[Xmca-l] Re: Unbelievable: number 19th strain according to Fox News?

Fri Apr 17 15:44:22 PDT 2020

Chuck

I think the tensions in this discussion so far (though quite amenable really, I thought, considering the times we are dying in) aptly reflect the struggle sociocultural theory is going through re domestication of CHAT first signalled in some of the Westernisations of Vygotskyan work but after several decades now looking somewhat morbid. The contradictions underlying CHAT are now perhaps surfacing in the political positions adopted around concrete events.

So there are defenders of Trumpism and the like in the list - as well perhaps as the various seriously contrasting fractions on the ‘left’ in the US; but internationally we have to be much better informed (we have learnt the virus has no boundaries). And we can ignore these political dimensions on this listserve, but only at the cost of showing how irrelevant our community/work then is to the political discourse that is so crucial to our survival these days.

The evidence of ‘life’ (non scholae sed vita discimus …)  on this list is its capacity to address CHAT to the challenges we face, globally, and an analysis of the nexus of science/technology with policy and practice (globally - of course)  is critical. The complete failure (and obvious ignorance or possibly deliberate stupidity) of the speakers from the White House is mirrored round the world in this respect; and we can see mass deaths everywhere – especially of the poor - as the consequence. In the UK the State had the chance to learn from China, and then from Italy: it sat on its hands.And so on around the globe.

This may be a means globally to generate a new solidarity of resistance – but it needs ‘theory’ or a praxis, or concept that can unify it. Yes, Latour’s approach is good and well, but… We already have a global  alliance of finance capital, and we have something like a growing alliance of its political supporters at least on the right (Trump, Modi, Bolsonaro, Johnson, and the petit-fascists in Eastern Europe and Africa, etc…)  - they are organising internationally, but what are we doing (collecting survey results on how folks would like to change their local cultural parameters? Nice and I’m with this but please, can we, and do we have time to expand this ?)

What about us? Who are ‘we’?  Are we irrelevant? What is the point of this if there is no “us”? I am trying to elucidate a collective subject here – and the object is IMO survival.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light, …  to sleep and perchance to dream, good night ,

Julian

PS To those who don’t want to see this discussion on xmca, I’d suggest they have the choice to simply delete everything on this thread – they don’t have to close us down (why would they?). I have done this to quite a few threads coming from xmca which I felt irrelevant to my interests, and it’s really only slightly inconvenient ….

PPS Alfredo: apologies, I did not know you were responsible for moderating this (do you think fraught?) discussion. With the exception of this sentence,  I have in response to your request checked the above post and eliminated irony, humour (mostly, given the need for balance), and sarcasm (but not passion, or hope,  I hope … after only 35 days of ‘shielded’ living, perhaps the kangaroos are getting loose in the top paddock, as they say down under ☺ )

From: <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf of Charles Bazerman <bazerman@education.ucsb.edu>
Reply-To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Date: Friday, 17 April 2020 at 20:41
To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Unbelievable: number 19th strain according to Fox News?

I do not understand why a discussion list devoted a the serious academic consideration of particular theories, analysis, approaches, findings, and applications that fall within its scope should avoid discussion of immediate pressing issues of great importance to the lives of all of our various communities, despite the range of views and analyses that might be brought to bear on the discussion, as long as all the analyses, findings, applications, etc present are presented according to serious academic standards. IF governments and economic institutions--along with individuals involved in their actions-- are core parts of the activity systems that affect how these issues impact our lives, of course these need to be examined, analyzed, evaluated, commented on.  If forums devoted to medicine, epidemiology, economics, politics, international affairs etc can do that, I do not see why those devoted to activity theory should restrict themselves.
What this does mean, however, is that calis need to be made responsibly, and where appropriate documented with credible evidence and sources--whether this has to do with historical namings of viruses as part of the evaluation of political or cultural actions or of the delivery of essential resources for the delivery of services in emergent and evolving circumstances.   This also means that those who object to claims or discussions have an equal responsibility to provide detailed analysis, evidence, and arguments that would locate precisely and support their objections, rather than wishing in a broad stroke to banish whole ill-defined classes of discussion.
The Latour inspired discussion of alternative futures is particularly appropriate to this list and of this moment. While I was writing in this email, for example, in the background I was listening to the Governor of California proposing community structures to come up with plans for recreating the economic and environmental structures post-crisis. As those details emerge, I would very much like to hear the analysis of members of the list to these proposals, as well as similar structures and plans emerging in other jurisdictions in this country and others.

Chuck
----
די פאַרייניקטע שטאַטן איז אַ פאָלק פון ימאַגראַנץ
الولايات المتحدة هي أمة من المهاجرين
Los Estados Unidos es una nación de inmigrantes.

The U.S. is a nation of immigrants.
History will judge.
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On Fri, Apr 17, 2020 at 11:50 AM Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@ils.uio.no<mailto:a.j.gil@ils.uio.no>> wrote:
Dear friends,

It seems that this discussion is raising a number of interesting challenges with regards to how to co-habit this list worth considering, and always in the most respectful manner.

One thing that I think is clear and always takes place is that when members use irony and/or sarcasm, even in as well intentioned as in the post that started this thread, there is the risk that people do not find it appropriate. It is not that this happens always, but obviously is something to consider before posting on those terms. I believe irony is a healthy and important resource to keep with us, just knowing it is, by nature, a double-edged sword.

The other thing, which I believe is more challenging, is that, as it’s been made clear by a few participants, and by the way in the most considerate manner (thanks!), is that elaborations in which political positions are qualified as part of our arguments may be experienced as inappropriate. And I wonder what to do with this as a community? This is particularly difficult because, at least as I see it, disconnecting politics from theory, in a list in which issues of human mind and activity are intrinsically connected to culture, is really not possible. What would we discuss, as a community interested in CHAT related issues, if not issues of politics, of social in/justice, as they relate to our present and futures? And how can we discuss it without making reference to the concrete, specific historical cases, public figures, parties, realities of the countries we live in?

And please, I am not here defending that this thread should continue, or that there would not be reason to feel it is not appropriate. I am just ignorant enough to realize that I have no clue as to what sort of moderation is appropriate here. So I would appreciate if no references to A has said this, or B has done that, are made; but would appreciate a lot a bit of help on this issue. I think that ignoring our colleague’s concerns and sensitivities is not right. But censoring political discussions, if these are voiced as part of an analysis of current matters of socio-historical relevance, does not feel right either. And please, note that many of us are not US citizens or residents, so you’ll have to excuse our ignorance.

Thanks,
Alfredo
From: <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>> on behalf of Edward Wall <ewall@umich.edu<mailto:ewall@umich.edu>>
Reply to: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Date: Friday, 17 April 2020 at 01:07
To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Unbelievable: number 19th strain according to Fox News?

Dear All

     I would appreciate if we could take such discussions off list, It is not that I don’t sympathize with the voiced frustrations, but I wish you would vent them elsewhere and elsewhen.

Ed

Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not, and a sense of humor was provided to console him for what he is.

On Apr 16, 2020, at  5:40 PM, Bonnie Nardi <nardi@ics.uci.edu<mailto:nardi@ics.uci.edu>> wrote:

Watching the debacle of Trump reveals, to me at least, how important class analysis is. Trump is deranged, and his everyday actions fall completely outside all social norms of decency, yet he is consistently supported by (1) his Republican cohorts, (2) big business (Bill Gates: “I don’t rule out voting for Trump if I have to pay too much in taxes”…) and (3) the alienated/uneducated class who’d rather at least have the fun of throwing a brick through the window than put up with any more PC bs (or abortion rights or separation of church and state). A potent and scary mix. The "complicity" Greg mentioned has several sources, all class-based in my view, but oddly variable.

Trump is a symptom of a society running off the rails. He could not have come to power had not the underlying conditions been ripe for it. He wasn’t the lesser of two evils for many voters — he was finally someone who they thought spoke for them whether they occupied corporate boardrooms or NASCAR bleachers or evangelical pews. Europe is also producing fascist-leaning leaders and other places have them firmly ensconced.

It’s damn weird to me that we’ve gone, in my lifetime, from U.S. leadership in gay rights, civil rights, disability rights, and environmentalism,  to the current horrendous situation. (Europe has implemented better environmental policies but the groundwork was laid in the U.S.) I love the U.S. the way a parent still loves a teenager gone bad, but that’s beside the point, this is now global, as Julian points out.  We are all in this together. Neoliberalism deftly divides us (I see it, e.g., in the virus discussions about how old people, are, let’s face it, expendable, and we worry too much about them -- the young need to get back to work, etc. There’s as much of this on reddit as there is from Republicans.)

What to do? The first thing is to rethink what a society can and should be. As part of this exercise I recommend Andre Gorz's Paths to Paradise. It's short, sweet, and prescient. Gorz recognized that environmental problems come from too much frenetic economic activity and that we are spending too much of our lives in alienating workplaces. He recommended a lot more automation and a lot more sharing of wealth. He has been a touchstone for me and others in the Computing within LIMITS community (see https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://computingwithinlimits.org/2020/__;!!Mih3wA!UhKLiuqxacZS-i1G63Rmw9sVVTfmV8xXytMPAw-HxtBfXY_tGPKYTIuBLG5FptVps3871Q$ <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/computingwithinlimits.org/2020/__;!!Mih3wA!X6Z1zy1ywvBUsh4PLzAdjWe7J-gfCIiKCjavnOndv0aE8iksRfWM1OkKDsjdIra1sk7s_Q$> for all the papers going back to 2015).

I think we absolutely have to address the big picture and smaller efforts (like growing meat in labs and so on) are not going to do much.

The pandemic has shown Gorz to be right about the environment -- I have been astonished at how quickly air and water are clearing, how animals are benefiting, etc. I didn't expect all that to happen so fast. In the San Francisco Bay Area where I live, air pollution is down 40%. There's lots of good media reporting on these kinds of changes which are global.

I think we must look to what CHAT has written about personality. I have never really understood that work but I sense that it's important. The culture now produces neoliberal "entrepreneurs" with their self-branding and paddle-your-own-canoe philosophies, but other eras produced other types. I live in a coastal town, and while the beach parking lots are closed, the surfers, walkers, and cyclists are out when they aren't normally out. They are probably getting their work done virtually in less time than normal (without a commute and the distractions of the office), and doing what they love doing!  Maybe we need a world of walkers and surfers -- that personality type. I'd be happy if people were more focused on knitting, and baking, and carpentry -- all those homely ways of producing rather than working, often for very little money, so they can buy everything at the store. Most of it ends up in landfills, by design, or, if it's food, it is so awful it contributes to the chronic diseases. Or working hard at high end jobs and ending up feeling one is entitled to what one has (the Bay Area has been badly affected by this) and that if you are poor it's kind of your own fault.

Yes, I recognize that staying home more has costs and that we can't produce everything ourselves, but the solution to the big picture is not to send everyone off to the workplace for most of their lives but to address issues of violence, production, quality of life, and so on in direct ways. We can't rely on by-products of our current work habits to stem violence, for example. That is just not right.

The post-growth movement in Europe is doing thoughtful work, and I recommend what they write. They cite Gorz (as well as Gandhi, Donella Meadows, and so on), and I think they are on the right track.

Best,

-

Bonnie

Bonnie Nardi
Professor (Emer.)
Department of Informatics
School of Information and Computer Sciences
5088 Bren Hall
UC Irvine 92697-3440
https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://darrouzet-nardi.net/bonnie__;!!Mih3wA!UhKLiuqxacZS-i1G63Rmw9sVVTfmV8xXytMPAw-HxtBfXY_tGPKYTIuBLG5FptUQWKguUg$ <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http:/darrouzet-nardi.net/bonnie__;!!Mih3wA!X6Z1zy1ywvBUsh4PLzAdjWe7J-gfCIiKCjavnOndv0aE8iksRfWM1OkKDsjdIrbdA0uVBQ$>
NEW BOOK: Heteromation and Other Stories of Computing and Capitalism (with Hamid Ekbia, MIT Press, 2017)

On Apr 16, 2020, at 11:14 AM, Julian Williams <julian.williams@manchester.ac.uk<mailto:julian.williams@manchester.ac.uk>> wrote:

Mike, hi

Surely not funny, of course. And we should have an even greater concern about India, where 1.4billion people are supposedly ‘shut down’ ( actually, many millions are walking hundreds of miles ‘home’ from the cities to their villages, wearing masks, but ..  ), and nationalist, anti-Muslim extremism - rampant before the crisis – is growing:

https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.democracynow.org/2020/4/16/arundhati_roy_coronavirus_india?utm_source=Democracy*Now*21&utm_campaign=5b85440b98-Daily_Digest_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fa2346a853-5b85440b98-192514813__;KyU!!Mih3wA!UhKLiuqxacZS-i1G63Rmw9sVVTfmV8xXytMPAw-HxtBfXY_tGPKYTIuBLG5FptVYGmn9Tw$ <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/www.democracynow.org/2020/4/16/arundhati_roy_coronavirus_india?utm_source=Democracy*Now*21&utm_campaign=5b85440b98-Daily_Digest_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fa2346a853-5b85440b98-192514813__;KyU!!Mih3wA!UAMlfob2n_Lh-WqpyVZk7kkIB6_iTHxnCHcoi9KlYa0gsgp20bbtBYAvZg22fqto0zXcVg$>

We can anticipate at least 40 million deaths in India  if this gets going -  and the fascists are planning to emerge dominant from this – all encouraged by your big man in the WH.

These deaths will perhaps make the holocaust seem like small fry – will we ever see trials for crimes against humanity? Perhaps not, because it will be difficult to pin these deaths on to intentional action, but maybe there should be a crime for intentional inaction? The abject state of public health systems (long term) and the incompetence and political management (short term) being the main charges.

Then in the US we can see some analyses of the way the deaths are hugely discriminatory against black/ethnic minorities and the poor: “More than 70 per cent of COVID-19 deaths in the state of Louisiana were African-Americans, despite accounting for just a third of the general population. In New York City it's 17 per cent of deaths, for a 9 per cent share of residents.”https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-16/drum-covid-african-american-affected/12153268__;!!Mih3wA!UhKLiuqxacZS-i1G63Rmw9sVVTfmV8xXytMPAw-HxtBfXY_tGPKYTIuBLG5FptVWqaBv5Q$ <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-16/drum-covid-african-american-affected/12153268__;!!Mih3wA!UAMlfob2n_Lh-WqpyVZk7kkIB6_iTHxnCHcoi9KlYa0gsgp20bbtBYAvZg22fqs1xrPL7g$>  Globally translated – this will become a terrible indictment of the world’s structure of poverty:

I had to pause the other day – is this kind of admittedly political posting appropriate to xmca listserve’s concerns: I think that’s a question for xmca – “are we/is xmca relevant to the millions of deaths likely as the pandemic spreads to the poor nations?” The question is moot – only you people out there can say, or do by saying.

Julian

PS It’s good that in some parts of the world this information is still getting out. The middle east, and Africa, in many parts, maybe is more difficult.

From: <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>> on behalf of mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu<mailto:mcole@ucsd.edu>>
Reply-To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Date: Thursday, 16 April 2020 at 18:36
To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: FW: Unbelievable: number 19th strain according to Fox News?

There is absolutely nothing funny about the crypto fascists running this government, Julian.
Trump is pushing towar monarchy in a fashion that might be funny if it were a Gilbert and Sullivan
musical.
mike

On Wed, Apr 15, 2020 at 2:27 PM Julian Williams <julian.williams@manchester.ac.uk<mailto:julian.williams@manchester.ac.uk>> wrote:
Dear all,

Kellyanne Conway … I think I heard her name a while back – what a Con, Ha ha?

But perhaps not so very funny, right?

God help us – it all fits – and now international pandemic and the next step is to defenestrate our only World Health Organisation…

I can’t see anything short of a massive rebellion being an appropriate response… get those idiots out of the white house?

Julian

Subject: Fwd: Unbelievable

White House counselor Kellyanne Conway falsely suggested Wednesday that there had been 18 previous strains of the novel coronavirus as she defended President Trump’s decision to suspend funding to the World Health Organization.

"This is covid-19, not covid-1, folks, and so you would think the people charged with the World Health Organization facts and figures would be on top of that,” Conway said during an interview on Fox News.

In fact, the “19” at the end of the virus’s name denotes that it was discovered in 2019, not that it is the 19th strain of the virus. At its outset, it was referred to by health officials as the “2019 novel coronavirus.”

--
the creation of utopias – and their exhaustive criticism – is the proper and distinctive method of sociology.  H.G.Wells
---------------------------------------------------
For archival resources relevant to the research of myself and other members of LCHC, visit
lchc.ucsd.edu<http://lchc.ucsd.edu/>.  For archival materials and a narrative history of the research of LCHC, visit lchcautobio.ucsd.edu<http://lchcautobio.ucsd.edu/>.

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