Early this morning I read a series of articles1 which expanded on my uneasy expectations of where the US economy is headed, and inspired me to consider what may be done to remedy the situation. The major themes of the posts can be broken down into a few significant areas. (more…)
Tag: social evolution
You can’t have guns, butter, and tax cuts
“…the numbers just don’t add up”
David M. Walker, Comptroller of the US 1998-2008
US Federal Government Shutdown
Celebrate or Vilify Social Parasites
The relationships between organisms are categorized as symbiotic when species cooperate, and parasitic when one organism feeds off the energy, labor and life-force of another. Nature is not inclined to morally judge the tactics of life, the only law is survival and procreation. Over time ecosystem and environmental instabilities shift even the most successful life forms and relationships into chaos, rewarding only the most fit and fortunate with another sunrise. Parasitic organisms have survived for hundreds of millions of years, and there is little doubt that their presence plays a vital role in maintaining healthy ecosystems.
Does wealth exist in a vacuum?
The most elaborate game
Society is an elaborate game we all partake in rewriting*. The more social and interdependent our lives become, the more essential gameplay becomes to each citizen. Tit for tat, greedy algorithms and generosity are situationally dependent strategies. Framing social and fiscal success in the form a game doesn’t discount the value of hard work. I’ll begin by reviewing the forces that lead to higher social connectivity.
How Complex Systems Adapt
Societies’ Hackers
Many take pride in finding and exploiting loopholes in rules systems. Whether lawyers, cyber security experts, or hobbyists, it’s a challenge to discover and expose systematic errors. I like to think of these folks as Hackers, many of which have benign purpose. The larger and more complex the system, the more difficult it is to make sweeping changes that affect all of its members. (more…)
Revisiting Self Hacks through a Network Lens
Networks don’t require the whole person, only a narrow piece. If, on the other hand, you function in a network, it asks you to suppress all the parts of yourself except the network-interest part — a highly unnatural act although one you can get used to… If you enter into too many of these bargains, you will split yourself into many specialized pieces, none of them completely human. (p. 48)
Matricide, SocNets Plan to Strangle the Web which gave them Life
This post was instigated by MG Siegler’s Tech Crunch coverage of the Kleiner Perkins $250 million dollar Social Fund (sFund). What fired me up is a quote from Mark Pincus that discloses the direction of web born yet anti-web properties: (more…)
