On: Revolt of the Public

Episode: N/A

Date: May 25, 2020

Background: Author and former CIA analyst.

Key Takeaways:

• More information = more uncertainty.
  • Previous sources of false sense of certainty lose credibility (institutions, people).
• More complexity = easier to break than to fix.
  • Easier to figure out what you are against, than what you are for.
  • Easier to break the system down, than to figure out how to fix it.
• De-scale = shorter time scale = experimentation = clearer feedback.
  • Pursue certainty through trial and error.
  • Replicate success, avoid spread of failure.

Key Subjects:

• Industrial age: stable institutions and authority.
  • Hierarchies formed that were in line with social and political environment.
  • Power structure relied on a monopoly of information.
  • Credibility of experts was high.
    • Predictions went largely unchallenged.
    • Nobody had the ability to talk back credibly.
  • [More cohesive population, controlled mass communication channels].
• Current age: stability of institutions and authority under attack.
  • Loss of information monopoly.
    • Information revolution started around 2001, 2002 (Internet).
      • Provided people with alternative information source.
    • Credibility of experts started to suffer.
      • (Bad) predictions more easily and credibly challenged.
      • May tilt balance towards distrust of experts.
  • Increased awareness of elite behavior (transparency).
    • Before: elite behaves/are thought to behave according to a higher moral code.
    • Now: elite behaves like everyone else (or worse).
• Nihilism: less interest in ideologies.
  • Fractured society: loss of general societal cohesion.
    • Small world: people have lost many of their communities (church, family, locality, etc.)
    • Big world: people are more incentivized (at least on social media) to polarize (shout to get attention).
  • No vision, no solutions.
    • It’s easier to focus on what you are against than what you are for.
    • Tactical freeze: there is nothing to negotiate about (you can’t offer any alternatives).
    • [Coming up with a solution is too difficult.]
    • [Figuring out how to intervene in complex systems is too difficult.]
    • [See also “Complexity — David Krakauer, Part 6“].
  • No solutions -> destruction becomes the only viable option.
    • It’s not: and therefore give me this.
    • It’s: and therefor you have to go (try something, anything, different).
  • Desire to purify, cleanse.
• Need to de-scale.
  • Distance.
    • Frustration with lack of impact.
    • Too many layers of bureaucracy.
  • Return to the personal sphere.
    • Information and decisions are more closely linked.
    • Acknowledge that route to certainty is through trial and error.
    • Success can be perceived and replicated.
    • Failure does not implicate the entire system.