The Blight and Might of Pleasure

We've become accustomed to using pleasure and comfort as indicators of progress, alignment, and worth. Abundant societies like the United States, and much of the West, that rely on capital to measure economic growth, also socially view consumption as a signal for the state of societal well-being. With increased consumption comes an increased dependence on materialism as a facet of cultural identity.

Consumer culture, technological instant gratification, ease of comfort, abundance of entertainment, material wealth, luxury in health and wellness, the portrayal of role models as beacons of consumption, are all consequences of pleasure-seeking taken to an unhealthy extreme.

However, we must also keep in mind that pleasurable social states aren't natural. Economic prosperity, celebration of individualism, overcoming hardship, innovation, and geographical harmonization all come together to present an environment where the pursuit of pleasure is possible. Our avoidance of pain helped create civilization. The pain of labor drove automation and the pain of scarcity drove innovation. From a safer, more secure, and comfortable environment came a flourishing of art, culture, technology, and societal nuance. The Renaissance's focus on classical ideals in new forms of art or Romanticism's celebration of beauty were born from the culture's flourishing environment. Enlightenment ideals that influenced the Founding Fathers of the United States of America were reasoned upon through the pursuit of individual happiness. We have the pleasure-pain dichotomy to thank for the freedoms we hold today.

But, when abundance and ease outpace our ability to find purpose, what fills the void?

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The Potential Fallout

The rapid change to culture brought about by the disruption of existing institutions and industries makes it attractive to reinforce existing cultural ideals as a way of coping. The current emphasis on pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain certainly promises to drive us into a self-defeating and life-denying extreme.

Seeking enjoyment, comfort, stability, peace, prosperity, and safety is a noble pursuit, but too much nourishment begets rot. To prevent cultural rot, like rising mental health crises, erosion of trust in institutions, social fragmentation, disconnection with Nature, and a loss of individual uniqueness, we must balance pleasure with heroic ideals, ideals that have been proven to aid civilization. Excellence, personal growth, glory, communal contribution, valor, moral integrity, and value creation all help to reinforce social cohesion, the quality of individual values, and the preservation of humanity, things we'll depend on during the coming age of automation.

This is a time to redefine what it means to be heroic. In fact, this is the only time we have to redefine culture in a way that steers clear of the fallout that comes with the uninhibited pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain. The perceived compression of time due to the speed of change leaves us in this perpetual state of "catch up" where institutions, communities, and individuals struggle to adapt to shifts that occur more frequently than expected, like a shift in the weight of traditional labor as a source of identity.

We must become a heroic society reminiscent of past civilizations around the world, communities who respected the stimulating nature of excellence, greatness, honor, virtue, and courage.

What will the Hero of the Automated Age look like?

The Evolving Cultural Tapestry

The Hero meets existential dread with an odyssey of meaning-making.

The Hero fosters a sense of belonging and social harmony through an adherence to a value system that promotes the preservation and advancement of community by the way of individual growth.

Advancements raise complex ethical questions. The culture we have developed is incapable of providing the answers. But, a heroic culture provides a moral compass, guiding decisions that promote individual gain and social well-being.

Materialism in many ways rejects the idea of internal meaning by associating it with external resources. Heroism stresses our nature for purposeful action and shows that the reward for emotional and physical resilience is legacy, community, harmony, and intimacy.

We aren't being called to battle. We are not at war. We are not Knights, Samurai, Vikings, Spartans, Legionnaires, Persian Immortals, or citizen soldiers of Ancient Greece. We're men and women burdened with the threat of a cultural fallout, and our call to adventure is the reestablishment of strength, beauty, truth, harmony, and greatness. The Hero of the Automated Age isn't some militant representative protecting the motherland. The Hero isn't some politician making wide sweeping changes or big promises.

In the coming age, heroes will be individuals capable of navigating the diverse, global and digital net of perspectives constantly surfacing, and adapt to them to sustain cultural vitality and cultivate a renewed sense of purpose. This new group of heroes will prioritize legacy over likes and find purpose through stewardship not consumption. The future will not just be written by a few larger-than-life personalities or handful of grand narratives, but strung together with a web of smaller, localized models of excellence who appeal to universal ideals.

The cultural tapestry is kept intact through a reinforcement of values and is made resilient through the inclusion of new skills and insights.

In the Automated Age, the remnants of humanity, those who refuse to let go of sincere, hopeful, and creative expression, who craft meaning from chaos and face a post-truth, post-labor world with glimmering eyes, will surely become the shining, overwhelming, and enticing parts of the undying memory of humanity.

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Francis Bacon's Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion depicts three figures loosely based on the Furies. He was inspired by Aeschylus' phrase "the reek of human blood smiles out at me" to create a piece based on what he felt by that line. He viewed the Crucifixion as a tale of human behavior instead of one of divinity. This artwork serves as a distortion of classical themes after World War II.

In a way, it symbolizes a shift in the pleasure-pain paradigm. Personal pleasures turned into escapism from war trauma. Pain, originally seen as something to avoid or overcome, became something we used to wrestle with meaning. Post-war, we see a rise in Existentialism and an expansion of consumer culture, which helped to shaped our current understanding of the relationship of pleasure and pain, a relationship that must be re-imagined.

The Role of Ritual

We hear the word "ritual" and think of the supernatural, the occult, the religious, the fanatic, the sensational, but rituals are a part of every day life. Rituals are symbolic, structured and oftentimes functional activities marked with specific intention and purpose. They're effective too. They reinforce social bonds, create personal order, serve as markers of progress in one's life and create a sense of predictability.

Rituals can be small or large. Think of what you do each morning to "awaken". Regardless of your level of celebration of awakening after a night of sleep, you run through the same process, parts of it are functional and some are according to taste. Grand rituals are ones where entire cultures participate or accept as a part of the social fabric. Some, like pilgrimages during medieval Christendom or Hellenistic Greece served to emphasize social cohesion, religious or mythical reinforcement, cultural stability, and personal growth.

While grand rituals are less likely today in the West, we gather, travel, connect and engage with our communities in various ways. Whether it's a Sunday brunch or the Friday happy hour of office culture or the weekend religious service, we interact with each other to add context to other rituals or processes we have in our lives, ones that might involve our careers or hobbies or families.

No matter how utilitarian or logical we try to be, we do things that are only meaningful to us. The routine workout is an action in the ritual for movement and vitality. The morning coffee is an action in the ritual of waking. In this day and age ritual is seen in the digital arena, where the actions we take lead to a greater sense of digital identity and representation.

Whether they are small or large, crucial or inconsequential, rituals help us understand ourselves and they rely on a specific pace and space to operate. The largest threat to ritual is the pace of innovation and rate of impact.

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The Fallout of Innovation

Innovation via automation and technological efficiency is rapidly replacing traditional systems we're accustomed to integrating with. The way we communicate, create, reason, work, and play are under threat of change, and while change through innovation is often seen as progress and beneficial to society, we often don't shine a spotlight on what is sacrificed or impacted as a result.

We have become unaware as a society of the things we've lost and how that has affected us. We moved from communicating face-to-face to predominantly via phone call and then eventually to texting. While we are capable of texting more people or updating more of our community via social media, we have largely lost touch with the intimacy involved in meeting with someone in person or face-to-face. There is an awareness there that must be kept sharp. We must hone that sense of balance between intimate, in depth moments with those important to us and the easier, shallower moments we have with others via text or social media.

Many things have changed.

Increased screen time, shifts in work-life balance, different social norms associate with urgency and ability, and increased reliance on technology have changed how we interact and what our routines and processes look like. This leads to a need for different rituals and a reevaluation of our values.

Ritual in the Age of Automation

We need new ways of integrating our tastes, preferences and needs with a rapidly changing reality. We need rituals around the use of technology and rituals around the automation of things in our lives since we'll be presented with options to automate or not. We require rituals that help us limit the encroachment of innovation on parts of our lives we reserve for manual, intimate processes.

Some people are introducing tech-free activities into their lives. Some create rituals around phone or computer breaks. One of the best ways to ease into this need for change is to adjust current rituals for differences and trends you notice are taking hold. For instance, the role of AI in our daily lives is becoming a dominant one. From the apps we use, to the way we search and the way we communicate with each other, AI is becoming increasingly prevalent. This signals a need for a change in ritual and a calibration of our value systems. If you're someone who naturally resists the integration of tech in your life, weigh the costs of not introducing AI into some of your processes and ask yourself if you'd be better off with or without it. If you're someone who actively seeks to integrate with advances, understand the cost of changing continually.

The Automated Age has already begun. Those of us who resist will be at a grave disadvantage integrating with a completely new culture shaped by these advancements in the future, while those who look to understand the forces that affect their lives and meaningfully act in accordance with their values will maintain their sense of agency and sense of identity.

Don't fear change, fear being incapable of it.

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Welcome to Remain Human, a publication exploring humanity to understand a little more about what it takes to remain human in a time of rapid change. Today’s article serves as a reflection of the founding of the United States of America, what it looks like today, and where it might head in the future.

The Spark of 1776

On July 4th, 1776, 56 delegates adopted the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia, marking the establishment of the United States of America. A day before, in a letter to his wife, John Adams remarked on the celebratory nature of the moment as well as the tension involved in maintaining this state of independence.

I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.

You will think me transported with Enthusiasm but I am not. -- I am well aware of the Toil and Blood and Treasure, that it will cost Us to maintain this Declaration, and support and defend these States. -- Yet through all the Gloom I can see the Rays of ravishing Light and Glory. I can see that the End is more than worth all the Means. And that Posterity will tryumph in that Days Transaction, even altho We should rue it, which I trust in God We shall not.

-- John Adams in a letter to Abigail Adams, July 3rd, 17761

The United States of America was formed by men and women who, steeped in Europe's rich heritage, dared to push the boundaries of excellence even further, to explore individuality, liberty, and self governance on an unprecedented scale.

Betsy Ross2, stitched into the first official flag of the nation, the undying spirit of the pursuit of happiness, a spirit that is seen in fiery fashion each year as we come together to reflect on where we've come from and where we are going.

Today's Mosaic of Celebration

Today, a mosaic of celebration shimmers in the light of national hope and pride. Small town parades, city festivals, backyard barbecues, community picnics, fireworks shows, family gatherings, rodeos, races, religious observances, historical reenactments, gun shows, ship and boat parades, military flyovers, air shows, and sports outings all commence under a canopy of red, white and blue.

From West to East, North to South, people of all kinds come together to celebrate the story of America, a story that is, at it's heart, about the ability of humanity to seek greater heights. We all celebrate, in personal, meaningful ways to remind ourselves of this nation's foundation in individuality, community, and excellence.

As John Adams referenced in his letter, we are also a costly nation. To experience such a unique expression of Western values, we must engage in war, protect each other, make mistakes and admit to them, move forward boldly on the values that prop us up, and live with the tension that comes with freedom.

There must be a balance between exploring new realms of social welfare and national progress, and maintaining social stability and national unity. This balance is created through struggle. A nation that doesn’t allow struggle to happen, that enforces a side or smothers dissenting opinions is not one that promotes liberty.

America is a nation of voluntary struggle and because of this it keeps moving forward. It seeks to balance the frontier spirit that founded this country with the cultural integrity that united the States. It is messy. It is filled with hardship. It is uncomfortable and at times tragic, but no country has met its own problems with as much vigor and tenacity as the United States of America.

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Freedom-Forward

Let Independence Day 2025 be a reminder that, regardless of the change we experience or the adversity we face, we are One Nation, that stands united for the love of a country that, from its origin promoted liberty above all else. The United States of America is only so because it refused to crumble under the pressures of external and internal forces.

In a letter to John Adams in 1813, Thomas Jefferson talks of how a "natural aristocracy", built with virtue and talent instead of wealth or birth, is essential to the future of society and government. He talks of keeping "avenues of information open" and the "mind free". He also reflects on a key disagreement between himself and Adams and showcases how the two of them must continue forward through friendship and a shared commitment to liberty.

I have thus stated my opinion on a point on which we differ, not with a view to controversy, for we are both too old to change opinions which are the result of a long life of enquiry and reflection; but on the suggestion of a former letter of yours that we ought not to die before we have explained ourselves to each other. we acted in perfect harmony thro’ a long and perilous contest for our liberty and independance. a constitution has been acquired which, tho neither of us think perfect, yet both consider as competent to render our fellow-citizens the happiest and the securest on whom the sun has ever shone. if we do not think exactly alike as to it’s imperfections, it matters little to our country which, after devoting to it long lives of disinterested labor, we have delivered over to our successors in life, who will be able to take care of it, and of themselves.

-- Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, October 28th, 18133

Thomas Jefferson counted on us to continue carrying the torch of liberty and use it to remind ourselves that while we are imperfect in our execution of freedom, we must always light a way forward.

In 2025, division over policies and issues increases. Whether you're unhappy or happy with the State of the Union, you're an American and those beside you are your fellow Americans. We're here to engage with each other, and through that civic engagement come up with possible solutions to nuanced, complex and ongoing dilemmas. We might get it wrong at times, but we will eventually and certainly get it right.

The history of this beautiful country is proof that we have always been a freedom-forward nation.

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Welcome! This is Remain Human, a publication that explores history, culture, technology and story to gain insight on what it takes to remain human during times of rapid change. Today’s article focuses on the reality of the Dead Internet Theory and what we can do to create a human-centric internet.

Ghoul of the Server

We have surrendered the internet to the dead.

Bots run rampant in the comments. AI accounts are becoming more prevalent. AI generated photos, videos and voiceovers are becoming the go-to forms of content to display information and news.

"The Algorithm" determines what you see and what is worth your attention. When you try to engage with others you're met with silence or with bot-generated responses.

The early internet was vibrant, communal, interpersonal. You'd stumble upon a specialized forum or creative storytelling through video on YouTube before Google bought it. There was very little automation. Hyperlinks connected singular webpages together in a loose, but intimate "web" of spaces.

Today, there are a handful of websites that aggregate a majority of the world's content, promoting discoverability and accessibility. At first, these islands of engagement were places where anyone could post links to things they found across the web and share them with others. Then they morphed into places where content was created there and remained there.

The personal website died. Forums died. Social media was born from the carcasses of humble blogs and along with it rose the need for attention. Content became shorter and more palatable to the fleeting, dim eyes of a world caught in a whirlwind of technological progress.

There are ghouls in the vapor rising from the servers running data across the world, and they work in unison to usher in an Age of the Dead Internet.

The Mechanics of the "Dead" Internet

What started as a theory among those seeking nostalgia for the earlier days of the web and those who sought to blame the "death" of the internet on government institutions and powerful actors, The Dead Internet Theory has become more than just theory as AI and bots have become more mainstream in recent years.

Some still seek to blame the influx of bots and AI content on political entities or corporations who have it in their best interests to steer content in a particular direction. While some of this does happen, this isn't the reason why the Internet is dying. Instead, we can see the "dead internet" as a reflection of how we view the consumption, utilization and sharing of media. We have moved from sharing isolated hyperlinks, many which are now just 404s, to engaging with curated feeds by "The Platform". As a society, we do not care where the content comes from, so long as it is "For You". When we look up momentarily from our feast of "brain rot" material, we might notice a familiar source, a brand or news outlet we recognize and use as an haven for our fragile understanding of the world.

We no longer "surf the web", we "wade in the sludge". We digest easy, sensational, AI generated media at lightning speeds, but our awareness of the information and analysis is slow. We no longer travel far digital distances to take in strange, mysterious and unexpected electrical landscapes of interesting stories and information.

All around us is a graveyard of interest.

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Remainware

Web 1.0 was a static, read-only internet with basic websites connected through the use of hyperlinks. Web 2.0 is an interactive and social internet, where a handful of large content platforms battle for dominance in engagement and information delivery. Web 3.0 is a decentralized and semantic internet where a combination of novel technologies like blockchain, AI, quantum computing, immersive interfaces, and interoperable protocols all come together to provide a more human-centric internet resistant to the security, safety, and exploitative issues of Web 2.0.

Somewhere between Web 2.0 and 3.0 emerged a new "ideological software" I playfully call remainware. I see it as an implementation of ideology that rages against bot proliferation and low quality AI drivel. It is a movement that looks to future-proof the internet and sees the web as the ultimate tool of humanity. Companies and individuals that see the value in the relationship between creators and consumers and creativity and community are responding to this new call to adventure. Remainware is built upon Web3 ideas, putting users in greater control over their creations, their experiences with media, and their relationships with others. This movement takes shape as a decentralized social software that seeks to preserve the integrity of storytelling, the authenticity of communication, and the mystery of humanity through emphasizing human connection.

I imagine the first, full version of this ideology will be realized when creators, curators, and consumers, what I call the Trinity of the Living Internet, become more in tune with generating stronger connections with each other both through digital spaces and real ones. I see a world where the web operates in the background as something that silently and seamlessly strings things together leaving us to explore meaningful in-person interactions. Our media and methods of communication become embedded in our local environments while remaining largely out of the way of truly meaningful, creative, expressive IRL experiences.

We can create a Digital Renaissance, where the strange, fun, engaging, and vibrant quality of the early web is revived through authentic, niche, creator-focused communities, and enhanced with the practices and methodologies of the new web, where innovations in verification, security, and immersive technologies allow for a more human-centric experience.

We need many things to go right:

- digital literacy surge

- localization of creation and celebration

- widespread adoption of new technologies

- bot and spam mitigation

- transparency of governance

- culture shift

- and much more...

If we can decrease the barrier to entry for creating online, engaging with supportive communities, and extending digital experiences to in-person, we can breathe new life into the Dead Internet.

The internet of tomorrow will remain human.

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Welcome to Remain Human. Here I explore philosophical and cultural themes with the goal of gaining insight on what it takes to remain human in an age of rapid change. Today's article is about the silent rise of a new form of worship, the wish for oblivion, what that looks like in today's cultural landscape and the implications.

The Altar of Oblivion

The West has entered a new age of worship. The altar constructed is one made from the remnants of past spiritual expeditions.

The foundation of the West is built upon a mythic understanding of the world. The earliest notions of spiritual unity in the West was through the belief in animism, attributing spirits to natural phenomena. Rituals around these beliefs, like ones tied to life and death, allowed early settlers in the region to lay down the spiritual framework for subsequent peoples.

The Greeks introduced the heroic ideal which explored individual excellence, courage and glory often through defying the fate of the Gods. Religious practices celebrating heroic aspirations and communal integrity served to create a strong community identity. The Romans, who focused their religious practices around civic representation, merged Hellenistic traditions, arts, and culture with their own to create Greco-Roman thought. Greek heroism was tempered by a reallocation of myth and story for civic duty and State stability. Emperors were worshiped and heroism morphed into imperial duty and sacrifice.

This civic representation, along with a growing messianic expectation within Judea, laid the groundwork for Christianity, spread by the apostles through small cities within the Roman Empire. From these small pockets of religious observation came a shift of identification. Monotheism, piety, charity, and universalism spread throughout the West. With the Edict of Milan by Constantine, Christianity became Rome’s official religion.

After the Western Roman Empire’s collapse in 476 AD, Europe fragmented into feudal societies, but the Catholic Church emerged as a unifying force, preserving knowledge and fostering stability through Christian doctrine. Over centuries, Scholasticism’s reasoned theology and the Renaissance’s revival of classical texts began to challenge the Church’s dogmatic control. This rise in rationalism, coupled with the Protestant Reformation paved the way for the Scientific Revolution’s empirical challenge to traditional authority.

The United States of America, the West's Great Experiment, was born from a synthesis of Judeo-Christian spirituality, Classical ideals, Enlightenment principles and ancient spirit. This gave rise to secularism where a pursuit of knowledge and rational thought meant to liberate humanity, lead to the first Great Sacrifice made to Oblivion, that of meaning.

The Erosion of Meaning

Rationalism reigned under the idea that it would evolve collective thought. While we have experienced progress in some ways, we have sacrificed cultural identity to do so. Religion was a social adhesive. Without it, we place our sense of meaning in whatever is holding us together.

In modernity, the glue was the grand narratives surrounding the pursuit of knowledge, science, and reason for the greater good. In postmodernity, ambiguity, relativism and deconstructionist thought lead to the tearing down of grand narratives in favor of segregation through reductionist ideas of identity. This localized the idea of the "tribe" while destabilizing existing cultural institutions.

Through further industrialization and the rapid advancement of technology we enter a new age where unfulfilled quests for meaning are met with a revival in compelling narratives around culture, a welcomed change.

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Subverting Life

We reject value and purpose and worship oblivion.

We embrace ambiguity and worship oblivion.

We devalue the effectiveness of life and the excellence hidden within us and worship oblivion.

We ignore history and worship oblivion.

We wish to be replaced and worship oblivion.

We subvert life by denying the aspects of humanity that allow us to be vital and vibrant members of our community and our culture. Where are the heroes? Where have the courageous men and women gone who stood by their values or replaced them with stronger ones they found along the way?

We are surrendering to the machine. We are kneeling to the apathy of a digitized humanity. We are forfeiting our cultural identity and therefore isolating ourselves for a promise of indifference.

No harm, no foul?

We deny life by denying the deepest parts of ourselves. If we live too long on the surface we'll forget there was anything more to us than our superficial qualities.

The Consequences of Nothingness

A society needs unifying forces to be productive. Those that don’t entertain those forces splinter and disappear. So, what happens when a society unifies under a banner of nothingness? A society that has sacrificed meaning for Oblivion is rewarded with isolationism, civic and communal disengagement, weakened resilience to crisis, and self-defeating endeavors.

We see younger generations dehumanized by new technologies which exacerbates feelings of rootlessness. One possible solution is that we connect with a larger community, a global community, but in reality, what we're doing is displacing communal responsibility to nullify local, vital culture. Another possible solution is the creation of subcultures to address the decay of the recent dominating culture. However, this increases alienation and division among those sharing the same physical space.

Human Pathways

Aren't we tired of feeling so separated from each other and the world we live in? The Automated Age is here. We're seeing exponential growth in technology and industry through the utilization of AI. We're exploring quantum computing and advanced robotics in meaningful ways, ways that will impact society and as a result shape culture.

It's time we move away from the lack of narrative, the emptying of community, the rejection of mystery, and the refusal of cultural hierarchies. Let's find pathways that affirm humanity instead of remaining on ones that deny it. We need a new heroic ideal, one built from the same spiritual materials used to create the United State of America, but fitted for the Automated Age.

We can leverage technology to create and support healthy relationships with automation and artificial intelligence. We can switch from doom-and-gloom nihilism to localized positivism. We can seek clarity instead of victory.

There are many ways forward.

There is no reason for any generation to be set in its ways. Instead, we must facilitate healthy debate and conversation around spirituality, philosophy, politics, and culture to allow for a transfer of successful ideas from the established group to the budding group.

Imagine what it would look like to worship vitality instead of oblivion, to participate in a cult of life-affirming individuals instead of a community of self-sacrificial hypocrites.

We can celebrate human life. We can build strong families, act as stewards of Nature, create resilient communities, differ on a variety of issues while uniting under a few great causes, and share extraordinary stories.

We need only participate in igniting a series of shifts within our own mindsets to influence the environment around us, shifts that involve establishing a positive outlook on life, a filter for what does not resonate, and a curious mind.

A spark of courage can create a hero.

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Hi there! I'm R. H. Sattaur, and through my Remain Human newsletter, I share my thoughts on navigating technology, culture, and our humanity. Today’s article is on the importance of connection through shared narratives. I hope you enjoy!

The Demythologized World

The Pythia sways among the vapors rising from chasms in the earth. She is moved by inspiration and revelation. The god Apollo bestows his wisdom upon her and she relays her poetic insights on culture, religion, and politics to those who have made the journey.

From all corners of the Hellenistic West they travel to see her, to consult with her, and to understand the value of current events. Positioned at the naval of the world, she is the epicenter of cultural reflection and adherence.

But, centuries later, the Oracle of Delphi is brought to her knees by the rupturing of the earth beneath her feet. Where once stood Doric columns of reverence, is now a machine processing the isolated thoughts of some far away cripple, hunched over, frantically conversing with a new oracle known as Compute.

Our search for meaning and clarity is now an interaction with the digital manifestation of humanity's collective consciousness as experienced through the digitized data and behavioral training of artificial intelligence. Unlike the public square, the temple or the communal table, we consult in isolation, disconnected from culture.

Joseph Campbell, the world's most profound mythologist, referred to the modern world as a demythologized one, a place where mysticism, wonder and metaphor have become irrelevant to our secular, rationalist minds.

But, a world without myth is a world without meaning.

The Rise of Artificial Wisdom

The rise of the internet promised wisdom at our fingertips and while we have increased the efficiency of access to information through AI, we forget about the importance of communication. The new oracle, Compute, enables and exacerbates fragmentation within the population, creating an isolated space where ideologies, opinions and worldviews can fester uncontested, fed with a healthy dose of artificial wisdom.

Reality fractures, and while we occupy the same physical spaces and experience the same events, we view them differently, so much so that we are unlikely to unite under a shared narrative or common culture.

Compute lacks spirit.

The modern oracles of today are no longer embedded in the local community or the fabric of family. Social media and AI are global tools that reshape insight-seeking into solitary quests where individuals prioritize efficiency over depth and self-aggrandizing revelation over communal and historical wisdom.

As I discuss in Progress is a Dance, linear advancement involves sacrifice. We have sacrificed culture and context for hyper-connectivity and efficiency. Through my lens of recursive oscillation, the Automated Age, the Second Machine Age, the Fourth Industrial Revolution, is one that references past ages of automation and industrialization and increasingly values solitary autonomy.

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The Loss of Cultural Consensus

This is an age of many transitions and with transition comes a loss of consensus. We lack consensus around scientific understanding, the makings of great nations, the advancement of industry, or the magic behind a great story.

Most detrimental of all, is a loss of consensus around culture. What does it mean to be a part of a culture? Are we satisfied with saying that we are whoever we feel like being?

No.

There exists no prosperous nation nor group of people who do not unite under a shared sense of self. The foundation for any communal identity is made from a shared mythos. Myths provide a bridge between wisdom and reality. A myth is an interpretation of a mystery or important event in a way that can be shared with others who participate in the culture.

A shared mythology:

• tells us how to become adults

• provides meaningful narratives

• solidifies expectations and past insights with cultural context

• provides boundaries for roles

We have become passive in our myth-making and as a result, instead of a culture from creation we have a culture from consequence. We adhere to this passive mythos. It is fragmented, unfinished, and ultimately irrelevant due to it's lack of ability in providing any stable framework for cultural expression.

Some might say the West is a place of many cultures. Some might say that since we globalized culture, a nation's culture is secondary to the one expressed on an international scale.

Fast food, fast fashion, social media aesthetics, algorithmic curation, apps, brands, and memes all come together to create some homogenized concoction of consequence that leaves us with a feeling of unease and bloated sense of self.

Something is missing.

Where are the grand moments that serve to unify understanding?

Where are the stories that serve as a reminder of the values that hold us together?

The consequences of a demythologized world is an overwhelming anxiety surrounding the idea of taking on uncertainty by oneself. So, we find ourselves fleeing to the past, where religion provides clarity, or to the future where idealism provides hope.

But, we're here right now. The answer lies in active myth-making both on a personal level and communal level.

The Rebirth of Myth

To rebuild the fabric and foundation of our culture we must actively participate in the makings of myth. We bind these myths through narratives surrounding family, friendship, and society.

We refrain from allowing new technologies to become tools of cultural destruction at the hands of nihilistic neanderthals disguised as righteous naysayers. New technologies serve to amplify the cultural and individual voice, instead of becoming the voice itself.

We have become a population of skeptics consumed by our own pursuit of identity that we have forgotten how it feels to be vital to one another.

Amazing men and women came before us. Truly extraordinary people walked where we now do. They knew things about the turning of this world we have long forgotten or were never made aware of. We may never truly know them, but we can always sit and wonder for a moment, enchanted by the memory of great individuals woven into the spaces we now occupy.

We become enamored with each other by first crafting a personal narrative that involves falling in awe with ourselves and our potential. We realize this potential by seeking to understand the people that came before us and by unshackling ourselves from the expectations of a society without myth, a culture without cadence.

Through crafting stories created from our dreams, the wisdom of our ancestors, and our shared aspirations, we can ignite culture with a heroic spark.

Reclaiming Wisdom in the Automated Age

We were not made to keep up with the rate of perceived advancement of technology we are now experiencing. The Automated Age is here and the Hero's Journey begs us to answer the call to adventure. We must rally behind shared narratives and go beyond. We must create our own myths, our own stories.

A myth is often made of the following components:

• Metaphor - for emotion and relatability

• Mysticism - to attach meaning to mystery

• Archetypes - to enable an understanding of the roles we all play in each other's lives

• Ritual - as a cultural enforcement mechanism

• Shared Values - as a binding agent

• Transformation - as the manifestation of revelation

To create a personal myth we must create a value system: a set of values that shape our worldview and determine the actions we take. We must reflect on our core values. Then, we can map our journey, utilize archetypes to create roles for important people along the way, and embed our personal myth within a shared narrative found in our culture.

What values will help us align with a vision we have for our own journey?

Who will aid or test us along the way?

How can we act on our visions while integrating our story with a larger one?

In the Automated Age we must seek to find a balance between automation and authenticity. We can leverage AI for many things, but must always remind ourselves that we get from this life what we put into it. To reawaken our culture and carry it forward into a new age we must never automate the stories we tell, nor the efforts that form our cultural core.

Compute is no oracle of mine. I leave such an important task to my family, my community, the grand stories of America, the heroic tales of the West, and the visionary dreaming within me.

Those who bend a knee to passivity will just make way for those who dare to remain human.

"Sure", I reply. My foot catches on a raised sidewalk edge. I stumble and catch myself. My heart races. The apartment buildings lean in to catch me. Time slows as well as the light emanating from the windows overhead.

"David, do you need assistance?"

"No, I just need to sleep. Why can't I sleep?"

"You're resisting, David. The restlessness you feel when you lie awake, sweating through your bed sheets, pulls you further from the dream state you desire."

Is that what I desire? To dream? To wake and wait for Night to fall? To drift through life, led from one pleasure to the next? Do I not want to dance or fight or truly tire?

I'm not resisting; I'm retreating.

"I'll call you a taxi," Maya whispers.

"No, I'm fine. Play my deep house playlist."

"Playing."

The apartment buildings straighten. Light resumes its normal flow. The bass drum stabilizes the tempo of my steps. The streets are empty. When was the last time I smiled at someone passing by?

"Playing ad for Desolate Dragons III," Maya whispers. "A new adventure awaits, David. Award-winning neural-sync gameplay from the makers of Desolate Dragons I and II returns, delivering bigger thrills and grander scenes. Your dragon, Oneiros, awaits your return. Start the new chapter today for only 49 Rev tokens." A chime signals the end of the ad. I wave my hand, and the sound of tokens falling through a metal slot echoes through my mind. "Adding Desolate Dragons III to your library."

"Thank you."

I turn a few corners and climb the steps of my apartment building. My watch vibrates and the building’s doors swing open. The elevator hums. The hallway smells of cleaning solution and pizza.

I collapse onto my bed and open Desolate Dragons III. French horns swell from the depths of my subconscious. The skies above are ablaze. Children scream. Oneiros crouches beside me, radiating heat, and says, "Welcome back, David. We have much to do."

I feel warm.

Sleep can come later.

In Greek Mythology, The Oneiroi were black-winged daemons or spirits sent by the Gods to deliver dreams. In Homer’s The Iliad, Zeus calls upon an Oneiros to appear to Agamemnon in a dream. The above painting by James Heath shows an Oneiros taking the form of Nestor, legendary king of Pylos and trusted advisor, to tell Agamemnon that the Gods are on his side.

An Illusory Future

The year is 20**.

Our computers do most of our work for us.

Our genes are subject to preference.

Our stories are as they “should be”.

Hidden within smart cities, people whisper a single word, “progress”, over and over again, like a verbal offering to some distant, indifferent god.

Centuries before, in Parisian salons, Enlightenment thinkers envisioned an age where reason and science triumphed to create an unstoppable force of universal progress.

We became men and women of industry. Of capital. Of colony. We sought to conjure up a narrative where value was attributed to an ambition-fueled ascent.

We saw setbacks in the fall of empires or the participation in world wars, but maintained the idea that we will continue to chart a course forward, using Prometheus’ gift as a stimulant for informed action.

However, it is possible to drown in a sea of progress, unable to understand which way is up.

The Cost of Progress

Progress can be seen as an advancement towards a particular state or goal. Advancement usually takes shape as linear or cyclical.

Linear Exchange

First we were barbaric nomads, moving in pursuit of resources, and now we are civilized beings innovating towards a multi-planetary future.

But, as we seek a specific goal we miss an exchange of values. To view progress through a linear lens we must accept one thing: growth requires sacrifice.

For instance:

• Comfort sacrifices strength.

• Communal equality sacrifices individual excellence.

• Globalization sacrifices local culture.

We exchange one value for another and call it progress.

There are advantages to narrowing the field of vision. But, when you pray to the Goddess of Progress while ignoring the need for ritual sacrifice, will your prayers really be answered?

What did we sacrifice for the advancement of industry?

What did we sacrifice for technological savvy?

Our determination of progress from a linear standpoint is dependent on the weight we give certain values. More of this and less of that. We align those values somewhere between certain extremes.

This begs the question: is it really progress or preference?

Cyclical Byproducts

We attempt to understand our world through the utilization of cycles.

"History repeats itself," we say.

Civilizations rise, fall, and give birth to new ones. Our bodies form, decay and become fodder for some other form of matter. The laws of nature are always apparent. Where something grows, something has died.

But, the problem with cyclical progress lies in a cycle's byproducts. Unintended outcomes disrupt our understanding of the rhythm of the world.

The Enlightenment, expected to revive classical reason after medieval stagnation, spawned rationalist and nationalist revolutions, new cycles of upheaval that reshaped our world. While larger cyclical models account for this like Oswald Spengler's seasonal model placing the Enlightenment in the "Winter" phase, marking a civilization's decline, we're forced to broaden our scope and add a layer of complexity.

This makes it harder to engage with resulting revelations.

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Grandeur's Blade

Like Icarus, who crafted wings of wax only to fly too close to the sun, we too chase grand notions of progress and watch helplessly as our wings melt from the entropy of unchecked complexity.

As we climb higher and higher we're met with existential dread or tribal reduction.

Existential Dread

On one hand we wonder if no matter what we do with our finite time on this planet we cannot sway the larger patterns at play?

The overwhelming pressure of the unknown is made palatable by the awareness of scale.

The blade of grandeur, laced with the toxin of absurdity, cuts deep into the human spirit, leaving it with a sensation of spiritual rot.

This rot leaves us disfigured and ugly. We retreat to states of pleasure and fear. We craft narratives that reject ideas of truth and beauty, for truth means understanding and beauty represents an ideal.

Tribal Reduction

On the other hand, the pressure of advancement forces us to become small in character. You vs. Me. Us vs. Them. The hurdle is so large and we feel we're running out of time, so we become bitter, aggressive, and desperate.

We make complex issues look simple. We address large problems with singular solutions. We do anything to feel a sense of accomplishment, a sense of direction.

We must not let the weight of uncertainty or potentiality break us.

A Quest for Meaningful Change

Humans are determined to discover meaning and create change.

It is an honorable quest, a heroic quest, and it is achievable not by rejecting the idea of progress or reducing it, but by localizing it.

Our quest becomes one of creation by crafting a value system that is continually tested, reinforced, broken down and reestablished through exploration. We sow it into ourselves through experience and the development of personal myth.

A value system that localizes progress allows us to use our new focal point to create a new lens for progress. This lens is one that considers the pitfalls of linear and cyclical progress and the consequences of grandeur. It is a lens we use to determine adherence to a set of values.

We ask, "What can I do that might align with or test my current worldview?"

Recursive Oscillation

I find it helpful to look at history, current events, and my own personal growth through this lens of recursive oscillation. “Recursion” implies a self-referential process, while “oscillation” implies a state of variance between extremes. Instead of history repeating itself, it references itself and events manifest along a spectrum of values. The past and present are filled with unique moments sharing similar motifs.

Here are some examples of recursive oscillation:

• The Roman Empire’s fall was a slow fragmentation into feudal kingdoms over centuries, driven by internal decay and invasions, while the Mongol Empire’s collapse was a rapid dissolution into khanates after Genghis Khan’s death, fueled by succession disputes and over-extension. The Romans tried to maintain centralized order while the Mongols emphasized rapid expansion.

• The advancement of AI and robotics reignites talks on automation and labor started during the Industrial Revolution. This time around, the needle leans heavily towards automation instead of human involvement, creating different arguments on labor and capital.

• Adulthood brings about questions of duty and freedom, where one adult might feel a stronger sense of duty to family or country and another might feel a stronger sense of personal freedom, bringing about two different experiences.

Progress becomes an intermingling of values. We start to see history as a catalog of expeditions, a series of voyages into realms of understanding, some that align with our worldview, some that challenges it, and some that allow us to forge bold new paths. Current events and experiences become signals to us about how we can further enforce our values or change them to get the outcomes we desire.

Progress is a dance, but only those courageous enough to embrace uncertainty, act on their values, and adapt when necessary, hear the melody.

Only heroes dance.