Well, this was one of the scarier discussions I’ve had in recent memory, and you do not want to miss it. In this episode John Robb and I discuss the ongoing total war between Vladimir Putin’s Russia, and the open-source networked insurgency that has emerged to do battle with him.
First off, thank you for all the work you have been putting in surrounding this conflict, I've found it invaluable. It is also interesting to see that some also feel that much of this is driven by technology itself, not just geopolitics. There is a Christian thinker, Jonathan Pageau, who posits that the internet is akin to the ancient pagan gods. That it exists through attention (worship) and our participation in it. An amoral, primordial force around which we build society. , the religion of a new age.
I’m here to second any interest in Pageau. If you’re reading replies to this comment and thinking “who that? Should I do the googles?” Yes you should … but also use DuckDuckGo
Good observation. The Imago Dei keeps being pushed aside as we seem Hell-bent on remaking ourselves in our own image. These tendencies are as theological as they are technologically and politically driven.
1. Robb’s thesis is impressive, but how does it account for the people who are engaged with the network at different levels? A fully plugged-in, remotely-working, screen-addicted member of the professional class is different from grandma on Facebook, though both are affected.
2. Where does the “real world” get a role? I think those who bump into the real (not network mediated) world more often at work or in life - who live less online - are often more skeptical of the network. This may be why, for example, truckers are protesting in multiple countries.
3. There was one throwaway line about people who perceive the world differently, e.g., those on the autism spectrum. I have wondered how people on the spectrum are going to save the world. This may be it: perceiving network patterns that most people miss.
Awesome. By the way, the variety of perspectives you're bringing to bear on events in Ukraine is unmatched. Nobody else is providing such an opportunity for broad engagement with the issues in one place. Thanks for helping your audience to get smarter on the complexities of the situation.
Happy to hear it! Since listening to the episode, I've been wondering about how network engagement is related to social and economic class as well as to political affiliation. I have heard a lot about a new working class movement in politics, but could you sub out "lower network engagement" for "working class" and get the same realignment?
How would "'lower' network engagement" be differentiated from "'higher' network engagement"? Would it be based on "amount of time" spent on the network? The WAY you engage in your network engagement? (do you go to argue about politics, or just to look at photos of family and friends?) Right now, I think working class can be determined based on one's income, or job type (manual labor), more or less. So I'm wondering if you'd have to sub out something more specific about the manner in which people use their social network engagement to get a better realignment with "working class." But that's just the first thing that popped into my head
Maybe the question of engagement has to do with the roles that the network plays in your life. Is it a part of your job and your social circles? Does it mediate how you see the world or how you do things and create meaning? Just as Robb noted that AI exists in the spaces between, where the data live, it is the amount of mediation that the network performs which gives it the power to shape our ideas and actions. Maybe that would be a productive direction to go?
The more you mention this divide in social media engagement, the more I begin to think that that will eventually become a way to differentiate classes, indirectly. I have worked a lot in Asia and South America, and the desire to whiten one's skin is really high because if you have lighter skin color, it shows you are not a laborer, doing "working class" jobs in the sun (and also you can afford luxuries such as skin lightening cream). I wonder if in the future people will use social media engagement in a similar fashion... perhaps the more engagement you display the more likely people will think you are full of spare time and are thus in a higher class (though maybe in the future the inverse could happen where people consider you lazy if you are engaging too much). It's interesting to think about🤔
I think that you are touching at the most fundamental problems of a digital society. There is a disconnection between words and swords. Basically before the digital era information and armed forces moved at the same speed. It is no longer true. Information can be instantaneously broadcasted over the entire globe. Moreover it is essentially free. How this tension is going to be resolved is not clear.
I cite the example of G. Beck and his role in extracting people during the Afghan rout as an idea of how swarms may instantiate themselves in real life. You need a common ground, it used to be the state, it looks like it is now at the level of religion (maybe Huntington was right?) or civilisation.
I don’t know who said this recently, but they pointed out that we could have major evolutionary pressures (and cultural) exerted on humanity. People who actually want to have children would explode in population. If AI is forces the human population down there would be major natural pressures to push back on it.
I’m there with you on the social approval and gullibility (and on the spectrum too, diagnosed as an adult, which was quite an experience). But if a person on the spectrum is able to get some distance from the emotional manipulation of the swarm, this might provide an opportunity to look ahead to the likely ends to which an idea adopted by the swarm will lead, while most are just following cues and going along for the ride. You might end up feeling like Chicken Little, though.
From another angle, being relatively impervious to those subtle social cues - which is not helpful in development, as you point out - may leave an autistic person standing outside the swarm wondering what all the fuss is about. I have heard more than a few contrarian takes on issues and though to myself, “spectrum.”
On a related note, does it seem like people on the spectrum are well-represented in libertarian circles? It does to me!
Just brainstorming here. Would be interested in other takes.
The “swarm” is made up mostly of corporations where Vanguard and Blackrock are the main stock holders. So is it really a decentralized swarm or is it a centralized effort?
See my other comments here - my line of thinking is similar to yours. People want answers they want to know how is this happening?
And it isn’t due to a ‘decentralized swarm’
It’s concrete, traceable organizations providing all the approved opinions and materials. There are incentives for complying and often severe punishments if you don’t.
To me, the swarm is the lower, broad end of the network. The part with numbers that contribute force and popular strength. Of course, the initial impulses that give direction come from above, I believe from an oligarchic structure. The result is more or less well-coordinated.
Dang it, i joined for the book club. I already read of 3 the 4 suggestions! And all i'm getting is these (first rate) conversations? What does this have to do with the book club! and don't give me "this is an active war" excuse.
I keep forwarding to others. they keep complaining "there's a paywall". Suck it up. Give him $5
I swear I will get back to the book club soon. Man, I really screwed the pooch on the planning for that. For the next book, I will prepare several episodes in advance so that emergent events don't completely derail me like they did this time around. I'm glad everyone seems to have enjoyed the book, though.
So, I have to ask. Will we ever see a conclusion to the Human Forever series? I have had it on my mind a lot. And by that I mean I have some gripes about the premise and want a excuses to launch into them.
Yes! That series is probably one I B will revisit with parts 3, 4… 10 over a long period of time. I need to get James on the show to discuss once WW3 is over.
You mean you didn't have "Russia actually invades Ukraine" in your planner? well shucks. Neither did I. You have a "dream" job that we normies can only wish we had the time for.
My rule of thumb since even before 2016 has been to disregard or be very suspicious of anything that takes on a Swarm aspect. If "everybody" believes it, I simply don't until I have proved to myself that belief is justified. I'm probably as tribal as anyone, but my skeptic nature ameliorates that tendency. And it helps that I pay attention to some very intelligent, knowledgeable, thoughtful, and informed people, like our host, Mr. Cooper.
This explained why all of the mistakes the strange new ideology has produced haven't caused cognitive dissonance that would force a reevaluation. Maximum evil of opponents + ultimate victory required + subtle cues from fellow swarm members + the ability of the swarm to pivot to a new target even without a centralized leader = cognitive dissonance will not be noticed by most and will actively be suppressed, even unconsciously, by the swarm.
Meanwhile, the cost of using either voice or exit in opposition has been increased. What worries me the most over the last two podcasts is that even if the adults in the room put together a reasonable solution, those advocating peace on both sides would be hamstrung by their respective swarms. And the same type of swarms likely exist in both Russian and China in different spaces in-between, and we may not have the cultural competence to identify them.
Quite, if you can privatize the profits and distribute the costs, and be distracted from the consequences your well intentioned but ignorant advocacy allowed.
The "swarm" idea is handy for answering the "why are all these reasonable people I know suddenly acting crazy?" question, but I would still like to know what to do next. The problem is an old one to some extent, going back to people with hammers seeing nails everywhere, though the aspect where people buy in without consciously choosing to do so - as in Darryl's AI short story idea - is more powerful and pernicious than anything that's come before. There may be no more effective form of social control for humans than subtle signals delivered across multiple media; it really digs deep into our evolutionary wiring.
Data control, or even data awareness, may be a solution. Another may be "doing real things with real people." Selecting leaders who have wrestled with practical problems might help; paper-pushers, bean-counters, and chair-force warriors have been the death of many organizations, and the network-engaged are all this and more. But it can't just be leaders. We need a conscious, deliberate, distributed effort to unplug so we can get the perspective to see networks as tools, not as all-encompassing realities.
Our institutions built to resist popular pressure and make judgements using rational criteria rather than emotion are being swept away by the Swarm. I'm thinking of the judiciary and the Senate. Journalism is of course in bad shape too, with a contest on between swarm journalists and those still focused on discovering facts.
I've been reading "Icarus Fallen" (another MM recommendation) and, after listening to the John Robb interview this morning, just happened to reach the chapter in the book titled "A Morality of Emotion & Indignation", and... damn - a lot of it compliments what Mr. Robb is talking about in regard to all the things you just called out in your first paragraph in that:
- people's ethical systems are no longer moored in place by anything resembling absolute values, and instead are fluid, and are guided by more relativist & subjective notions of "good" & "evil";
- you can think of "evil" then as not fixed, but whatever is fashionable; in the context of the network swarm, it's almost like everybody receives a patch/OS update that redefines the evil du jour on a ongoing basis. Being unmoored to anything solid, it can be the complete opposite of what it was last week, and few people will call out any bullshit, hypocrisy, or contradiction - even if it is completely contradictory with a prior version of "evil", it's all "evil", it's the current version, and that's all that matters. The ethical system compares itself only with the current iteration of evil, and disregards whatever is older than five minutes ago. (And this is where you fall in line or be ostracized or worse.)
- instead of making rational, deliberate moral judgments that weigh an idea or situation against a fixed ideal, our judgements become reactive & emotional (and the faster they happen the better); think here of the "empathy triggers" concept
- the shallow lack of a formal ethical structure makes it easier to align people broadly in opposition to something vs for anything
- it is an ethics of complacency that is itself something like a consumption good - it becomes part of our identity, and there is virtue & satisfaction associated with going along with the tribe; it is low commitment and requires little to no actual sacrifice (which makes Mr. Robb's comments about the swarm not fearing its own mortality way effing scarier)
- this flexible & fluid ethical system is perhaps itself a product of the technological environment in which it is currently operating to terrifying effect (it seems it can potentially be frustrated/distracted/diverted; it also may be vulnerable to its "reasonable promise" being somehow shown to be unattainable)
- attempts to "debate" or otherwise appeal to reason are self-defeating, not just in that they are a waste of time at the margin, but that they cast a doubt upon the evilness of the evil (which everybody knows is evil), and - who would be most likely to question whether the evil du jour is actually evil, than somebody who is "on the side" of that evil; if you were "good" you would know perfectly well that there is nothing to debate (DC's comparison to a cult applies here, as well as with Mr. Robb's sentiments re: reaction against dissenters/actors (corporate/public & private) who don't fall in line).
Anyway, still working my way through the book (which is great thus far), but thought it was very random & fortuitous that the section I happened to be on jived with the points you called out above / complimented Mr. Robb's thesis as it did. I wasn't familiar w/ JR prior to listening to the interview, but... now have more to add to the pile.
Thank you. Keep up the great, and I mean great, work. What you are doing is God's work and I mean that in both a secular (intellectual) and religious (spiritual) standpoint. In an age of superficial emoting that passes for insight, what you offer and provide is invaluable.
I love how the cooperative network of podcasters has turned into a gold mine of thought provoking resources. For me it started with Dan Carlin's Hardcore History, to Mike Duncan's The History of Rome, then to Danielli Bollelli's History on Fire who turned me onto your MartyrMade podcast. It has been an ever expanding network of access to great minds ever since. I'm glad to see you are now doing this full time and look forward to your next deep dive into a historical subject. It also doesn't hurt to get turned on to some new tunes along the way. Thanks.
I have experienced the same itinerary as well with the addition of Jocko. I appreciate the networking that has happened among these podcasts from time to time, not always in agreement, but therefore interesting and a great guide through history.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately, there’s a whole generation of young adults coming up that are getting into college and the workforce, starting families and all that, who were either very young or not yet born when 9/11 happened, and for a person like me (I’m 34, I was 13 at the time) who watched all the media/political shenanigans develop from then until now, all the disastrous wars and social unrest, as chaotic and ridiculous as all of it has been, I at least have something to compare it all to. I mean I remember the internet being integrated into the way we did our homework and seeing that develop into online gaming, p2p file sharing… between political insanity and technological quantum leaps, it doesn’t seem like this next generation has any way of getting their bearing in how quickly and dramatically things can change, or even understanding the nature of the present day with those considerations in mind. I think that’s gotta be a factor in the swarming effect. It’s a runaway train, culture and interpersonal relations have been built on a constantly mutating landscape. I don’t know if that makes me feel any better about the future but when you talk about intermediate power structures being eroded and replaced, it helps me understand how important things like church and family and community really are. Bit of a ramble but I took a lot from this episode, gonna be thinking about it for a while. Cheers.
Dude, you've been working overtime the past couple weeks
DC should go on holidays more often if this is what we get when he gets back
In the mean time, we end up in "episode desert" only to then get "episode flood". However, isn't that a replication of CA weather systems?
First off, thank you for all the work you have been putting in surrounding this conflict, I've found it invaluable. It is also interesting to see that some also feel that much of this is driven by technology itself, not just geopolitics. There is a Christian thinker, Jonathan Pageau, who posits that the internet is akin to the ancient pagan gods. That it exists through attention (worship) and our participation in it. An amoral, primordial force around which we build society. , the religion of a new age.
I’m here to second any interest in Pageau. If you’re reading replies to this comment and thinking “who that? Should I do the googles?” Yes you should … but also use DuckDuckGo
Word is don’t use DuckDuckGo anymore. Use Brave.
Good observation. The Imago Dei keeps being pushed aside as we seem Hell-bent on remaking ourselves in our own image. These tendencies are as theological as they are technologically and politically driven.
Great stuff, if scary.
Three things stood out:
1. Robb’s thesis is impressive, but how does it account for the people who are engaged with the network at different levels? A fully plugged-in, remotely-working, screen-addicted member of the professional class is different from grandma on Facebook, though both are affected.
2. Where does the “real world” get a role? I think those who bump into the real (not network mediated) world more often at work or in life - who live less online - are often more skeptical of the network. This may be why, for example, truckers are protesting in multiple countries.
3. There was one throwaway line about people who perceive the world differently, e.g., those on the autism spectrum. I have wondered how people on the spectrum are going to save the world. This may be it: perceiving network patterns that most people miss.
Good question, will ask when we chat again
Awesome. By the way, the variety of perspectives you're bringing to bear on events in Ukraine is unmatched. Nobody else is providing such an opportunity for broad engagement with the issues in one place. Thanks for helping your audience to get smarter on the complexities of the situation.
Your second point really helped me get a better idea why people could be so vehemently against the truckers. Thanks!
Happy to hear it! Since listening to the episode, I've been wondering about how network engagement is related to social and economic class as well as to political affiliation. I have heard a lot about a new working class movement in politics, but could you sub out "lower network engagement" for "working class" and get the same realignment?
How would "'lower' network engagement" be differentiated from "'higher' network engagement"? Would it be based on "amount of time" spent on the network? The WAY you engage in your network engagement? (do you go to argue about politics, or just to look at photos of family and friends?) Right now, I think working class can be determined based on one's income, or job type (manual labor), more or less. So I'm wondering if you'd have to sub out something more specific about the manner in which people use their social network engagement to get a better realignment with "working class." But that's just the first thing that popped into my head
Maybe the question of engagement has to do with the roles that the network plays in your life. Is it a part of your job and your social circles? Does it mediate how you see the world or how you do things and create meaning? Just as Robb noted that AI exists in the spaces between, where the data live, it is the amount of mediation that the network performs which gives it the power to shape our ideas and actions. Maybe that would be a productive direction to go?
The more you mention this divide in social media engagement, the more I begin to think that that will eventually become a way to differentiate classes, indirectly. I have worked a lot in Asia and South America, and the desire to whiten one's skin is really high because if you have lighter skin color, it shows you are not a laborer, doing "working class" jobs in the sun (and also you can afford luxuries such as skin lightening cream). I wonder if in the future people will use social media engagement in a similar fashion... perhaps the more engagement you display the more likely people will think you are full of spare time and are thus in a higher class (though maybe in the future the inverse could happen where people consider you lazy if you are engaging too much). It's interesting to think about🤔
I think that you are touching at the most fundamental problems of a digital society. There is a disconnection between words and swords. Basically before the digital era information and armed forces moved at the same speed. It is no longer true. Information can be instantaneously broadcasted over the entire globe. Moreover it is essentially free. How this tension is going to be resolved is not clear.
I have touched on the subject here : https://spearoflugh.substack.com/p/the-disablers
I cite the example of G. Beck and his role in extracting people during the Afghan rout as an idea of how swarms may instantiate themselves in real life. You need a common ground, it used to be the state, it looks like it is now at the level of religion (maybe Huntington was right?) or civilisation.
I don’t know who said this recently, but they pointed out that we could have major evolutionary pressures (and cultural) exerted on humanity. People who actually want to have children would explode in population. If AI is forces the human population down there would be major natural pressures to push back on it.
I’m there with you on the social approval and gullibility (and on the spectrum too, diagnosed as an adult, which was quite an experience). But if a person on the spectrum is able to get some distance from the emotional manipulation of the swarm, this might provide an opportunity to look ahead to the likely ends to which an idea adopted by the swarm will lead, while most are just following cues and going along for the ride. You might end up feeling like Chicken Little, though.
From another angle, being relatively impervious to those subtle social cues - which is not helpful in development, as you point out - may leave an autistic person standing outside the swarm wondering what all the fuss is about. I have heard more than a few contrarian takes on issues and though to myself, “spectrum.”
On a related note, does it seem like people on the spectrum are well-represented in libertarian circles? It does to me!
Just brainstorming here. Would be interested in other takes.
When family and friends start to ask why im acting so weird all of the sudden I'm blaming this surprise attack martyr made marathon.
Glad I’m not the only person that has to do this!
The “swarm” is made up mostly of corporations where Vanguard and Blackrock are the main stock holders. So is it really a decentralized swarm or is it a centralized effort?
See my other comments here - my line of thinking is similar to yours. People want answers they want to know how is this happening?
And it isn’t due to a ‘decentralized swarm’
It’s concrete, traceable organizations providing all the approved opinions and materials. There are incentives for complying and often severe punishments if you don’t.
It’s not any more complicated than that.
What I’ve stated is rather Mundane.
What’s shocking is that no one is describing it.
To me, the swarm is the lower, broad end of the network. The part with numbers that contribute force and popular strength. Of course, the initial impulses that give direction come from above, I believe from an oligarchic structure. The result is more or less well-coordinated.
Dude goes quiet for weeks then drops a two hour dissertation on America's culpability of the Ukraine situation and 3 big interviews!
Dang it, i joined for the book club. I already read of 3 the 4 suggestions! And all i'm getting is these (first rate) conversations? What does this have to do with the book club! and don't give me "this is an active war" excuse.
I keep forwarding to others. they keep complaining "there's a paywall". Suck it up. Give him $5
I swear I will get back to the book club soon. Man, I really screwed the pooch on the planning for that. For the next book, I will prepare several episodes in advance so that emergent events don't completely derail me like they did this time around. I'm glad everyone seems to have enjoyed the book, though.
So, I have to ask. Will we ever see a conclusion to the Human Forever series? I have had it on my mind a lot. And by that I mean I have some gripes about the premise and want a excuses to launch into them.
Yes! That series is probably one I B will revisit with parts 3, 4… 10 over a long period of time. I need to get James on the show to discuss once WW3 is over.
"Once WW3 is over". So these will be carved in stone or communicated with smoke signals?
OK, i'm just kidding. 8 track......
Great to hear! Thanks for the reply.
You mean you didn't have "Russia actually invades Ukraine" in your planner? well shucks. Neither did I. You have a "dream" job that we normies can only wish we had the time for.
Take your time, I read slow. :(
Wow Darryl, I'm still listening to the last couple of episodes you put out. I literally listen to all of them at least twice.
Great stuff and thank you for keeping it flowing.
Darryl, you are cranking out the content!
Most depressing to me are people that resisted The Swarm on Trump and covid, to then be sucked in by Ukraine/Russia.
My rule of thumb since even before 2016 has been to disregard or be very suspicious of anything that takes on a Swarm aspect. If "everybody" believes it, I simply don't until I have proved to myself that belief is justified. I'm probably as tribal as anyone, but my skeptic nature ameliorates that tendency. And it helps that I pay attention to some very intelligent, knowledgeable, thoughtful, and informed people, like our host, Mr. Cooper.
This explained why all of the mistakes the strange new ideology has produced haven't caused cognitive dissonance that would force a reevaluation. Maximum evil of opponents + ultimate victory required + subtle cues from fellow swarm members + the ability of the swarm to pivot to a new target even without a centralized leader = cognitive dissonance will not be noticed by most and will actively be suppressed, even unconsciously, by the swarm.
Meanwhile, the cost of using either voice or exit in opposition has been increased. What worries me the most over the last two podcasts is that even if the adults in the room put together a reasonable solution, those advocating peace on both sides would be hamstrung by their respective swarms. And the same type of swarms likely exist in both Russian and China in different spaces in-between, and we may not have the cultural competence to identify them.
Isn’t it wonderful?
Quite, if you can privatize the profits and distribute the costs, and be distracted from the consequences your well intentioned but ignorant advocacy allowed.
Need to figure out how to re-direct awful results engineered by good intentioned people.
The "swarm" idea is handy for answering the "why are all these reasonable people I know suddenly acting crazy?" question, but I would still like to know what to do next. The problem is an old one to some extent, going back to people with hammers seeing nails everywhere, though the aspect where people buy in without consciously choosing to do so - as in Darryl's AI short story idea - is more powerful and pernicious than anything that's come before. There may be no more effective form of social control for humans than subtle signals delivered across multiple media; it really digs deep into our evolutionary wiring.
Data control, or even data awareness, may be a solution. Another may be "doing real things with real people." Selecting leaders who have wrestled with practical problems might help; paper-pushers, bean-counters, and chair-force warriors have been the death of many organizations, and the network-engaged are all this and more. But it can't just be leaders. We need a conscious, deliberate, distributed effort to unplug so we can get the perspective to see networks as tools, not as all-encompassing realities.
Our institutions built to resist popular pressure and make judgements using rational criteria rather than emotion are being swept away by the Swarm. I'm thinking of the judiciary and the Senate. Journalism is of course in bad shape too, with a contest on between swarm journalists and those still focused on discovering facts.
I've been reading "Icarus Fallen" (another MM recommendation) and, after listening to the John Robb interview this morning, just happened to reach the chapter in the book titled "A Morality of Emotion & Indignation", and... damn - a lot of it compliments what Mr. Robb is talking about in regard to all the things you just called out in your first paragraph in that:
- people's ethical systems are no longer moored in place by anything resembling absolute values, and instead are fluid, and are guided by more relativist & subjective notions of "good" & "evil";
- you can think of "evil" then as not fixed, but whatever is fashionable; in the context of the network swarm, it's almost like everybody receives a patch/OS update that redefines the evil du jour on a ongoing basis. Being unmoored to anything solid, it can be the complete opposite of what it was last week, and few people will call out any bullshit, hypocrisy, or contradiction - even if it is completely contradictory with a prior version of "evil", it's all "evil", it's the current version, and that's all that matters. The ethical system compares itself only with the current iteration of evil, and disregards whatever is older than five minutes ago. (And this is where you fall in line or be ostracized or worse.)
- instead of making rational, deliberate moral judgments that weigh an idea or situation against a fixed ideal, our judgements become reactive & emotional (and the faster they happen the better); think here of the "empathy triggers" concept
- the shallow lack of a formal ethical structure makes it easier to align people broadly in opposition to something vs for anything
- it is an ethics of complacency that is itself something like a consumption good - it becomes part of our identity, and there is virtue & satisfaction associated with going along with the tribe; it is low commitment and requires little to no actual sacrifice (which makes Mr. Robb's comments about the swarm not fearing its own mortality way effing scarier)
- this flexible & fluid ethical system is perhaps itself a product of the technological environment in which it is currently operating to terrifying effect (it seems it can potentially be frustrated/distracted/diverted; it also may be vulnerable to its "reasonable promise" being somehow shown to be unattainable)
- attempts to "debate" or otherwise appeal to reason are self-defeating, not just in that they are a waste of time at the margin, but that they cast a doubt upon the evilness of the evil (which everybody knows is evil), and - who would be most likely to question whether the evil du jour is actually evil, than somebody who is "on the side" of that evil; if you were "good" you would know perfectly well that there is nothing to debate (DC's comparison to a cult applies here, as well as with Mr. Robb's sentiments re: reaction against dissenters/actors (corporate/public & private) who don't fall in line).
Anyway, still working my way through the book (which is great thus far), but thought it was very random & fortuitous that the section I happened to be on jived with the points you called out above / complimented Mr. Robb's thesis as it did. I wasn't familiar w/ JR prior to listening to the interview, but... now have more to add to the pile.
This must be what heaven is like! Keep them coming! 🙌
while nice, my heaven does not include having to worry about the implications of WW3.........
I completely agree. I was just appreciating the volume of content.
My heaven is WW3.
My man, I can't keep up with the content flow (not complaining, just admitting).
I had to listen twice...
Far and away THE BEST podcast available today. Thank you sir!
Thank you. Keep up the great, and I mean great, work. What you are doing is God's work and I mean that in both a secular (intellectual) and religious (spiritual) standpoint. In an age of superficial emoting that passes for insight, what you offer and provide is invaluable.
I love how the cooperative network of podcasters has turned into a gold mine of thought provoking resources. For me it started with Dan Carlin's Hardcore History, to Mike Duncan's The History of Rome, then to Danielli Bollelli's History on Fire who turned me onto your MartyrMade podcast. It has been an ever expanding network of access to great minds ever since. I'm glad to see you are now doing this full time and look forward to your next deep dive into a historical subject. It also doesn't hurt to get turned on to some new tunes along the way. Thanks.
I would add Dangerous History in there as well, done by an unabashed anarchist with a serious beef against Woodrow Wilson.
I have experienced the same itinerary as well with the addition of Jocko. I appreciate the networking that has happened among these podcasts from time to time, not always in agreement, but therefore interesting and a great guide through history.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately, there’s a whole generation of young adults coming up that are getting into college and the workforce, starting families and all that, who were either very young or not yet born when 9/11 happened, and for a person like me (I’m 34, I was 13 at the time) who watched all the media/political shenanigans develop from then until now, all the disastrous wars and social unrest, as chaotic and ridiculous as all of it has been, I at least have something to compare it all to. I mean I remember the internet being integrated into the way we did our homework and seeing that develop into online gaming, p2p file sharing… between political insanity and technological quantum leaps, it doesn’t seem like this next generation has any way of getting their bearing in how quickly and dramatically things can change, or even understanding the nature of the present day with those considerations in mind. I think that’s gotta be a factor in the swarming effect. It’s a runaway train, culture and interpersonal relations have been built on a constantly mutating landscape. I don’t know if that makes me feel any better about the future but when you talk about intermediate power structures being eroded and replaced, it helps me understand how important things like church and family and community really are. Bit of a ramble but I took a lot from this episode, gonna be thinking about it for a while. Cheers.
Really cool how you're bringing in alternative (if not opposing, per se) viewpoints. Great discussions.