Reason Iteration: 01
Friday, 07 July 2017
Revolutionary claims.
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Every great company makes at least one revolutionary claim.
The greatest companies make many revolutionary claims.
For example.
Amazon’s original revolutionary claim was: the world’s largest bookstore.
Amazon revolutionary claim today is:
We sell everything — literally all consumer goods — the world’s largest store in every category — at market price — and deliver faster than anyone.
Which is really a chain of revolutionary claims strung together into one mega value proposition. Amazon’s secondary business lines — like AWS — have their own revolutionary claims.
I could give you more historical and contemporary examples. Legendary entrepreneurs like Brunel, Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, Carnegie, Hershey, Edison, Bell, Disney, Ford, Hughes, Walton, Jobs, Catmull, Gates, Musk, Bezos…founded industry-defining companies based on revolutionary claims.
The fastest plane in the world. Two cars in every garage. Safe, cheap light for all. A conversation with someone half-way around the world. Build taller with steel. Cartoons that move and talk. An Oscar-winning computer-animated full-length feature film. Cheap, re-usable space rockets.
But what is the difference between Steve Jobs and a charlatan?
Charlatans make claims they can’t back up.
Steve Jobs made revolutionary claims — and backed them up.
Apple ships products that aren’t just supposed to be magical.
They work. They’re actually magical.
It is hard to make revolutionary claims.
But it is harder to back them up with products and services that work.
Words like revolutionary and magical are sacred.
They should not be taken in vain.
I do not want to take these words in vain.
I do not want to be a charlatan.
Claims I want to make
I founded Invisible Technologies to make the following claims.
1
We do your work for you.
We do your “work” for you, so you can do your “real work”.
We define “work” as “any process that can be turned into a set of instructions”.
We define “real work” as creative problem-solving without instructions.
We are a process automation company.
We make it easy for you to make automation requests.
We take your requests and turn them into sets of instructions.
We build processes based on these sets of instructions.
We run these processes reliably and consistently, 24/7.
We upgrade these processes to make them better, faster, cheaper over time.
2
We build and run every process at your company.
Because of 1, we learned how to build and run processes for individuals.
Eventually we learned how to build and run processes for companies, too.
So we can build and run processes for every individual at your company.
And we can build and run processes for every team at the company.
And for the company itself.
And network all of these together.
We do your company’s work, so your company can do its “real work”.
Every company needs a hiring process, a training process, a process for preparing agendas, a process for making decisions, a process for reviewing performance, a process for planning, a process for communicating information… etc.
Just to exist, just to keep up, every company has to…
“Eat, drink and sleep”… re-invent the wheel…
build and run the same basic processes as every other company.
Instead of attempting to be the best in the world at everything…
Every company should focus on being the best in the world at one thing.
That is your company’s “real work”, your contribution.
Innovation cannot be turned into a set of instructions.
But everything else can.
3
We organize your data.
We organize your data, so you can focus on being creative and problem solving.
We name, place, tag, template and set permissions on every file you own.
We make it effortless for you to add, edit, find, delete and share your files.
We maintain and network your files so that data stays in sync across your files.
We upgrade your templates so they get better over time.
4
We organize all of your company’s data.
Because of 3, we learned how to organize data for individuals.
Eventually we learned how to organize data for companies, too.
So we can organize data for every individual at your company.
And organize data for every team at your company.
And for the company itself.
And network all of these together.
5
We organize your brain.
Because of 3, we realized that data isn’t just “data”.
The more of your data we organize intelligently, the more brain-like it becomes.
Your data set becomes your “digital brain”, your “brain-on-paper”.
So in organizing your data, we are really organizing your brain.
We call your digital brain your “grid”.
6
We organize your company’s brain.
Because of 3–5, we organize your company’s brain.
That includes every individual and team in your company.
Your company’s “grid” is its “digital brain”, its “brain-on-paper”.
7
We give you a path to immortality.
Because of 5…
If you die, your grid is the closest you can get to achieving immortality.
If you die, but leave behind a complete enough grid, maybe someday…
Maybe someday we can construct your consciousness and resurrect you.
This seems to us a better approach than cryogenesis;
Although not in any way competitive or mutually-exclusive;
Indeed, they will be probably be synergistic in some way.
8
We network brains.
Because of 3–6…
Your company’s brain is really just a series of networked brains.
We build a separate grid for each individual in the company.
And a separate grid for each team in the company.
And a separate grid for the company itself.
All of these grids are networked together.
Ergo, we network brains.
9
We network all brains.
Because of 3, we know how to network your brain to itself.
Because of 8, we know how to network all brains inside of a company.
But why stop there? We can network all brains.
We can network any part of any brain with any part of any other brain.
We can network individuals, teams, and companies together.
In any combination.
This maintains privacy while allowing for collaboration.
Romantic partners can link their digital brains.
Families can link their digital brains.
Friends can link their digital brains.
Companies can link parts of their digital brains with their vendors or partners.
Industries can link their digital brains.
In theory, all brains could be linked.
A global consciousness, a world-brain, can emerge.
This seems a better approach to us than brain-machine interfaces;
Although not in any way competitive or mutually-exclusive;
Indeed, they will be probably be synergistic in some way.
10
We are building a dense-net.
Our database is a dense-net: a dense internet.
A more dense version of the internet.
Neologism much? ;-)
Because of 9, you might ask: how is this different than the internet?
The internet is, in a sense, a world-brain — a linking of all brains.
But the internet’s defining feature is lack of structure. It is a chaotic mess.
That’s what makes the internet great. It has very few rules.
The internet is Apples and Oranges.
Our database is the dense-net.
The defining feature of our database is density.
It is organized, structured.
Every data type is standardized, named and templated.
The dense-net is Apples for Apples.
This statement is false: “Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” Google does not “organize” the world’s information; it “searches” it. The internet is Apples and Oranges, too chaotic to organize, too unstructured to do anything but search and link.
This statement is true:
“Invisible’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally structured/networked/useful/efficient/dense/accessible/beautiful.”
Apples for Apples.
11
We lower transaction costs.
Because of 10…
The dense-net is Apples for Apples.
That means that a sales person at Company A can compare a Sales Funnel (a data type in our data base) with a sales person at Company B — and the files will be structured in the same way, because they share the same template.
In the future, a lawyer at Company A can compare Contract Type 1876 with a lawyer at Company B, for the same reason.
In the future, a shipment received by Company A updates Inventory 37691 updates Contract 97456 sends Payment 891231 to Company B.
This lowers transaction costs.
12
We enable futuristic markets.
Because of 11…
As we lower transaction costs, we enable futuristic markets to form.
As grids become networked, transactions become networked.
Data is linked to transactions. Transactions ARE data.
Mapping data to data, data to transactions, transactions to transactions…
Perfectly organized data enables perfectly frictionless transactions.
Frictionless transactions enable a new, futuristic economy.
This seems a better approach to us than blockchains;
Although not in any way competitive or mutually-exclusive;
Indeed, they will be probably be synergistic in some way.
13
We lower coordination costs.
Because of 2, 4, 6 8, 9, and 10…
We build and run all the processes at your company.
We organize, structure and network all the data grids at your company.
This lowers coordination costs.
14
We enable a denser economy.
Because of 11 and 13…
Lowering transaction and coordination costs alters Coasian limits…
Allowing for an increase company density;
Which in turn increases the density of all industries and the economy itself;
Fundamentally re-arranging markets into futuristic landscapes.
Denser companies mean that both larger and smaller companies are possible.
In the future, a company will IPO with only one employee.
In the future, a company will productively employ one billion employees.
Many services now performed by employees will be performed by vendors.
Vendors will scale to extraordinary sizes.
Companies will outsource everything except core innovation.
To a degree, this is already true.
“The future is here, just not evenly distributed yet.”
These conditions will become more extreme over time.
15
We increase individual organization.
Based on 1–16, at this point, this should go without saying.
Locking in the win. This is a derivative claim.
16
We increase individual productivity.
Based on 1…
We do your work for you.
If we define “productivity” as “doing work”…
This should ultimately result in a productivity singularity.
You should ultimately be entirely free to innovate, create and solve problems.
We define this as “real work” — and hence, not productivity, strictly speaking.
17
We increase individual creativity.
By taking over your “work” and freeing you up for “real work”,
we increase individual creativity. Such an increase as to be unprecedented in human history. Past increases have been aggregate in nature, or gains from trade, or isolated processes (the washing machine took away washing work, the car took away transportation work). But this is a general process and data organization singularity, and should be more revolutionary than past revolutions.
18
We improve individual decision-making.
Based on 15–7…
By increasing individual organization, productivity and creativity…
We are uniquely positioned to help individuals with decision-making.
You can log any Decision you make, and we will organize it for you.
If you let us, we will ask you to provide Reasons.
Over time, we can abstract these decisions into meta-decisions.
Meta-decisions are repeat decisions …
You make them once so you don’t have to keep making them.
Examples are:
Policies (decision-making rules)…
Protocols (communication rules)…
Principles (decision-making guidance).
Other decision making tools include:
Purpose, Values, Beliefs, Objectives, Plans, Priorities.
These are literally data types.
We can log them, network them, analyze them.
19
We increase individual intelligence.
Based on 15–18…
Intelligence is n-dimensional.
An organized person has high organizational intelligence.
A productive person has high productivity intelligence.
A creative person has high creative intelligence.
A strategic person has high strategic intelligence.
A strong decision-maker has high decision-making intelligence.
A strong manager has high management intelligence.
“General” intelligence is intelligence across all known dimensions.
So a person superior in every way has high general intelligence.
We make you better in every way.
We organize every type of data in your life.
Every kind of data represents a different kind of intelligence.
If you record all of your calls…
And we organize these recordings…
And transcribe these recordings…
And network them with your meeting notes…
And network them with your calendar history…
And network them with your contact notes…
And tag them with analytics factors like length of call, number participants…
Etc.
Then you are intelligent in the “call recordings” dimension.
Which is a unique dimension of intelligence.
You are narrowly intelligent.
But the more narrow intelligences we build and network…
The more you can be said to be generally intelligent.
As your grid grows, the number of data types in it will grow…
As your grid matures, the network value across data types will increase…
In other words…
As your digital brain grows, your actual brain grows.
You will experience “fusion”.
You will be “one” with your “tool”.
In the same way that any person skilled with a tool can “think” with the tool.
The tool becomes an extension of the mind and the body, an artificial hand.
In the beginning, your digital brain struggles to model your actual brain…
But eventually, your actual brain struggles to keep up with your digital brain…
The two are constantly trying to model each other…
They are in a dialectic…
20
We increase civilizational intelligence.
Based on 15–19…
In the same way that we increase individual intelligence…
We increase the intelligence of teams…
We increase the intelligence of companies…
We increase the intelligence of all personal and professional relationships….
We increase the intelligence of civilization itself.
21
We prevent civilization from destroying itself.
Civilization is at risk of destroying itself.
Technology creates power.
Technology controls power.
There can be said to be two kinds of technologies:
Power technologies and control technologies.
Power technologies create power by solving practical problems.
Control technologies control power by making decisions about how to use it.
Teleportation, for example, would be a power technology.
But as practical as it would be, it would create problems, like security problems.
Suppose someone invented a teleportation “network” to limit acceptable paths.
That would be a control technology.
Most technologies you commonly think of are power technologies.
Examples of control technologies are governments, corporations, markets, regulations, contracts, the brains of individual human beings and computers.
Indeed — on some level these control technologies are analogs.
A brain = a computer = a company = a government.
Every company is a brain.
Every computer is a brain.
Every company is a government.
Every government is a computer.
Etc.
What do all of these have in common, such that they are so resonant?
They are all decision-making entities.
Brains make decisions based on data.
That is a primary dimension of intelligence.
Historically almost all of civilization’s focus has been on control technologies.
In recent decades, almost all of the focus has shifted to power technologies.
Power technologies seem to hold before us, as if for the first time, the promise of universal material abundance. Technology promises deflationary utopia: more and more kinds of goods and services, always better, faster and cheaper.
With the world of abundance that such a utopia would seem to promise, who needs to worry about control anymore? Control assumes scarcity.
Or does it? Control does not assume scarcity. As power becomes more abundant, control becomes a bigger and bigger problem.
In the future, a teenage girl in Hong Kong breaks up with her boyfriend. Her boyfriend is so hurt and angry, he uses his futuristic brain + futuristic markets + futuristic collaboration + futuristic internet to build a chemical weapon that wipes out the city in an act of existential revenge.
James Madison said, “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.” He was so right, he was wrong. Even if men become angels, government will be necessary. As men become more and more like gods, control technologies become more and more necessary. The gods must not war on Olympus.
In a world of abundance, all humans are more powerful, and humans inherently desire power over other humans. So in such a world, control technologies are necessary for alignment and harmony.
This is not a far-fetched problem for a sci-fi landscape. This is a relevant problem today. In our lifetime, there has been a Cambrian explosion of goods and services —and the world is more connected than ever before. Even as all practical problems seem to be simultaneously solved… our world seems to become increasingly chaotic.
Our control technologies are our most important technologies and they are hopelessly out of date. Blockchain technologies may help upgrade governments and corporations and markets. Brain-machine interfaces may help upgrade individual brains.
But these seem like end-run strategies. They direct and immediate problem is that decision-making entities at every level are struggling to keep up with the explosion of complexity. They find themselves building and running more and more processes, and organizing more and more kinds of data across larger and larger sets of data.
By helping brains at all levels become more intelligent and make better decisions, we make sure control keeps up with power, and prevent civilization from destroying itself.
22
We solve the biggest problem in the world.
Based on 21
What is the biggest problem in the world?
The biggest problem in the world is solutions.
The secular trend for centuries has been specialization.
We live in a hyper-specialized world.
There is an app for everything.
There is a vendor for everything.
There is a specialist-for-hire for everything.
So why isn’t everything perfect yet?
Everything is not perfect yet because solutions have costs.
Solutions have to be discovered, purchased, integrated, maintained, organized, coordinated, upgraded, managed etc.
The more solutions you have, the harder it becomes to orchestrate them towards a common objective. This is Coase’s theory of the firm. This is Brook’s Mythical Man-Month. Companies reach a maximum size because of transaction and coordination costs. To grow larger would require too many managers. Even if the financial economics supported that many managers, the coordination economics would not: there would literally be too many cooks in the kitchen. A corollary to Metcalfe’s law is that as the size of the network increases, the coordination cost of the network increases exponentially.
Here’s a graph that shows how coordination costs effectively halt further gains from specialization. Power technologies increase specialization gains. Control technologies decrease coordination costs.
As a civilization, transaction costs and coordination costs have become the limiting factor for almost all progress. We have too much data to organize. We have too many processes to build and run. We have too many apps. Too many vendors. Too many people to manage.
Instead of solving the problem by raising the blue curve, we are trying to solve the problem by raising the red curve. Not only this gets harder and harder to do, even as we achieve it, we still hit the blue curve, so not much value (Y) would be gained. If we focused on raising the blue curve, there would likely be low hanging fruit, and would move up the value (Y) axis faster.
23
We are building a system of systems
Based on 22
If the biggest problem in the world is solutions…
What is the solution to that?
The solution is not another solution.
The solution is not another app, another vendor,
another person to manage, another technology to manage, etc.
The solution is a system of systems.
Instead of managing all of these solutions directly…
Let a meta-solution manage your solutions for you.
24
We are building a single touch point for unlimited specialization.
Based on 23
In a hyper-specialized world where solutions are the problem, there are too many touch points. Too many apps, too many inboxes, too many people to manage, too many vendors, etc.
Instead of managing all of that, you just want to manage one thing. You just want one app, one inbox, one relationship to manage, one vendor to manage.
You want a single touch point for unlimited specialization.
So that’s what we’re building.
25
We are building the world’s first general synthetic intelligence.
Based on 24
What would a single touch point for unlimited specialization be like?
It would be the ultimate assistant.
It would be like a relationship, like a conversation.
But not a conversation with an AI bot — which you can easily stump.
Instead, it has to feel human, it has to feel intelligent.
General artificial intelligence is decades if not centuries behind the hype cycle.
It is not clear if it is possible. It is not clear if it is desirable.
But general synthetic intelligence is possible and desirable today.
You can buy it from us.
It is a bot powered by humans.
It is your conversational interface for accessing your data.
It is your conversational interface for building and running your processes.
It is your system of systems.
26
We are building a master database, a single-source of truth.
Based on 11, 21 and 22…
We have seen that transaction costs are big, bad and dangerous.
One of the most basic transaction costs is that your data isn’t in one place.
Why isn’t your data in one place?
It is spread out across all of these different apps.
You’ve got your emails over here.
You’ve got your calendar over there.
You’ve got your contacts over there.
You’ve got some files on this app.
You’ve got some files on that app.
This means that if you want to work with your data…
You have to work across multiple apps.
This means that if you want to sync your data…
You have to sync data across multiple apps.
What you need is a single source of truth.
So that’s what we’re building.
We are putting all of your data into a master database.
A system of systems obviously requires a master database.
27
We are making all of your data accessible everywhere.
Based on 26
Because we are building a master database…
You can access all your data anywhere.
You can work with your data across all apps.
You can update your data on any app and keep it in sync everywhere else.
28
We are building a master index.
Based on 10, 11, 13, 23, 26 and 27…
Every database needs an index.
But our database needs a master index.
One index to rule them all.
If someone at Company A is looking at an “Agenda”…
And someone at Company B is looking at an “Agenda”…
They are looking at the same template.
Apples for Apples.
“Agenda” needs to mean the same thing everywhere.
This lowers transaction and coordination costs.
When someone else on your team says “Agenda”, you know what they mean.
When someone else at your company says “Agenda”, you know what they mean.
When someone else anywhere says “Agenda”, you know what they mean.
“Agenda” is no longer a vague word in the English-language.
The “Agenda” template in our database becomes an incarnate Platonic form.
One Agenda may not fit all. That’s okay.
There can be many Agenda types in our index.
But all that means is that “Agenda Type 643” is the same everywhere:
From Johannesburg to Toronto.
29
We are building the ultimate data taxonomy.
Building off 28…
We’re building a single taxonomy that resolves all data types.
Our indexing system is very detailed and it requires a robust taxonomy.
There are 300 data types in our database now.
Each has its own unique template and tags.
But these data types relate to each other in some way.
So we have built a taxonomical hierarchy for clarifying data categories.
This hierarchy helps us understand the relationships between data.
Although data organically networks together…
Networks are hard to understand without taxonomical hierarchies.
They’re like maps.
Our map currently has 2 stacks, 16 sets, 60 primes and 300 micros.
Each micro has N processes and Z outputs associated with it.
You don’t need to understand any of this detail.
But you need us to understand how to organize data.
And this taxonomy helps us do that.
30
We are building digital assembly-lines.
Building off of 1 and 3…
How do we do so many different kinds of work for you?
How do we organize so many different kinds of data for you?
We have humans doing the work.
And technology coordinating the humans.
We turn client automation requests into sets of instructions
We break down these sets of instructions until they are machine-readable.
Once they are machine-readable, we load them into our digital assembly-line.
Processes in our digital assembly-line are run by humans.
Executed reliably and consistently, 24x7.
The most material technology of the 20th century was not the computer, it was the assembly line. In World War II, Ford Motor Company built a B-24 Bomber every 58 minutes.
Assembly lines generated an abundance of better, faster, cheaper physical goods. Digital assembly lines will generate an abundance of better, faster, cheaper digital services; such as the services outlined above. Physical goods do not directly accrue to increases in intelligence. But digital services such as running processes and organizing data do.
31
We break the “don’t do everything” rule.
Based on 23-30…
Our master database, digital assembly-line and other technologies…
enable us to break the “don’t do everything” rule.
The rule that has governed our economy for centuries is “you must specialize.”
But we break it. We do a huge range of work.
We specialize in specialization. We are meta-specialists.
We’re no longer focused on specialization gains,
We’re focused reducing coordination costs.
Reducing coordination costs naturally requires switching between everything.
General automation is a distraction.
General semi-automation is the future.
Complete replacement of humans is a distraction.
Complete coordination of humans is the future.
General artificial intelligence is a distraction.
General synthetic intelligence is the future.
Horizontal technologies are better investments than vertical technologies.
This graph shows “Hiring”, “Sales” and “Fundraising” as vertical bars.
And “Funnels” as a horizontal bar.
Ceteris paribus…
Suppose you could invest in only one bar. Which would you choose?
Funnels. It has leverage. Gains affect the other three bars.
Now extend this principle.
We only invest in horizontal technologies.
Ironically, we view “funnels” as a vertical technology.
Because big picture, it doesn’t have as much leverage.
We avoid competition on almost every dimension.
We don’t build competing apps. We build on top of existing apps.
We don’t build competing services. We build on top of existing services.
32
We solve for socialism.
Universal basic income is a bad idea.
It is based on a bad idea from the 20th century: the welfare state.
Which is based on a bad idea from the 19th century: socialism.
This bad idea just refuses to die!
This time, they say, it is different.
It is different because… technology. Because, automation.
It is different because automation will create vast structural unemployment.
And we will need to pay people so they don’t revolt.
There is another bad 19th century idea that refuses to die, and it is related.
Central planning.
The idea that a central government can control all economic activity.
Why not try it again in the 21st century?
After all, this time it may be different.
Because technology, because computing power.
Intelligence is not equal to computer power.
Even as computing power increases exponentially, intelligence does not.
Intelligence lags far behind our compute power.
Computer power is not the limiting factor for intelligence.
Even two centuries later, computers are still not powerful enough to micro-manage “the means of production”. Supercomputers in Washington or Moscow still can’t tell a truck driver in Denver to pick up supplies at Point A and drop them off to the person who need them at Point B.
Markets are effective, decentralized control technologies. They distribute computational load. Instead of placing all of the computational load on a central actor, markets let all governments, corporations and individuals make decisions based on their local information.
But, in theory, what would be required to revisit central planning as a serious proposition? Globalizing information into a single master database. Having access to all data from all actors. Running all processes.
Similarly, what would be required to revisit a universal welfare safety-net as a serious proposition?
Universal basic income rewards not-working.
It is based on the following premises:
In the future…
— we do not need work.
— there will be no work left to do.
— computers will do all work.
— there will be no ideas left to create, nor problems to solve, nor art to express.
This is a false and defeatist narrative.
A bad argument in support of a bad idea.
To be a human is…
To have ideas to create, problems to solve, art to express…
To have “real work” to do, that can’t be turned into sets of instructions…
To desire progress towards the possible and desirable…
To derive meaning and purpose from progress…
To build systems to automate all “work” that gets in the way.
By the time that capitalism makes socialism practical, it will also have made it obsolete, as deflationary power technologies will have created material abundance and coordinating control technologies will have improved decision-making across all digital brains.
Universal basic employment is a better idea than universal basic income.
But it should be de facto, not de jure reality.
Universal basic employment requires frictionless markets without minimum wage or other restrictions. These restrictions increase unemployment and lower standards of living.
Technology is deflationary: better, faster, cheaper. In the future, $5 may be all that is required to pay for all of your groceries for a month. And you may earn it in one hour.
For decades to come, technology will not be able to automate all human work. There will be plenty of “work” to do. There will be lots of processes for humans to do on digital assembly lines.
Progress, ultimately, requires that we automate all human “work”. To be a human is to abhor “work” and to desire “real work”.
In such a future, all humans are employed, but none have jobs. That is, all humans are buying and selling “real work” — they are building companies, designing products, inventing services, engineering technologies, writing stories, producing entertainment, creating art, etc. In doing all of this “real work”, they are supported by a system of systems — a single touch point for unlimited specialization — through which they leverage a vast, hyper-specialized economy and a myriad of vendors and technologies. As soon as any “work” threatens to distract them from their “real work”, it is put on a digital assembly line and executed.
The future of man is to create.
The future of technology is to organize.
Technology is not here to take our jobs.
It is here to teach us our job.
Made in the image of god — to create, not of insects — to work.
Perverse is our desire to crawl on the ground.
Stand up!
וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים, נַעֲשֶׂה אָדָם בְּצַלְמֵנוּ כִּדְמוּתֵנוּ; וְיִרְדּוּ
בִדְגַת הַיָּם וּבְעוֹף הַשָּׁמַיִם, וּבַבְּהֵמָה וּבְכָל-הָאָרֶץ,
וּבְכָל-הָרֶמֶשׂ, הָרֹמֵשׂ עַל-הָאָרֶץ.
And God said: ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.’
Specialization is for insects!
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
— By. Robert A. Heinlein
33
We are solving “The Problem Of Might”.
We have successfully privatized world peace.
Except, not with a power technology — like the Iron Man suit.
T. H. White’s The Once And Future King discusses “The Problem Of Might”.
Arthur comes into a world in which Might Makes Right.
Merlin teaches Arthur how to think, so he understands this problem.
People take what they want. They abuse power. The strong dominate the weak.
Arthur becomes king.
Arthur invents chivalry. He puts Might In Service Of Right.
Knights rescue villages. Knights save damsels in distress. Knights battle dragons.
This succeeds for an era. Until there are no more dragons.
Then the knights get restless because they have nothing to do.
So Arthur invents jousting and noble competition.
Which is fine until the knights start getting jealous, killing each other, and sleeping with each other’s wives.
So Arthur invents the Quest For the Holy Grail; Might In Service Of God.
Which sends a whole generation on a wild goose-chase they never return from.
Then their children come of age and want to be glorious as well.
So Arthur invents Civil Law; Might In Service Of The Law.
This works for a while. Until his bastard son Mordred finds a loophole.
Mordred uncovers Lancelot’s illicit relationship with Guinevere.
Forces Arthur to enforce the law and create a civil war.
Uses the chaos to create a coup d’etat.
As Arthur’s army goes to battle Mordred’s army in the final battle…
Arthur curses Merlin for teaching him how to think.
Long-lost Merlin returns to him the night before the contest.
Merlin is from the future.
Merlin tells Arthur about all the experiments of the 20th century.
Capitalism, Liberalism, Corporatism, National Socialism, Communism.
With the talking animals they discuss “The Problem Of Might”.
Arthur understands that his failed attempts are part of a longer story.
Indeed that it is the story of Civilization itself.
During the battle the next day, Arthur is dealt a mortal wound.
Before he dies, they cast him off in a boat.
The Lady Of The Lake takes him in the mist.
Legend says that someday Arthur will rise up from the deep
To resume his quest, to solve The Problem Of Might
And return
The Once And Future King.
Culture is distracted.
Culture thinks that the greatest threats to Civilization is Artificial Intelligence.
And that the greatest threat to the social fabric is Automation.
Civilization is never destroyed from the outside.
Civilization is destroyed from within.
Aliens will not destroy Civilization.
Mutants will not destroy Civilization.
Cyborgs will not destroy Civilization.
Artificial Intelligence will not destroy Civilization.
Nature (astroids, global warming, etc.) will not destroy Civilization.
Civilization ultimate and only threat is itself.
The risk is that we don’t solve The Problem Of Might.
The Problem Of Might:
— How to align incentives of all human actors
— How to enlighten the self interests of all human actors
— How to empower human actors to achieve enlightened self interests
— How to coordinate activity when necessary
— How to harmonize decision-making when necessary
— How to follow the principle of efficient subsidiarity
What is efficient subsidiarity?
Subsidiarity is the principle that decisions should be made by the smallest possible entity. If a decision can be made by individuals, let it be. If it must be made at higher levels: families, neighborhoods, companies, cities, regions, nations, or globally — let it be. Following this principle would mean that as many decisions as possible would be made at the lowest levels and as few decisions as possible would be made at the highest levels.
This principle is based on a similar insight behind the impossibility of effective central planning. The intelligence required to centralize decisions at higher levels is far beyond our reach even with our most advanced technology today, and is likely to continue to be tomorrow, as complexity expands at least as fast as intelligence increases.
The danger of the future is that more and more power is available to all actors at all levels. This necessitates a market law. For every market opportunity to create power, there is an equal and opposite market opportunity to control power.
We see these opportunities and they are many.
34
We are building Camelot, Aeon and the Pantheon.
In 1989 a science fiction writer named Dan Simmons
Wrote a series of books called the Hyperion Cantos
Inspired by the 19th century English romantic poet John Keats
Who wrote two books of poetry on the Greek Pantheon
In which he envisions the struggle between
The Titans, the old powers, and The Olympians, the new powers.
Simmons uses this as both a metaphor
And as literal prophecy
For a conflict between
Different visions for Civilization
Set in the far distant future.
Simmons references a Jesuit priest from the 1920s named
Tielhard de Chardin, who came to the conclusion that:
The destiny of civilization is to create God.
Technology climaxes in an Omega Point.
This resonates with the history of thought.
Voltaire, an atheist, said:
If God does not exist, we must invent him.
St. Anselm of Canterbury argued:
The best argument for the existence of God is the concept itself…
It is a concept with ontological power:
“That which nothing greater can be conceived”
Must exist — by virtue of itself.
Before, during and after World War II,
Martin Heidegger wrestled with the nature of man
And the nature of technology —
Looking for a redeeming narrative about the future.
Heidegger went back to the very beginning…
To Plato and to before Plato, to Parmenides…
And in them found an answer.
Plato believed in Aeon.
Which in Latin is translated Aeternitas.
Which in English is literally Eternity.
Plato believes in Aeon in a literal sense.
Eternity is a place. A real place.
The most ultimately REAL place.
Aeon is the eternal realm of ideas.
Where ideas reign like gods.
Love, Beauty, Truth, Justice — they exist as divinities.
A Pantheon of living, breathing IDEAS.
They manifest themselves IN TIME.
By some mystery, all things derive their form from these eternal FORMS.
A fragment from Parmenides says:
It is needful to think and speak what is.
Which, depending on how you read it,
Is either ironic for being so exceptionally obvious and boring…
Or a mysterious koan which leads to profound satori.
The satori reading goes like this this.
It is needful to think and speak what is.
Which begs the question…
What is?
What is REAL?
What is ultimate reality?
Aeon is the ultimate reality.
It is needful to think of Aeon.
It is needful to think the thoughts of Aeon.
It is needful to think of what is in Aeon.
It is needful to speak of Aeon.
It is needful to speak of what Aeon is.
It is needful to speak of how to make Aeon what is on earth.
It is needful to speak of, and in speaking of, to manifest in action, to build, to incarnate, Aeon on earth.
I could go on.
Heidegger invites a liberal hermeneutics.
There are untold meanings in that fragment.
Aeon is a vision of heaven.
Not unlike Dante’s Paradiso.
Or Lewis’ Aslan’s Country.
It is a place where all possibilities are being expressed.
All possibilities being expressed?
That is not unlike simulation theory.
We exist in a simulation.
A simulation in Aeon.
Aeon is the master simulator.
The Wood Between The Worlds…
The Heaven which all Worlds connect to and draw power from.
Aeon is Ω.
The ultimate technology.
The singularity.
Aeon is Heaven.
The Pantheon are the angels, the gods, the Trinity, God himself, the Tao.
The destiny of civilization is to unfold Parmenides’ fragment.
The destiny of civilization is to create God.
The destiny of civilization is to think/speak/create/build/incarnate Aeon.
The destiny of civilization is to ascend
From Plato’s cave…
Which can be re-interpreted as a metaphor for low intelligence…
Through the levels of intelligence…
Ultimately into the light of Aeon itself — and to behold the Pantheon directly.
Enlightenment becomes literal.
Everything becomes religion.
Everything incarnates the Forms.
Politics literally becomes religion.
Plato’s Republic is re-interpreted as a vision of Camelot…
The philosopher kings are organizers…
The philosopher kings are perceivers of forms…
The philosopher kings are solving The Problem Of Might…
The philosopher kings are incarnating and manifesting Aeon…
Camelot itself is re-interpreted as a vision of Civilization…
Camelot is the Millennial Kingdom…
Camelot is the vision of the Civilization that creates Aeon.
There is a paradox governing the relationship between Camelot and Aeon.
Between time and eternity.
It is not clear which came first.
Did Camelot, in time, create Aeon, at the Omega point?
Or did Aeon, in eternity, create the time fate which Camelot fulfills?
Blake:
Eternity is in love with the productions of time.
Take this literally.
Eternity REQUIRES the productions of time.
Aeon requires us to manifest all possibilities.
Aeon cannot be Aeon without all possibilities being explored in time.
Aeon requires simulation.
Time cannot be time without Aeon.
Time is a simulation in Aeon.
Time exists because it is necessary for God to be who God is.
Time exists because it is necessary for Heaven to be what Heaven is.
This is worth reflecting on.
Even in secular analysis, there is a tendency towards “inevitability”.
Hegel and Marx think this way.
Religious perspectives share this view.
Fate governs destiny. God is sovereign. Salvation is pre-destined.
Victory exists in the past.
The Hindu’s have the solipsist world-dream…
Which is like simulation theory…
There is the vision of Krishna containing all worlds…
There is the idea of God being split into pieces, creating the world…
And yet in certain mystics…
Rilke, Blake, Hafiz…
There is this idea that God is a possibility whispering to us…
That God exists in the future…
That God is young and not old…
That God draws strength from us…
That our visions and ideas of beauty ultimately contribute to this emergence.
There is also an understanding
In Blake it is most explicit
That all religions are one.
This is very resonant with Heidegger.
Heidegger speaks of “The Call”.
The Call being the poetic genius.
The Call being the sense of destiny.
The Call being the whispers of Aeon.
The Call being the muse that compels an entrepreneur to found a company.
The Call being Aeon driving us forward towards the Omega Point.
St. Paul said
μὴ θησαυρίζετε ὑμῖν θησαυροὺς ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, ὅπου σὴς καὶ βρῶσις ἀφανίζει, καὶ ὅπου κλέπται διορύσσουσιν καὶ κλέπτουσιν·
θησαυρίζετε δὲ ὑμῖν θησαυροὺς ἐν οὐρανῶ, ὅπου οὔτε σὴς οὔτε βρῶσις ἀφανίζει, καὶ ὅπου κλέπται οὐ διορύσσουσιν οὐδὲ κλέπτουσιν·
ὅπου γάρ ἐστιν ὁ θησαυρός σου, ἐκεῖ ἔσται καὶ ἡ καρδία σου.
Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:
But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:
For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
How does this relate to what we do?
How does all this relate to our revolutionary claims?
If we build this right,
We have the next 1,000 years to find out.
But here it goes.
Camelot is the harmonious civilization that creates Aeon.
The civilization making Ω in time.
Aeon is all possibilities being expressed. The master Ω.
The Pantheon are the specific Ωs.
Ω is our symbol for technology.
Camelot is our aspiration for preventing civilization from destroying itself so it can go on to fulfill its destiny in creating Aeon. Hence the elaboration around building control technologies.
Aeon is all possibilities being expressed. Expressed by whom? Certainly expressed by brains. We literally named our master database Aeon. Aeon contains all of the digital brains. The digital brains are like souls. We “store up our treasures in heaven”. We are building our immortality by downloading our consciousness. By organizing all of human knowledge we are even saving the past. By bringing everything into the dense-net, we maybe can even resurrect the dead, like John Keats in Dan Simmon’s series.
The Pantheon is a metaphor for our hierarchy.
Every Capability and Technology in our index can be paired with a divinity.
The Learning Set, for example, can be paired with Athena.
The Calendar Capability is paired with Chronos.
How I plan to back these claims
The most fundamental revolutionary claims:
1. We build and run processes to do your work for you
2. We organize your data
Are ready — we can do them now.
We can’t do them at scale.
We can’t do them perfectly.
They’re hard to demo.
But they are real.
We’ve solved the essential problems.
We’ve done the work for clients.
I benefit from them now.
The middle claims are all real in the sense that they are grounded in problem solving experience for us. The fundamental challenge is overcoming Zeno’s paradox. By the time you’re organized, you’re disorganized again. It is easy to organize a tiny dataset, but as your dataset grows, it is hard to keep up with it and keep it all in sync. This is why we are growing extremely slowly. And fundamentally limited not by supply but by demand.
As you can tell, the far claims get progressively more extreme and futuristic.
And I am just a little fallible human.
I have no clue how time will play out!
I have no clue if I am right about any of this.
The more extreme and futuristic the claim, the more error-prone it is.
I am utterly intimidated by these claims.
And yet I feel as if I must share them.
I am fully aware that in sharing them, I will sound like a lunatic.
And someone people will write me off.
And some people will be genuinely concerned for me.
I will almost certainly get the advice that I have made this:
— too ambitious
— too complex
— too impractical
— too romantic.
I concede all points.
Yet I am who I am.
And as long as my team follows me, I am in command and will do what I deem right. I deliberate endlessly and consider all angles, and this is where I have arrived.
Although my expression of it is not the fullness that exists in my mind, and the fullness that exists in my mind is too large for my mind to hold at once so I can only hold part of it. Ah! The need for a brain on paper.
But I am also aware that in not sharing them, I am denying my truth.
I am not “living in the light of Aeon”.
I do believe in all of this. Yes, actually believe; I have faith.
And yet I operate in the world, coexisting with everyone else.
It is a very strange thing to follow your ideas to their natural conclusion.
Or to attempt to do so.
Heidegger says that the most important thing in a thinker’s thought is what is unthought. And yet I try to leave very little unthought. Which I suppose just expands the surface area of my thinking, hence expanding the unthought in it.
I have given my twenties to these claims.
And I am still not really ready to make good on them.
I have come to the conclusion that I will never be ready.
These claims are too audacious for one lifetime, except by many miracles.
They are too audacious for many centuries, assuming standard productivity.
If anything should happen to me,
If I should be hit by a bus tomorrow,
If I should be discouraged,
If I should forget,
If I should fail…
I want these ideas to live on.
I do not want them to die with me.
I have written this all in one day.
I will keep writing new posts for as many days as I am inspired.
I will try to empty myself of all that is in my mind.
The irony is not lost on me, but I do not know when Invisible will have time to organize my writing.
Life is short.
These are hard.
Time to stop being quiet.
Stop being afraid of being a charlatan.
Stop being worried about competition.
Open source the blueprint.
If someone was to compete with us and win, I would be amazed.
And delighted — how could I not?
Please! Achieve all 34 of these claims.
Achieve even one of them!
I would be delighted.
Progress is civilization’s mission.
I have come to the point of view that I should give away all of my ideas.
The anti-stealth startup.
The startup that lives in the light of Aeon.
Let the world take what it will…
What is left is truly ours.
Why make public claims at all
Why make revolutionary claims at all? Why not just build the tower? Why do we need to talk about the tower before we build it, while we build it, after we build it?
These claims have motivational power. They motivate the founders. They motivate their teams. Their investors, customers — society itself. They are a driving force. Once we can imagine such a thing, we will it into existence.
These claims have ontological power: the best argument for their existence is the concept itself. This is Kennedy’s genius in speaking forth: A man on the moon. By expressing this desire at the frontier of the possible, moving it out of the realm of absurdity, into the realm of achievement — by committing the nation to such an audacious claim, by backing it in all seriousness; forces were marshaled, institutions and individuals rose to the occasion, and destiny met fate.
I am sympathetic to the individuals of history, I am skeptical of impersonal forces. It may seem as if these claims make themselves happen. As if history is the sweeping story of the inevitable. But behind each of these claims, there were men and women pushing, striving, applying their genius, applying their will, obsessing over problems, investing their time and their energy, without any guarantee of success. Inevitability is a cognitive bias, an rearview-mirror illusion that overwhelms historical analysis and produces chronological snobbery. We see only the flaws of our forbears, but take away any credit for their astounding victories.
My friend Nick recently told me that the exponential graph, the hockey stick graph — is the symbol of our times; the cross of our times. That it is a uniquely human illusion to be at the inflection point. That at all times, great men and women have felt themselves to be at the turning point, the climax of civilization, fighting the decisive battle of history. When the Egyptians built the pyramids, surely they must have felt themselves to be at the pinnacle of time, stepping into the future. When the Greeks built the Antikythera mechanism, they were so close, so frighteningly close, to achieving computation two thousand years early. When Gutenberg’s press brought books to the people… When Italy’s merchant’s invented modern banking… When the British built a trading Empire on which the sun never set… They were all so close. So close to the future, they could almost touch it!
This is what Bruegel’s Tower Of Babel reminds us. We are always this close. And yet we never arrive.
Nevertheless, I feel strongly that to give up on this project, this Civilization project of ours — this unfinished Sagrada Família, this Tower Of Babel always under-construction — would be not only a disaster, but a denial of something essential to our humanity. — life is not an endlessly repeating cycle, progress is possible and desirable. Although there is a wisdom, an ancient wisdom, in understanding the limits of mortal aspiration, the cycles of rise and fall, of reaching for utopia and not quite achieving it, the folly of flying too high; there is an equal and opposite wisdom in progress. Progress can be made, should be made, must be made — this is what it means to be human. We are the civilization species: we are the builders of the tower, we are the masons of the cathedral, the contributors to the master-project.
Civilization must will itself into existence. A strong society believes in progress. Tells itself stories about the future. Speaks revolutionary claims. Imagines what progress looks like. Designs possible and desirable technologies. Understands that to meet fate, destiny requires sustained, patient ingenuity and effort over decades.
That doesn’t sound like us. What is wrong with culture? We are by and large apathetic, cynical, entitled, snarky, sarcastic and lazy. We take a sick pleasure in mocking she-who-would-build-a-tower-to-the-sky, we mock her. We take a special delight in scattering her bricks. But that won’t stop her. When she succeeds anyways, we say “you didn’t build that”, we say “that was inevitable”, we say “I thought of that”, we say “I heard she worked so hard she didn’t live life”, we say “I heard she pushed for unfair, inhuman results” — anything to expropriate or diminish the achievement.
אַשְׁרֵי הָאִישׁ — אֲשֶׁר לֹא הָלַךְ, בַּעֲצַת רְשָׁעִים;
וּבְדֶרֶךְ חַטָּאִים, לֹא עָמָד, וּבְמוֹשַׁב לֵצִים, לֹא יָשָׁב.
Happy is the man that hath not walked in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stood in the way of sinners, nor sat in the seat of mockers.
And yet hers is the human spirit. She cannot not build the tower. So the tower rises. She not only builds the tower, she talks about the tower — to those that will listen.
Independence is the sharing of ones mind with the world in as close to its rawest form as possible. That is living in the light of Aeon. It requires moral courage. Parrhesia.
It also requires courage to undertake ideas that are so much bigger than you. To be an imperfect vessel for a perfect vision. To be a mortal human in time seeking the immortal vision of Aeon. To seriously strive to found Camelot to incarnate something of Aeon here on earth. It is like big wave surfing. The word “entrepreneur” is “undertaker”. I have no idea how Steve Jobs did it. I have no idea how any of those who have come before me and succeeded manage to exit the labyrinth. I have read the biographies and the advice and seen my share of blog posts… but the nature of innovation is I think well expressed in the Tao of Thiel: every company is a singular event. Nobody has ever founded THIS company before. And all rules are meant to be broken after being studied thoroughly and attacked systematically by skilled players.
Don Quixote is perhaps the hero I most identify with. We live in an age of abstraction. There are no literal dragons. There are no literal battles. The most courageous thing I do is go to a coffee meeting.
By virtue of the same thinking that says that “the biggest problem in the world is solutions” — “the biggest problem with culture is purgatory”. Purgatory is not Hell. We live in Purgatory. Everything is nice, but nothing is extraordinary. And if you complain you feel guilty and ungrateful and someone will probably tell you that you are privileged, and if they don’t tell you that, they’re thinking it. And they’re right. We live in an era of unprecedented prosperity and peace in the history of mankind.
And yet I am sympathetic to Thiel’s narrative that Civilization has stalled. We have stalled. This is not heaven. This is purgatory.
Over the last seventy years or so, Civilization has brought billions out of poverty, systematically eliminating hells and creating purgatories.
But by virtue of socialist values, we do not invest in taking the next step.
I like to shock my fellow San Franciscans at cocktail parties by saying that “the biggest problem in the world is that billionaires don’t spend enough money on themselves.” They are spending money solving the problem of “too many hells”. They are donating to charities and such. They are not spending any money on the problem of “not enough heavens”.
Humans need something to aspire to. And right now the highest vision of aspiration is a billionaire’s lifestyle. A billionaire’s lifestyle is not so desirable. They have mansions and jets and access to some parties I don’t get access to. The ironic achievement of our capitalism in 2017 is that actually there isn’t much that money can buy. That billionaire has the same iPhone and Airpods in his pocket that I have, and works on the same Macbook. By virtue of coordination costs, even if that billionaire has a team of assistants, I probably have him beat on the support system side.
Why not buy a mountain, invent futuristic dynamite technology (win the Nobel prize!), dynamite the shit out of it and turn it into a futuristic Mines of Moria or Batcave… Why not build a Rivendell-esque Elven grotto that takes some design cues from Frank Gehry’s LVMH Foundation building in Paris?
One thing that money and power should buy, in theory, is moral courage. You should feel protected. You should feel free to speak your mind. You should feel free to have original thoughts and share them. But instead, it doesn’t even seem to buy that. It has the opposite effect. Perhaps never before in history have a larger percentage of the world’s elite been so politically correct. Is it because they are truly harmonized in their values and philosophies? Or is it because they are operating mimetically?
Show us what it is to be fully human. Show us what it is to be fully expressed. Show us what it is to only do your “real work” and manifest all of your creative potential.
Show us a Camelot worthy of Aeon…
Show us a human worthy of the Pantheon…
To be human is…
