i think @kalladomcdowell has it: as we deal more and more with the multidimensional spaces of machine learning, we need the access the multidimensional thought styles of magic and animism.
i wrote some thoughts on this today actually also https://robotface.substack.com/p/the-big-sleep
Interesting that for most people this free associated with literal magic, pagan spiritualities, animism etc. For me it connects mainly to observation/measurement instruments and tools, ways of seeing etc. Enchantment is a radically empiricist mode for me.
McLuhan approach: enchantment is unconscious media extensions. Disenchantment is autoamputation. Re-enchantment is new media extensions. New sensory leaks.
A hidden peril of being stuck indoors too much is lack of sensory leakage. Unexpected sights, smells, tastes, noises, textures. "Home" is sensory closure. All sensations are familiar. Stumbling across novel sensations at home is really rare.
Having slept on this it strikes me that much of my own disenchantment stems from all these people trying to pursue their anti-modern re-enchantment programs š¤£
Like someone remarked that Q was a re-enchantment project. That example kinda sums up the problem with the idea.
Thesis: Re-enchantment Olympics as an emerging replacement for Oppression Olympics (which was started by black lesbian crypto-marxist identitarians in 1989 and won by cis-white male crypto fascist identitarians in 2020, much to the amusement of thise with any sense of irony left)
Events:
early education
post-theism
grand narrative
new domesticity
media production
techno-animism
climate relations
environmental stewardship
alien relations
nature relations
economic visioning
I donāt know whether this is much of an improvement on oppression Olympics, but Iām rooting for some linear combination of Rick and Morty and Elon musk to sweep all the golds and silvers
Hmm thereās now enough here to write up. Usually this is the stage where Iāve convinced myself a solution exists and lose interest for a year before writing a long post about it when Iām in a random heavy-lift mood looking for something to do.
The thread through my stuff that leads here would be:
Return of the Barbarian (2011)
Welcome to the Future Nauseous (2012)
The Locust Economy (2013)
You Are Not an Artisan (2013)
Premium Mediocre (2017)
Against Waldenponding (2019)
Domestic Cozy (2019)
Internet of Beefs (2020)
Update 10 months later⦠yeah re-enchantment is toast as a usefully general concept. It was promising but too loaded with reactionary primitivist baggage to be of much use to anyone else. Poison-pilled as far as Iām concerned.