In a single-source-of-truth, “lossy” society; “outliers” are always fair game. An outlier is a person or thing that is markedly different or detached from the others in a particular group, class, or category. How does Cornithaca County deal with outliers? The answer is simple: Outliers hold anomalous values, they’re a source of disruption and discontent, so just delete them.
They may start with people of a different race, gender, national origin or belief — but they won’t stop there.
In a county where lock-step legislators rule on the basis of doctrinal code; you don’t think that your child’s education would be any different. [If you think about their education at all beyond hearing: “It’s the Best!”]
Imagine even art being taught as a group activity, where your ideas need to be approved by everyone in the group, or you cannot contribute to the picture. In Cornithaca County it’s called “collaboration” — in history it’s called “oppression.”
It’s more than just lab coats; there seems to be an aura of “otherness” that pervades scientific experimentation. It’s as if their actions have the same natural inevitability as gravity, and are divorced from the human sphere of care and compassion.
Their view from the scientific heights delights in portraying people as insignificant and ephemeral, but it’s only people that give Science any meaning.
Science is not in the service of the Universe, it’s in the service of people.
As Artificial Intelligence looms larger and larger, overshadowing humanity, there is one clear result — nothing is being done to protect us. The actuality of human displacement has been met, not with protections or retraining programs, but with indifference and vague assurances of new jobs in the future. There’s not even a mention of what country those jobs will be in.
There is an old joke in which a corporate “tycoon” vacationing in a small fishing village instructs a skilled fisherman on the steps he can take to become rich so he can retire and enjoy life. The fisherman responds by asking “Why? I’m doing that right now.”
We could have a simpler and much more fulfilling life with all the latest technology, but then where would the “tycoons” be?
The once independent rural community I live in has been taken over by an affluent suburban pastiche of incomers. They recently pushed through a 300 page Comprehensive Plan whose most influential writer stated that she didn’t think the rural people “deserved to live there.”
There won’t be any “fishing villages” in their Cornithaca County!
It’s a common occurrence in satire to question whether something is actually satirical or not. Since the Cornithaca County book is intended to challenge the reader, I have tried not to give even that solid ground. Some parts are obviously outrageous and others quite “sensible.” It’s easy today to only connect with the people and sites that reinforce your beliefs and not be exposed to different ways of viewing the world. Thinking and learning can be uncomfortable, but there’s a comfort in realizing you are part of a larger world than you ever knew existed.
Have you ever gotten those large, bulging envelopes from charitable fund raisers and wondered who is paying for all the printed enclosures, the cards, address labels, pens, t-shirts, ornaments, personalized note pads and attention-getters they contain?
Do you wait in a long line at the only open check-out counter, only to be publicly questioned about your charitable intentions so the store’s owners can brag about how generous they are?
Non-profits are increasingly using aggressive and psychologically manipulative means to enrich themselves; and why not? — Since they are “good” by definition; every act is cleansed. Cornithaca County’s Corporate-Educational-Non-profit- Bureaucrat-Conglomerate is more that “good” by their own definition; they’re “better.”
And if you’re “better,” what acts can’t you justify?
Another structured lesson for students. Government authorities have traditionally claimed to aim at perfection and have fallen far short. You can imagine how far short they’ve fallen when they only strive to reach adequacy — or you could take a look around and not have to imagine.
You know you live in Cornithaca County when they don’t fix the problem, just change the definition.
Since learning of my Family Farm Fun book being used for home schooling in Agricultural Pollution and Rural Justice topics, I decided to consciously add structured lessons to the content of this book. I hope that they will encourage the imaginative and creative thought that has [except for lip service] been removed from the classroom.
Is this an example of the “Lossy” Society?
Like the “Stone Monuments” Maze, this maze is just for fun and has no connection to the Cornithaca County agenda of the book. It’s one of the places set aside for the reader to relax. The solution has been added to this image. In this book, as in the Family Farm Fun book, the solutions to all the puzzles and mazes will be given in the back.
In a time of “doing good by definition,” it’s important to look behind the bureaucratic billboards and see what their “vision of the future” is actually like. Non-profits are defined as “good” [even if 80% of the donations are siphoned off before they trickle down to the needy] and so is “Science.”
Why is it that so many professions that deal in cold hard cash and cold hard facts are now cloaking themselves in compassion and concern?
The answer is revealed in Cornithaca County.
