0547 In chapter three, Stiles recalls Noam Chomsky’s book (1988), Manufacturing Consent.  Chomsky tells the story of Walter Lippmann (1889-1974), adored as the most influential journalist of the 20^th century and regarded as the father of modern journalism.  Lippmann wrote books disparaging the public at large, questioning their ability to function as intelligent members of society.  In short, people are too stupid for democracy.

0548 Still, people love the word, “democracy”.

Perhaps, the elites may script a self-serving fiction about “democracy”, where “democracy” empowers the elites in an Age of Crowds, because the elites represent the common folk.

We must protect “our democracy”, from everyone who does not buy into elite narratives.

0549 Democracy never appeals to logic.  Democracy entices crowds with images and parables. Democracy presents simple slogans that crystallize into manufactured “truths”.  Democracy exposes the ambitions of its opponents, while presenting what seems to be madness, wrapped in slogans promoting liberty, equality and fraternity.  Democracy works miracles, demonstrating its authority.  Those who promote democracy with donations of, say, $100,000,000, ask folk to enter the kingdom, then smile as the sheep build their own corral. 

0550 What is necessary to define the word, “democracy”?

The experts will tell.

0551 The first amendment enshrines freedom of the press.  But, what is freedom?  Is the press free to call upon experts funded by the private Rockefeller Foundation in the support of public legislation, which will be passed by senators, who are now directly elected by the citizens of each state?  Do those citizens buy into the concept of “our democracy”?  Are those citizens subject to the techniques of crowd management?

Is “freedom of the press” now “the liberty to spread values determined by highly educated… er… credentialed experts”?

0552 In 1919, Upton Sinclair writes The Brass Check: A Study in American Journalism: Evidence and Reason Behind The Media’s Corruption.

In 1922, Walter Lippmann publishes his masterwork, Public Opinion, arguing that experts are necessary to sift through complex data (observations and measurements of phenomena) in order to guide the masses to the optimum decisions.

Surely, a citizen of the original thirteen colonies would applaud Upton Sinclair for his honesty.

Surely, a citizen in the Age of Crowds would follow Lippmann’s argument because expert reviewers extol Lippmann’s appeal to reason_3a,1a, where the intellect_3a contextualizes the will_1a and the will_1a has no desire for truth.

0553 What does the will_1a desire?

In the Age of Crowds, the will_1a does not desire timeless transcendentals, such as truth, beauty, wisdom, salvation, friendship, and so on.  The will_1a desires “the transcendentals” of crowds: liberty, equality and fraternity.

Almost twenty years before the Second Battle of the Enlightenment Gods, the Hot War Among Fraternal Ideologies(1938-1945), Sinclair celebrates a new age of fraternity, trying to be born.  Sinclair says that the press ought to assist the birth.  Instead, the press insists on killing the child in the womb.

0554 Little does Sinclair know that the demon-gods of the hot war among fraternal ideologies incubate in-vitro in the crib of what the press fails to say and who the press is beholden to.

0555 Lippmann’s vision is further refined during the Third Battle of the Enlightenment Gods: The Cold War Among Materialist Ideologies (1945-1989).  Ownership of broadcasting media (radio and television) consolidates.  The Central Agency for Intelligence initiates a systemic infiltration of corporate media.

There is resistance.  Stiles presents a list of whistleblowers spanning from 1908 to 2020.

0556 By the start of the Fourth Battle of the Enlightenment Gods: Empirio-normative Domination of Subject Populations in the Post-Truth Condition (1989 to present), corporate media and government collaborate.  Experts infiltrate every American institution.

According to Stiles, intentional biases and outright deception replace the quest for truth_3a,1a.

Yes, such may be the case.  But, the suggestion can be made for a transformation of the hidden agenda (SV_i) that no one can see, but everyone knows is there.  What else would explain (SI_i) what we think and see (SO_i)?

0557 Here is a picture.

0558 Chapter four discusses techniques of stagecraft.  A staged event_2c captures the awareness_3a,1a of the scrappy player level.  That awareness_2a is situated by experts_3b.  Then, expert valuations_2b open an opportunity_1c for the one of scientism_3c to execute an empirio-normative judgment_2c.

Once again, here is a picture of the interscope for the post-truth condition, derived from an Looking at Steve Fuller’s book (2020) “A Player’s Guide to the Post-Truth Condition”.

0559 An execution of an empirio-normative judgment_2c is an occasion for stagecraft_2c.  So, stagecraft keys into the operations of an interventional sign-vehicle (SV_i).

An empirio-normative judgement_2c (SV_i) stands for what I think [which cannot be objectified as] what I say_2a (SO_i) in regards to my reason_3a,1a (SI_i).

0560 In previous figures, I depict the SV_i activating the SI_i then leading to a SO_i.

But, this depiction misleads in so far as it suggests that this triadic sign-relation is a sequence of two dyadic relations.  It is not.  Three elements are simultaneously in play.  Two of the elements belong to the realm of actuality, SV_i (green) and SO_i (tangerine).  The third element belongs to the realms of normal context and potential, SI_i (purple).

0561 Color-coding the interventional sign-relation allows me to visualize the triadic relation that stagecraft captures.

0562 Color-coding also suggests that the content-level of the post-truth condition is more complex than it first appears.

Already, I know that the content-level is a site of contention, because professional agents of media and expertise produce specific content-level nested forms designed to be accepted wholesale and incorporated into the general content-level nested form for the scrappy player.  Indeed, a technical word for players who have wholesale “bought into” a prepackaged specific content-level nested form is “woke”.  Others use the technical term, “zombie”.

0563 For the current battle of enlightenment gods, I use the term “bigilib”, for big government (il)liberals.

0564 An interventional sign-vehicle (SV_i) activates what I think_2a.

So, what is the nature of what I think_2a?

0565 Can I compare the scrappy player level with the content level of the scholastic interscope for how people think(elaborated in A Primer on the Individual in Community, by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues, as well as Looking at John Deely’s Book (2010) “Semiotic Animal” appearing in Razie Mah’s blog in October 2023)?

Here is a picture.

0566 Active body_2a corresponds to the body in action.  The five senses are active.  So are proprioceptors that report the status of all sorts of body functions.

Sensate soul_2a corresponds to feelings and sensations and qualia.  The smell of a rose triggers a memory… not a complete memory, but a reminiscence that cannot be put into words.  Yet, spoken words may be conjured, especially if someone is at hand to help with one’s vocabulary.  A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

What I sense [substantiates] what I feel_2a in the normal context of what is happening_3a operating on the potential of ‘something’ happening_2a.

0567 So, maybe, stagecraft presents the scrappy player with what is happening_3a,1a and what I think_2a corresponds to the entire content level of the scholastic interscope for how people think.

0568 Why stop there?

Why not have what I think_2a correspond to the entire scholastic interscope?

Here is a picture of the interscope for what I think_2a.

0569 Surely, this fits better.  What I think_2a cannot be limited to sensations and feelings_2a.  Can it?  The subscripts are a little confusing here, because an element in the interscope for the post-truth condition_2a now contains the entire interscope for how humans think, according to pre-modern scholastics.

0570 Let me dwell on the scholastic interscope for the moment.

0571 The three normal contexts constitute a perfectly (or completely) appropriate hierarchy.  Does this make sense_3ccontextualizes what it means to me_3b, while what it means to me_3b situates what is happening_3a.  Is there a name for a transcendental that brings all these normal contexts into alignment.  Perhaps, the labels, “prudence” or “temperance”, apply.

0572 The three potentials also constitute a perfectly appropriate hierarchy.  Contextualizing the situation_1c should put situating content_1b into perspective, just as situating content_1b should tell me the meaning, presence and message of ‘something’ happening to me_1a.

The key point is “me”.  If I want to figure out what is happening_3a, then I must be true to myself.  I cannot deny sensation_2a.  I cannot pick and choose my perceptions_2b.  I cannot refuse the opportunity to find the context where sensation and perception both make sense_2c.  Is there a name for a transcendental that brings all these potentials into alignment.  Perhaps, the labels, “truth” and “beauty”, apply.

0573 Finally, the three actualities constitute a completely integrated hierarchy.

0574 There is more.

On one hand, the actualities may be pictured as a virtual nested form.

I will use this nested form to portray what I think_2a in the post-truth interscope.

0575 On the other hand, the perspective_c level actuality is itself a triadic relation that brings the situation_b level into relation with the content_a level, not as a virtual category-based nested form, but as a judgment.

A judgment is a triadic relation composed of three elements: relation, what is, and what ought to be.  If each of these elements is imbued with one of Peirce’s three categories, then the judgment becomes actionable.

0576 Here is a picture for philosophical judgment, whose transcendental is wisdom.

Wisdom (relation, thirdness) brings the universality of sensation (what is, secondness) into relation with the intelligibility of perception (what ought to be, firstness).

0577 At this point, what I think_2a seems to be an incredibly nuanced element in the post-truth condition.

If, what I think_2a corresponds to the scholastic interscope for how humans think, then the transcendentals of prudence, temperance, truth, beauty and wisdom are built into how I think_2a. It is like a gift from the One Who Gives, Without Us Knowing Why.  This gift is given in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.  So, the embodied transcendentals are adaptations to a world that no longer exists.  Today, the followers of Thomas Aquinas might label that world, original justice,compared to our current Lebenswelt of original sin.

0578 Indeed, it seems that the interscope for the post-truth condition aims to put what I think_2a into a box, so that my own mind becomes the corral for the sheep that I have become. 

0579 Now, let me go back to that philosophical judgment.

Does it associate to what I say_2a?

Hmmm….

0580 Actionable judgments unfold according to Peirce’s categories.

Here is the nested form corresponding to the above philosophical judgment.

0581 The normal context of wisdom₃ brings the universality of sensation₂ into relation with the potential for intelligibility of perception₁.

0582 This nested form is magnificent, but it has an Achilles heel.

The perspective-level philosophical judgment evolves in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in, when hominins practice hand talk and implicit abstraction.  Hand talk and implicit abstraction are holistic, so there is no avenue to disarticulate the elements of actionable judgment and its corresponding nested form.  In hand talk, what I think is embodied as what I say.  So, the entire scholastic interscope is built into the human body and soul.  Meaning, presence and message are not differentiated.

In our current Lebenswelt, people use spoken words.  Spoken words are not holistic.  They are specific.  Indeed, what I think_2a (for example, as formulated by the scholastic interscope for how humans think) is very difficult to put into spoken words_2a.  However, my judgment is easy to speak, because spoken words are available (if not already suggested, by an ongoing interventional sign-vehicle (SV_i) and interpretant (SI_i).

0583 Yes, what I think_2a and what I say_2a both belong to the interventional sign-object (SO_i).

However, what I think_2a is holistic because it manifests as an interscope and what I say_2a is not, because it manifests as an actionable judgment.

0584 Speech realizes that actionable judgment in the following manner.

After the actionable judgment unfolds into a category-based nested form, spoken conversation typically deals with actualities, then later, potentials, and lastly, normal contexts.

Here is another picture of the scrappy player level, with these developments in mind.

0585 Uh oh.  I am starting to see that what I think and what I say are not the same nested forms.

And the key is secondness.  After all, secondness is the realm of actuality.  So, if anything comes to the fore, it will be the realm of actuality.

0586 What I think is denoted by a virtual nested form in secondness where the normal context of my judgment_2c brings the actuality of my perceptions_2b into relation with the potential of my sensations_2a.  My perception_2b associates to actuality₂ on the situation_b level, which makes perception_2b an actuality₂ occurring on the level_b associated with actuality.

So, perception_2b stands out as far as what I think is concerned.

0587 What I say is different.  The universality of sensation gives what is the character of secondness.  The intelligibility of perception imbues what ought to be with the character of firstness.  The relation, wisdom, if I can call it that, associates with thirdness. 

0588 In sum, secondness (or the character of actuality) goes with perception for what I think and with sensation for what I say.  So, what I say_2a will initially speak about sensation and universality, within the normal context of the intellect_3a and the potential of the will_1a for the scrappy player.

0589 What does that imply?

What I say_2a does not necessarily objectify what I think_2a, because I (a scrappy player) will first talk about sensations (actuality₂) as if my sensations are universal, then perceptions (potential₁) as if my perceptions are intelligible, and finally, about whether any of this makes sense (normal context₃), as if some sort of wisdom is involved.

0590 Ah, that last sentence sounds like what is of the Positivist’s judgment.  A noumenon [cannot be objectified] as its phenomena.

0591 Whoa!  Put on the brakes!

Let me pause and take a deep breath and first consider the Positivist’s judgment.

Here is a picture.

A positivist intellect (relation, thirdness) brings an empirio-schematic judgment (what ought to be, secondness) into relation with the dyad, a noumenon [cannot be objectified as] its phenomena (what is, firstness).  The positivist intellect has a rule.  Metaphysics is not allowed.

Plus, for the empirio-schematic judgment, a disciplinary language (relation, thirdness) brings mathematical and mechanical models (what ought to be, secondness) into relation with observations and measurements of phenomena (what is, firstness).

0592 These two interlocking judgments are developed in Comments on Jacques Maritain’s Book (1935) Natural Philosophy.

0593 Now I may return to the interscope of the post-truth condition and consider how the Positivist judgment might unfold into the virtual nested form in the realm of actuality (that is, the second column).

What is (belonging to firstness) goes with the content_a-level actuality₂.

What ought to be (belonging to secondness) consists in the empirio-schematic judgment, unfolding to occupy the entire the situation_b-level.

That leaves only the relation of the Positivist’s judgment, labeled “the positivist intellect”.  The empirio-normative judgment_2c represents the positivist intellect.  The positivist intellect has a rule.  Metaphysics is not allowed.  The empirio-normative judgment_2c obeys the same rule.

0594 Here is a picture of the interscope of the post-truth condition with key words of the Positivist’s judgment displayed.  

0595 Okay, the interscope of the post-truth condition expresses the Positivist’s judgment in expansive style.  The Positivist’s judgment expands into all levels.  Also, the empirio-schematic judgment expands into a category-based nested form on the situation level.

On the scrappy player level, the noumenon, the thing itself, corresponds to what I think and associates to the prescientific scholastic interscope for how humans think.  What I say associates to the relational structure of human judgment and corresponds to phenomena, that will be situated as observations and measurements_1b by experts_3b in the post-truth interscope.

On the expert level, the empirio-schematic judgment unfolds.

On the relativist one level, the positivist intellect is represented by the empirio-normative judgment_2c.

0596 Here is the Positivist’s judgment, embodied in the post-truth interscope, as if the judgment has unfolded into the virtual nested form for the category of secondness.

What represents the positivist intellect_2c?

The empirio-normative judgment_2c.

0597 Now I consider the Torches of Freedom campaign that Stiles describes in chapter four as an example of stagecraft.

On March 31, 1929, at the Easter parade in New York City, a young woman steps out of the crowd on 5^th Avenue and lights a cigarette.  Press photographers capture the moment.  The incident is magnified by radio and newspaper reports.  The next day, a puff piece appears in the New York Times, applauding the courage of the ladies who lit up at the Easter parade.  Women should do what they want to do.

0597 The goal of stagecraft is to present a fiat accompli, an event_2a and a commentary_2a, aiming to overlay what I think [and] what I say_2a.

0598 Once this is accomplished, then the interscope for the post-truth condition engages as an exercise of applied science.  What I think belongs to a noumenon and what I say corresponds to that noumenon’s phenomena.

0599 After the event, a Bernay-linked agency may ask my opinion, particularly how I feel (sensations) and what the event means to me (perceptions).  All phenomena not related to the promotion campaign will be dismissed.

Then, this data_1b will be analyzed according to the disciplinary language_3b and methodologies_2b of advertising in order to arrive at a model of value_2b, not for the scrappy player, but for the cool-headed person who pays for the campaign.  The determination of value_2b may occasion the opportunity_1c for another staged event_2c, in which “courageous ladies”, once again, light up cigarettes as a demonstration of their freedom and independence.

0600 What does this mean?

On the content level, “my” intellect_3a and “my” will_1a are not exclusively my own, even though they occupy the normal context_3a and potential_1a of the scrappy player level.  Instead, “my” reason_3a,1a is contested.  My reason_3a,1a is precisely the target of the empirio-normative judgment_2c.

0601 Needless to say, stagecraft is a rich man’s sport.

Plus, psychometrics is the science behind the sport.

0602 In chapter five, Stiles discusses why the word, “propaganda”, is damaged goods.

Creel’s success in the First World War and Edward Bernay’s success at marketing for American corporations leaves a bad taste in the mouths of the scrappy players.

0603 One sour note concerns exactly whose intellect_3a and will_1a constitute reason_3a,1a on the scrappy player level.

Stagecraft, done well, presents the scrappy player with a “filled in” content-level nested form, ready made to swallow whole.  In the figure below, “my” intellect_3a and the broadcast intellect_3a are confounded.  So, are “my” and “the target’s” will_1a.

When stagecraft succeeds, my reason_3a,1a becomes what it_3a,1a is targeted to be.

0604 The propaganda techniques used during the First World War left many Americans feeling betrayed.  They felt duped.  The psychometric sciences performed so well.  Too bad that the stagecraft was later shown to be exactly that.

Exactly what?

Shall I say “pure theater”?  Or, should I say “deception”?

0605 I suppose that the complainers sound like Eve, after the Fall, vexed at the cunning trick that led her into error.

The serpent’s spoken words tell her precisely what to think, and she turns its propaganda into her own actions.

How stupid is that?

0606 Another sour note concerns the categorical nature of what I think compared to what I say.  

A categorical shift occurs, precisely mimicking the Kantian slogan, a noumenon [cannot be objectified as] its phenomena.  Both a noumenon (the thing itself) and its phenomena (its observable and measurable facets) are real elements.  The contiguity between them contains a negation, so no matter how many observations and measurements one makes, one can never objectify the thing itself, which is the subject of natural experience.

0607 However, (and this point gets confusing) the noumenon and its phenomena belong to the same entity.  So, the apparently real elements in Kant’s slogan are distinctions which cannot ever be separated.  A noumenon does not exist without its phenomena.  Phenomena do not exist without their noumenon.  Yes, both labels apply to the same entity.

Got that?

0607 Kant’s slogan constitutes what is of the Positivist’s judgment.

The German philosopher, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804 AD), introduces the noumenon in order to balance an imbalance.  Scientists are only interested in observations and measurements of what can be observed and measured, that is, phenomena.  A century after Kant’s slogan takes shape, scientific circles argue that they should be able to dispense with the noumenon, the thing itself, altogether.  Veil the noumenon with scientific models.

Can I apply this to what I think_2a?

0608 Yes, the distinction between what I think and what I say compares to the distinction between a noumenon and its phenomena.

0609 What I think may be diagrammed using the scholastic interscope for how humans think.  Nine elements operate simultaneously to achieve a living thing, a human thought.  Imagine trying to perform that operation in a computer simulation!  What I think, like a noumenon, is holistic.  It is what we (humans) evolved to do.  It is a subject for philosophical discourse.  It is no accident that the transcendentals, including truth, come into play in the interscope for what I think.

The problem?

What I think cannot be directly observed and measured by the psychometric sciences.

0610 What I say can be observed and measured.

What I say is the unfolding of the perspective-level judgment.  

The actionable judgment goes like this.  Wisdom (or some other relation, thirdness) brings the universality of sensations embedded within what people say (what is, secondness) into relation with the intelligibility of perceptions (what ought to be, firstness).

The category-based nested form goes like this.  The normal context of wisdom, or some other transcendental₃ brings the actuality of the universality of sensation₂ into relation with the potential intelligibility of perception₁.

0611 The hang-up comes when looking at the content-level actuality_2a.

What I think_2a does not match what I say_2a.

0612 The category of secondness is the realm of actuality.  So, actuality should stand out in regards to what I think as well as what I say.  What stands out for what I think?  What stands out for what I say?  They aren’t the same.

Perception concerns my perceptive soul informing my reactive body, as in phantasms generating emotions.

Sensation is all about my active body substantiating my sensate soul, as in a scent generating a feeling.

0613 So, what is the first question that a postmodern journalist asks someone about a staged event?

Of course, the first question is “How do you feel about the incident?”

Stagecraft provokes the perception.  The survey question asks for the sensation.

There is a method to this madness.

For the psychometric sciences, what I think goes with the noumenon and what I say corresponds to its phenomena.  The expert_3b builds a model of value_2b based on observations and measurements_1b of phenomena_2a.  If the one of scientism_3csees an opportunity_1c for that value_2b, an empirio-normative judgment_2c will be executed.  Another incident will occur, and now the media is already prepared with a narrative and a model, designed to overlay onto my judgments_2a, my perceptions_2a and my sensations_2a, in order to to guide me as to what is the universal and intelligible thing to do_3a.

0614 Twenty years after the end of the First World War, and at the opening of the Second World War, concerned Americans establish an Institute of Propaganda Analysis.

They first try to sift good from bad propaganda.

That does not work.

America enters the Second Battle of the Enlightenment Gods: The Hot War Among Fraternal Ideologies (1938-1945).

0615 Chapter six is titled, “The Infrastructure of Belief”.

Le Bon sets the metaphor.  If beliefs are like buildings, then what are the main pillars that hold up the construction?  Once identified, the infrastructure of belief may account for how propaganda is more persuasive than appeals to logic.  Propaganda targets the infrastructure of belief.

0616 Le Bon identifies five pillars.  Stiles claims that these pillars are hard-wired into the human brain.  She also says that they correspond to trusted sources in a community.

Here is a list of pillars, along with the corresponding trust.

0617 Where would the pillars apply in the post-truth interscope?

In modern construction, the soil is too unstable to support a multi-story structure of concrete and steel.  So, architects call for pillars to be driven down, into the bedrock, which may be under meters of soil, in order to assure the stability of the ground beneath the building.  In effect, the pillars drive through the organic material above the bedrock with shafts of steel-reinforced concrete.

Unfortunately, if modern construction serves as a metaphor.  Then, the organic material above the bedrock, what we otherwise would call the “ground”, is the thing that the pillars of the elite edifice of the situation and perspective levels of the post-truth interscope pass through.

0618 In other words, the five pillars drive through the content-level actuality, which is the contiguity between what I thinkand what I am willing to say.

The pillar-driving metaphor offers another avenue for appreciating Stiles’s argument.

0619 In the following diagram, I arrange the five pillars so that they drive through the bubbles for what I think and the ellipse for what I say.  I do so by putting Le Bon terms as drivers (proceeding from the top) and reinforcers (supporting from the bottom).

0620 Let me start with thirdness.

Authority comes down on my judgment.  Only I have the authority to bring the intelligibility of my perceptions into relation with the universality of my sensations.  Only I have the authority to relate my emotions to my feelings.  Only I have the authority to relate what I think is going on with what I see going on around me.  Until, of course, I find myself wrapped up in the sign-object of an interventional sign-relation.

Social pressure moves aside any wisdom that I might say.  Remember that wisdom (thirdness) is the relation between the intelligibility of my perception (what ought to be, firstness) and the universality of my sensation (what is, secondness).  Social pressure works directly on wisdom, replacing it with its own, already formulated denkstyle.

0621 What about secondness?

Imagination is a potential underlying perception.  But, this is not my imagination.  This is the imagination that is wrapped up in stagecraft.  In regards to what I think, imagination makes the perception that stagecrafters want me to conjure more real, but not necessarily more intelligible.  Oh, their imaginary perception may seem more intelligible, because it is already embedded in the staged event.

Language can drive through the universality of sensation. Sensation is the gateway to perception.  What is happeningunderlies what it means to me.   Sensation associates to the active body (complete with its five senses and internal sensing mechanisms) substantiating the sensate soul (the actuality of feelings, qualia and experience, in the most foundational sense of the words).  When I turn to my colleague and ask, “Did you feel that?”, “that” is a sensation.  

If my colleague (or a broadcast announcer) offers a statement formulating how I should feel, then that statement is decoded immediately, because sensation is universal.  In staged events, a reporter tells me what my sensations are.  So, when I hear about an “unprovoked attack”, then I know how that feels.  It feels like being mugged.

0622 What about firstness?

0623 In regards to what I say, externally driven imagination makes perception more plausible. The person hearing the speaker’s words has to wonder, “Would this make sense if I were in the speaker’s situation?”

Imagination targets intelligibility from below.  Firsthand reports are so effective in stagecraft.  If what a so-called “victim” says adds to the plausibility of the narrative, then that goes right through any scrappy player’s attempts to figure out what really happened.   Stiles tells the story of Elizabeth O’Bagy, who wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal about her first-hand knowledge of the “moderate” Syrian opposition. Her op-ed turned into a lesson in stagecraft.

0624 From above, the scrappy player allows his own experiences of prior staged events to color the way his active body substantiates his sensate soul.  If a person lives through one lockdown, then a later, second, lockdown is less shocking.  If the person is confronted with one police officer asking for papers, the person is less shocked when police officers show up in the subway, asking to look in people’s bags.  Habituation is crucial.

The window of stagecraft always shifts towards greater surveillance (the experts need data to do their job) and control(including, the political power necessary to conduct psychometric experiments).

0625 Le Bon’s five pillars are like metal pylons piercing the organic ground of the human mind.

And what a building LeBon’s pillars support.

Today’s post-truth edifice has experts on the many floors.  Experts in natural science are located on the ground floors.  Experts on social science are on the floors above the natural scientists.  Experts on the psychometric sciences occupy still higher floors, high enough to have their own elevator. In the penthouse, the one of scientism resides.  In order to get to the elevator to the penthouse, one has to change elevators at the highest floor of the psychometric sciences.

0626 Yes, the metaphor of modern construction portrays the five pillars that Le Bon reveals as foundational supports, driven like steel pylons through the organicity of our human minds, to the bedrock of a geological formation that we cannot see, because our own awareness covers that foundation, like soil covering bedrock.

0627  My God-given authority is challenged by the fact that what I think_2a and what I say_2a is pierced, and becomes the thing that gardeners will landscape, because the pillars supporting the edifice of empirio-normative stagecraft goes through our organic minds, with shafts of explicit abstractions that are as sturdy as concrete and steel.

Now, a compromised intellect_3a contextualizes what I think_2a and pillar-pierced will_1a undergirds what I am willing to say_2a.

0628 Can I assert that “my intellect_3a” and “my will_1a” constitute the normal context and potential on the scrappy player level?

Or, have interventions by empirio-normative judgments (SV_i) activated my intellect_3a and my will_1a (SI_i), again and again, in such a fashion that they are no longer “mine”, but “ours”.  It takes a village to raise a child.   It takes a laboratory to raise a compliant citizen-subject.

So now, my God-given intellect_3a and will_1a have been donated to the psychometric sciences_2b as subject matter to provide valuations_2b that can be used as opportunities_1c to conduct (using my taxpayer dollars) further empirio-normative interventions (SV_i).

0628 Slowly, what I think transfers “my” wisdom, universality and intelligibility to “our” authority, imagination and experience.  What I say transmogrifies into a product of social pressure, label-manipulation and pre-packaged imaginary scenarios, which are intelligible, only in the way that a lie that may get someone out of being accused of a crime is intelligible. 

0631 Here is a picture of the associations rendered above.

0631 One of today’s fashion statements is body-piercing and tattoos.  If body-piercing is an interventional sign-object(SO_i), then what, I ask, is the interventional sign-vehicle (SV_i)?

0632 Well, that question is very difficult, because I cannot see an interventional sign-vehicle (SV_i), even though evolution has prepared me to be aware of its presence_2c.

So, let me ask an easier question.

The interventional sign-relation couples perspective and content levels.

The specifying sign-relation couples content and situation levels.

0633 So, here is the question.

If body-piercing is a specifying sign-vehicle (SV_s), then what, I ask, is the specifying sign-object (SO_s)?

Yes, the specifying sign-vehicle (SV_s) is a content_a-level actuality₂.

And, the specifying sign-object (SOs) is a situation_b-level actuality₂.

0634 So, once again, what does body-piercing specify?

Well, I suppose it_2a says something like this, “The normal context of social pressure₃ brings the language of body-piercing₂ into relation with the possibility of my imagination₁.”

0635 What is someone who has body-piercings thinking?

The normal context of my own authority₃ brings the actuality of my imagination₂ into relation with possibilities inherent in the experience of being pierced and tattooed₁.

0636 So, take a look at the following content-level actuality_2a and ask, “What the hell is going on?”

0637 Do body-piercings and tattoos signal that the pierced and inked one is just a hunk of meat suspended on the five pillars of propaganda?

It sounds horrible to say it that way, but surrender can also be regarded as liberation.

Once I am liberated, then what I think can be objectified as what I say by way of body-piercing.

Is that not the nature of fashion?

Everyone wants to see and be seen.

0638 Fashion, the arts, the corporate media, and everything else American conduct stagecraft.  Stiles lists institutional bulwarks, basically floors of experts belonging to the tower of the one of scientism, in the following manner.

0639 Experts package the imagination.  Experts regulate the language.  Experts make sure that no-one who does not align with the scientismist one will ever be promoted.  Experts publish essays ridiculing perceived oppositions.  Professors demand that each student recite their lessons.  Experts plan and execute events that capture the awareness of scrappy players, especially the ones who have surrendered, as well as the ones who do not quite understand what they are becoming.  Scrappy players_2a are the ones who provide the data_1b for experts_3b to model_2b.

0640 Chapter seven discusses the systematic manipulation of the pillars of belief.

Stiles calls the process, “operation sheepskin”, in a tongue-in-cheek reference to various covert (yet, later disclosed) initiatives of the Agency of Centralized Intelligence.

As Stiles tells it, opportunistic manipulations of the pillars of belief are already ongoing at the end of the nineteenth century, as seen in the way that Southern Railroad covered the tracks of their systematic exploitations by paying for news stories that extolled their… um… reputation for honesty in commerce.  Yes, that’s the ticket.

The press is compliant, because the ticket is where the money is.  Plus, those who were systematically ripped off don’t have any money.  Funny how it works that way.  Heads I win. Tails you lose.

0641 Savvy observers in the late 1800s and early 1900s note the trend.  These observers codify the techniques of crowd manipulation.  The first step in crowd manipulation is to find a crowd.  The second step seems to be, “Start a rumor.”  Well, that sounds precisely the job for the newfangled newspapers printed on cheap paper.  There is always someone who is cooking the books who will offer an opportunity for someone to make dough by publishing a story with a hidden agenda_2c.

Of course, the reader who wants to be informed does not regard the hidden agenda.  The reader sees all the news that is fit to print.

0642 Here is a picture of the post-truth interscope for the early 1900s.  The details on the printed page are true, but the hidden agenda is not revealed.  Indeed, if material that is intentionally omitted becomes available, then it becomes clear that a planted story has been… um… cooked up.

But, that does not change the newspaper’s slogan, “News that you can trust!”

0643 Clearly, at this time, the press reports news that people are interested in.  After all, the main source of revenue for newspapers is subscriptions or people paying for a copy of the latest print.  For the most part, editors and writers do not promote values that contest the values of the paying customer.

But, the “culinary customer”, you know, the one with dough, (as well as, a taste for manipulation and propaganda) savors the occasional foray into stagecraft.  In stagecraft, the press reports an event that is designed to further a hidden agenda.  In order to do so, the content-level of the newspaper’s reason_3a,1a differs from the content-level reason_3a,1a of the scrappy player, in such a way that the player’s reason_3a,1a becomes a target for manipulation.

0644 Of course, if the crappy player replaces his own reason_3a,1a with the targeted reason_3a,1a provided by a press release, then what the crappy player thinks can be objectified as the media narrative that the crappy player recites.

May I call that replacement, “submission”?

Submission calls for recitation, while critical thinking calls for interpretation.

But, how can one interpret any newspaper report when information that does not conform to the media narrative is intentionally omitted?

That is what hidden agendas tend to do.

Hidden agendas hide information.

0654 One may wonder.

How far can this manipulation go?

That is the question that operation sheepskin intends to answer.

0655 Well, the Committee on Public Information provides an early assessment for operation sheepskin.

Here is a picture.

0656 How far can this manipulation go?

The manipulation can go as far as the one who cooks the books_3c needs.

Indeed, during the Second World War, The Second Battle of the Enlightenment Gods, the Hot War Among Fraternal Ideologies (1938-1945), the ones who cook the books_3c come one step closer to Fuller’s concept of the relativist one_3c, as the one outside of all jurisdictions.  Public-private partnerships enter the picture in significant ways.  Plus, these book-cooking collaborations_3c set the groundwork for the Third World War, The Third Battle of the Enlightenment Gods, the Cold War Among Materialist Ideologies (1945-1989).

0657 But, before I go to chapter eight, I want to linger in the claim that Stiles makes at the end of chapter seven.  Stiles connects the way that the five pillars work to the architecture of the human brain.  This connection provides an excuse for a review.

0659 How does Stiles explain this connection?

Here is a picture of the intensity of a stagecraft event with the corresponding emotional response.

This is a picture of stimulus (left column) and response (right column).

0660 How should I diagram this portrayal of cause and effect?

To start, the empirio-normative judgment_2c targets the reader’s intellect_3a and will_1a.

Thus, the cause is press reports overlaying the content level of the post-truth interscope.

The effect is how the reader’s intellect_3a and will_1a responds.

0661 The reported events and the media narrative_2a work coherently, because any reports that muddle the narrative are selectively omitted.  However, the naive reader does not know this.  The naive reader presumes that the events and narrative are true.  The post-truth reader does not make that assumption.  The post-truth reader knows that material most likely has been omitted, even by media outfits who proclaim themselves to be “trusted sources”.

0662 Nevertheless, the psychology of what I think comes into play, along with the derivative character of what I say.

Recall that the premodern scholastics develop the concepts that go into the postmodern scholastic interscope for how humans think.

Impressions_2a and feelings_2a occupy the content level.

Phantasms_2b and emotions_2b occupy the situation level.

Decisions_2c and judgments_2c occupy the perspective level.

All three levels contribute to what I think in the post-truth interscope.

0663 In the stimulus-response scenario, emotions_2b takes center stage for how humans think.

If Stiles is correct, the normal context of targeting the intellect_3a and the potential of targeting the will_1a aims to influence the actuality of emotions_2a in what the scrappy player thinks_2a.