We Are Not Saved

Lately there have been a lot of attempts to relitigate history. It is felt that taking history which has been ignored and giving it new emphasis will both increase the accuracy of that history and also help mitigate the negative effects of historical events. I show that this is generally not the case and that what we choose to emphasis is more based on the narrative we're pushing than the actual impact of the history or event in question.

There were various approaches to fighting COVID, and in retrospect we ended up with the worst of all. It's understandable that we didn't follow China in taking the authoritarian approach. And it's also understandable that we weren't going to be as lackadaisical as we were in 1918. But what kept us from taking the technolibertarian approach of human challenge trials, first doses first, and approving the Astrazeneca vaccine as soon as Europe did. And more importantly why are we now taking the exact opposite approach, "pausing" Johnson and Johnson, while Europe restricts Astrazeneca? Why are we so bold when it comes to government spending and so timid when it comes to vaccine safety?

Secular Cycles by: Peter Turchin and Sergey A. Nefedov Where Is My Flying Car? A Memoir of Future Past by: J. Storrs Hall A Short Stay in Hell by: Steven L. Peck Cibola Burns by: James S. A. Corey Nemesis Games by: James S. A. Corey Classical Philosophy: A history of philosophy without any gaps, Volume 1 by: Peter Adamson Playing at the World: A History of Simulating Wars, People and Fantastic Adventures, from Chess to Role-Playing Games by: Jon Peterson Earth Abides by: George R. Stewart The Goal: A Business Graphic Novel by: Eliyah Goldratt

I present a metaphor for technology and progress as an ancient temple with thousands of knobs. Technology allows us to turn the knobs, but we're never quite sure what they do, and we generally decide to turn the knobs as far as we can without this understanding. In the metaphor they control the weather, but in reality they control the weather of civilization, which just like the actual weather is a chaotic system where small changes can create massive effects. Effects like the hurricane of change and disruption which is currently bearing down on us...

The recent Netflix series "Murder Among the Mormons" bills itself as a true crime drama, but really it's a multi-faceted philosophical inquiry into questions of epistemology. Most notably through the central role fraud and forgery plays in the story, but the inquiry goes beyond that into issues of divine revelation, the reconstruction of history and the role of mercy when truth becomes difficult to pin down.

Scott Alexander recently posted a study showing European municipalities which had the Napoleonic Code imposed upon them did better economically than nearby municipalities which didn't. He uses this to support a contention that radical reform is better than traditional institutions at delivering positive outcomes. My contention is not that we should be looking at narrow metrics of success but rather how radical reform deals with complexity, as opposed to other methods of dealing with complexity like cultural evolution, which seems to be the primary contender to expert led reform in the form of technocracy. All of which is to say that yes, the subject of this episode is very similar to the subject of my previous episodes (book reviews excepted).

The WEIRDest People In the World: How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous by: Joseph Henrich Island of the Blue Foxes: Disaster and Triumph on the World's Greatest Scientific Expedition by: Stephen R. Bown The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism by: Thomas Frank Billy Miske: The St. Paul Thunderbolt by: Clay Moyle The Landmark Thucydides by: Thucydides Edited by Robert B. Strassler The Abolition of Man by: C. S. Lewis Orthodoxy by: G. K. Chesterton Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife by: Bart D. Ehrman

Prediction is tough. You never know if things are about to get a lot worse, as was the situation with Polish Jews in 1937. Or if they're going to get a lot better, which was the situation of East Germans in 1988. But there are signs...

The problem of political unity weighs heavily on people's minds. But as with most problems technocrats imagine that if they just implement the right policy that unity will follow. In reality people only unify around myths, and historically myths have been assembled into religions. Both things that technocrats are generally opposed to. But can they survive without them. A survey of the literature says... no.

Technocracies have been much in the zeitgeist recently, at least in the corners of the internet I frequent. And there appears to be significant disagreement as to how effective they are. While I understand the idea behind them and the way in which they're supposed to work, I'm not sure they actually work in the way people expect. Or perhaps more importantly I don't think they're the best tool for dealing with the current crisis. I offer some alternative epistemological frameworks and suggest that technocracies might be missing something important.