So glad I found this channel! Just subscribed! I'm trying to change my feed to be a bit more hopeful and proactive about the future, rather than so sad and reactionary. Thank you for your content!
Hi, thank you, so glad to hear that as it is exactly the vibe I'm aiming at. I think it's the approach we need to take if we're going to get through all this together into a decent future. We've got to aim higher than just hoping to survive.
Dear Go Meta, thank you for the video! I totally agree that to look for the origin of the polycrisis should be a priority today, and I also agree the problem is - at least in part - philosophical. Best wishes, Arthur
I think we have a fairly similar background, coming from math, and I have also been trying to understand the current issues we face in an 'eclectic' kind of way, like you put it towards the end of the video lol. Thanks for the upload! Looking forward to more videos. I definitely see many of the crises you listed in the introduction as related and coming from the same root causes, but I think the problems ultimately giving us many of these crises are local and based around individuals. For example, wars + rising inequality I think are due largely to tribalist thinking, and this has taken over recently (and throughout history) for two main reasons I think: 1) A lack of empathy and 2) the difficulties in both understanding and communicating meaning, especially complex ideas and events involving a large number of people (even within the same society). I think these have always existed, and I believe will be present in any system, but modern technology is pushing it further. Personally, I believe the optimal thing a government could do here is to invest in and fix public education. To make sure that children are shown good examples, so that we can foster that empathy that is needed to actually care enough to address say, the homelessness crisis or the issues of inequality on a societal level. If we can do that on a large scale and consistently, I believe human ingenuity can lead the rest of way to solutions for other problems, like climate change issues, AI challenges, etc.
Hi, I agree with the link to individual psychology and indeed the idea that education is a crucial aspect of what we need to improve in order to get us out of this mess. I have a few videos planned that are about education in the age of AI, as I think that now, more than ever, there is a need to champion education as a necessary, social good for healthy democracies, rather than just seeing it as a way to skill up the next generation of workers. And I agree that we need to foster a culture of empathy and solidarity with others. I used to lean heavily towards technological determinism, but for the last decade or so it's become clearer to me that while of course we need better technology, that's the relatively easy part. The hard part is having a healthy culture that chooses to do good things with our technology so that we build a healthy, sustainable society. Thanks for your comment, and I'm glad you've found my channel!
Collective sensemaking is absolutely possible when people meet. Online, it seems as if this idea is absurd in itself. Great channel! Thank you very much!
Thank you! I obviously hope that there is some level of shared sensemaking that can also be done though videos and discussions like these. So, I hope that wish doesn't sound too absurd 🙂 We've all got to chip into these conversations and at least online it can be done globally and asynchronously!
@@Go-Meta I am completely with you! Background: When I watch online discussions with large numbers of participants, I'm always reminded of the SNL skit with the bartender who has a group of friends at the bar arguing about something. Whenever they're about to go home, the bartender throws in a "controversial" line, which leads to the friends continuing to argue and ordering another beer. I see short, vague comments like this all the time. I think if a person had something to say, they would want to make some sort of specific point if they are going to take the time to comment at all. Such comments could be totally automated, which increases engagement and distorts the discussion.
Thanks for mentioning the near-death of nuance in public discourse. I believe this needs more attention but funnily enough I don't hear a lot of people talking about it. I just discovered your channel via an 8-month-old video about Moloch. You've got yourself a new subscriber. Thanks for your work!
Yup, far too many discussions of complex issues are structured as if you have to pick one extreme or the other; or insisting that you can't have slightly different views in subtly different contexts. I used to be worried that Neil Postman's analysis in "Amusing Ourselves to Death" was fully correct in identifying a trend of ever shorter, simpler forms of discourse becoming the norm. Now I take some comfort in the rise in long form podcasts and videos as demonstrating that there is a growing audience of people around the world who want to delve deeper. So, I am quietly optimistic about the possibility of growing an ever larger culture of quality public discourse. The question is whether this interest in quality discourse can grow large enough to have serious impacts on our politics. My hope is that the more of us get involved in such discussions, the more chance there is of reaching that aspirational goal. And, thank you for your comments, I really appreciate the feedback and the discussion!
Universal Basic Services seems more sensible than UBI. It's not necessarily dependent on a financial system resembling our current one. And I don't think it's too far-fetched to imagine a shift in cultural values to include some more of life's essentials as fundamental human rights. Surely we can agree to collaborate enough to provide everyone with basic essentials. I suggest that include at least shelter, water, food and simple healthcare.
Yeah, it is interesting to think about the longer term places that our political economy will evolve to, but I guess I'm always also trying to think of the route from here to there. So I think some form of money (and indeed property ownership - so basics of capitalism) are likely to remain in place for quite a while, the question is how to evolve these steps wise towards a new paradigm. Here I certainly agree that a risk around the idea of UBI is that there are many who see it as a replacement for Universal Basic Services, rather than as an addition! I also am very curious about the various different ways that something a little like UBI could be introduced, because I think the detail will matter a lot in terms of how it impacts the political economy. I'm hoping to put some videos together about these sorts of ideas 'soon' 😀
Just want to say that though I’m not coming from a math background, I resonated with this point of view and had a similar appraisal developing independently. Perhaps converging on a truth?
Problematique was what the Club of Rome called it. We should have listened to Donella Meadows in 1972 when overshoot was just starting at half our current population and ⅓ of energy use.
Last year I read "Limits and Beyond", the book of various people's reflections on "Limits to Growth" 50 year later. Was a sobering, but interesting read. I intend to do a book review video about it someday 'soon' .... not nearly enough time in each day! :-)
@@Go-Meta I listened to a podcast with historical sound bites on how the Limits to Growth study was dismissed toot sweet. William Canton Jr.'s book "Overshoot" really kicked the hoping right out of my bloodstream. Thermodynamic laws can't be litigated in court. Global industrial civilization is going to crash hard and we are helpless to slow it, mitigate it or choose a less harmful path until it kills a lot of us. We won't agree to cooperate or plan because our myths have us trapped.
Where is channel "Fall of Civilizations" and they made video about The Assyrians, where they read letter from child to mother, which was written on clay tablet in cuneiform, and what it show, that people don't change in they behaviours in few millennia which passed. Technology change, but not humans. I think to change it, we should learn about psychology in schools, and not about what it is, but what we are. So as society we could become better, not driven mainly by impulses, as animals. EDIT (after 6:23) I think is about learning, not to know, but to can do it, about delay reward which can be bigger than instant reward. But it is fight between instincts and intellect, and we can't assume that somehow it happen, we must learn people so they could do it. And please stop learning them that money are most important, because when we ending with Warren Buffett which have billions and don't even investing in health to make his life better, because he don't even think about how to use money, but how to have more money, which is stupid IMO. (but using money without saving is same or even worst, but this is lack of aiming for long term rewards)
About democracy... it becoming idiocracy, when people with most votes wins, and most of people are not thinking long term... and is even worst than this, because new law is for this most people, so with each generation where is more of less thinking people, because environment is making them possible, and our body and brain is lazy. One other thing is demographic, when most votes are from old people, they would vote for people which making they life better, and they don't care about young (not until you make them think about it, and even then they are blind by own imagination). Where is video which show mathematically that if we only focus on our benefits, democracy can lead to worst law for all. And there are few on "Economics Explained" about problem with voting demographic and similar problems. About psychology is part too, because our brain is trying to make our ego happy, so if we don't put energy in thinking about stuff, it will lie to use to make us happy, that our ideas are great. And this is easy see in even investing, where inteligent people are making stupid decision because they can't change they believes base on facts. Where are billionaires which become millionaires because they couldn't accept they are wrong.
I agree that we need to better understand human psychology. I used to think that new technology was the biggest part of what we needed to do, but increasingly I think the cultural changes are more important. But, we have learned a lot about psychology since the Assyrians were around, but we haven't yet properly integrated this learning into our culture. I also, certainly agree that money is not what is most important, but the dynamics of our political economy is partly driven by the logic of how our money works. If we don't try to shift this logic to a better one, then it will continue to have negative impacts on the psychology of our culture. And, thanks for sharing your thoughts here 👍
To not make many comments and edit one, I put it here. 8:50 about our wasteful economy I see two good change to made: 1) extend warranty (free repairs) for products basing on average time of use. And it could be change each year by year, so for smartphones it would not change much, few years max but for cars it would change a lot, as for household appliances: refrigerators, washing machines, etc. Which would reduce wast, and encourage producers to make better one, of course it would collapse some sells, because people would not change as often, but this is good for whole economy, because people will use this money on things which are need to be replace. 2) cost of garbage, for example company making plastic bottles and sell them to consumers (I think it may be good to limit it to consumers sells, not between companies, or as VAT can be transfer), so they must buy back same amount of bottles they made, or pay for environmental damage they making, which could be use as money for recycling. Why this way? Because I think is best thing to leave implementation to market, but put frames which lead them in good direction. And maybe it would be good to put max age for politics, because as young don't have knowledge about life, old one don't have knowledge about today world. And with avg age going up, and technology progressing faster it becoming big problem (yeah, question by congress why TikTok is using wifi...)
As I would like UBI, I think it would make people lazy, and long term it would collapse our civilization. And crypto don't solving any problem, because it only change how you validate money value, not what it dose (and I ignoring a lot other problems). Centralized system will be always more efficient. What we should think about is what with people which don't give any benefits to society and they taking from it? What robots make more by less, do mean that we should lose potential great inventors to lazy life? I would prefer pointless job which are required to get money, and maybe not pointless but which work more as schools than doing real work? I didn't think about it deeply yet.
@@Go-Meta as I said, focusing people on money, is wrong way (IMO). Because money should be representative of value, so goal should be how to create more value, but not money. This is why whole financial/banking sector is something wrong, because they are needed, but they should not made so much profit, because they don't create as much value, but because they are so close to money, they can force they way. And banking system in USA is one of the worst on Earth... But I don't think is something should be focus for this topic, because as is wasteful and other all bad for society, it is not main problem, but I may be wrong. And in computer era, I don't see reason why my transfer should take more than few seconds, and this should be regulated, enforce on banks to create systems which all this, because they don't doing it only because they making more money this way (money in transfer are not on account, but they have it, so may do full profit on them)
I’m binging your videos now. I’ve got a TikTok account with about 40k followers and I want to start posting clips from great videos. Do I have permission to post your videos? I will, ofcourse, link people to your account and give credit!
@@Go-Metai do wish you the best of luck in that regard but i actually meant good luck in finding an answer to the metacrisis. i've listened bostrom, schmachtenberger, harris and yudkowsky talk about it, but even their megabrains can't come up with a satisfying answer, which is obviously quite concerning 😐
@@optimusprimevil1646 yeah, I know what you mean. To me the most concerning aspect of all this is that if you read books from 20 or 50 years ago (and more!) people were worried about similar things and proposing ways to improve society and improve our long term trajectory - but they were largely ignored. So, the tough question is: even with great ideas, why will society change this time! But, giving up on trying is not an option. These current decades are when humanity will discover if we really can be collectively wise or not! And, yup, better answers to the tough questions is definitely one part of what is needed.
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
So glad I found this channel! Just subscribed! I'm trying to change my feed to be a bit more hopeful and proactive about the future, rather than so sad and reactionary. Thank you for your content!
Hi, thank you, so glad to hear that as it is exactly the vibe I'm aiming at. I think it's the approach we need to take if we're going to get through all this together into a decent future. We've got to aim higher than just hoping to survive.
Dear Go Meta, thank you for the video! I totally agree that to look for the origin of the polycrisis should be a priority today, and I also agree the problem is - at least in part - philosophical. Best wishes, Arthur
Glad you enjoyed it!
I think we have a fairly similar background, coming from math, and I have also been trying to understand the current issues we face in an 'eclectic' kind of way, like you put it towards the end of the video lol. Thanks for the upload! Looking forward to more videos.
I definitely see many of the crises you listed in the introduction as related and coming from the same root causes, but I think the problems ultimately giving us many of these crises are local and based around individuals. For example, wars + rising inequality I think are due largely to tribalist thinking, and this has taken over recently (and throughout history) for two main reasons I think: 1) A lack of empathy and 2) the difficulties in both understanding and communicating meaning, especially complex ideas and events involving a large number of people (even within the same society). I think these have always existed, and I believe will be present in any system, but modern technology is pushing it further.
Personally, I believe the optimal thing a government could do here is to invest in and fix public education. To make sure that children are shown good examples, so that we can foster that empathy that is needed to actually care enough to address say, the homelessness crisis or the issues of inequality on a societal level. If we can do that on a large scale and consistently, I believe human ingenuity can lead the rest of way to solutions for other problems, like climate change issues, AI challenges, etc.
Hi, I agree with the link to individual psychology and indeed the idea that education is a crucial aspect of what we need to improve in order to get us out of this mess. I have a few videos planned that are about education in the age of AI, as I think that now, more than ever, there is a need to champion education as a necessary, social good for healthy democracies, rather than just seeing it as a way to skill up the next generation of workers.
And I agree that we need to foster a culture of empathy and solidarity with others. I used to lean heavily towards technological determinism, but for the last decade or so it's become clearer to me that while of course we need better technology, that's the relatively easy part. The hard part is having a healthy culture that chooses to do good things with our technology so that we build a healthy, sustainable society.
Thanks for your comment, and I'm glad you've found my channel!
Hi Oli - just wanted to say that I am enjoying your videos and your exploration of the challenges we face now and in the future.
Collective sensemaking is absolutely possible when people meet. Online, it seems as if this idea is absurd in itself. Great channel! Thank you very much!
Thank you!
I obviously hope that there is some level of shared sensemaking that can also be done though videos and discussions like these. So, I hope that wish doesn't sound too absurd 🙂 We've all got to chip into these conversations and at least online it can be done globally and asynchronously!
@@Go-Meta I am completely with you! Background: When I watch online discussions with large numbers of participants, I'm always reminded of the SNL skit with the bartender who has a group of friends at the bar arguing about something. Whenever they're about to go home, the bartender throws in a "controversial" line, which leads to the friends continuing to argue and ordering another beer. I see short, vague comments like this all the time. I think if a person had something to say, they would want to make some sort of specific point if they are going to take the time to comment at all. Such comments could be totally automated, which increases engagement and distorts the discussion.
Thanks for mentioning the near-death of nuance in public discourse. I believe this needs more attention but funnily enough I don't hear a lot of people talking about it.
I just discovered your channel via an 8-month-old video about Moloch. You've got yourself a new subscriber. Thanks for your work!
Yup, far too many discussions of complex issues are structured as if you have to pick one extreme or the other; or insisting that you can't have slightly different views in subtly different contexts. I used to be worried that Neil Postman's analysis in "Amusing Ourselves to Death" was fully correct in identifying a trend of ever shorter, simpler forms of discourse becoming the norm. Now I take some comfort in the rise in long form podcasts and videos as demonstrating that there is a growing audience of people around the world who want to delve deeper. So, I am quietly optimistic about the possibility of growing an ever larger culture of quality public discourse. The question is whether this interest in quality discourse can grow large enough to have serious impacts on our politics. My hope is that the more of us get involved in such discussions, the more chance there is of reaching that aspirational goal.
And, thank you for your comments, I really appreciate the feedback and the discussion!
Universal Basic Services seems more sensible than UBI. It's not necessarily dependent on a financial system resembling our current one. And I don't think it's too far-fetched to imagine a shift in cultural values to include some more of life's essentials as fundamental human rights. Surely we can agree to collaborate enough to provide everyone with basic essentials. I suggest that include at least shelter, water, food and simple healthcare.
Yeah, it is interesting to think about the longer term places that our political economy will evolve to, but I guess I'm always also trying to think of the route from here to there. So I think some form of money (and indeed property ownership - so basics of capitalism) are likely to remain in place for quite a while, the question is how to evolve these steps wise towards a new paradigm. Here I certainly agree that a risk around the idea of UBI is that there are many who see it as a replacement for Universal Basic Services, rather than as an addition! I also am very curious about the various different ways that something a little like UBI could be introduced, because I think the detail will matter a lot in terms of how it impacts the political economy. I'm hoping to put some videos together about these sorts of ideas 'soon' 😀
Just want to say that though I’m not coming from a math background, I resonated with this point of view and had a similar appraisal developing independently. Perhaps converging on a truth?
Not just plastering over the symptoms... daniel woulda loooved what you convey in this here fine video, i do believe good sir. Tremendous video.
Thank you! That's really lovely feedback, thanks!
Problematique was what the Club of Rome called it. We should have listened to Donella Meadows in 1972 when overshoot was just starting at half our current population and ⅓ of energy use.
You may not have to live in Fortress world as the troglodytes will kill you for a can of tuna.
Last year I read "Limits and Beyond", the book of various people's reflections on "Limits to Growth" 50 year later. Was a sobering, but interesting read. I intend to do a book review video about it someday 'soon' .... not nearly enough time in each day! :-)
😬 ... hope not!
@@Go-Meta I listened to a podcast with historical sound bites on how the Limits to Growth study was dismissed toot sweet. William Canton Jr.'s book "Overshoot" really kicked the hoping right out of my bloodstream. Thermodynamic laws can't be litigated in court. Global industrial civilization is going to crash hard and we are helpless to slow it, mitigate it or choose a less harmful path until it kills a lot of us. We won't agree to cooperate or plan because our myths have us trapped.
Where is channel "Fall of Civilizations" and they made video about The Assyrians, where they read letter from child to mother, which was written on clay tablet in cuneiform, and what it show, that people don't change in they behaviours in few millennia which passed. Technology change, but not humans. I think to change it, we should learn about psychology in schools, and not about what it is, but what we are. So as society we could become better, not driven mainly by impulses, as animals.
EDIT (after 6:23) I think is about learning, not to know, but to can do it, about delay reward which can be bigger than instant reward. But it is fight between instincts and intellect, and we can't assume that somehow it happen, we must learn people so they could do it. And please stop learning them that money are most important, because when we ending with Warren Buffett which have billions and don't even investing in health to make his life better, because he don't even think about how to use money, but how to have more money, which is stupid IMO. (but using money without saving is same or even worst, but this is lack of aiming for long term rewards)
About democracy... it becoming idiocracy, when people with most votes wins, and most of people are not thinking long term... and is even worst than this, because new law is for this most people, so with each generation where is more of less thinking people, because environment is making them possible, and our body and brain is lazy.
One other thing is demographic, when most votes are from old people, they would vote for people which making they life better, and they don't care about young (not until you make them think about it, and even then they are blind by own imagination). Where is video which show mathematically that if we only focus on our benefits, democracy can lead to worst law for all. And there are few on "Economics Explained" about problem with voting demographic and similar problems.
About psychology is part too, because our brain is trying to make our ego happy, so if we don't put energy in thinking about stuff, it will lie to use to make us happy, that our ideas are great. And this is easy see in even investing, where inteligent people are making stupid decision because they can't change they believes base on facts. Where are billionaires which become millionaires because they couldn't accept they are wrong.
I agree that we need to better understand human psychology. I used to think that new technology was the biggest part of what we needed to do, but increasingly I think the cultural changes are more important. But, we have learned a lot about psychology since the Assyrians were around, but we haven't yet properly integrated this learning into our culture. I also, certainly agree that money is not what is most important, but the dynamics of our political economy is partly driven by the logic of how our money works. If we don't try to shift this logic to a better one, then it will continue to have negative impacts on the psychology of our culture.
And, thanks for sharing your thoughts here 👍
To not make many comments and edit one, I put it here. 8:50 about our wasteful economy I see two good change to made:
1) extend warranty (free repairs) for products basing on average time of use. And it could be change each year by year, so for smartphones it would not change much, few years max but for cars it would change a lot, as for household appliances: refrigerators, washing machines, etc. Which would reduce wast, and encourage producers to make better one, of course it would collapse some sells, because people would not change as often, but this is good for whole economy, because people will use this money on things which are need to be replace.
2) cost of garbage, for example company making plastic bottles and sell them to consumers (I think it may be good to limit it to consumers sells, not between companies, or as VAT can be transfer), so they must buy back same amount of bottles they made, or pay for environmental damage they making, which could be use as money for recycling.
Why this way? Because I think is best thing to leave implementation to market, but put frames which lead them in good direction.
And maybe it would be good to put max age for politics, because as young don't have knowledge about life, old one don't have knowledge about today world. And with avg age going up, and technology progressing faster it becoming big problem (yeah, question by congress why TikTok is using wifi...)
As I would like UBI, I think it would make people lazy, and long term it would collapse our civilization. And crypto don't solving any problem, because it only change how you validate money value, not what it dose (and I ignoring a lot other problems). Centralized system will be always more efficient.
What we should think about is what with people which don't give any benefits to society and they taking from it? What robots make more by less, do mean that we should lose potential great inventors to lazy life? I would prefer pointless job which are required to get money, and maybe not pointless but which work more as schools than doing real work? I didn't think about it deeply yet.
@@Go-Meta as I said, focusing people on money, is wrong way (IMO). Because money should be representative of value, so goal should be how to create more value, but not money. This is why whole financial/banking sector is something wrong, because they are needed, but they should not made so much profit, because they don't create as much value, but because they are so close to money, they can force they way. And banking system in USA is one of the worst on Earth... But I don't think is something should be focus for this topic, because as is wasteful and other all bad for society, it is not main problem, but I may be wrong. And in computer era, I don't see reason why my transfer should take more than few seconds, and this should be regulated, enforce on banks to create systems which all this, because they don't doing it only because they making more money this way (money in transfer are not on account, but they have it, so may do full profit on them)
I’m binging your videos now. I’ve got a TikTok account with about 40k followers and I want to start posting clips from great videos. Do I have permission to post your videos? I will, ofcourse, link people to your account and give credit!
Yes, that would be fantastic! Thank you!
good luck dude
Thank you! It's been ages since I've had the chance to make a new video, life gets busy! But hopefully soon 🙂
@@Go-Metai do wish you the best of luck in that regard but i actually meant good luck in finding an answer to the metacrisis. i've listened bostrom, schmachtenberger, harris and yudkowsky talk about it, but even their megabrains can't come up with a satisfying answer, which is obviously quite concerning 😐
@@optimusprimevil1646 yeah, I know what you mean. To me the most concerning aspect of all this is that if you read books from 20 or 50 years ago (and more!) people were worried about similar things and proposing ways to improve society and improve our long term trajectory - but they were largely ignored. So, the tough question is: even with great ideas, why will society change this time!
But, giving up on trying is not an option.
These current decades are when humanity will discover if we really can be collectively wise or not!
And, yup, better answers to the tough questions is definitely one part of what is needed.