Summary

The text discusses the concept of Social Orders as a form of technology akin to artificial intelligence, suggesting that Western society is currently experiencing the decline of its Social Order.

Abstract

The author presents a perspective on the decline of society by likening Social Orders to an aging artificial intelligence. They reflect on the idea that the Western world's Social Order, characterized by a Faustian drive for infinity and expansion, is entering its twilight years. This concept is contrasted with a more cyclical view of history, where societies are seen as recurring events rather than linear progressions. The author argues that the decay of a Social Order can be observed in the lack of originality and creativity in culture, as seen in America's reliance on familiar narratives driven by profit incentives. The text suggests that this stagnation leads to a societal rigidity and a collective sense of being 'over it,' manifesting in a lack of hopefulness and seriousness, particularly among the younger generation. The author posits that the decline is inevitable and necessary for the birth of new societal structures, and that the current societal 'death' is part of a larger cycle of life and decay.

Opinions

The author believes that the Western societal model is nearing the end of its life cycle, akin to an aging artificial intelligence.
They challenge the Western-centric view of history as a linear progression, instead favoring a cyclical model where societies are born, live, and die.
The text suggests that the current lack of cultural creativity and innovation is a symptom of a dying Social Order.
The author posits that the constant recycling of past stories and symbols for profit is evidence of the societal decline.
There is an underlying sentiment that people are becoming increasingly disillusioned with the current state of society.
The author implies that the creation of new religions or belief systems will not

We are Trapped in a Dying Machine — and That’s Ok

Perspective on the Decline of a Society

Awhile ago I first stumbled on the idea of thinking about Social Orders as a type of technology, specifically an Artificial Intelligence. If you want to check that out, here you go:

The Singularity Has Always Been Here — The Social Order is an Artificial Super Intelligence

A Calmer Look at the ASI and The Gravitational Pull of Singularity

medium.com

That idea has grown on me increasingly for its ability to contextualize a lot of what I see today. And what I see more clearly, and that I intuited unknowingly in this essay, is that we are in an aging Social Order. It is in the latter half of life.

I think my view at the time of writing both articles was one where I thought of the society that we currently live in as the largest totalizing expression of social order. However, I have recently realized that this is a bias that stems directly from living in the ‘Western World’ zeitgeist.

Now I am more aware that the Western world Social Order of today, is simply the type that encourages and endorses infinity, a stretching outward forever into the world. It is Faustian and America is the Extroverted expression of that same seed premise. And it is that Social Order that is beginning to age out.

It is clearer to me that Social Orders have lived and died many times already but due to the Western bias, I saw that as the progress of history. In reality, there are societies that don’t even engage with history in this way so it is incorrect to think that all past civilization is a culmination to our present one (or that our present one is the nourishment for some future one). That way of thing itself is a sign of the times.

With a more cyclical view, though I can’t say that it is perfect, I can say that it is way easier to see one Unit of a thing. A single unit of anything is a measurement of a reoccurring happening. Any particular rock, is a reoccurring happening through time, and thats where it gets its ‘thing-ness’ at least in our minds. It’s endurance of form. Observing change is observing an alteration in the happening that was reoccurring.

Scaling that concept up from a rock to a Social Order, is looking at the Social Order like a cyclical event or an oscillation around a particular theme.

What Does it Mean for a Social Order to Live or Die?

Well, in one sense Living is a process of Dying and vice versa. As soon as you are born you are dying, and the approach of death is living. However, by dying, I am referring to the process of decay in the later half of a cycle. The downward trend of the cosine graph.

I would say that the line between living, growing, and evolving towards a peak and death, decay, and resolving towards a valley, is the ability to expand upon new energy, or in short, Creativity.

It’s the ability to process anomalies that emerge from reality AND to take inspiration from those anomalies and expand on them further, rather than suppress them. Your body takes on new energy through food and creates ‘more’ you with it. When you are older, this no longer happens, as the energy gets used form maintenance or preservation of what you have.

With that, I think we are currently in this dying Social Order and it is shown, at least here in America, in the constant rehashing of the same old stories and symbols of the past throughout our culture. The creativity of the symbols is now commercialized and consumed by the profit incentive itself and as such depends on narrative that are common and familiar. There is no way, or more specifically no incentive structure, to put something totally foreign outward to the culture at scale.

That felt sense of rigidity and constant rehash is actually the stifling of excess creativity contributing disruption to the steady state of the system. The managerial angle to culture, and the compartmenting of expression to not be too strange even if strange is wanted.

There is a subtle but increasingly louder urge from us as the people living in the society of just being ‘over it’. And that over it, also manifests as the younger generation not wanting kids. Not really having a sense of hopefulness, or not taking anything seriously anymore.

I kinda talked about this loss of charge or meaning here,

We Might be Making a New Religion Soon

Truth Singularity & Meaning Inflation

medium.com

but I think with this perspective, I can see that a new religion or perspective won’t really change it either. The religion will be the supporting belief needed to help process the slow death of the Social Order system, not actually a reemergence of something that revives it.

No one really wants it to be revived and it need not be. For anything new to be born again and flourish, the Social Order would have to die and allow its decomposing symbols to be consumed and reinterpreted in the mosh-pit of a disorganized world. Which will come with its own set of challenges, mind you.

I think before we get to that state, we will see the breakdown happen in the form of exorbitant expenditures of effort and symbols on things that fail to generate more of it. This is all going to be the spending away of all the history, symbols, credit, and stories, all their legitimacy, thrown into a meaningless void like a war, or a money grab or something.

It will be bad, but I suspect that it is that bad because thats what it takes for us to collectively detach from the Social Orders we know and grew in. Its harshness will be a reflection of our collective loyalty, not just in heart but in mind. A reflection of our inability to think or conceive ideas outside of the context we know.

So we are unfortunately trapped in a dying Social Order, just like cells trapped in a dying body. But we don’t need have that understanding cause us suffering. I think it give me a sense of peace to know that this collapse is not ‘final’ but rather just one of many. Maybe with a greater understanding and acceptance of it, we could make the death a far more graceful one.