Hi Slick, this is a wonderfully accurate description of the dynamics among a subset of humans, mostly men, whose self-esteem rests upon their sense of control over and influence upon others.
I agree that the accumulation of money serves the drive for interpersonal power. The sense that we can affect others is the basis for the need we all have to feel good about ourselves, to feel like we matter, like we're important.
Beneath the surface of men like the Koch brothers, Trump, Putin, Musk, and bunches of technocrats and autocrats, lies the broken hearts of little boys who were deprived of tenderness in their earliest relationships with mothers, fathers, nannies, etc.
They grew up determined not to care about that and They discovered that they could keep heartache and shame at bay by substituting toughness and an annihilating form of competition as the basis for self-esteem. Western culture has been shaped, for thousands of years, by these dynamics so boys like this step into a long line of autocratic role-models beginning with emotionally distant and insensitive parents, especially fathers, who humiliate and ridicule the inborn sensitivity of their little boys who might otherwise retain their inherent sweetness.
My suggestion is that we, collectively, observe how the taboo on tenderness destroys little boys before the age of three and exposes them to a culture of cruelty in which they must dominate or be humiliatingly dominated for the rest of their lives. Boys and girls absorb the gendered messages the culture, by way of the family first, sends them. As we individually and collectively alter our emotional stance towards our infants and toddlers we alter the character and values of the adults they will become.
Yes. Absolutely. We need the right brain back, and urgently. And that's exactly what's coming next!
Before Stephenson, I'll probably have to get into Heidegger, and try to explain what he *actually* meant by Sein and Gestell.
Right now the colossal misunderstanding of his later thought by Dugin et al. has him rolling in his grave fast enough to power all our AI and data centres...
While we're on the subject of affecting the direction the world is being driven in, there's a universe of understanding in the attachment theory of Mary Ainsworth and John Bowlby, that addresses how our earliest sense of emotional security affects us in all subsequent relationships for the rest of our lives.
I very much appreciate the wide and deep perspective you've laid out so thoroughly and clearly for us in this astonishing piece, especially the guide for how we can undermine the pillars of power that support the autocrats. ♥️
Yes - I think Kenneth Rasmussen's substack might be of interest to you as well.
If I can ask for one favour, the most helpful thing right now is to help propagate the seeds of tomorrow. If it feels right, I will be grateful for every share, restack, for every question and suggestion, for everyone who finds this and finds it useful.
Slick, I'm definitely sharing this clearly articulated piece that like the poem about the blind people touching different parts of the elephant, adds dimensions to our understanding of the human dynamics by which we're all being affected. Ok to share on Bluesky?
I'll check out Rasmussen as well...thanks for the suggestion. 🌻
I was able to follow this, and I feel its a remarkable piece and will be rereading and thinking about it. However, like many Americans, I am more of a concrete thinker.
What do the alternatives embedded in this mean in the concrete knowable world in the next few years? I personally have always felt good about the US Constitution, and the way our government was organized. But we have allowed it to be royally screwed up by the lack of concrete guardrails to retain representatives and others in their lanes (and apathy/undereducation).
( my opinion)- Until fairly recently, historically, the US system of government has served most of the people – not always well, but at least an attempt. As greed and ruthlessness has impacted its operation over time (Think lobbyists, citizens united, etc.), using the tools of mis- and disinformation, division, and gross economic disparity, we have not noticed how fast or dangerous the fall has been.
Like many Americans, I wonder what’s next. And I do feel blinkered by my propensity to see things in concrete terms, and visualize what they (could) look like.
I think the answer is found in Heidegger and McGilchrist: bring back the right side of the brain, the meaning and connection.
The left brain has taken over and is attempting remodel the world in its image: separate units, easy to understand and manipulate.
But that's not what humans are.
Humans are not *just* concrete, tangible creatures with simple goals and simple minds. Humans have a soul, emotions, and care about more than their GDP and retirement--not cold, soulless machines in a cold, soulless world...
As far as concrete action, I feel like myself and my household are taking a step toward local, autonomous and self-sustaining networks.
While perhaps you meant this on an even larger and more technological scale (communications, open source software, etc.) for concrete thinkers such as myself and the previous commenter, focusing on creating your own village can be the first step.
Local and self-sustaining can start with your own household. Removing yourself from the monetary system in a traditional way by being a self-sustaining village (growing your own food, fishing or foraging food, finding people locally willing to deal in bartering terms, move back in with your parents or communities of people willing to trade services for goods, developing stronger real life interpersonal relationships, ditch your car and walk.) The tao of the ancestor is how myself and my husband refer to our philosophy on getting back to meaning.
In my life I've found these things to bring a great sense of meaning, spirituality and fulfillment back to my life. I've been wrestling with this question for years, I saw some kind of writing on a wall I think at my corporate "science" job and this is the best I have come up with on how to conduct myself. However, I obviously read this article for more answers, I would love to hear what others think is the best way forward.
There are many aspects to this, as you point out, and a journey of a thousand miles starts with a first step.
I'm writing more on this, and will share references as well.
In a nutshell: you got it. Find alternatives that are more resilient, more convivial (Ilich), for the things that matter in your life.
If you live walking distance from your friends, you may not need the same tools as if you connect as a distant network.
There's another half of the answer, beyond systems, that's even harder to articulate: moving beyond the modern worldview. It's very hard for us modern people to do, and I'm also writing more on this.
Fair enough. I should mention that I’m concrete, and also analytical. I don’t disagree even a little bit on the need for regaining more right side of the brain operation in the world.
I am strongly lacking in that kind of knowledge. I have not read anywhere close to that many books. All 20 YEARS preceding now I’ve been flipping through online pages and articles, and I could not memorize that much stuff from those books. Even if aimed “at the right stuff” and the right ideals, that’s where I am at.
Because if I never have even tried to make such a "predictive" article and never have memorized that much stuff in my entire life or been as intentional as I'm *imagining* you've been in studying this for as many years, what does that mean?
(I.e. I imagine you sitting for several hours per day reading books, very carefully, reading the same page 5-6 times, really trying to hammer that shit into your head, writing very careful notes, hammering that shit even when it is the most boring teeth-gnawing thing you can do because you know you gotta HOLD ONTO it and you have to thus not just be chasing novelty all the time like I would [i.e. read a few pages then go to something totally different that looks new shiny and interesting, then rapidly forgetting those few pages in minutes] but rote revisiting "boring familiar stuff" a zillion times, etc. But that's also just imagination, too.)
I don't, quite the opposite, because you just said you read and study and investigate things.
We, and our minds, have different strengths and preferences, I wouldn't judge you for that either.
It's easier for me to remember things I deeply care about, or am very curious about. Writing about it helps as well. I take it as a compliment, but don't take it as a limitation!
I don’t. I mostly scroll social media these days, and have for the past 10 years, but not the kardashian kind of stuff, but the stuff said by people like you, on sites like quora etc. Regardless, much of it just doesn’t stick.
I think a helpful thing to answer would be the following. Take some average sized, say 300 pp., book on some "serious" topic. Now:
1. Do you actively take intentional notes when reading this?
2. If so, what volume would those fill?
3. Do you repeatedly re-read the book or pages several times to make things "stick"?
4. How do you re-use notes and how much do you aim to ensure is retained?
5. 30 days after ending the reading, how much do you think you could write about the book if you were to do so? Like just listing all recallable specific facts (name of person X, date they did Y, what Y was, etc.).
This would at least give me some metrics of what the kind of intellectual competence that seems urgently necessary for this situation and the things I've wanted to do, looks like. For me, the answers are:
1. No, almost never;
2. Very little, by extension;
3. Never, it's way too boring to read the same thing over 6-10 times;
Having studied attachment theory and child development, I too wholeheartedly believe that one of the keys to peace is to un-brainwash the “male mind”, starting at birth. Keep up the good fight, Dr. Taylor and Stay Slick.
haven't studied any theories but I can say, from personal experience, that in many..what subcultures (?) the females (mom, sisters, aunties) make no excuses for "spoiling" babies and toddlers (and sometimes that goes on too long where it has negative effects) much affection, holding, speaking. while the males err on the side of toughening up the future man for spiritual/physical/psychic slings and arrows of fate. a yin/yang thing, I guess, the sexual binary in full flower. etc etc
Agreed. Generally, that is how it goes. I know maybe I am too much of an optimist at some level, but I feel like we could minimize so many of societal issues, such as violence, greed, oppression, lack of empathy, etc. if we could help men (and boys) figure out how to deal with problems more efficiently. This starts at home. And, the most effective way is for families to practice empathy — with all living and nonliving things. Parents also need to be more educated about (and actively practice) gender equality. We need to teach both boys and girls that feelings and emotions are a powerful part of life, regardless of gender, and how to adequately deal with our feelings. Our children’s inner-worlds should be as important to us as their annual physical check-ups. With unattended emotional support, girls tend to internalize their problems and boys externalize. Here lies the issue, and in my opinion this is why we are in the situation we are in, and always have been. We have work to do.
Kristin, you and I are of the same or similar mind. The taboo on tenderness in the rearing of boys, how they are gutted of their vulnerability and humanity and then stuffed with entitlement and grandiosity, inculcated into a culture of cruelty and competition, has left us in this existential crisis.
Looking forward to more discussion about balancing our human, relational needs. 😊♥️👍
"Hi Slick, this is a wonderfully accurate description of the dynamics among a subset of humans, mostly men, whose self-esteem rests upon their sense of control over and influence upon others."
"mostly men" Lesbian? Feminist? Clearly American because you value your TLA.
The rest of your post resonates. Boys , IRL, are more sensitive than girls. up to puberty. Whatever can be damaged before then, will remain damaged. it's true for girls too.
As for women, I can name only two, after 43 years in the workforce, who were good managers, the rest being obsessed with petty control and micromanagement. Making sure everyone got the same amount of biscuits. That works in a household, but not in commerce.
And women get away with the worst crimes because of a cultural ideal not to punch them in the face.
But I disagree with one of the pillars of your conclusion:
"This isn’t just about breaking the Technate. It’s about making sure nothing like it can ever rise again."
This strikes me as ahistorical. Empires and civilizations do collapse, and then what remains is a decentralized patchwork of communities which slowly declines (in harmony with nature locally) until the next incarnation takes over. There are a few historical examples of federal empires or civilizations (ex. SE Asia or the natives of N. America) sustainably existing in a decentralized way, but eventually these fall to their neighboring empires expansion.
Like you I believe the revolution has already occurred and we're now in a transitional phase of consolidation in the illiberal age. And eventually a resistance will emerge and the system will fall apart, or at least cut off parts it can't control, because like you said, it's inevitable.
There are a lot of unknowns though. So I'd say it's unclear where we end up.
Sci-fi world presents us with black swans, and then there's God.
If I were to criticize your essay I'd say the omission of God, faith and meaning or purpose of life, these are going to be relevant going forward. There's also a curious debate about AI and the occult, but this is sci-fi world too.
Oh, that's coming, friend. We need the right brain back, and there's a very meaningful framework for it in an old niche religion.
I'll elaborate in upcoming articles but you can think of the technate as the digital demiurge, of Dugin and 4PT as a colossal misunderstanding of Heidegger, and of both as just an embodiment of the Gestell, not its replacement. Bringing Being into existence isn't a numbers game.
There’s a blueprint for decentralized freedom that is protected by an over arching LIMITED central government that can provide protection for all within it against domination from the outside. It’s called the US Constitution. To build a stable and secure future for freedom, we don’t need chaos and liberation from all authority. We need to get back to very limited central authority that can allow and protect the development of decentralized systems like those described by Slick.
Tell that to JFK, and every other victim. Look, the US constitution and the bill of rights are great documents, potentially among the best in their class, but in reality they're only as good as the implementation. So. In principal I agree with you and my guess is so would the majority of people, if we're talking common sense. But we need to look at outcomes and reality, honestly. So for instance, this constitution, did it protect "the people" from the creation of the federal reserve? So maybe it can be improved, and maybe 100 years from now it will need further updates or upgrades.
I agree with you. The US Constitution (like any other) is just words on paper if people do not adhere to it in practice. Totalitarian regimes sometimes use nice sounding constitutions as window dressing. The Soviet constitution guaranteed freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of assembly. But the government did the opposite. In the US, the federal government has grown in size and scope of intrusiveness for beyond what the founders of the country envisioned. The federal reserve is one of many examples. I don’t think it will be easy to roll that back. But a lot of people want to do that, and it can be done. The idea of blowing it all up and starting with a tabula rasa to make everything better has an idealistic appeal if you presume it will all work out the way you want. But the history of the world shows it rarely works out that way for long. Many revolutions are short-lived. And decentralized systems have nearly always been swallowed by more powerful forces. After the fall of Rome, Europe was extensively decentralized with thousands of independent villages, city states, and principalities. But through conquest, or the desire to band together to avoid conquest, these consolidated into a handful of nations. The numerous indigenous tribes and clans throughout the Americas were conquered by European powers, the United States, and Canada. After the American Revolution, the Americans did not want to live subject to a national government. But the federal system under the Articles of Confederation proved to be too unstable and risked having the country become vulnerable to predatory European powers. I agree with their solution to cede some power to a national government in the interest of providing stability for all to live how they want within its boundaries. The granting of only the enumerated powers in the Constitution was supposed to constraint the federal government. During the initial ratification process, the general population was wise to be concerned that was not enough to constrain those who want to accumulate power, and insisted that the Bill of Rights be included. But as you know, people who want to centralize power to enrich themselves and control others have exceeded those guard rails. I see a much greater chance of long-run success in a non-partisan effort to work within the existing US Constitution to return to more decentralization than wiping the slate clean and risking ending up with an unknown future that is likely not what was intended. It’s not going to be easy. There are forces within our system that want to control too much. But I don’t think they are a feature of our system. I think there will always be such forces and the need to stand up against them under any system or lack of system. There are people working to decentralize things in various ways. On the monetary side, there is crypto and some states make gold and silver legal tender. And a lot of people are tired of government trying to dictate how they live their lives and their speech. My hope is that if enough people across the political spectrum can agree that government should not be social engineering, that our country can thrive as a place where communities are allowed to live their lives the way that they want.
I agree about revolutions. I think the appeal is inversely proportional to the suffering of those willing to engage in action. Poor and hungry people don't often worry about what's beyond their line of sight.
In general, I agree about decentralization being optimal in terms accountability and resilience, with different levels stacked upon each other to maximize their respective domains, efficiency, etc (municipal, state, national, etc), and there's no reason why (in theory) we couldn't have a great global level of governance.
The problem is related to what you mentioned towards the end, the social control and engineering aspects. For instance, back in 1919 when the CFR was being established by a small group of US/UK elites, among the various opinions holding sway of why it was necessary concerned "the people" who could not be trusted with their rights and so their decisions needed to be influenced. This "top down" view of the world is a continuation of the aristocratic justification of inequality; eugenics is another good example, and we can still see its existence today in both the right and left camps of the political discourse.
I don't have a solution to offer right now, suffice to say there's a lot more going on than meets the eye and among the issues which will need to be resolved are the bullshit concepts of capitalism and money, crypto included. I say bullshit because they're human illusions and until we accept we're in God's world, there will always be folks willing to take from others what's not theirs.
We are idealistic. That’s good! But idealism needs to be combined with realism if the results are to actually work in practice and be lasting.
Personally, I am not in favor of global governance. I think global cooperation is very important and can help avoid and solve international issues and matters that are not within any country, such as overfishing and pollution of the oceans. But I think it is best to have less one-size-fits-all governance at each successive level above localities. I think the US federal government should be limited in its authority, and do not think there should be any governing authority outside our country that can impose its will on us. Higher and more removed levels of government are more likely to have different viewpoints and interests than people on the lower levels and therefore be enforcing things that are undesired by people at the lower levels. We already have a national government, trying to impose too much on people. We don’t need an extra layer on top of that. Besides the fact that each layer of government is more removed from us and has differing interests, each one is subject to corruption and abuse. Power tends to attract people who want to misuse it to benefit themselves and their supporters and/or ideologues untempered by humility, who believe they have the right and duty to impose their “correct“ views on everyone else. You give some good examples of that. You are right that it is continuing today. And I’m sure people will try to continue in the future. That is a main reason why I believe decentralization and checks and balances on power are necessary.
Your final point is important. I have a different take on it. I think human nature is the problem. It is a cliché that money is the root of all evil. But I think that money is just a medium of exchange. It is a way to store value and not be limited by the barter system. (By the way, money can be anything that is accepted for that purpose – cash, precious metals, digital account balances, crypto, shells, or big round stones with a hole in the middle - all of which are illusions in terms of holding any intrinsic value, other than metals that have practical use or are valued for being shiny.) Money and credit have enabled an explosion of economic development that has made tremendous improvements to people‘s lives all over the world, including food, medicine, increasing lifespan, and technology. It hasn’t resulted only in good. There’s a lot of theft and other evil that is driven by the lust for the power that money can buy (possession of material things and control of people). But it seems like that has always been the way of the world for some people. Even without money, there has been theft, conquest, pillaging, and slavery. I wish everyone would be good, whether because it is what God wants for us or because following the golden rule is the only fair in just way to treat other people. But unfortunately, humans are not always like that in this world. Maybe in the next.
The US Constition was written by a cohesive culture of 2.5 million citizens. Jews coined the term “melting pot” for their plans to destroy a functioning society. We now have 300 million multi-cultural people running around this factory farm. For every size of human grouping, there is a proper form of governance. Republics fail when above a monoculture of 20 million people. The USA will need to form 50 voluntary confederations with our 50 states. These states will need to form their own ethnicities and culture. Segregation and deportations are back.
I prefer "unconcealment" to "revelation," and yes there is much to say about the left brain dominance of modernity as demiurge, AI as oracle, elite spirituality, and the next stage of consciousness. That's coming!
Don't forget the evangelicals that want to steamroll the holy land to jump start the rapture and bring on the 2nd coming. Thank you for writing this. My friends were certain I lost my mind when I started talking about Halderman and Dark Enlightenment. Nobody was listening to me.
It *is* hard to believe. Feels too dark, too negative, almost crackpot theory, if you say things like "Elon's grandpa advocated the ideas he's pushing now" and "being a nazi isn't original in Elon's family".
Hopefully we never get to a point where everyone has to contend with it. Hopefullier (yes I made that up) we contend with it earlier and never have to get there.
Essentially the George Orwell of 1984 fast forward to the 2020’s. Yes, this is exactly where we are. Trump is controlled by Musk and the Russian oligarchy (Putin) who rescued his businesses 15 years ago. Through Trump they are engineering the collapse of the USA. Everything Trump is doing is destroying America - its social safety net, meager as it was, its education system, poor as it was, its health care system, deteriorating as it was. All of these systems will be collapsed into a crumbled civil service and servile armed forces who will meekly submit the west to the technocratic oligarchy that presently controls Russia and thus will control most of the world. The world will be left as a bipolar world with the Russian/US techno/oligarchic regime facing the Chinese Capitalist/Communist Empire. A frightening world created by the dumb MAGA voters who preferred a weak tyrant obviously supported by an oligarchy totally uninterested in the wellbeing of the American citizenry. So here we are facing a tragic future without a clear way of defeating these monsters who we have in fact created because of our slavish desire for ‘things’.
I've read this a few times, and each time I am less terrified. Not that you're not spot on, I think you are, but that we won't cede our power quite so easily.
You left out that Musk’s grandfather served time in prison for Sedition in the 1930’s in Canada based on this theory. They must be stopped. They were stopped before.
Very interesting read, I will be contemplating it over the weekend. I wish someone in my life (family or friend) would read it and debate it or discuss it with me. Most people just would not belive it, thinking I am a crazy qanon conspiracy theorist. Few around me think about these things.
very interesting but not too grounded in reality. with our failing power grid, rising costs of living, a $34+ trillion debt bubble and declining global influence abroad, in the future, these commodities aren’t going to be available for most americans, not even the uber rich ones. nor will the rest of the world be able or as willing to invest in them either. i think when that shift happens, many people in poverty will begin to realize the class struggle and begin to rely on themselves locally for resources and trade, and find new ways to govern themselves. many people have already given up on legacy media, for its fear-mongering, propaganda and toxicity, and i believe social media and AI will be next, given the negative effects it’s had on our society, schools, and attention spans, as well as the fact that it’s produced by the very tech oligarchs sucking the wealth out of our country.
This resonates with what I am sensing as well. Seed Discord amongst them,claim our turf outside of their control, create decentralized networks for caring and sharing and stay weird and unpredictable.
Regroup. Renerate. Throw in some wrenches into their machine.
Quite a few empires to.dismantle to make the "no more crowns" happen.we gonna need a big pirate fleet for that.
Also.gotta support a lot of people into becoming Sovereign to become ungovernable.
Still a lot of folx that cannot handle uncertainty and will.gladly relinquish freedom for.the illusion of order and control.
I think.we basically blowing into the same.horn. @chaos compass
Not all of us, but those who choose not to comply in the new digital overlords fiefdom can make the choice to band together as Pirates or struggle alone for their own survival.
There are some outside influences that may exacerbate or prevent many of the steps towards the rise of the ‘Technate’.
Climate Change for a start, combined with the logistics of AI. Then there are the other power centers in Beijing, New Delhi, São Paulo and Jakarta. Countries with nuclear weapons and several hundreds of millions of mouths to feed.
A Technate will require enormous amounts of electricity and potable water. A Cloud Data Center consumes enough power and water to support about 100,000 people. And AI will demand many, many more data centers, to the point that in areas where they have them, human and most other life will not be able to exist. Between the sound, the heat plumes and the desertification, they will be dead zones.
Countries with vast populations will have no compunction about invading neighbours and taking the land and water to feed their populations. The world is running dry on potable water as it is, as industry wastes as much as people consume on processes that should be using grey water.
And as the equatorial regions become to hot to support human life, people will migrate en masse and will consume the available food and water like locusts. They could have been helped to stay in their homes if the worlds power centers had not been fighting any and all attempts to reduce the damage they are doing to produce their profits.
And even if their engineers try to moderate the use of these two most precious resources with improved designs, the replacement of humans with AI will drive greater demand than any improved efficiency can provide.
1 kW = 0.28434514 Tons of cooling
A typical site today uses 100MW of electricity, and because of the heat produced by the servers and other hardware it will need 284.3 tons of cooling, more if you are in an area like Arizona. If there are clusters, like around a nuclear reactor, they will be competing for cooling water.
AIs like ChatGPT will require even more power, 10 times because it requires high end video card chip sets to do floating point calculations. A gamer knows that the video card burns half the power used by the pc. Now think of a server with 10’s or 100’s of such chip sets. The infrastructure needed to replace the people in governance and management would require more resources than the US Military every year. Data centers will become like a cancer.
Now consider that the other players will be going down the same rabbit hole. China will have less powerful AIs but because the people are easily expendable (slaves have little value in Chinese Communist Party’s thinking, less so in a Technate) they will direct all resources to defeating their competitors. And the Chinese hackers already have ready access to SV courtesy of Elon Musk. The Russians have ready access through Trump. They will not take a challenge to their perceived entitlements lying down.
Now consider that a country like China has run out of arable land, and potable water. The Three Gorges dam is not able to produce enough electricity to sustain their data centers, let alone keep the lights on for the government. They will take what they can from Russia, and South East Asia. Even by force.
Indonesia has some 300 million people, and they like the Chinese are reliant on fish for supplying protein. Their Navies will be dueling over fishing grounds and pirating catches. Even up to Monterey Bay and Cape Cod. As the ocean’s surface temperatures rise, the food chains will collapse, and then raiding coastal areas will replace fishing. And the Indian government will be fighting for a share for themselves after the glaciers feeding the Ganges are all gone.
And last but not least, there is the nuclear option. Say a repressed, disgruntled, petulant dictator like Kim Jong Un who lofts an ICBM to do an air burst EMP, and anything electronic not hardened to withstand the EMP is fried. As would be the Technate.
There is allot at play now, and it seems we are headed to the apocalypse at warp speed. But as you pointed out, we can resist and slow down their efforts to a full stop. Like the Athenian who manned the oars at the Battle of Salamis, we citizens of this world still have agency.
If you want to flummox Amazon, buy local and pay in cash.
Dump Facebook.
Dump StarLink, Tesla and anything else Musk’s corrupted.
Get a library card and read books.
Write letters instead of email or posting.
Learn to garden, and garden with your neighbours.
Learn to raise animals like chickens, rabbits and pigs.
Learn the laws that have enabled the oligarchs and document their consequences.
Get involved with local affairs and present the news at coffee shops, community clubs and to family and friends.
We can take back this world from those few who think themselves our betters. Remember the lesson in the movie GATTACA: don’t hold back. Once you commit, do not hold anything back.
I love this article! Especially when you mention LotR, because I have been screaming from the rooftops we have to unite like the denizens of Middle Earth and vanquish Sauron and Saruman; that we have to invest in building our local communities, mutual aid, growing food in our urban yards, on balconies, window sills, etc., and ultimately in building local networks of ungovernability. I am a fan!
I see tremendous potential and opportunity in this exceedingly dark moment. The situation is so dark that even the staunchest and most comfortable liberals are experiencing political clarity. I am hopeful that this clarity will open the way for spiritual clarity as well, in that people realize that we have hit not only the political and economic, but also ecological and spiritual wall. We cannot keep going in the direction we’ve been going. The future will either be the dark technofeudalist dystopia you describe so terrifyingly well, or we will awaken to our true potential, learn to shed our ego and embrace our essence in the process of chaos and disruption. That from the ashes of the ego driven world a new world will emerge that is rooted in cooperation, consciousness, and sustainability. We can indeed achieve this if we follow your advice. You are speaking to my personal vision.
Whilst I agree that their internal contradictions and factions will doom them in the short term, they'd be doomed longer term anyway due to climate change and the rising costs and eventual depletion of fossil fuels. Their model assumes limitless energy and resources, and that's not reality. Unless they've got ultra-reliable, scalable, cold fusion in their back pocket... 👀
But your prescription - decentralization - is also the right solution for climate change as well. When the center cannot hold, all that's left is the edge (or more accurately, the Mesh).
You're absolutely right. 10/10, no notes. They'll extract everything they can in the meantime, squeeze the planet for every ounce of anything they can use. Then they'll be screwed, and everyone, everything else with them.
Meanwhile they think they'll more than make up for it by mining everything in sight--planets, asteroids, even the moon--and that Earth will just be one depleted planet in a constellation of colonized specks of dust, because they missed the part of astrophysics where the places with adequate conditions for life are few and far between.
They read too much sci-fi, and not the right kind--or just can't tell dystopia from desirable futures.
And yes to the edge, yes to the mesh. Though if there's one tree in sight or any resource anywhere in the vicinity, the edge where you live may just become another mining colony before you get a chance to make a painting of the landscape...
I think all of us would prefer to live in a post-scarcity society like The Culture or maybe even The Federation... Just no-one wants to live through the Dark Ages that seems to inevitably presage them.
I think the Tech Bros would seemingly prefer Trantor or (as much as I love Honor Harrington) the aristocracy of the Star Kingdom of Manticore (just without duty, honour and noblesse oblige...).
De-centralized. Organically local. Open Source. Bank on yourself.
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2. You may receive ArtWork in your change when buying a product locally, as a gift for a birthday, as a tip for a job well done, & more.
3. Closer to the expiration date (find date on the ArtWork), turn it back to the owner of the ArtWork and they will give you cash or more-than-equivalent services or products.
4. The more ArtWork is passed for exchange in the community before it is turned in, the more sustainable the community economy!
Get real…. Spend ArtWork…. Go local.
___________________
OWNER::BUSINESS instructions
Why use ArtWork as local exchange in Advertising:
--Get people talking about what you are doing.
--Use your advertising budget locally.
--Subtract the cost of your ArtWork as advertising.
--Watch people smile & laugh when “playing” with your “funny money”.
How to get started:
--Pay a small amount to a local artist for the ArtWork. Or make your own.
--Set aside an amount of cash to pay the “reward” for the return of the ArtWork. (You also may barter for the ArtWork with services or product.)
--Write or pay a writer to add:
1. Your business & slogan & offerings.
2. Your area of “good within ___miles of your place of business”.
3. Expiration date. Usually 3-6 months.
--Give your ArtWorks away.
1. You can only spend ArtWork other than your own.
2. Offer as a thank you to: Regulars, High pay customers, Bonuses &
Perks, Friends & Family, Lovers.
When the ArtWork is presented back to you
--Give cash or
--Give services or
--Give a product.
Keep gifting it out until closer to the expiration date.
_____________________
ARTIST instructions
1. You may
--Make your own ArtWork to advertise you and your business. OR
--Be commissioned to make ArtWork for someone else to advertise.
--Do one or the other because the Kindly-Tizing ArtWork is Open Source, meaning the ArtWork is not copyrighted. K-TAW believes in a gift society and a healthy local economy.
2. If you are commissioned to produce an ArtWork for someone else:
--You may sell your labor and supplies. Once a business, person, or a not-for-profit owns the ArtWork then the ArtWork totally belongs to them. They must set aside the “reward money” to exchange by the expiration date.
3. If you create the ArtWork for yourself to advertise yourself:
--You are the owner. When you own the ArtWork, you are the one who must set aside the “reward money” to exchange by the expiration date. The Owner must give ArtWork away as a gift to the community economy.
--You may take the cost of ArtWork off your income for advertising.
4. The Owner of the ArtWork must give/gift it away during the time period.
Hi Slick, this is a wonderfully accurate description of the dynamics among a subset of humans, mostly men, whose self-esteem rests upon their sense of control over and influence upon others.
I agree that the accumulation of money serves the drive for interpersonal power. The sense that we can affect others is the basis for the need we all have to feel good about ourselves, to feel like we matter, like we're important.
Beneath the surface of men like the Koch brothers, Trump, Putin, Musk, and bunches of technocrats and autocrats, lies the broken hearts of little boys who were deprived of tenderness in their earliest relationships with mothers, fathers, nannies, etc.
They grew up determined not to care about that and They discovered that they could keep heartache and shame at bay by substituting toughness and an annihilating form of competition as the basis for self-esteem. Western culture has been shaped, for thousands of years, by these dynamics so boys like this step into a long line of autocratic role-models beginning with emotionally distant and insensitive parents, especially fathers, who humiliate and ridicule the inborn sensitivity of their little boys who might otherwise retain their inherent sweetness.
My suggestion is that we, collectively, observe how the taboo on tenderness destroys little boys before the age of three and exposes them to a culture of cruelty in which they must dominate or be humiliatingly dominated for the rest of their lives. Boys and girls absorb the gendered messages the culture, by way of the family first, sends them. As we individually and collectively alter our emotional stance towards our infants and toddlers we alter the character and values of the adults they will become.
Thanks doc!
Yes. Absolutely. We need the right brain back, and urgently. And that's exactly what's coming next!
Before Stephenson, I'll probably have to get into Heidegger, and try to explain what he *actually* meant by Sein and Gestell.
Right now the colossal misunderstanding of his later thought by Dugin et al. has him rolling in his grave fast enough to power all our AI and data centres...
Thanks for your response, Slick. 🙏
While we're on the subject of affecting the direction the world is being driven in, there's a universe of understanding in the attachment theory of Mary Ainsworth and John Bowlby, that addresses how our earliest sense of emotional security affects us in all subsequent relationships for the rest of our lives.
I very much appreciate the wide and deep perspective you've laid out so thoroughly and clearly for us in this astonishing piece, especially the guide for how we can undermine the pillars of power that support the autocrats. ♥️
Yes - I think Kenneth Rasmussen's substack might be of interest to you as well.
If I can ask for one favour, the most helpful thing right now is to help propagate the seeds of tomorrow. If it feels right, I will be grateful for every share, restack, for every question and suggestion, for everyone who finds this and finds it useful.
🙏
I’m planning to use this locally, and have re-shared it on other platforms - hopefully that’s OK.
It's appreciated, even!
Slick, I'm definitely sharing this clearly articulated piece that like the poem about the blind people touching different parts of the elephant, adds dimensions to our understanding of the human dynamics by which we're all being affected. Ok to share on Bluesky?
I'll check out Rasmussen as well...thanks for the suggestion. 🌻
Please do!
It's all OK and helpful--the more people see it, the better--and thank you so much!
not only 'shared' but 'saved', this is like el gato malo on kitty steroids
I was able to follow this, and I feel its a remarkable piece and will be rereading and thinking about it. However, like many Americans, I am more of a concrete thinker.
What do the alternatives embedded in this mean in the concrete knowable world in the next few years? I personally have always felt good about the US Constitution, and the way our government was organized. But we have allowed it to be royally screwed up by the lack of concrete guardrails to retain representatives and others in their lanes (and apathy/undereducation).
( my opinion)- Until fairly recently, historically, the US system of government has served most of the people – not always well, but at least an attempt. As greed and ruthlessness has impacted its operation over time (Think lobbyists, citizens united, etc.), using the tools of mis- and disinformation, division, and gross economic disparity, we have not noticed how fast or dangerous the fall has been.
Like many Americans, I wonder what’s next. And I do feel blinkered by my propensity to see things in concrete terms, and visualize what they (could) look like.
I think the answer is found in Heidegger and McGilchrist: bring back the right side of the brain, the meaning and connection.
The left brain has taken over and is attempting remodel the world in its image: separate units, easy to understand and manipulate.
But that's not what humans are.
Humans are not *just* concrete, tangible creatures with simple goals and simple minds. Humans have a soul, emotions, and care about more than their GDP and retirement--not cold, soulless machines in a cold, soulless world...
As far as concrete action, I feel like myself and my household are taking a step toward local, autonomous and self-sustaining networks.
While perhaps you meant this on an even larger and more technological scale (communications, open source software, etc.) for concrete thinkers such as myself and the previous commenter, focusing on creating your own village can be the first step.
Local and self-sustaining can start with your own household. Removing yourself from the monetary system in a traditional way by being a self-sustaining village (growing your own food, fishing or foraging food, finding people locally willing to deal in bartering terms, move back in with your parents or communities of people willing to trade services for goods, developing stronger real life interpersonal relationships, ditch your car and walk.) The tao of the ancestor is how myself and my husband refer to our philosophy on getting back to meaning.
In my life I've found these things to bring a great sense of meaning, spirituality and fulfillment back to my life. I've been wrestling with this question for years, I saw some kind of writing on a wall I think at my corporate "science" job and this is the best I have come up with on how to conduct myself. However, I obviously read this article for more answers, I would love to hear what others think is the best way forward.
There are many aspects to this, as you point out, and a journey of a thousand miles starts with a first step.
I'm writing more on this, and will share references as well.
In a nutshell: you got it. Find alternatives that are more resilient, more convivial (Ilich), for the things that matter in your life.
If you live walking distance from your friends, you may not need the same tools as if you connect as a distant network.
There's another half of the answer, beyond systems, that's even harder to articulate: moving beyond the modern worldview. It's very hard for us modern people to do, and I'm also writing more on this.
You may like another piece that makes the case for it: https://open.substack.com/pub/heyslick/p/a-perfect-cage-how-the-system-consumes
Fair enough. I should mention that I’m concrete, and also analytical. I don’t disagree even a little bit on the need for regaining more right side of the brain operation in the world.
And I'm far from having all the answers. The conversation is how we get there altogether!
Amazing and upsetting how much memory you have because I am so fucking limited in knowledge by comparison. Upset at me, not you.
I am strongly lacking in that kind of knowledge. I have not read anywhere close to that many books. All 20 YEARS preceding now I’ve been flipping through online pages and articles, and I could not memorize that much stuff from those books. Even if aimed “at the right stuff” and the right ideals, that’s where I am at.
What does this make me?
A curious mind at the very least, and that's all it takes
So do you judge me as incurious?
Because if I never have even tried to make such a "predictive" article and never have memorized that much stuff in my entire life or been as intentional as I'm *imagining* you've been in studying this for as many years, what does that mean?
(I.e. I imagine you sitting for several hours per day reading books, very carefully, reading the same page 5-6 times, really trying to hammer that shit into your head, writing very careful notes, hammering that shit even when it is the most boring teeth-gnawing thing you can do because you know you gotta HOLD ONTO it and you have to thus not just be chasing novelty all the time like I would [i.e. read a few pages then go to something totally different that looks new shiny and interesting, then rapidly forgetting those few pages in minutes] but rote revisiting "boring familiar stuff" a zillion times, etc. But that's also just imagination, too.)
I don't, quite the opposite, because you just said you read and study and investigate things.
We, and our minds, have different strengths and preferences, I wouldn't judge you for that either.
It's easier for me to remember things I deeply care about, or am very curious about. Writing about it helps as well. I take it as a compliment, but don't take it as a limitation!
I don’t. I mostly scroll social media these days, and have for the past 10 years, but not the kardashian kind of stuff, but the stuff said by people like you, on sites like quora etc. Regardless, much of it just doesn’t stick.
I think a helpful thing to answer would be the following. Take some average sized, say 300 pp., book on some "serious" topic. Now:
1. Do you actively take intentional notes when reading this?
2. If so, what volume would those fill?
3. Do you repeatedly re-read the book or pages several times to make things "stick"?
4. How do you re-use notes and how much do you aim to ensure is retained?
5. 30 days after ending the reading, how much do you think you could write about the book if you were to do so? Like just listing all recallable specific facts (name of person X, date they did Y, what Y was, etc.).
This would at least give me some metrics of what the kind of intellectual competence that seems urgently necessary for this situation and the things I've wanted to do, looks like. For me, the answers are:
1. No, almost never;
2. Very little, by extension;
3. Never, it's way too boring to read the same thing over 6-10 times;
4. Almost never;
5. Probably a few sentences maybe?
Having studied attachment theory and child development, I too wholeheartedly believe that one of the keys to peace is to un-brainwash the “male mind”, starting at birth. Keep up the good fight, Dr. Taylor and Stay Slick.
Wholeheartedly is more than the sociopaths in charge can ever do. Thank you.
haven't studied any theories but I can say, from personal experience, that in many..what subcultures (?) the females (mom, sisters, aunties) make no excuses for "spoiling" babies and toddlers (and sometimes that goes on too long where it has negative effects) much affection, holding, speaking. while the males err on the side of toughening up the future man for spiritual/physical/psychic slings and arrows of fate. a yin/yang thing, I guess, the sexual binary in full flower. etc etc
Agreed. Generally, that is how it goes. I know maybe I am too much of an optimist at some level, but I feel like we could minimize so many of societal issues, such as violence, greed, oppression, lack of empathy, etc. if we could help men (and boys) figure out how to deal with problems more efficiently. This starts at home. And, the most effective way is for families to practice empathy — with all living and nonliving things. Parents also need to be more educated about (and actively practice) gender equality. We need to teach both boys and girls that feelings and emotions are a powerful part of life, regardless of gender, and how to adequately deal with our feelings. Our children’s inner-worlds should be as important to us as their annual physical check-ups. With unattended emotional support, girls tend to internalize their problems and boys externalize. Here lies the issue, and in my opinion this is why we are in the situation we are in, and always have been. We have work to do.
Yes! You will love the next pieces, that's exactly where we're going.
Left and right brain, the integral mind, and escaping the nihilistic entrapment of modernity.
The next evolution isn't just political, it's a way of being.
Really!? That’s very exciting!! I’m looking forward to reading! 🖤
Looking forward to more of this discussion, slick!
🌻😊👍
Kristin, you and I are of the same or similar mind. The taboo on tenderness in the rearing of boys, how they are gutted of their vulnerability and humanity and then stuffed with entitlement and grandiosity, inculcated into a culture of cruelty and competition, has left us in this existential crisis.
Looking forward to more discussion about balancing our human, relational needs. 😊♥️👍
Dr. Taylor, I feel so relieved to read your words. I’m so happy you exist. 🫶🏼
Aw, this is so wholesome! Best comments in the history of Substack
"Hi Slick, this is a wonderfully accurate description of the dynamics among a subset of humans, mostly men, whose self-esteem rests upon their sense of control over and influence upon others."
"mostly men" Lesbian? Feminist? Clearly American because you value your TLA.
The rest of your post resonates. Boys , IRL, are more sensitive than girls. up to puberty. Whatever can be damaged before then, will remain damaged. it's true for girls too.
As for women, I can name only two, after 43 years in the workforce, who were good managers, the rest being obsessed with petty control and micromanagement. Making sure everyone got the same amount of biscuits. That works in a household, but not in commerce.
And women get away with the worst crimes because of a cultural ideal not to punch them in the face.
Nicely put!
Fantastic read! Awesome! Thanks!
But I disagree with one of the pillars of your conclusion:
"This isn’t just about breaking the Technate. It’s about making sure nothing like it can ever rise again."
This strikes me as ahistorical. Empires and civilizations do collapse, and then what remains is a decentralized patchwork of communities which slowly declines (in harmony with nature locally) until the next incarnation takes over. There are a few historical examples of federal empires or civilizations (ex. SE Asia or the natives of N. America) sustainably existing in a decentralized way, but eventually these fall to their neighboring empires expansion.
Like you I believe the revolution has already occurred and we're now in a transitional phase of consolidation in the illiberal age. And eventually a resistance will emerge and the system will fall apart, or at least cut off parts it can't control, because like you said, it's inevitable.
There are a lot of unknowns though. So I'd say it's unclear where we end up.
Sci-fi world presents us with black swans, and then there's God.
If I were to criticize your essay I'd say the omission of God, faith and meaning or purpose of life, these are going to be relevant going forward. There's also a curious debate about AI and the occult, but this is sci-fi world too.
Oh, that's coming, friend. We need the right brain back, and there's a very meaningful framework for it in an old niche religion.
I'll elaborate in upcoming articles but you can think of the technate as the digital demiurge, of Dugin and 4PT as a colossal misunderstanding of Heidegger, and of both as just an embodiment of the Gestell, not its replacement. Bringing Being into existence isn't a numbers game.
Conscious Light. Reality. Transcendental Spirituality. Understanding. Adi Da.
There’s a blueprint for decentralized freedom that is protected by an over arching LIMITED central government that can provide protection for all within it against domination from the outside. It’s called the US Constitution. To build a stable and secure future for freedom, we don’t need chaos and liberation from all authority. We need to get back to very limited central authority that can allow and protect the development of decentralized systems like those described by Slick.
Tell that to JFK, and every other victim. Look, the US constitution and the bill of rights are great documents, potentially among the best in their class, but in reality they're only as good as the implementation. So. In principal I agree with you and my guess is so would the majority of people, if we're talking common sense. But we need to look at outcomes and reality, honestly. So for instance, this constitution, did it protect "the people" from the creation of the federal reserve? So maybe it can be improved, and maybe 100 years from now it will need further updates or upgrades.
I agree with you. The US Constitution (like any other) is just words on paper if people do not adhere to it in practice. Totalitarian regimes sometimes use nice sounding constitutions as window dressing. The Soviet constitution guaranteed freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of assembly. But the government did the opposite. In the US, the federal government has grown in size and scope of intrusiveness for beyond what the founders of the country envisioned. The federal reserve is one of many examples. I don’t think it will be easy to roll that back. But a lot of people want to do that, and it can be done. The idea of blowing it all up and starting with a tabula rasa to make everything better has an idealistic appeal if you presume it will all work out the way you want. But the history of the world shows it rarely works out that way for long. Many revolutions are short-lived. And decentralized systems have nearly always been swallowed by more powerful forces. After the fall of Rome, Europe was extensively decentralized with thousands of independent villages, city states, and principalities. But through conquest, or the desire to band together to avoid conquest, these consolidated into a handful of nations. The numerous indigenous tribes and clans throughout the Americas were conquered by European powers, the United States, and Canada. After the American Revolution, the Americans did not want to live subject to a national government. But the federal system under the Articles of Confederation proved to be too unstable and risked having the country become vulnerable to predatory European powers. I agree with their solution to cede some power to a national government in the interest of providing stability for all to live how they want within its boundaries. The granting of only the enumerated powers in the Constitution was supposed to constraint the federal government. During the initial ratification process, the general population was wise to be concerned that was not enough to constrain those who want to accumulate power, and insisted that the Bill of Rights be included. But as you know, people who want to centralize power to enrich themselves and control others have exceeded those guard rails. I see a much greater chance of long-run success in a non-partisan effort to work within the existing US Constitution to return to more decentralization than wiping the slate clean and risking ending up with an unknown future that is likely not what was intended. It’s not going to be easy. There are forces within our system that want to control too much. But I don’t think they are a feature of our system. I think there will always be such forces and the need to stand up against them under any system or lack of system. There are people working to decentralize things in various ways. On the monetary side, there is crypto and some states make gold and silver legal tender. And a lot of people are tired of government trying to dictate how they live their lives and their speech. My hope is that if enough people across the political spectrum can agree that government should not be social engineering, that our country can thrive as a place where communities are allowed to live their lives the way that they want.
We're both idealistic 🤣
I agree about revolutions. I think the appeal is inversely proportional to the suffering of those willing to engage in action. Poor and hungry people don't often worry about what's beyond their line of sight.
In general, I agree about decentralization being optimal in terms accountability and resilience, with different levels stacked upon each other to maximize their respective domains, efficiency, etc (municipal, state, national, etc), and there's no reason why (in theory) we couldn't have a great global level of governance.
The problem is related to what you mentioned towards the end, the social control and engineering aspects. For instance, back in 1919 when the CFR was being established by a small group of US/UK elites, among the various opinions holding sway of why it was necessary concerned "the people" who could not be trusted with their rights and so their decisions needed to be influenced. This "top down" view of the world is a continuation of the aristocratic justification of inequality; eugenics is another good example, and we can still see its existence today in both the right and left camps of the political discourse.
I don't have a solution to offer right now, suffice to say there's a lot more going on than meets the eye and among the issues which will need to be resolved are the bullshit concepts of capitalism and money, crypto included. I say bullshit because they're human illusions and until we accept we're in God's world, there will always be folks willing to take from others what's not theirs.
We are idealistic. That’s good! But idealism needs to be combined with realism if the results are to actually work in practice and be lasting.
Personally, I am not in favor of global governance. I think global cooperation is very important and can help avoid and solve international issues and matters that are not within any country, such as overfishing and pollution of the oceans. But I think it is best to have less one-size-fits-all governance at each successive level above localities. I think the US federal government should be limited in its authority, and do not think there should be any governing authority outside our country that can impose its will on us. Higher and more removed levels of government are more likely to have different viewpoints and interests than people on the lower levels and therefore be enforcing things that are undesired by people at the lower levels. We already have a national government, trying to impose too much on people. We don’t need an extra layer on top of that. Besides the fact that each layer of government is more removed from us and has differing interests, each one is subject to corruption and abuse. Power tends to attract people who want to misuse it to benefit themselves and their supporters and/or ideologues untempered by humility, who believe they have the right and duty to impose their “correct“ views on everyone else. You give some good examples of that. You are right that it is continuing today. And I’m sure people will try to continue in the future. That is a main reason why I believe decentralization and checks and balances on power are necessary.
Your final point is important. I have a different take on it. I think human nature is the problem. It is a cliché that money is the root of all evil. But I think that money is just a medium of exchange. It is a way to store value and not be limited by the barter system. (By the way, money can be anything that is accepted for that purpose – cash, precious metals, digital account balances, crypto, shells, or big round stones with a hole in the middle - all of which are illusions in terms of holding any intrinsic value, other than metals that have practical use or are valued for being shiny.) Money and credit have enabled an explosion of economic development that has made tremendous improvements to people‘s lives all over the world, including food, medicine, increasing lifespan, and technology. It hasn’t resulted only in good. There’s a lot of theft and other evil that is driven by the lust for the power that money can buy (possession of material things and control of people). But it seems like that has always been the way of the world for some people. Even without money, there has been theft, conquest, pillaging, and slavery. I wish everyone would be good, whether because it is what God wants for us or because following the golden rule is the only fair in just way to treat other people. But unfortunately, humans are not always like that in this world. Maybe in the next.
The US Constition was written by a cohesive culture of 2.5 million citizens. Jews coined the term “melting pot” for their plans to destroy a functioning society. We now have 300 million multi-cultural people running around this factory farm. For every size of human grouping, there is a proper form of governance. Republics fail when above a monoculture of 20 million people. The USA will need to form 50 voluntary confederations with our 50 states. These states will need to form their own ethnicities and culture. Segregation and deportations are back.
I prefer "unconcealment" to "revelation," and yes there is much to say about the left brain dominance of modernity as demiurge, AI as oracle, elite spirituality, and the next stage of consciousness. That's coming!
Don't forget the evangelicals that want to steamroll the holy land to jump start the rapture and bring on the 2nd coming. Thank you for writing this. My friends were certain I lost my mind when I started talking about Halderman and Dark Enlightenment. Nobody was listening to me.
It *is* hard to believe. Feels too dark, too negative, almost crackpot theory, if you say things like "Elon's grandpa advocated the ideas he's pushing now" and "being a nazi isn't original in Elon's family".
Hopefully we never get to a point where everyone has to contend with it. Hopefullier (yes I made that up) we contend with it earlier and never have to get there.
Elon’s grandfather served time in prison in Canada for sedition for this, so they can be stopped.
Canada should be proud for jailing Elon's grandpa, 80 years ago!
But now what?
Essentially the George Orwell of 1984 fast forward to the 2020’s. Yes, this is exactly where we are. Trump is controlled by Musk and the Russian oligarchy (Putin) who rescued his businesses 15 years ago. Through Trump they are engineering the collapse of the USA. Everything Trump is doing is destroying America - its social safety net, meager as it was, its education system, poor as it was, its health care system, deteriorating as it was. All of these systems will be collapsed into a crumbled civil service and servile armed forces who will meekly submit the west to the technocratic oligarchy that presently controls Russia and thus will control most of the world. The world will be left as a bipolar world with the Russian/US techno/oligarchic regime facing the Chinese Capitalist/Communist Empire. A frightening world created by the dumb MAGA voters who preferred a weak tyrant obviously supported by an oligarchy totally uninterested in the wellbeing of the American citizenry. So here we are facing a tragic future without a clear way of defeating these monsters who we have in fact created because of our slavish desire for ‘things’.
I disagree heartily with the last part of your comment.
We are not powerless. And we desire more than things.
Stay tuned, compadre; 1984 wasn't meant as an instruction manual, and it will never work as such for very long.
easy now. pretty soon you'll be acquiescing to anyone's right to dissent
I've read this a few times, and each time I am less terrified. Not that you're not spot on, I think you are, but that we won't cede our power quite so easily.
'Become Ungovernable' is an excellent battle cry.
Thank you: your and other's reactions are the best reward for my writing. Whether we like it or not, we are in it, so let's win it!
She who can destroy a thing has the real control of it.
You left out that Musk’s grandfather served time in prison for Sedition in the 1930’s in Canada based on this theory. They must be stopped. They were stopped before.
Hear hear!
I will never enroll in X. That is such an easy step tonstay a little decentralized. Musk can make it the Everythjng App. More power to him.
Very interesting read, I will be contemplating it over the weekend. I wish someone in my life (family or friend) would read it and debate it or discuss it with me. Most people just would not belive it, thinking I am a crazy qanon conspiracy theorist. Few around me think about these things.
Thanks for the head spin.
You can share it with them, asking for their take, framing it as "hard-to-believe but..." or whatever feels comfortable.
Nothing qanon here
very interesting but not too grounded in reality. with our failing power grid, rising costs of living, a $34+ trillion debt bubble and declining global influence abroad, in the future, these commodities aren’t going to be available for most americans, not even the uber rich ones. nor will the rest of the world be able or as willing to invest in them either. i think when that shift happens, many people in poverty will begin to realize the class struggle and begin to rely on themselves locally for resources and trade, and find new ways to govern themselves. many people have already given up on legacy media, for its fear-mongering, propaganda and toxicity, and i believe social media and AI will be next, given the negative effects it’s had on our society, schools, and attention spans, as well as the fact that it’s produced by the very tech oligarchs sucking the wealth out of our country.
I would love to read your oppositions and critiques. The points you listed don't invalidate the ideology and strategy of the factions in power.
Aye, good read.
This resonates with what I am sensing as well. Seed Discord amongst them,claim our turf outside of their control, create decentralized networks for caring and sharing and stay weird and unpredictable.
Regroup. Renerate. Throw in some wrenches into their machine.
Quite a few empires to.dismantle to make the "no more crowns" happen.we gonna need a big pirate fleet for that.
Also.gotta support a lot of people into becoming Sovereign to become ungovernable.
Still a lot of folx that cannot handle uncertainty and will.gladly relinquish freedom for.the illusion of order and control.
I think.we basically blowing into the same.horn. @chaos compass
We all pirates now!
Not all of us, but those who choose not to comply in the new digital overlords fiefdom can make the choice to band together as Pirates or struggle alone for their own survival.
It'll start getting a bit zany when we all follow Markoff Chaney.
https://definithing.com/statutory-ape/
Dear Ms. Scholl,
There are some outside influences that may exacerbate or prevent many of the steps towards the rise of the ‘Technate’.
Climate Change for a start, combined with the logistics of AI. Then there are the other power centers in Beijing, New Delhi, São Paulo and Jakarta. Countries with nuclear weapons and several hundreds of millions of mouths to feed.
A Technate will require enormous amounts of electricity and potable water. A Cloud Data Center consumes enough power and water to support about 100,000 people. And AI will demand many, many more data centers, to the point that in areas where they have them, human and most other life will not be able to exist. Between the sound, the heat plumes and the desertification, they will be dead zones.
Countries with vast populations will have no compunction about invading neighbours and taking the land and water to feed their populations. The world is running dry on potable water as it is, as industry wastes as much as people consume on processes that should be using grey water.
And as the equatorial regions become to hot to support human life, people will migrate en masse and will consume the available food and water like locusts. They could have been helped to stay in their homes if the worlds power centers had not been fighting any and all attempts to reduce the damage they are doing to produce their profits.
And even if their engineers try to moderate the use of these two most precious resources with improved designs, the replacement of humans with AI will drive greater demand than any improved efficiency can provide.
1 kW = 0.28434514 Tons of cooling
A typical site today uses 100MW of electricity, and because of the heat produced by the servers and other hardware it will need 284.3 tons of cooling, more if you are in an area like Arizona. If there are clusters, like around a nuclear reactor, they will be competing for cooling water.
AIs like ChatGPT will require even more power, 10 times because it requires high end video card chip sets to do floating point calculations. A gamer knows that the video card burns half the power used by the pc. Now think of a server with 10’s or 100’s of such chip sets. The infrastructure needed to replace the people in governance and management would require more resources than the US Military every year. Data centers will become like a cancer.
Now consider that the other players will be going down the same rabbit hole. China will have less powerful AIs but because the people are easily expendable (slaves have little value in Chinese Communist Party’s thinking, less so in a Technate) they will direct all resources to defeating their competitors. And the Chinese hackers already have ready access to SV courtesy of Elon Musk. The Russians have ready access through Trump. They will not take a challenge to their perceived entitlements lying down.
Now consider that a country like China has run out of arable land, and potable water. The Three Gorges dam is not able to produce enough electricity to sustain their data centers, let alone keep the lights on for the government. They will take what they can from Russia, and South East Asia. Even by force.
Indonesia has some 300 million people, and they like the Chinese are reliant on fish for supplying protein. Their Navies will be dueling over fishing grounds and pirating catches. Even up to Monterey Bay and Cape Cod. As the ocean’s surface temperatures rise, the food chains will collapse, and then raiding coastal areas will replace fishing. And the Indian government will be fighting for a share for themselves after the glaciers feeding the Ganges are all gone.
And last but not least, there is the nuclear option. Say a repressed, disgruntled, petulant dictator like Kim Jong Un who lofts an ICBM to do an air burst EMP, and anything electronic not hardened to withstand the EMP is fried. As would be the Technate.
There is allot at play now, and it seems we are headed to the apocalypse at warp speed. But as you pointed out, we can resist and slow down their efforts to a full stop. Like the Athenian who manned the oars at the Battle of Salamis, we citizens of this world still have agency.
If you want to flummox Amazon, buy local and pay in cash.
Dump Facebook.
Dump StarLink, Tesla and anything else Musk’s corrupted.
Get a library card and read books.
Write letters instead of email or posting.
Learn to garden, and garden with your neighbours.
Learn to raise animals like chickens, rabbits and pigs.
Learn the laws that have enabled the oligarchs and document their consequences.
Get involved with local affairs and present the news at coffee shops, community clubs and to family and friends.
We can take back this world from those few who think themselves our betters. Remember the lesson in the movie GATTACA: don’t hold back. Once you commit, do not hold anything back.
Then we don’t get mad, we get even.
Yes, yes, and yes. It's either the whole world is depleted, or we manage to salvage something. The stakes are existential.
I love this article! Especially when you mention LotR, because I have been screaming from the rooftops we have to unite like the denizens of Middle Earth and vanquish Sauron and Saruman; that we have to invest in building our local communities, mutual aid, growing food in our urban yards, on balconies, window sills, etc., and ultimately in building local networks of ungovernability. I am a fan!
I see tremendous potential and opportunity in this exceedingly dark moment. The situation is so dark that even the staunchest and most comfortable liberals are experiencing political clarity. I am hopeful that this clarity will open the way for spiritual clarity as well, in that people realize that we have hit not only the political and economic, but also ecological and spiritual wall. We cannot keep going in the direction we’ve been going. The future will either be the dark technofeudalist dystopia you describe so terrifyingly well, or we will awaken to our true potential, learn to shed our ego and embrace our essence in the process of chaos and disruption. That from the ashes of the ego driven world a new world will emerge that is rooted in cooperation, consciousness, and sustainability. We can indeed achieve this if we follow your advice. You are speaking to my personal vision.
Thank you!!
Did you say LoTR? I have a little gift for you...
https://open.substack.com/pub/heyslick/p/the-dark-elves-fallacy-neoreactionaries
Whilst I agree that their internal contradictions and factions will doom them in the short term, they'd be doomed longer term anyway due to climate change and the rising costs and eventual depletion of fossil fuels. Their model assumes limitless energy and resources, and that's not reality. Unless they've got ultra-reliable, scalable, cold fusion in their back pocket... 👀
But your prescription - decentralization - is also the right solution for climate change as well. When the center cannot hold, all that's left is the edge (or more accurately, the Mesh).
You're absolutely right. 10/10, no notes. They'll extract everything they can in the meantime, squeeze the planet for every ounce of anything they can use. Then they'll be screwed, and everyone, everything else with them.
Meanwhile they think they'll more than make up for it by mining everything in sight--planets, asteroids, even the moon--and that Earth will just be one depleted planet in a constellation of colonized specks of dust, because they missed the part of astrophysics where the places with adequate conditions for life are few and far between.
They read too much sci-fi, and not the right kind--or just can't tell dystopia from desirable futures.
And yes to the edge, yes to the mesh. Though if there's one tree in sight or any resource anywhere in the vicinity, the edge where you live may just become another mining colony before you get a chance to make a painting of the landscape...
I think all of us would prefer to live in a post-scarcity society like The Culture or maybe even The Federation... Just no-one wants to live through the Dark Ages that seems to inevitably presage them.
I think the Tech Bros would seemingly prefer Trantor or (as much as I love Honor Harrington) the aristocracy of the Star Kingdom of Manticore (just without duty, honour and noblesse oblige...).
I mean, yes, I'd rather it be post-scarcity than post-apocalyptic 😅
Solid references there!
It's the fact that Musk et al seem to prefer Option 2 that terrifies me...
Brilliant!
STEAL THIS IDEA!…PLEASE. STEAL IT, MODIFY IT, USE IT TO EMPOWER YOURSELF!
ART WORKS for COMMUNITY CURRENCY
K-TAW = Kindly-Tizing ArtWork :: a kind of funny money
ArtWork backed by community spirit of exchange
MISSION: We are artists banded together in partnership with businesses and community to exchange Art-Works in support of the local economy.
METHOD: Beyond permaculture currency. Barter. Banter. Build.
De-centralized. Organically local. Open Source. Bank on yourself.
PURPOSE: Dollar-sized ArtWorks used as advertising and gifted into the local economy. To be used by businesses and citizenry … to trade.
CONSUMER Instructions
1. Use ArtWork as you would cash for dinner, coffee, soda, tips, a massage, health care, child care, & more. Ask the community business if they take the ArtWork.
2. You may receive ArtWork in your change when buying a product locally, as a gift for a birthday, as a tip for a job well done, & more.
3. Closer to the expiration date (find date on the ArtWork), turn it back to the owner of the ArtWork and they will give you cash or more-than-equivalent services or products.
4. The more ArtWork is passed for exchange in the community before it is turned in, the more sustainable the community economy!
Get real…. Spend ArtWork…. Go local.
___________________
OWNER::BUSINESS instructions
Why use ArtWork as local exchange in Advertising:
--Get people talking about what you are doing.
--Use your advertising budget locally.
--Subtract the cost of your ArtWork as advertising.
--Watch people smile & laugh when “playing” with your “funny money”.
How to get started:
--Pay a small amount to a local artist for the ArtWork. Or make your own.
--Set aside an amount of cash to pay the “reward” for the return of the ArtWork. (You also may barter for the ArtWork with services or product.)
--Write or pay a writer to add:
1. Your business & slogan & offerings.
2. Your area of “good within ___miles of your place of business”.
3. Expiration date. Usually 3-6 months.
--Give your ArtWorks away.
1. You can only spend ArtWork other than your own.
2. Offer as a thank you to: Regulars, High pay customers, Bonuses &
Perks, Friends & Family, Lovers.
When the ArtWork is presented back to you
--Give cash or
--Give services or
--Give a product.
Keep gifting it out until closer to the expiration date.
_____________________
ARTIST instructions
1. You may
--Make your own ArtWork to advertise you and your business. OR
--Be commissioned to make ArtWork for someone else to advertise.
--Do one or the other because the Kindly-Tizing ArtWork is Open Source, meaning the ArtWork is not copyrighted. K-TAW believes in a gift society and a healthy local economy.
2. If you are commissioned to produce an ArtWork for someone else:
--You may sell your labor and supplies. Once a business, person, or a not-for-profit owns the ArtWork then the ArtWork totally belongs to them. They must set aside the “reward money” to exchange by the expiration date.
3. If you create the ArtWork for yourself to advertise yourself:
--You are the owner. When you own the ArtWork, you are the one who must set aside the “reward money” to exchange by the expiration date. The Owner must give ArtWork away as a gift to the community economy.
--You may take the cost of ArtWork off your income for advertising.
4. The Owner of the ArtWork must give/gift it away during the time period.
--Because if you sell the ArtWork, you
1. must pay taxes on the sale and
2. cannot deduct ArtWork as advertising.
5. ALL THE POINTS FOR THE BUSINESS OWNER APPLIES.
This must have taken a lot of time to write. Well done. Well organized. Worth repeated reading … a lot to consider.
This is honestly the most hopeful analysis I've read so far. Thank you for this! I'm all in.