Culture of Deception?

I thought this was a very thought provoking article. What do you guys think.

Here is the link. http://www.transparencynow.com/confusion.htm

Post 1

Thursday, August 19, 2004 - 5:15am

"in which we can no longer always rely on the evidence of our senses to tell us what is real. "

If our senses are so unreliable, then how do we ever realize we are being deceived? The answer is "Reason." I recommend you go and read more Objectivist literature, particularly "Philosophy: Who Needs It" by Ayn Rand. I don't get what this article is trying to say. The only message I can reasonably interpret is that people who choose not to think are easily deceived, which is true.

Ethan

Post 2

Thursday, August 19, 2004 - 6:30am

People who lie are slaves to that lie, and can only depend on the stupidity of others to keep gaining an advantage for being dishonest. This article is a good demonstration why. For instance, the article cites James Randi as exposing fraudulent tricks that con people every year.

Post 3

Thursday, August 19, 2004 - 8:29am

They have a whole page of these weird articles. I can't really figure out what there point is. Can any of you geniuses figure them out?

http://www.transparencynow.com/tablesim.htm

Post 4

Thursday, August 19, 2004 - 1:10pm

I'm not going to read most of his essays, but a glimpse at the list gives me the followingl impression:

Media creates images of society. These images are sometimes distorted from how things actually are...and then we live as if the distortions are true, and this leads to further misunderstandings about the world, and we attempt to reconcile those misunderstandings either by evading (though acting out, simulations, or simply ignoring the facts) or by trying re-shape reality to our expectations (which, granted, is evading the fact that the world is as it is and there's nothing you can really do about it).

I may very well be wrong about the overall content of his essays; that's just my impression over his articule summaries. Whether or not he endorses these positions, or simply warns about the distortions getting carried away, is also another issue entirely.

Post 5

Thursday, August 19, 2004 - 1:31pm

from what little I looked at the site, it seems to be a tired rehashing of jean beaudrillard. beaudrillard's most well known claim, in his book "simulacra and simulation" is essentially that we reify the unreal, the fictitious, the world of media images so much, and interact with them so much, that there is no longer a substantive difference between real and unreal: that the unreal has come to be so prominent in our minds and to so affect so much of our lives that we might as well call it real also. and, thus, "reality" is a pointless concept. this website is nothing just a copying of a postmodernist superstar.

Post 6

Thursday, August 19, 2004 - 3:34pm

I don't think that's what he is trying to say. It looks like he is saying that all these unrealities and simulations are causing a lot of problems in our society.

Post 7

Thursday, August 19, 2004 - 4:53pm