Welcome to the start of the next 100 episodes. In this inaugural episode of season 2, Tom and I discuss the context of how the practices and attitudes from 20th century history have led to this moment. These include the Cold War, advertising, debt, the internet and unsustainable, wasteful power concentration in an economic and political system known as corporatism. We then get into how exactly information technology such as blockchain will decentralize and transform every aspect of society away from concentrated power toward interconnected innovation, empowerment, personalization and options. How it will enable ideas like universal basic income and disable the idea that a massive central authority is capable of making wise decisions and interventions on behalf of everyone. How it can merge novel and meaningful experiences with a social fabric that complexly connects humanity to family, community, environment, creativity and self both physically and digitally. The idea of an ethical and intellectual framework known as technological humanism and the Matrix subplot about the defeat of cynicism and nihilism also find their ways into this longer than usual conversation.

Man V Mob

The Signal Through the Noise (Why Decentralize?)

Centralized institutions and income are no match for the empowerment of information, networks and technology. First we must understand why our industrial era systems and their incentives are broken beyond repair before we can thoughtfully consider the blueprint of technological humanism.

Moving Past Career and Nation

Sarah returns for a conversation about how to use unexpected, stressful down time to your benefit, disengaging from trolling, willingly exposing yourself to discomforts and the recent loss of her brother Derek to addiction.

Meaningful Leisure & Exposure to Stigmas

Tom and I talk about what to look out for in the emerging antipropaganda culture of active thought toppling the assumptions and mental models which compose our attitudes of complacency and resentment. Our immediate future is studded with domestic tribal political divides and geopolitical rivalries like what has emerged with Russia and China yet there is substantial room for optimism.

Climbing Out of the Mud

In the 21st year of the 21st century my resolution is to bring together minds to create the blueprints for networks of media and education which abandon thriving on propaganda, narrow-mindedness and outrage in favor of empowered engagement, collaboration and self-actualization.

21st: Remaking Media and Education

One of the biggest problems with our economy is that it is a market that traffics in the single metric of monetary value. I suggest our global economy will transform into parallel economies with alternative currencies of time, attention, creativity and other exchanges. This will make it harder to dominate and monopolize because of tradeoffs. We'll be able to convert from one to any other form, transact using blockchain and most importantly define human value and the vast societal contributions beyond solely what makes the most money.

The Multiconomy

If we want benevolent artificial intelligence and a pro-human future that empowers our individual flourishing then why don't we use groups of ethical thinkers as the training data? Would this be the best way to ensure that the most considerate and thoughtfully nuanced human tendencies and patterns are the ones that influence and compose our algorithms?

AI Training Clusters

Can we sustain a real-life team of renegade thinkers and empathetic vigilante ethicists who propose solutions that mediate between Washington DC and Silicon Valley? How could a new checks and balances superstructure influence prosocial innovation and policy, serve as a conduit of public engagement, empower individuals, redefine journalistic integrity and promote the new education movement? How can we prevent such a group from becoming cynical and dystopian government contractors like the Watchmen or corporatized and opportunistic merchandise like The Boys?

A Real Justice League

This isn't history with names and dates as you've been forced to learn it. In this slightly longer episode I break history down into 6 domains: paradigms, narratives, ego blows, saeculums, supercycles and alliances. After listening you'll recognize alignments and more fully understand the moment we're in right now.

The Essential Patterns of History

This episode on why Yin and Yang need each other focuses on the complementarity of conservatives and liberals, libertarians and socialists and men and women.

Yin and Yang

Part 2 of the Cogs No More episode, this half is about how our systems of education dehumanize us and limit our capacity for self-realization.I also talk about how designers of industrial era society and politics regarded people as stupid and dangerous unidimensional masses of livestock which needed to be surveilled and managed.We have gotten so far lost from humanist ideals and its prosocial pursuit of happiness but we're finding our path back.

Standardized Education Makes Cogs

The feeling of being a cog in an isolating, impersonal machine was the effect of regarding emotionally complex and sociable human beings with needs as part of an industrial assembly line.As we transition to a technological society we have the chance to rediscover humanism, reassert our value and incentivize the happiness of self-discovery. Or we can shrug and let ourselves become standardized inputs in a dystopian computer. The choice is ours.

Cogs No More

We ought to listen to wisdom backed up by thoughtfully considered experience and resolve to be less taken in by self promotion, image curation, material status, professional title, name recognition, controversy or performance.

Thoughts of a Nobody

How do we manage the simultaneous discontinuities in everything we take for granted? Geopolitics, technology, employment, socializing, democracy, wealth, influence and unifying greater purpose are all on the table and we're out of plays. Time for the next round.

The Reshuffling

What has the lost year done for our pursuits and our intimacy?

The Lost Year

Open, honest dialogue on eclectic topics. Think in new ways. Battle anxiety. Build resilience. Be amused.

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Man V Mob

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