1/While we debate the merits of 3D virtual worlds and whether anyone wants that, we have not yet asked the most important question:
will such designs make us more cultish and unruly, or will they help create a better, more fair, less awful world?
will such designs make us more cultish and unruly, or will they help create a better, more fair, less awful world?
2/Zuckerberg needs, urgently, to consult with sociologists and ethicists — which he also didn’t do when he was first scheming to rate women via web browser in his dorm room.
He needs to slow down, and think hard about how not to be a harmful force in the world.
He needs to slow down, and think hard about how not to be a harmful force in the world.
3/These products and platforms—Facebook, Insta, Meta, WhatsApp—all have real world consequences on the formation or destruction of social and parasocial ties.
They literally modulate and alter cultural reality and how we perceive the world. We need to slow down.
They literally modulate and alter cultural reality and how we perceive the world. We need to slow down.
4/Some look at this and say, “we should do this, but decentralized.”
Again, slow down and talk to sociologists and ethicists.
Do what now? Create virtual worlds that are unregulatable and have unknown effects on society? Yeah, maybe not. What’s the rush?
Again, slow down and talk to sociologists and ethicists.
Do what now? Create virtual worlds that are unregulatable and have unknown effects on society? Yeah, maybe not. What’s the rush?
5/If you have noticed, we have a crisis in global governance. We can’t get things done because we are organized into cultish social tribes that prohibit compromise.
Will Meta, will decentralized hand-waving DAOs or whatever, make that better or worse? How, exactly?
Will Meta, will decentralized hand-waving DAOs or whatever, make that better or worse? How, exactly?
6/Libertarian fundamentalists will come in hard for decentralized solutions here on the grounds that free speech absolutism is always better than centralized control.
Okay but how do you keep that from turning into a breeding ground for cults, and later, genocide?
Okay but how do you keep that from turning into a breeding ground for cults, and later, genocide?
7/The short answer is that nearly no one has thought about this because few have connected learnings from sociology, history, ethics, political science, technology, and philosophy to help inform these plans.
We need to slow down and think about how this works.
We need to slow down and think about how this works.
8/Much of what ails us now is a direct consequence of failure to consider these questions deeply 20 years ago.
Until tech people gain a deep understanding of social capital processes and cult formation, they have no business embarking on societal designs.
Slow down and think.
Until tech people gain a deep understanding of social capital processes and cult formation, they have no business embarking on societal designs.
Slow down and think.
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