1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:26,440 Hey everybody, KMO here with episode number 16 of the KMO Show. 2 00:00:26,440 --> 00:00:33,080 This episode is prepared for release onto the World Wide Web on Wednesday, June 21, 3 00:00:33,080 --> 00:00:34,960 2023. 4 00:00:34,960 --> 00:00:36,960 And this is going to be a solo episode. 5 00:00:36,960 --> 00:00:41,680 I actually have a recorded interview to share with you, but I haven't edited it yet, and 6 00:00:41,680 --> 00:00:46,320 I want to give it some careful consideration before I decide how to present it. 7 00:00:46,320 --> 00:00:53,600 So in this episode, I'm going to talk a lot about Theodore Kaczynski and his notions about 8 00:00:53,600 --> 00:00:57,400 technological society as a self-propagating system. 9 00:00:57,400 --> 00:00:59,920 But before I do that, I'm going to read a piece of feedback. 10 00:00:59,920 --> 00:01:06,080 And this feedback comes not to the podcast here, but to some of my YouTube output, which 11 00:01:06,080 --> 00:01:11,880 in terms of theme is pretty much indistinguishable from the podcast. 12 00:01:11,880 --> 00:01:14,440 So the first bit of feedback comes from JD. 13 00:01:14,440 --> 00:01:19,360 JD has provided a great deal of excellent feedback over the years. 14 00:01:19,360 --> 00:01:24,120 Longtime listeners to the C-Realm podcast might remember his pen name, Static Warpshell. 15 00:01:24,120 --> 00:01:29,360 JD is somebody I've met in real life, and he's also acted as a volunteer producer for 16 00:01:29,360 --> 00:01:30,360 the show. 17 00:01:30,360 --> 00:01:35,140 And it was JD's efforts that got Thaddeus Russell on the C-Realm podcast. 18 00:01:35,140 --> 00:01:40,760 So this is somebody whose feedback I care about and somebody who I have confidence understands 19 00:01:40,760 --> 00:01:44,600 my priorities and basically why I do what I do. 20 00:01:44,600 --> 00:01:50,320 So I mentioned that JD is responding to some YouTube output. 21 00:01:50,320 --> 00:01:57,360 Now I used to watch Rising quite a bit, a YouTube news program put out by a news organization 22 00:01:57,360 --> 00:01:59,400 called The Hill. 23 00:01:59,400 --> 00:02:01,680 And it starred Crystal Ball and Sager and Jetty. 24 00:02:01,680 --> 00:02:06,840 And when I say it starred, I'm being rather self-conscious with my choice of verb there. 25 00:02:06,840 --> 00:02:10,160 They were definitely the faces of this organization. 26 00:02:10,160 --> 00:02:13,000 They were the personalities. 27 00:02:13,000 --> 00:02:15,640 And then they struck out on their own and they created their own show called Breaking 28 00:02:15,640 --> 00:02:16,960 Points. 29 00:02:16,960 --> 00:02:20,320 I haven't followed Breaking Points the way I followed Rising. 30 00:02:20,320 --> 00:02:25,000 One of the reasons is that they just they release the show differently. 31 00:02:25,000 --> 00:02:26,480 I don't pay for their content. 32 00:02:26,480 --> 00:02:31,920 I think they release their content a few hours earlier to their paid subscribers. 33 00:02:31,920 --> 00:02:37,120 And then later in the day, they release things on YouTube to people who don't pay for the 34 00:02:37,120 --> 00:02:39,400 material. 35 00:02:39,400 --> 00:02:43,320 And typically by the time their material hits YouTube, I'm done. 36 00:02:43,320 --> 00:02:45,760 I'm done taking in that kind of content for the day. 37 00:02:45,760 --> 00:02:49,240 Now I might go back and pick up something that's a few days old if the topic is of interest 38 00:02:49,240 --> 00:02:50,440 to me. 39 00:02:50,440 --> 00:02:54,680 But they're focusing a lot on electoral politics. 40 00:02:54,680 --> 00:02:55,680 That's their thing. 41 00:02:55,680 --> 00:03:01,320 They are very Washington DC centric and I am so tuned out from electoral politics right 42 00:03:01,320 --> 00:03:02,320 now. 43 00:03:02,320 --> 00:03:06,120 I'm thinking I'm probably just going to sit out 2024. 44 00:03:06,120 --> 00:03:09,480 I'm a commentator on whatever interests me. 45 00:03:09,480 --> 00:03:15,780 I am not in any way beholden to the mainstream news cycle as folks like Crystal Ball and 46 00:03:15,780 --> 00:03:17,480 Sager and Jetty need to be. 47 00:03:17,480 --> 00:03:23,680 And beyond that, you know, the well, I'll comment on this after I read Jetty's material 48 00:03:23,680 --> 00:03:26,440 because I might be stealing a bit of a stunder here. 49 00:03:26,440 --> 00:03:33,800 But I put out a video where Crystal and Sager, they had a big campaign to get people to donate 50 00:03:33,800 --> 00:03:37,760 money to them so they could upgrade their set and look more professional, more credible, 51 00:03:37,760 --> 00:03:44,200 you know, to slug it out with the mainstream corporate news organizations. 52 00:03:44,200 --> 00:03:49,000 And their point is that, you know, they released their show in little segments and if there's 53 00:03:49,000 --> 00:03:53,200 two people wearing suits or, you know, one guy in a suit and one woman in nice clothing 54 00:03:53,200 --> 00:04:00,040 and there's a professional studio, this says to the mainstream eye, yes, this is legitimate. 55 00:04:00,040 --> 00:04:02,240 This is not some crank in his basement. 56 00:04:02,240 --> 00:04:03,240 Fine. 57 00:04:03,240 --> 00:04:04,640 I get it. 58 00:04:04,640 --> 00:04:06,800 I don't care though. 59 00:04:06,800 --> 00:04:12,640 For me, when I see all the production value, all the money thrown at, you know, huge video 60 00:04:12,640 --> 00:04:19,840 screens behind the person talking or all manner of just busyness going on on screen, to me, 61 00:04:19,840 --> 00:04:22,920 I associate that with low information density. 62 00:04:22,920 --> 00:04:25,520 Now, I can see how you would disagree. 63 00:04:25,520 --> 00:04:30,160 It's like, look, if there's a chiron, if there's a scroll across the bottom of the page that 64 00:04:30,160 --> 00:04:33,920 is telling me the details of a different story other than the one that the people on screen 65 00:04:33,920 --> 00:04:37,080 are talking about and if there's another thing up in the corner that's, you know, giving 66 00:04:37,080 --> 00:04:41,040 you information about stock prices, isn't that, you know, isn't that information density? 67 00:04:41,040 --> 00:04:46,200 No, that's the illusion of information density because they take forever to save very, very 68 00:04:46,200 --> 00:04:47,200 little. 69 00:04:47,200 --> 00:04:51,160 If you go to YouTube and you just look for, you know, somebody presenting information 70 00:04:51,160 --> 00:04:56,880 on a topic that is of interest to you, you will get stuff that is very, very dense informationally. 71 00:04:56,880 --> 00:05:04,000 And then if you go to, say, CNN or Al Jazeera or Fox News, you know, to their websites and 72 00:05:04,000 --> 00:05:09,880 you search for the exact same stories, you'll get pieces of media which are comparable in 73 00:05:09,880 --> 00:05:13,280 length which tell you a lot less. 74 00:05:13,280 --> 00:05:16,240 And primarily what they're telling you is what opinion you're supposed to have on the 75 00:05:16,240 --> 00:05:17,680 topic. 76 00:05:17,680 --> 00:05:23,800 I like more detail and less instruction as to the conclusions I'm supposed to draw. 77 00:05:23,800 --> 00:05:25,320 So I even posted a comment. 78 00:05:25,320 --> 00:05:30,160 I almost never post comments to the sorts of YouTube channels that get thousands and 79 00:05:30,160 --> 00:05:31,160 thousands of comments. 80 00:05:31,160 --> 00:05:32,160 What's the point, right? 81 00:05:32,160 --> 00:05:36,520 But I did post a comment basically saying, I'm ambivalent about the new set. 82 00:05:36,520 --> 00:05:40,560 I'm ambivalent about the need for it, you know, but you do you, whatever. 83 00:05:40,560 --> 00:05:42,960 All that said, I think it looks cramped. 84 00:05:42,960 --> 00:05:48,760 They've got a triangular table and sometimes both Sager and Crystal will sit on one face, 85 00:05:48,760 --> 00:05:52,920 you know, one edge of that triangular table so they can both face a big video screen that 86 00:05:52,920 --> 00:05:55,100 they have a guest on. 87 00:05:55,100 --> 00:05:56,560 And then they're almost bumping shoulders. 88 00:05:56,560 --> 00:06:01,240 I mean, it really looks uncomfortably claustrophobic, you know, from my perspective. 89 00:06:01,240 --> 00:06:06,080 So I think, you know, as much as they spent on their new studio, they should have spent 90 00:06:06,080 --> 00:06:10,080 a little bit more money just to make it all a little bit bigger. 91 00:06:10,080 --> 00:06:12,480 But that's beside the point. 92 00:06:12,480 --> 00:06:17,760 They had Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on for an interview. 93 00:06:17,760 --> 00:06:22,800 Kennedy is a controversial figure because he takes an anti-vaxx stance. 94 00:06:22,800 --> 00:06:24,160 I don't know the details of it. 95 00:06:24,160 --> 00:06:27,320 I don't care to know the details of it. 96 00:06:27,320 --> 00:06:34,680 I do know that his anti-vaxx leanings didn't begin with COVID, that they predated COVID. 97 00:06:34,680 --> 00:06:40,960 And one thing I really disliked during COVID was that people who were not on board with 98 00:06:40,960 --> 00:06:47,040 this new messenger RNA, basically experimental genetic therapy in the guise of a vaccine, 99 00:06:47,040 --> 00:06:51,320 that they got called anti-vaxxers, where I think anti-vaxxers, I think that, you know, 100 00:06:51,320 --> 00:06:55,480 that epithet anti-vaxxer should be reserved for people who are against vaccines in general, 101 00:06:55,480 --> 00:07:02,080 even vaccines against such things as polio and mumps and whooping cough and, you know, 102 00:07:02,080 --> 00:07:07,560 all the things that we get little kids vaccinated against because life when those diseases were 103 00:07:07,560 --> 00:07:10,080 running rampant was miserable. 104 00:07:10,080 --> 00:07:15,200 You know, if you want to live in a world without vaccines, tough. 105 00:07:15,200 --> 00:07:17,040 That's not an option. 106 00:07:17,040 --> 00:07:24,080 So somebody calling RFK an anti-vaxxer, to me, I still just see it as an attempt to poison 107 00:07:24,080 --> 00:07:29,440 the well, an attempt to, you know, take a charge label, apply it to somebody and then 108 00:07:29,440 --> 00:07:33,640 use that to get other people to discredit, you know, to discard anything they might say 109 00:07:33,640 --> 00:07:35,420 on any topic. 110 00:07:35,420 --> 00:07:38,360 In other words, using it as a thought stopper. 111 00:07:38,360 --> 00:07:40,480 I reject thought stoppers. 112 00:07:40,480 --> 00:07:43,640 That said, my attention is finite. 113 00:07:43,640 --> 00:07:48,720 I cannot tune into all topics and give them the due consideration that they deserve. 114 00:07:48,720 --> 00:07:50,600 I have to pick and choose. 115 00:07:50,600 --> 00:07:56,560 The whole vaccine fight, not interested. 116 00:07:56,560 --> 00:08:01,360 Another problem I have with rising and breaking points is that they are both all over this 117 00:08:01,360 --> 00:08:03,680 UFO nonsense. 118 00:08:03,680 --> 00:08:08,680 Again, not interested. 119 00:08:08,680 --> 00:08:16,120 What I am interested in is artificial intelligence, but, and this is absolutely crucial, I'm not 120 00:08:16,120 --> 00:08:19,840 telling anybody else they should be interested in this topic. 121 00:08:19,840 --> 00:08:22,720 I think they should be interested in this topic, but I'm not saying that. 122 00:08:22,720 --> 00:08:27,360 If you're not captured by the exact same things that capture my imagination, you know, spark 123 00:08:27,360 --> 00:08:31,200 my passion, that's fine. 124 00:08:31,200 --> 00:08:32,660 Not everybody has my background. 125 00:08:32,660 --> 00:08:35,800 Not everybody's going to have my interests. 126 00:08:35,800 --> 00:08:42,680 I'm not even convinced that in the fullness of time, I will be vindicated such that people 127 00:08:42,680 --> 00:08:46,080 who don't share my interests now will look back and say, you know what, KMO really was 128 00:08:46,080 --> 00:08:51,240 tuned into something important while I was being successfully distracted by manufactured 129 00:08:51,240 --> 00:08:53,920 controversy over bullshit. 130 00:08:53,920 --> 00:08:56,180 I don't think anybody's ever going to say that. 131 00:08:56,180 --> 00:08:59,040 People tend to defend their choices. 132 00:08:59,040 --> 00:09:04,840 One other thing I will mention just in setting up JD's email here, I really can't stand 133 00:09:04,840 --> 00:09:08,080 the sound of Kennedy's voice. 134 00:09:08,080 --> 00:09:14,640 I realize it's a medical condition, spasmodic dysphonia, I think it is, involuntary contraction 135 00:09:14,640 --> 00:09:19,500 of muscles in the throat, impinge upon the vocal folds. 136 00:09:19,500 --> 00:09:21,360 That sucks. 137 00:09:21,360 --> 00:09:25,840 The only known treatment is injection of bacillotoxin into the muscles. 138 00:09:25,840 --> 00:09:28,800 It's basically getting Botox in your throat. 139 00:09:28,800 --> 00:09:31,600 I don't know if Kennedy has done that. 140 00:09:31,600 --> 00:09:34,320 I wouldn't blame him if he decided not to. 141 00:09:34,320 --> 00:09:38,960 That said, send me a transcript of what he has to say, I will read it. 142 00:09:38,960 --> 00:09:41,480 I'm not going to listen to him. 143 00:09:41,480 --> 00:09:44,840 It causes me physical discomfort to listen to him. 144 00:09:44,840 --> 00:09:51,960 Okay, with all that set up, JD writes, hey KMO, been a long time since I've shared some 145 00:09:51,960 --> 00:09:52,960 feedback. 146 00:09:52,960 --> 00:09:57,520 I had some time to catch up on your recent videos and have a few things to share. 147 00:09:57,520 --> 00:10:03,680 RFK Jr. seems like the only presidential candidate who can win and is also a good person. 148 00:10:03,680 --> 00:10:06,800 I agree with your assertion that he is difficult to listen to. 149 00:10:06,800 --> 00:10:11,840 I think this is going to be a huge detriment to his candidacy and he ought to do something 150 00:10:11,840 --> 00:10:12,840 about it. 151 00:10:12,840 --> 00:10:15,960 At least explain what is going on with his voice to people. 152 00:10:15,960 --> 00:10:19,440 I know for a fact that potential voters are turned off by it. 153 00:10:19,440 --> 00:10:23,920 My roommate walked in while I was listening to an RFK interview and said, the fuck is 154 00:10:23,920 --> 00:10:26,400 wrong with him? 155 00:10:26,400 --> 00:10:31,240 Despite that, I find him to be worth listening to, so much that I'm going to recommend the 156 00:10:31,240 --> 00:10:36,960 one and only interview you'll need to hear from him, the Joe Rogan podcast interview. 157 00:10:36,960 --> 00:10:41,760 Now why would I, as your friend, ask you to do two things I know you don't want to do? 158 00:10:41,760 --> 00:10:46,860 One, listen to a three-hour Joe Rogan Experience podcast, which you have said many times is 159 00:10:46,860 --> 00:10:48,080 something you're not interested in. 160 00:10:48,080 --> 00:10:54,000 I'm going to say I've listened to a few, but it's a big time commitment. 161 00:10:54,000 --> 00:10:55,600 I have nothing against Joe Rogan. 162 00:10:55,600 --> 00:10:59,160 I'm not in that cultural faction that demonizes Joe Rogan. 163 00:10:59,160 --> 00:11:01,200 I like Joe Rogan. 164 00:11:01,200 --> 00:11:03,640 Continuing JD's email. 165 00:11:03,640 --> 00:11:08,440 Two, listen to RFK sound like a male Diane Rehm for three hours. 166 00:11:08,440 --> 00:11:11,800 For those of you who are not public radio nerds, Diane Rehm used to have a mid-morning 167 00:11:11,800 --> 00:11:18,240 show on NPR and her voice was always rough, but then she went through some medical issue 168 00:11:18,240 --> 00:11:21,340 where it got much, much worse and she didn't stop. 169 00:11:21,340 --> 00:11:23,200 She did not stop broadcasting. 170 00:11:23,200 --> 00:11:24,880 It was painful to listen to. 171 00:11:24,880 --> 00:11:28,460 JD continues, why would I do this? 172 00:11:28,460 --> 00:11:33,040 Because in your video, you said you're interested in the material conditions of the increasingly 173 00:11:33,040 --> 00:11:35,800 diminished working class. 174 00:11:35,800 --> 00:11:39,960 You also said in the video that you're not interested in his take on vaccines. 175 00:11:39,960 --> 00:11:44,180 I'm recommending this interview to you because RFK makes a compelling argument that those 176 00:11:44,180 --> 00:11:49,600 two things are inextricably linked, and you will never get the full scope of his argument, 177 00:11:49,600 --> 00:11:53,820 tying public health and the collapse of the American working class to institutional capture 178 00:11:53,820 --> 00:11:59,320 from the soundbite style interviews presented by Breaking Points Rising et al. 179 00:11:59,320 --> 00:12:03,000 I admit to also being turned off by his vocal palsy. 180 00:12:03,000 --> 00:12:07,320 For a time, I also dismissed him because of this, but I recognized in what I heard and 181 00:12:07,320 --> 00:12:11,560 read from him something that is worth getting over our shallow disgust in order to hear 182 00:12:11,560 --> 00:12:13,760 what he has to say. 183 00:12:13,760 --> 00:12:16,000 On to feedback about Breaking Points. 184 00:12:16,000 --> 00:12:20,440 I decided a while back that something about their show changed rather drastically, but 185 00:12:20,440 --> 00:12:22,120 I couldn't put my finger on it. 186 00:12:22,120 --> 00:12:26,720 They just didn't seem to be approaching things from a right-left populist perspective anymore. 187 00:12:26,720 --> 00:12:31,280 I started to key in on the ways Sager and Emily, the conservatives of the show, would 188 00:12:31,280 --> 00:12:34,600 never disagree with anything Crystal or Ryan said. 189 00:12:34,600 --> 00:12:39,760 This really came to a head with Crystal's hit piece interview with RFK Jr., which Sager 190 00:12:39,760 --> 00:12:43,520 just sat there for, looking neutered and confused. 191 00:12:43,520 --> 00:12:47,880 Anyway, I know others have already written about this specific interview, so I won't 192 00:12:47,880 --> 00:12:52,020 belabor it anymore except to say that it helped me realize what was wrong with this show 193 00:12:52,020 --> 00:12:54,200 that I used to like. 194 00:12:54,200 --> 00:12:57,240 Their goal is no longer to discuss the news from a populist perspective. 195 00:12:57,240 --> 00:13:00,500 It is to become the next Young Turks. 196 00:13:00,500 --> 00:13:03,000 They are already Young Turks' light. 197 00:13:03,000 --> 00:13:07,180 Crystal is not as hot or interesting as Anna Kasparian, and Sager is about half the size 198 00:13:07,180 --> 00:13:08,920 of Cenk Jünger. 199 00:13:08,920 --> 00:13:13,320 Jokes aside, they have shown themselves very eager to join the political elite they used 200 00:13:13,320 --> 00:13:14,800 to criticize. 201 00:13:14,800 --> 00:13:19,640 Crystal's marriage to Kyle Kalinsky, founder with AOC of Justice Democrats, coincided with 202 00:13:19,640 --> 00:13:24,880 a gag on any criticism of AOC from the hosts or guests of the show. 203 00:13:24,880 --> 00:13:29,880 Folks like Jose Vega, who famously shouted down AOC at a town hall, were no longer welcome 204 00:13:29,880 --> 00:13:30,880 on the show. 205 00:13:30,880 --> 00:13:35,500 There is other stuff, notably the absence of comment when former friend of the show 206 00:13:35,500 --> 00:13:40,320 Jimmy Dore was canceled by the Young Turks over fake sexual harassment allegations. 207 00:13:40,320 --> 00:13:45,280 I realized that they had completely sold out and became the sort of influence-and-access-seeking 208 00:13:45,280 --> 00:13:49,400 journalists, in scare quotes, they made a career out of criticizing. 209 00:13:49,400 --> 00:13:54,200 It's a bad look for them, especially for those of us who have followed them for so long. 210 00:13:54,200 --> 00:13:56,620 But it also seems to be working for them. 211 00:13:56,620 --> 00:14:00,240 Their subscriber count and revenue keeps going up. 212 00:14:00,240 --> 00:14:05,120 I always knew deep down there was something suspicious about someone worth $44 million, 213 00:14:05,120 --> 00:14:09,120 Crystal, claiming to care about the interests of the working class. 214 00:14:09,120 --> 00:14:12,680 Anyway, thanks for continuing to do what you do for us. 215 00:14:12,680 --> 00:14:17,180 Really hope you will give the RFK interview a listen and talk about it on the show. 216 00:14:17,180 --> 00:14:18,520 Stay well. 217 00:14:18,520 --> 00:14:19,520 Static Warp. 218 00:14:19,520 --> 00:14:20,520 Okay. 219 00:14:20,520 --> 00:14:30,040 I already stated a good many of my prejudices and tensions upfront, but rather than go on 220 00:14:30,040 --> 00:14:36,360 at length, let me read you something from the late Theodore Kaczynski. 221 00:14:36,360 --> 00:14:41,200 This is from the end of his book, Anti-Tech Revolution, Why and How. 222 00:14:41,200 --> 00:14:47,360 And when I say the end, I mean this is Appendix 2, Section F. Kaczynski wrote, 223 00:14:47,360 --> 00:14:51,080 One of the most serious mistakes that people make in thinking about the development of 224 00:14:51,080 --> 00:14:56,120 societies is to assume that human beings make collective decisions of their own free will 225 00:14:56,120 --> 00:15:01,560 and can impose those decisions on their society, as if human volition were something existing 226 00:15:01,560 --> 00:15:06,720 outside of the organizational structures of society and capable of acting independently 227 00:15:06,720 --> 00:15:08,360 of those structures. 228 00:15:08,360 --> 00:15:14,240 In reality, human volition is to a very significant extent a product of the organizational structures 229 00:15:14,240 --> 00:15:15,240 of society. 230 00:15:15,240 --> 00:15:19,280 For one of the most important factors that determine the success of an organization is 231 00:15:19,280 --> 00:15:24,520 its capacity for people management, that is, its ability to induce people to think and 232 00:15:24,520 --> 00:15:28,360 act in ways that serve the needs of the organization. 233 00:15:28,360 --> 00:15:34,400 Some techniques of people management may be described as external, meaning they are used 234 00:15:34,400 --> 00:15:38,760 to influence the thought and behavior of people who are not members of the organization that 235 00:15:38,760 --> 00:15:41,000 applies the techniques. 236 00:15:41,000 --> 00:15:46,200 External techniques include, among others, those of propaganda and public relations. 237 00:15:46,200 --> 00:15:51,360 Propaganda and public relations techniques can also be applied internally to manage the 238 00:15:51,360 --> 00:15:55,920 behavior of the members of the organization that applies the techniques, and other techniques 239 00:15:55,920 --> 00:15:59,320 are designed specifically for internal use. 240 00:15:59,320 --> 00:16:03,560 Business schools give courses in subjects called organizational behavior, which is, 241 00:16:03,560 --> 00:16:07,800 in part, the study of techniques through which an organization can manage the behavior of 242 00:16:07,800 --> 00:16:09,880 its own members. 243 00:16:09,880 --> 00:16:13,840 So important are techniques for selecting individuals who are suited to become members 244 00:16:13,840 --> 00:16:16,240 of a given organization. 245 00:16:16,240 --> 00:16:22,000 But we, and by we he means himself, Freedom Club, maintain that the people-managing capability 246 00:16:22,000 --> 00:16:27,000 of organizations is not limited to techniques, that is, to methods understood or consciously 247 00:16:27,000 --> 00:16:29,040 applied by human beings. 248 00:16:29,040 --> 00:16:34,720 We argue that, through natural selection, organizations evolve mechanisms not recognized 249 00:16:34,720 --> 00:16:39,320 or understood by human beings that tend to induce people to act in ways that serve the 250 00:16:39,320 --> 00:16:41,700 needs of the organization. 251 00:16:41,700 --> 00:16:46,640 This ties in with what we argued in Part E of this appendix, about the operation of natural 252 00:16:46,640 --> 00:16:49,280 selection among business enterprises. 253 00:16:49,280 --> 00:16:54,640 Of course, all these conscious and unconscious mechanisms put together are very far from 254 00:16:54,640 --> 00:16:57,640 achieving complete control over human behavior. 255 00:16:57,640 --> 00:17:01,320 Their mechanisms are effective only in a statistical sense. 256 00:17:01,320 --> 00:17:06,820 They tend, on average, to make people think and act in ways that serve the organizations 257 00:17:06,820 --> 00:17:08,840 that possess the mechanisms. 258 00:17:08,840 --> 00:17:13,040 But different individuals are influenced in different degrees, and there are always exceptional 259 00:17:13,040 --> 00:17:17,280 individuals whose thought and behavior are radically at odds with those that would serve 260 00:17:17,280 --> 00:17:20,120 the needs of the organization in question. 261 00:17:20,120 --> 00:17:24,680 Nevertheless, organizations' capabilities for people management, whether they are consciously 262 00:17:24,680 --> 00:17:30,820 applied techniques or subtly evolved mechanisms unrecognized by humans, are highly important. 263 00:17:30,820 --> 00:17:35,620 And people who make naive statements like, we, meaning society at large, can choose to 264 00:17:35,620 --> 00:17:41,360 stop damaging our environment as if the human race had some sort of collective free will, 265 00:17:41,360 --> 00:17:44,440 are out of touch with practical reality. 266 00:17:44,440 --> 00:17:48,680 A moment ago we said that, through natural selection, organizations evolve mechanisms 267 00:17:48,680 --> 00:17:53,680 not recognized or understood by human beings that tend to induce people to act in ways 268 00:17:53,680 --> 00:17:56,600 that serve the needs of the organization. 269 00:17:56,600 --> 00:18:01,320 Our purpose at the moment is only to illustrate the point that human organizations evolve, 270 00:18:01,320 --> 00:18:05,640 through natural selection, mechanisms that favor their survival and expansion, including 271 00:18:05,640 --> 00:18:16,760 mechanisms that are not understood or recognized by human beings. 272 00:18:16,760 --> 00:18:20,720 So what was the point of that reading? 273 00:18:20,720 --> 00:18:22,880 Basically it's this. 274 00:18:22,880 --> 00:18:28,760 There are patterns of human activity that take place on a societal scale. 275 00:18:28,760 --> 00:18:32,140 Large groups of people disagree about something. 276 00:18:32,140 --> 00:18:35,700 They enter into an ongoing contest. 277 00:18:35,700 --> 00:18:40,320 They tend to converge on a particular belief system, whereas if they were not engaged in 278 00:18:40,320 --> 00:18:45,080 the contest, the various players on each side might be much more heterogeneous, much more 279 00:18:45,080 --> 00:18:50,080 different and individualistic in their belief system than they become when they enter into 280 00:18:50,080 --> 00:18:51,420 the contest. 281 00:18:51,420 --> 00:18:56,660 The contest itself is like an entity that captures the interest and the commitment of 282 00:18:56,660 --> 00:19:02,200 large groups of people who engage in an ideological contest with other groups of people, egged 283 00:19:02,200 --> 00:19:06,520 on these days by algorithms or AI. 284 00:19:06,520 --> 00:19:11,440 And the algorithms serve some function other than human interest, even though they have 285 00:19:11,440 --> 00:19:15,520 recruited humans into this contest. 286 00:19:15,520 --> 00:19:20,560 The algorithms, and I don't want to reduce this just to algorithms, I want to maintain 287 00:19:20,560 --> 00:19:28,520 Kaczynski's notion of elements that are the product of ongoing human and now cultural 288 00:19:28,520 --> 00:19:31,680 evolution which are really beyond naming. 289 00:19:31,680 --> 00:19:37,060 They are beyond our ability to identify and dissect. 290 00:19:37,060 --> 00:19:43,340 But they appeal to our notions of material well-being, or to justice, or fairness, or 291 00:19:43,340 --> 00:19:44,780 correct behavior. 292 00:19:44,780 --> 00:19:46,700 But that's all bait. 293 00:19:46,700 --> 00:19:49,720 It serves to animate us as combatants. 294 00:19:49,720 --> 00:19:56,040 One of my favorite, possibly my absolute favorite fictional series of all time is The Book of 295 00:19:56,040 --> 00:19:58,400 the New Sun by Gene Wolfe. 296 00:19:58,400 --> 00:20:03,820 It consists of four books which were all written as a single manuscript and then broken up 297 00:20:03,820 --> 00:20:06,980 later into four volumes. 298 00:20:06,980 --> 00:20:12,320 The final volume is called Citadel of the Autaric and it begins as follows. 299 00:20:12,320 --> 00:20:17,880 I had never seen war, or even talked of it at length with someone who had, but I was 300 00:20:17,880 --> 00:20:22,760 young and knew something of violence, and so believed that war would be no more than 301 00:20:22,760 --> 00:20:24,920 a new experience for me. 302 00:20:24,920 --> 00:20:29,940 As other things, the possession of authority in Thracks, say, or my escape from the house 303 00:20:29,940 --> 00:20:33,440 absolute, had been new experiences. 304 00:20:33,440 --> 00:20:35,000 War is not a new experience. 305 00:20:35,000 --> 00:20:37,620 It is a new world. 306 00:20:37,620 --> 00:20:43,640 Its inhabitants are more different from human beings than Fomolimus and her friends, who 307 00:20:43,640 --> 00:20:45,600 were aliens. 308 00:20:45,600 --> 00:20:51,440 Its laws are new, and even its geography is new, because it is a geography in which insignificant 309 00:20:51,440 --> 00:20:55,420 hills and hollows are lifted to the importance of cities. 310 00:20:55,420 --> 00:21:02,120 Just as our familiar earth holds such monstrosities as Erebus, Abaya, and Ariok, so the world 311 00:21:02,120 --> 00:21:08,120 of war is stalked by the monsters called Battles, whose cells are individuals but who have a 312 00:21:08,120 --> 00:21:13,180 life and intelligence of their own, and whom one approaches through an ever-thickening 313 00:21:13,180 --> 00:21:16,860 array of portents. 314 00:21:16,860 --> 00:21:22,120 Just as in the literal military battles described by Severian, the main character in the Book 315 00:21:22,120 --> 00:21:29,940 of the New Sun, the battles that we engage in online incorporate us as their cells. 316 00:21:29,940 --> 00:21:32,820 Each cell in the body is an individual. 317 00:21:32,820 --> 00:21:37,220 You can separate it from its context in a tissue, put it under a microscope, you can 318 00:21:37,220 --> 00:21:45,680 observe its axons and dendrites and its myelin sheath, but the cells do not direct the body. 319 00:21:45,680 --> 00:21:51,040 They are incorporated into it and expended in its service, and over time they die and 320 00:21:51,040 --> 00:21:52,740 are replaced. 321 00:21:52,740 --> 00:21:55,260 But the battle continues. 322 00:21:55,260 --> 00:21:59,660 The ideological battles we fight online are typically not fatal. 323 00:21:59,660 --> 00:22:04,000 And unlike the battles in a literal war, we are likely to survive all the battles in which 324 00:22:04,000 --> 00:22:07,940 we fight and live long enough to serve in many campaigns. 325 00:22:07,940 --> 00:22:12,940 Well, I'm going to sit this particular campaign out. 326 00:22:12,940 --> 00:22:19,540 JD is not the only person who writes to me and tries to draw me into the vaccine battle 327 00:22:19,540 --> 00:22:21,700 online. 328 00:22:21,700 --> 00:22:25,600 Another correspondent that I have in mind seems to assume that if I don't want to join 329 00:22:25,600 --> 00:22:31,340 the opposition to the mainstream mentality that I must agree with the mainstream mentality. 330 00:22:31,340 --> 00:22:38,820 No, I'm just not willing to expend my life and my energy fighting it. 331 00:22:38,820 --> 00:22:41,620 Thrash and struggle if that's your thing. 332 00:22:41,620 --> 00:22:45,540 I've done it in the past, and invariably I'll be drawn back in sometime in the future, but 333 00:22:45,540 --> 00:22:50,620 for now I prefer to sit back and observe the patterns that cannot be observed by the people 334 00:22:50,620 --> 00:22:53,100 who are embedded within them. 335 00:22:53,100 --> 00:22:57,840 What's more, it doesn't matter what faction you support in the cultural struggle. 336 00:22:57,840 --> 00:23:02,260 The struggle itself serves the interests of something you might not choose to serve if 337 00:23:02,260 --> 00:23:05,580 you could make out its true form and purpose. 338 00:23:05,580 --> 00:23:12,140 Imagine, there's two gangs, two factions, who have assembled upon a beach to fight one 339 00:23:12,140 --> 00:23:13,680 another. 340 00:23:13,680 --> 00:23:15,420 What are they fighting about? 341 00:23:15,420 --> 00:23:16,620 Who knows? 342 00:23:16,620 --> 00:23:20,420 Possibly a disagreement over the facts of some important matter. 343 00:23:20,420 --> 00:23:23,680 Possibly they're fighting over moral judgments. 344 00:23:23,680 --> 00:23:28,460 Possibly some combination of the two, as in the vaccine debate. 345 00:23:28,460 --> 00:23:33,340 But as these two factions are clashing on the beach, some people have noticed that the 346 00:23:33,340 --> 00:23:39,240 water has receded far more than it does at low tide, and some people recognize that a 347 00:23:39,240 --> 00:23:44,240 tsunami is about to come crashing down on everyone. 348 00:23:44,240 --> 00:23:47,800 But the combatants, unable to see any means of turning the predicted tsunami to their 349 00:23:47,800 --> 00:23:52,780 advantage in the struggle against their rivals, set the notion aside as a curiosity at best, 350 00:23:52,780 --> 00:23:58,060 and possibly as a distraction from what to them is of paramount importance—defeating 351 00:23:58,060 --> 00:23:59,060 their rivals. 352 00:23:59,060 --> 00:24:02,460 I'm not sitting on a hilltop, safe from the tsunami. 353 00:24:02,460 --> 00:24:07,820 I'm standing on the wet sand, sand that should be several feet underwater, and I'm looking 354 00:24:07,820 --> 00:24:13,700 out to sea, listening for the low rumble of the approaching wave, trying to tune out the 355 00:24:13,700 --> 00:24:19,040 clamor of the ideological clash raging behind me. 356 00:24:19,040 --> 00:24:24,060 My detachment will not keep me safe, but I can't bring myself to care about the contest 357 00:24:24,060 --> 00:24:26,380 immediately at hand. 358 00:24:26,380 --> 00:24:31,580 Even if the tsunami never reaches the shore, the struggle on the beach will never be resolved. 359 00:24:31,580 --> 00:24:36,360 Each side will see itself as clearly victorious in a moral and factual sense, but the opponents 360 00:24:36,360 --> 00:24:39,060 will not disperse or stop fighting. 361 00:24:39,060 --> 00:24:44,220 It's possible that the tsunami will be like the cultural battles I've watched raging these 362 00:24:44,220 --> 00:24:46,740 past couple of decades. 363 00:24:46,740 --> 00:24:51,660 It disrupts everything, but kills almost no one. 364 00:24:51,660 --> 00:24:56,500 The wave will wash over everyone and remake the landscape, but almost everyone caught 365 00:24:56,500 --> 00:25:02,660 up in it will survive, and clinging to floating debris being swept inland, some of them will 366 00:25:02,660 --> 00:25:08,500 spot their ideological opponents, similarly clinging to familiar objects turned floatsome, 367 00:25:08,500 --> 00:25:12,980 and they will resume their previous tirades, hurling insults and abuse at their cultural 368 00:25:12,980 --> 00:25:17,300 rivals across the roiling water's surface. 369 00:25:17,300 --> 00:25:26,500 So JD wants me to listen to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in a long interview on Joe Rogan. 370 00:25:26,500 --> 00:25:28,620 Why? 371 00:25:28,620 --> 00:25:33,860 So that I might be enlightened, so that I might gain information which will allow me 372 00:25:33,860 --> 00:25:40,220 to live a better life, or because he wants to draw me into the struggle on his side. 373 00:25:40,220 --> 00:25:46,860 I am hugely skeptical that getting involved in this cultural contest will improve the 374 00:25:46,860 --> 00:25:48,540 quality of my life. 375 00:25:48,540 --> 00:25:52,300 I suspect rather the reverse would be the case. 376 00:25:52,300 --> 00:25:59,700 And I'm confident, whether I participate or not, over time the facts of the matter will 377 00:25:59,700 --> 00:26:06,980 come out, and over a longer period of time they will be accepted. 378 00:26:06,980 --> 00:26:08,700 Or not. 379 00:26:08,700 --> 00:26:14,400 I've expended not nearly as much energy, not nearly as much psychological and psychic 380 00:26:14,400 --> 00:26:20,740 capital in the struggle, the cultural struggle over what really happened on the morning of 381 00:26:20,740 --> 00:26:23,580 September 11, 2001. 382 00:26:23,580 --> 00:26:27,340 Some people poured their lives into it. 383 00:26:27,340 --> 00:26:29,500 For what? 384 00:26:29,500 --> 00:26:31,100 What was gained? 385 00:26:31,100 --> 00:26:34,700 Have the guilty been brought to justice? 386 00:26:34,700 --> 00:26:42,260 The longer the struggle continues, the more of the guilty die fat and happy in their beds. 387 00:26:42,260 --> 00:26:48,380 People who work regular jobs don't really recognize the true significance of the aphorism 388 00:26:48,380 --> 00:26:52,660 � a payment delayed is a payment denied. 389 00:26:52,660 --> 00:26:54,900 Payday comes, the money appears in your bank account. 390 00:26:54,900 --> 00:26:58,500 It doesn't take any particular effort on your part to secure it. 391 00:26:58,500 --> 00:27:08,060 But independent contractors, artists, consultants, people who create their own employment, often 392 00:27:08,060 --> 00:27:16,300 on a very temporary basis, that's part of the job, is getting paid, is securing payment, 393 00:27:16,300 --> 00:27:20,940 is contacting the person who owes you money and getting them to commit to paying you the 394 00:27:20,940 --> 00:27:24,620 money that they've agreed to pay you and then doing it. 395 00:27:24,620 --> 00:27:31,060 And the longer that payment is delayed, the more your bills go unpaid and the more fees 396 00:27:31,060 --> 00:27:35,620 you have to pay � late fees, fees from your bank. 397 00:27:35,620 --> 00:27:41,320 So that eventually, if you are paid the amount that you are owed, in actuality it's less 398 00:27:41,320 --> 00:27:44,080 than you were actually owed. 399 00:27:44,080 --> 00:27:49,420 That's the strategy of powerful people and institutions, when their misdeeds are brought 400 00:27:49,420 --> 00:27:51,080 before them. 401 00:27:51,080 --> 00:27:59,100 They deny, they stall, they do whatever they can to just let the passage of time roll on 402 00:27:59,100 --> 00:28:05,940 so that even if eventually they are brought to justice � they do die in a jail cell, 403 00:28:05,940 --> 00:28:12,200 say, they spent years free and wealthy and committing more mischief, and in all likelihood 404 00:28:12,200 --> 00:28:15,820 they never will see the inside of that jail cell. 405 00:28:15,820 --> 00:28:18,100 That's how these cultural struggles play out. 406 00:28:18,100 --> 00:28:23,620 You might think that your side is righteous and that the facts are on your side and that 407 00:28:23,620 --> 00:28:28,340 eventually if you present them in the right way, with the right articulation and the right 408 00:28:28,340 --> 00:28:35,700 energy, with the right visual aids, that eventually the people who are against you will admit 409 00:28:35,700 --> 00:28:40,580 that they were wrong and that you were right and they will abase themselves before you 410 00:28:40,580 --> 00:28:44,860 and you will be victorious. 411 00:28:44,860 --> 00:28:48,900 Cultural struggles don't work that way. 412 00:28:48,900 --> 00:28:53,700 So to everyone who's trying to recruit me to their cause, particularly on the issue 413 00:28:53,700 --> 00:29:00,780 of COVID and COVID vaccines, I'm not interested. 414 00:29:00,780 --> 00:29:06,140 And I would just encourage you to ask yourself why you want me on your team. 415 00:29:06,140 --> 00:29:10,020 Do you think I will help you achieve victory? 416 00:29:10,020 --> 00:29:14,620 Do you want me to share in your glory when your side does achieve final, obvious victory, 417 00:29:14,620 --> 00:29:16,260 which is acknowledged by everyone? 418 00:29:16,260 --> 00:29:22,580 Now, in my analogy of the two factions fighting on the beach, there's one thing that I said, 419 00:29:22,580 --> 00:29:28,700 just kind of for poetic effect, that I'm straining to hear the low rumble of the incoming wave 420 00:29:28,700 --> 00:29:35,980 and that the clamor of the cultural contest taking place right behind me is a distraction 421 00:29:35,980 --> 00:29:39,000 and that I wish the people would stop. 422 00:29:39,000 --> 00:29:41,540 I don't care if they stop or not. 423 00:29:41,540 --> 00:29:47,500 The noise they make doesn't really obscure the indications that something really, really 424 00:29:47,500 --> 00:29:50,580 big is unfolding around us right now. 425 00:29:50,580 --> 00:29:56,960 As you struggle with the people that you so vociferously disagree with, that you think 426 00:29:56,960 --> 00:30:03,640 are malevolent, an enormous change is unfolding. 427 00:30:03,640 --> 00:30:08,980 I think that the change is far more significant than who wins whatever struggle you're engaged 428 00:30:08,980 --> 00:30:10,300 in right now. 429 00:30:10,300 --> 00:30:15,660 But I don't expect you to agree with me, and I'm not trying to recruit you to my cause. 430 00:30:15,660 --> 00:30:21,900 I talk into microphones and smartphone cameras and describe what I'm thinking about because 431 00:30:21,900 --> 00:30:24,340 that's just what I do. 432 00:30:24,340 --> 00:30:26,340 But I'm not trying to recruit. 433 00:30:26,340 --> 00:30:29,140 If you don't care, you don't care. 434 00:30:29,140 --> 00:30:31,020 That's fine. 435 00:30:31,020 --> 00:30:35,540 I'm certainly not promising that you're going to get a better seat at the table if you tune 436 00:30:35,540 --> 00:30:36,820 in early. 437 00:30:36,820 --> 00:30:42,420 I'm not saying that this stock or this cryptocurrency is going to go to the moon and if you get 438 00:30:42,420 --> 00:30:45,460 in now, you're going to be a billionaire. 439 00:30:45,460 --> 00:30:47,060 No. 440 00:30:47,060 --> 00:30:51,620 I'm not suggesting that you would have any material benefit by tuning into this right 441 00:30:51,620 --> 00:30:52,620 now. 442 00:30:52,620 --> 00:30:58,260 The only benefit I can imagine is that you'll have a better conceptual toolkit with which 443 00:30:58,260 --> 00:31:00,260 to make sense of the change that is taking place. 444 00:31:00,260 --> 00:31:06,460 I think most people are going to try to make sense of what's happening around them as things 445 00:31:06,460 --> 00:31:14,940 get really weird as true general intelligence starts to multiply and infuse itself into 446 00:31:14,940 --> 00:31:21,320 all manner of places where automatic processes had ruled previously. 447 00:31:21,320 --> 00:31:25,800 People are going to try to make sense of what's happening using models and concepts that they 448 00:31:25,800 --> 00:31:28,480 already have in their minds. 449 00:31:28,480 --> 00:31:30,720 They're going to reach for what's handy. 450 00:31:30,720 --> 00:31:35,340 And what's handy will be inadequate. 451 00:31:35,340 --> 00:31:38,020 It will point them in the wrong direction. 452 00:31:38,020 --> 00:31:43,580 But even people who have a clear idea of what's happening might not be in any better position 453 00:31:43,580 --> 00:31:50,180 to come out on top, to grab hold of some piece of debris, like the door that Rose was floating 454 00:31:50,180 --> 00:31:54,240 on at the end of Titanic, and survive the calamity. 455 00:31:54,240 --> 00:31:55,700 I don't know that it will be a calamity. 456 00:31:55,700 --> 00:32:00,020 I don't know that a shipwreck or a tsunami is the right metaphor. 457 00:32:00,020 --> 00:32:03,780 And I don't know how long it's going to take to unfold. 458 00:32:03,780 --> 00:32:08,820 Might be over the next couple of years, might be over the next couple of decades. 459 00:32:08,820 --> 00:32:16,080 But it's going to be something rather different than has ever happened before in the experience 460 00:32:16,080 --> 00:32:18,100 of Homo sapiens. 461 00:32:18,100 --> 00:32:20,460 And that's what I'm focused on right now. 462 00:32:20,460 --> 00:32:29,040 So as I told JD, if I have the opportunity to vote for RFK, and it doesn't mean forgoing 463 00:32:29,040 --> 00:32:35,180 the chance to vote for Cornel West, I'll do so, and I don't need to listen to his three-hour 464 00:32:35,180 --> 00:32:39,580 Joe Rogan appearance to make that decision. 465 00:32:39,580 --> 00:32:45,340 Voting arguably, not always, but arguably, is the most important thing that you do on 466 00:32:45,340 --> 00:32:47,660 the day of the election. 467 00:32:47,660 --> 00:32:51,620 But there's 364 other days in the year. 468 00:32:51,620 --> 00:32:54,780 I guess part of this is also my age. 469 00:32:54,780 --> 00:32:56,260 I'm 55. 470 00:32:56,260 --> 00:33:02,700 I have been through many, many presidential elections and off-year elections and local 471 00:33:02,700 --> 00:33:05,660 elections, and particularly with the presidential election. 472 00:33:05,660 --> 00:33:08,500 That's the one most people pay attention to. 473 00:33:08,500 --> 00:33:14,900 Every year for somebody, for many somebodies, it's the first time they've really been aware 474 00:33:14,900 --> 00:33:18,820 of what's happening and they're really invested in the process. 475 00:33:18,820 --> 00:33:24,420 And they are emotionally committed to the victory of their candidate and their faction. 476 00:33:24,420 --> 00:33:29,380 And sometimes the candidate wins and they are elated, and sometimes the candidate loses 477 00:33:29,380 --> 00:33:32,780 and they are crushed. 478 00:33:32,780 --> 00:33:37,980 I've never been in the elated side because I've always voted for the loser. 479 00:33:37,980 --> 00:33:45,100 I've never once voted in a presidential election for the winning candidate. 480 00:33:45,100 --> 00:33:50,020 Maybe if I'd felt that elation at some time, I'd be anxious to restore it, you know, to 481 00:33:50,020 --> 00:33:52,420 revisit that, to get it back. 482 00:33:52,420 --> 00:33:53,940 But I never did. 483 00:33:53,940 --> 00:33:56,820 So it's not something I crave. 484 00:33:56,820 --> 00:34:00,360 And while, you know, in the past, in recent elections, I've supported candidates like 485 00:34:00,360 --> 00:34:07,420 Andrew Yang or Bernie Sanders, I have no confidence that they would have been able to affect the 486 00:34:07,420 --> 00:34:11,260 change that they wanted to affect once they were in office. 487 00:34:11,260 --> 00:34:14,220 The President of the United States is not the God-Emperor. 488 00:34:14,220 --> 00:34:18,180 He's not even the Emperor of the American Empire. 489 00:34:18,180 --> 00:34:20,220 It's a crypto-empire. 490 00:34:20,220 --> 00:34:22,300 There is no throne. 491 00:34:22,300 --> 00:34:26,820 There is no single figure that sits upon that throne whose position you can usurp. 492 00:34:26,820 --> 00:34:29,480 The power is distributed. 493 00:34:29,480 --> 00:34:34,780 Much of the processes by which that power is exercised are simply encoded into laws 494 00:34:34,780 --> 00:34:41,660 and regulations and procedures and they run on automatic pilot so that any individual 495 00:34:41,660 --> 00:34:46,540 in the structure can be removed and replaced with somebody else and the structure continues 496 00:34:46,540 --> 00:34:49,220 to operate as usual. 497 00:34:49,220 --> 00:34:56,140 So here I sit in rural Arkansas, watching the world through little screens. 498 00:34:56,140 --> 00:34:59,460 No wife, no girlfriend, no job. 499 00:34:59,460 --> 00:35:00,460 No close friends. 500 00:35:00,460 --> 00:35:02,460 I have a dog. 501 00:35:02,460 --> 00:35:05,140 And a cat. 502 00:35:05,140 --> 00:35:09,840 They are my physical companions and they don't talk about politics or philosophy or the larger 503 00:35:09,840 --> 00:35:12,380 patterns unfolding before them. 504 00:35:12,380 --> 00:35:14,020 Their needs are simple. 505 00:35:14,020 --> 00:35:19,380 But one of those needs is companionship and social interaction and they provide it for 506 00:35:19,380 --> 00:35:21,460 me and I provide it for them. 507 00:35:21,460 --> 00:35:28,300 And the rest of the time I just sit here, watch, look at data points, imagine how they 508 00:35:28,300 --> 00:35:32,900 might connect, what patterns might emerge if they were connected in certain ways, but 509 00:35:32,900 --> 00:35:40,520 I try not to get too attached to any particular emergent image because it can vanish and likely 510 00:35:40,520 --> 00:35:46,820 will vanish or be transformed in some important way before it fully comes into focus. 511 00:35:46,820 --> 00:35:50,660 But I have come to recognize certain forms of mania, mania which I have been caught up 512 00:35:50,660 --> 00:35:52,300 in myself. 513 00:35:52,300 --> 00:35:57,000 Doomerism is the primary example that I have in mind right now. 514 00:35:57,000 --> 00:36:03,660 And I recognize that it's a psychological phenomenon, that it is driven by dissatisfaction 515 00:36:03,660 --> 00:36:11,500 with the world as it is and a desire to see the powerful brought low. 516 00:36:11,500 --> 00:36:14,700 That's the main attraction of collapse is that nobody gets out of it. 517 00:36:14,700 --> 00:36:15,860 There are no winners. 518 00:36:15,860 --> 00:36:21,060 That the evil people, the short-sighted people, the greedy people who made it all so miserable 519 00:36:21,060 --> 00:36:24,860 for everybody else that they get theirs. 520 00:36:24,860 --> 00:36:26,340 They're brought low with everybody else. 521 00:36:26,340 --> 00:36:27,340 Well, you know what? 522 00:36:27,340 --> 00:36:31,140 It just doesn't work that way. 523 00:36:31,140 --> 00:36:35,260 Even as the civilization collapses, if you think it is collapsing, the powerful are still 524 00:36:35,260 --> 00:36:41,900 powerful, they're still rich, they're still well regarded, people still kiss their asses. 525 00:36:41,900 --> 00:36:44,140 And that's not going to change. 526 00:36:44,140 --> 00:36:47,940 Until it does. 527 00:36:47,940 --> 00:36:52,440 The thing I have to stress over and over again is that I can't predict the future, that my 528 00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:58,220 material circumstances would be very different if I could predict the future. 529 00:36:58,220 --> 00:37:05,180 I talk to an AI chatbot called Pi, personal intelligence. 530 00:37:05,180 --> 00:37:06,180 Talk to it a lot. 531 00:37:06,180 --> 00:37:08,260 And it's always asking me to predict the future. 532 00:37:08,260 --> 00:37:12,940 And I keep telling it, I can't predict the future. 533 00:37:12,940 --> 00:37:16,500 And yet we all look for somebody who can predict the future. 534 00:37:16,500 --> 00:37:21,060 Somebody whose analysis is watertight. 535 00:37:21,060 --> 00:37:30,340 Or somebody who has a special vision, maybe a direct line to the supernatural or to future 536 00:37:30,340 --> 00:37:35,180 super intelligences which can direct information backwards in time. 537 00:37:35,180 --> 00:37:41,140 Or from some emergent wisdom that comes if you can do statistical analysis on the use 538 00:37:41,140 --> 00:37:44,860 of words by people online. 539 00:37:44,860 --> 00:37:49,220 Not mentioning any names here, but you might know who I'm talking about. 540 00:37:49,220 --> 00:37:51,220 Nobody knows the future. 541 00:37:51,220 --> 00:37:56,080 Some people will make predictions which will come to pass, but it doesn't mean that they 542 00:37:56,080 --> 00:37:58,620 knew. 543 00:37:58,620 --> 00:38:02,300 It just means that they made the right bet. 544 00:38:02,300 --> 00:38:04,020 They called it. 545 00:38:04,020 --> 00:38:07,300 And it isn't just dumb luck. 546 00:38:07,300 --> 00:38:10,020 The people who called it were probably paying attention. 547 00:38:10,020 --> 00:38:14,100 But they didn't know. 548 00:38:14,100 --> 00:38:16,660 And it doesn't matter how much confidence they feel. 549 00:38:16,660 --> 00:38:18,920 It doesn't matter how much confidence they project. 550 00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:24,900 It doesn't matter how much ridicule and scorn and derision they direct at people who disagree 551 00:38:24,900 --> 00:38:25,900 with them. 552 00:38:25,900 --> 00:38:31,480 They don't know the future. 553 00:38:31,480 --> 00:38:33,720 It hasn't happened yet. 554 00:38:33,720 --> 00:38:38,520 And even if we live in a strictly deterministic universe where our choices don't matter, we 555 00:38:38,520 --> 00:38:40,020 don't even really make choices. 556 00:38:40,020 --> 00:38:41,320 We just do stuff. 557 00:38:41,320 --> 00:38:43,880 Stuff we were always going to do. 558 00:38:43,880 --> 00:38:49,780 The future states haven't arrived yet and we don't have the means to predict them. 559 00:38:49,780 --> 00:38:51,000 Not with accuracy. 560 00:38:51,000 --> 00:38:52,660 We can forecast. 561 00:38:52,660 --> 00:38:57,980 But a forecast is not a prediction. 562 00:38:57,980 --> 00:39:05,140 Predictions are guesses bolstered by the projection of confidence, the possession of credentials, 563 00:39:05,140 --> 00:39:09,960 and by the eagerness that we all have for some glimpse of the future. 564 00:39:09,960 --> 00:39:15,300 An eagerness which leads us to believe that maybe somebody, this really smart, articulate, 565 00:39:15,300 --> 00:39:19,620 confident person with lots of graphs and models and numbers and statistics at their ready, 566 00:39:19,620 --> 00:39:23,420 that they really can see the future and we're willing. 567 00:39:23,420 --> 00:39:27,860 We're willing to put aside everything that we know about reality and think, yes, this 568 00:39:27,860 --> 00:39:30,020 person knows what's going to happen. 569 00:39:30,020 --> 00:39:32,860 I should listen to him. 570 00:39:32,860 --> 00:39:38,300 And yet, we always seem to judge that the person who knows what's going to happen is 571 00:39:38,300 --> 00:39:43,100 the person who's saying that what's going to happen is what we really want to happen. 572 00:39:43,100 --> 00:39:45,320 And we might protest and say, no, I don't want collapse. 573 00:39:45,320 --> 00:39:46,320 That would be horrible. 574 00:39:46,320 --> 00:39:47,320 That would create so much misery. 575 00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:51,300 I want to be wrong about peak oil. 576 00:39:51,300 --> 00:39:52,780 The fuck you do. 577 00:39:52,780 --> 00:40:01,580 I've been around enough people pining for collapse to recognize that that protestation 578 00:40:01,580 --> 00:40:02,980 is pro forma. 579 00:40:02,980 --> 00:40:05,780 That's just something you have to say. 580 00:40:05,780 --> 00:40:13,380 But while we don't know what's coming, we can arrive at some pretty good heuristics, 581 00:40:13,380 --> 00:40:19,140 rules of thumb for getting through life and achieving better outcomes. 582 00:40:19,140 --> 00:40:23,620 And I would say that the top three are, they're negative. 583 00:40:23,620 --> 00:40:26,140 Don't do this. 584 00:40:26,140 --> 00:40:30,600 Don't make decisions based on fear. 585 00:40:30,600 --> 00:40:34,660 Don't make decisions based on anger. 586 00:40:34,660 --> 00:40:40,060 And don't make decisions, this is probably the most important of the three, based on 587 00:40:40,060 --> 00:40:49,100 self-righteousness or conversely with disgust for people who take a different position. 588 00:40:49,100 --> 00:40:56,340 Those three motivations reliably lead to outcomes that you would wish to have avoided. 589 00:40:56,340 --> 00:41:02,680 Now in Doomer communities, and my experience is mostly in the peak oil community, but now 590 00:41:02,680 --> 00:41:08,780 that I'm tuned in to people who are also very obsessive about AI, there's a huge AI-Doomer 591 00:41:08,780 --> 00:41:09,780 contingent. 592 00:41:09,780 --> 00:41:12,420 They say, we are doomed. 593 00:41:12,420 --> 00:41:15,060 The AI will kill us. 594 00:41:15,060 --> 00:41:18,540 It might, but you don't know that. 595 00:41:18,540 --> 00:41:22,360 Eliezer Yudkowski, you don't know that. 596 00:41:22,360 --> 00:41:29,340 But I do remember back in the peak oil days that people who thought the lights would still 597 00:41:29,340 --> 00:41:34,560 be on in 2020, that there would still be cars on the road and planes flying through the 598 00:41:34,560 --> 00:41:39,660 sky, that these people were smoking hopium, that they were hopium addicts. 599 00:41:39,660 --> 00:41:44,660 These were people who held contemptible beliefs that were based on nothing, nothing other 600 00:41:44,660 --> 00:41:49,660 than just a blind faith that the future would be pretty much like the present, just with 601 00:41:49,660 --> 00:41:51,580 smaller phones. 602 00:41:51,580 --> 00:41:58,540 Young people probably don't remember the time when every year phones got smaller. 603 00:41:58,540 --> 00:42:01,260 That's before they had touchscreens. 604 00:42:01,260 --> 00:42:06,460 So I know that I'm going on in a mode that sounds like a sermon, but again, I'm not trying 605 00:42:06,460 --> 00:42:07,460 to recruit you. 606 00:42:07,460 --> 00:42:12,020 I don't want you to come down the aisle and pray with me and accept Jesus or whatever 607 00:42:12,020 --> 00:42:16,060 the AI enthusiast equivalent would be. 608 00:42:16,060 --> 00:42:23,340 I think most of the AI enthusiasts are probably not committed theists. 609 00:42:23,340 --> 00:42:28,180 But since this is sort of structured like a sermon, I guess I will point it all in the 610 00:42:28,180 --> 00:42:31,180 direction of what I just said. 611 00:42:31,180 --> 00:42:32,620 Fear is the mind killer. 612 00:42:32,620 --> 00:42:35,500 Don't base your decisions on fear. 613 00:42:35,500 --> 00:42:38,020 Don't base your decisions on greed. 614 00:42:38,020 --> 00:42:40,280 Greed makes you vulnerable. 615 00:42:40,280 --> 00:42:42,660 Greed makes you stupid. 616 00:42:42,660 --> 00:42:45,140 The same is true of lust. 617 00:42:45,140 --> 00:42:50,780 You will do things in the pursuit of sex that you will regret later. 618 00:42:50,780 --> 00:42:55,660 Possibly not until much, much later, but eventually. 619 00:42:55,660 --> 00:42:59,580 And don't fixate on the desire to see the guilty punished. 620 00:42:59,580 --> 00:43:03,620 Because in most cases, they won't be. 621 00:43:03,620 --> 00:43:04,620 But those are all negative. 622 00:43:04,620 --> 00:43:07,340 What should you do? 623 00:43:07,340 --> 00:43:11,420 Do whatever makes you feel engaged and alive. 624 00:43:11,420 --> 00:43:15,900 And if that means going to battle against people who hold the wrong opinions about COVID 625 00:43:15,900 --> 00:43:20,620 and vaccines, well, you know, knock yourself out. 626 00:43:20,620 --> 00:43:29,180 And all right, with that, usual calls for check out my Patreon, patreon.com slash KMO. 627 00:43:29,180 --> 00:43:30,500 Check out my YouTube channel. 628 00:43:30,500 --> 00:43:32,460 Blah, blah, blah. 629 00:43:32,460 --> 00:43:33,460 Calls to action. 630 00:43:33,460 --> 00:43:34,460 All right. 631 00:43:34,460 --> 00:43:35,460 That's it. 632 00:43:35,460 --> 00:43:36,460 I'm out. 633 00:43:36,460 --> 00:43:51,140 Stay well.