn't, in a way I think Arendt would be forced to, confront the power dynamics inherent in the problematic he himself lays out.
Davies does well to point out the combination of financial priorities with those of speed, early in his discussion. And this is of obvious importance, when the scale and intensity of these priorities are so dominant.
But while he talks about the importance of consensus, pragmatism and how these and other things factor into decision-making, he doesn't really even bring up what the decisions bear on in the real world until towards the end of the talk, when he brings up climate change at 35:19, and the COVID controversy (I forget when, here).
In both of these hugely impactful crises, despite the fact that there has been a great deal said and published about them, in one case,(climate change) media conglomerates control the flow of information so that it is still conceivable that there are large parts of the population that are unaware of the nature of the problem. There is no involvement of a democratic response, because information is not being shared in proportion to its importance or its significance for a democratic population. So, as in a mathematical equation, the signs or markers for "democracy" cancel or are cancelled out, and we are left with Arendt's totalitarian world, which is some sense, just an elaboration of Gramsci's hegemony.
With COVID, where 4 per cent of the world's population experienced 20 per cent of world COVID deaths, it can be said that much of the population simply wished to stay ignorant of science and medical expertise, and so there were not fertile or adequate roots in the population for an appropriate response. It must be added, however, that even the government's responses were often inept, misinformed, or ill-timed, and occurred within a business context of high-stakes pharmaceutical marketing and distribution.
All in all, Davies does a good job of speaking to the limits both of expertise and discourse in what are non-democratic and even anti-democratic contexts.
Thank you for posting. Didn’t Freud say all thought Is based in emotion ? To be given neuro scientific evidence to support this making it more respectable. Or indeed Nietzsche say similar ?
I like the point about the parallel state and the central banks. Great talk.
Fast thinking -,impulsive - reminded of the two systems fast and slow.