Final 5 for Pogomix's "Mellowbrick" Video Competition

You can see the final 5 and vote here. My 2 faves are neck-and-neck at the top. Here's one of them:

Telecomix and We Rebuild

Telecomix seems perhaps to be a subset of We Rebuild, or a term associated with certain news and other functions? Among other efforts, Telecomix worked to provide alternate communication channels during the Mubarek regime's shut-down of Egyptian internet access (see Egypt/Main Page).

We Rebuild describes itself:

We Rebuild is a decentralized cluster of net activists who have joined forces to collaborate on issues concerning access to a free Internet without intrusive surveillance. . . . There are no leaders, nor members. We Rebuild is simply an international chaotic event, and our actions can not be predicted in detail. We are a flow of passions, and we sometimes refer to our driving force as “data-love”.

. . . . The We Rebuild initiative promotes and participates in building the Internet to be accessible for everyone everywhere, enabling true freedom of speech. This is something which can not be guaranteed by states or corporations, but requires the polyvocal voice of the Internet. You will run in to us when you least expect it, especially if you are making decisions about the Internet. But since our strategies are based in the passionate sharing of ideas, you will most likely be happy to see us.

More at the WeRebuild wiki and the Telecomix News Agency; see also Datalove.

Happy Solstice

To celebrate, here's some video of our galaxy edge-on, shot by a farmer/photographer in S. Dakota:

SCOPE Basel 2011 Catalogue

Here's their embed-able, virtual version; roll over one of the bottom corners to take it to full-screen:

Artists Interview Assange

. . . at length, at e-flux here and here.

(Image: "Proposal for a Multi-Jurisdictional Logo: Can a visual presence be created, and dismantled, based on domains based in different jurisdictions, switching on and off? Courtesy of Metahaven.")

An excerpt:

Censorship is not only a helpful economic signal [i.e., if an organization is expending resources to suppress info, then it may be surmised that the org fears that the info might reduce its power and therefore that, out of the very large domain of info in the world, such suppressed info might be expected to be among the most useful in bringing about change; thus, censorship is always also] an opportunity, because it reveals a fear of reform. And if an organization is expressing a fear of reform, it is also expressing the fact that it can be reformed. So, when you see the Chinese government engaging in all sorts of economic work to suppress information passing in and out of China on the internet, the Chinese government is also expressing a belief that it can be reformed by information flows, which is hopeful but easily understandable because China is still a political society. It is not yet a fiscalized society in the way that the United States is, for example. The basic power relationships of the United States and other Western countries are described by formal fiscal relationships, for example one organization has a contract with another organization, or it has a bank account, or is engaged in a hedge. Those relationships cannot be changed by moderate political shifts. The shift needs to be large enough to turn contracts into paper, or change money flows.

HUO: And that’s why you mentioned when we last spoke that you’re optimistic about China?

JA: Correct, and optimistic about any organization, or any country, that engages in censorship. We see now that the US State Department is trying to censor us. We can also look at it in the following way. The birds and the bees, and other things that can’t actually change human power relationships, are free. They’re left unmolested by human beings because they don’t matter. In places where speech is free, and where censorship does not exist or is not obvious, the society is so sewn up—so depoliticized, so fiscalized in its basic power relationships—that it doesn’t matter what you say. And it doesn’t matter what information is published. It’s not going to change who owns what or who controls what. And the power structure of a society is by definition its control structure. So in the United States, because of the extraordinary fiscalization of relationships in that country, it matters little who wins office. You’re not going to suddenly empty a powerful individual’s bank account. Their money will stay there. Their stockholdings are going to stay there, bar a revolution strong enough to void contracts.

And:

. . . there is an idea that these great American companies, Facebook and Twitter, gave the Egyptian people this revolution and liberated Egypt. But the most popular guide for the revolutionaries was a document that spread throughout the soccer clubs in Egypt, which themselves were the most significant revolutionary community groups. If you read this document, you see that on the first page it says to be careful not to use Twitter and Facebook as they are being monitored. On the last page: do not use Twitter or Facebook. That is the most popular guide for the Egyptian revolution. And then we see Hillary Clinton trying to say that this was a revolution by Twitter and Facebook.

Much more at the links above.

B.t.w., there's a new website providing clear, helpful info about the status of the legal proceedings against Assange, at swedenversusassange.com.

A Secular Humanist Declaration

Just came across this:

A Secular Humanist Declaration
Issued in 1980 by the
Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism
(now the Council for Secular Humanism)

* * * * *

Secular humanism is not a dogma or a creed. There are wide differences of opinion among secular humanists on many issues. Nevertheless, there is a loose consensus with respect to several propositions. We are apprehensive that modern civilization is threatened by forces antithetical to reason, democracy, and freedom.

* * * * *

We are nevertheless surrounded by doomsday prophets of disaster, always wishing to turn the clock back - they are anti science, anti freedom, anti human. In contrast, the secular humanistic outlook is basically melioristic, looking forward with hope rather than backward with despair. We are committed to extending the ideals of reason, freedom, individual and collective opportunity, and democracy throughout the world community. The problems that humankind will face in the future, as in the past, will no doubt be complex and difficult. However, if it is to prevail, it can only do so by enlisting resourcefulness and courage. Secular humanism places trust in human intelligence rather than in divine guidance. Skeptical of theories of redemption, damnation, and reincarnation, secular humanists attempt to approach the human situation in realistic terms: human beings are responsible for their own destinies. We believe that it is possible to bring about a more humane world, one based upon the methods of reason and the principles of tolerance, compromise, and the negotiations of difference.

* * * * *

The secular humanist recognizes the central role of morality in human life; indeed, ethics was developed as a branch of human knowledge long before religionists proclaimed their moral systems based upon divine authority. The field of ethics has had a distinguished list of thinkers contributing to its development: from Socrates, Democritus, Aristotle, Epicurus, and Epictetus, to Spinoza, Erasmus, Hume, Voltaire, Kant, Bentham, Mill, G.E. Moore, Bertrand Russell, John Dewey, and others. There is an influential philosophical tradition that maintains that ethics is an autonomous field of inquiry, that ethical judgments can be formulated independently of revealed religion, and that human beings can cultivate practical reason and wisdom and, by its application, achieve lives of virtue and excellence. Moreover, philosophers have emphasized the need to cultivate an appreciation for the requirements of social justice and for an individual's obligations and responsibilities toward others. Thus, secularists deny that morality needs to be deduced from religious belief or that those who do not espouse a religious doctrine are immoral. For secular humanists, ethical conduct is, or should be, judged by critical reason, and their goal is to develop autonomous and responsible individuals, capable of making their own choices in life based upon an understanding of human behavior. Morality that is not God-based need not be antisocial, subjective, or promiscuous, nor need it lead to the breakdown of moral standards. Although we believe in tolerating diverse lifestyles and social manners, we do not think they are immune to criticism. Nor do we believe that any one church should impose its views of moral virtue and sin, sexual conduct, marriage, divorce, birth control, or abortion, or legislate them for the rest of society. . . . Secular humanist ethics maintains that it is possible for human beings to lead meaningful and wholesome lives for themselves and in service to their fellow human beings without the need of religious commandments or the benefit of clergy.

* * * * *

We recognize the need for intellectual modesty and the willingness to revise beliefs in the light of criticism. Thus consensus is sometimes attainable. While emotions are important, we need not resort to the panaceas of salvation, to escape through illusion, or to some desperate leap toward passion and violence. We deplore the growth of intolerant sectarian creeds that foster hatred. In a world engulfed by obscurantism and irrationalism it is vital that the ideals of the secular city not be lost.

Full text at the Council for Secular Humanism (image by eli maaravi). Says it was endorsed by Isaac Asimov, Arthur Danto, Richard Kostelanetz, B. F. Skinner, et al.; I endorse it, too.

Mark Von Schlegell Talk

at the ArtCenter (possibly the Art Center College in Pasadena, CA?), in a series of videos uploaded to YouTube in April, 2007.



In the 4th vidi, the excerpt he reads from his first published article, "The Next Revolution and the Great Two-Faced American," referring to Pres. Lincoln, prompted me to wonder, do we not recognize some Machiavels because they happen to have been successfully benevolent? I hate hypocrisy, deception, manipulation, etc. when they're used, e.g., to lie us into war; but I want to forgive them when they're used, as Lincoln did, to end slavery. Could there be "good" psychopaths – people unimpeded by empathy or remorse, but who happen to get their jollies from creating rather than exploiting and destroying?

Oh, yeah; they're called artists.

Riot Kissers

"She had actually been injured," [said the father of the male kisser]. A riot police officer had knocked her down with a shield, he said. "He lay down next to her to comfort her. She was crying, and he just kissed her to calm her down."

Details at CNN.