House of Eratosthenes

Even squirrels know enough to store nuts, so that they will have something to eat when food gets scarce. But the welfare state has spawned a whole class of people who spend everything they get when times are good, and look to others to provide for their food and other basic needs when times turn bad.

The welfare state we know, is a government-sponsored, long-term, inter-generational effort to tilt the balance of Architects and Medicators. “Architect,” used here, refers not to the profession but to the personality type; it is a reference to the Code of Hammurabi, specifically Law 229 which says a bad architect who builds a house that falls down upon the family living in it, should be crushed to death. That is what Architects do; their efforts are toward building houses that will not fall. They think ahead. They perceive the world around them in terms of the complex systems contained in that world, and the simpler parts that make up those systems. They therefore make it their business to figure out how those parts fit together, so they can gauge how well the system is likely to work, whether it be built by someone else or by themselves, whether it’s already in operation or in the process of being constructed.

Medicators are stewards of their own emotional state, in the moment. They enjoy a much keener insight into the emotions of other people who are in proximity to them, but they fortify this at the expense of their own grasp on reality. They do not see the world as made up of complex working systems made up of simpler parts, instead they see it as a big, universe-wide blob, which is then divided conveniently depending on the situation so that good things can be separated from bad things. Once that’s done, it becomes a universe-wide monolithic blob all over again. Medicators, for all the talking they do about the bad things, don’t have much of an opinion about where the bad things are supposed to go; they just want them gone.

Medicators medicate. That, as I’ve written before, is what they do. They participate in politics to medicate themselves. If their children require better discipline, they literally medicate the children. They shun details. If you have a rash or a burn and you put a medicinal balm on it, you don’t need to concern yourself with what the balm is doing to that part of your body; you just put it on, it feels good, you get relief, and you take it as a given there’s some kind of healing going on. A perfect encapsulation of the Medicator’s solution to every problem. Apply X to Y, some big ol’ mystery thing happens, things get better.

So, yes. Saving for bad times is not the Medicator’s thing. They tend to live in the moment. I’m hungry, what’s for lunch? — without a single thought about tomorrow’s lunch, or tonight’s dinner. It isn’t first-&-foremost a discipline thing, or an intelligence thing. It’s got to do with how the world is perceived. For the purpose of going about the business of living in it.

Architects think and Medicators feel. Out of all of the vexing human conflict and dysfunctional relationships, most of those problems come about when Architects and Medicators come in contact with each other. They aren’t really supposed to.

Medicators have their own justice system, one based on “toddler’s rules.” And they have their own economic system. When the miscreant who’s stolen something that someone else “wouldn’t miss,” and didn’t pay his child support, ends up in front of a judge — what you are seeing there is a conflict between worlds, with the trouble-maker representing one world and the judge representing the other. It’s chaos versus order. Each of these “worlds” could be justified, and seen to be working just fine, if only spared from the angst of coming into contact with the other. The only real difference is that the Medicator’s world is not self-sustaining.

Want an iPhone! Our free market system depends on an Architect mindset, by which the protagonist views himself, and the thing he wants to get, and then the system of transactions, with legal tender and products and services changing hands, all as objects that should interact in some way, with a vision toward him getting hold of the thing he wants or needs. It is wholly inadequate for the individual who views all of the universe as a warm gooey mess. And so, if we get some more new individuals coming to “maturity” dedicated to this Medicator mindset of “I’m hungry, what’s for lunch?,” then we have a very effective Cloward-Piven strategy in place, fit to bring the whole capitalist system crashing down like a house of cards.

The irony is, this would rely on focusing human thought on imminent wants and needs, with such intensity and such popularity of parallel thought & desire, that such individuals will, through their actions, destroy the economic system that has shown the greatest promise for fulfilling those wants and needs. Even squirrels know how to store nuts, but these people don’t; and, too many among their number don’t seem too enthralled with learning how.

It is hard to blame the people themselves, since so many are born into it. But we certainly should blame the politicians who spend so much effort and energy trying to make it happen.

Problem is, Cloward and Piven were architects, too. They saw the system far too clearly to have gone through it in a medicator feelings-daze. They knew full well what they were doing… and who their useful stooges would be.

There’s a word for clever, cold, ruthless people who seek to encourage large swathes of dull, hysterical people to be dependent on them. I’ll paraphrase another very effective architect: “Give me a communist, and in a week I’ll turn him into a National Socialist.” The animating emotions are the same (jealousy, hatred, crippling fears of inadequacy); only the expressions are different.
- Severian | 07/25/2012 @ 09:38
Yup, we have some very, very bright people who have this enviable ability to walk in both worlds. I’ve met some people who are just way up there, burning the candle at both ends, and it’s hard to tell where they are most at-home. I envy those people, I’m certainly not one of them.

However, when extremely intelligent and gifted people apply their considerable talents to a challenge that is out of their element, they consistently do the sensible thing which is to take the path of least resistance. It’s a pity C&P went sojourning in the world of Architects when they were really more at home in the other world, because what they did was undertake to destroy instead of to build. That is a far easier path; you hardly need to comprehend how things fit together, in order to destroy.

I’m sure they would have built something awesome, had they belonged where they were tourist-ing.
- mkfreeberg | 07/25/2012 @ 09:52
Agreed…. except I don’t think Cloward and Piven were touristing.

One of the main reasons academia is so monolithically leftist is that it’s the only place a kind of intelligence I call “verbal dexterity” has real value. Not a pretty phrase, I’ll admit, but I’m sure you know what I’m talking about — the verbally dextrous are usually a few points above the mean in most intelligence measures, but they’re top-quintile or better in the kinds of skills that win debate tournaments. Aside from law, journalism, and academia, though, there just aren’t too many paying jobs for that skillset. A society like ours values business and engineering, which the verbally dextrous find either too hard (math-related fields) or, worse, too dependent on the inherent — and inherently unfair– advantages of looks, connections, and social skills. Is it any wonder, then, that the three verbal professions are the most overwhelmingly leftist in America?

I think Cloward and Piven saw that their particular skillsets would let them make a much bigger splash in academia than in private enterprise. At that point, all it took was a dose of Bakunin (“the urge to destroy is also a creative urge”) and they were off…..
- Severian | 07/25/2012 @ 10:25
So, then, you favor regulation for architects, with stiff penalties? What about the inherent socialism in that?

What about the banking system architect who builds a banking system that collapses on the depositors? What’s the penalty for that, to bury them in dollar bills?

Sometimes I think you almost get the historical references, other times I think they fly by. Were you the guy who first said, “Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat and drink beer all day?”
- edarrell | 07/26/2012 @ 10:46
What about the inherent socialism in that?

Wow, how fascinating is Planet Darrell! You have complete lack of accountability…just go ahead and build, on whatever crackpot idea pops into your head, and if people get hurt as a result you don’t even have to find out about it, much less deal with the consequences…and then, you have socialism. Anarchy, or else let you or your idols enjoy Louis XIV status, ruling over society like mortal gods. Odd, for someone who insists there’s a strict, unstated criteria for “socialism” that the President doesn’t meet…and is entirely unwilling, or unable, to state for the record how Little Nero falls short.

That’s much worse than simple False Dillema — it’s clamping the jumper cables to the wrong terminals. What better example have we seen in living memory, apart from the last three years, of eggheads coming up with crackpot schemes that fail to work, or achieve the exact opposite of what they were supposed to, and using their fine speechcrafting skills to avoid any & all consequences? Lack of accountability is not the opposite of socialism. It is a natural result of it.

No, it is you who have missed the point. The “Architects/Medicators” observation deals with individual personalities, not with the society in which they live. Perhaps you’ve invested so much adrenaline in thinking up the perfect rules for a society, or cheering on Obamandias as He does so, that you can’t comprehend anything else? So the point about CoH229 is not a point about the punishment, or even the threat. It is all about the mode of thinking that is triggered as a result. Hammurabi did not tolerate pie-eyed liberals in his kingdom, and we owe the profession of architecture to this, along with all other disciplines that work the same way.

Liberals want to run everything. But they do all their thinking, in a way that is appropriate only if there is nothing of importance riding on the outcome. They’re not merely mistaken, they’re Medicators, indulging in repetitive activities that do not improve anything, are not really supposed to, and do nothing to educate or edify. Obama Himself proves it every day; today’s perfect speech changes very little, and usually nothing at all, from where things were left after yesterday’s perfect speech. It’s just something He does, like playing golf. A way to burn off the time. To medicate.

Thing I Know #401. People who refuse to work with details don’t fix things.
- mkfreeberg | 07/27/2012 @ 07:35
Just noticed this: Severian defined “verbal dexterity” and, when you used this particular skill to demonstrate what an ardent fan I am of socialism — heh — thus, showing how it works…it was in this exact same thread, the very next post, a mere 21 minutes later. Funny!

The trouble with v.d. is, if you have it, you need to improve on it continuously, and if you go to that much effort then you have to use it. This is one of many reasons why liberal ideas are inclined to be bad ones, they have this tendency to be the opposite of what common sense would counsel. All these verbally dextrous people have to use their verbal dexterity, to illustrate things as the opposite of what they really are.

First step to evaluating the expression “2+2” is to eliminate 4 as a possible answer. No-can-do, that’s what the rubes would say. It has to be something else.
- mkfreeberg | 07/27/2012 @ 07:54
Gee, but squirrels “forget”, and waste MOST of their labors collecting and storing
nuts they’ll never eat.

How about “The Grasshopper and the Ants”?
No…wait, that’s all about that Communism that just hasn’t been “done right” yet.

“Three Little Pigs”? “Three Billy Goats Gruff” ?Nope, that implies some sort of (fill in the blank) -riarchy or something.

“Chicken Little”?
“The Boy Who Cried Wolf”?
“Rumplestiltskin”?
“The Fisherman’s Wife”?

“The Emporor’s New Clothes”? Naw, that’s all about a fear of being precieved as “out-of-touch” with the popular trend.

Architects and Medicators.
I have this naggiung tendancy to desperately cling to authors that simplify “complicated” things to a level that even a child can comprehend, rather that the “Big Thinkers” with the childlike tendancy to invent “it’s complicated….” reasoning why their kind aren’t personally responsable for the empty “communal” jam jar, NOR the jam all over their face and fingers.
Maybe that’s why I STILL refuse to (ie) call window placement “fenistration“, or “accessable emergency wellness care insurance” a cure
- CaptDMO | 07/27/2012 @ 08:01
Oops.
“…~~their kind~~…”/ they , or their allies,
- CaptDMO | 07/27/2012 @ 08:10

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Even Squirrels Know How to Store NutsWednesday, July 25th, 2012

Even Squirrels Know How to Store Nuts
Wednesday, July 25th, 2012