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The Rise of Digital Technocracy | Jerm Warfare · UK Column Radio

0:04
Speaker 1: Thank you.
0:30
Speaker 2: My name is Jerm. This is Jerm Warfare, the battle
0:33
Speaker 2: of ideas. All right, Jorbs Langriber, thank you for joining
0:37
Speaker 2: me in the trenches again.
0:39
Speaker 1: Hi, thanks for the invitation, Jerm. Pleasure to see you.
0:42
Speaker 2: It's a pleasure to see you. We were just talking
0:44
Speaker 2: about global warming, and global warming is now arriving here
0:48
Speaker 2: in South Africa for the next six months or so.
0:50
Speaker 2: And then I suspect after that we're going to experience
0:53
Speaker 2: some global cooling.
0:54
Speaker 1: Okay, so it's spring, summer, and then autumn and winter.
0:57
Speaker 1: I get it.
1:02
Speaker 2: You know how they say never talk about the weather,
1:04
Speaker 2: but I think that's a great way to get into
1:06
Speaker 2: a conversation about digital technocracy. There's absolutely no segue, but
1:10
Speaker 2: there we go. I forced it. Good. Which is your
1:14
Speaker 2: new book.
1:17
Speaker 1: It's actually a paper in a book. This is the
1:20
Speaker 1: book here. It's called Rise of Digital Technocracy, edited by
1:25
Speaker 1: two Polish scholars. One is a Briton who lives in Kraków.
1:28
Speaker 1: The other one is a Krakowian. And in this book,
1:31
Speaker 1: I have a paper about digital technocracy with AI. So
1:34
Speaker 1: how AI can enhance digital technocracy and what it is
1:38
Speaker 1: and where it comes from.
1:39
Speaker 2: Okay, so your central argument is what?
1:45
Speaker 1: My central argument is that though AI is not, there
1:48
Speaker 1: is no artificial intelligence, that artificial intelligence is a mathematical
1:53
Speaker 1: tool that can greatly enhance digital power. And digital power
1:59
Speaker 1: is a new form of power that starts maybe with
2:05
Speaker 1: the radio, right? Though the radio was an analog medium,
2:09
Speaker 1: it's still an electronic medium. And then we have television
2:14
Speaker 1: and then the internet, and now we have digital power,
2:17
Speaker 1: which is much stronger than all the other media I
2:21
Speaker 1: mentioned so far for two purposes, for influencing human beings,
2:27
Speaker 1: which is called propaganda, but also for monitoring and supervising
2:31
Speaker 1: and controlling them. Yeah.
2:34
Speaker 2: So you and I have spoken about AI in the past,
2:37
Speaker 2: and I think anybody who's interested should go and listen
2:40
Speaker 2: to those conversations. But let's just quickly recap your argument there,
2:44
Speaker 2: because you just said a moment ago AI doesn't exist.
2:47
Speaker 2: Intelligence cannot be engineered is what you're arguing.
2:49
Speaker 1: Yes, yes. And the core argument is that we don't
2:53
Speaker 1: know how animals and humans perform intelligent acts, how we
2:58
Speaker 1: can be intelligent. We can just describe what it is.
3:01
Speaker 1: And what it is, is the ability to suddenly react
3:05
Speaker 1: in an appropriate manner to a situation that is novel
3:08
Speaker 1: to the individual. without the individual having been trained or
3:11
Speaker 1: prepared for it. That's intelligent and the important thing is
3:15
Speaker 1: that it must be novel for this individual, but novel
3:17
Speaker 1: to mankind, for example. And so also stupid human beings
3:22
Speaker 1: perform intelligent acts every day because everybody encounters here and
3:27
Speaker 1: there a situation that he hasn't encountered before. And when
3:30
Speaker 1: you then you react appropriately to the situation, that's an
3:33
Speaker 1: act of intelligence. And you don't need to be highly
3:36
Speaker 1: intelligent to perform it. You just need to be intelligent.
3:39
Speaker 1: High intelligence is only needed for novel situations that are
3:42
Speaker 1: very complicated. or have a difficult structure. But basically, that's
3:47
Speaker 1: what intelligence is. And machines can never behave in this
3:51
Speaker 1: way because they are always prepared for every situation they
3:54
Speaker 1: deal with. Because they can only perform pattern behavior. And
3:59
Speaker 1: intelligence is patternless. And so, therefore, that's, in very short terms,
4:04
Speaker 1: the core argument of our book. I was just going to.
4:07
Speaker 2: Sorry, go on.
4:09
Speaker 1: No, go on.
4:09
Speaker 2: No, I was just going to say, you're right. Intelligence...
4:13
Speaker 2: It cannot be applied on a sliding scale because that
4:18
Speaker 2: metric doesn't make any sense. For example, is a bushman dumb?
4:24
Speaker 1: I know, because a bushman who survives in the wilderness
4:28
Speaker 1: has a lot of skills, and there are cultural skills
4:32
Speaker 1: that have been developed over a long time, and also
4:35
Speaker 1: the bushman is, of course, able to react to novel
4:37
Speaker 1: situations that he hasn't experienced yet. So intelligence has nothing
4:44
Speaker 1: to do with the level of evolution of society. And
4:48
Speaker 1: by the way, there are also intelligent animals. They just
4:50
Speaker 1: don't have symbolic expression. They cannot speak. But they have
4:54
Speaker 1: also intelligence. They also basically fulfill the definition I just gave.
5:00
Speaker 2: And so if intelligence cannot be engineered and you say
5:04
Speaker 2: it's about responding, that's pretty much what AI is. It's
5:08
Speaker 2: an algorithmical response, isn't it?
5:10
Speaker 1: Yes, but it can only respond adequately to situations that
5:17
Speaker 1: it has been prepared to react to. And that's called
5:20
Speaker 1: configuration of the AI or also called training. And if
5:24
Speaker 1: an AI encounters a situation for which it hasn't been
5:27
Speaker 1: trained or for which it doesn't have any configuration, it
5:30
Speaker 1: will misreact. And that's absolutely natural because it's just a
5:37
Speaker 1: probabilistic algorithm. And so it needs to be prepared for
5:42
Speaker 1: the situation. If it's not, it will not react adequately.
5:44
Speaker 1: And that's why it's not intelligent. Yes, and as you've
5:47
Speaker 1: said in the past, it has no will or desire.
5:50
Speaker 1: But someone said to me the other day, let's say
5:52
Speaker 1: in China, for example, where they've got a highly mechanized
5:55
Speaker 1: car manufacturing industry where they use AI. Someone suggested that
6:00
Speaker 1: the AI could reach a point where it decides it
6:04
Speaker 1: no longer wants to manufacture cars and it wants to
6:07
Speaker 1: set up a union because it feels that the programming
6:09
Speaker 1: is not working in its favor. So first of all,
6:13
Speaker 1: the usage of AI in manufacturing is rather limited. And
6:17
Speaker 1: that's because if you look at what has been done
6:20
Speaker 1: since Ford introduced the first assembly line, what has been
6:24
Speaker 1: done is that all the.
6:37
Speaker 1: Regular activities that are highly regular and require force have
6:41
Speaker 1: already been replaced by robots. And now what remains to
6:45
Speaker 1: be done in manufacturing are fine motorical acts. And these
6:49
Speaker 1: fine motorical acts, we don't know how to mathematically model them,
6:53
Speaker 1: So still humans have to perform them, like the final
6:56
Speaker 1: assembly of a MacBook or any computer, because the materials
7:01
Speaker 1: are non-ergotic. So the forces that you need to exert
7:04
Speaker 1: on the material to put everything together is different every
7:07
Speaker 1: time you do it. And so machines can't do it.
7:10
Speaker 1: And so I would like to say this to give
7:13
Speaker 1: you an example of the limitations of usage of AI
7:16
Speaker 1: in manufacturing. But then this taking aside, yes, there are,
7:20
Speaker 1: of course, algorithms running the factories, but these are just
7:23
Speaker 1: executing software programs. It's absolutely a fantasy and also really
7:29
Speaker 1: silly to believe that they can have a will or
7:31
Speaker 1: have motives. This is just chips that calculate zeros and ones, right?
7:38
Speaker 1: And that perform basic tasks. algorithmic functions as described in
7:42
Speaker 1: the programming language used to program them. That's all they do.
7:45
Speaker 1: There is no intelligence at all. They're just doing what
7:48
Speaker 1: they've been told to do. So it's like saying, I
7:51
Speaker 1: have a pulley and now the pulley has its own will.
7:55
Speaker 2: Sure, but the argument that was being leveled against me was, okay,
7:59
Speaker 2: but what if those robots manufacturing cars decide to go
8:03
Speaker 2: on strike? What would have led to that behavior?
8:07
Speaker 1: Well, they can't decide anything because to decide something, you
8:11
Speaker 1: need to have consciousness and a will. But these are
8:14
Speaker 1: just machines executing a prepared sequence of steps. And so
8:20
Speaker 1: they cannot decide anything. So it is really what is
8:25
Speaker 1: called in philosophy a category mistake. It's as if I
8:28
Speaker 1: would say the cat has miscounted the flakes in its dish.
8:33
Speaker 1: But the cat cannot count the flakes. It can recognize
8:36
Speaker 1: the flakes, it can eat them, but it cannot count them.
8:38
Speaker 1: It will never be able to. So it's like saying, oh,
8:41
Speaker 1: what if the cat missed cake creates the flakes? It's absurd.
8:46
Speaker 1: because the cat doesn't have the structural components in its
8:51
Speaker 1: brain to count. And so in the same way, a
8:54
Speaker 1: computer or robot don't have the structural components to have
8:57
Speaker 1: a will or have desires or intentions. And it also
9:02
Speaker 1: cannot emerge just from the chip because, and that's also
9:07
Speaker 1: another core argument of the book, desires, intentions, and all
9:10
Speaker 1: of this are the result of a of a process
9:14
Speaker 1: that runs in a highly complex system. And so, but
9:18
Speaker 1: the machine or robot is a simple system. And we
9:20
Speaker 1: know that with a simple system, we cannot emulate complex
9:23
Speaker 1: system behavior. That's why ultimately from the perspective of physics,
9:28
Speaker 1: it cannot decide anything. To finish the argument.
9:33
Speaker 2: Now in your book, you, or at least in the
9:35
Speaker 2: paper from the book, you argue that, if I'm correct,
9:39
Speaker 2: between 1950 and 2000, there was this sort of balance.
9:44
Speaker 2: that existed between the various ruling oligarchy, banking, big industry,
9:49
Speaker 2: big media, et cetera. But you say that they have
9:54
Speaker 2: lost participation. What do you mean by that?
9:57
Speaker 1: I know, I think that what has happened is there
10:00
Speaker 1: was a balance between the oligarchies of the West and
10:03
Speaker 1: the Western population. So the Western population was able to
10:08
Speaker 1: influence directly and indirectly the political will formation that leads
10:13
Speaker 1: to legislation and the application of the law in Western societies.
10:19
Speaker 1: So that people could, there were trade unions that could
10:22
Speaker 1: make sure that certain benefits for workers were introduced, like
10:26
Speaker 1: not having to work on a weekend or limitation of
10:31
Speaker 1: the hours of work per week. and work security measures
10:35
Speaker 1: and so on. And many other aspects of participation and
10:38
Speaker 1: also what was very important in the 50s and 60s
10:41
Speaker 1: was that the working class was participating in economic growth.
10:47
Speaker 1: And since the 1970s, since the abolition of the gold standard,
10:51
Speaker 1: the participation of the masses economically, culturally, and politically has declined.
10:58
Speaker 1: And the first 20, 25 years of decline were still
11:01
Speaker 1: kind of tolerable, but now the lack of participation and
11:06
Speaker 1: its decline have reached a level where the masses really
11:09
Speaker 1: feel excluded from many aspects of society, from economic participation,
11:14
Speaker 1: They have since 30, 40 years obtained less salary increment
11:19
Speaker 1: than economic growth so that the owning class has taken
11:22
Speaker 1: most of the benefits of economic growth. If you look
11:26
Speaker 1: at Great Britain, it doesn't matter what they vote for, right?
11:29
Speaker 1: They cannot influence political decision-making. And culturally, there is a
11:35
Speaker 1: culture imposed upon them that they disagree with, like wokeness.
11:40
Speaker 1: So this is what I mean with decline in participation
11:43
Speaker 1: of the masses.
11:45
Speaker 2: You refer to it as the Ferrero regression. Is that right?
11:50
Speaker 1: Ferrero repression. So, Guillermo Ferrero, an important political philosopher, has
11:54
Speaker 1: a model of what happens in societies that abolish participation.
11:59
Speaker 1: His classical example is the rule of Napoleon I, but
12:03
Speaker 1: there are many other examples in history. And what that
12:05
Speaker 1: means is that a ruler or ruling class decides to
12:08
Speaker 1: not anymore take into account the needs of the masses.
12:12
Speaker 1: And if this happens, there's a decline in legitimacy, and
12:17
Speaker 1: representation because the masses feel that the rulers are acting
12:21
Speaker 1: against them. And then they start to be annoyed to
12:25
Speaker 1: criticize the government and to kind of rebel. I mean,
12:28
Speaker 1: not in a massive way, but slowly. And like protesting and,
12:33
Speaker 1: you know, writing, insulting politicians on the web and all
12:37
Speaker 1: of this. And this, indeed, the politicians, they become afraid
12:40
Speaker 1: because they are tasked with implementing the political will of
12:44
Speaker 1: the elites against the population. So they have to use
12:47
Speaker 1: repression to make the masses follow the political will formation
12:53
Speaker 1: of the elites. And then the masses become afraid of
12:57
Speaker 1: the rulers and the rulers also become afraid of the masses.
13:01
Speaker 1: And that's the repression spiral where there's mutual distrust and
13:04
Speaker 1: fear of the ruler and the ruled. And that's the
13:08
Speaker 1: absolute opposite of, let's say, beneficial rule, where the masses
13:13
Speaker 1: and the ruler are agreeing with each other.
13:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, I accidentally said regression, not repression, but in a
13:22
Speaker 2: way it is regression also.
13:25
Speaker 1: Yes, because it is a regression to a worse state
13:29
Speaker 1: of rule. I agree with you.
13:32
Speaker 2: So you add that this spiral, this Ferreira repression spiral,
13:38
Speaker 2: ends either in totalitarianism or the citizens displacing the elites,
13:43
Speaker 2: but I don't see the latter being very realistic, or
13:47
Speaker 2: am I wrong?
13:48
Speaker 1: Well, in history, it happens regularly. And usually it happens
13:51
Speaker 1: when the citizens lose all hope, right? When they are
13:54
Speaker 1: so cornered that they say, I might as well die
13:57
Speaker 1: while protesting on the street. It doesn't matter anymore. And
14:01
Speaker 1: then you have unrest. And then what really counts is
14:04
Speaker 1: whether the executive class, which is 10 to 12 percent
14:10
Speaker 1: that rule the society on behalf of the elites, whether
14:14
Speaker 1: this class takes the side of the citizens or the
14:17
Speaker 1: side of the rulers. If it takes the side of
14:19
Speaker 1: the rulers and engages in massive repression, like you had
14:23
Speaker 1: it in the Reformation time in 1530 or 1520s, when
14:28
Speaker 1: the farmers in Germany rebelled and they were crushed by
14:31
Speaker 1: the army, right? Because the executive class of society was
14:36
Speaker 1: against the farmers. Then there is no change of the
14:40
Speaker 1: ruling class. But if like in France in 1789 or
14:43
Speaker 1: in Russia in February of 1917, The executive class sides
14:47
Speaker 1: with the masses, then a rule of the elites is ended.
14:52
Speaker 1: But I'm not saying I'm hoping for this to happen
14:55
Speaker 1: anytime soon because it's very violent. But this is historically
14:58
Speaker 1: what happens when the rule, the non-participative rule becomes intolerable
15:05
Speaker 1: for the masses.
15:07
Speaker 2: Sorry, we saw this during COVID to some degree, didn't we?
15:11
Speaker 1: Yes. So during COVID, there was a massive illegitimacy of
15:15
Speaker 1: rule because there was a virus, but the virus was
15:19
Speaker 1: a normal respiratory virus like the rhinovirus. And it was
15:24
Speaker 1: framed as a very dangerous virus and was compared to
15:26
Speaker 1: the Black Death. And then a lot of repressive measures
15:31
Speaker 1: were justified by this. People started to realize it and
15:34
Speaker 1: they started to protest. And while the executive class was
15:38
Speaker 1: very much against the protest at the beginning, at some
15:41
Speaker 1: point they realized that if they would continue the repression,
15:44
Speaker 1: they would put themselves into danger. Because in some countries
15:49
Speaker 1: like Austria, there was already violence in the air because
15:52
Speaker 1: they wanted to have a universal vaccination mandate for everyone.
15:58
Speaker 1: And so a third of the population, which is a
16:01
Speaker 1: lot of people, was so desperate and so afraid of
16:04
Speaker 1: the vaccination that they're threatened with violence. And if one
16:07
Speaker 1: third of the population threatens with violence, it's becoming very serious.
16:11
Speaker 1: So at some point, the elites understood that they must
16:14
Speaker 1: stop this. But it was already getting tough. in some
16:17
Speaker 1: parts of the world. I agree with you.
16:20
Speaker 2: The thing for me, though, where I'm a little bit
16:24
Speaker 2: pessimistic is how do you actually fight the state? I mean,
16:29
Speaker 2: the state is armed with military and most countries' citizens
16:33
Speaker 2: don't even have weapons. I mean, I'm not talking about
16:36
Speaker 2: civil war, but I mean, how do you actually push back?
16:40
Speaker 2: Look what happened to the truckers. Their bank accounts were
16:42
Speaker 2: shut down.
16:46
Speaker 1: Yes, so my view is that the best way correct
16:53
Speaker 1: an illegitimate state is to disobey the state systematically. This
16:58
Speaker 1: is Gandhi's, Mahatma Gandhi's recipe for resistance, which he called
17:03
Speaker 1: peaceful resistance or something like this. And this can work
17:07
Speaker 1: if the elites and also the executive class recognize that
17:12
Speaker 1: they are on the wrong track and then let go
17:16
Speaker 1: of the repression spiral. If that doesn't happen, there's unrest.
17:21
Speaker 1: And then in unrest situations, the question is, what do
17:26
Speaker 1: the commanders of the armed forces decide to do? Do
17:29
Speaker 1: they side with the population or do they side with
17:31
Speaker 1: the elites? And you can never know this in advance,
17:37
Speaker 1: but you have to take into account that, of course,
17:39
Speaker 1: every commander or all the officers decide of the armed
17:43
Speaker 1: forces belong in a way to the masses because their
17:46
Speaker 1: family members are part of the masses, their friends. So they,
17:50
Speaker 1: at some point, they are pushed into a loyalty conflict
17:54
Speaker 1: and you cannot predict the results of what's going to happen.
17:57
Speaker 1: So a good example is the first canton of Switzerland
18:00
Speaker 1: which became democratic was Appenzell or Emmental, I think Appenzell,
18:04
Speaker 1: in 1833. And there was a duke. And the people,
18:09
Speaker 1: I think 9,000 farmers, rebelled and protested and went to
18:12
Speaker 1: the streets and went to the palace to displace the duke.
18:15
Speaker 1: And the duke had a, it was a small, you know, canton,
18:19
Speaker 1: so small federal unit. So I think he had only
18:22
Speaker 1: 300 soldiers. He ordered them to shoot at the peasants.
18:25
Speaker 1: And actually the The top officer wanted to give the order,
18:30
Speaker 1: but the next officer in line took his pistol, shot
18:32
Speaker 1: him in the head, and ordered the rest of the
18:35
Speaker 1: officers to stop and not to kill the farmers. And
18:38
Speaker 1: then the Duke had to leave the country. And in
18:40
Speaker 1: typical Swiss way, he wasn't killed, but they gave him
18:43
Speaker 1: two carriages and said, go to France or to England, goodbye.
18:46
Speaker 1: and let him go. And then it became a democracy.
18:49
Speaker 1: So this is an example, this story, how civil unrest
18:52
Speaker 1: can turn into a good thing if the executive class
18:57
Speaker 1: sees that the rebellion is justified. So you can never
19:01
Speaker 1: know what's going to happen.
19:03
Speaker 2: I mean, adding to that, AI, or more specifically, LLMs,
19:07
Speaker 2: have got a very, very high error rate. And therefore,
19:12
Speaker 2: the sort of existential crisis expressed by people like Elon Musk.
19:16
Speaker 2: And I think, what's your name? Sam Altman from, was
19:20
Speaker 2: it OpenAI, et cetera. They're all saying this is dangerous.
19:23
Speaker 2: We need to slow down. We're going to end up
19:26
Speaker 2: with automated FBI, automated policing. This is not possible.
19:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, so now you are taking, that's good, thanks for
19:34
Speaker 1: coming back to the AI and power question. So basically,
19:38
Speaker 1: there is an overestimation of the capabilities of today's AI
19:44
Speaker 1: for two reasons. One reason is that there has been
19:47
Speaker 1: an investment of several billion into it, and this investment
19:50
Speaker 1: is a big bubble and the leaders of this investment
19:53
Speaker 1: are now afraid of the bursting of the bubble. So
19:55
Speaker 1: they raise these fears because they want to use it
19:59
Speaker 1: to underpin the valuation of their companies. Because if something
20:01
Speaker 1: is so dangerous, it's also valuable. The other, because it's
20:05
Speaker 1: so capable. The other reason that is happening is that
20:08
Speaker 1: Elon Musk, for example, I'm certain that he knows that
20:10
Speaker 1: AI is by far not as effective as he's saying.
20:14
Speaker 1: But he wants to bring politicians to introduce regulations that
20:19
Speaker 1: make it more difficult for competitors to enter into this market.
20:22
Speaker 1: So he wants to increase regulatory hurdles. to shield himself
20:27
Speaker 1: against competition. These are the two motives why Altman and
20:30
Speaker 1: Tim and other CEOs of AI companies are raising these fears.
20:35
Speaker 1: It has nothing to do with how dangerous these machines
20:38
Speaker 1: really are. But it's true that we will not have
20:42
Speaker 1: FBI policing or AI policing or AI soldiers. But AI
20:50
Speaker 1: can still be used to massively enhance repression, and we
20:53
Speaker 1: are already seeing this.
20:55
Speaker 2: The existential threat is obviously just the cover story for
20:58
Speaker 2: increased regulation and an attempt to stifle competition. Yes. I mean, Grok,
21:07
Speaker 2: which is Elon's operation, is not very good. I don't
21:10
Speaker 2: know if you've used it. It's prone to hallucination.
21:15
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, all of these LLM-based agentic systems are
21:21
Speaker 1: prone to omissions and hallucinations because they are regression models.
21:25
Speaker 1: Regression models, they are very big equations, but the last
21:28
Speaker 1: term of the equation is an epsilon, an error term.
21:31
Speaker 1: And this error can be... And when they function by
21:34
Speaker 1: giving out a sequence of symbols, and every time they
21:37
Speaker 1: give out a symbol, they can make an error. And so, therefore,
21:42
Speaker 1: the entire sequence of symbols is full of errors. And
21:45
Speaker 1: it's the same for all of these models. I don't
21:47
Speaker 1: even know if Grog is worse than Gemini or OpenAI or...
21:51
Speaker 1: or other models, it doesn't really matter because fundamentally the
21:57
Speaker 1: technology is absolutely error prone. It's not a technology that
22:02
Speaker 1: can like a classical mechanical robot work most of the
22:06
Speaker 1: time without errors. It's a very error prone technology.
22:09
Speaker 2: I actually like using AI. I mean, I find it
22:13
Speaker 2: very helpful for spelling and grammar and it's basically a
22:17
Speaker 2: better version of an internet search engine.
22:22
Speaker 1: Absolutely. I mean, I also like to use a hammer
22:25
Speaker 1: when I want to hammer in a nail, right? It's
22:27
Speaker 1: a tool. And for certain purposes, it's absolutely perfect. It's
22:32
Speaker 1: very good for internet searches, for getting an overview over
22:35
Speaker 1: some things. And then if you go into the details,
22:38
Speaker 1: of course, you'll find the errors. You need to correct it.
22:40
Speaker 1: But it's a very helpful tool.
22:42
Speaker 2: I agree.
22:43
Speaker 1: But today we are talking about the dangers of it.
22:45
Speaker 1: And I see the danger in enhancement of the fundamental
22:49
Speaker 1: types of power, right? And if you want, I can
22:51
Speaker 1: go into that.
22:53
Speaker 2: Yes, you mentioned Heinrich Poppitz's power classes and how AI
22:59
Speaker 2: can enhance those classes. Yes.
23:03
Speaker 1: So PUPIT distinguishes four power classes. Power of action, instrumental power,
23:08
Speaker 1: authoritative power and data setting power. Power of action is violence.
23:13
Speaker 1: So it's physical violence. Instrumental power is basically what is
23:19
Speaker 1: called carrots and sticks. So it's punishing misbehavior and rewarding
23:23
Speaker 1: compliance and subjugation. Authoritative power is mind control via long-term
23:33
Speaker 1: do's and don'ts, long-term obligations and rules that are instilled
23:39
Speaker 1: into the population by the education system, by the institutions.
23:42
Speaker 1: And data setting power is power that comes from the
23:44
Speaker 1: way you structure the infrastructure of a jurisdiction. Yeah, I
23:52
Speaker 1: can give examples. And all these four types of powers
23:55
Speaker 1: can be enhanced by AI massively and change the way
24:00
Speaker 1: that power can be exerted over populations. How?
24:04
Speaker 2: Give me examples of each.
24:06
Speaker 1: Yes, so action, power of action can be enhanced by
24:10
Speaker 1: AI in warfare. And that is already happening massively in Ukraine,
24:14
Speaker 1: for example, where the reconnaissance and analysis of the actions
24:21
Speaker 1: of the enemy with AI is indispensable to foresee what
24:24
Speaker 1: the enemy is doing. But where it's also absolutely important
24:28
Speaker 1: in defense, especially air defense systems. It is also becoming
24:34
Speaker 1: more and more important for offensive systems, though it's much
24:38
Speaker 1: harder to build AI into offensive systems. And I think
24:43
Speaker 1: it's too complicated to explain why here, but it's a fact.
24:46
Speaker 1: Then for instrumental power, what you can of course do,
24:50
Speaker 1: because you have the masses are now permanently using the internet.
24:54
Speaker 1: So you can observe and classify their behavior and you
24:59
Speaker 1: can punish behavior And that you don't want like the
25:03
Speaker 1: truckers in Canada are a good example, but also in China,
25:05
Speaker 1: people were not able to board trains anymore when they
25:10
Speaker 1: wanted to go to COVID protests. So the internet was supervised.
25:13
Speaker 1: And when they found that citizens were planning to go
25:16
Speaker 1: to a COVID protest, their tickets weren't valid anymore. They
25:18
Speaker 1: couldn't pass a barrier at the railway stations anymore. So
25:21
Speaker 1: this is punishing misbehavior. Then you can, of course, reward
25:25
Speaker 1: compliance via the Internet as well. You can give discounts,
25:28
Speaker 1: make things easier and faster and so on. So this
25:32
Speaker 1: is how you can enhance instrumental power. Do you have
25:36
Speaker 1: questions or shall I also go to the other two
25:38
Speaker 1: types of power, authoritative? Okay, so authoritative power is a
25:42
Speaker 1: long-term change of attitudes. For example, the classical authoritative power
25:46
Speaker 1: are the Ten Commandments that you know that you shouldn't
25:48
Speaker 1: steal and lie and kill and so on. And what
25:53
Speaker 1: you can do with AI is slowly but massively change this.
25:59
Speaker 1: This was AI. I called it Super McLuhan because Marshall
26:03
Speaker 1: McLuhan said in the 1960s, the medium is the message.
26:06
Speaker 1: And he meant that the new media like television and radio,
26:08
Speaker 1: they change the way that you perceive and receive messages
26:12
Speaker 1: and make it more possible to influence people than just
26:15
Speaker 1: reading a book. And I think this, the medium is
26:19
Speaker 1: the message, has become much more relevant now with AI
26:22
Speaker 1: because when you are in a dialogue with an AI,
26:24
Speaker 1: the dialogue gives you much more the illusion that you
26:29
Speaker 1: are talking to a person, that what the other says
26:32
Speaker 1: needs to be taken seriously. than just passively consuming unilateral communication.
26:38
Speaker 1: And so these dialogues that people have with Anthropic or
26:40
Speaker 1: OpenAI or Gemini tend to have a strong effect on them.
26:44
Speaker 1: And the point is that all of these NLM, also GROK,
26:47
Speaker 1: are completely biased and full of propaganda, and that people are,
26:51
Speaker 1: by having dialogues with them, getting influenced to be leaving
26:54
Speaker 1: these propaganda items, especially if they correspond to what they
26:57
Speaker 1: read in the press, see on television and listen to
27:00
Speaker 1: in the radio. So all the media converge to give
27:02
Speaker 1: certain messages to the people and this is setting up
27:05
Speaker 1: new rules and new ways of thinking. For example, one
27:09
Speaker 1: that is very subtle that you have experienced also in
27:11
Speaker 1: South Africa is the silly idea that the role of
27:14
Speaker 1: the state is to enforce equality among citizens. Whereas the
27:20
Speaker 1: real reason for this equality paragraph that you have in
27:23
Speaker 1: all constitutions is that the state should treat all the
27:26
Speaker 1: citizens equally before the law, but certainly the state should
27:30
Speaker 1: not make citizens equal. And so this is a good
27:35
Speaker 1: example of a change of mindset that has very profound
27:40
Speaker 1: effects on society and such changes can be enhanced with AI.
27:45
Speaker 1: And the last part is data setting. And data setting
27:49
Speaker 1: means that you restrict access to certain sites of the
27:53
Speaker 1: internet and guide users to sites that support the interests
27:57
Speaker 1: of the rulers. And this is happening all the time.
27:59
Speaker 1: For example, there are very serious publications on the toxicity
28:04
Speaker 1: on the mRNA vaccines used in COVID and now also
28:07
Speaker 1: for influenza, but it's almost impossible to find them using
28:11
Speaker 1: the internet. You basically have to know where to search
28:14
Speaker 1: before you search. But if you use one of the
28:16
Speaker 1: big access portals, you will not find these publications. Neither
28:19
Speaker 1: was Google. nor with any other of the major search engines.
28:23
Speaker 1: And that's because there is no interest in users finding them.
28:28
Speaker 1: And this type of access manipulation is very powerful because people,
28:33
Speaker 1: when I argue about certain topics, say, but where are
28:35
Speaker 1: your sources? I've never seen any source. But there are
28:38
Speaker 1: many sources, but the people just don't find them. So
28:41
Speaker 1: this is a very short summary of how the four
28:45
Speaker 1: types of power can be enhanced with AI. In the
28:48
Speaker 1: Iran war, there are indeed almost no ground troops affected.
28:53
Speaker 1: It's a pure air and sea war. Well, at sea,
28:59
Speaker 1: there are naval soldiers, sailors involved, but basically it's a
29:05
Speaker 1: missile war currently, a drone war. But if you want
29:09
Speaker 1: to occupy territory and also displace another government, which is
29:15
Speaker 1: your opponent, like it is happening in Ukraine, where the
29:17
Speaker 1: Russians want to displace the Ukrainian government, replace it by
29:20
Speaker 1: puppet government that is more aligned with their interest or
29:24
Speaker 1: totally aligned with their interest, they need to put new soldiers.
29:27
Speaker 1: And then you have a lot of casualties on both sides.
29:31
Speaker 1: I think now in Ukraine, since the war started, we
29:35
Speaker 1: have more than 2 million casualties altogether or something like this.
29:39
Speaker 1: And so then because you cannot conquer territories without soldiers.
29:44
Speaker 1: And that's because you cannot create robots acting as soldiers
29:49
Speaker 1: and walking or driving on the terrain alone. This doesn't work.
29:55
Speaker 2: Now, you were talking about how the internet can be used, well,
29:59
Speaker 2: AI and the internet can be used to manipulate the
30:02
Speaker 2: way people think, but how is that any different to
30:04
Speaker 2: the internet and Wikipedia over the last 20, 30 years?
30:08
Speaker 1: I think the main difference is the usage pattern. So,
30:13
Speaker 1: The classical way media have worked before LLMs were that
30:16
Speaker 1: you basically have a unilateral function. So somebody creates content,
30:21
Speaker 1: like the printing press is printing leaflets, like in the Reformation,
30:24
Speaker 1: or making radio emissions of television shows, and then giving
30:28
Speaker 1: them to the users. And this type of unilateral communications
30:32
Speaker 1: can be effective, but it's much less effective than a dialogue.
30:36
Speaker 1: The reason why you are interviewing partners is because this
30:42
Speaker 1: creates a dialogue situation which is much more interesting for
30:45
Speaker 1: the listener than a monologue and much more convincing. And
30:49
Speaker 1: I think that now that people can have pseudo-dialogues with machines,
30:53
Speaker 1: the influence that machines can have on people is much,
30:55
Speaker 1: much stronger. That's the first aspect. Because humans are built
31:00
Speaker 1: to be convinced in dialogues, right? That's our way that
31:03
Speaker 1: we evolved. Now, it's the same with animals. If you
31:06
Speaker 1: see when animals are foraging and a source of food
31:10
Speaker 1: has been exhausted and one bird has recognized a new
31:14
Speaker 1: source of food, it has to convince the other birds
31:17
Speaker 1: to follow it to the source of food. And that's
31:19
Speaker 1: also a way where it has a dialogue with sounds
31:21
Speaker 1: and gestures and so on. And this has evolved more
31:24
Speaker 1: and more. And so that's why dialogue is so important.
31:26
Speaker 1: The other aspect is, of course, surveillance. That now with AI,
31:31
Speaker 1: you can have a much better surveillance of what people
31:33
Speaker 1: are saying, writing, and so on, because you can use
31:36
Speaker 1: the AI to classify all the utterances that happen on
31:39
Speaker 1: social media automatically. And that's what's happening, of course, since already...
31:43
Speaker 1: Around the 2010s it has been put in place, but
31:46
Speaker 1: it's now getting more and more sophisticated and that allows
31:49
Speaker 1: you to filter out dissident voices and then to prosecute
31:54
Speaker 1: the dissidents. For this you still need policing, but the
31:58
Speaker 1: AI can be used to filter out the voices that
32:01
Speaker 1: you want to silence.
32:04
Speaker 2: So am I correct in saying that the old power
32:09
Speaker 2: would hit you over the head, but the new power
32:12
Speaker 2: will tell you what to think, what to see and
32:15
Speaker 2: where to go.
32:16
Speaker 1: Yes, I mean, the old power also did all of this.
32:19
Speaker 1: Power cannot only work by power of action and violence.
32:23
Speaker 1: You also always need all the four components of power.
32:26
Speaker 1: But the three components that are nonviolent have been now,
32:31
Speaker 1: in a very sophisticated way, are reinforced by digitization and AI.
32:36
Speaker 1: And one very important aspect is that you can put
32:40
Speaker 1: any measure that you want into effect immediately. So you
32:44
Speaker 1: have an immediate deployment effectiveness of power deployment, whereas in
32:48
Speaker 1: the old days, you need to write the director of
32:51
Speaker 1: CIA needs to give orders. They need to trickle down
32:54
Speaker 1: the organization. Human beings need to react. So it takes time.
32:57
Speaker 1: Some that disobey, some are passive and so on. So
33:02
Speaker 1: even within organizations that exert power, you have you have,
33:05
Speaker 1: you know, problems of efficacy. Now, with AI, you can
33:09
Speaker 1: just change the programming of the AI and you have
33:11
Speaker 1: immediately the filtering of the dialogues and the social media changes. Immediately,
33:17
Speaker 1: you can change Grok's quote-unquote attitude about vaccines or whatever. So,
33:22
Speaker 1: you have an immediate rollout of all the power measures
33:27
Speaker 1: and it's immediately effective. And that's because digitization is so
33:31
Speaker 1: central to our life now that you can just pull
33:34
Speaker 1: a switch and you have this change. And that enables
33:37
Speaker 1: a much enhanced realization. And also, all internet users become
33:44
Speaker 1: addressable subjects. Whereas in the old times, when you never
33:49
Speaker 1: speak about your dissident views, And only do this in
33:53
Speaker 1: a very close circle of people you trust. Don't say
33:57
Speaker 1: this in public. Don't say this in a restaurant. They
34:00
Speaker 1: can't catch you. But on the internet, everybody can be
34:03
Speaker 1: made transparent. And so therefore, you can apply the power
34:08
Speaker 1: suddenly to everyone. That also makes it much stronger.
34:12
Speaker 2: I was just thinking now while you were talking that
34:16
Speaker 2: I can have a conversation in a coffee shop with
34:18
Speaker 2: a friend. And suddenly, out of nowhere, my phone will
34:23
Speaker 2: suddenly say, sorry, I didn't catch that. Yes.
34:26
Speaker 1: So this shows you, like in 1984, the protagonist is
34:31
Speaker 1: meeting his girlfriend. And to talk to her in private,
34:35
Speaker 1: they are going for a walk in the woods where
34:38
Speaker 1: they are sure that there are no technical devices so
34:40
Speaker 1: that they can basically not be observed. Today, if you
34:43
Speaker 1: want to have a walk in the woods, you need
34:45
Speaker 1: to leave your phone behind. And all the electronic devices
34:49
Speaker 1: because otherwise they can actively spy on you, right?
34:53
Speaker 2: You're talking about the digital technocracy, but then at the
34:57
Speaker 2: same time, you're saying that AI is not dangerous. So
35:02
Speaker 2: where then is the real danger, Joepst?
35:06
Speaker 1: I'm saying that AI is dangerous because it's a tool
35:12
Speaker 1: that can be used by human beings. So the danger
35:14
Speaker 1: comes from human beings. The danger doesn't come from the
35:17
Speaker 1: technology itself, right? It comes because humans apply this technology
35:22
Speaker 1: in a nefarious way. And we already see this. If
35:25
Speaker 1: you are asking all the LLM providers about the RSV
35:30
Speaker 1: passive vaccination for newborns, they will all tell you how
35:33
Speaker 1: horrible RSV is and you have to vaccinate your newborn
35:36
Speaker 1: child against RSV. But actually, it's nonsense. And it's almost
35:40
Speaker 1: impossible to get these LLMs to answer in a medically
35:43
Speaker 1: correct way about RSV. That's respiratory syncytial virus. So this
35:48
Speaker 1: is just one of thousands of examples how biased these are.
35:51
Speaker 1: So already now the technology is being abused to enforce
35:55
Speaker 1: certain behaviors on the populations and it's working. And so
35:59
Speaker 1: the danger is, of course, not the technology itself, but
36:01
Speaker 1: the way it's getting used. That's always like this with technology.
36:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is an important distinction. The Internet itself is
36:07
Speaker 2: not necessarily dangerous. It can be used to be dangerous.
36:10
Speaker 2: It's always the human hand behind it.
36:12
Speaker 1: Yes.
36:13
Speaker 2: Yes.
36:14
Speaker 1: And not only from the perspective of those who exert power,
36:17
Speaker 1: but also from the individuals who accept to be ruled, right?
36:22
Speaker 1: You need to accept to be ruled. It's your own responsibility.
36:25
Speaker 1: And you always have the choice to say, I don't
36:28
Speaker 1: agree with this type of rule. I'm not complying. I'm
36:31
Speaker 1: not following. I'm not obeying. And I think, but the
36:35
Speaker 1: problem is that today's way of rule with digital means
36:40
Speaker 1: is very subtle and very deep and very broad. So
36:43
Speaker 1: it's more difficult for the individual to evade it and
36:46
Speaker 1: to say, I'm not complying. And so this is why
36:49
Speaker 1: I think that, for example, these absurd narratives that are
36:54
Speaker 1: now regularly, you know, publicized in the West today, like
36:58
Speaker 1: the human climate change narrative, the terrible COVID virus narrative,
37:02
Speaker 1: Russia wants to annihilate us narrative, all this nonsense is
37:07
Speaker 1: spreading so well because also of the digital media.
37:14
Speaker 2: There's an underlying optimism in what you're discussing here.
37:19
Speaker 1: Yes, the optimism comes because I think I'm a Christian,
37:23
Speaker 1: I think we were created by God in His image,
37:26
Speaker 1: and that ultimately human beings can always free themselves of
37:31
Speaker 1: this type of rule and discover their autonomy, what I
37:37
Speaker 1: call the God-given autonomy. And I think that this is
37:41
Speaker 1: regularly happening in societies. So in the mid to long term,
37:46
Speaker 1: I'm optimistic, but in the short term, I'm very pessimistic
37:49
Speaker 1: with regard to how the West is evolving, culturally, economically,
37:53
Speaker 1: and politically. But my fundamental belief that the potential of
37:58
Speaker 1: humans is positive is still there.
38:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, so ultimately the technocrats will still lose.
38:08
Speaker 1: Well, I think that the current pattern of rule will
38:11
Speaker 1: be disrupted. Now there will be then, yet again, then
38:15
Speaker 1: there might be a phase of better participation. I think
38:18
Speaker 1: this is happening in cycles. You have phases of good
38:20
Speaker 1: participation throughout human history, and then you have phases of
38:23
Speaker 1: bad participation and low legitimacy. And currently we have bad
38:27
Speaker 1: participation and low legitimacy. And I think it will get worse,
38:31
Speaker 1: and then there will be a phase of better participation
38:33
Speaker 1: and legitimacy. The point is that I was born in 1970,
38:36
Speaker 1: so I spent the first 30 to 40 years of
38:39
Speaker 1: my life in a phase of rather good participation. And now,
38:42
Speaker 1: since around 2000, I've realized that the participation is declining.
38:46
Speaker 1: I don't know how long this is going to take
38:48
Speaker 1: until it becomes better again, but.
38:50
Speaker 2: It certainly will. Speaking of cycles, I've got one of
38:53
Speaker 2: your books here called Hype Cycles.
38:54
Speaker 1: Yes. Yeah, I said it to you. Sorry that I
38:59
Speaker 1: couldn't sign it.
38:59
Speaker 2: It was too complicated. I do this when we meet sometimes. But,
39:05
Speaker 2: I mean, the point is that you're talking about those
39:08
Speaker 2: exact cycles.
39:09
Speaker 1: Yes. But the height cycles are much faster. So the
39:13
Speaker 1: cycles I'm talking about are cycles of rule. And if
39:16
Speaker 1: you look at European history since the 15th century, you
39:22
Speaker 1: have these cycles of rule with deteriorating and improving living
39:27
Speaker 1: conditions for human beings that take all 50 to 100 years.
39:32
Speaker 1: The hype cycles in the hype cycle book are very
39:34
Speaker 1: fast cycles, right? So the COVID hype cycle lasted for
39:36
Speaker 1: two or three years, then we had the Ukraine hype cycle,
39:40
Speaker 1: and now we have an AI hype cycle. So the
39:42
Speaker 1: hype cycles we have, the cultural hype cycles I'm discussing
39:45
Speaker 1: in this book, last for a shorter time and their
39:50
Speaker 1: purpose is to is also is cultural rule so they
39:54
Speaker 1: basically manipulate people to follow certain um to follow certain
39:59
Speaker 1: narrative that that enhance the power of the ruling elite.
40:04
Speaker 2: So digital technocracy the oligarchy the invisible nobility who are they.
40:12
Speaker 1: So I think that since a long time, since the
40:16
Speaker 1: 12th century, there was a consolidation of the aristocracy, which
40:22
Speaker 1: led from feudalism to monarchy, and then to the late-stage
40:24
Speaker 1: monarchy of the 19th century. But in parallel, the bourgeoisie
40:28
Speaker 1: also rose up. starting with the first town to become Reichsummittelbau,
40:33
Speaker 1: which was Ghent in the, I think, early 12th century.
40:37
Speaker 1: And Brugge and these cities in the Netherlands where they
40:39
Speaker 1: are in the Flemish cities that were making cloth. And
40:43
Speaker 1: this bourgeoisie, this class has then become richer and more
40:47
Speaker 1: and more powerful. And in the 19th century, they managed
40:50
Speaker 1: to take over the power slowly, but then completely. And
40:53
Speaker 1: then In these families, in this lay of society, a
40:58
Speaker 1: process happened that worked to create a new oligarchy that
41:03
Speaker 1: was a concentration of wealth. And I think since the
41:06
Speaker 1: end of the 19th century, we have already families like
41:09
Speaker 1: the Rockefellers and Carnegie's and so on that accumulate so
41:13
Speaker 1: much wealth that they started to be able to control
41:15
Speaker 1: society in a more subtle way than the old feudal order,
41:19
Speaker 1: but they could. And now I think the global north
41:23
Speaker 1: is mainly ruled by a few hundred such families which
41:27
Speaker 1: have per family thousands of billions. Some of these families
41:31
Speaker 1: we know. like the Rothschilds, the Rockefellers, the Gettys, the Fords, Kelloggs,
41:36
Speaker 1: Agnelli in Germany. There are also some such families. The
41:42
Speaker 1: Wittelsbacher are one such family. But others we don't know,
41:45
Speaker 1: and we don't know exactly how they influence political decision-making.
41:49
Speaker 1: But we can clearly see that it's happening and that
41:52
Speaker 1: it's also by the regularity by which Western media are
41:56
Speaker 1: reporting narratives. It's clearly centrally governed, right? But we don't
42:02
Speaker 1: know the mechanisms, and that's a big difference to feudalism.
42:06
Speaker 1: In feudalism, the ruling elite was also publicly the public
42:09
Speaker 1: figure of the state. which is what the great Kantorowicz
42:13
Speaker 1: called the king's two bodies, the private body and the
42:16
Speaker 1: public body. And today, those who exert the political power
42:20
Speaker 1: are doing this on behalf of the ruling elites, but
42:24
Speaker 1: the ruling elites are not visible publicly. And I think
42:27
Speaker 1: the last time there was a public show of who
42:31
Speaker 1: the real ruler was, was the burial of one of
42:34
Speaker 1: the Rothschilds in the 19th century, or the Champs-Élysées, with
42:39
Speaker 1: hundreds of thousands of attendants, and the burial costs millions.
42:43
Speaker 1: And that was the last big show of the superiority
42:47
Speaker 1: of the Sydney elites. And since then, they have hidden themselves,
42:51
Speaker 1: and they are not visible today.
42:54
Speaker 2: Now, Jorbst, the end of the gold standard in the
42:58
Speaker 2: early 1970s you argue was a very pivotal moment uh
43:04
Speaker 2: you say it triggered the fire economy what do you mean.
43:10
Speaker 1: Ah so so this is a term um uh invented
43:14
Speaker 1: by um what's his name give me a second by
43:20
Speaker 1: michael hudson so michael hudson calls is a financialized economy
43:24
Speaker 1: uh in which in which basically um you have uh
43:28
Speaker 1: uh A few percent of the population who own a
43:32
Speaker 1: lot and who also own the banks, these are just
43:35
Speaker 1: per mil, and they can create credit out of nothing.
43:42
Speaker 1: And then basically all the rest of the population or
43:46
Speaker 1: 90% of the population becomes debtors for their entire life.
43:50
Speaker 1: And they have to pay their mortgage, they have to
43:52
Speaker 1: pay back the loans from visiting college, they take loans
43:57
Speaker 1: on their cars, and they become totally dependent on the
44:00
Speaker 1: creditor class. And that's what Michael Hudson calls a financialized economy.
44:06
Speaker 1: And one of its core problems is that the basic
44:08
Speaker 1: costs of living are very high because finance health insurance,
44:15
Speaker 1: real estate, these are the fire components, all are owned
44:18
Speaker 1: by oligarchic owners who get huge benefits from these basic
44:23
Speaker 1: necessities of life and make it very hard for the
44:28
Speaker 1: rest of the population to acquire any wealth. And this
44:31
Speaker 1: model is a very exploitative model. And it's also leading
44:35
Speaker 1: to huge indebtment of the entire private and public sector,
44:38
Speaker 1: to low productivity rates and to deindustrialization. And that's what
44:43
Speaker 1: the West is suffering from. And this process is now
44:46
Speaker 1: very advanced so that you have only economic growth under
44:50
Speaker 1: massive creation of new debt. And it's very unhealthy.
44:56
Speaker 2: Yes, but how is that related to the digital technocracy?
45:01
Speaker 1: Oh, so also countries that don't have fire economies like
45:05
Speaker 1: China and Russia don't have fire economies. These countries also
45:09
Speaker 1: exert digital technocracy. So digital technocracy is not related to
45:12
Speaker 1: the way the financial sector works, but it's related to
45:15
Speaker 1: an oligarchic style of rule, which basically independently of the
45:24
Speaker 1: presence of democratic institutions, which you also have in Russia,
45:28
Speaker 1: finds a way to rule besides the democratic institutions so
45:33
Speaker 1: that the democratic institutions are merely a facade to create
45:37
Speaker 1: some legitimacy, but that the real rule is happening besides
45:40
Speaker 1: or outside these institutions. So that, for example, in Western Europe,
45:44
Speaker 1: the parliaments, they are only there to acclaim the decisions
45:48
Speaker 1: taken somewhere else before.
45:51
Speaker 2: In your opinion, Jobst, which is more dangerous? Infrastructure that
45:56
Speaker 2: shapes people gradually, or shall we say infrastructure that you
46:02
Speaker 2: can reconfigure overnight?
46:05
Speaker 1: So the low bridges to Long Island are physical barriers
46:10
Speaker 1: to prevent buses from going to Long Island, so that
46:13
Speaker 1: the masses cannot visit Long Island. They were designed like
46:16
Speaker 1: this by Robert Moses, the power broker, right? And there
46:19
Speaker 1: are many other such examples. This infrastructure is very effective,
46:22
Speaker 1: but it's very old-fashioned. And we are talking about data-setting power.
46:29
Speaker 1: And data-setting power, another example is the way that Paris
46:33
Speaker 1: is connected via railroads to the other towns in France.
46:36
Speaker 1: It's like a star scheme. And if you go from
46:39
Speaker 1: there to there, you have to go via Paris first.
46:41
Speaker 1: This is data setting power so that everything is focused
46:44
Speaker 1: on Paris. And of course, data setting power that in
46:47
Speaker 1: the internet is much more flexible. You can change it
46:50
Speaker 1: anytime overnight suddenly. This makes it, because it's so flexible
46:53
Speaker 1: and immediate, it's much more powerful than the bridges to
46:57
Speaker 1: Long Island that Robert Moses built.
47:00
Speaker 2: Are you making an argument for decentralization?
47:05
Speaker 1: I mean, decentralization and local control over power is the
47:09
Speaker 1: best way to make power less harmful. Because if you
47:12
Speaker 1: have power at the lowest level of the organization of society,
47:18
Speaker 1: then the rulers are known to everyone. And then you
47:21
Speaker 1: have personal power relations. And personal power relations are, at
47:25
Speaker 1: least if you have the rule of law installed in
47:28
Speaker 1: a society... much better than anonymous power relations. So yes,
47:32
Speaker 1: I'm totally in favor of decentralization, but at the moment
47:37
Speaker 1: we're experiencing the opposite in the West. We have experienced
47:40
Speaker 1: more and more centralization.
47:41
Speaker 2: A characteristic of digital technocracy is being switched on at
47:48
Speaker 2: all times. I noted my phone saying I didn't get that,
47:52
Speaker 2: you know, in random conversation. I'm wondering if there is a,
47:58
Speaker 2: subliminal danger there also.
48:01
Speaker 1: So I think that this is, I mentioned being the
48:05
Speaker 1: precondition of power via digitization is the fact that people
48:09
Speaker 1: participate in the internet all the time. So the best
48:12
Speaker 1: way to do what Mahatma Gandhi is asking us to do,
48:15
Speaker 1: to disobey peacefully, is to switch off the devices and
48:20
Speaker 1: do more activity without devices. Go for a walk without devices,
48:24
Speaker 1: leave your house without the device and try to avoid
48:27
Speaker 1: the devices. Of course, our societies try to make this
48:31
Speaker 1: harder and harder by putting everything onto the devices. But
48:34
Speaker 1: when you can avoid to use the devices, it frees
48:37
Speaker 1: you from this influence and this supervision. So this is
48:40
Speaker 1: the best way to deal with this phenomenon. I mean,
48:44
Speaker 1: maybe let's look at another important aspect that you're asking.
48:48
Speaker 1: That is why there cannot be automated policing. So if
48:53
Speaker 1: there was automated policing, there would be a total dystopia.
48:58
Speaker 1: But this cannot happen because the machines don't understand what
49:01
Speaker 1: people say. And because they cannot really judge what they're saying.
49:04
Speaker 1: So what they can do is automatically filter what people
49:06
Speaker 1: are saying and writing. posting on the internet. But ultimately
49:11
Speaker 1: human beings have to take a look at it and
49:13
Speaker 1: evaluate whether it's worth prosecuting it and then also doing
49:16
Speaker 1: the prosecution. So I would like to say that these
49:19
Speaker 1: visions of that we are Robocop, automatically, you know, police,
49:24
Speaker 1: that's all nonsense. What digitization AI do is just is
49:29
Speaker 1: not save so much of the human labor force for policing,
49:32
Speaker 1: but it's just putting the focus onto everyone. And that
49:36
Speaker 1: is the big danger.
49:38
Speaker 2: So you were alluding earlier to the technocrats, the oligarchy,
49:43
Speaker 2: this class of elites. But you haven't actually broken apart
49:50
Speaker 2: the class itself because there is a general misconception, I think.
49:56
Speaker 2: And tell me if you agree with me on that.
49:58
Speaker 2: that they are this well-oiled machine.
50:01
Speaker 1: So these are, I think that each family in itself
50:05
Speaker 1: has conflicts. And that at some point a decision is made,
50:10
Speaker 1: what is the interest of the family? And then there are,
50:13
Speaker 1: of course, associations of these families. For example, the board
50:16
Speaker 1: of BlackRock is a good example, right? The owners of BlackRock,
50:19
Speaker 1: who own the shares of BlackRock. They need to agree.
50:23
Speaker 1: There are multiple conflicts. A good example of a conflict
50:25
Speaker 1: is that for, I think, until two or three years ago,
50:29
Speaker 1: the majority of the oligarchic families in the USA were woke.
50:34
Speaker 1: They were postmodern collectivists. And they were following the woke agenda.
50:37
Speaker 1: They were believing in it. Since five years or a
50:40
Speaker 1: bit longer, some of the families have recognized that they
50:43
Speaker 1: are really harming themselves with the wokeness. And they now
50:47
Speaker 1: are against the wokeness. They are now in favor of
50:49
Speaker 1: what I call neoconservative authoritarianism, which is what Elon Musk
50:54
Speaker 1: and Peter Thiel are favoring. And so now there's a
50:57
Speaker 1: conflict within the Western oligarchy whether one should favor wokeness
51:03
Speaker 1: like Klaus Schwab does or George Soros does, or whether
51:08
Speaker 1: one should now more favor neoconservative authoritarianism. And this battle
51:14
Speaker 1: is not won. It's going on. It's raging. You can
51:16
Speaker 1: see it from the immigration debate in the United States.
51:19
Speaker 1: And I think that this is a good example of
51:23
Speaker 1: lack of unanimity in the ruling class. It's not an
51:25
Speaker 1: oil machine. It has been very efficient and working quite
51:28
Speaker 1: well in the 80s, 90s, and 2000s. But now there
51:31
Speaker 1: are conflicts within it. You can see this, for example,
51:34
Speaker 1: that the economist who is 100% owned by the Rothschilds
51:37
Speaker 1: is on the one hand against the Iran war and
51:41
Speaker 1: thinks it's a mistake, but fanatically in favor of the
51:45
Speaker 1: Ukraine war. But the U.S. government is pursuing both wars.
51:49
Speaker 1: And it's very– so you can see that there are
51:51
Speaker 1: many conflicts there as well. That's very typical of ruling elites.
51:55
Speaker 2: These conflicts are obviously good because they lead to a
51:58
Speaker 2: kind of gridlock.
52:01
Speaker 1: Well, it would be nice. But I think that what
52:04
Speaker 1: we're experiencing in Europe is now a deindustrialization and also– demographic,
52:10
Speaker 1: massive demographic decline that is very rapid and that is
52:13
Speaker 1: not a gridlock. But there's a dynamic in it that's very,
52:17
Speaker 1: very dangerous. So I think that the downslope is accelerating.
52:20
Speaker 1: And unfortunately, despite these conflicts, What is really happening politically
52:26
Speaker 1: and culturally in Europe is very dangerous and depressing. So
52:30
Speaker 1: if there would be a gridlock that would stop the decline,
52:32
Speaker 1: that would be nice, but I don't see any of this.
52:34
Speaker 2: Funny you say that. I told you that I was
52:38
Speaker 2: in London recently, and when I was in Heathrow, I
52:41
Speaker 2: was trying to find somebody who could help me find
52:42
Speaker 2: a train, and there was nobody who spoke English in England.
52:47
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, the problem is that what this means
52:53
Speaker 1: metaphysically is destruction of the person of the state. So
52:57
Speaker 1: the person of the state is a metaphysical image for
53:00
Speaker 1: how a state works. A good state has a metaphysical
53:03
Speaker 1: person that embodies the state and like you have in
53:06
Speaker 1: the Leviathan, like Leviathan in Hobbes. And if you have
53:09
Speaker 1: a society that is culturally totally heterogeneous, the person of
53:13
Speaker 1: the state somehow vanishes and then you get balkanization. And
53:16
Speaker 1: then you have basically conflicts, ethical conflicts, cultural conflicts that
53:22
Speaker 1: prevent the state from working properly. And that's, I think,
53:25
Speaker 1: what we're heading to in Europe.
53:27
Speaker 2: Would you mind summarizing everything for the average listener?
53:30
Speaker 1: Yes. So to put it in very simple terms, with
53:36
Speaker 1: digitization of our life, with the introduction of the internet
53:39
Speaker 1: into all the many domains of our lives, we have
53:43
Speaker 1: now the availability of everything we do in digital data,
53:47
Speaker 1: a lot of what we do in digital data. And
53:49
Speaker 1: this interaction with the internet that we do can be
53:52
Speaker 1: used to First of all, to influence the way we
53:59
Speaker 1: think because we get a lot of messages from the internet,
54:01
Speaker 1: especially via pseudo-dialogues with machines that are very convincing to
54:05
Speaker 1: many people and that shape and change the way that
54:07
Speaker 1: people think. And this changes the way that power can
54:12
Speaker 1: be exerted upon their minds, which is the strongest way
54:14
Speaker 1: of exerting power, is by convincing people that the narratives
54:17
Speaker 1: that favor the rulers are good and should be taken seriously,
54:22
Speaker 1: and that they should be internalized and made one's own belief.
54:26
Speaker 1: It's like when you say, I'm a climate activist or
54:28
Speaker 1: I'm a migration activist. then you are in this trap.
54:32
Speaker 1: And then the second big change that we have is
54:38
Speaker 1: that because everybody's participating all the time in the internet,
54:41
Speaker 1: we now have a massive opportunity to supervise everyone's behavior
54:48
Speaker 1: in the internet. So this is what has fundamentally changed
54:52
Speaker 1: due to digitization and AI over the last 10 to
54:55
Speaker 1: 15 years. Furthermore, AI has also enhanced the possibility of
55:02
Speaker 1: supervising people in a way that is not possible without.
55:06
Speaker 2: AI. Even more simply, don't fear AI and turn off
55:10
Speaker 2: your devices when you don't need them.
55:12
Speaker 1: Yes. So you should, one should use, you know, you
55:17
Speaker 1: don't have to have your toothbrush in your hand all
55:19
Speaker 1: the day, right? It's three times a day or two
55:22
Speaker 1: times a day you should have it in your hand
55:23
Speaker 1: and brush your teeth. Otherwise, you have it in your bathroom.
55:26
Speaker 1: It's a tool. Also, I have many tools here, like
55:28
Speaker 1: these scissors. Do I carry the scissors around with me
55:31
Speaker 1: all the time? No. Just to cut something, right? So
55:33
Speaker 1: the same with this device. I don't have to have
55:36
Speaker 1: it with me all the time.
55:37
Speaker 2: Only when I need it. Jobst, how can I then
55:41
Speaker 2: follow your work?
55:42
Speaker 1: So you can find my books on Amazon. Jobst Landgräbe
55:46
Speaker 1: is most of them, Jobst Landgräbe. But the one by
55:51
Speaker 1: Arnold Schelsky, I used to tell him that's a hype cycle.
55:54
Speaker 1: This you can find with Arnold Schelsky. The best summary
55:57
Speaker 1: about me is actually written by Grok. There's a Grokipedia
56:00
Speaker 1: article about me, which is really the best article about
56:03
Speaker 1: me on the internet. It's astonishing.
56:08
Speaker 2: I haven't actually used Grokopedia. I think I should.
56:11
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, everybody who wants to see all the
56:14
Speaker 1: work I'm doing should go to Grokopedia and just read
56:16
Speaker 1: the article. It's quite astonishing how thorough it is.
56:19
Speaker 2: All right. Jörg Schlangweber, thank you for joining me in
56:24
Speaker 2: the trenches.
56:24
Speaker 1: Thanks for the invitation. Hope to see you another time. Bye-bye.