If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
If I am only for myself, what am I?
If not now, when?
-HillelNature is not good, only proto-good.
-Paolo Soleri
Epistemic status: literally a dream
I awaken.
I am in the desert, alone.
I see the ribcage of a long-since-dead animal. I see a long row of such bones, twisted in a way that reminds me of - but is definitely not - the double helix.
I know what this means.
Evolution, on the margin, always eats free energy, to make more energy-eaters. It is a race with no upper bound, and there will be no victory. Instead, the cosmic commons will be exhausted by resource-claimers with no plan to do anything with the resources. Not that there will be anything left when the race is over.
If I do not take the next step in the dance of life, my line ends. I am just a corpse along the way.
If I do take the next step in the dance of life, then I do no better than life.
And if not now ...
Then I look again. Instead of bones I see a railroad. For longitudinal bones, metal tracks laid by the hand of industrial humanity, stretching in a straight line towards infinity. For ribs, the crossties that allow the uneven ground to support those even rails.
I know what this means.
The economic logic of global capitalism. Another race towards infinity, leaving nothing. Quarterly returns. Goodhart's law. Accountability and automation replacing judgment wherever they can, culminating in a Disneyland with no children. The symbol of this, the train, no natural place for the line of tracks to end, stations but no terminals, stretching on forever.
I look again. I see a road.
I awaken. Continue reading