There is a growing genre of tech writing that studiously pretends that a sort of ironic apathy towards technological literacy is the same thing as magical belief systems. It is not. This is an example of this genre.http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/11/in-2029-the-internet-will-make-us-act-like-peasants.html …
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Whoops wrong link for the Zizek thing http://www.autodidactproject.org/other/cynzizek.html …
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What's going on here is an ironic apathy that might in some narrow respects be functionally similar to behavior governed by magical belief systems, but there's no way you can confuse naive magical belief for the typical postmodern varietyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJp86_tj9KQ …
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A big tell is that genuine magical beliefs induce uncritical reverence for wielders of esoteric knowledge. Far from being treated as Merlins, the literate magicians of postmodernity are largely treated with something between patronizing contempt and resentful anger.
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Believing in this kind of neo-medievalist reading of the modern human condition is a bit like believing visitors to Disneyland actually believe in fairies and princesses and large anthropomorphic rodents named Mickey, just because they might wear some larping costumes.
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If you've actually met people with literalist magical thinking beliefs, there is no way you'd be confused about this. There's no way my ironic messing around with horoscopes is anything like my grandparents sincere reliance on horoscopes for major life decisions.
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Basically, this so-called postmodern peasant is simply someone who has some mix of laziness, indifference, and lack of curiosity about, how modern technology works, and a rational assessment that they're probably not smart enough to understand most of it.
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This does not of course preclude belief in specific superstitious ideas and conspiracy theories, but the general, default epistemology is not magical thinking for most people. It is simply a kind of rational laziness that can look like it under certain behavioral lenses.
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its much like druidism. High-level technology left by autistic dwarves, we dont know how they work so its magic we worship and weave mythic narratives about
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The curious thing is when poison irony has real power in the world of humans. Sure the nymag article here is a goofy reach, but is it really so far off to call these interventions "magical thinking"?https://religionnews.com/2019/11/15/the-next-stage-of-witch-resistance-is-here/ …
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