East German communists and mega-computers
anecdote · personal/autobiographical ·
retold in 3 talks
A computer specialist recounts how GDR planners thought digital mega-computers would finally make central planning workable, not grasping that computerisation was precisely what would destroy communist economies. Žižek calls this the mirror image of Hawken's fantasy.
As told 2
“they thought with modern mega computers ... finally these computers will be strong enough to take into account all the fluctuations of the needs ... and finally communism will become workable”
“their model of computerization was big central computers control everything.”
What it carries
one story, many jobs: the ideas this anecdote is deployed to argue, one tally mark per use (an idea page shows the same relation from the other end, as its shelf of stories)
Its cast and sources
populated by
John Searle1Peter Hawken1Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor1Boko Haram1Alexander Nevsky1Donald Tusk1Lech Kaczyński1Aleksander Kwaśniewski1
alongside works
Every retelling 2
A computer specialist recounts how GDR planners thought digital mega-computers would finally make central planning workable, not grasping that computerisation was precisely what would destroy communist economies. Žižek calls this the mirror image of Hawken's fantasy., illustrating natural capitalism,commodity form,mirror illusions of system change
An East German computer genius explained that the leadership tried to 'computerize' central planning (a big central computer controlling shoe production) rather than understanding the decentralized logic of digital civilization, leading to their demise., illustrating forces of production,postmodern, decentralized, digital