This is the one feels most plausible and most imminent. Some argue that it has already begun, that our shared reality is like shards of a broken mirror, with each piece showing something slightly askew and none capturing the whole.
What will we do when we can no longer believe what we see? When everything can be plausibly…
This is the one feels most plausible and most imminent. Some argue that it has already begun, that our shared reality is like shards of a broken mirror, with each piece showing something slightly askew and none capturing the whole.
What will we do when we can no longer believe what we see? When everything can be plausibly denied? When every image, video, and audio clip becomes a political Rorschach test in which whatever disconfirms one’s beliefs can be claimed to be a deepfake?
The cryptographic “watermarking” that Andreessen suggests will escalate an expensive arms race for “truth” and naturally centralize the production of verified reality into a few companies rich enough to wage the war. These are Andreessen’s Bootleggers. Their profits will rely on an information landscape of blurred fact and fiction, and may in fact work to ensure that everything outside of their walled gardens is as incoherent as possible.
Kingsnorth offers a greenshoot of hope here, to be of a place, to commit to it, to build a community there and to conduct as much of your life in real time, in real space, and out of the seductive glow of the Machine.
Great post, your last bit about community is so true. I have told my kids just connect to your community, live in reality and love in real time. That’s humans that’s real.
Andreesen is a "bootlegger". It's the design of his meaningless life he fell into. That's why he wrote the self-serving essay. Scott Adams captured him when it happened, a lowly programmer for a browser, who had wheelbarrows of money dumped on him through no fault of his own. It made Andreesen believe he was brilliant and sycophants surround such people to prop it up.
For my part, I used to spend hours researching and refuting stupid things my "friends" were saying on the Internet, but I learned that every time they were presented with an alternative set of "facts" they disappeared from the contest but would later go on to repeat more lies. They refused to do the work I was doing to challenge the garbage they happily ingested and regurgitated.
As a result, I decided that since almost everything the news is a lie, then any alternative perspective is likely closer to the truth. It became a lot easier to respond to the likes of our very own Comprof by just outing him as a liar rather than putting in the effort to prove it to him, which he doesn't accept anyway. I honestly don't know what the truth is because I have to believe someone if I want to stay engaged, but I think I know who not to believe, and that's a start. Some day I will die and none of it will concern me anymore.
Reality Collapse:
This is the one feels most plausible and most imminent. Some argue that it has already begun, that our shared reality is like shards of a broken mirror, with each piece showing something slightly askew and none capturing the whole.
What will we do when we can no longer believe what we see? When everything can be plausibly denied? When every image, video, and audio clip becomes a political Rorschach test in which whatever disconfirms one’s beliefs can be claimed to be a deepfake?
The cryptographic “watermarking” that Andreessen suggests will escalate an expensive arms race for “truth” and naturally centralize the production of verified reality into a few companies rich enough to wage the war. These are Andreessen’s Bootleggers. Their profits will rely on an information landscape of blurred fact and fiction, and may in fact work to ensure that everything outside of their walled gardens is as incoherent as possible.
Kingsnorth offers a greenshoot of hope here, to be of a place, to commit to it, to build a community there and to conduct as much of your life in real time, in real space, and out of the seductive glow of the Machine.
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I explore these issues a little deeper here:
https://open.substack.com/pub/corsonfinnerty/p/the-age-of-disbelief
Great post, your last bit about community is so true. I have told my kids just connect to your community, live in reality and love in real time. That’s humans that’s real.
Andreesen is a "bootlegger". It's the design of his meaningless life he fell into. That's why he wrote the self-serving essay. Scott Adams captured him when it happened, a lowly programmer for a browser, who had wheelbarrows of money dumped on him through no fault of his own. It made Andreesen believe he was brilliant and sycophants surround such people to prop it up.
For my part, I used to spend hours researching and refuting stupid things my "friends" were saying on the Internet, but I learned that every time they were presented with an alternative set of "facts" they disappeared from the contest but would later go on to repeat more lies. They refused to do the work I was doing to challenge the garbage they happily ingested and regurgitated.
As a result, I decided that since almost everything the news is a lie, then any alternative perspective is likely closer to the truth. It became a lot easier to respond to the likes of our very own Comprof by just outing him as a liar rather than putting in the effort to prove it to him, which he doesn't accept anyway. I honestly don't know what the truth is because I have to believe someone if I want to stay engaged, but I think I know who not to believe, and that's a start. Some day I will die and none of it will concern me anymore.
No death yet please you so sensible stay as long as possible on earth even if it’s just to irritate those idiotic friends!
Interesting, didn’t know that backstory