The Pan Narrans Approach to Science

[innerbrat]

The reasons I haven't said much about the discussions of race in science fiction and fantasy that have been ricocheting around the relevant sections of the internet this year can be summed up by two points; I've been reading and listening more than having anything to say, and most of my friends have had better things to say than I have

Comments

[pmoodie]

A fascinating and thought-provoking post

[innerbrat]

I take your point about scientists being story-tellers like any others, but that sort of thing makes us poor laypersons a bit nervous! Some of us are fascinated by science, but we rely on scientists to explain their discoveries in terms we can understand. We read what we can, but we don't have time to read everything. So, we only get a part of the picture, and even that is inevitably going to be coloured by the individual bias of whichever scientist wrote it.
Unfortunately you're just going to have to deal with that. I mean, how do you know anything about the world outside your own limited experience without a) constructing your own stories and b) listening to other people's stories?

As to this Mammoth business, it seems to me that ascribing some kind of higher morality to prehistoric cultures is just racism of a different sort. I find it hard to accept that homo sapiens just suddenly started to exploit the environment irresponsibly in the last couple of centuries, it's only just that we've recently developed the technology to do it

[pmoodie]

It doesn't negate your point, but the impression I get is not that it's not ascirbing this morality to a prehistoric people that lost it, but to an extant (but endangered) people that have always had it.

Again though, I think it's a strangely prejudicial way of thinking. Apart from a bit of cultural variation, I think all people are basically the same.

[matgb]

Put it a different way, I'm a political scientist by training if not by paid work.

we rely on scientists[journalists] to explain their discoveries[the scandals] in terms we can understand

What's the difference? How accurately is the media reporting stories to you? For example, what proportion of MPs have a)done nothing wrong, b) made a bookkeeping error or c) actually tried to fleece the system over expenses?

Guarantee most people asked will horribly inflate the last two and underestimate the first one.

Same with science-I love reading science stories, but you have to take everything with a pinch of salt, as there's no such thing as an unbiased reporter.

Anyway, gotta go, SB finishes work.

[anonymous]

"OK, maybe it is that we're all racist"
We're not all racist, but we are all xenophobic outside our village. Racism is an emotive 'rationalisation' of instinctive xenophobia, driven by the human need to find patterns. The cure is peaceful co-existence, which removes the xenophobia.

To make a serious issue of humans causing mass extinctions is to miss the point that maybe they did (and they did - see Rapa Nui aka Easter Island) and maybe they didn't. But either way, they didn't SET OUT to; it just happened that way. They are no more to 'blame' than the dino-killer was to blame for hitting Yucatan. And humans have been highly beneficial to many species (chickens, the 'flu virus, cockroaches, etc). Don't blame humans for being human, but don't defend them, either. Just try and understand them as part of nature. With understanding comes the opportunity for control, if we want to.

[innerbrat]

I love you, but I wish you'd at least sign off your comments.

We're not all racist, but we are all xenophobic outside our village. Racism is an emotive 'rationalisation' of instinctive xenophobia, driven by the human need to find patterns. The cure is peaceful co-existence, which removes the xenophobia.
I don't disagree, but I tend to use 'xenophobia' to imply prejudice based on nationality, which is just as universal. And I don't think it can be removed by peaceful co-existence. I don't think you can remove the instinct to divide the world into 'us and them'.

Apart from that, how does this differ from my point?

They are no more to 'blame' than the dino-killer was to blame for hitting Yucatan.
IDK, humans have the ability to understand consequences and actions, and all that free-will stuff, and so yes, we're to blame for the consequences of our actions, whether the consequence was intended or not

[anonymous]

Sorry about not signing : ID

[innerbrat]

We're (unsurprisingly) idealogically aligned on the xenophobia thing, give or take a fews semantics. The thing is, I don't think it's possible to 'remove' the 'them', I just think we should deal with the co-existence.

(Removing the them = loss of diversity or ignoring diversity, and that's not desirable)

'blame' implies wrongdoing implies absolute morality. Our actions have consequences, but those actions are also consequences, so how far back do you go before you hit the 'absolute action'? I am not to blame for wiping out the mammoths, and I don't see why I should be expected to feel guilty. And I'm sure their contemporary, the smilodon, would have had no compunction about wiping out us.
I was using 'blame' and 'responsibility' more or less synonymously, and I wasn't talking about living humans accepting blame or feeling guilty. Humans having caused extinctions in the past confers a responsibility (and yes, blame, because humans are aware of consequences) on those humans, not on their descendants

[furikku]

I want to read this megafauna extinction post of yours. :D

The One thing that puzzles me about the whole thing is, why, if you are writing an AU, does it have to be the American Continent at all? Why can't you have some entirely fictional continent like Lemuria or something that has just somehow managed to not be populated with anything but Cool Megafauna?

(Other puzzlers include, "Why does she think her only options to write aboriginals are 'Savage' or 'Noble Savage'?" and "Does she really think she's covering any kind of new ground here, seriously?!")

[apiphile]

My major objection to this is:

why are we viewing human-caused extinctions prior to culpable "modern" civilisation as morally good/bad and not just one species proving more successful than another?

[innerbrat]

This is a value of 'we' that doesn't necessarily include me.

[apiphile]

Sorry, should have been clearer about that.

[davegodfrey]

Tudors vs Mammoths sounds an interesting concept for a world, (and I don't understand why you have to remove the Native Americans to do it) but I know exactly how it would really end- the guys with guns will wipe out the mammoths, even faster than the Clovis guys could have IRL. And frankly that isn't really a book I want to read. I'd be much more interested in something with the megafauna in the modern US.

And I'm not even going to go near the guys who think the overkill model is racist. I'm trying to resist the urge to point out the existence of Keystone Species, and how dependant entire ecosystems can be on a single organism, but I know it won't make any difference.