Reading Theory Podcast

Show Notes for Episode 1, Part 1

1. First Discussion

Reading runs from 1:46 until 3:15.

1.1 On textile workers and luddites

We mention that textile workers were deeply affected by the industrial revolution, but we didn't name names, and there is one that is particularly important to name: the Luddites - a 19th-century movement of English textile workers who opposed very specific types of machinery. There are two things about them that are particularly interesting for us. (1) They were maligned, we often use the term 'luddite' as a pejorative, but this is far from the truth of who they are. They were technologists who developed their own tools and machinery. They weren't sentimentalists attached to the old ways, but rather they were keenly aware of the implications of the types of machines that the factory owners were pushing on them. (2) They were political activists, and had very interesting anarchist-adjacent ideas and ways of working together. See for example, podcast[1], video[2], and book[3] cited below.

1.2. On the origins of the Internet

The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was the first wide-area packet-switched network with distributed control and one of the first computer networks to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the technical foundation of the Internet. The ARPANET was established by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (now DARPA) of the United States Department of Defense[4].

1.3. On the origins of mobile phones

We raised a question about the date of the first mobile phone. Motorola was the first company to produce a handheld mobile phone. On 3 April 1973, Martin Cooper, a Motorola researcher and executive, made the first mobile telephone call from handheld subscriber equipment, placing a call to Dr. Joel S. Engel of Bell Labs, his rival.[5]

1.4. On the status of the Internet in 1982

ARPANET was established by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (now DARPA) of the United States Department of Defense in 1969, and it was the first implement key technologies that laid the foundations for the internet. By the late 1970s, people who worked with computers were using Email, Bulletin Board Systems, and Usenet to communicate over the internet. By the time Ivan Illich gives this lecture, people were also able to connect to the internet with a modem and a home computer, though it was still quite novel and rare.

1.5. On tools for conviviality

Tools for Conviviality is a 1973 book by Ivan Illich that examines how technology serves society, and specifically who it serves. He uses the term convivivial to refer to tools that "serve politically interrelated individuals rather than managers"[6].

References

1. Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff (Mar. 2024). All Hail King Ludd: Howthe Luddites Almost Saved Us. Cool Zone Media. url: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-cool-people-who-did-cool-96003360/episode/part-one-all-hail-king-ludd-159850054/.
2. Andrewism (Jan. 2024). Should We Be Luddites? url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bP2rObVK1zg.
3. Merchant, Brian (2023). Blood in the Machine: The Origins of the Rebellion Against Big Tech. Little, Brown. isbn: 9780316487733.
4. Internet, Living (2021). ARPANET – The First Internet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET. Quote from Wikipedia, retrieved 2024-06-11.
5. Motorola (Apr. 1979). Motorola Demonstrates Portable Telephone. Motorola Communications Division press release. Quote from Wikipedia, retrieved 2024-06-11.
6. Illich, Ivan (1973). Tools for Conviviality. Open Forum. Harper & Row. isbn: 9780060803087. PDF

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2. Second Discussion

Reading runs from 15:34 to 17:13

2.1. On Murray Bookchin

Murray Bookchin (born January 14, 1921, Bronx, New York, U.S.—died July 30, 2006, Burlington, Vermont) was an activist and intellectual who was well-known and loved in anarchist circles. Among his many contributions is the philosophy of social ecology, which seeks to place human societies within the framework of the natural environment, rather than in opposition to it, and points specifically to hierarchy and domination as root causes of both ethical and environmental degradation. His theories inspired the development of Democratic Confederalism, the political system that the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) has been implementing in Rojava since 2012.

Writings by Murray Bookchin are freely available at the anarchist library.

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3. Third Discussion

Reading runs from 29:26 to 33:15

3.1. On Bullshit Jobs

Bullshit Jobs: A Theory is a 2018 book by anthropologist David Graeber that postulates the existence of meaningless jobs and analyzes their societal harm. He contends that over half of societal work is pointless and becomes psychologically destructive when paired with a work ethic that associates work with self-worth. Graeber describes five types of meaningless jobs, in which workers pretend their role is not as pointless or harmful as they know it to be: flunkies, goons, duct tapers, box tickers, and taskmasters. He argues that the association of labor with virtuous suffering is recent in human history and proposes unions and universal basic income as a potential solution[1].

3.2. On the free and open source movement

Open-source hardware (OSH, OSHW) consists of physical artifacts of technology designed and offered by the open-design movement. Both free and open-source software (FOSS) and open-source hardware are created by this open-source culture movement and apply a like concept to a variety of components. It is sometimes, thus, referred to as FOSH (free and open-source hardware). The term usually means that information about the hardware is easily discerned so that others can make it – coupling it closely to the maker movement[2].

3.3. More Graeber stanning

Debt: The First 5,000 Years is a book by anthropologist David Graeber published in 2011. It explores the historical relationship of debt with social institutions such as barter, marriage, friendship, slavery, law, religion, war and government. It draws on the history and anthropology of a number of civilizations, large and small, from the first known records of debt from Sumer in 3500 BCE until the present[3].

Writings by David Graeber are freely available at the anarchist library.

3.4. Usufruct

Usufruct is a limited real right (or in rem right) found in civil law and mixed jurisdictions that unites the two property interests of usus and fructus. Usus (use, as in usage of or access to) is the right to use or enjoy a thing possessed, directly and without altering it. Fructus (fruit, as in the fruits of production) is the right to derive profit from a thing possessed: for instance, by selling crops, leasing immovables or annexed movables, taxing for entry, and so on. A usufruct is either granted in severalty or held in common ownership, as long as the property is not damaged or destroyed. The third civilian property interest is abusus (literally abuse), the right to alienate the thing possessed, either by consuming or destroying it (e.g., for profit), or by transferring it to someone else (e.g., sale, exchange, gift). Someone enjoying all three rights has full ownership [4].

3.5. The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia

The Dispossessed is a 1974 science fiction novel by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, one of her seven Hainish Cycle novels. It achieved a degree of literary recognition unusual for science fiction due to its exploration of themes such as anarchism and revolutionary societies, capitalism, utopia, individualism, and collectivism. It paints a clear portrait of what an Anarchist society could look like, after a revolution in which the anarchists were allowed to escape to a desolate moon-planet, Anarres. The ambiguity of the situation is what makes this depiction particularly compelling. The living conditions are harsh on Anarres, but everyone shares the burden equally. The upper class people on Urras clearly have a better life than the intellectuals on Anarres, but Le Guin makes a strong case that the people of Anarres are living fuller, more authentically human lives in many respects [5].

3.6. Beyond Human Rights

"Beyond human rights" and Homo Sacer are two texts from philosopher Giorgio Agamben. The premise is that what we hold as 'Human Rights' cannot be protected under the current system of nation-states. He points to the refugee as one such figure that exposes the contradiction: the notion of human rights is intended to protect figures such as the refugee, but in practice they are excluded from its purview [6, 7].

References

1. Graeber, David. 2018 Bullshit Jobs. New York; London; Toronto; Sydney; New Delhi: Simon & Schuster. isbn: 978-1-5011-4331-1.
2. Gibb, Alicia, ed. (2015). Building Open Source Hardware: DIY Manufacturing for Hackers and Makers. Quote from Wikipedia, retrieved 2024-06-11. New York: Addison-Wesley, pp. 253–277.
3. Graeber, David (2011). Debt: The First 5,000 Years. Quote from Wikipedia, retrieved 2024-06-11. Melville House. isbn: 1612190987, 9781612190983.
4. Wikipedia contributors (2024). Usufruct — Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2024-06-11.
5. Guin, Ursula K. Le (1974). The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia. New York: Harper & Row.
6. Agamben, Giorgio (1998). Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life. Trans. by Daniel Heller-Roazen. Stanford: Stanford University Press
7. Agamben, Giorgio. (2008) "Beyond Human rights" Open, special issue on Social Engineering. No. 15, pages 90-95.

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