I’ve noticed after several years writing on cultural drift, I’ve yet to tempt anyone to work with me on understanding or fixing it, nor to indirectly support such efforts.
You should go on more mainstream podcasts (Joe Rogan, diary of CEO, etc.) and if you are already doing that let us know. You are very niche right now nobody has heard of you or your ideas. You need more exposure.
I would add as a 4th item that people usually need relatively safe financial situation and high social standing.
It's easier to attract a high value mate by being cultural bandwagoner or at least not openly disagree with the sacred cows of the current structure (for example egalitarianism). Or you need to be so high status that it is OK for you to openly disagree.
If you already have a mate and children, then there isn't much to lose and it makes more sense to indulge with controversial cultural ideas.
Also curious about specifics. I'd be interested in working with you. I value your work, and I'm not afraid of being associated with your topics.
I have co-authored 2 evo psych papers on touchy topics (attractiveness & sexual fluidity), and I also grew a TikTok to get 1.7M views + 250k likes on a video (doing street interviews on something completely different).
Even though selection of groups and ideas does play a role in society, you shouldn't adopt the label "social Darwinism," because to most people it refers to Victorian-age classist pseudoscience. Richard Dawkins wisely did not use the term "social Darwinism" for his idea of a meme. You should follow his example.
In any case, you clearly do not believe the principles of Darwinism yield good societies. Your whole drift narrative asserts that society does NOT effectively evolve, and that it requires some external intervention to revert it to a prior cultural state.
I agree with you on all of this, and humbly think I understand it. My question is, what do you mean by "work with?" I think the "work" for "demonstrating this is obviously a problem and has bad effects" is done - I mean, I believe you; I'm convinced!
But you asked for help "fixing it": I think this is doable, but what you have described is creating a new religion, but you have identified the biggest problem:
"Choosing and promoting concepts of the “sacred” arising from profane analysis,"
No one wants to build a god with just stone and money.
So you have to be sneaky about it, and build something sacred, and conceal the fact that the features of what you built were indeed informed by profane analysis, while also making it available to be discovered, by ... well, the initiated, who have hopefully achieved a level of acceptance of the... sacred... necessity of profane analysis, even if it is kept politely out of sight in day to day activities.
Basically I think what you want to build is an Order, something like the Jesuits (non-denominational of course). I think this is the least objectionable, least-profane "form" that people accept for doing things like your 10 points.
I can type up more later, have a half-written article about it, but non jokingly, first steps are probably:
1. found a charitable organization: I will fill out the paperwork with Ohio as "Order of Saint Joan" which I think is a good name, if perhaps unfortunately associated with ominous outcomes
2. hire/ordain Phil Tetlock and some of his superforecasters, and start raising tithes from on-average successful predictions on real-money markets, into the coffers
3. contact various "initiates" who are okay with the "base sacred goals on profane analysis" concept (I can think of a few dozen on substack) and get them evangelize the concept of "concrete steps to peacefully undrift culture back to more effective traits". I think Tyler Cowen and Scott Alexander are already attempting to do similar things to this with their grants
4. hire project managers/legates to execute on these or similar undrift projects
5. raise enough money to buy a prediction market exchange (or build one, or convince existing ones to host contracts explicitly to cover the % of success of these undrift projects)
6. hire some sci fi authors to wrap (I mean, make pre-eminent) some ritual, decorations, hierarchies and social norms around all of this in a aesthetically pleasing and sacred-appealing way
definitely true, but I feel like in keeping with the spirit of the idea, earning some of that money via prediction markets would be... appropriate. Need to think more on it.
We are living in literally THE DECADE when humans first acquired a nearly-complete understanding of the mysteries of epistemology, which are the key to all other mysteries. It has taken 4 billion years for life to get to this point. And now, when we are so close to understanding the dynamics of society, the possibility space of politics, and perhaps the physical basis of aesthetics, morality, and qualia, it seems you want the vanguard of this movement to apply itself to smashing this whole grand project and diving back into the sewage of religion and mysticism.
A grand new social religion, led by cynical elites following an abstruse philosophy which they conceal from the masses, is WHAT WE HAVE TODAY in the social justice movement. Or look at the history of communism, or at Christianity in the 4th century AD. These movements get parasitized by selfish and dishonest agents, who are at an advantage in movements which must build a bulwark against truth. Such movements must destroy the liberal mechanisms which allow a society to push their beliefs towards reflective equilibrium, because doing so would expose the true purpose of the elites.
"you want the vanguard of this movement to apply itself to smashing this whole grand project and diving back into the sewage of religion and mysticism." I don't see where you are getting that from.
This is an important point, and one I would make myself about the idea, but I think you are conflating the two parts of ideology/religion.
There is the actual beliefs about the world and morality - "don't steal" (which are objectively measured/selected by their impact on reality and people's actions) - and then there are the evolutionary sustaining/propagation parts that don't really affect reality (whether Noah's ark existed or not doesn't really matter) but exist only to propagate the belief, and are measured by how successfully they persuade and retain (the important ideological payload) in people's brains, and those brains are often indeed influenced by mystical things, for probably inescapable biological reasons. (basically Dan Dennett here)
My case here is that people exist on that objective-mystical spectrum, and if you are trying to persuade billions of people you kinda have to accept that. You are right that traditional old school religions (and "woke" too) lean too heavily on mysticism in the "actionable beliefs" and many modern, objectively-based ideological movements lean too heavily on non-mysticism in their attempts to persuade, and their reach is limited by that.
So I suggest, let's split the difference. Use our objective logical faculties to find the right actionable beliefs, and then also use those faculties to determine what the most persuasive form of mystical (if you want to use that term) dressings, rituals, are, and apply them. While allowing for that spectrum of humanity to participate at their own level of "mysticism."
I interpret what you're saying as "I don't want mysticism to infect the actionable beliefs" and I totally agree, every ideology/beliefsystem/religion has always had to establish that firewall, even those that entirely reject mysticism as a tactic, because people's tendency towards that exists no matter what, and slipping into that failure mode is not always perceived clearly. I can't promise that we'd do it right, but I can promise that consciously identifying that risk and enshrining "keep checking to make sure your actual real world conclusions are informed by objectivity" as a belief probably gives one a better chance of avoiding it.
I'm referring specifically to the fact that in the 4th century, Neo-Platonists dominated Christian theology, and used the Gospels as a compelling emotional story to push Platonist ideas, notably by canonizing the writings of Paul, elevating Paul's bizarre theology of salvation by blood over Jesus', and translating the Bible into Latin in a way that supported their dogmas (after which they treated the Latin as superior to the Greek!) They also used a military dictatorship to suppress competing belief systems (sometimes violently, sometimes by incentives); forced adherents to break their brains by claiming to believe the logically absurd proclamations of the 1st council of Nicaea which perhaps only dozens of people even comprehended; and began making a lot of money by doing these things. All these things fit the pattern of an elite philosophical movement pretending to be a religion, proceeding first to absolute power, then to the deliberate intellectual corruption to break their subjects' brains, and then being themselves parasitized by (or becoming) selfish opportunists.
The Cluny period didn't begin until many centuries later.
Yes, Neoplatonist nonsense. Yes, Nicaean absurdity, yes corrupt elite abusing church power. Yes, violently suppressing competing doctrines. And yet, despite all that and more, the revolutionary message of Christ carried by the vehicle of the Catholic Church, transformed history. I won’t deny the ugly, but I am saying that Christianity - including even the corrupt Catholic Church - deserves some credit for the West and the culture and progress you applaud.
Christianity was the single largest factor in the development of Europe. It literally defined the borders of what we call Europe. So everything would have happened very differently without it. John Locke agreed with you on this. I acknowledge Christianity's doctrine that it is individuals rather than communities or species which have souls; this is not as common as people now think it is (and has become much less common since Hegel, Marx, Hitler, and critical race theory; the "social justice" movement literally means justice for races rather than for individuals).
But I will not give Christianity "credit" in the sense of saying that it did more good than harm. I've seen many books and blogs arguing that, but I don't think the scales sum up that way. Athens would have been a much healthier polis than Jerusalem to build a civilization on.
Do you write somewhere about effecting “governance mechanisms based on open speculative markets” that are ultimately “non-libertarian”? What is an open speculative market in this context?
it might make sense to make a more specific ask rather than to outline all the sources of friction of people joining you… I find the problem you’re outlining pretty hard to wrap my head around, though obviously I have a lot of problems with the current culture and it’s effective oppressiveness
I wish I had the gift of writing well. I wish that I could honestly say that my own family’s survival wasn’t my greatest concern. But I wholeheartedly agree with your sentiment and goals.
Have you talked to Rudyard Lynch? I think in a way you share the same motivation and he is not scared of proposing radical ideas. He recently brought up trying to reignite the culture of alchemy as a healthier substitute for Marxist ideology for instance. He doesn't have a trained analytical mind but I think he could be a useful collaborator and he is for sure very intelligent, intellectually honest and ridiculously knowledgeable. He likes the elephant in the brain. Elon likes him which got him a lot of exposure as well.
I think of Catholicism. A long effort in continuous cultural preservation may prove more evolutionarily fit to seriously address these issues in an increasingly turbulent world. Perhaps rather than an upstart preservation, a useful instinct would be a study of preservation/leadership history, or a union of futarchy to existing structures.
Would it be as good to equip those fighting cultural drift today, even their values do not totally match your own? Or is it your hope to elevate our present American/Internet/Present-Utopian ideals by empowering them to culturally persist?
You should go on more mainstream podcasts (Joe Rogan, diary of CEO, etc.) and if you are already doing that let us know. You are very niche right now nobody has heard of you or your ideas. You need more exposure.
I am available for such forums, but being available doesn't get you on them.
Dwarkesh?
Robin was on there in 2020 - see:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aagyRGKv66g
I would add as a 4th item that people usually need relatively safe financial situation and high social standing.
It's easier to attract a high value mate by being cultural bandwagoner or at least not openly disagree with the sacred cows of the current structure (for example egalitarianism). Or you need to be so high status that it is OK for you to openly disagree.
If you already have a mate and children, then there isn't much to lose and it makes more sense to indulge with controversial cultural ideas.
Also curious about specifics. I'd be interested in working with you. I value your work, and I'm not afraid of being associated with your topics.
I have co-authored 2 evo psych papers on touchy topics (attractiveness & sexual fluidity), and I also grew a TikTok to get 1.7M views + 250k likes on a video (doing street interviews on something completely different).
We could chat, but the key is #2.
Which to me is your most unclear point. Are you looking for an ally working independently? Someone you would pay at all?
Examples / an explicit vision would help.
Once I had $, I'd think about who to pay. If you see the problem, you should be able to think of ways to work on it.
Right. So the “Big Ask” is: free labor 😂
I thought #2 meant not afraid of being associated with your topics?
That's #3
(The TikTok thing was a 6-week experiment I did to see if I could make something go viral. I stopped afterwards.)
How did you do it? Have you written about that somewhere?
I’d like to chat about building the technical infrastructure as open source, and ensuring it benefits everyone.
I don't see why such governance should be substantially non-libertarian and non-egalitarian, as long as people and cultures are allowed to fail.
> hated “Social Darwinism” label
Even though selection of groups and ideas does play a role in society, you shouldn't adopt the label "social Darwinism," because to most people it refers to Victorian-age classist pseudoscience. Richard Dawkins wisely did not use the term "social Darwinism" for his idea of a meme. You should follow his example.
In any case, you clearly do not believe the principles of Darwinism yield good societies. Your whole drift narrative asserts that society does NOT effectively evolve, and that it requires some external intervention to revert it to a prior cultural state.
I didn't mean to say it was my favorite term, just that it is a term that will likely get used, whether we like it or not.
I agree with you on all of this, and humbly think I understand it. My question is, what do you mean by "work with?" I think the "work" for "demonstrating this is obviously a problem and has bad effects" is done - I mean, I believe you; I'm convinced!
But you asked for help "fixing it": I think this is doable, but what you have described is creating a new religion, but you have identified the biggest problem:
"Choosing and promoting concepts of the “sacred” arising from profane analysis,"
No one wants to build a god with just stone and money.
So you have to be sneaky about it, and build something sacred, and conceal the fact that the features of what you built were indeed informed by profane analysis, while also making it available to be discovered, by ... well, the initiated, who have hopefully achieved a level of acceptance of the... sacred... necessity of profane analysis, even if it is kept politely out of sight in day to day activities.
Basically I think what you want to build is an Order, something like the Jesuits (non-denominational of course). I think this is the least objectionable, least-profane "form" that people accept for doing things like your 10 points.
See #2. If you think the best approach is to build an Order, then "working on" would have you do that.
I can type up more later, have a half-written article about it, but non jokingly, first steps are probably:
1. found a charitable organization: I will fill out the paperwork with Ohio as "Order of Saint Joan" which I think is a good name, if perhaps unfortunately associated with ominous outcomes
2. hire/ordain Phil Tetlock and some of his superforecasters, and start raising tithes from on-average successful predictions on real-money markets, into the coffers
3. contact various "initiates" who are okay with the "base sacred goals on profane analysis" concept (I can think of a few dozen on substack) and get them evangelize the concept of "concrete steps to peacefully undrift culture back to more effective traits". I think Tyler Cowen and Scott Alexander are already attempting to do similar things to this with their grants
4. hire project managers/legates to execute on these or similar undrift projects
5. raise enough money to buy a prediction market exchange (or build one, or convince existing ones to host contracts explicitly to cover the % of success of these undrift projects)
6. hire some sci fi authors to wrap (I mean, make pre-eminent) some ritual, decorations, hierarchies and social norms around all of this in a aesthetically pleasing and sacred-appealing way
Before any "hire" steps would have to be "get $" steps.
definitely true, but I feel like in keeping with the spirit of the idea, earning some of that money via prediction markets would be... appropriate. Need to think more on it.
We are living in literally THE DECADE when humans first acquired a nearly-complete understanding of the mysteries of epistemology, which are the key to all other mysteries. It has taken 4 billion years for life to get to this point. And now, when we are so close to understanding the dynamics of society, the possibility space of politics, and perhaps the physical basis of aesthetics, morality, and qualia, it seems you want the vanguard of this movement to apply itself to smashing this whole grand project and diving back into the sewage of religion and mysticism.
A grand new social religion, led by cynical elites following an abstruse philosophy which they conceal from the masses, is WHAT WE HAVE TODAY in the social justice movement. Or look at the history of communism, or at Christianity in the 4th century AD. These movements get parasitized by selfish and dishonest agents, who are at an advantage in movements which must build a bulwark against truth. Such movements must destroy the liberal mechanisms which allow a society to push their beliefs towards reflective equilibrium, because doing so would expose the true purpose of the elites.
"you want the vanguard of this movement to apply itself to smashing this whole grand project and diving back into the sewage of religion and mysticism." I don't see where you are getting that from.
This is an important point, and one I would make myself about the idea, but I think you are conflating the two parts of ideology/religion.
There is the actual beliefs about the world and morality - "don't steal" (which are objectively measured/selected by their impact on reality and people's actions) - and then there are the evolutionary sustaining/propagation parts that don't really affect reality (whether Noah's ark existed or not doesn't really matter) but exist only to propagate the belief, and are measured by how successfully they persuade and retain (the important ideological payload) in people's brains, and those brains are often indeed influenced by mystical things, for probably inescapable biological reasons. (basically Dan Dennett here)
My case here is that people exist on that objective-mystical spectrum, and if you are trying to persuade billions of people you kinda have to accept that. You are right that traditional old school religions (and "woke" too) lean too heavily on mysticism in the "actionable beliefs" and many modern, objectively-based ideological movements lean too heavily on non-mysticism in their attempts to persuade, and their reach is limited by that.
So I suggest, let's split the difference. Use our objective logical faculties to find the right actionable beliefs, and then also use those faculties to determine what the most persuasive form of mystical (if you want to use that term) dressings, rituals, are, and apply them. While allowing for that spectrum of humanity to participate at their own level of "mysticism."
I interpret what you're saying as "I don't want mysticism to infect the actionable beliefs" and I totally agree, every ideology/beliefsystem/religion has always had to establish that firewall, even those that entirely reject mysticism as a tactic, because people's tendency towards that exists no matter what, and slipping into that failure mode is not always perceived clearly. I can't promise that we'd do it right, but I can promise that consciously identifying that risk and enshrining "keep checking to make sure your actual real world conclusions are informed by objectivity" as a belief probably gives one a better chance of avoiding it.
I think Christianity deserves more credit than that - even Medieval Catholicism. https://reasonableness.substack.com/p/cluny-and-early-individualism-in
I'm referring specifically to the fact that in the 4th century, Neo-Platonists dominated Christian theology, and used the Gospels as a compelling emotional story to push Platonist ideas, notably by canonizing the writings of Paul, elevating Paul's bizarre theology of salvation by blood over Jesus', and translating the Bible into Latin in a way that supported their dogmas (after which they treated the Latin as superior to the Greek!) They also used a military dictatorship to suppress competing belief systems (sometimes violently, sometimes by incentives); forced adherents to break their brains by claiming to believe the logically absurd proclamations of the 1st council of Nicaea which perhaps only dozens of people even comprehended; and began making a lot of money by doing these things. All these things fit the pattern of an elite philosophical movement pretending to be a religion, proceeding first to absolute power, then to the deliberate intellectual corruption to break their subjects' brains, and then being themselves parasitized by (or becoming) selfish opportunists.
The Cluny period didn't begin until many centuries later.
Yes, Neoplatonist nonsense. Yes, Nicaean absurdity, yes corrupt elite abusing church power. Yes, violently suppressing competing doctrines. And yet, despite all that and more, the revolutionary message of Christ carried by the vehicle of the Catholic Church, transformed history. I won’t deny the ugly, but I am saying that Christianity - including even the corrupt Catholic Church - deserves some credit for the West and the culture and progress you applaud.
Christianity was the single largest factor in the development of Europe. It literally defined the borders of what we call Europe. So everything would have happened very differently without it. John Locke agreed with you on this. I acknowledge Christianity's doctrine that it is individuals rather than communities or species which have souls; this is not as common as people now think it is (and has become much less common since Hegel, Marx, Hitler, and critical race theory; the "social justice" movement literally means justice for races rather than for individuals).
But I will not give Christianity "credit" in the sense of saying that it did more good than harm. I've seen many books and blogs arguing that, but I don't think the scales sum up that way. Athens would have been a much healthier polis than Jerusalem to build a civilization on.
My counter-factual history runs a different course than yours, but we are left to speculate in vain.
Do you write somewhere about effecting “governance mechanisms based on open speculative markets” that are ultimately “non-libertarian”? What is an open speculative market in this context?
I added links to posts on that.
Any candidate would also have to believe that the rise of machine intelligence is not a more pressing problem.
I don't think that is a rational or sensible belief. Indeed, I am a little surprised that you don't even see fit to mention it.
it might make sense to make a more specific ask rather than to outline all the sources of friction of people joining you… I find the problem you’re outlining pretty hard to wrap my head around, though obviously I have a lot of problems with the current culture and it’s effective oppressiveness
I wish I had the gift of writing well. I wish that I could honestly say that my own family’s survival wasn’t my greatest concern. But I wholeheartedly agree with your sentiment and goals.
Why non-libertarian? Please elaborate. Thanks.
Most governments in history haven't been very libertarian. So good chance a general search in the space of them will often not be very libertarian.
By the way I love your work. I’m a big fan of your friend Bryan and through him I found your work.
PS—My wife and I are moving to Ohio so I can track the local Amish community now approaching 90,000.
Cosmist historian here, sir, reporting for duty.
Have you talked to Rudyard Lynch? I think in a way you share the same motivation and he is not scared of proposing radical ideas. He recently brought up trying to reignite the culture of alchemy as a healthier substitute for Marxist ideology for instance. He doesn't have a trained analytical mind but I think he could be a useful collaborator and he is for sure very intelligent, intellectually honest and ridiculously knowledgeable. He likes the elephant in the brain. Elon likes him which got him a lot of exposure as well.
Well I'm an old farmer in Thailand way past my prime. What do you want me to do?
I think of Catholicism. A long effort in continuous cultural preservation may prove more evolutionarily fit to seriously address these issues in an increasingly turbulent world. Perhaps rather than an upstart preservation, a useful instinct would be a study of preservation/leadership history, or a union of futarchy to existing structures.
Would it be as good to equip those fighting cultural drift today, even their values do not totally match your own? Or is it your hope to elevate our present American/Internet/Present-Utopian ideals by empowering them to culturally persist?