Nilsi

I will unplug from the internet for 90 days. This means no social media, no YouTube, no news, no WhatsApp (which will probably get me in trouble lol), no Spotify, etc. I just cannot engage with all this intellectually and psychologically taxing content while effectively focusing on my career. Moderation has never worked for me, so doing yet another hail mary seems like a sensible idea. I don't want to run away from the world's problems and escape into some solipsistic bubble obviously, but I need some time and space to think and focus on real-world stuff. My plan is to work in sales until I'm a millionaire and then drop out to focus on important philosophical problems, which will realistically take me 2-3 years if I give it my all. It's impossible to make any significant progress on large-scale societal issues if you put in 8-10 hours of psychologically taxing work every day. So, as ethically dubious as this may be, it's still my best plan to do something useful with my life. I will also burn through a lot of karma regarding luxury, sex, and power in this position, so that's quite good. And I strive to become an elite-level sales manager (which I will have to become on this tight schedule I've set for myself), which will translate reasonably well to any form of communication. I will use these 90 days to really begin and study the ins and outs of effective communication (and persuasion), reconnect to reality on a somatic and visceral level, and get clear on how to proceed from there intelligently. So, anyways, until then!

There were no "authentic geeks" in ancient Greek or Rome. Most philosophers were chads. To me that is like saying stop becoming happy and be authentically depressed. There are obviously lots of motives converging in anything humans do. To me precisely that is the key. To live in such a way that all your motives converge as much as possible. And the will to power is one of the most fundamental motives in life and nature. Life wants to grow, to dominate, to assert itself. Doesnt take a postmodernist to figure that out. Of course not everyone can do that. Thats why most people will not agree with this - because most people will never be able to exercise their will to power much at all. There are many more antelopes in nature than lions. So anything antelope will be more agreeable.

The problem with the geek is that he/she is the only one who knows that he/she is doing something admirable. Even when they reach the top of what they are doing, its so niched down that no one really appreciates it (or only a small group of other geeks). I would consider someone like Chris Langan a geek, but people liek Huberman or Lex Fridman are actually exercising their will to power and look at how much success it brought them.

I could go without the veggies as well, but what I like is that they usually cook their chicken in little oil and you can order as much of it as you want. I dont want a stir fry thats half oil, half food - especially considering the kind of shitty plant oils that most places use.

What do you mean? I exclusively eat those when I'm travelling or I'm on the run. A shit load of fresh vegetables + meat (I always order 3x meat). Doesn't get much better than this, if you ask me. (Just make sure to find a place that is using fresh, high quality ingredients).

lol. All Im really obsessing about is being able to live with as much creative freedom as possible. Im not trying to become some Bond villain.

Yeah. Its quite good as well. The first one is still a cut above though.

He is a interesting character. I listened to his conversation with Lex. I barely study these days. If I need insight into something, I just go for a walk. When worst comes to worst I ask Chat-GPT. Everything else is way too slow and muddy.

This is fine. Things can be infinitely more complex and nuanced than I could ever comprehend. What I talk about holds though. You can not contemplate your way to health, money and power. And those are infinitely valuable. They give you maximum optionality in life. Contemplation only simulates this. AI and synthetic biology will only make this more obvious. While you contemplate this stuff, I will use it to increase my power and optionality even more. This is evolution. Survival of the fittest. Those dynamics will always exist. The only question is whether you want to ascend or be left in the dust.

I hate to bring him up again, but there is actually quite some wisdom in Andrew Tate using "geek" and "nerd" as a slur. Its men of action that end up being rewarded by life with health, looks, riches and a great (genetic) legacy. This goes for all great human achievements, of course - be they artisitc, politic, literary, etc. Even Hegel spent a good chunk of his life in action, fighting the creative battle to immortalize his ideas (as anti-action as they may be).

In my humble opinion, all this contemplative and spiritual work is a necessary station one has to pass to actualize ones highest potential - but I dont see it as the destination (anymore). Nowadays Im so immersed in life, metaphysical questions dont even arise. I live a life of action and I have never been more fulfilled. But still, I wouldnt be able to live life on such a high level had I not done all the thinking, reading and exploring first. Aliens, gene-splicing and artificial intelligence are just some novel artifacts of our age. They dont change the fundamental dynamics of life.

The problem is way deeper than being biased toward some one ontological system or scientific model. Colletcively we have probably explored the whole possibility space of human thought and philosophy up to this point in history and look where it lead us... arguing endlessly over whether other people are real or not There is a time and place for contemplation. When it becomes the main event though, it turns on intself and chips away at the roots that once gave it life in the first place.

Fair, although that is just the logical conclusion of idealism. The same way materialism makes you question your own free will. Metaphysical rumination itself is the symptom of a sick mind, if you ask me. Nothing good ever came out of it. Not 2.000 years ago and not today.

Yeah, I didnt think so lol This place is way too sterile for anything new and worthwhile to emerge. Actualized.org has become an idealist cul de sac. I could leave for 10 years and I wouldnt miss anything.

If you were "blissed out" all the time, there would be no reason to go to work on a monday morning. Who cares, if your boss fires you, when youre gonna be blissed out anyways? Who cares if you shave, or take a shower? Why even bother standing up and walking to the toilet, when you can just shit your pants and be blissed out? This of course applies to every motivation and instinct you currently possess. In this Buddhist fantasy, life and culture would deteriorate quite quickly into a homogenous soup of indifference - which is exactly what you will experience, when you actually transcend the distinction of pain and pleasure in some peak (or permanent, if you insist) meditation/psychedelic/etc. experience.

This is the epitome of whats wrong with modern "psychology." A healthy psyche is not cultivated in the library. Thats where you go to reflect and strategize, but the bulk of the work happens in the field. Every psychology book worth its salt will conclude this in some way or another, which makes this even more ironic. The same thing happens in university. They tell you all the fancy science and research on "mental health"... while taking your most vital and formative years from you, weakening your spirit and spitting you out with a piece of paper and a crushed soul.

I flunked out after a week lol I felt more pressure to check YouTube/news etc. than I felt to cum The internet is so interwoven into the contemporary mind, it craves it more than biological reproduction.

Why do you assume that a post-work world with AGI will bring out the lowest angels of our nature? I think that liberating people from a lifetime of anxiety, stress, poor health, and poverty would be very liberating and beautiful, probably resembling Burning Man rather than The Matrix. Evolution sure is a ruthless force - but somehow we managed to survive 70+ years of the bomb without blowing ourselves up, so there must be some good reason why the universe has kept us around (hopefully more than just serving as bootloaders for the AI overlord).

An AI cant be a human, by definition. There are always tradeoffs - we know that from developmental psychology. A construct-aware philosopher can not experience the innocent naivete of a pre-conventional fundamentalist.

Humans create art, start families, appreciate a beautiful sunset, fall in love... Is that not a valid job? "O great star! What would your happiness be, if you had not those for whom you shine!"

How can you talk so authoritatively about economics and not know about that image And I have no idea what youre talking about.

Even if that were sensible, there is no way that it's going to happen. Good luck convincing the most capable humans on earth to simply stop working on what they perceive to be the most important endeavor in all of human history. Even if you were to bomb or hack all the AI labs in the world, pissing off these mad scientists is a recipe for disaster. Furthermore, we absolutely need AI to address climate change and other catastrophic risks, so there is no way out of this.

That seems to be the consensus among AI experts though. The definition of AGI is, that it can do everything a human does, just better and way more efficient (including emotional intelligence etc.) I dont see why this would devalue human life. You will still be around to explore all the new possibilities and to live more aligned with your intrinisic values. Also, lets not kid ourselves - its only a matter of time until these machines will exceed human capabilities, so we better have a reason to stick around.