The Dark Ages Weren’t Actually Dark

Most people still have the idea… the image… that the “Dark Ages” were filthy and grotesque, like a Monty Python film.

Not only is that false, but the people of the Dark Ages should be held in high regard. They’re the people who, for the first time in human history, killed slavery on a civilizational scale. They also created free market capitalism. And so, the prosperity that we enjoy to this day exists thanks to the people and ideas of the Dark Ages.

If that sounds crazy to you, you should probably listen.

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The Collapse of The Enlightenment

We are watching the Enlightenment collapse before us in real time. I’ll be as brief as I can in my explanation of why this is so and how it came about, but it strikes me as something we should understand.

Bear in mind that what remains of the Enlightenment is collapsing for structural reasons. I haven’t formed this discourse around political or academic theories, I’m basing it on facts and direct observations. Obviously I’m simplifying (one can’t write history any other way), but minus the inevitable exceptions and complications, this is what happened and what is happening. Continue reading “The Collapse of The Enlightenment”

Sapolsky’s Baboons

Among the most important scientific findings of the 20th century were those of Dr. Robert Sapolsky. His work was becoming an interesting but fairly straightforward study, until a freak accident turned it into a human turning point. (Don’t stop listening half-way through or you’ll miss it!) Sapolsky’s findings show that the kind of progress we dream about is unquestionably possible. That puts the burden back on us, of course… and that scares a lot of people… but let there be no more question, we CAN step into a better age.

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The Cryptography Revelation

Cryptography has changed the world over the past few decades. Without it there would be no Internet commerce, no VPNs, or Tor, or Bitcoin, or Wikileaks, or the Snowden revelations, or BitTorrent. But however impressive the results, it’s the power of the crypto vision that has driven them… and a revelation it is. Those who grasp it are often changed for life.

 

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A Defense of 1950s Housewives

I believe that women are inherently as valuable as men. But I don’t believe this because of politics, I believe it because of experience.

Young people are taught  that women before 1970 or so were suppressed, deprived of education and legally raped by their husbands. But I’m telling you that’s false. My mom, her friends, and many other women I knew were not dupes, weaklings, and victims. Whoever wishes to can hate me for this, but I was there and I know what I saw… and I will defend the women I loved. Continue reading “A Defense of 1950s Housewives”

Status Revisited

A few years ago I uploaded a post on status, to somewhat mixed reviews. A significant number of people feel that status is something to embrace, or at least something that can’t be fought.

And so today I’m “doubling down,” as people like to say these days, because once you recognize the perversity of status, you also recognize that we very much need to get past it. Continue reading “Status Revisited”

First Parallel Society Podcast

Buckminster Fuller’s advice for building a better world was to create a new model that makes the old model obsolete, and the Parallel Society podcast is dedicated to just that. We cover cryptocurrency, biohacking, private space flight, homeschooling and much more.

Buckminster Fuller’s advice for building a better world was to create a new model that makes the old model obsolete, and the Parallel Society podcast is dedicated to just that. We cover cryptocurrency, biohacking, private space flight, homeschooling and much more.

 

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Culture Versus Conscience

Culture has always been the antagonist of conscience.

Once we see ourselves as part of a larger entity… once we identify with it… we feel a necessity to conform to it. If we don’t, we lose the existential crutch that larger entities offer us. And, partly as a result of living with that collective identification, most of us are emotionally unprepared to stand alone before the world. Continue reading “Culture Versus Conscience”