There are kinds of conspiracies that
fit neatly into the theorizing that goes on more and more nowadays –
afterawhile they all seem quite
banal though.
And then there are
those conspiracies that would likely be utterly meaningless to most
people, and yet that have huge negative consequences that are hard to
undo once they have been exercised.
A conspiracy is
what you call it when several people agree to overcome objective
fairness or even previously agreed social standards and rules, in
order to benefit themselves at the cost of those who are not in their
own small group.
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| The Guardian Newspaper's photo of the BBC iPhone |
Society operates on
such complicated bases that sociologists and historians and political
scientists and economists have been a long time at deciding what
really makes it tick; and they still don't all agree. But all the
same, society is larger than a few media chief editors and their
unseen Svengalis.
I see a conspiracy.
It is the one
whereby people make unilateral decisions about terminologies, and
unilateral decisions about meanings to words in common usage. I'm not
being jocular here. I really mean it.
By 'unilateral' I
mean 'not what the common usage or definition already otherwise is.'
I mean that the few and the monolithic overcome the many and the
diverse by force and not by logic; 'the few' in this instance being
the 'unilateral' part of what I was saying above.
This type of
conspiracy has existed in the past and it typically occurs when there
is some kind of dictatorship in control and where the leadership goes
mad. No one is able to challenge the leadership because of
overbalanced sheer power, yet virtually everyone realizes the
falseness of the dogma that is being decreed.
Now
there are a lot of simple words that the public uses which don't
require a lingustic scientist to attest to their 'actual' meaning.
The english language being what it is, actually
ascribes meanings to words that common speakers also ascribe, and any
other donation of meaning has traditionally by english teachers and
literate people been called the employment of 'jargon.'
This
position is changing, or has indeed already changed perhaps, on
account of a tribe of leading people insisting, often or most usually
through the media, that they alone
give imprimatur upon meanings of things, meanings or words, and just
plain meanings fullstop.
And so
you will at this minute see the BBC deciding to slip in one
definition of the word 'beauty' (such an innocuous thing, you would
suppose) when offering to the public that a maths formula is where
'true beauty' resides... And in the instance of the radio version of
the story – which appears to indeed have about five variations and
guises that it appears under on different websites and locations –
it is specifically the formula for the dynamic movement of
fluids, that is claimed to be
one example, attested by a lady scientist, of sheer and utter true
beauty (the formula, that is,
not the scientist).
I am
not sure why there have come to be so many recent examples in the
media of the twisting or misinterpreting of Plato and other ancient
philosophers... Beauty is many things and not just one; one facet of
something may be imbued with a quality of beauty, but it itself is
not 'beauty' per se. Thus it is not 'true beauty.' And never can it
be. It is a sensible
thing seen through the dark glass of the human senses. That is what
Plato actually did say – but here in this recent narrative there is
this implication by association of 'maths' into things that the
argument just given in the media has the weight of traditional and
classical academic thinking. And it certainly does not.
A
single maths formula may have the quality of beauty but it is not
itself 'beauty.' The whole complicated area that the ancient Greeks
went into when they explained what they meant by the purity of
beauty, is today mashed up with words like 'pure' and 'austere' and
'perfect' and a lot of other 'extreme' or absolutist words to give
you a 'sense' rather than a manifest list describing the standard
definition. And it is very dangerous to have people in positions of
blanket power, especially media power, start this business of working
on people's feelings
when they claim that
they intend to arrive at specific technical meanings. I always get
the feeling then of
someone trying to play around with the public's sentiments, and I ask
myself why? Maybe it's just a mistake and an accident...
Beauty is a very
complicated thing indeed.
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| 2014 Zegna Limited Edition Maserati |
For
example. Zegna is going to have a go at their idea of a beautiful
rendering of the interior of the Maserati Quattroporte this year.
Well, you see, it's actually not their
idea – because if it were just their
idea, the risk is the cars would not sell. No indeed, these vehicles
will need to find notes of desire within the hearts and minds of the
wealthy buyers that they are in harmony with. It is a public
idea of beauty that Zegna will
work from. And they mean it to be that.
A premium Champagne
manufacturer in France is making a Champagne with deliberate hints of
Russian caviar in it, and one could think this is a stupid idea. I
don't know; I haven't tried this Champagne. But juxtapositions do
work when it comes to art and things of beauty, and it's not even as
simple as to say that subtlety is the key. It may not be. Many a
great building is brutalist and not subtle at all, and some even
combine quite outrageously conflicting themes – a pickle, crystal,
steel, open office plans, spiralling motifs – and yet they do work
together.
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| Luvienz 'Caviar' Champagne |
No I
do not fear the accidental or mistaken gestures in print and media,
but the deliberate and shameless and highly-sophisticated high
quality types of propaganda.
Oh no,
when the establishment thinker starts all this nonsense of measuring
the unmeasurable, and determining for you by a scientific method what
is 'best' for you – there is something actually serious afoot.
Of course you are
quite free to think that media time on the BBC is cheap or free and
paid for by the altruistic British citizen and taxpayer who thinks
that intellectual wheelspinning by highly-qualified academics is just
the thing for any dull afternoon when there is absolutely nothing
else going on that could capture the attention of the public or
requires to be reported to them since they are the very heart and
soul of democracy and have to be served.
Is there something
about the maths formula for fluid flow dynamics that can be applied
to the flows of money in an economy...? And if so, is it a thing of
beauty? And to whom?
