Become Aware Of It, Pay Attention To It. Read About It, Learn About It, Write About It, Talk About It. Teach It.
Reflections upon anything under the sun and beyond. It may not be easy to be a Global Citizen, but it's not hard to engage the Globe.
Looking Forward to a Clockwork Orange Horror Show
The Big Lie won't go away. Between now and the 2022 midterm elections, the country will get crazier and crazier. Instead of Left and Right-wing organizations LARPING war with paintball guns, we might see some live-fire battles in the streets of American cities.
Trump won 74,222,958 votes, or 46.8 percent of the votes cast. There are still tens of millions of people in the USA that support The Big Lie and are all in on dozens of insane conspiracies.
What's the percentage of Americans who can think clearly, I wonder?
Forget about the garbage flowing out of cable news networks and ponder for a moment the mad shyte firehosing from alternative media platforms and the good old world wide web.
Things in the United States are at a fever pitch of emotion now. The contagion of inane ideas from America spreads around the world like a memetic mental pandemic. Bad ideas and conspiracies are everywhere. And undergirding it all is a brand of stubborn, willful ignorance unprecedented in world history. People were probably saner when they were illiterate.
We are facing serious existential threats to global civilization, and misinformation and perniciously odious lies are all we can regurgitate as we separate into disastrous clubs and go to war with anyone who doesn't subscribe to our fantasies, illusions, and delusions.
We can look forward to a Clockwork Orange horror show. Perhaps it's time to start a tune-out movement. Do movements even work these days?
https://www.facebook.com/globehackers www.cospolon.eu
LET’S TAKE THE PROFIT OUT OF WAR
We all should know by now that war is a profitable business. It should not be this profitable. We must not incentivize profit-seeking and corruption when we are pursuing rational and moral defense policy.
CEOs shouldn’t have a financial stake in the murderous mass violence of modern warfare.
By Sam Pizzigati | August 25, 2021
In the 21st century, many of us are used to the murderous mass violence of modern warfare.
After all, we grew up living it or hearing about it. The 20th-century rates as the deadliest in human history — 75 million people died in World War II alone. Millions have died since, including a quarter-million during the 20-year U.S. war in Afghanistan.
But for our forebears, the incredible deadliness of modern warfare came as a shock.
The carnage of World War I — with its 40 million dead — left people scrambling to prevent another horror. In 1928, the world’s top nations even signed an agreement renouncing war as an instrument of national policy.
Still, by the mid-1930s the world was swimming in weapons, and people wanted to know why.
In the United States, peace-seekers followed the money to find out. Many of America’s moguls, they learned, were getting rich off prepping for war. These “merchants of death” had a vested interest in the arms races that make wars more likely.
So a campaign was launched to take the profit out of war.
On Capitol Hill, Senate Democrats set up a committee to investigate the munitions industry and named a progressive Republican, North Dakota’s Gerald Nye, to chair it. “War and preparation for war,” Nye noted in 1934, had precious little to do with “national defense.” Instead, war had become “a matter of profit for the few.”
The war in Afghanistan offers but the latest example.
We won’t know for some time the total corporate haul from the Afghan war’s 20 years. But Institute for Policy Studies analysts Brian Wakamo and Sarah Anderson have come up with some initial calculations for three of the top military contractors active in Afghanistan from 2016-2020.
They found that total compensation for the CEOs alone at these three corporate giants — Fluor, Raytheon, and Boeing — amounted to $236 million.
A modern-day, high-profile panel on war profiteering might not be a bad idea. Members could start by reviewing the 1936 conclusions of the original committee.
Munitions companies, it found, ignited and exacerbated arms races by constantly striving to “scare nations into a continued frantic expenditure for the latest improvements in devices of warfare.”
“Wars,” the Senate panel summed up, “rarely have one single cause,” but it runs “against the peace of the world for selfishly interested organizations to be left free to goad and frighten nations into military activity.”
Do these conclusions still hold water for us today? Yes — and in fact, today’s military-industrial complex dwarfs that of the early 20th century.
Military spending, Lindsay Koshgarian of the IPS National Priorities Project points out, currently “takes up more than half of the discretionary federal budget each year,” and over half that spending goes to military contractors — who use that largesse to lobby for more war spending.
In 2020, executives at the five biggest contractors spent $60 million on lobbying to keep their gravy train going. Over the past two decades, the defense industry has spent $2.5 billion on lobbying and directed another $285 million to political candidates.
How can we upset that business as usual? Reducing the size of the military budget can get us started. Reforming the contracting process will also be essential. And executive pay needs to be right at the heart of that reform. No executives dealing in military matters should have a huge personal stake in ballooning federal spending for war.
One good approach: Rep. Jan Schakowsky’s Patriotic Corporations Act.
Among other things, that proposed law would give extra points in contract bidding to firms that pay their top executives no more than 100 times what they pay their most typical workers. Few defense giants come anywhere close to that ratio.
War is complicated, but greed isn’t. Let’s take the profit out of war.
Article from otherwords.org
People like to talk about God's Glory, The Love of God, and God's Love.
I understand the sentiment. If it’s we are referring to a nonegocentric, connection with “Creation,” but I can’t imagine God being prideful of the stuff “He” made. “Glory to badass me.” But people are mostly like that, and people write the stories.
“Pride comes before the fall.”
It's not cool to be a sage these days. Being wise takes a special kind of effort to acquire skills and attitudes that are not popular in schools these days. Education is too narrow, too institutionalized. There has to be a place for community-based education. Perhaps we should think of it as a culture of learning.
I feel it's glorious to be alive, the miracle of nature, and what's wrong with being in awe of particles doing their thing within something we know as the laws of physics — the mysteries of star stuff and all of that.
(We think we know a lot, but we don't know shit.)
I sincerely don't believe that God is needy like humans. I can't imagine God pining away for me to pay attention to "Him," although I do feel God's "love," and since we are part and parcel and all of that, I'm sure he feels "my" love.
(Love is not only a conduit, and it’s surely not a base transaction.)
LOVE is more profound than human love. I can't imagine a Human God. I am not Greek. Perhaps my mystical self is not human. LOL.
One can’t deny our need for love.
God LOVES We Love THE LOVING is the whole thing.
Jesus was co-opted by culture and power and used in various nefarious and also benign ways by people and institutions that needed, for whatever reasons, to use Jesus to parse the narrative for whatever purpose.
Yeshua is someone I know a lot better, and I see reflections of him everywhere — even in people's actions, thoughts and feelings.
I swear I could write his story. I'd call it "Tales of Hippy Yeshua who came to America from Guatemala."
But a God without an institution is very hard to worship. There has to be a hierarchy of commands. People are difficult to control. Or perhaps, too easy to manage?
I'm pretty sure that if people didn't have “The Book,” they’d have met Yeshua anyway.
Facing Facts Allows Us To Reshape The World
This post was inspired by a comment to a comment I left on a video about Climate Change. Sometimes people can be very generous and positively inspiring.
Humans have been changing the landscape and affecting the environment since they started playing with fire and pointy sticks.
Sooner or later, one must face facts.
Everything is interdependent. Your independence is expressed through what you know. Those of us who have stopped learning, know nothing.
Visit the links and understand what it all means. Click on every hyperlink. Take your time.
1 — All civilizations have collapsed into the sand because of the desiccation of the local environment.
2 — Bio-Complexity has been exponentially decreasing since pointy sticks and fire.
Dynamical shifts between the extremes of stability and collapse are hallmarks of ecological systems. These shifts are limited by and change with biodiversity, complexity, and the topology and hierarchy of interactions. Most ecological research has focused on identifying conditions for a system to shift from stability to any degree of instability—species abundances do not return to exact same values after perturbation. Real ecosystems likely have a continuum of shifting between stability and collapse that depends on the specifics of how the interactions are structured, as well as the type and degree of disturbance due to environmental change. Here we map boundaries for the extremes of strict stability and collapse. In between these boundaries, we find an intermediate regime that consists of single-species extinctions, which we call the extinction continuum. We also develop a metric that locates the position of the system within the extinction continuum—thus quantifying proximity to stability or collapse—in terms of ecologically measurable quantities such as growth rates and interaction strengths. Furthermore, we provide analytical and numerical techniques for estimating our new metric. We show that our metric does an excellent job of capturing the system's behaviour in comparison with other existing methods—such as May’s stability criteria or critical slowdown. Our metric should thus enable deeper insights about how to classify real systems in terms of their overall dynamics and their limits of stability and collapse.
3 — The IPCC is vastly understating what is happening.
4 — As much as 80% of all non-human or agricultural life is already gone, and the rate of extinction is increasing.
Plant and animal extinctions are occurring at a rate of at least 1,000 times faster than the time before humans, a new study says.
In the study, published Thursday by the journal Science, lead author and biologist Stuart Pimm of Duke University and colleagues, calculated a “death rate” of species going extinct each year out of 1 million. On pre-human earth, the death rate was 0.1, but that number spiked to between 100 to 1,000.
The main reason is attributed to habitat loss, as animals are left without places to live as areas around the planet are being taken over and changed by human presence. With the added pressures of invasive species and climate change, the study writes, species are vanishing faster.
5 — The Earth has lost one-third of its forest cover since the last ice age.
6 — Anthropogenic global warming or "climate change" is a fact.
The fact is, if you want to, you can do something about this. Start with educating yourself about the topic. Ask yourself, is life on earth important enough for you to take action. Do your children’s future ability to live meaningful lives matter? Choose your leaders wisely. Engage with your local community to solve problems and create new economies.
A rigorous theory of money, credit, and bankruptcy in the context of a mixed economy, uniting Walrasian general equilibrium with macroeconomic dynamics and Schumpeterian innovation.
What is wealth? Wealth is life and conscientiousness. What is economics?
“Every short statement about economics is misleading (with the possible exception of my present one.)”
If you really don’t care about what happens to life on Earth, continue on aping the behaviors you’ve learned and throw away your agency and sovereignty. If you are fortunate, enjoy and be thankful for what you have — come what may.
Have You Been To The Mountain Top?
How far do we have to go back in history before we find no warriors and, therefore, no mythology about war? How might a warrior mentality serve the cause of peace and long-term survival as we cook our habitat? And remember, "Mental toughness is a lifestyle." Please tell me how we expunge the violence within us. How will we make peace? "You live uncomfortable to gain growth." True or not? Our heroes today need to apply their passion, discipline, and skill to solve existential risks caused by our current global culture. Can we have "belief in ourselves" without violence as our motivation and end-game? Who do the Special Forces serve? Point to a time and a culture in history where you had ideal men and women. What were they like? What was that culture like? Perhaps you can't find one in the past, so please, imagine a culture of peace, abundance, and spiritual growth that might exist in the future. Tell me about that. How do we create that world? Imagine the sacrifices we’ll have to make. Can you bear that cross? Can you imagine the mountain top?
I watched the events on September eleventh, 2001 on TV in Tokyo. That day I stumble upon The Mountain Top speech on my computer. The first time I read Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s final speech was in high school. The second time I read it was on 911.
I knew things would change in ways I couldn’t imagine. In 2021 I see changes coming at me like stampeding mustangs. Today it seems everyone is against everything. No one can agree on anything. I feel nothing but nostalgia for the days when leaders inspired people.
Every year since 911 something has inspired me to read the speech again. This morning it was pondering the drone wars that put me on to it. So here I go. Join me. Find a quiet place and read this out loud.
Thank you very kindly, my friends. As I listened to Ralph Abernathy in his eloquent and generous introduction and then thought about myself, I wondered who he was talking about. It's always good to have your closest friend and associate say something good about you. And Ralph is the best friend that I have in the world.
I'm delighted to see each of you here tonight in spite of a storm warning. You reveal that you are determined to go on anyhow. Something is happening in Memphis, something is happening in our world.
As you know, if I were standing at the beginning of time, with the possibility of general and panoramic view of the whole human history up to now, and the Almighty said to me, "Martin Luther King, which age would you like to live in?" — I would take my mental flight by Egypt through, or rather across the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the promised land. And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn't stop there. I would move on by Greece, and take my mind to Mount Olympus. And I would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes assembled around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and eternal issues of reality.
But I wouldn't stop there. I would go on, even to the great heyday of the Roman Empire. And I would see developments around there, through various emperors and leaders. But I wouldn't stop there. I would even come up to the day of the Renaissance, and get a quick picture of all that the Renaissance did for the cultural and aesthetic life of man. But I wouldn't stop there. I would even go by the way that the man for whom I'm named had his habitat. And I would watch Martin Luther as he tacked his ninety-five theses on the door at the church in Wittenberg.
But I wouldn't stop there. I would come on up even to 1863, and watch a vacillating president by the name of Abraham Lincoln finally come to the conclusion that he had to sign the Emancipation Proclamation. But I wouldn't stop there. I would even come up to the early thirties, and see a man grappling with the problems of the bankruptcy of his nation. And come with an eloquent cry that we have nothing to fear but fear itself.
But I wouldn't stop there. Strangely enough, I would turn to the Almighty, and say, "If you allow me to live just a few years in the second half of the twentieth century, I will be happy." Now that's a strange statement to make, because the world is all messed up. The nation is sick. Trouble is in the land. Confusion all around. That's a strange statement. But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough, can you see the stars. And I see God working in this period of the twentieth century in a away that men, in some strange way, are responding — something is happening in our world. The masses of people are rising up. And wherever they are assembled today, whether they are in Johannesburg, South Africa; Nairobi, Kenya; Accra, Ghana; New York City; Atlanta, Georgia; Jackson, Mississippi; or Memphis, Tennessee — the cry is always the same — "We want to be free."
And another reason that I'm happy to live in this period is that we have been forced to a point where we're going to have to grapple with the problems that men have been trying to grapple with through history, but the demand didn't force them to do it. Survival demands that we grapple with them. Men, for years now, have been talking about war and peace. But now, no longer can they just talk about it. It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it's nonviolence or nonexistence.
That is where we are today. And also in the human rights revolution, if something isn't done, and in a hurry, to bring the colored peoples of the world out of their long years of poverty, their long years of hurt and neglect, the whole world is doomed. Now, I'm just happy that God has allowed me to live in this period, to see what is unfolding. And I'm happy that He's allowed me to be in Memphis.
I can remember, I can remember when Negroes were just going around as Ralph has said, so often, scratching where they didn't itch, and laughing when they were not tickled. But that day is all over. We mean business now, and we are determined to gain our rightful place in God's world.
And that's all this whole thing is about. We aren't engaged in any negative protest and in any negative arguments with anybody. We are saying that we are determined to be men. We are determined to be people. We are saying that we are God's children. And that we don't have to live like we are forced to live.
Now, what does all of this mean in this great period of history? It means that we've got to stay together. We've got to stay together and maintain unity. You know, whenever Pharaoh wanted to prolong the period of slavery in Egypt, he had a favorite, favorite formula for doing it. What was that? He kept the slaves fighting among themselves. But whenever the slaves get together, something happens in Pharaoh's court, and he cannot hold the slaves in slavery. When the slaves get together, that's the beginning of getting out of slavery. Now let us maintain unity.
Secondly, let us keep the issues where they are. The issue is injustice. The issue is the refusal of Memphis to be fair and honest in its dealings with its public servants, who happen to be sanitation workers. Now, we've got to keep attention on that. That's always the problem with a little violence. You know what happened the other day, and the press dealt only with the window-breaking. I read the articles. They very seldom got around to mentioning the fact that one thousand, three hundred sanitation workers were on strike, and that Memphis is not being fair to them, and that Mayor Loeb is in dire need of a doctor. They didn't get around to that.
Now we're going to march again, and we've got to march again, in order to put the issue where it is supposed to be. And force everybody to see that there are thirteen hundred of God's children here suffering, sometimes going hungry, going through dark and dreary nights wondering how this thing is going to come out. That's the issue. And we've got to say to the nation: we know it's coming out. For when people get caught up with that which is right and they are willing to sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory.
We aren't going to let any mace stop us. We are masters in our nonviolent movement in disarming police forces; they don't know what to do, I've seen them so often. I remember in Birmingham, Alabama, when we were in that majestic struggle there we would move out of the 16th Street Baptist Church day after day; by the hundreds we would move out. And Bull Connor would tell them to send the dogs forth and they did come; but we just went before the dogs singing, "Ain't gonna let nobody turn me round." Bull Connor next would say, "Turn the fire hoses on." And as I said to you the other night, Bull Connor didn't know history. He knew a kind of physics that somehow didn't relate to the transphysics that we knew about. And that was the fact that there was a certain kind of fire that no water could put out. And we went before the fire hoses; we had known water. If we were Baptist or some other denomination, we had been immersed. If we were Methodist, and some others, we had been sprinkled, but we knew water.
That couldn't stop us. And we just went on before the dogs and we would look at them; and we'd go on before the water hoses and we would look at it, and we'd just go on singing "Over my head I see freedom in the air." And then we would be thrown in the paddy wagons, and sometimes we were stacked in there like sardines in a can. And they would throw us in, and old Bull would say, "Take them off," and they did; and we would just go in the paddy wagon singing, "We Shall Overcome." And every now and then we'd get in the jail, and we'd see the jailers looking through the windows being moved by our prayers, and being moved by our words and our songs. And there was a power there which Bull Connor couldn't adjust to; and so we ended up transforming Bull into a steer, and we won our struggle in Birmingham.
Now we've got to go on to Memphis just like that. I call upon you to be with us Monday. Now about injunctions: We have an injunction and we're going into court tomorrow morning to fight this illegal, unconstitutional injunction. All we say to America is, "Be true to what you said on paper." If I lived in China or even Russia, or any totalitarian country, maybe I could understand the denial of certain basic First Amendment privileges, because they hadn't committed themselves to that over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of the press. Somewhere I read that the greatness of America is the right to protest for right. And so just as I say, we aren't going to let any injunction turn us around. We are going on.
We need all of you. And you know what's beautiful tome, is to see all of these ministers of the Gospel. It's a marvelous picture. Who is it that is supposed to articulate the longings and aspirations of the people more than the preacher? Somehow the preacher must be an Amos, and say, "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream." Somehow, the preacher must say with Jesus, "The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to deal with the problems of the poor."
And I want to commend the preachers, under the leadership of these noble men: James Lawson, one who has been in this struggle for many years; he's been to jail for struggling; but he's still going on, fighting for the rights of his people. Rev. Ralph Jackson, Billy Kiles; I could just go right on down the list, but time will not permit. But I want to thank them all. And I want you to thank them, because so often, preachers aren't concerned about anything but themselves. And I'm always happy to see a relevant ministry.
It's all right to talk about "long white robes over yonder," in all of its symbolism. But ultimately people want some suits and dresses and shoes to wear down here. It's all right to talk about "streets flowing with milk and honey," but God has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down here, and his children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's all right to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's preachers must talk about the New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennessee. This is what we have to do.
Now the other thing we'll have to do is this: Always anchor our external direct action with the power of economic withdrawal. Now, we are poor people, individually, we are poor when you compare us with white society in America. We are poor. Never stop and forget that collectively, that means all of us together, collectively we are richer than all the nations in the world, with the exception of nine. Did you ever think about that? After you leave the United States, Soviet Russia, Great Britain, West Germany, France, and I could name the others, the Negro collectively is richer than most nations of the world. We have an annual income of more than thirty billion dollars a year, which is more than all of the exports of the United States, and more than the national budget of Canada. Did you know that? That's power right there, if we know how to pool it.
We don't have to argue with anybody. We don't have to curse and go around acting bad with our words. We don't need any bricks and bottles, we don't need any Molotov cocktails, we just need to go around to these stores, and to these massive industries in our country, and say, "God sent us by here, to say to you that you're not treating his children right. And we've come by here to ask you to make the first item on your agenda fair treatment, where God's children are concerned. Now, if you are not prepared to do that, we do have an agenda that we must follow. And our agenda calls for withdrawing economic support from you."
And so, as a result of this, we are asking you tonight, to go out and tell your neighbors not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis. Go by and tell them not to buy Sealtest milk. Tell them not to buy—what is the other bread?—Wonder Bread. And what is the other bread company, Jesse? Tell them not to buy Hart's bread. As Jesse Jackson has said, up to now, only the garbage men have been feeling pain; now we must kind of redistribute the pain. We are choosing these companies because they haven't been fair in their hiring policies; and we are choosing them because they can begin the process of saying, they are going to support the needs and the rights of these men who are on strike. And then they can move on downtown and tell Mayor Loeb to do what is right.
But not only that, we've got to strengthen black institutions. I call upon you to take your money out of the banks downtown and deposit your money in Tri-State Bank—we want a "bank-in" movement in Memphis. So go by the savings and loan association. I'm not asking you something we don't do ourselves at SCLC. Judge Hooks and others will tell you that we have an account here in the savings and loan association from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. We're just telling you to follow what we're doing. Put your money there. You have six or seven black insurance companies in Memphis. Take out your insurance there. We want to have an "insurance-in."
Now these are some practical things we can do. We begin the process of building a greater economic base. And at the same time, we are putting pressure where it really hurts. I ask you to follow through here.
Now, let me say as I move to my conclusion that we've got to give ourselves to this struggle until the end. Nothing would be more tragic than to stop at this point, in Memphis. We've got to see it through. And when we have our march, you need to be there. Be concerned about your brother. You may not be on strike. But either we go up together, or we go down together.
Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness. One day a man came to Jesus; and he wanted to raise some questions about some vital matters in life. At points, he wanted to trick Jesus, and show him that he knew a little more than Jesus knew, and through this, throw him off base. Now that question could have easily ended up in a philosophical and theological debate. But Jesus immediately pulled that question from mid-air, and placed it on a dangerous curve between Jerusalem and Jericho. And he talked about a certain man, who fell among thieves. You remember that a Levite and a priest passed by on the other side. They didn't stop to help him. And finally a man of another race came by. He got down from his beast, decided not to be compassionate by proxy. But with him, administering first aid, and helped the man in need. Jesus ended up saying, this was the good man, this was the great man, because he had the capacity to project the "I" into the "thou," and to be concerned about his brother. Now you know, we use our imagination a great deal to try to determine why the priest and the Levite didn't stop. At times we say they were busy going to church meetings—an ecclesiastical gathering—and they had to get on down to Jerusalem so they wouldn't be late for their meeting. At other times we would speculate that there was a religious law that "One who was engaged in religious ceremonials was not to touch a human body twenty-four hours before the ceremony." And every now and then we begin to wonder whether maybe they were not going down to Jerusalem, or down to Jericho, rather to organize a "Jericho Road Improvement Association." That's a possibility. Maybe they felt that it was better to deal with the problem from the causal root, rather than to get bogged down with an individual effort.
But I'm going to tell you what my imagination tells me. It's possible that these men were afraid. You see, the Jericho road is a dangerous road. I remember when Mrs. King and I were first in Jerusalem. We rented a car and drove from Jerusalem down to Jericho. And as soon as we got on that road, I said to my wife, "I can see why Jesus used this as a setting for his parable." It's a winding, meandering road. It's really conducive for ambushing. You start out in Jerusalem, which is about 1200 miles, or rather 1200 feet above sea level. And by the time you get down to Jericho, fifteen or twenty minutes later, you're about 2200 feet below sea level. That's a dangerous road. In the days of Jesus it came to be known as the "Bloody Pass." And you know, it's possible that the priest and the Levite looked over that man on the ground and wondered if the robbers were still around. Or it's possible that they felt that the man on the ground was merely faking. And he was acting like he had been robbed and hurt, in order to seize them over there, lure them there for quick and easy seizure. And so the first question that the Levite asked was, "If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?" But then the Good Samaritan came by. And he reversed the question: "If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?"
That's the question before you tonight. Not, "If I stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to all of the hours that I usually spend in my office every day and every week as a pastor?" The question is not, "If I stop to help this man in need, what will happen to me?" "If I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?" That's the question.
Let us rise up tonight with a greater readiness. Let us stand with a greater determination. And let us move on in these powerful days, these days of challenge to make America what it ought to be. We have an opportunity to make America a better nation. And I want to thank God, once more, for allowing me to be here with you.
You know, several years ago, I was in New York City autographing the first book that I had written. And while sitting there autographing books, a demented black woman came up. The only question I heard from her was, "Are you Martin Luther King?"
And I was looking down writing, and I said yes. And the next minute I felt something beating on my chest. Before I knew it I had been stabbed by this demented woman. I was rushed to Harlem Hospital. It was a dark Saturday afternoon. And that blade had gone through, and the X-rays revealed that the tip of the blade was on the edge of my aorta, the main artery. And once that's punctured, you drown in your own blood—that's the end of you.
It came out in the New York Times the next morning, that if I had sneezed, I would have died. Well, about four days later, they allowed me, after the operation, after my chest had been opened, and the blade had been taken out, to move around in the wheel chair in the hospital. They allowed me to read some of the mail that came in, and from all over the states, and the world, kind letters came in. I read a few, but one of them I will never forget. I had received one from the President and the Vice-President. I've forgotten what those telegrams said. I'd received a visit and a letter from the Governor of New York, but I've forgotten what the letter said. But there was another letter that came from a little girl, a young girl who was a student at the White Plains High School. And I looked at that letter, and I'll never forget it. It said simply, "Dear Dr. King: I am a ninth-grade student at the White Plains High School." She said, "While it should not matter, I would like to mention that I am a white girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune, and of your suffering. And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died. And I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't sneeze."
And I want to say tonight, I want to say that I am happy that I didn't sneeze. Because if I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1960, when students all over the South started sitting-in at lunch counters. And I knew that as they were sitting in, they were really standing up for the best in the American dream. And taking the whole nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the Founding Fathers in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around in 1962, when Negroes in Albany, Georgia, decided to straighten their backs up. And whenever men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been here in 1963, when the black people of Birmingham, Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation, and brought into being the Civil Rights Bill. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have had a chance later that year, in August, to try to tell America about a dream that I had had. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been down in Selma, Alabama, been in Memphis to see the community rally around those brothers and sisters who are suffering. I'm so happy that I didn't sneeze.
And they were telling me, now it doesn't matter now. It really doesn't matter what happens now. I left Atlanta this morning, and as we got started on the plane, there were six of us, the pilot said over the public address system, "We are sorry for the delay, but we have Dr. Martin Luther King on the plane. And to be sure that all of the bags were checked, and to be sure that nothing would be wrong with the plane, we had to check out everything carefully. And we've had the plane protected and guarded all night."
And then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers?
Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord. — Dr. Martin Luther King
My Initial Response To Jamie Wheals Recent News Letter (Warning, Dark)
This is my initial response to Jamie Wheal’s recent newsletter. And, understand one thing, I have a huge crush on Jamie Wheal, I think he’s a good man.
Find our way back to what, Jamie, “It’s the economy, stupid” or dropping acid in Golden Gate Park? Were the good old days, the caveman days, or those frolicking moments when we ran wooly mammoths off of cliffs? Put like this, Jamie... Go back to 1968 or 1958 or 1929 or... This cheap energy, modern industrial system was morally bankrupt and broken before it was born. The Internet and viral memes have stuck our ugliness in our faces and made us confront our madness or embrace our madness, and because NOW is now, we think this broken, violent, dishonest crap is something new and exclusive to wee little "us." Greed and violence, you little Peaky Blinder, Boardwalk Empire, Tony Soprano, God Father, Vietnam War, 1929 Crash, Great Depression, WWI, WWII, Napoleon in Russia, Kill All The Brutes, Empire Baby, Roman Empire, Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, Poll Pot, Mongol Hoards, Jack The Ripper, Greed Is Good, Wolf of Wall Street, Debt and Circuses, WikiLeaks, Who Killed Kenedy, Irish Potato Famine, no germ theory, age of reason, US Civil War, Jim Crow, Leopold II, Scythian raiders, Samurai, Rape of Nanking, Serial Killer psychopath and on and on and on and on, little, I noticed moral high ground fella. WTF do we have to call it, Human Nature? And yet, we are sublime and beautiful all the same. Homo Sapiens had a good run and never really wised up. The Stoic Sage, Taoist Monk, Budding Buddha, Celtic Hermit, Kung Fu, Beatitudes Jesus, Joseph Campbell, King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table, Bhagavad Gita, Book of Five Rings, Be Like Water, Socrates, Pericles, Marcus Aurelius, Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt, Qin Shi Huang, Man's Search for Meaning, Cosmos, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, The Conquest of Happiness, This is Water, Meditations, Letters from a Stoic, Oh, The Places You Go!, An Intimate History of Humanity, The Road Less Traveled, thing never really caught on.
[Read Jamies Wheal’s book— “Recapture The Rapture.” Do it now.]
Wisdom, it seems was never valued enough to supplant our murderous tendencies. Although, “Wisdom” can be a nice business model for a very special niche market. So now we run our omnicidal killing machine, AKA modern civilization with post, post-modern tendencies, right over the cliff. Splat, the coyote, doesn't walk away from reality after all. “Boil, boil, toil, and trouble.” The devil may care and we were created in God’s image. Now that’s entertainment.
Jamie’s recent newsletter:
You may well have missed this last week, but a relatively unknown podcaster posted a string of tweets outlining the alt-right/Capitol Riot justification for how they see things, and why revolt appears reasonable these days. Tucker Carlson devoted over 7 minutes to it on his show, and then DT retweeted it too. After that, all hell broke loose in the chattering classes.
Our buddy Tristan Harris (Social Dilemma, Center for Humane Tech) sent it to a small group of us, asking for thoughts on the breakdown in shared reality.
I'd been conceiving of writing something like this reply for ages but resisting almightily because I can't stand the political, reactive, culture war washing machine––but it was a good group to woodshed the ideas with, and now that it's written, figured I'd pass along. (and if any of these conclusions don't jive with your own particulars, just play through, it's the larger point and pattern, not the pissing match we're trying to illuminate here)
So, if you've kinda wondered why/how we've all got festering splinters in our minds these days––here's my sense of a bit of what's been happening...
My sense is "Russia gate" is only one of several epistemic schisms we've had in the past five years, and each one has prompted a specific maladaptive response in the collective psyche.
Few examples (would be curious if you guys are tracking others):
1) Access Hollywood Tape Never has any national candidate survived a comparable smoking gun scandal. Without it, #Metoo would likely have never happened with the same virulence.
2) Trump/Putin 🤝 Bizarre repeat coziness, never before seen between US and its arch rival. Combined with the Cambridge Analytica scandal and shock election, it prompted all sorts of WTF scrambling for meaning as the Poles shifted––suddenly Republicans were defending a special relationship with a KGB mastermind and Dems were looking to the FBI/CIA/NSA, who had been the villains of Civil Rights and social justice as their potential saviors.
3) Mueller 🤠 Fit everyone's idea of a beyond reproach Cary Grant/John Wayne traditional father figure/G-Man, and after two years of hyping and hoping that Daddy would sort it all out and put us back on the tracks of Platonic Truth...nothing. He just sort of faded to black while Barr crowed from the rooftops "nothing to see here!" and bizarrely, everyone sort of went along with it, despite pages and pages of damning findings.
4) Epstein TWO US PRESIDENTS AND THE ROYAL FAMILY directly and repeatedly implicated in a massive super shady something or other and then the motherfucker up and dies in prison with no video tape! Were it not for Epstein, we likely would never have had pastel QAnon and #savethechildren. His spooky island temple and little black book gave proof to the PizzaGate fever dream.
5) Global/National/Partisan Response to Virus 🦠 The crisis playbook for the past fifty odd years has been transnational in flavor, with orgs like the WHO and CDC leading the way, and all G6-8 Nations' leaders falling in line, generally sharing resources and data and emphasizing coordinated response to global events. (see 9/11 initial response, etc.). None of it was perfect, but that was at least the dominant coordinating narrative. FFW to 2020 and we have US Gov't casting aspersions at those efforts, suppressing testing, slandering public health experts, refusing to mobilize a national emergency power to coordinate supplies (even within and for US citizens), explicitly suppressing aid to some states due to the political affiliation of their governors or voting persuasion of their citizens, and, perhaps for the first time ever, making bog-standard basic protocols like mask usage, a signifier of tribal identity. A complete and utter abdication of national unity and global responsibility.
5) George Floyd His words "I can't breathe" ricocheted around the world, and became the rallying cry in Paris, London, et al. The notion of "to serve and protect" being overridden by a seemingly murderous cop and then militarized police response to peaceful protests (Never mind the parsing of the event, actual stats on black on blue violence etc etc––just talking about the psychic shockwaves of the flashpoint itself). Without this and "good people on both sides of Charlottesville" we would not have #defundthepolice, Antifa or CRT/Anti-racism in quite the same way.
6) Wuhan Lab/NIH/Fauci It's a bit like post-mortems showing that Bush sr. admin helped Bin Laden family members exit the US post 9/11. All a bit too cozy, too much overlap to be pure coincidence, wheels within wheels, conspiracy fodder. And the fact that mainstream press and even peer reviewed journals like the Lancet all fell in line, despite no compelling epidemiological "smoking gun" to confirm natural origin, fully undermined their later backtracking. (to say nothing of all the inept and shifting guidance from masks to distancing to vaxes, boosters, openings)
7) Capitol Riot The party of law and order fomenting and even glorifying lawlessness (doesn't matter how justified or not you think it was, it's a HUGE flip for conservatives to be in that role and not the radical left)––with half the right claiming victory and the other half claiming false flag op, is evidence of the epistemic confusion.
There's tons of others, at least half of which sprang from Trump's admin––from villainizing the "rain, snow, dark of night" Post Office as partisan stooges, to upending Tea Party deficit vigilance and breaking budgets, to voter suppression in a "free democracy" suddenly being talked about out loud, to RINO now meaning (an actual conservative who refused to bend the knee to Trumpism vs. the other way round) to "fake news" becoming the rallying cry of a president who produced more documented lies than any figure in history––it's all become classic schizophrenic double bind territory––the only way to resolve the cognitive dissonance is to go crazy, or to subscribe to a grand narrative that can explain it all.
My sense is that partisans on both sides have been putting thumbs on the scales of their propaganda engines for a while, but if you had to call it, I'd make the case that the Blue Church well and truly lost its mind during the Trump admin due to many of the schisms mapped above (amplified by a totally captured right wing news media), and upon realizing that the old rules of fair play and debate had been thoroughly shredded and they were getting their asses kicked, abandoned their own standards of due process, fact-checking, right of reply, etc with a vengeance. To the point where "liberals" are openly advocating some the most illiberal policies in the public sphere, in the name of leveling injustice.
#yesallmen #whitefragility etc. could not exist as the "guilty until proven innocent" stand that they are, without the trampling of good faith civil discourse.
Unfortunately, the Blue Church/Mainstream media has been serving up a hat trick of own goals, so they've lost huge chunks of whatever reasoned credibility they might have once held––the meritocrats and technocrats that held claim to running media, government, academic and NGOs since Bretton Woods, have all effectively shat the bed, and we're now looking at Turchin's thesis of overproduction of elites coming home.
See recent Atlantic article: The Next Decade Could Be Even Worse
Boris Johnson (Eton, Oxford) JD Vance (Yale Law) Bannon (HBS/Goldman) Hawley (Stanford/Rhodes), Cruz (Princeton), and lots of others are exploiting the populist turn and there's nothing strong enough at the center of the old consensus to hold them back.
***
Hope that helps map the wonky-ass terrain we've been traversing and maybe even sheds some light on "splinters in your own mind"––little nagging wounds that have festered under the skin.
It’s not always super fun to have to go back through a litany like that––in many cases we’d all prefer to forget what we’ve just been through––but in order to find our way back to common ground, it’s important to note all of the things that knocked us off track.
We haven’t gone crazy, the world has. And if we’re going to find our way back to mutuality, respect and shared commitments to Life, Liberty and that ever-elusive Pursuit of Happiness, it’s important to reclaim our cognitive liberty. No one should ever be renting space in our heads, without our consent.]
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so men persecuted the prophets who were before you.
The Rivalrous Game "The West" Invested and China is Winning
The game the anglo cultures invented is now being played expertly by China. China is winning simply because the Players in the West are greedy and ethically and morally bankrupt. The rich get obscenely more decadent while compliant consumers meekly and mindlessly further the destruction of habitat. On a biblically dramatic scale, we know not what we are doing. If we did, we might change direction. Instead, the machine makes us high, and we keep feeding the machine.
This blog post is a long, detailed, and entertaining read that you won't want to miss. Trust me; it's fun to understand what's going on. Don't worry; you don't have to do anything. Simply enjoy being aware of it all.
The Most Important Project
The Internet of Influencers, intellectuals, and floggers of all things is a crowded space. Everyone is busily looking for their thousand true fans. Regardless of what we are learning about or explaining to others, there is one thing we all have in common, we all drink from the same information trough.
We are using the Internet to research whatever we are interested in; in many cases, we subscribe to the same aggregators, email lists, YouTube channels, newsletters, etc. We probably have read the same books.
Some of us are better presenters, more exciting talent than others. Some of us are in it for the money, others for clicks, and many of us are still doing things online for its pure joy and adventure.
However, it is irksome when presenters become so full of themselves that they believe, repeatedly, that they have somehow scooped the rest of us. Most of the time, I hear people present things I have already read about or heard about from other sources. In many cases, months ago. Still, many people feel like because they are saying it, it's finally going to break. We all are biased towards our fame, whether our influence is genuinely significant or not. We are motivated to maintain our audience and grift audience share from others in the same space.
I am a follower of current events and very curious about many things. My curiosity doesn't make me unique — I'm simply that kind of person. It takes different people a certain amount of time to pay attention to a story or an event. By the time they catch up, they are often too late to call their reporting a scoop. They are simply parroting, albeit in their unique way, information that they have digested from older sources. Regurgitating info while thinking we are original is reasonably typical. I am not criticizing people for taking a stab at a subject.
We should, however, be humble and acknowledge our sources, not just the things we have recently looked at, but things that our predecessors uncovered months ago. We should admit to being influenced by trends in the culture, the zeitgeist, and even our prejudices. We are interdependently swimming in the same ocean of life. Very few of us will ever have an original idea or break a story that most people don't know about. We shouldn't get too enamored by taking credit for things.
When I find an excellent cause, I always hope the information market gets saturated with contributors who support the cause — this is how we can create universal validation and adoption of something good. It helps when the information is out there and unavoidable. I am not talking about propaganda, marketing material, or public relations. You know what I mean.
I would love it if all of my Internet Intellectuals encouraged people to support Daniel Schmachtenberger's Consilience Project. And no, I am not saying Daniel came up with this all by himself or even that the idea is his original idea. He always works with a team of amazing people and sources from everywhere any necessary support.
My father had a project like The Consilience Project back in the 1970s, "Catalyst Complex." Sometimes it takes too long for great things to take off.
In my ever so humble and unimportant opinion, The Consilience Project is the most critical initiative in the world today. I am hoping it catches on worldwide. I won't explain it here; please follow the links below and learn about it. We must learn how to make sense of our increasingly fast-paced, scientific, technological world culture and everything having to do with what it is and how it got this way. We need to make better sense of the word to make better decisions and have more and higher quality agency and sovereignty. If we don't, we will not make it much further into the future, and our quality of life will drastically diminish.
For what it's worth, Buliamti.
Jim Rutt Show
https://www.jimruttshow.com/currents-daniel-schmachtenberger/
The Consiliense Projet
“Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front” by Wendell Berry
Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front
by Wendell Berry
Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.
So, friends, every day do something
that won’t compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.
Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.
Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion — put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?
Go with your love to the fields.
Lie easy in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn’t go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.
“Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front” from The Country of Marriage, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc. 1973. Also published by Counterpoint Press in The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry, 1999; The Mad Farmer Poems, 2008; New Collected Poems, 2012.
Status, Money, Fear and the Story Structure of The Big Game A
Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
I listened to Chris Hedges on the Sheer Intelligence podcast the other day. Robert Sheer and Hedges are very concerned about Julian Assange. Sheer was amazed that more people in the media profession and journalism were not as concerned. That got me thinking again about what I’ve noticed since I was pretty young, something that I think anyone reading this has understood as well. Status and money are vital to people in our culture. Suppose an opinion becomes detrimental to your ability to maintain your wealth and status. In that case, it’s in your interest to change that opinion or set it aside and focus on things that protect you. Our species is like that, and one doesn’t have to audit Robert Sapolsky’s lectures to know it.
Then I realized how “The West” is an astoundingly wonderful place to be rich. Increasingly other countries that used to be poorer are becoming that way too, as consumerism takes hold worldwide. China also has lots of fun ways for people to spend money. Japan has for a long time. In the United States, one can buy almost anything, more things than in most places, and more conveniently. Do you want a sports franchise, a ski resort, a superyacht, a private jet, a house in some of the most amazing cities on earth? It’s all there for the buying. The wealthiest countries in Europe are also like this; they are very nice places to be rich. In the T.V. series “The City on the Hill,” an immigrant from northern Ireland tells her new American friend that she “came for the money, of course.” What are refugees looking for; is it true that the only path to safety and security is cash?
If you are working for the Players, you may have the price of a ticket to the ball game and a six-pack, and that might be enough for you, as long as you can provide for your family and get a bit of respect from friends, family, and workmates. There are plenty of fun things for servants to do in an affluent society.
Entertainment is big business, and some well-paid entertainers are in media and journalism. They maintain the pro-business narrative needed to keep the consumer credit system rolling. If you are lucky, you get paid well to be a part of the system. Happy Days! You are a son of Uncle Sam.
Then I thought about a Netflix series I watched called “Sons of Sam,” and I realized how controlled that story was while it happened. The resolution of the case was the end of a perfect narrative structure. There is also a relatively tragic personal story of Author Maury Terry who starts connecting dots until his whole world became a connect-the-dots, never-ending obsession. The world can become a lonely place when you go too far down into a rabbit hole.
Of course, a group like “Q” conspiracy theorists must emerge from this system. Maury Terry was a prime example that you would inevitably see some pretty ugly connections if you look hard enough.
It’s interesting how traumatizing events must always have a beginning, middle, and end. They must be tied up neatly like a T.V. drama. There has to be an ending where the good guys win, and people can feel safe again. The talk therapy that Gabor Mate espouses is inaccessible to most people. Our culture isn’t concerned that deeply with the health and welfare of ordinary people.
Look at Epstein, at G.W. Bush on the aircraft carrier, Obama patting himself on the back when U.S. special forces killed Osama. The D.C. riots burned out just in time for investigators and prosecutors to chase down the insurrectionists and get justice. Biden rode in with his tried and true bit players to save the day after Trump tried to tear everything down. Wow, that was close; now everything is safe and regular again.
If there were no bad guys, we’d have to create one, which is what our culture does. Why do we need a war on drugs? Why did some folks at various agencies miss the Soviet Union so much? Because many folks work for people who want to be Players, they would lose their wealth and status without bad guys. The Players have a lot more, but the bit players have just enough to feel terrified of losing what they have.
Yes, I know, there are bad guys out there, and we must protect ourselves from them. But can you imagine that there are some cultures where there are far fewer problems and far fewer bad people, fewer sick people?
To keep ordinary people from tearing down a corrupt system, you need to keep them distracted, busy and just enough stressed that they haven’t much energy left to think deeply about things. When the system starts to break, the best distraction is a feared enemy or a criminal gang — “super-preditors.” Make people afraid, even if there is nothing really to be fearful of, and then have the powers that be come in and fix it. If you are a fan of history, you can see this playing out since the dawn of civilization.
The product the C.I.A. provides the U.S. government is all about this game of fear and hostility. It’s vital to the core values of American culture, American exceptionalism, and American innocence.
The pandemic is like Assange and Son of Sam; it provides a narrative for people to obsess over so they can release tension without focusing on the systemic and structural nature of their problems. It is always more profitable for The Players to have a crisis; it distracts from the real issues and consolidates more power and control. This game of thrones is the core of the system’s logic. There is no need for a conspiracy. Evildoers must be identified and defeated by heroes within the system over and over again. The cycle is relentless. Look at how connected Bernie Madoff and Jeffrey Epstein were. Corrupt people in high places are central players within the Big Game A.
It is also essential to maintain the belief in the population that ordinary people can become Players, someone with power and control and vast wealth and resources. That’s the dream. We constantly fantasize about what we’d do if we were Players. It keeps us going. Would we be a good Emporer or just exact vengence?
We worship football hoodlums and apologize for their horrific crimes because you see, they are football fans, addicts. They can’t help it. And we think it would be cool to get away with murder. These brutes become heroes, with popular YouTube channels garnering millions of views. Why is that?
A news organization is lucky to find a salacious story that will sell longer than the usual 24-hour news cycle. We call this market a news cycle, and they are cycling so fast now we can’t remember what was in vogue three months ago.
You must train yourself not to be taken in by this. It’s your only hope.
Think of all of these stories’ seemingly bizarre connections as a kind of six degrees of separation. If you look hard enough, everything is connected. Our problems are systemic, structural, and complex. We need to think slowly, clearly, and long term to find a way forward that isn’t this same old racket of violence and neglect.
Many people, groups, and organizations are working on providing pathways out of this insanity, but I fear it won’t catch on. And that’s what keeps me up at night.
Profits First— Preface
Communities and Societies are built on trust.
Trust can be inspired in very different ways. Think of “In God We Trust” on the dollar bill, or an International Financial Consultant’s business card that might say, “A & M Investments, a business built on trust.”
A “Profits First” ethos is unsustainable for many reasons. Many books have been written across many thought domains, if not explicitly then implicitly on this very subject.
At the scale of our 21st-century science and technology-driven world, we can't avoid prosocial considerations or global resource management and sustainability questions. We all live in a networked, global culture. There are cultural differences across nation-states, of course, but no one who understands our world would deny that our economy is global.
careful management of available resources.
(It would be best to understand the origins of words, how words evolve, and their significance to various cultures and societies at any given time. The same goes for concepts, ideas, and theories.)
Suppose we desire to go back to a period where we live in traditional communities and cultures of a much smaller scale, say, communities that thrived over nine thousand years ago. In that case, we don't need to worry much about sustainability or prosocial issues. Back then, we would most probably possess an animistic reverence for nature and our environment that, even though it would not have been scientific, would have helped us understand and care for our ecosystem in the hope that it would sustain our children in the future. Our community culture would help to reinforce norms and best practices that were good for the community and its environment.
Communities are groups of people where everyone is easily recognizable and where everyone has a stake in everyone else's success. We all work together to thrive.
a particular area or place considered together with its inhabitants.
Jordon Hall has an interesting way of articulate areas surrounding community and society.
At our present scale, this kind of community exists in a limited sense with layer upon layer of organizational and ideological structures that must exist to drive society's tremendously creative and productive power. These are societies governed by abstractions that serve the machine, the greater good. Religion, philosophy, ideology, and later physics, and science were all used to varying degrees to structure and systematize extremely complex institutions needed to achieve greater and greater leverage of various forms of power.
Suppose we are going to solve the many challenging problems of today. In that case, we will need to understand how science, technology, education, and wisdom traditions might combine to assist in the mindful development of cultures that place greater value on natural services, our environment, our resources, and general health.
We need a genuinely pro-life world order. We cannot rely solely on competition to achieve success; we must work harder at diplomacy, cooperation, and collaboration.
Although we may be in some sense winning, if we can't approach the development of power more wisely (wisdom is a big, amorphous bucket, I know), the world we know can only, ultimately, be a death machine.
The changes required to ensure a future for Homo Sapiens requires us to have faith and a rich imagination. We must re-engineer, restructure, and redesign everything having to do with society while maintaining the best elements of what we have created and developed to this point. We need nothing short of a new calendar. Instead of thinking of all the days to come as being A.D. (After Death), we need to know that from this day forward, from day one, we are living in a Pro-Life world.
We don't progress so much as continue, and it would be hard to argue against continuing to make things a bit better.
Life is divided into three terms - that which was, which is, and which will be. Let us learn from the past to profit by the present, and from the present, to live better in the future. —William Wordsworth
If you allow me to indulge my curation habit, I suggest you listen to this Pitchfork Economics podcast episode.
Do wealthy Americans have too much power—with Thom Hartmann.
Is the U.S. an oligarchy, or does it just have a bunch of super-rich people living in it? Is there a difference? Author Thom Hartmann joins Nick and Paul to explain the relationship between wealth and American political power and share some of the research that went into his latest book, ‘The Hidden History of American Oligarchy.’
Thom Hartmann is the #1 progressive radio talk show host in the US and a New York Times bestselling author.
Twitter: @Thom_Hartmann
Prep For A More Perfect Union
“Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.” — Abraham Lincoln
By now, most of us know about the prepper community. I have to say that I like preppers. Preppers, or what we used to call survivalists, are people interested in things that might be critical in an emergency. Some of them have diverse skill sets that they've been developing for many years. There are many decent YouTube channels, websites, and blogs offering sound advice about survival and thriving through an emergency. Canadian Prepper has an extensive online store with all the gear one might need. Acquiring things is fun.
One can argue about how effective any given "prep" might be or whether particular fears and concerns are warranted. However, I feel that, in general, preppers are focused on doing good things for their families and communities. Many seem to have an active, healthy lifestyle that they enjoy. At any rate, what's wrong with being prepared for the worst.
If society breaks down and you are on your own, you won't survive very long, no matter how well prepared you are.
Imagine if you had a very nice, well supplied and defended farm. Suppose some gang wanted it, and you didn't have a platoon of special operative mercenaries or a larger community willing to protecting it. In that case, the bad guys could easily take everything from you. If you are a billionaire paying a private army, what happens when your currency is no longer worth anything to your soldiers? How long would it take for the team's alpha to depose you? Think of Mongolian or native American raiders; heck, if you are not interested in history, think of the tribes in the TV show, The Walking Dead. There will always be another group with good reasons to take your resources.
So if you want to be well prepared, you will be a member of a well-organized team of skilled people.
We live on a fantastic scale. Please think of how extensive, productive, and elaborate the global economy is; what's more, we are all dependent on every institution, business, and person who helps run the global economy. If you aren't, you live in a cave in the wilderness somewhere. Even if you are off-grid, you depend on institutions that afford you the right to private property. Unless you are squatting, slash, trespassing in the wastelands somewhere. Yes, even the wilderness is under some institution's dominion.
It is fascinating to learn how indigenous tribes or nations thought of the resources required to sustain themselves. We are far from hunter-gatherers. We are dependent on container ships, jet airplanes, and Satellites, for goodness sake. Most of us couldn't live without a networked computer in our pockets.
When I hear extreme libertarians complain about the government or this or that institution, I think to myself, go ahead, try to get on without them, and see how well you do. When people spend their days on conspiracy websites where bloggers complain about Klaus and The Great Reset, I think of how helpless and powerless they must feel and how confused they are about the social system they’ve inherited.
It is tough to set up a sustainable institution. And once you have something, you need to maintain it and evolve to meet new needs and challenges. History has a lot to teach us here.
What does it take to form a "more perfect union," and who is in charge of that project?
What we think of as democracy today may be far from democratic. The main reason is that I don't believe the Demos (whole citizen living within a particular city-state) is up to the challenge of taking responsibility for the Kratos (power or rule.) What runs our world is corporate interests. A person's utility serves the profit-making machine that feeds the upper classes. Today's democracy is similar to classical periods of history when the power to rule and vote was limited to members of a club of "citizens" who were then trusted to look after laborers, slaves, merchants, farmers, soldiers, etc. The only difference now is that people who don't directly serve the corporate class's interests are arguably much better off than in antiquity.
But, of course, one might say that people back then were illiterate, more straightforward, with ritual and magic to frame their lives. They didn't have to bother with understanding artificial intelligence while nursing a dozen addictions. Today, if we don't know about the sixth extinction, quantum computing, enlightenment era political philosophy, nuclear bombs on hypersonic missiles, climate change, quantum mechanics, etc., we can hardly call ourselves well informed. Our ancient brothers and sisters only had to fear the usual wars and marauding gangs. If Roman Legions could keep things stable, then let Legions be Legions and get on with life.
So what would it take to engage in the project of forming "a more perfect union?" In my opinion, it would take a much better-educated society. Who decides what a well-educated society is if not all of us, and we need to take responsibility to make that happen. We need to step up and take power but in the right way. Being more responsible, having more agency, and sovereignty starts with educating ourselves.
Social systems, cultures, economies, etc., have changed throughout history and will continue to change.
We must understand how our institutions work and how they operate in concert to manage all the services we take for granted. We need to comprehend what's wrong with our institutions, with our systems if we are going to reform them and improve them structurally. Our challenges today are unlike any that have come before.
We can be productive members of society, working to make things better, overcoming complex challenges in our rapidly changing world, or one can sit back and complain as if our only options were violent revolution or living in a cave.
Radical change is necessary, but today that is a very delicate endeavor. If we don't do it right, we lose everything; we lose the future.
We may be frustrated with people working in corporations, working for government agencies, or the myriad of diverse institutions required for civilized life on a global scale. Still, without them, no matter how well prepared you might be, you wouldn't last long.
After this world falls apart, it will take generations of survivors to get back to anything resembling civilization. I don't think we want that to happen. I mean, isn't continuing to learn about our amazing universe, our unique selves, and everything else that informs us a wonderful thing? Don't you want to see thousands of future generations have a chance to take this marvelous adventure?
Our only real option is to understand in-depth what risks we face and discover ways to avert these threats through a vast community effort— working together within well-governed institutions to ensure the world doesn't fall apart.
Let's not let our emotions get the best of us; instead, let's let our minds inform our feelings and be the best we can be.
What's Left To Say? Lots, and lots more to learn.
I'm sharing a video of Bret Weinstein, an evolutionary biologist, dark web public intellectual, and his professor in exile wife, Heather E. Heying, also an evolutionary biologist discussing their opinions on vaccine safety in a broad, nuanced, and contextualized way. They are not medical experts, math whizzes, like Bret's brother, Eric, or statisticians, but they are sincerely making an effort to make sense of the subject. They have left most, not all, of their ideological peccadillos to the side. This type of expounding of informed opinion is my kind of candy, a treat with a probability of an upside.
I have several good friends in the "Scamdemic" camp. I've followed that narrative for many months now. I find these things entertaining; I don't think perversely so. I learn something from it. The mayhem and confusion surrounding the pandemic are grist for humor and improvised rants. However, the pandemic continues to be tragic. Making a bit of fun can be a stress reducer sometimes; trust me on this.
One of my friends sent me yet another opinion piece from a Doctor telling us how the world has hysterically gotten it all wrong, and every institution is in on it. Sorry, if you want to steelman the piece, please read it. I find it interesting, although I am not a "Truther."
Here's the link: "What's Left to Say?" The author is Dr. Malcolm Kendrick.
Who is Dr. Malcolm Kendrick's (Scottish Doctor-GP-author, speaker, sceptic.) Have you look at Dr. Kendrick's book titles. I am not against this man. I'm interested in "The Great Collestol Con" as much as any older man with a cardiovascular system. I'm curious about where the man is coming from ideologically; it gives me information about how the good Doctor arrives at his opinions. In my opinion, his work is as biased as any I've seen. One could get one's best advice on cholesterol in the blood from a chiropractor or a GP, but I believe that there are better sources of information on it. I'm not saying that he didn't do his research for his books. Maybe he did excellent research. I have not read any of his books. As far as his article is concerned, what do I know? I can only say that I smell the Scamdemic Gish Gallop all over it; call it intuition.
A claim to fame:
(Just one week prior to this talk, delivered at CrossFit HQ during a CrossFit Health event on Dec. 15, 2018, Kendrick's Wikipedia page was deleted because, as he explains, "I'm now considered dangerous enough to be removed from public consumption." In this talk, he shares one thread of his "dangerous" thinking — a thread that follows the distortion of data pertaining to cholesterol and statin research, which he explores in greater detail in his second book, Doctoring Data.) https://www.crossfit.com/essentials/malcolm-kendrick-ddc-lecture
Don't get me wrong; I enjoy the bad pharma, bad science books, and ideas as much as any curious fellow. I like dangerous. I like heterodox thinkers, as long as they can be trusted a bit. Some people up that alley are earnest, and some are just trying to make waves and make a name for themselves. We will all choose our white jackets based on our own biases and call it science's truth. But science is complex and scientific opinion is always provisional. New Data is always coming in.
I'd like to see what Heather and Bret's take on his piece is; I'd like to follow their thought processes as they puzzled through it. I think, if they wanted to, they'd present an earnest effort.
To my "Samdemic" friends, I often suggest spending a half-day with Dr. Mark Crislip; I'm guessing they could learn something valuable from a skeptical infectious disease Doctor during a pandemic. I've followed him for 15 years. He's undoubtedly taught this medical dummy a thing or two. Bully for me.
I like that Heather and Bret refrain from pretending to be experts in the domain of medicine while making a sincere effort to comb through some info on the Covid-19 vaccine subject. The examples in their video were a bit generic; I have to say. I mean, SNOPES and NBC—FFS—you'd think they'd know better. Perhaps they didn't want to invest the time in throwing up some better sources to make their point. Being as lazy as your average man, I can certainly understand this. I am not calling them lazy.
While I'm at it, I'd pass Dr. Kendrick's blog post by Steve Novella; he is a Sceptic with a 'K' from the USA and a neurosurgeon; I'd also love to see how Dr. Crislip filters Dr. Kendrick’s science-informed opinion writing. They all follow the science; they all read graphs and run stats. It is not all rocket science, you know. It takes decades to become an expert in one domain of science if you are not a certified genius. It is a fact that experts in their specific relevant fields have more nuanced views of their subjects of research and practice. It might help to listen to them sometimes. We might learn something.
Update: It is a rare talent to make complex subjects accessible. Zdogg (DR. ZUBIN DAMANIA, MD) has a great sense of humor, expertise and explains things nicely, calmly, and humorously.
From The Mud— Agape
Try to imagine what the world would be like right now if we didn't have vaccine science/technology. Take your time. Next year won't be much different from last year. That I can tell ya. The problems that were causing the most damage to people and life on earth will still be here, accelerating, and getting worse. Please forgive me for saying that, but we are adults here and we can face up to the challenges of the 21st Century, right.
The strange thing is, for the first time in my life, I almost feel like I can't imagine what the world will be like in 10 years. I'm not talking about iPhones, VR Goggles, The Premier League, The NBA, or Politics in general, I'm talking about culture, society, children, the environment, travel...
[materialism (n.) 1748, "philosophy that nothing exists except matter" (from French matérialisme); see material (n.) + ism. As this naturally tended toward "opinion or tendency based upon purely material interests," it came to be used by late 19c. for any low view of life (opposed to idealism). As "a way of life based entirely on consumer goods," by 1930.]
People only seem to strive for more things. Right now, people across the United States think they can look forward to grand, mad, mayhem on Black Friday next year, a very, very commercial Christmas time, and the mother of all hangovers on New Year's Day. They think they will get vaccinated and happy days will be restored when the arm pain subsides.
They didn't notice the real threats to their health in 1979, 2008, 1018 and they won't in 2023. Tend your garden, friends, cultivate love, enjoy the days. Agape! Maybe Jesus got a little bit of his concept of love from the Greeks, God existed before the Greeks, right? Let your imagination fly to the heavens. Many things are improbable and anything is possible. You will still find your feet in the mud at the end of the day. Life, what a blessing.
This Has Nothing To Do With A Smoke Filled Room
THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH A SMOKE FILLED ROOM
Right on queue, we all fell for it, we all thought, “Everything has changed, nothing will be the same.” We have a new global war to fight. Who and what will make us secure, will make you secure?
It’s the same crisis in a new decade, but this time it may actually be different.
I am not a big fan of Corbet, but it is time to delve into things like we never have before. What kind of "RESET" do we want? I can imagine what the wealthy and powerful want.
The plebs are just getting in the way of their GAME A, Game of Thrones. They don't want to throw useless jobs at us anymore; they don't want to rely on our consumer addictions when they know full well Climate Change is coming to shut down the competition on all sides of the Game.
So what kind of reset do we want, the infinite game, Game B, Zeitgeist Movement, something else? We had better rev up that think global and act local trope. We are running out of time.
There is no doubt that those who emerge from the system and believe in it and have the power within it took advantage of the Covid-19 opportunity and that this kind of opportunism arises from the system's logic. Some of the "players" may not even be aware of this, just as most of the plebs have no idea how to start asking questions.
Mundane Realms, Agency, Sovereignty and Comfort
Realms — A field or domain of activity or interest.
Realms emerge as preconditions from which conscious or unconscious attitudes towards life arise. One rarely chooses one's domain; instead, we inherit it. People say that one can choose one's friends but not one's family. Perhaps when we choose, we are only reacting to elements inherent in our preconditions. Many forces beyond our will program our wants and needs. Today, a sophisticated suite of technologies engineered to do this; how these technologies work is unknown to most of us.
What kind of person believes she has helped create the system in which she lives and relies upon? When is this belief not just an illusion or a delusion?
It seems that one must first be aware of a panoply of options and possibilities before the power to make a choice becomes available. What preconditions are required for one to have that kind of sense of agency and sovereignty? What kind of natural circumstances allows a person to experience freedom within the constraints of reality?
I don't expect that knowing what you may know about life in Syria since 2015, you would have chosen to have been born there when you could have been born somewhere with a stable and peaceful future. Of course, we don't decide where we are born. Our birth, we attribute to fate or the mysterious machinations of God.
How do the necessary preconditions for freedom, agency, sovereignty, health, and sustainability come about? Curiosity, ingenuity, creativity, endurance, and many other qualities are needed for these things to become the latticework of society.
In complex living systems, balance is natural. Symbiosis is the crux of biology; everything in the ecosystem is interdependent. All elements working in concert find a way to express themselves perfectly within a given context and time.
Homo Sapiens is the only animal we know of that can disrupt living systems to such a degree that we can change them entirely or destroy them. Our conscious and subconscious thoughts can also modify nature in positive or negative ways. How can we gain control over our thoughts to such a degree that we can find equilibrium, health, and peace, liberating the positive, creative forces within our imaginations?
Think of a family huddled in a cellar in 2018 in abject terror, avoiding bullets and bombs. During pauses in the violence, when, for a brief moment, while sensing that the horror may end, memories of merely being a proud member of a family and community come flooding back.
Familiar things are so comfortable and complete— as we perform routine habits, a mindless sense of well being, only broken by occasional shocks and insults, takes over and time dilates.
In times of peace and stability, we can take things for granted; death becomes so remote that it's easy to think of heaven, not as something we long for but as an inevitable outcome— a reward for living a good life. During the good times, we can experience unity and bliss in a moment of clarity and peak experience, and although it is transient, it is there, even though one gets the sense that it can't be held or owned. Moments like these appear as a dark field, a movement, and a rest.
On the impoverished side of The Cage (and I am speaking of poverty in its broadest sense), where there is only violence, pain, and chaos, endurance is paramount for survival. A wide-eyed numbness brought on by ongoing trauma is one's only respite from acute pain and suffering. Everything gives way to the organisms inertia. Where there is complete powerlessness, only this stubborn inertia can remain. Time and luck will determine whether one can enter The Cage from there.
Understand that in all realms of existence, we remain the animals we are following our nature that transcends higher faculties.
As one experiences the inherent spectrum of possibilities in each realm, one's sense of joy, contentment, desire, comfort, pain, and suffering are entirely different in quality and kind. Each domain is capable of reflecting unique qualities within individuals and society. Various Cages manifest and reflect unique attributes to various Bubbles or Castles.
In each realm, whatever one's circumstances might be, except for one's struggle with desire, everything is mundane.
Next, let's talk about the realm we call The Cage.
THIS PANDEMIC DID NOT HAVE TO BE SO CATASTROPHIC
Since the start of the pandemic, hundreds of doctors have successfully used hydroxychloroquine to treat patients symptomatic of COVID-19 infections. In frustration at the media negativity about this safe, effective medicine American doctors have sent an open letter to Dr Fauci raising their concerns.
August 12, 2020
Anthony Fauci, MD
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
Washington, D.C.
Dear Dr. Fauci:
You were placed into the most high-profile role regarding America’s response to the Coronavirus pandemic. Americans have relied on your medical expertise concerning the wearing of masks, resuming employment, returning to school, and of course medical treatment.
You are largely unchallenged in terms of your medical opinions. You are the de facto “COVID-19 Czar”. This is unusual in the medical profession in which doctors’ opinions are challenged by other physicians in the form of exchanges between doctors at hospitals, medical conferences, as well as debate in medical journals. You render your opinions unchallenged, without formal public opposition from physicians who passionately disagree with you. It is incontestable that the public is best served when opinions and policy are based on the prevailing evidence and science, and able to withstand the scrutiny of medical professionals.
As experience accrued in treating COVID-19 infections, physicians worldwide discovered that high-risk patients can be treated successfully as an outpatient, within the first 5 to 7 days of the onset of symptoms, with a “cocktail” consisting of hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and azithromycin (or doxycycline). Multiple scholarly contributions to the literature detail the efficacy of the hydroxychloroquine-based combination treatment.
Dr. Harvey Risch, the renowned Yale epidemiologist, published an article in May 2020 in the American Journal of Epidemiology titled “Early Outpatient Treatment of Symptomatic, High-Risk COVID-19 Patients that Should be Ramped-Up Immediately as Key to Pandemic Crisis”. He further published an article in Newsweek in July 2020 for the general public expressing the same conclusions and opinions. Dr. Risch is an expert at evaluating research data and study designs, publishing over 300 articles. Dr Risch’s assessment is that there is unequivocal evidence for the early and safe use of the “HCQ cocktail.” If there are Q-T interval concerns, doxycycline can be substituted for azithromycin as it has activity against RNA viruses without any cardiac effects.
Yet, you continue to reject the use of hydroxychloroquine, except in a hospital setting in the form of clinical trials, repeatedly emphasizing the lack of evidence supporting its use. Hydroxychloroquine, despite 65 years of use for malaria, and over 40 years for lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, with a well-established safety profile, has been deemed by you and the FDA as unsafe for use in the treatment of symptomatic COVID-19 infections. Your opinions have influenced the thinking of physicians and their patients, medical boards, state and federal agencies, pharmacists, hospitals, and just about everyone involved in medical decision making.
Indeed, your opinions impacted the health of Americans, and many aspects of our day-to-day lives including employment and school. Those of us who prescribe hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and azithromycin/doxycycline believe fervently that early outpatient use would save tens of thousands of lives and enable our country to dramatically alter the response to COVID-19. We advocate for an approach that will reduce fear and allow Americans to get their lives back.
We hope that our questions compel you to reconsider your current approach to COVID-19 infection.
Questions regarding early outpatient treatment
There are generally two stages of COVID-19 symptomatic infection; initial flu like symptoms with progression to cytokine storm and respiratory failure, correct?
When people are admitted to a hospital, they generally are in worse condition, correct?
There are no specific medications currently recommended for early outpatient treatment of symptomatic COVID-19 infection, correct?
Remdesivir and Dexamethasone are used for hospitalized patients, correct?
There is currently no recommended pharmacologic early outpatient treatment for individuals in the flu stage of the illness, correct?
It is true that COVID-19 is much more lethal than the flu for high-risk individuals such as older patients and those with significant comorbidities, correct?
Individuals with signs of early COVID-19 infection typically have a runny nose, fever, cough, shortness of breath, loss of smell, etc., and physicians send them home to rest, eat chicken soup etc., but offer no specific, targeted medications, correct?
These high-risk individuals are at high risk of death, on the order of 15% or higher, correct?
So just so we are clear—the current standard of care now is to send clinically stable symptomatic patients home, “with a wait and see” approach?
Are you aware that physicians are successfully using Hydroxychloroquine combined with Zinc and Azithromycin as a “cocktail” for early outpatient treatment of symptomatic, high-risk, individuals?
Have you heard of the “Zelenko Protocol,” for treating high-risk patients with COVID 19 as an outpatient?
Have you read Dr. Risch’s article in the American Journal of Epidemiology of the early outpatient treatment of COVID-19?
Are you aware that physicians using the medication combination or “cocktail” recommend use within the first 5 to 7 days of the onset of symptoms, before the illness impacts the lungs, or cytokine storm evolves?
Again, to be clear, your recommendation is no pharmacologic treatment as an outpatient for the flu—like symptoms in patients that are stable, regardless of their risk factors, correct?
Would you advocate for early pharmacologic outpatient treatment of symptomatic COVID-19 patients if you were confident that it was beneficial?
Are you aware that there are hundreds of physicians in the United States and thousands across the globe who have had dramatic success treating high-risk individuals as outpatients with this “cocktail?”
Are you aware that there are at least 10 studies demonstrating the efficacy of early outpatient treatment with the Hydroxychloroquine cocktail for high-risk patients — so this is beyond anecdotal, correct?
If one of your loved ones had diabetes or asthma, or any potentially complicating comorbidity, and tested positive for COVID-19, would you recommend “wait and see how they do” and go to the hospital if symptoms progress?
Even with multiple studies documenting remarkable outpatient efficacy and safety of the Hydroxychloroquine “cocktail,” you believe the risks of the medication combination outweigh the benefits?
Is it true that with regard to Hydroxychloroquine and treatment of COVID-19 infection, you have said repeatedly that “The Overwhelming Evidence of Properly Conducted Randomized Clinical Trials Indicate No Therapeutic Efficacy of Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ)?”
But NONE of the randomized controlled trials to which you refer were done in the first 5 to 7 days after the onset of symptoms- correct?
All of the randomized controlled trials to which you refer were done on hospitalized patients, correct?
Hospitalized patients are typically sicker that outpatients, correct?
None of the randomized controlled trials to which you refer used the full cocktail consisting of Hydroxychloroquine, Zinc, and Azithromycin, correct?
While the University of Minnesota study is referred to as disproving the cocktail, the meds were not given within the first 5 to 7 days of illness, the test group was not high risk (death rates were 3%), and no zinc was given, correct?
Again, for clarity, the trials upon which you base your opinion regarding the efficacy of Hydroxychloroquine, assessed neither the full cocktail (to include Zinc + Azithromycin or doxycycline) nor administered treatment within the first 5 to 7 days of symptoms, nor focused on the high-risk group, correct?
Therefore, you have no basis to conclude that the Hydroxychloroquine cocktail when used early in the outpatient setting, within the first 5 to 7 days of symptoms, in high risk patients, is not effective, correct?
It is thus false and misleading to say that the effective and safe use of Hydroxychloroquine, Zinc, and Azithromycin has been “debunked,” correct? How could it be “debunked” if there is not a single study that contradicts its use?
Should it not be an absolute priority for the NIH and CDC to look at ways to treat Americans with symptomatic COVID-19 infections early to prevent disease progression?
The SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 virus is an RNA virus. It is well-established that Zinc interferes with RNA viral replication, correct?
Moreover, is it not true that hydroxychloroquine facilitates the entry of zinc into the cell, is a “ionophore,” correct?
Isn’t also it true that Azithromycin has established anti-viral properties?
Are you aware of the paper from Baylor by Dr. McCullough et. al. describing established mechanisms by which the components of the “HCQ cocktail” exert anti-viral effects?
So- the use of hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin (or doxycycline) and zinc, the “HCQ cocktail,” is based on science, correct?
Questions regarding safety
The FDA writes the following: “in light of on-going serious cardiac adverse events and their serious side effects, the known and potential benefits of CQ and HCQ no longer outweigh the known and potential risks for authorized use.”So not only is the FDA saying that Hydroxychloroquine doesn’t work, they are also saying that it is a very dangerous drug. Yet, is it not true the drug has been used as an anti-malarial drug for over 65 years?
Isn’t true that the drug has been used for lupus and rheumatoid arthritis for many years at similar doses?
Do you know of even a single study prior to COVID -19 that has provided definitive evidence against the use of the drug based on safety concerns?
Are you aware that chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine has many approved uses for hydroxychloroquine including steroid-dependent asthma (1988 study), Advanced pulmonary sarcoidosis (1988 study), sensitizing breast cancer cells for chemotherapy (2012 study), the attenuation of renal ischemia (2018 study), lupus nephritis (2006 study), epithelial ovarian cancer (2020 study, just to name a few)? Where are the cardiotoxicity concerns ever mentioned?
Risch estimates the risk of cardiac death from hydroxychloroquine to be 9/100,000 using the data provided by the FDA. That does not seem to be a high risk, considering the risk of death in an older patient with co-morbidities can be 15% or more. Do you consider 9/100,000 to be a high risk when weighed against the risk of death in older patient with co-morbidities?
To put this in perspective, the drug is used for 65 years, without warnings (aside for the need for periodic retinal checks), but the FDA somehow feels the need to send out an alert on June 15, 2020 that the drug is dangerous. Does that make any logical sense to you Dr. Fauci based on “science”?
Moreover, consider that the protocols for usage in early treatment are for 5 to 7 days at relatively low doses of hydroxychloroquine similar to what is being given in other diseases (RA, SLE) over many years- does it make any sense to you logically that a 5 to 7 day dose of hydroxychloroquine when not given in high doses could be considered dangerous?
You are also aware that articles published in the New England Journal of Medicine and Lancet, one out of Harvard University, regarding the dangers of hydroxychloroquine had to be retracted based on the fact that the data was fabricated. Are you aware of that?
If there was such good data on the risks of hydroxychloroquine, one would not have to use fake data, correct?
After all, 65 years is a long-time to determine whether or not a drug is safe, do you agree?
In the clinical trials that you have referenced (e.g., the Minnesota and the Brazil studies), there was not a single death attributed directly to hydroxychloroquine, correct?
According to Dr. Risch, there is no evidence based on the data to conclude that hydroxychloroquine is a dangerous drug. Are you aware of any published report that rebuts Dr. Risch’s findings?
Are you aware that the FDA ruling along with your statements have led to Governors in a number of states to restrict the use of hydroxychloroquine?
Are you aware that pharmacies are not filling prescriptions for this medication based on your and the FDA’s restrictions?
Are you aware that doctors are being punished by state medical boards for prescribing the medication based on your comments as well as the FDA’s?
Are you aware that people who want the medication sometimes need to call physicians in other states pleading for it?
And yet you opined in March that while people were dying at the rate of 10,000 patient a week, hydroxychloroquine could only be used in an inpatient setting as part of a clinical trial- correct?
So, people who want to be treated in that critical 5-to-7-day period and avoid being hospitalized are basically out of luck in your view, correct?
So, again, for clarity, without a shred of evidence that the Hydroxychloroquine/HCQ cocktail is dangerous in the doses currently recommend for early outpatient treatment, you and the FDA have made it very difficult if not impossible in some cases to get this treatment, correct?
Questions regarding methodology
The Key to Defeating COVID-19 Already Exists. We Need to Start Using It
In regards to the use of hydroxychloroquine, you have repeatedly made the same statement: “The Overwhelming Evidence from Properly Conducted Randomized Clinical Trials Indicate no Therapeutic Efficacy of Hydroxychloroquine.” Is that correct?
In Dr. Risch’s article regarding the early use of hydroxychloroquine, he disputes your opinion. He scientifically evaluated the data from the studies to support his opinions. Have you published any articles to support your opinions?
You repeatedly state that randomized clinical trials are needed to make conclusions regarding treatments, correct?
The FDA has approved many medications (especially in the area of cancer treatment) without randomized clinical trials, correct?
Are you aware that Dr. Thomas Frieden, the previous head of the CDC wrote an article in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2017 called “Evidence for Health Decision Making – Beyond Randomized Clinical Trials (RCT)”? Have you read that article?
In it Dr. Frieden states that “many data sources can provide valid evidence for clinical and public health action, including “analysis of aggregate clinical or epidemiological data”-do you disagree with that?
Frieden discusses “practiced-based evidence” as being essential in many discoveries, such SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome)-do you disagree with that?
Frieden writes the following: “Current evidence-grading systems are biased toward randomized clinical trials, which may lead to inadequate consideration of non-RCT data.” Dr. Fauci, have you considered all the non-RCT data in coming to your opinions?
Risch, who is a leading world authority in the analysis of aggregate clinical data, has done a rigorous analysis that he published regarding the early treatment of COVID 19 with hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and azithromycin. He cites 5 or 6 studies, and in an updated article there are 5 or 6 more-a total of 10 to 12 clinical studies with formally collected data specifically regarding the early treatment of COVID. Have you analyzed the aggregate data regarding early treatment of high-risk patients with hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and azithromycin?
Is there any document that you can produce for the American people of your analysis of the aggregate data that would rebut Dr. Risch’s analysis?
Yet, despite what Dr. Risch believes is overwhelming evidence in support of the early use of hydroxychloroquine, you dismiss the treatment insisting on randomized controlled trials even in the midst of a pandemic?
Would you want a loved one with high-risk comorbidities placed in the control group of a randomized clinical trial when a number of studies demonstrate safety and dramatic efficacy of the early use of the Hydroxychloroquine “cocktail?”
Are you aware that the FDA approved a number of cancer chemotherapy drugs without randomized control trials based solely on epidemiological evidence. The trials came later as confirmation. Are you aware of that?
You are well aware that there were no randomized clinical trials in the case of penicillin that saved thousands of lives in World War II? Was not this in the best interest of our soldiers?
You would agree that many lives were saved with the use of cancer drugs and penicillin that were used before any randomized clinical trials–correct?
You have referred to evidence for hydroxychloroquine as “anecdotal”- which is defined as “evidence collected in a casual or informal manner and relying heavily or entirely on personal testimony”- correct?
But there are many studies supporting the use of hydroxychloroquine in which evidence was collected formally and not on personal testimony, has there not been?
So it would be false to conclude that the evidence supporting the early use of hydroxychloroquine is anecdotal, correct?
Comparison between the US and other countries regarding case fatality rate
(It would be very helpful to have the graphs comparing our case fatality rates to other countries)
Are you aware that countries like Senegal and Nigeria that use Hydroxychloroquine have much lower case-fatality rates than the United States?
Have you pondered the relationship between the use of Hydroxychloroquine by a given country and their case mortality rate and why there is a strong correlation between the use of HCQ and the reduction of the case mortality rate.?
Have you considered consulting with a country such as India that has had great success treating COVID-19 prophylactically?
Why shouldn’t our first responders and front-line workers who are at high risk at least have an option of HCQ/zinc prophylaxis?
We should all agree that countries with far inferior healthcare delivery systems should not have lower case fatality rates. Reducing our case fatality rate from near 5% to 2.5%, in line with many countries who use HCQ early would have cut our total number of deaths in half, correct?
Why not consult with countries who have lower case-fatality rates, even without expensive medicines such as remdesivir and far less advanced intensive care capabilities?
Giving Americans the option to use HCQ for COVID-19
Harvey Risch, the pre-eminent Epidemiologist from Yale, wrote a Newsweek Article titled: “The key to defeating COVID-19 already exists. We need to start using it.” Did you read the article?
Are you aware that the cost of the Hydroxychloroquine “cocktail” including the Z-pack and zinc is about $50?
You are aware the cost of Remdesivir is about $3,200?
So that’s about 60 doses of HCQ “cocktail,” correct?
In fact, President Trump had the foresight to amass 60 million doses of hydroxychloroquine, and yet you continue to stand in the way of doctors who want to use that medication for their infected patients, correct?
Those are a lot of doses of medication that potentially could be used to treat our poor, especially our minority populations and people of color that have a difficult time accessing healthcare. They die more frequently of COVID-19, do they not?
But because of your obstinance blocking the use of HCQ, this stockpile has remained largely unused, correct?
Would you acknowledge that your strategy of telling Americans to restrict their behavior, wear masks, and distance, and put their lives on hold indefinitely until there is a vaccine is not working?
So, 160,000 deaths later, an economy in shambles, kids out of school, suicides and drug overdoses at a record high, people neglecting and dying from other medical conditions, and America reacting to every outbreak with another lockdown- is it not time to re-think your strategy that is fully dependent on an effective vaccine?
Why not consider a strategy that protects the most vulnerable and allows Americans back to living their lives and not wait for a vaccine panacea that may never come?
Why not consider the approach that thousands of doctors around the world are using, supported by a number of studies in the literature, with early outpatient treatment of high-risk patients for typically one week with HCQ + Zinc + Azithromycin?
You don’t see a problem with the fact that the government, due to your position, in some cases interferes with the choice of using HCQ. Should not that be a choice between the doctor and the patient?
While some doctors may not want to use the drug, should not doctors who believe that it is indicated be able to offer it to their patients?
Are you aware that doctors who are publicly advocating for such a strategy with the early use of the HCQ cocktail are being silenced with removal of content on the internet and even censorship in the medical community?
You are aware of the 20 or so physicians who came to the Supreme Court steps advocating for the early use of the Hydroxychloroquine cocktail.In fact, you said these were “a bunch of people spouting out something that isn’t true.”Dr. Fauci, these are not just “people”- these are doctors who actually treat patients, unlike you, correct?
Do you know that the video they made went viral with 17 million views in just a few hours, and was then removed from the internet?
Are you aware that their website, American Frontline Doctors, was taken down the next day?
Did you see the way that Nigerian immigrant physician, Dr. Stella Immanuel, was mocked in the media for her religious views and called a “witch doctor”?
Are you aware that Dr. Simone Gold, the leader of the group, was fired from her job as an Emergency Room physician the following day?
Are you aware that physicians advocating for this treatment that has by now probably saved millions of lives around the globe are harassed by local health departments, state agencies and medical boards, and even at their own hospitals? Are you aware of that?
Don’t you think doctors should have the right to speak out on behalf of their patients without the threat of retribution?
Are you aware that videos and other educational information are removed off the internet and labeled, in the words of Mark Zuckerberg, as “misinformation.”?
Is it not misinformation to characterize Hydroxychloroquine, in the doses used for early outpatient treatment of COVID-19 infections, as a dangerous drug?
Is it not misleading for you to repeatedly state to the American public that randomized clinical trials are the sole source of information to confirm the efficacy of a treatment?
Was it not misinformation when on CNN you cited the Lancet study based on false data from Surgisphere as evidence of the lack of efficacy of hydroxychloroquine?
Is it not misinformation as is repeated in the MSM as a result of your comments that a randomized clinical trial is required by the FDA for a drug approval?
Don’t you realize how much damage this falsehood perpetuates?
How is it not misinformation for you and the FDA to keep telling the American public that hydroxychloroquine is dangerous when you know that there is nothing more than anecdotal evidence of that?
Fauci, if you or a loved one were infected with COVID-19, and had flu-like symptoms, and you knew as you do now that there is a safe and effective cocktail that you could take to prevent worsening and the possibility of hospitalization, can you honestly tell us that you would refuse the medication?
Why not give our healthcare workers and first responders, who even with the necessary PPE are contracting the virus at a 3 to 4 times greater rate than the general public, the right to choose along with their doctor if they want use the medicine prophylactically?
Why is the government inserting itself in a way that is unprecedented in regard to a historically safe medication and not allowing patients the right to choose along with their doctor?
Why not give the American people the right to decide along with their physician whether or not they want outpatient treatment in the first 5 to 7 days of the disease with a cocktail that is safe and costs around $50?
Final questions
Fauci, please explain how a randomized clinical trial, to which you repeatedly make reference, for testing the HCQ cocktail (hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin and zinc) administered within 5-7 days of the onset of symptoms is even possible now given the declining case numbers in so many states?
For example, if the NIH were now to direct a study to begin September 15, where would such a study be done?
Please explain how a randomized study on the early treatment (within the first 5 to 7 days of symptoms) of high-risk, symptomatic COVID-19 infections could be done during the influenza season and be valid?
Please explain how multiple observational studies arrive at the same outcomes using the same formulation of hydroxychloroquine + Azithromycin + Zinc given in the same time frame for the same study population (high risk patients) is not evidence that the cocktail works?
In fact, how is it not significant evidence, during a pandemic, for hundreds of non-academic private practice physicians to achieve the same outcomes with the early use of the HCQ cocktail?
What is your recommendation for the medical management of a 75-year-old diabetic with fever, cough, and loss of smell, but not yet hypoxic, who Emergency Room providers do not feel warrants admission? We know that hundreds of U.S. physicians (and thousands more around the world) would manage this case with the HCQ cocktail with predictable success.
If you were in charge in 1940, would you have advised the mass production of penicillin based primarily on lab evidence and one case series on 5 patients in England or would you have stated that a randomized clinical trial was needed?
Why would any physician put their medical license, professional reputation, and job on the line to recommend the HCQ cocktail (that does not make them any money) unless they knew the treatment could significantly help their patient?
Why would a physician take the medication themselves and prescribe it to family members (for treatment or prophylaxis) unless they felt strongly that the medication was beneficial?
How is it informed and ethical medical practice to allow a COVID-19 patient to deteriorate in the early stages of the infection when there is inexpensive, safe, and dramatically effective treatment with the HCQ cocktail, which the science indicates interferes with coronavirus replication?
How is your approach to “wait and see” in the early stages of COVID-19 infection, especially in high-risk patients, following the science?
While previous questions are related to hydroxychloroquine-based treatment, we have two questions addressing masks.
As you recall, you stated on March 8th, just a few weeks before the devastation in the Northeast, that masks weren’t needed. You later said that you made this statement to prevent a hoarding of masks that would disrupt availability to healthcare workers. Why did you not make a recommendation for people to wear any face covering to protect themselves, as we are doing now?
Rather, you issued no such warning and people were riding in subways and visiting their relatives in nursing homes without any face covering. Currently, your position is that face coverings are essential. Please explain whether or not you made a mistake in early March, and how would you go about it differently now.
Conclusion
Since the start of the pandemic, physicians have used hydroxychloroquine to treat symptomatic COVID-19 infections, as well as for prophylaxis. Initial results were mixed as indications and doses were explored to maximize outcomes and minimize risks. What emerged was that hydroxychloroquine appeared to work best when coupled with azithromycin. In fact, it was the President of the United States who recommended to you publicly at the beginning of the pandemic, in early March, that you should consider early treatment with hydroxychloroquine and a “Z-Pack.” Additional studies showed that patients did not seem to benefit when COVID-19 infections were treated with hydroxychloroquine late in the course of the illness, typically in a hospital setting, but treatment was consistently effective, even in high-risk patients, when hydroxychloroquine was given in a “cocktail” with azithromycin and, critically, zinc in the first 5 to 7 days after the onset of symptoms. The outcomes are, in fact, dramatic.
As clearly presented in the McCullough article from Baylor, and described by Dr. Vladimir Zelenko, the efficacy of the HCQ cocktail is based on the pharmacology of the hydroxychloroquine ionophore acting as the “gun” and zinc as the “bullet,” while azithromycin potentiates the anti-viral effect. Undeniably, the hydroxychloroquine combination treatment is supported by science. Yet, you continue to ignore the “science” behind the disease. Viral replication occurs rapidly in the first 5 to 7 days of symptoms and can be treated at that point with the HCQ cocktail. Rather, your actions have denied patients treatment in that early stage. Without such treatment, some patients, especially those at high risk with co-morbidities, deteriorate and require hospitalization for evolving cytokine storm resulting in pneumonia, respiratory failure, and intubation with 50% mortality. Dismissal of the science results in bad medicine, and the outcome is over 160,000 dead Americans. Countries that have followed the science and treated the disease in the early stages have far better results, a fact that has been concealed from the American Public.
Despite mounting evidence and impassioned pleas from hundreds of frontline physicians, your position was and continues to be that randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have not shown there to be benefit. However, not a single randomized control trial has tested what is being recommended: use of the full cocktail (especially zinc), in high-risk patients, initiated within the first 5 to 7 days of the onset of symptoms. Using hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin late in the disease process, with or without zinc, does not produce the same, unequivocally positive results.
Dr. Thomas Frieden, in a 2017 New England Journal of Medicine article regarding randomized clinical trials, emphasized there are situations in which it is entirely appropriate to use other forms of evidence to scientifically validate a treatment. Such is the case during a pandemic that moves like a brushfire jumping to different parts of the country. Insisting on randomized clinical trials in the midst of a pandemic is simply foolish. Dr. Harvey Risch, a world-renowned Yale epidemiologist, analyzed all the data regarding the use of the hydroxychloroquine/HCQ cocktail and concluded that the evidence of its efficacy when used early in COVID-19 infection is unequivocal.
Curiously, despite a 65+ years safety record, the FDA suddenly deemed hydroxychloroquine a dangerous drug, especially with regard to cardiotoxicity. Dr. Risch analyzed data provided by the FDA and concluded that the risk of a significant cardiac event from hydroxychloroquine is extremely low, especially when compared to the mortality rate of COVID-19 patients with high-risk co-morbidities. How do you reconcile that for forty years rheumatoid arthritis and lupus patients have been treated over long periods, often for years, with hydroxychloroquine and now there are suddenly concerns about a 5 to 7-day course of hydroxychloroquine at similar or slightly increased doses? The FDA statement regarding hydroxychloroquine and cardiac risk is patently false and alarmingly misleading to physicians, pharmacists, patients, and other health professionals. The benefits of the early use of hydroxychloroquine to prevent hospitalization in high-risk patients with COVID-19 infection far outweigh the risks. Physicians are not able to obtain the medication for their patients, and in some cases are restricted by their state from prescribing hydroxychloroquine. The government’s obstruction of the early treatment of symptomatic high-risk COVID-19 patients with hydroxychloroquine, a medication used extensively and safely for so long, is unprecedented.
It is essential that you tell the truth to the American public regarding the safety and efficacy of the hydroxychloroquine/HCQ cocktail. The government must protect and facilitate the sacred and revered physician-patient relationship by permitting physicians to treat their patients. Governmental obfuscation and obstruction are as lethal as cytokine storm.
Americans must not continue to die unnecessarily. Adults must resume employment and our youth return to school. Locking down America while awaiting an imperfect vaccine has done far more damage to Americans than the coronavirus. We are confident that thousands of lives would be saved with early treatment of high-risk individuals with a cocktail of hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and azithromycin. Americans must not live in fear. As Dr. Harvey Risch’s Newsweek article declares, “The key to defeating COVID-19 already exists. We need to start using it.”
Very Respectfully,
George C. Fareed, MD, Brawley, California
Michael M. Jacobs, MD, MPH, Pensacola, Florida
Donald C. Pompan, MD, Salinas, California
Will They Have The Intestinal Fortitude For A Knife Fight?
During a global pandemic, the United States continues its experiment with a lack of leadership, science denial, and neoliberalism.
Where is the much-touted BIG DATA? Of course, Big Data serves MONEY too, so why hasn't Fed created funds been thrown into brute force big data projects to parse the pandemic and develop best practices for combating challenges surrounding it?
In the United States, nothing happens without money. The Players have had a good looting spree. They control the capital. For things to get back to "normal" (extracting resources at a fever pace to support economic growth through mindless consumerism), they are going to have to deal with the monster virus.
Why don't the players pay large, global, tax-dodging companies with important shareholders some big bucks so they can crunch the SARS-COVID-2 data and get the Bread & Circuses show back on the road? They own those companies, after all.
Could it be that the Players believe that there is no hope for their business model moving forward? Have they lost their faith in the global neoliberal economic growth model? Are they throwing in the towel and preparing their bug-out mansions near the poles? Is this their last night at the poker table?
Come on Players; you are all geniuses, you can throw some of those ones and zeros at solving some of these problems so we can all stay entertained and full of dreams until wet-bulb earth puts an end to your self-terminating game.
Who are the Players going to lord over while they're hunkered down in their fortified mini city-states? They'll have to direct their blood lust for power against each other. Are they planning to develop a Game of Thrones World?
Someone should come up with a uber-lux dojo chain to teach oligarchs how to knife fight. They could go at each other with sticks, canes, swords, and knives just for sport once the plebs have died off in mass numbers. Playing the role of a noble knight might provide some excitement for them. Oh, I forgot, the Players let other people do the fighting.
The Players had better get busy training before their private armies put an end to them once they realize that for the first time in human history, resources have suddenly become, in fact, very scarce.
THE C.S.I. EFFECT 2020 AND A HAPPY ENDING
The "CSI EFFECT" 2020— Two heroic researchers from The W.H.O. go to China to investigate the origins of SARS-COVID-2 and discover that the mainstream narrative was correct. There is a beginning, middle, and an end, just like on T.V.
The Players/Looters can get back to business scrambling to control assets and resources before the Great Game ends. Wear your mask, wash your hands, don't touch anyone, keep your distance, make sure your government buys and stockpiles expensive pharmaceuticals that may or may not work, take your supplements, pray, fight, protest, and wait for a vaccine that may or may not help 10 to 60 percent of the people who get it. And please, for God's sake, follow President Bush's advice, updated for 2020, and, "Just go shopping on Amazon."
The spectacle will resume at a stadium near you once the Players have had their fill of assets. Your businesses will be chopped up by private equity and dumped, your jobs will be automated. Don't expect any dividends if you don't own stocks/equities.
Now, get back to your computer in the kitchen and work your tail off. Take that online course to get an inside track on that web-based job. Hop on that cargo ship while working your gig economy labor contract as you travel the world and bear witness to the decline of the tech-driven-industrial consumer culture. Maybe you will get lucky and land on a farm, do not "pass go," collect peaches from the orchard.
As we all know, we are required to carry a tracking device at all times; we are not be able to live without it. Carry it until you are wearing it and remember, they are watching you. Wear it until it's integrated into your body, augmenting your consciousness more directly than through old fashioned media. Embody it until you are uploaded into the cloud.
Don't panic; only the war machine's investors make money on panic and fear. Stay peaceful and follow direction— you know the drill, you've read the novels. Reestablish a conventional mainstream narrative that supports the wealthy to ensure a reasonable extension of relative comfort, food, and entertainment until hot-bulb earth makes it impossible to live in most parts of the planet. Sophisticated scientists, engineers, designers, and entrepreneurs will make sure your neurotransmitters make you feel stimulated and "happy."
We are poorly programmed agents (not free agents) whose function is to perpetuate a self-terminating game that only sociopaths play. Above all, we must make the players believe that they desire our affection. If not, they will kill us all and play with their robots.
But don't think about all of that. Focus on nominating your brother for Queer Eye or your daughter winning a ZOOM delivered American Idol contest. Know in your hearts that someday your Super Bowl M.V.P. will be going to Disney World that feels a lot more like West World. And remember, people don't solve problems, guns solve problems.
Jesus loves you, Mohamed is the profit, after the cycles of birth and death there is liberation, meditation is good, Sam Harris is smart, Jordon Peterson is wise, Science/Technology/Engineering is amazing, Donald will make America great again in his second term, Black Lives Matter, you too can empathize with a rape victim, aluminum staws will save the planet, we will terraform Mars, Elon Musk is a genius, Bill Gates know more about everything than anyone and can give more to charities he deems worthy than you can, Robert Deniro is oppressed, Tucker Carlson is a public intellectual, not an entertainer, the Democrats and Republicans are different parties, you need a new iPhone, open-source is scary, Capitalism is the best economic system ever, Lefties cause cancer, a plant-based diet costs money just like a keto diet or a paleo diet, etc.
Come on, let's reinvigorate this story. Let's fix it. It was a good story despite the endless war, environmental destruction, inequality, climate change, and so on. It's fun and exciting!
I have a solution. Make inflation taboo. End taxes for everyone, yes, of course, corporations are people too. Give everyone 100K USD equivalent a year and keep extracting resources to provide growth in products and services. Bail everything and everyone out like a perfect version of modern monetary theory and let people return to their consumer habits. We will worship elites, whether they are preachers, business people, sportspeople, or entertainers. Life will be good until the earth can no longer support humans. The end will look more biblical then. Perhaps that's the poetic end we've always wanted.
Come on, folks, let's work our asses off for @TheRealApocalypse.
Daniel Schmachtenberger— the only way we'll have a future
We hope you will thoroughly understand Daniel Schmachtenberger’s train of thought. It is vital that we do.
FUTURE THINKERS PODCAST
In this episode of Future Thinkers:
The generator functions of existential risks
The impact of win-lose games, multiplied by exponential technology
Win-lose games in the essence of capitalism, science, and technology
How to solve multi-polar traps
How to replace rivalry with anti-rivalry
The design criteria of an effective civilization
The characteristics of complex and complicated systems
Open-loop vs. closed-loop systems
Scalable collective intelligence, sense-making, and choice-making
The relationship between choice and causation
Natural and conditioned experiences
The difference between power and strength
The path to a post-existential-risk world
How to increase our self-sovereignty
Why incentives are intrinsically evil
Daniel Schmachtenberger
Today on the show we welcome back Daniel Schmachtenberger, the co-founder of Neurohacker Collective and founder of Emergence Project.
After addressing the existential risks that are threatening humanity in one of our earlier episodes, Daniel now dives deeper into the matter. In the following three episodes, he talks about the underlying generator functions of existential risks and how we can solve them.
Win-Lose Games Multiplied by Exponential Technology
As Daniel explains, all human-induced existential risks are symptoms of two underlying generator functions.
One of these functions is rivalrous (win-lose) games. This includes any activity where one party competes to win at the expense of another party. Daniel believes that win-lose games are at the root of almost all harm that humans have caused, both to each other and to the biosphere. As technology is increasing our capacity to cause harm, these competitive games start to exceed the capacity of the playing field. Scaled to a global level and multiplied by exponential technology, these win-lose games become an omni lose-lose generator. When the stakes are high enough, winning the game means destroying the entire playing field and all the players.
Daniel then looks into some of the issues that capitalism, science, and technology have created. Among byproducts of these rivalrous games are what he calls “multipolar traps”. Multipolar traps are scenarios where the things that work well for individuals locally are directly against global well-being. He proposes that our sense-making and choice-making processes need to be upgraded and improved if we want to solve these traps as a category.
Daniel believes that the current phases of capitalism, science, technology, and democracy are destabilizing and coming to an end. In order to avoid extinction, we have to come up with different systems altogether and replace rivalry with anti-rivalry. One of the ways to do that is moving from ownership of goods towards access to shared common resources. Daniel argues that we are at the place where the harmful win-lose dynamics both have to and can change.
He also proposes a new system of governance that would allow groups of people that have different goals and values to come to decisions together on various issues.
Humanity’s current predatory capacity enhanced with technology makes us catastrophically harmful to the environment that we depend on. Daniel challenges the notion of “the survival of the fittest”, and argues that it is not the most competitive ecosystem that makes it through, but the most self-stabilizing one.
Complicated Open-Loop Systems vs. Complex Closed-Loop Systems
The biosphere is a complex self-regulating system. It is also a closed-loop system, meaning that once a component stops serving its function, it gets recycled and reincorporated back into the system. In contrast, the systems humans have created are complicated, open-loop systems. They are neither self-organizing nor self-repairing. Complex systems, which come from evolution, are anti-fragile. Complicated systems, designed by humans, are fragile. Complicated open-loop systems are the second generator function of existential risks.
Open loops in a complicated system, such as modern industry, create depletion and accumulation. This means that resources are depleted on one end of the chain and waste is accumulated on the other end. A natural complex system, on the contrary, reabsorbs and processes everything, which means there is no depletion or waste in the long run. This makes natural systems anti-fragile. By interfering with natural complicated system, we affect the biosphere so much that it begins to lose its anti-fragility.
At the same time, man-made complicated systems are outgrowing the planet’s natural resources to the point where collapse becomes unavoidable.
Daniel explains that the necessary design criteria for a viable civilization which is not self-terminating are:
Creating loop closure within complicated man-made systems
Having the right relationship between complex natural and complicated man-made systems
Creating anti-rivalrous environments within which exponential technology does not threaten our existence
The Relationship Between Choice and Causation
Daniel explains that adaptive capacity increases in groups, but only up to a point. After a certain point, adding more people starts having diminishing effects per capita. This results in people defecting against the system because that’s where their incentives are. He proposes that we create new systems of collective intelligence and choice-making that can scale more effectively.
Science has given us a solid theory of causation. Through science, we have gained incredible technological power that magnifies the outcomes of our choices. We don’t have a similarly well-grounded theory of choice, an ethical framework to guide us through using our increased power. When it comes to ethics, science rejects all non-scientific efforts, such as religious ideas or morals. Instead, win-lose game theory has served as the default theory of choice in science. This has lead to dangerous myopia towards the existential risks that are generated from win-lose games.
It is necessary to address these ethical questions, especially in terms of existential risk we are now at. We have to improve the individual and collective choice-making to take everything in consideration and realize how we are interconnected with everything around us. “I” is not a separate entity, but an emergent property of the whole.
We need to have a theory of choice that relates choice and causation. The core to the solution, as Daniel explains, is the coherence dynamics, which internalizes the external and includes it in the decision making process.
The Path to a Post-Existential-Risk World
Daniel talks about the need for individuals and systems to have strength as opposed to power. Strength is not the ability to beat others, the ability to maintain sovereignty in the presence of outside forces.
The path to the post-existential risk world is towards a civilization that is anti-rivalrous, anti-fragile, and self-propagating. Ultimately, we have to create a world that has not only overcome today’s existential risks but is also a world where humanity can thrive.
FTP057, 058, 059: Daniel Schmachtenberger – Solving The Generator Functions of Existential Risks
Euvie: I’m reading Carl Young right now and he’s talking about his experience [00:01:30] of going to live with the [inaudible [0:01:32] Indians and how it completely just blew apart his conception of what was natural and how the western world view is different from other world views. He noticed that they were so happy and serene and they felt as one with their environment and they had this very special relationship with the sun. It was very beautiful but, at the same time, he realized how they were very vulnerable to [00:02:00] the invasion of western civilization. If we create a new civilization operating system that is not oriented towards winning wars, then how do we ensure that it doesn’t get destroyed by those who are?
Daniel: Imagine there’s a group of people that get a stronger theory of causation. They learn Newton’s physics and now they can use calculus to plot a [inaudible [0:02:22] curve and make the [inaudible [0:02:23] hit the right spot every time, rather than the pendulum dousing, which is hit or miss. That belief is going to catch on [00:02:30] and that’s why science really caught on, took us out of the dark ages, was because it led to better weapons and better agriculture tech and better real shit. It proliferated because it was proliferative. If we increase our theory of causation, that ends up catching on.
If we could increase our theory of causation and our theory of choice, and the relationship between them, that would actually be the most adaptive. Especially in the presence of where our particular game-theoretic model of choice, with the extension of causation we have, is definitely self-determinating, [00:03:00] definitely anti-adaptive. I know we’ve been on for a long time. There’s really only one more thing that I want to share that closes this set of concepts. Remember we said that any source of asymmetric advantage, competitive advantage in a win-lose game will end up, once it’s deployed, being figured out and utilized by everybody. You just up the level of ante in the playing field.
We also said that in the [inaudible [0:03:25] and many of the tribes we’ve mentioned [00:03:30] lost win-lose games. We don’t want to try and build something that’s just going to lose at a win-lose game, but we know that if it tries to win at win-lose games it’s just still part of the same existential curve that we’re on. It has to not lose at a win-lose game while also not seeking to win. It’s basically not playing the game but it is oriented about how not to lose. It’s a very important thing. We can think about power, the way we have traditionally thought of power, as a power over or power [00:04:00] against type dynamic – game-theoretic, win-lose dynamic. Any agent that deploys a particular kind of power leads to other agents figuring how to deploy the same and other kinds of power. Power keeps anteing up until we get to problems.
We could think about another term we might call strength, which is not the power to beat someone else but it’s the ability to not be beaten by someone else. It’s the ability to maintain our own sovereignty and our own coherence in the presence of outside forces. We could talk about my power, “Can I go beat somebody up?” [00:04:30] But my strength is, “Can my body fend off viruses? Can I fend off cancers? Can I actually protect myself if I need to protect myself?” Which is different than, “Can I go beat other people up?” The power game is the game we actually have to [inaudible [0:04:45]. Power over dynamics means rivalrous dynamics, mean win-lose dynamics, is the source of evil.
It’s not that money is the source of evil, it’s that power over where I think my wellbeing is anti-coupled to yours ends up being [00:05:00] the source of evil and money’s just very deep in the stack of power dynamics. Status is and certain ways of relating to sex and a number of things are. We have to get rid of the power over dynamics. It doesn’t mean that I can’t develop the strength that makes me anti-fragile in the presence of rivalry. Then I say, “What kind of capacity can I develop that doesn’t get weaponized by somebody else and used against me, given that any asymmetric capacity I get can be weaponized?” There’s really only one and this is a really interesting thing.
[00:05:30] If I make the adaptive capacity of… Say we’re trying to make a new civilization as a model and a new [inaudible [0:05:38] civilization, new economics, new governance, new infrastructure, a new culture that has comprehensive loop closure, doesn’t create accumulation or depletion, doesn’t have rival risk games within it etcetera. If I try to have some unique adaptive capacity via a certain type of information tech, the other world will see that information tech and [00:06:00] use it for all kinds of purposes including against me where there’s an incentive to do so. The same is true if I use military tech or if I use environmental extraction tech, I’m still in the same problem.
If my advantage, if the advantage of the way this civilization’s structured has to do with increase coherence in the sense-making and choice-making between all the agents in the system, all the people in the system, increase interpersonal coherence, this cannot be weaponized. Anyone else employing it is now just a [00:06:30] system it’s self-propagating. For instance, when we start playing rivalrous games we start realizing that it’s not just us against somebody else, its teams against larger teams. Then the idea with a team is we’re supposed to cooperate with each other to compete against somebody else.
They compete against someone else idea ends up going fractal and I end up even competing against my teammates sometimes, and that’s part of why the collective intelligence doesn’t scale thing is because I’ll cooperate with my other buddies [00:07:00] on the basketball team unless there’s also a thing called most valuable player and I’m in the running for it and I have a chance to make the three-point shot rather than pass, even though it decreases the chance of the team winning. Now, I have an inventiveness alignment. I might go for that. Then it gets bigger where there’s a couple of us that both want the same promotion to the same position at the company and we’re actually going to try and sabotage the other one, even though that harms the company because my own incentive is not coupled with their [00:07:30] incentive and with the company.
Then I can look a couple of different government agencies that are competing for the same chunk of the budget. They will actually seek to undermine each other so they get more of the budget when they’re supposed to be on the same team called that country. What we realize is we get this thing called fractal disinformation, fractal decoherence, and defection happening everywhere. That creates the most broken information ecology and the least effective coordination and cooperation possible. [00:08:00] That’s everywhere, that’s ubiquitous. It’s the result of that underlying rivalry. As we mentioned before, if I have some information, I want to make it to where nobody else can use it. I’m going to trademark it, patent it, protect my intellectual property. Before I release it, I actually want to disinform everybody else about it, tell them the gold is somewhere else so that they go digging somewhere else and don’t pay attention to what I’m doing.
If I am both hoarding information, disinforming others, and [00:08:30] keeping my information from being able to be synthesized with others, that means I’m going to not let my knowledge about cancer research and whatever it is be out there because I gotta make the [inaudible [0:08:39] back. The best computer that the world could build doesn’t exist because Apple has some of the IP but Google has some of the IP, and 10 other companies have some of the IP. The best computer that science knows how to build can legally not be built in this world. And the best phone [00:09:00] and the best car and the best medicine and the best every fucking thing there is because we keep the actual adaptive knowledge from synthesizing, let alone that everybody’s having to reproduce the same fucking work because we don’t want to share our best practices.
Then almost all the budget is going into marketing against the other ones rather than actual development and the marketing’s just lying in manipulation, at least, about why ours is comprehensively better when they then have to say the same thing about what their IP does that’s good and our IP does [00:09:30] another thing. Imagine if we had a world where all the IP got to be synthesized. Nobody was disinforming anybody else. Nobody was sabotaging anyone else. Everyone was incented to share all of the info. To synthesize all the info, to synthesize all of the intellectual property ideas etcetera, work towards the best things possible, imagine how much more innovation would actually be possible, how much more collective intelligence and capacity would actually be possible.
If our source of adaptive advantage [00:10:00] is that, is we make a world and now we have to come back to – we were talking about – if you possess a good and I no longer have access to it, we’re in a rivalrous relationship. You possess a piece of information that I don’t then get to have access to, we’re in rivalrous information of knowledge etcetera. If you have access to something and we’ve structured the nature of access where we have engineered the scarcity out of the system as such that you’re having access doesn’t make me not have access, and you having access leads to you [00:10:30] being a human who has a full life and some of your full life is creativity and generativity.
Now, not only do you have full access to those transportation resources but also maker studios and art studios and education and healthcare and all the kinds of things that would make you a healthy, well adaptive, creative person – and every well-adapted person’s creative. Nobody wants to just chill out watching TV all the time unless they were already broken, broken by a system that tried to incent them to shit that nobody wants to do or, if they can get a way out, they will but they’re a broken person. If someone was supported in an educational system [00:11:00] to pay attention to what they were innately fascinated and to facilitate that, they will all become masterful at some things with innate, intrinsic motivation to do those things.
Now, in a world where we support everybody to have access to the things that they are intrinsically incented to want to create. If, right now, I get status by having stuff but if we are engineering [inaudible [0:11:24] system everyone has access, nobody possesses any of it, everybody has access to all of it. There’s no status of having things and it’s totally boring. [00:11:30] There’s no differential advantage, the only way you get status, the only way you get to express the uniqueness of what you are is by what you create. Now, the whole system’s running towards that but you don’t create something to get money because money for what, to have access to shit you already have access to? Because you get to be someone who created that thing and both your own intrinsic express of it and extrinsically getting to offer to the world that would recognize that.
Now, we have a situation where we all have access to commonwealth resources that create an anti-rivalrous relationship to [00:12:00] each other. Obviously, I’m just speaking about this at the 100,000-foot level. We could drill down on what the actual architecture looks like but there is actual architecture here. It is viable, it meets the design of criteria. We have sense-making processes where we look at what a good design would be before making a proposition for a design that doesn’t lead to polarization and radicalization, that lead to progressively better synergistic satisfiers and get us out of theory of trade-offs and into [inaudible [0:12:27] also as a way of having people be [00:12:30] more unifiable and on the same team.
If I’ve got this world where it’s the source of competitive advantage if you want to call it that, is that it is obsolete at a competition within itself, it has real coherence. Then not only is the quality of life erratically higher because the people don’t feel lonely and they actually have creative shit to do and they aren’t being used as instrumental pawns to some other purpose etcetera, and the quality of life is better because they’re actually making better medicine and better technology and better [00:13:00] etcetera because of the ability for the IP to synthesize and everything else. This world can also out-innovate in really key ways in other places in the world. Then, rather than the rest of the world wanting to attack it, it can actually say, “Here, we’ll export solutions you want.” The rest of the world starts to create a positive dependence relationship.
The rest of the world says, “Shit, we want to be able to innovate. Why were they able to solve that problem we weren’t able to solve?” Because our guys were sabotaging each other and their guys weren’t sabotaging each other. We say, “Great, [00:13:30] here’s the social technology to use. Now, as soon as the implement that, it’s not being weaponized, that’s just the world actually shifting. That’s where this model actually becomes a new base [inaudible [0:13:37] the world starts flowing to. You have to do that. You create a prototype of a false act civilization that is anti-rivalrous, that is anti-fragile against rivalry – strengths, not power – and that is auto-propagating that by the nature of the solutions that it is exporting and by its own adaptive capacity, its own design [00:14:00] starts to implemented in other places. That’s ultimately, the desire. That is a path to a post-existential risk world, which is building it in prototype in a way where it auto-propagates.
Mike: That’s so exciting.
Euvie: Are there places where these prototypes are being built?
Daniel: Kind of but not really. There are intentional communities where people are trying to practice some things they feel will be relevant, a closed look agriculture [00:14:30] system where they at least have regenerative agriculture and maybe some kinds of social coherence technologies where they have a better system of conflict resolution than our current judicial system. Better parenting, better education. We have those things and those are cool and they’re valuable but they still have to buy their computers from Apple and fly on a Boeing to get somewhere that depends upon environmental destruction and war. They can’t actually provide a high-tech civilization, they’re not yet [00:15:00] civilization models and the civilization models are all part of this one dominant civilization model. This is the next endeavor.
Before a full-stack civilization occurs, obviously partial ones but that is directed towards a full stack civilization have to occur. Because in the world we’re talking about, there is no place for the things currently called judges or lawyers or politicians or bankers. Those systems don’t exist. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t an equivalent of a judicial system that is totally fucking different from the level of the theory [00:15:30] of ethics to the [inaudible [0:15:31]. Somebody has to be getting trained in the civics of that system. There’s nothing like banking but there are things like paying attention to how the accounting of this new economy works but people have to be trained in that. I’ll give you one, for instance, we think about the physical economy.
We’ll take attention out and just look at physics. We see that there are at least three different kinds of physics involved in the materials economy that are fundamentally different in their math. There is a physics of atoms, [00:16:00] physical atoms. There is a physics of energy and there is a physics of bits. Right now, those are fungible. I can use the same dollar to buy software or to buy energy or to buy metals or physical stuff, food. There’s a fixed number of atoms of a certain type on the planet that are reasonably accessible.
Right now, we’re just taking them from the environment in a way that causes depletion and then putting them back into the environment as waste in a way that causes accumulation toxicity on both sides. [00:16:30] You can’t keep doing that, we have to close loop it where we have been, give or take, a finite amount of metals. Not just metals but hydrocarbons, everything. A finite amount of atoms that are in a closed-loop relationship but they can be upcycled because we have the energy to upcycle them, which means putting the same atoms into a higher pattern – where the pattern is evolving, the pattern’s stored in bits.
If I take the atoms out of one battery, put it into a new battery which evolved as battery technology. That new battery is in bits, a blueprint. [00:17:00] I’m going to use energy to take the atoms in the current form, disassemble them and reassemble them into this new battery. There’s a fixed amount of atoms – we have to close loop those. There’s not a fixed amount of energy. We get new energy from the sun every day but we have a finite bandwidth of how much we get, we have to operate within. That’s not closed-loop, we can use that up and it has entropy. Within that bandwidth, we [00:17:30] have to work. Bits are fundamentally unlimited – limited only by the computing of the energy and matter. That can keep expanding basically indefinitely.
Once I’ve made a bit, I can reproduce it exponentially without any unit cost because I can reproduce it exponentially without unit cost once I’ve developed at once. I get an exponential return on software in a way that I could never get on atomic stuff, which is why Elon has a hard time raising money for the physical stuff, and [00:18:00] WhatsApp sold for 19 billion dollars. It’s why all the unicorns are software and mostly social tech or fintech or something that is actually doing not good things for the world can create exponential returns. It’s why Silicon Valley has basically mostly just invested in software stuff. If you make those fungible, you’ll actually be moving the energy away from the atom and away from the energy into the virtual. Away from the physical into the virtual, even though the virtual depends [00:18:30] on the physical, so you’re actually debasing the substrate upon which it depends.
You notice that since the bit we can keep having more of forever, they don’t go through an entropy degradation when we use them, the energy we can use entropically degrades but we get more of it every day and the atoms don’t entropically degrade but we have to keep cycling them and there’s a fixed number. The physics, the accounting of those are totally different. That’s not one economy that’s totally fungible to its self-appointed accounting system. That’s three completely separate [00:19:00] but interacting physical economies. Again, we already said we’re not owning goods, we’re having access to shared commonwealth services. To really go into it, it’s a lot of things. These are examples of some of the considerations that have to happen to actually be able to think about things like economics at a level of depth that is appropriate to the nature of the issues.
If we don’t answer the question of what makes a good civilization. We simply say [00:19:30] what allows civilization to endure. We start with, let’s just say we don’t want the existential catastrophic risk. There’s a whole bunch of different types of existential catastrophic risks that all have the same generator function, so we have to create categorical solutions to the generator functions. It turns out that those are the generator functions that have made all the things that we intuitively have experienced as sucking – like violence and environmental devastation.
Solving those generator functions doesn’t just allow us to survive [00:20:00] in maybe some dystopian dynamic. Anti-rivalrous dynamics with each other and close loop dynamics and the proper relationship between the complicated and the complex. Scalable collective intelligence systems in a right understanding in theory of choice and relationship with the theory of causation end up being a way of mapping to a world that is definitely [inaudible [0:20:20] on any meaningful definition of [inaudible [0:20:23] and any meaningful consideration of what good could mean. We come back to this mythopoetic. [00:20:30] We can’t keep going the way that we’re going. There’s a purgatory coming and it’s going to go one way or the other. One way is really shitty and one way’s really lovely.
That’s a true story. Bucky Fuller said utopia or oblivion and it’s going to be hit or miss until we’re actually there. We’re not gonna know which way it goes. That’s the thing we’re just kind of in on is what it takes if we try to solve the various risks in isolation is impossible, we fail. If what it takes to solve them categorically ends up [00:21:00] also mapping to how we engage everyone in creating the true, the good, and the beautiful that is theirs to create progressively better, both upregulating their sense-making of what that is with themselves and with each other being able to make that, scaling the collective intelligence that is progressively answering those questions better.
Mike: Can you leave us with some book recommendations for anyone who wants to read up on this a little more and expand their understanding?
Euvie: Books or other resources.
Daniel: Yes. [00:21:30] I wish I could share more things than I can but a lot of what we’re thinking in terms of a new civilization design like this is new. It doesn’t mean it’s not drawing on lots of elements. Couple things. We mentioned Jeffrey West’s work Scale on collective intelligence, that’s very valuable. We talk about some of the dynamics of game theory that have to shift and so finite and infinite games are just my favorite starting point. It’s one of the types of books that is very simple but has multiple levels of depth [00:22:00] of meaning. If you read it multiple times, you’ll gain new insights.
Euvie: That one blew my mind.
Mike: Yup, me too.
Daniel: James Carse, very beautiful. I have a blog, civilizationemerging.com that has some articles on these types of topics. There’s also a booklist there with a heap of books.
Euvie: Great.
Mike: Awesome. This, as always, is enlightening and so fun.
Daniel: There are books that are valuable and there’s obviously all of your podcasts available. If you had the [00:22:30] experience of anything that I said making sense and actually seeming obvious. But then you also realize you never thought it in that particular way, then there’s a question, “Why did I never think it in that way, even though it seems obvious after the fact?” That’s one of the properties that clarity has is it can add novel insight but that seems obvious and [inaudible [0:22:50] relates to everything that we know.
Then we say, “Okay, I wasn’t thinking about rivalrous dynamics and upping the ante clearly enough, [00:23:00] I wasn’t thinking about the exponential economy and software and atoms all being fungible. There’s a problem there. I wasn’t thinking about open loops, closed loops in this particular way.” You can. If you start just asking for yourself, “What do I think is actually wrong?” Of all the things that seem wrong, what do they have in common? Why are those things that are wrong, wrong? Then go deeper. Keep going deeper with that. Don’t look for one answer. Are there a number of different things that come together [00:23:30] that are partial answers to this? What would solving that look like? There are resources of other peoples thinking on these things but they won’t replace. They will inspire.
They won’t replace your own deep thinking on these things for your own sense-making. The resource that I would offer the most is when you are bothered by something or you wish some beautiful thing existed more than it does, really think hard about why things are the way they are. Know that the first thoughts you will come with [00:24:00] are not that good. If you stop, you won’t get beyond there. If you really keep working on it and thinking about it and then going and researching in light of that question and then thinking about it more, you actually start to get novel and meaningful and deeper sense-making that is aligned with what is yours to pay attention to and work on.
Euvie: To relate to what you said earlier, I think it really helps to use different modes of inquiry. People can get stuck in just intellectual inquiry or just [00:24:30] spiritual inquiry. But all are valuable. When we can see the same thing from several different perspectives, it becomes a 3D object, rather than just being flat.
Daniel: You just actually mentioned one of my favorite practices is really endeavoring to see and experience the world through the perspective of someone else and actually see and experience it. If I’m still thinking, “No, if I was in their position, I wouldn’t do that,” I haven’t got it yet. If I was in their position, I would do. If I’m really putting myself [00:25:00] in a position, I would get enraged by the things they’re enraged by. I would get excited by the things they’re excited by. This, both as a practice of empathy and connection, as a practice of understanding, as a practice of intelligence and learning because I see different things. If I look at the world through the lens of a mechanical engineer, I see shit everywhere that mechanical engineers see that you never saw.
This is different than if you look through the lens of a fashion designer, or you look through the lens of a game theory person. They’re looking at different things. Or an evolutionary biologist. [00:25:30] There’s a whole universe I wasn’t paying attention to – like when you buy a car and you see it everywhere, you put on a lens and you start seeing all kinds of stuff, effective sense-making. Also, as a kind of spiritual technology of getting out of the default mode of what you think you are. When I’m trying to be someone else, it’s not my personality that can do that. If I’m trying to take their personality, it’s not perspective that can do it. It’s the same consciousness witnessing my perspective that can then witness somebody else’s. As soon as I do that, I actually dissociate from just being [00:26:00] my personality and then I get some more spaciousness around it and less reacted by it.
Euvie: This also relates to not just looking through the lens of different personalities or different modern frameworks, it’s also looking through the lens of premodern frameworks or even animal frameworks and that can all be very useful, as well. If we look at the world through the lens of quote-unquote primitive tribe, then different things come into focus and different things become very meaningful and very powerfully meaningful. It [00:26:30] resonates through your whole being… wow. That’s not to be dismissed, because there’s something there.
Mike: At the very minimum, for self-discovery, it’s super useful because we spent more time as those primitive versions of ourselves than we have the modern versions. You can untie a lot of behaviors that you don’t really realize you have based off of just looking at the world from a primitive standpoint.
Daniel: If your [inaudible [0:26:55] decide to go visit the Amazon and live with a tribe [00:27:00] and experience the world through those eyes and be affected by it and then look at how they can incorporate elements of that experience of the world and their previous experience of the world to being able to live more fully. That would be beautiful. This was wonderful, I really appreciated being here with you both. I really do want to say that I love your podcasts and I love what you’re creating, both of you together. It’s very easy to have [00:27:30] well informed dystopian views and it’s easy to not think about things or it’s easy to have poorly informed positive views.
To have well informed positive views is actually tricky. If we keep being anything like the kinds of people that we have always been, that do really wonderful and really atrocious shit with our power but having exponentially more power, they’re all dystopian scenarios. We have to be something really different than we’ve ever been, which requires some type of deep [00:28:00] shift that could make that happen. That requires some deep thinking, some deep imagination. I know that what you are really dedicated to doing here on the show. I’m reminded of this quote from the book of Romans. It says the pathway to heaven and narrow and steep and the pathway to hell is wife and many. It’s just like a way of thinking about thermodynamics, which is that there’s just more ways to break shit than to build it.
There’s not that many ways all the cells can in your body [00:28:30] can come together that make you, the emergent property of you. There’s a lot of ways that you just get 150 pounds of goo. We say, “Okay, we’ve got a lot of power and most of those scenarios with a lot of power suck. How could we have this much power that doesn’t suck? How could we have this much power and not use it against each other?” We start seeing Orwell and control systems and we start saying, “That sucks, too.” To keep thinking through, “How could we have it that doesn’t suck that can’t depend on aliens or Jesus [00:29:00] coming back? How do we get us to be that kind of consciousness?” It’s a really good way of thinking about how to actually address these problems.
If we can’t [inaudible [0:29:09] without vision, man perishes. If we can’t even see a well-grounded positive future and positive use of the technological capacity have, we are not going to make it. I love that you all have this space dedicated to exploring a topic. The incentive is always evil. It’s a bitch. I don’t want to [00:29:30] move from perverse incentive to positive incentive. Positive incentive means my sense-making has determined what I think is good and I’m going to try and extrinsically override your sense-making to make a choice aligned with my sense-making.
I’m going to use an extrinsic reward strategy to co-opt your sovereignty and have your choice making be based on my sense-making incentive scheme rather than your own sense-making. That is always the basis of evil. If I want to have a collective [00:30:00] intelligence that’s actually intelligent, I need everyone to have intrinsic sense-making and choice-making that is incorruptible, which means it’s not being co-opted by extrinsic reward and punishment schemas. I got this wrong at first. I use to say, “We have to create a world where the incentive of every agent is rigorously aligned with the wellbeing of every other agent and of the commons, that is wrong.
What is right is to say that we must [00:30:30] rigorously remove any place where the incentive of an agent is misaligned with the wellbeing of other agents and the commons, but an adequate future is one that has no system of structural incentive.
Euvie: That’s a mind-blower.
Daniel: The cells in your body are actually not trying to get the other ones to do what they want them to do. They have their own internal sense-making processes and they do what makes sense to them. What makes sense to them also happens to be [00:31:00] what’s good for the ones around them, because they depend on the ones around them and vice versa and they’re in a communication process. The brain is not overriding the cells and in no way could handle the complexity necessary of the cells not doing their own sense-making. Better incentive schemas as a transition, which is happening in the blockchain, is nice. It’s worse than more perverse incentives but it is transitional, not post-transitional.
It actually does not address existential-risk, it doesn’t give us the right collective intelligence. The right collective intelligence has to be [00:31:30] fractal sovereignty. Meaning, at the level of an individual and every group size, it has its own intact sense-making and choice-making that ends up being vectoring towards Omni consideration. The level of shift that we’re talking about is hard to imagine.
Mike: Yeah. What has to be invented to even begin a transition and then be put to rest so that the next version can come along is such a long road.
Daniel: The reason we [00:32:00] incent people is because we have a civilization that needs a lot of shit done that is not fun. It’s dreadful stuff. We want to get the people to do the dreadful stuff. If we created a commonwealth where everyone had access to resources, then nobody would do the dreadful stuff and then the state would have to force them. That’s why we don’t like communism. Then you get the state imperialism. We say, “Okay, cool, let the free market force them instead,” it’s economic servitude but at least that doesn’t look like somebody did it because the [00:32:30] market is just the anonymous thing.
If you don’t do the shitty job, you’re homeless and you’re kids can’t eat. Cool. But we’ll tell you the story that you can work your way up and become wealthy, even though statistically we know that it’s silly, it happened to those two guys that one time. Even though statistically the rest of the time having more resources makes it easier to make more resources, and having less resources makes it harder to make more resources. The system has a gradient that makes it actually continue in the direction of inequality, not otherwise. [00:33:00] That’s where incentive came from. That’s the good side.
The negative side is a few controlling the many is to use incentive, reward, and punishment, and to get people to do the shitty things we have to do them. This is using choice to create a system of causation – incentive is a causal system, game theory is a causal system – to control the choice of others. Control or co-op. I want to have my theory of choice effect [00:33:30] causal dynamics that are only causal. I.e. If I make an automated robot, I haven’t actually made a sentient being a utility. I’m going to say something even deeper, which is instrumental relationships are evil.
Mike: Can you expand that?
Daniel: Yeah. If I’m interacting with you to meet some people that you know to get my network ahead or to get some knowledge from you or to gain access to something or to whatever it is, I have something [00:34:00] that I want to do that you are an instrument towards, you are a path towards. It’s a utilitarian ethic. You are a ends to a means for me. However I relate with you, however it affects your own sovereign, sentient experience is a place I might externalize harm because it’s not why I’m relating with you.
Mike: Yeah, yeah.
Daniel: Again, a healthy world, a world of the future, other people need to have intrinsic [00:34:30] value independent of utilitarian value to everyone. That’s a part of the culture. Not just the other people and other beings, all kinds of sentient beings, but relationships have intrinsic value. I’m going to invest in the integrity of our relationship independent of me getting anything out of it because it is actually the basis of meaningfulness itself. Which is why in a utilitarian and instrumental dynamic, we’re getting ahead while feeling utterly fucking meaningless and destroying everything [00:35:00] that is meaningful in the process. That is us being hooked to addiction to a stupid game, where what we think we want is not what we actually want, and what we think of as a win is actually an Omni stupid thing.
This is why the Hindu concept of Dharma was a virtue ethic, not a utilitarian ethic and there was a very meaningful set of concepts of, “Do what is inherently right in your relationships with life, [00:35:30] independent of what the outcome might be, because you really don’t know what the fucking outcome is going to be.” If you try and just figure out what the outcome is going to be, you’re going to be wrong a lot of times and you’re also going to justify a lot of unethical stuff. Utilitarianism is the rampant ethics that anyone who’s paying attention to ethics pays attention to right now. It’s not without any merit but it is also problematic. It is up there with democracy and capitalism and the philosophy of science in terms of being a [00:36:00] problematic thing, to be the dominant system.
We cannot actually predict in complex systems well enough to do a utilitarian thing and the intrinsic dynamics of a relationship in another being end up becoming moved to being a means to an ends other than them. As soon as I start factoring everything meaningful along the chain of whatever I think my outcome is to where my outcome is actually being in a way that is an integrity with an honouring of all life, [00:36:30] now it’s a virtue ethic.
Euvie: Yeah. I was having this conversation recently about people who are obsessed with life hacking and optimizing everything. When they get into that mindset, eventually they get to what they call optimizing relationships and then they start putting people on a value hierarchy where they want to interact with high value people and they want to get a high value woman and they’re using these tactics to find and attract the most high value woman. It’s funny, because those people, [00:37:00] in my experience, are some of the most existentially unhappy people that I’ve met. They will never demonstrate it outward, in an outward way, but that’s what I’ve noticed. That people who try to optimize everything in this kind of utilitarian way end up really profoundly unhappy.
Daniel: It’s the same thing as continuously pursuing a better high. It’s, “I’m getting a hit from winning at a particular thing, so I’ve got to try to win at it all the time.” But, “I need the hit because my baseline [00:37:30] is that life feels fucking meaningless because I don’t actually have any real relationships and I don’t even know what meaning means. I don’t even know what intimacy means.” That hyper normal environment needs hyper normal stimuli to feel anything. The fact that I use people instrumentally has people end up not liking me, which makes me hurt even more, which makes me want another hit even more.
Mike: People like you make it super easy. You just come on and it’s like we listen to audiobooks all day then we get to actually talk [00:38:00] to the person who’s coming up with the cutting-edge ideas themselves. It’s quite interesting, thank you.
Daniel: Bye ya’ll.
Euvie: It’s always wonderful getting our brains blown by you, thank you.
Daniel: Thank you both, this was really fun.
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