It is as shortsighted as it is condescending to explain the international rise in religious fundamentalism by suggesting that people want easy answers to the problems of a complex world. No doubt, sometimes, they do. But they just as surely want worldviews that express moral standpoints: that human dignity is a good which cannot be bartered, that some actions are so vile they cannot be redeemed. Clarity should never be confused with simplicity, moral clarity least of all. But a view that has no means to express legitimate needs for moral clarity will leave people to seek it elsewhere, and to settle for moral simplicity instead. Scruples about using moral language responsibly should lead us to use it responsibly, not to abandon it entirely - leaving moral ammunition in unscrupulous hands.
Showing posts with label Philosophy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Philosophy. Show all posts
01 December 2010
Quote from Susan Neiman's Evil in Modern Thought
29 July 2010
Starbucks to Apples
Does it seem like the Animate series has been focusing on the Marxists as of late? Still, where else can you get cartoon illustrated Žižek? It's funny, the first RSA post I started, I still haven't put up is of his x's lecture on the paradox of choice.
One good insight from the lecture that video is excerpted from:
One good insight from the lecture that video is excerpted from:
The lesson of the ongoing financial crisis is for me exactly the opposite one. Most of the gigantic sums of bailout money is going not to this passive minority but precisely to this Ayn Randian deregulated titans who failed in creative schemes and thereby brought about the meltdown. It is not the great creative geniuses who are now helping lazy ordinary people; it is the ordinary taxpayers who are helping the failed creative geniuses.
28 July 2010
24 July 2010
The Atheistic Socrates?
that those who study these things do not even believe in the gods (Apol. 18d).Your fallible blogger here takes the view that yes, all the philosophers were "atheist", iows - they deny the civic deities.
Note: this definition is why early Christians for instance were charged w/ atheism.
Philosophers were either atheist or "closet atheist" paying lip service. I think Plato overcompensates with Socrates' character to establish he wasn't one so looking for "by Zeus", etc is overly simplistic. Whether the text is revisionist, I don't know and don't really care. The texts themselves are atheistic.
I'm not sure of the full contextual significance. In my head is the notion that "lip service" suffices, in other words as long as you perform the required piety, it doesn't matter what you believe. I do know this is the case later on with the Romans, but a lot changed in the time between. I'll check with my friendly neighborhood scholar and you check with yours.
Socrates however reinterprets everything. In the preceding dialogue Euthyphro which main theme is piety, Socrates mocks all conventional understandings of sacrifice. Instead the character of Socrates offers up a notion of "true" piety which is cultivating the soul, blah, blah, blah. Prayers and sacrifice are pointless, which is entailed by Athenian political notions of polytheism.
The reason why he being accused of atheism is due to the perception of this undermining the social order which requires the gods' good grace. Plato is saying my religious practice is more "truly" spiritual than yours will ever be and that you're just playing games.
Theological merit aside, the argument itself is unsatisfactory to the specific charge as it fails to meet the implied requirements. Meaning the two views are significantly different to the point that this "truer" view is atheistic. Meletus and the people aren't as dumb as Plato thinks they are.
Thoughts?
Amartya Sen's take on the Social Contract
Amartya Sen:
The dominitaries (dominators/dignitaries?) of justice today tend to think up the deliberation from justice be aimed at clarifying or arriving at a diagnosis of perfect justice, in particular perfectly just institutions. That it tends to do either directly or indirectly by using a device that was generated in just pre-Enlightenment or just pre- the main phase of Enlightenment, namely Thomas Hobbes in the 17th century, the idea of a social contract. So the idea of justice has got intimately linked with a kind of perfect world with particular perfect institution that the social contract should aim at and achieve.(Source)
And I think we have two problems with it. First of all, I think that the belief that we would have an agreement on the nature of the perfect world is I think a mistake. It's not that we wouldn't agree on many things, but you know some people would ultimately when they tackle between say promoting liberty and promoting economic inequality may go in one direction or the other. And couldn't we say that one position is unreasonable and the other not. On the other hand both these groups quite agree on lots of things in the Enlightenment period itself, like Adam Smith, Mary Wollstonecraft, and many others I could think of, Tom Paine, would agree that slavery was unjust, but that doesn't mean that they agreed necessarily upon a perfectly just world.
So I think that gets the question wrong, and particular to think about only perfect institutions assumes that we are not really concerned ultimately with human lives. And institutions fine, but you know you gotta second guess the institutions, did you get them right? Supposed you arrive at a contract, thinking that "these will work out like they did" doesn't. So the ultimate test has to be how is the world going? So in both these respects are needed a departure. I think the idea of justice needs a departure. Also by the way concentration on the social contract which is conducted by citizens of a sovereign state, you limit your deliberations of justice within the confines of the citizenry of a state. And while that might of been the direction in which Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau did and might go, and later on in our time Rawls and Ronald Dworkin, John Rawls the greatest philosopher of our time, I think *unintelligible*, Ronald Dworkin, Robert Nozick, differing from each other, but each taking a social contract within a nation state to be the central exercise.
In contrast say somebody like Adam Smith was right from the beginning concerned with the openness of the deliberation. You have to listen to voices not only from near but also from very far. The third respect is the first, is that it complete makes the idea of global justice absolute nonsense because you can't have a global sovereign state. Indeed that point of view was put forward very powerfully by one of the great philosophers of our time namely Tom Nagel arguing that the idea of global justice is a chimera. Given that, I think we need a departure, but that really means we have to drop the social contract. Social contract demands a unique resolution, a concentration in institution, behavioral fall inline, and concentration of participation of members of the state. And the idea of justice is much broader than that. It's concerned with how to remove injustice in which anyone from anywhere in the world could have their say. We could pay attention we don't have to come to a complete agreement on the nature of the perfectly just world. But if we agree that certain things are say the subjugation of women (*unintelligible*), or slavery in that time, people dying of illness for which cure is known, medicine could be produce cheaply but the delivery system doesn't work, to say/to agree that it is a great injustice doesn't require you to agree on a view of a perfect world.
21 July 2010
Socrates' Introduction to His Defense
And Socrates' character shines through. The opening sarcasm demonstrates wit, rather than arrogance. Plato begins establishing that Socrates is not an academic dweeb. His character is deferential to the jury, rather than disrespectfully insolent or snubbing them.
We're to of assumed Socrates' accusers have poisoned the well. Socrates responds by shifting through a series of contrasts: Socrates/accusers, speaking truth/rhetoric, spontaneous/crafted, stranger/familiar. He does not mince words, contrasting "lying" and "truthfulness". Socrates mocks the warning against him to the jury, unpacking its meaning by claiming a commitment to truth. And the truth of his speech unfolds in one way as a critique of the injustice of Athens' political activities. There's the archetype here of the elderly who's too old for young men's games.
Socrates then ask the jury to forgive his non-custom conforming speech as he'll be employing the same type as he typically does in the market place. The customary speech is supposedly foreign to his tongue, so they should treat him as a stranger. Rather than be prejudiced, the jury should evaluate Socrates' claims. Plato suggest that this is excellence (ἀρετή) just as Socrates' excellence is telling the truth.
The implied audience is picking up Apology asking themselves "why did we convict Socrates?" By this point in time, they know how the drama ends. They're familiar with the idea that it was Socrates' own fault for not adjusting to "the way things are done", a familiar logic in our own time. They've heard he was an ass. They've heard that these led to the unfortunate mistake of convicting him. They've heard he was an "atheist". They've heard he was a sophist. They've heard that these led him to being justly convicted. For now Plato's polemic argues against those who wish to shift responsibility for Socrates' sentence upon his "unconventional" manner, offering the reader a differing perspective.
Obviously, there's danger of reading into any text. Plato is not concerned with Athens' rhetorical atmosphere excluding other types of voices ignored at Justice's expense, but rather its refusal to hear logos discourse. Today folks still wish to privilege rational discourse over the rhetorical theatrics of the political sphere.
20 July 2010
Plato's First Tetralogy
In each of the four narratives, the reader is invited into a world inhabited by Socrates, to follow his last days and witness his character.
In Euthyphro we walk beside him as we watch him expose Euthyphro's bs, marveling at his ability to unravel Euthyphro's claims. We laugh at his wit and worry over his fate.
In the Apology we sit amongst the jurors, critically evaluating what is said and meditating on the transpired events now removed from the theatrics.
In Crito, if we sympathetic we plea alongside, hoping he'll be persuaded to reason, while if antagonistic patiently watch if he proves himself all too human, thereby vindicating ourselves.
In the death scene of Phaedo, we find hope in Socrates' fate yet are embarrassed by our grief. We marvel at his courage, learn from his counsel, relish our final moments with this great man.
Here we explore for ourselves a man quite unlike who we imagined from his reputation. We accede to some points, form our own views, distance ourselves from shortcomings of other characters, and enjoy the pleasure of discoursing w/ a man who threw all of Athens into an uproar.
In Euthyphro we walk beside him as we watch him expose Euthyphro's bs, marveling at his ability to unravel Euthyphro's claims. We laugh at his wit and worry over his fate.
In the Apology we sit amongst the jurors, critically evaluating what is said and meditating on the transpired events now removed from the theatrics.
In Crito, if we sympathetic we plea alongside, hoping he'll be persuaded to reason, while if antagonistic patiently watch if he proves himself all too human, thereby vindicating ourselves.
In the death scene of Phaedo, we find hope in Socrates' fate yet are embarrassed by our grief. We marvel at his courage, learn from his counsel, relish our final moments with this great man.
Here we explore for ourselves a man quite unlike who we imagined from his reputation. We accede to some points, form our own views, distance ourselves from shortcomings of other characters, and enjoy the pleasure of discoursing w/ a man who threw all of Athens into an uproar.
Rethinking New: Part IV
So...who do you trust? For me it boils down to two important components: a capacity for understanding and honesty.
As much as one might not trust the medical-pharmaceutical industrial complex, they've got the capacity for understanding that honest Betty Sue from Deming, NM doesn't. As far as medicine is concerned, research on the Internet doesn't count. It's possible your local pastor might not have the philosophical training to understand what pomos or neo-Marxist are saying. The face on TV is reading a teleprompter. Economics requires high-school math unless you're a genius. You need to find folks who have the capacity for understanding.
This is what the capacity for understanding does not mean: they come to the "orthodox" opinions. Honest, intellectually equal folks have differing viewpoints. Again find the best that each position has to offer and find different ones. It also doesn't mean an "expert" or someone with a Ph.D. As anyone who has first-hand experience with something might suggest, there's a lot you can't find in books (or intelligentsia). Often times the "shocking" discovery is made that most laypersons understood something all along before the cognoscenti caught up. Not a mystery; it's called common sense. People are stupid; people aren't stupid. Plus laypersons and intelligentsia share a prejudice for my favorite passtime: bsing.
Honesty is a hard virtue to really embody IMO. Its simplest level is not lying and not trying to deceive others. Another is the issue of acting in good faith and sincerity, conditioned by a process of relinquishing self-deception; here the news/blog business often fail. Thirdly is an openness to others that allows oneself to be known. You're not looking for this with news, unless you're talking about friends. In fact I'd be suspicious elsewhere too, precisely cause that "personableness" is often an illusion intentionally manufactured to engender trust. This third level is more of participating honestly in community where it's appropriate.
To elaborate on the second part, good faith is the intent to fulfill expectations that one is leading others to assume. OTOH, people need to watch out for false expectations. If someone is completely aware of what they're doing and how the public is incorrectly perceiving them and they do nothing to correct or even capitalize on it, that's bad faith. If you watched the previously posted clip, that's what Crossfire was doing. It's often rationalized that "everyone" knows its a game, but that's not an excuse. Intentionally legitimating an unqualified authority is also bad faith. The ways which corporate news do this are inexhaustible. Feigning neutrality is a classic example of insincerity. Revealing assumptions and allegiances is a big help to avoiding this particular form; stating them and going on to pretend that these aren't affecting anything while proceeding to promote propaganda is not.
What I'm not suggesting is honesty = transparency. Privacy is a good thing. It is also not assuming falsely assuming responsibility for every falsehood or mistake that one has or expecting it of others. We're human, which entails a level of imperfectionism and a willingness to risk being wrong. Especially with professionalism in the equation, people always act differently in front of an audience than otherwise. This isn't insincerity per se. It also ties into false expectations, as you're not "betrayed" if in real life they're different from how you'd imagined them.
Many folks employ what we like to call a hermeneutic of suspicion in a totalizing fashion, and that's bad. They're not just being critical, arguably an epistemic virtue. They're attempting to move beyond this to reveal or uncover or "unmask" what's really going on behind any argument or group, which might not even be conscious to the author/speaker/people. It is reading between the lines par excellence. Now as a caveat I'll say this, it is sometimes appropriate to employ a hermeneutic of suspicion, particularly when people act or events are suspicious! So it's not an either/or deal like I'm making it out to be. The reason I say it's bad is cause they're destroying the possibility for a healthy relationship and discussion (assuming it can be had). They're showing a fundamental disrespect for and insincerely engaging others. On the other hand if their hermeneutics leads them into dialogue with the subject, perhaps that's a sign they're employing it appropriately. Generally that's not the case, and they're impervious to relevant feedback. Indeed, often times they'll deconstruct sciences (which I actually think is a good thing), but then not understanding what's been discredited interpret in such a fashion as to ignore any findings. Please note: this is a blog, not a rigorous examination on any philosophical articulations but a commentary and critique on their abuses. These aren't hardline distinctions obviously, and it's completely possible for someone to be acting in bad faith, insincere, and deceiving themselves at the same time.
Some good reasons not to trust someone. The widely heldness of a belief in what their articulating. The task is verifying not taking for granted. Authority, especially an unqualified one. They really need to be field-specific competent; news sources bring these in all the time. Prejudices. Now we are all prejudiced. We have a whole range of preferences when it comes to trust, from the symmetry of the face, to how closely they look like us, whether they're ideologically similar, their tone of voice. This is something that's still being explored, in the mean time we need to be aware and be careful. All these are HORRIBLE reasons to trust someone.
There's two important senses of trust, and they shouldn't be confused. There's the idealistic version of trust and a sense of realist trust, where we trust others to behave consistently to themselves. While we can open ourselves up to the first, the second can be just as reliable. For example, if someone has consistently "stolen" something from you, they've probably broken your idealistic trust, but you can have a realistic trust that they'll do it again should the opportunity arises. News sources can be trusted and relied on in this second regard. Are they competent? If not they can be trusted to need someone else to interpret and get their facts for them. If we're talking about the junk food, I can list off examples from NPR to CNN to Fox.
Final thoughts: learn to trust yourselves. If you're male, learn to work on self-deception (trust me on this). It's easier to trust yourself if you're in community, but that's a different issue. "Strangers", that includes all news sources, need to earn your trust. If you go around naively giving the benefit of the doubt, you're gonna head straight to cynicism. Rather cultivate maturity with your trust. Take risk on insignificant issues for example, and as said before, to be wrong is human and insignificant. Randomly review what is being said. There's lots of ways.
Thoughts anyone? On the post, news, dinner?
As much as one might not trust the medical-pharmaceutical industrial complex, they've got the capacity for understanding that honest Betty Sue from Deming, NM doesn't. As far as medicine is concerned, research on the Internet doesn't count. It's possible your local pastor might not have the philosophical training to understand what pomos or neo-Marxist are saying. The face on TV is reading a teleprompter. Economics requires high-school math unless you're a genius. You need to find folks who have the capacity for understanding.
This is what the capacity for understanding does not mean: they come to the "orthodox" opinions. Honest, intellectually equal folks have differing viewpoints. Again find the best that each position has to offer and find different ones. It also doesn't mean an "expert" or someone with a Ph.D. As anyone who has first-hand experience with something might suggest, there's a lot you can't find in books (or intelligentsia). Often times the "shocking" discovery is made that most laypersons understood something all along before the cognoscenti caught up. Not a mystery; it's called common sense. People are stupid; people aren't stupid. Plus laypersons and intelligentsia share a prejudice for my favorite passtime: bsing.
Honesty is a hard virtue to really embody IMO. Its simplest level is not lying and not trying to deceive others. Another is the issue of acting in good faith and sincerity, conditioned by a process of relinquishing self-deception; here the news/blog business often fail. Thirdly is an openness to others that allows oneself to be known. You're not looking for this with news, unless you're talking about friends. In fact I'd be suspicious elsewhere too, precisely cause that "personableness" is often an illusion intentionally manufactured to engender trust. This third level is more of participating honestly in community where it's appropriate.
To elaborate on the second part, good faith is the intent to fulfill expectations that one is leading others to assume. OTOH, people need to watch out for false expectations. If someone is completely aware of what they're doing and how the public is incorrectly perceiving them and they do nothing to correct or even capitalize on it, that's bad faith. If you watched the previously posted clip, that's what Crossfire was doing. It's often rationalized that "everyone" knows its a game, but that's not an excuse. Intentionally legitimating an unqualified authority is also bad faith. The ways which corporate news do this are inexhaustible. Feigning neutrality is a classic example of insincerity. Revealing assumptions and allegiances is a big help to avoiding this particular form; stating them and going on to pretend that these aren't affecting anything while proceeding to promote propaganda is not.
What I'm not suggesting is honesty = transparency. Privacy is a good thing. It is also not assuming falsely assuming responsibility for every falsehood or mistake that one has or expecting it of others. We're human, which entails a level of imperfectionism and a willingness to risk being wrong. Especially with professionalism in the equation, people always act differently in front of an audience than otherwise. This isn't insincerity per se. It also ties into false expectations, as you're not "betrayed" if in real life they're different from how you'd imagined them.
Many folks employ what we like to call a hermeneutic of suspicion in a totalizing fashion, and that's bad. They're not just being critical, arguably an epistemic virtue. They're attempting to move beyond this to reveal or uncover or "unmask" what's really going on behind any argument or group, which might not even be conscious to the author/speaker/people. It is reading between the lines par excellence. Now as a caveat I'll say this, it is sometimes appropriate to employ a hermeneutic of suspicion, particularly when people act or events are suspicious! So it's not an either/or deal like I'm making it out to be. The reason I say it's bad is cause they're destroying the possibility for a healthy relationship and discussion (assuming it can be had). They're showing a fundamental disrespect for and insincerely engaging others. On the other hand if their hermeneutics leads them into dialogue with the subject, perhaps that's a sign they're employing it appropriately. Generally that's not the case, and they're impervious to relevant feedback. Indeed, often times they'll deconstruct sciences (which I actually think is a good thing), but then not understanding what's been discredited interpret in such a fashion as to ignore any findings. Please note: this is a blog, not a rigorous examination on any philosophical articulations but a commentary and critique on their abuses. These aren't hardline distinctions obviously, and it's completely possible for someone to be acting in bad faith, insincere, and deceiving themselves at the same time.
Some good reasons not to trust someone. The widely heldness of a belief in what their articulating. The task is verifying not taking for granted. Authority, especially an unqualified one. They really need to be field-specific competent; news sources bring these in all the time. Prejudices. Now we are all prejudiced. We have a whole range of preferences when it comes to trust, from the symmetry of the face, to how closely they look like us, whether they're ideologically similar, their tone of voice. This is something that's still being explored, in the mean time we need to be aware and be careful. All these are HORRIBLE reasons to trust someone.
There's two important senses of trust, and they shouldn't be confused. There's the idealistic version of trust and a sense of realist trust, where we trust others to behave consistently to themselves. While we can open ourselves up to the first, the second can be just as reliable. For example, if someone has consistently "stolen" something from you, they've probably broken your idealistic trust, but you can have a realistic trust that they'll do it again should the opportunity arises. News sources can be trusted and relied on in this second regard. Are they competent? If not they can be trusted to need someone else to interpret and get their facts for them. If we're talking about the junk food, I can list off examples from NPR to CNN to Fox.
Final thoughts: learn to trust yourselves. If you're male, learn to work on self-deception (trust me on this). It's easier to trust yourself if you're in community, but that's a different issue. "Strangers", that includes all news sources, need to earn your trust. If you go around naively giving the benefit of the doubt, you're gonna head straight to cynicism. Rather cultivate maturity with your trust. Take risk on insignificant issues for example, and as said before, to be wrong is human and insignificant. Randomly review what is being said. There's lots of ways.
Thoughts anyone? On the post, news, dinner?
17 July 2010
The Trial of Socrates
In the Apology and Crito Plato attempts to present the character of Socrates as the ideal citizen. As the narratives unfold we realize that Socrates' fate was to be thrust into a trial for nothing other than his spiritual superiority, piety to Athens, moral excellence, and love for his fellow Athenians. During the trial Socrates accepts the tragedy, responsibility, and role he must necessarily play. His integrity dooms him, projecting him forward. By contrast, the farce of the trial, cruelty of the sentence, and ultimate impotence in corrupting our hero unveils the petty character of both his formal accusers and general critics, reversing the condemnation for sacrificing Athens' most pious and loyal citizen.
But who is he? Plato's utter contempt bleeds through for Athens' values and people; conflating Socrates' legitimate critiques w/ bs. To some the gadfly bears more of a metaphorical resemblance to an ass. Socrates' resolved smugness hardly substitutes for objective contributions, and his flippant considerations of responsibilities call into question for us his purported virtues. What we're left with is nothing more than an arrogant protagonist who considers himself above any of the "pettiness" which infects his beloved city, failing to allow a truly dialogical response from even the community of his supporters.
Whoever Socrates might really have been, Plato's characterization tarnishes his legacy as a champion for intellectual excellence. Although, it should be stated that the glimpses we see from other sources might leave us scratching our heads at Plato's favorable, idealized portrayal. Was Socrates unjustly punished? Yes. Does he make his case for himself? Well... maybe not, I don't think so at least. Eventually, I'm gonna argue his relational impact and susceptibility postmortem to Plato's exploitation are his true enduring contributions to Athens and the world and posterity.
29 April 2009
Playing for Change
Some of you might of seen the video that Carl Olson posted "Stand By Me", which then distributed amongst my circles quicker than chlamydia at a drunken orgy.
It's a clip from a film, Playing for Change: Peace Through Music. Still trying to find out if it's been released and part of a cd/dvd package or is going to be. In fact, its wiki entry was deleted for this very reason.
Playing for Change seems to of started out with two guys traveling around the world recording primarily street artist with studio-quality equipment. They seem to have formed sponsored some charity performances with some of the musicians as well and have invested in helping communities with humanitarian projects.
As Mark Johnson explains in one video:
The music is not going to bring about unification, or transcend our differences. I've seen and have participated in fetishizing music personally. Don't get me wrong, music is an important part of our human experience and is extremely powerful and transformative. The philosophy confuses though divisive surface issues for an underlying orientation to one another which is at stake.
We use anything and everything to pit ourselves against one another, including music. And sound-byte documentation of the potential and hope for music isn't a realistic response to this situation. This obviously doesn't mean we should mire ourselves in cynicism either, and that either/or seems to be what many people flip back-and-forth on. This project is doing amazing things, collaborating with organizations helping refugee relief to African arts development. Mark Johnson is producing and orchestrating something beautiful. And their project is a worthwhile project. Let's not get melodramatic though and attach a false sense of hope to it. Inspirational definitely, indeed music can allow us to see what it means to be more fully human and commit to that endeavor. That's doesn't then equate to world peace. I'm willing to bet humanity has probably been making music for longer than governments, the mentioned religious divisions, etc have existed. We need to look the underlying spirit of such sentiments and our problems, especially the nihilistic ones, in the face.
Thus far it seems they've posted 4 other similar music vids online.
They've also included a few live projects and a few missional ones. They're doing some kind of web episodes, but I've found they're easier to download on Vimeo or facebook than the main site.
The music is amazing, fusing different instrumentation and performative styles together. It's unique and highly eclectic. Despite distances around the world, the performers are having the opportunity to come together in the music, which will I'm guessing soon be more explicitly commented on in reference to the mission stance of the organization. The ones produced thus far have been uplifting and urge bonding together, lyrically and musically. As you notice musicians with headphones I believe they're hearing a base line and some other instrument (Roger Ridley?) with which they're rhythmically playing along with, hence the ability to play in unison though they're miles apart and have never met the other musicians or played with them. It started with Roger Ridley (here's him playing "Bring It On Home"), and asking if they could record his version of "Stand By Me".
Since then though, some of the musicians have been touring with each other as previously stated:
A Joni Mitchel cover by them.
PBS coverage
It's a clip from a film, Playing for Change: Peace Through Music. Still trying to find out if it's been released and part of a cd/dvd package or is going to be. In fact, its wiki entry was deleted for this very reason.
Playing for Change seems to of started out with two guys traveling around the world recording primarily street artist with studio-quality equipment. They seem to have formed sponsored some charity performances with some of the musicians as well and have invested in helping communities with humanitarian projects.
As Mark Johnson explains in one video:
Playing for Change was born out of the idea that we have to inspire each other to come together as a human race and that music is the best way to do this...
the belief that we can do a lot more for this world if we work together, than we ever can apart.
The music is not going to bring about unification, or transcend our differences. I've seen and have participated in fetishizing music personally. Don't get me wrong, music is an important part of our human experience and is extremely powerful and transformative. The philosophy confuses though divisive surface issues for an underlying orientation to one another which is at stake.
We use anything and everything to pit ourselves against one another, including music. And sound-byte documentation of the potential and hope for music isn't a realistic response to this situation. This obviously doesn't mean we should mire ourselves in cynicism either, and that either/or seems to be what many people flip back-and-forth on. This project is doing amazing things, collaborating with organizations helping refugee relief to African arts development. Mark Johnson is producing and orchestrating something beautiful. And their project is a worthwhile project. Let's not get melodramatic though and attach a false sense of hope to it. Inspirational definitely, indeed music can allow us to see what it means to be more fully human and commit to that endeavor. That's doesn't then equate to world peace. I'm willing to bet humanity has probably been making music for longer than governments, the mentioned religious divisions, etc have existed. We need to look the underlying spirit of such sentiments and our problems, especially the nihilistic ones, in the face.
Thus far it seems they've posted 4 other similar music vids online.
- "War/No More Trouble"
- "One Love"
- "Don't Worry"
- "Chanda Mama" (Looks like they finished this one after I started the post. Thank you phone interruptions.)
They've also included a few live projects and a few missional ones. They're doing some kind of web episodes, but I've found they're easier to download on Vimeo or facebook than the main site.
The music is amazing, fusing different instrumentation and performative styles together. It's unique and highly eclectic. Despite distances around the world, the performers are having the opportunity to come together in the music, which will I'm guessing soon be more explicitly commented on in reference to the mission stance of the organization. The ones produced thus far have been uplifting and urge bonding together, lyrically and musically. As you notice musicians with headphones I believe they're hearing a base line and some other instrument (Roger Ridley?) with which they're rhythmically playing along with, hence the ability to play in unison though they're miles apart and have never met the other musicians or played with them. It started with Roger Ridley (here's him playing "Bring It On Home"), and asking if they could record his version of "Stand By Me".
Since then though, some of the musicians have been touring with each other as previously stated:
A Joni Mitchel cover by them.
PBS coverage
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