Shirky's essay applies Wilfred Bion's thought in "Experiences in Groups" to various
forms of electronic conversation. In his book Bion describes early efforts to carry
on group therapy, first with returning WWII veterans, then more generally. As I remember
it, Bion was first struck by the expectations everyone in the group had about how his
own role should be carried out. Once frustrated by Bion's miserably unresponsive
and counterproductive performance (as they saw it), groups developed along one of the
three less-than-ideal lines described by Shirky (replace the priest, watch the romantic
developments, or flee). These were not individual responses, but characteristics of the
whole group. The sense in which the group is an enemy of itself becomes apparent,
I think, from "the moment of conception," as a result of the groups inability to get beyond
these three alternatives. Interestingly, Bion's book moves beyond the small group
and into discussions of nations (a nation at war is functioning as a fight/flight group).
In the interview with Christoph Spehr (Geert or Trebor conducted, I believe), Spehr's use
of science fiction for imagining better or more constructive possibilities sounds like the
"thought experiment" strategy in Anglo-American philosophy. Spehr expresses some
admiration for this type of thought, but in my experience it is distinctinctively "terraneous
thinking" of the alien, a haven for the retreat from responsibility Spehr admirably accepts,
and a death knell for maquis (otherwise melancholic over the failure of the Left, yet
given some freedom inevitably pursuing new plans of learning and prospects for locating
"temporary autonomous zones").
Bernie Roddy