#Network theory

[fundgruber]

Halyna Zubchenko and Hryhoriy Pryshedko, Triumph of Cyberneticians, c. 1970s. Mosaic on the facade of the Institute of Cybernetics in Kiev. https://www.e-flux.com/journal/82/134024/the-great-accelerator/

[omegaphilosophia]

Theories on the Philosophy of Power

The philosophy of power encompasses various theories that seek to understand the nature, sources, and implications of power in human societies. Here are some key theories in the philosophy of power:

Pluralist Theory: Pluralist theory posits that power is dispersed among multiple groups and individuals in society, and no single entity holds absolute power. According to this view, power is decentralized, and different groups compete for influence through political, economic, and social channels.

Elite Theory: Elite theory contends that power is concentrated in the hands of a small elite group within society, such as political leaders, business magnates, or cultural elites. According to this perspective, elites wield disproportionate influence over political decisions and societal outcomes, often at the expense of the broader population.

Marxist Theory: Marxist theory emphasizes the role of economic power in shaping society and maintains that power relations are fundamentally determined by class dynamics. According to Marxists, the bourgeoisie (owners of capital) hold power over the proletariat (working class) through the control of economic resources, leading to exploitation and inequality.

Foucauldian Theory: Drawing from the work of Michel Foucault, Foucauldian theory examines power as a diffuse and pervasive force that operates through disciplinary mechanisms and social institutions. Power is not solely held by individuals or groups but is embedded in societal structures and practices, shaping norms, behaviors, and subjectivities.

Feminist Theory: Feminist theories of power highlight the gendered dimensions of power relations and critique patriarchal structures that perpetuate male dominance and female subordination. Feminist scholars analyze how power operates within families, workplaces, and political systems, and advocate for gender equality and social justice.

Poststructuralist Theory: Poststructuralist theorists, such as Jacques Derrida and Judith Butler, challenge essentialist notions of power and instead focus on power as performative and discursive. Power is understood as fluid and contingent, constructed through language, discourse, and social practices, rather than being inherent or fixed.

Network Theory: Network theory conceptualizes power as emerging from relational connections and interactions between actors within complex networks. Power is distributed unevenly across network structures, with some nodes or actors exerting greater influence due to their centrality, connectivity, or resource control.

Rational Choice Theory: Rational choice theory models individual behavior as driven by rational calculations of costs and benefits, including the pursuit of power. According to this approach, individuals seek to maximize their utility or achieve their goals by strategically deploying resources and forming alliances to enhance their power position.

Critical Theory: Critical theories of power, influenced by the Frankfurt School and critical social theory, emphasize the role of ideology, culture, and social institutions in perpetuating power inequalities. Critical theorists analyze how power operates through processes of domination, hegemony, and ideological control, and advocate for emancipatory social change.

Intersectional Theory: Intersectional theory considers how power operates at the intersections of multiple axes of identity, including race, gender, class, sexuality, and ability. This approach recognizes that power relations are shaped by intersecting systems of oppression and privilege, and emphasizes the importance of addressing multiple forms of inequality simultaneously.

These theories offer diverse perspectives on the nature and dynamics of power, illuminating its complexities and providing insights into its effects on individuals, groups, and societies.

[ratbits]

"[       ] noise" by Victoria Adukwei Bulley

Victoria Adukwei Bulley reflects on the difficulty finding quiet and clarity in a loud, busy world in “[ ] noise” Translated Vase by Sookyung Yee//Credit: Google Arts & Culture In math, science, and acoustics, “noise” is often defined as an unwanted or unintentional signal. Noise distorts and obscures, prevents you from hearing what you’re trying to make out the message or getting a clear idea…

[goldhearts-lover]

Hello villainous fandom... this is a more Papergold ship blog but I probably will post about other characters 😋 also Papergold content as well as hcs

ALSO PLZ SEND FANFIC OR ART REQUESTS!!! I need ideas 😞. This ship is so underrated to the point I'm making content myself 😭😭.

[rockspider556]

One of my absolute favorite conspiracy theories is that 911 is just the universe’s fix-it fanfic of Hawaii Five-0, where a higher power saw McDanno being robbed of canon status and was like, "Fine, I'll do it myself."

The evidence you ask?

Steve = Eddie (military background, broody, emotionally constipated but will kill for his partner).

Danny = Buck (loud, dramatic, sunshine dumbass, absolutely in love with his best friend).

Charlie in H50 vs. Christopher in 911—both are adorable kids who serve as the emotional glue.

The entire "work partners but basically married" thing.

Slow-burn so agonizing that it’s actively hurting the fandom.

Domestic couch scenes

Conclusion: The McDanno fandom somehow manifested Buddie into existence as a second chance, a cosmic fix-it fic where this time, the writers will actually pull the trigger and make them canon.

[kaurwreck]

Rereading the early Guild Arc is incredible because it's Fukuzawa and Mori engaging in viciously nasty and personal threats to one another's closest loved ones and allies that wildly escalates beyond their implicitly agreed upon tension, which comes to a head because Dazai petulantly mischaracterizes Mori as pathologically mathematical (because he isn't over that Mori could do what he did to Dazai) and intentionally triggers the paranoia and obsessive compulsive betrayal sensitivity that he'd clocked in Mori at fifteen, causing Mori to irrationally lash out and release Q (and then self flagellate because the consequences of this were wildly amplified by the Guild's seizure of Q), by which point Dazai realizes he'd gone too far and now has to get Ango hit by a car about it.

And Francis is just like. There.

(He's also going through it, but because Louisa isn't in underground son protection jail like Ranpo or hashing out unresolved grief like Dazai and Mori, she's keeping Francis rational with decision trees and focused tasks within the realm of his control.)

This is why there's a chapter called "The Conflict of Strategies." The Strategy of Conflicts by Thomas Schelling is about coordination between mutually dependent parties in conflicts. Unlike zero-sum games (in which one person's gain is equivalent to another's loss), mutually dependent parties rely on each other and so can't draw blood without harming themselves in the process.

The Agency and the Port Mafia are both pillars maintaining Yokohama's tenuous stability; if one falls, the whole city could devolve into a warzone. Thus, their mutual dependence is part of the logical structure of any strategy and demands some kind of collaboration or mutual accommodation, even if only in the avoidance of mutual disaster.

Mori often uses a strategy of irrationality, i.e. he acts volatile and whimsically sociopathic, where he's actually very controlled and rational, which Dazai knows. But, as Dazai reveals to Mori's horror in Fifteen, Dazai also knows where Mori is vulnerable to emotional provocation. This is because Mori, like everyone else, isn't completely rational or completely irrational; it's not a one-dimensional scale. But, "everyone else" includes Dazai.

Dazai characterizes Mori as a math equation because he's still reeling from the betrayal he feels over Mori sacrificing Oda despite knowing how much Dazai loved Oda, and despite Mori knowing it would drive Dazai away from him— because he and Mori also love each other. Even though Dazai probably understands logically that Mori made the decision despite his love for Dazai (and not in the absence of it) because Mimic was an existential threat on Yokohama, Dazai cannot shake the irrational and emotional thought, "If you could do that to me, of all people, you really are as coldly logical as a math equation."

This is irrational because Dazai knows that's not true; he demonstrated in Fifteen that he knows that Mori is terrified of, more than anything else, chaos, and that the threat of chaos is enough to trigger Mori into decisions he does not want to make and otherwise would not make. That's what he was trying to do in Mori's office in the first chapter of Fifteen— goad Mori into killing him by invoking a fear response.

But, Dazai is hurt and so he treats Mori as coldly rational and approaches him with vicious disregard for Mori's betrayal sensitivity, loneliness, and fear by taking Kouyou and leveraging Kyouka to keep Kouyou from returning to Mori. Mori, having lost Kyouka and thus Kouyou's incentive for staying in the Port Mafia, was already afraid he'd lost Kouyou's loyalty and support— and she's one of the four people he depends on. He also depends on Dazai, and although he's aware he drove Dazai away, that still hurts him. Further, Dazai demonstrating that he can and will use what he knows about Mori against him is terrifying to Mori because Dazai is one of the very few people capable of emotionally manipulating Mori. Dazai has Mori's nerves pinched between his fingers while telling Atsushi it's just an electrical wire.

Anyway, then Q is seized, hundreds of Port Mafia members and affiliates are killed, and Mori is wracked with shame and the fear that he behaved like the old boss. That's why Hirotsu and Chuuya are so gentle with him, and why, despite their agreement that Kouyou would stay with Dazai until Dazai saved Kyouka, Dazai asks her to return to Mori. It's also why the Agency and Port Mafia call a truce to collaborate against the Guild, without blaming Mori for what happened. They forgive because the cost of fighting is, as just demonstrated, too high, but also, they recognize that the escalation was mutually cultivated.

It's also why, at the very end, Mori asks Kouyou why she stays when she could leave. He knows he doesn't have Kyouka anymore, and he's still grappling with his guilt for those entrusted to his care that were killed because of his lapse in rationality. But, Kouyou assures him that this is a version of the Port Mafia she wants to protect. Because, even as Mori was spiraling and releasing Q, Kouyou was realizing that, unlike what happened to her, Kyouka could leave and decide for herself where and with whom she feels safe and has purpose. She could do that because Mori and the Agency have helped to create spaces and community and stability where there wasn't before. He's helped create a world where Kyouka can be a flower born in darkness and yet still make the choice to bloom in the light without being rejected or burned by it.

(And also because Kyouka left, and Mori didn't go after her to force Kouyou to stay. Because he would never do that.)

She wants to nurture that world with him, and she trusts him. The conflict may have escalated, but as soon as the cost was felt by the city and their own people, the Port Mafia and Agency were able to mutually deescalate and collaborate to contain the chaos and defuse it before it spread.

Mori isn't the old boss, and the humanity and love in him is reflected in his stewardship of their city. His humanity and love also mean he's capable of being hurt and will sometimes act emotionally and irrationally. But, it's okay for him to not always be rational; that's why Kouyou and Chuuya (and Hirotsu, who was goddamn MVP in the Guild Arc) are there to support him.

[kurokamiiii]

🩷💚 My two favorite characters ❤️🧡

[beardedmrbean]

[hiddenparabletheory]

What Is Hidden Parable Theory?

I have been getting a lot of questions about my theory. Here is a very short description of it. Check it out. It will blow your mind!

Many of you may be asking yourself “What exactly is Hidden Parable Theory?”. In this article, I will try to help clarify this question. So, what is Hidden Parable Theory? Hidden Parable Theory is a form of numerology that I modified using mathematical behavior based on the golden ratio. Why the golden ratio? Well, many scholars view the golden ratio as evidence of the existence of God or more specifically a Grand Creator of all things. So, it makes sense from a logical standpoint to use it as a way to interpret the Bible. Numerology then is the pathway of connecting numerical relationships that are found with the golden ratio and the Bible. Essentially, this is what makes up Hidden Parable Theory.

Defined as straight numbers Hidden Parable Theory uses these symbolic representations of numbers found in nature to make connections with numbers in the Bible. Another way to think of it is these symbolic numbers are basically interpreted as universal numbers and are also found in other religions as well. So, locating these universal numbers in the Bible is how Hidden Parable Theory makes interpretations that are fundamentally based on elements found in nature. But it does not stop here.

The golden ratio is only one of many examples that exist in nature that support this concept of straight numbers. It is then by making connections with these other scientifically defined models in nature that a well-defined interpretation of the Bible can be made. Then it is by using these straight numbers found in the Bible and religious artifacts that codes to hidden parables are formulated.

[seriousbrat]

what do you think the wizarding world economy is? I don’t think they’re capitalist, they’re obviously not communists, but I’m not sure beyond them. sometimes I think it must be a state run restricted market but maybe it’s just a bunch of cottage industries? they don’t seem involved in agriculture.

I kind of see the WW as a culture of the upper classes only, like the majority of magical folk occupied a higher classes status than serfs (like those in a religious order, maybe, and aristocracy) which further complicates this question

omg I'll be honest, I'm not super well versed in economics to be able to give a very educated or definitive answer to this haha, but it's an interesting topic! Also there's not that much specific information in canon, because I don't think jkr gave this any thought whatsoever lmao. Which to be fair is not really necessary to do in a kid's fantasy.

The government does regulate the market-- such as with Percy's cauldron bottoms haha. Percy mentions that this crucial world-changing bit of legislation is specifically meant to address imported cauldrons, indicating there is trade with other nations, and trade agreements. The Ministry also regulates import/export, which we also see with Ali Bashir and his carpets. Given Crouch and Percy's attitudes towards both Ali Bashir and the foreign cauldron bottoms, I think it's very possible that the Ministry's policy towards international trade is generally protectionist rather than free-trade. Tariffs for everyone! 😬

It seems as though goods are generally produced through craftsmanship rather than large-scale industrial processes. As far as I can remember there's never any mention of any factories or true industrialisation of any sort, rather goods such as broomsticks, snitches, wands, robes are produced by hand, on an individual basis by dedicated craftsmen.

So you could be right about cottage industries being prevalent in terms of internal trade; it's honestly probably some sort of mixed economy with maybe lingering elements of mercantilism (which would make sense given they're 'behind' the Muggle world in many respects.) but I'm not certain what, if anything, Britain would export. Possibilities are potions ingredients, broomsticks, robes (this would be a good parallel to Britain's history with the textile industry) or, perhaps, floo powder.

Floo powder is maybe an interesting product to look at. According to this pottermore entry on Floo Powder, manufacture of Floo powder is strictly controlled, and "no shortage of Floo powder has ever been reported, nor does anybody know anyone who makes it. Its price has remained constant for one hundred years: two Sickles a scoop." So that does seem to indicate a high level of intervention in trade by the Ministry. Also i have no idea what the fact that the price hasn't changed for a century says about either inflation or currency rates lol.

Anyway, tbh I think they must engage in agriculture in some fashion, because a girl's gotta eat and we know that food cannot be magically produced. I guess it's possible that they somehow exchange with Muggles (or other wizarding states. this seems more likely. maybe spain lol, since a lot of produce sold in the UK is grown here.) But I tend to think they're mostly self-sustaining.

Agriculture can be made much more efficient through the use of magic, basically eliminating a lot of the manual labour involved. You'd also need much less space (and it's already a reduced population) and could potentially speed up the time it takes to grow crops. The Weasleys have a vegetable patch and pigs and chickens-- many magical families seem to live in rural areas so I can imagine there might be a system where families who grow crops and/or keep livestock can trade in surplus produce for refined goods such as flour, oil, etc or 'luxury' goods like chocolate. Some sort of state-organised smallholding situation makes more sense to me as opposed to large-scale agricultural production.

As far as I can recall, we have no canon examples of anyone going shopping for food. But there must be something in place. The Hogwarts kitchens must go through an incredible amount of supplies (and yes food can be magically multiplied, but even so) and it has to come from somewhere. It's likely that the Hogwarts house-elves deal with procurement themselves.

Speaking of which, there's also the factor of slavery forming a part of this society and therefore the economy. We know of the existence of 'elf-made wine,' although this is treated in canon as a luxury good. It's likely that most wine is made through magic. There's a spell that produces a 'fountain of wine' and it's unclear whether beverages are beholden to the food exception to gamp's law. Either way it's almost certainly possible to transfigure grapes directly into wine, and therefore wine produced artisanally (by elves) is given more value. Basically I don't think they have elves engaged in industrial-scale labour, but they still form a part of the economy in some way.

And the other thing to consider (and that we don't know) is to what extent the goblins are involved in the wizarding economy and in what way. They control the only bank and also control the production of currency. I developed some Goblin lore a while ago, which you can find here, but something I theorised is that Goblins don't actually value wizarding currency internally within their own society (rather precious metals themselves) and basically use it as a means to exert some influence over wizarding society, to keep themselves afloat so that wizards don't completely subjugate them the way they have the house-elves. Technically the Goblins (as I envision them) would be Bullionist I believe. But the wizarding economy and the goblin economy would be closely intertwined, basically interdependent.

So... I'm just not sure how all this would be defined lmao. This got very long because I was just vomiting every possible thought about the wizarding economy lol so sorry. Perhaps someone who knows more about economics than me (art degree lol) would be able to give a better answer haha.

like the majority of magical folk occupied a higher classes status than serfs

Regarding this-- we have a few examples from Beedle, which is really our only source of information about how magical people lived pre-Statute of Secrecy. Babbity Rabbity is a washerwoman for a King who hates magic, for instance. Of course, this is fiction in-universe, but I think it still gives some indication of what life was like for witches and wizards at the time. Similarly the wizards in 'Hopping Pot' live in a cottage in a small village, but on the other hand the Warlock in 'Hairy Heart' is wealthy and lives in a castle. From this, I would hazard that witches and wizards were most likely present in all levels of society pre-Statute. (and this also follows since a child born to Muggles can have magical ability, they wouldn't suddenly be relegated to a different social class) We know some, like the Malfoys, had close ties to the nobility, but likely not all.

[fundgruber]

The roots of the world-image we’ll call ‘poetry’ first become legible, with weird historical abruptness, in 18th-century Germany. Still high on G W Leibniz half-inventing the computer, German philosophy was looking to perfect our understanding of the world by making our thoughts more effable – that is, distilling our concepts as far as we can into explicit lists or recipes or rules. The prospect of perfection here lies partly in precision and self-knowledge for their own sake, partly in the promise that all concepts bottom out in absolutes like God or soul or cosmic logos, where our thoughts achieve completeness. It’s against this backdrop that we find the wonderful but half-forgotten Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten arguing, in 1735, that not all thinking strives for effability: poetry is a special kind of thought that’s patently not effable, but perfect just the way it is. What makes poetry perfect, per Baumgarten, is that, although poems cannot make our thoughts transparent like philosophy, they can enlarge the scope of our thoughts to a point that reveals their fullest nature. A poem is a network of interconnected images, feelings and apprehensions that achieves a kind of rational completeness in its density, diversity and harmony. [...] Baumgarten’s theory of good poetry had a kind of absurd, computer-sciencey brilliance to it: good poetry is simply a large quantity of sensate thought. The trick to this absurd-sounding idea is that, to think a lot but all at once, we have to think associatively, self-referentially, vividly, temporally – anything and everything that keeps our thoughts interconnected in a living whole. And these interconnections themselves, as we grasp them, not only maintain the thought-network but enter into it as ineffable thoughts of relations, and then as ineffable thoughts of relations of (ineffable thoughts of) relations and so on, until we reach the fullness of ‘beautiful thinking’.

Peli Grietzer, Patterns of the lifeworld. Machine learning theory is shedding new light on how to think about the mysterious and ineffable nature of art. https://aeon.co/essays/why-poetry-is-a-variety-of-mathematical-experience

"Poetry, as the imaginative grasping of a world’s coherence, is in part ‘about’ the same thing as the scientific image: the causal-material patterns that make rational life possible. And while our scientific image in, say, the mid-20th century had nothing much that poetry could hold on to, times and images have changed – especially with the development of modern machine learning. In recent years, the field of machine learning has produced exciting mathematical and empirical clues about the patterns that make up human lifeworlds, the mechanics of imaginative grasping, and the resonance between the two."

"Poetry is, in important part, the promise that we can have sacred mystery without the metaphysical, religious or supernatural baggage. To do right by poetic thought, we need to weave a language for sacred mystery from manifest and scientific threads. Can we do this through something like a minimal poetic gloss on basically technical ideas? My hope for keeping poetry as sacred mystery, then, is to propose that our experience of poetry is a variety of mathematical experience."

[dear-kumari]

A couple months ago I started writing a draft essentially joking that a lot of the uncritical praise for Malevolent must be sublimated backlash to TMA, but the further I get into TMA and the discourse surrounding it the more I think that that might actually just be true

[christianfangirl1]

Who has theory’s or headcannons about PEACE ORG from villainous???

[donotdestroy]

“Critics see the move as an attempt to cater to the incoming Trump administration and avoid political retaliation, suggesting the consequences of Meta’s new policies could have serious implications for the types of posts, hateful and violent speech, and misinformation that can spread even faster than they already do across Meta’s platforms.”

[classycookiexo]

[mangyraccooon]

I’ve seen the fandom take a bastard character and make them a poor little meow meow, twice now

Which isn’t a lot but it’s fucking disappointing.