An interesting theory on the Sapient Paradox, the question of why civilization came to be so late in the human species' evolution. We're about 200.000 years old but civilization is closer to 20.000.
The author posits that reputation/gossip control in small groups was the limiter to growth and that the structure of civilization helped dampen this need. However, social media has brought this "gossip trap" back on a worldwide level, risking a return to government by reputation.
I doubt things can be attributed to single causes like this but it's a compelling (and long) read.
There’s a universal rule that smoke alarms will always start bleeping out their low battery warning in the middle of the night.
Dries Depoorter built software to scan online public cameras and link them to geotagged instagram posts from the same location. Basically finding people from a single instagram photo and potentially tracking them across any public (or not) camera out there. Technically impressive, yet disturbing.
There was a video on the page too, but it seems to have been pulled due to a copyright claim from Earthcam who, I imagine, weren't very happy about their cameras being used for this.
Douglas Rushkoff on the ultra-wealthy trying to figure out how the world will end (because of them) and how to dominate through it. Quite depressing, if unsurprising.
Finally, the CEO of a brokerage house explained that he had nearly completed building his own underground bunker system, and asked: “How do I maintain authority over my security force after the event?” The event. That was their euphemism for the environmental collapse, social unrest, nuclear explosion, solar storm, unstoppable virus, or malicious computer hack that takes everything down.
I'm reading the Bright Green Lies book and found this thought-provoking discussion with one of the authors.
As he says, there's definitely an issue with the environmental movement these days being more interested in keeping modern civilization on its current course, rather than trying to protect the actual planet itself like it used to.
And the dominant blind faith in "green" technology does tend to make me uneasy.
I'd never though of it that way, but all these sites pushing conspiracy theories, hoaxes and other lies are a great trap for catching and selling a gullible audience:
Jones has profited and is likely to continue to profit from his labors in the Lie Economy, the marketplace where gullible viewers are sorted from the skeptical and delivered to advertisers who make the most of their naïveté.
