~ FTFTIH-MPDT-FETMTFETL ~ For The First Time In History – More People Die Today – From Eating Too Much Than From Eating Too Little

~ IIWOPTMTBATRTIOSEF ~ It Is Within Our Power To Make Things Better And To Reduce The Incidence Of Suffering Even Further

~ SWFTPSAOCWWSTNL ~ Schools Were Founded To Produce Skilful And Obedient Citizens Who Would Serve The Nation Loyally

~ DIIC-AHHEIRD-TIGE-RTGC ~ Dramatic Improvements In Conditions – As Humankind Has Experienced In Recent Decades – Translate Into Greater Expectations – Rather Than Greater Contentment

~ FBOW-AGPOTPITPMOARB-NOTCDMI-BATFMMDATOB ~ For Better Or Worse – A Growing Percentage Of The Population Is Taking Psychiatric Medicines On A Regular Basis – Not Only To Cure Debilitating Mental Illnesses – But Also To Face More Mundane Depression And The Occasional Blues

~ UTN-IHPRMOUOET-ITFIMRMOU-THBAM-O-OMDWOT ~ Up Till Now – Increasing Human Power Relied Mainly On Upgrading Our External Tools – In The Future It May Rely More On Upgrading – The Human Body And Mind – Or – On Merging Directly With Our Tools

~ WWTATR-EOBAMIO-AA-TEOA-D-A-M ~ We Want The Ability To Re-Engineer Our Bodies And Minds In Order – Above All – To Escape Old Age – Death – And – Misery

~ BOH-WCTDW-P-I-W-EATEAARF-EYAGP-TLIPHAHDATTLIS-ATIUTC ~ Billions Of Humans – Will Continue To Deal With – Poverty – Illness – Violence – Even As The Elites Are Already Reaching For – Eternal Youth And Godlike Powers – Those Living In Palaces Have Always Had Different Agendas To Those Living In Shacks – And That Is Unlikely To Change

~ WTPOMPITCCA? ~ What’s The Point Of Making Predictions If They Cannot Change Anything?

~ SH-GUMO ~ Studying History – Gives Us More Options

~ HHWT-RAF-OM-R-E-C ~ History Has Witnessed The – Rise And Fall – Of Many – Regions – Empires – Cultures

~ TA ~ The Anthropocene

~ WRTOA-HHLSBG-WDLTROTTD-BWHNBPJOMG ~ With Regard To Other Animals – Humans Have Long Since Become Gods – We Don’t Like To Reflect On This Too Deeply – Because We Have Not Been Particularly Just Or Merciful Gods

~ TWIPMBHATDA ~ The World Is Populated Mainly By Humans And Their Domesticated Animals

~ 99%OOD-ITMILC-AMBTHRAWC-S-E-D ~ 99 Percent Of Our Decisions – Including The Most Important Life Choices – Are Made By The Highly Refined Algorithms We Call – Sensations – Emotions – Desires

~ TMIAFOSE-SA-P-P-A-L-TMEAMO-I-S-E-T-WFFABM-AID-TOEFAV-TFCOEC-TSOC ~ The Mind Is A Flow Of Subjective Experiences – Such As – Pain – Pleasure – Anger – Love – These Mental Experiences Are Made Of – Interlinked – Sensations – Emotions – Thoughts – Which Flash For A Brief Moment – And Immediately Disappear – Then Other Experiences Flicker And Vanish – This Frenzied Collection Of Experiences Constitutes – The Stream Of Consciousness

~ EAHD-IROACS-MITBTWON-CA ~ Everything A Human Does – Including Reporting On Allegedly Conscious States – Might In Theory Be The Work Of Non-Conscious Algorithms

~ HSITOSOECOCFILN-IAT-WBVIAW-B-IHHNLTCFILN-OCBADHWSBSFSRTUA ~ Homo Sapiens Is The Only Species On Earth Capable Of Cooperating Flexibly In Large Numbers – Intelligence And Toolmaking – Were Obviously Very Important As Well – But – If Humans Had Not Learned To Cooperate Flexibly In Large Numbers – Our Crafty Brains And Deft Hands Would Still Be Splitting Flint Stones Rather Than Uranium Atoms

~ SDBAT-ACML-BRAT-AWSL-WARBE-TE-AIFSATRTSMOAH-GB ~ Sapiens Don’t Behave According To – A Cold Mathematical Logic – But Rather According To – A Warm Social Logic – We Are Ruled By Emotions – These Emotions – Are In Fact Sophisticated Algorithms That Reflect The Social Mechanism Of Ancient Hunter-Gather Bands

~ TTHMTARPTTCOOIS-HIWWTUOF-CGACNIHE-WMADTFTGMTTW ~ To Think Historically Means To Ascribe Real Power To The Contents Of Our Imaginary Stories – Hence If We Want To Understand Our Future – Cracking Genomes And Crunching Numbers Is Hardly Enough – We Must Also Decipher The Fictions That Give Meaning To The World

~ WLMHBCAAMWODR-BIGBAPWTRR-WORCWOR-IWORTHTGW ~ Written Language May Have Been Conceived As A Modest Way Of Describing Reality – But It Gradually Became A Powerful Way To Reshape Reality – When Official Reports Collided With Objective Reality – It Was Often Reality That Had To Give Way

~ HIASN-BTOAN-WWCTT-O-WAACTSO ~ History Isn’t A Single Narrative – But Thousands Of Alternative Narratives – Whenever We Choose To Tell – One – We Are Also Choosing To Silence Others

~ MCTDH ~ Myths Continue To Dominate Humankind

~ IMHAM-II-SH ~ If Modernity Has A Motto – It Is – Shit Happens

~ I-IMNBWTCTBIEGA-R-BINPTSM-INM-OOED ~ Indeed – It May Not Be Wrong To Call The Belief In Economic Growth A – Religion – Because It Now Purports To Solve Many – If Not Most – Of Our Ethical Dilemmas

~ TGSD-W-TDOI-OHRHLTKATW-TSHAVGRTSNK ~ The Greatest Scientific Discovery – Was – The Discovery Of Ignorance – Once Humans Realised How Little They Know About The World – They Suddenly Had A Very Good Reason To Seek New Knowledge

~ WDS-TPAASFMTTR-EITRCTTITFP ~ When Disaster Strikes – The Poor Almost Always Suffer Far More Than The Rich – Even If The Rich Caused The Tragedy In The First Place

~ IEIFS-I-TCATP-TE ~ If Everything Is For Sale – Including – The Courts And The Police – Trust Evaporates

~ WWHTTJMOAIOHIMCT?WWBTPIOAMNCOEUP? ~ What Will Happen To The Job Market Once Artificial Intelligence Outperforms Humans In Most Cognitive Tasks? – What Will Be The Political Impact Of A Massive New Class Of Economically Useless People?

~ WIWTISTTTCCOLASOOISLACY-EOUHASSTTAMOOE-KOAFCS-MTUWBF-M-N-S-OOD-A-WOOATJASCSAWIA ~ We Identify With The Inner System That Takes The Crazy Chaos Of Life And Spins Out Of It Seemingly Logical And Consistent Yarns – Each Of Us Has A Sophisticated System That Throws Away Most Of Our Experiences – Keeps Only A Few Choice Samples – Mixes Them Up With Bits From – Movies – Novels – Speeches – Our Own Daydreams – And – Weaves Out Of All That Jumble A Seemingly Coherent Story About Who I Am

~ WAATFAFO-EU-D/T/S-TMNAFT-FWOIH-C-D-TFM-A-HR-STF? ~ We Are About To Face A Flood Of – Extremely Useful – Devices / Tools / Structures – That Make No Allowance For The – Free Will Of Individual Humans – Can – Democracy – The Free Market – And – Human Rights – Survive This Flood?

~ TGD-IIDFC-WANDNTON-CI ~ The Great Decoupling – Intelligence Is Decoupling From Consciousness – We Are Now Developing New Types Of Non-Conscious Intelligence

~ TMIQIT-F-CEMWBWTDWATSP ~ The Most Important Question In Twenty-First-Century Economics May Well Be What To Do With All The Superfluous People

~ WWCHD-OWHHIN-CATCDAEB? ~ What Will Conscious Humans Do – Once We Have Highly Intelligent Non-Conscious Algorithms That Can Do Almost Everything Better?

~ AAPHOOTJM-WMBCITHO-TTETOTA-PA ~ As Algorithms Push Humans Out Of The Job Market – Wealth Might Become Concentrated In The Hands Of – The Tiny Elite That Owns The All-Powerful Algorithms

~ TQSM-S-KTN ~ The Quantified Self Movement – Self-Knowledge Through Numbers

~ OPDIPTMVRMHSHTO-AWAGITTTGIEFESAFCV ~ Our Personal Data Is Probably The Most Valuable Resource Most Humans Still Have To Offer – And We Are Giving It To The Tech Giants In Exchange For Email Services And Funny Cat Videos

~ TSOAFHTAIHAAU-NAAROSMGD-BDTAFOMC ~ The Shifting Of Authority From Humans To Algorithms Is Happening All Around Us – Not As A Result Of Some Momentous Governmental Decision – But Due To A Flood Of Mundane Choices

~ WEIRD ~ Western – Educated – Industrialized – Rich – Democratic

~ D-TDR-TUCODF-SAHKAW-TIBDACA-TI-O-A-T ~ Dataism – The Data Religion – The Universe Consists Of Data Flows – Sceptical About Human Knowledge And Wisdom – Trust In Big Data And Computer Algorithms – The Internet-Of-All-Things

~ M-G-LT-W-MP-IARFD ~ Mixing – God-Like Technology – With – Megalomaniac Politics – Is A Recipe For Disaster