How Psychotechnology Changed Humanity Forever
This essay is inspired by the brilliant work of John Vervaeke. For the full experience, I highly recommend his series, Awakening From the Meaning Crisis, here.
Thank you, John.
The year was 1177 B.C.
The Bronze Age collapse was underway, marking the greatest demise in the history of civilization. This led to the Dark Age, where alchemical seeds of future thought took root.
Small remnant societies barely clung to survival, placing huge demands on cognition. What emerged from this age were mental tools forever transforming our ability to think and communicate.
This pivotal moment in history came to be known as the Axial Age. Before this age, literacy was rare, with clunky characters lacking the versatility of the modern alphabet we now take for granted. This bluntness put a harsh limit on the range of thoughts that could be conveyed. Imagine having to express modern ideas, from physics to philosophy, with only the characters below.
Though aesthetic, the characters are too obtuse for modern use. The learning curve was steep, making literacy a full-time job for…
