My People

I had been at loose ends regarding what to read next, when I stumbled across mention of this book. 

I just finished the first chapter and - these are my people.

They're asking questions I've asked before (with actual knowledge to back it up!) and some I haven't yet.

I'm looking forward to the rest of the book. 😁

Musings on the Psychology Behind Terrible Decisions

We recently had a couple of days with a noticable haze, and the smell of smoke. It came from the wildfires in Canada (reaching all the way to central Illinois).

Sure, I've heard humans started those fires... But fires don't catch like that unless the vegetation is dry. This is Canada for crying out loud... I have never seen wildfires in Canada spread smoke so far.

Throw in the heat waves, the insurance companies dropping customers in places like Florida, and it seems like we're really starting to feel the consequences that scientists have been predicting for a while now.

Which makes me think about how we got here. And about the organized efforts to prevent 7s from doing anything about it. (Like this).

It's pretty common for people to dismiss these things as 'greed', or corporations (and billionaires) being just plain evil...

And maybe it's true. I mean, we do have story after story of corporations suppressing information that can be life threatening. Radium girls, cigarette companies, Erin Brockovich - that's just a small fraction of the multitude of examples. If anyone wonders why 'evil corporations' are a constant trope, they haven't really been paying attention to what corporations have proven they're willing to do. If you add in less immediately lethal activity (like Volkswagen's emissions scandal) the list grows even longer. 

Is greed and evil really enough of an explanation though?

I mean sure, maybe some of the people involved are knowingly choosing to do wrong for short sighted gain or something, who knows?

But with my personal rules of thumb (most people don't want to think of themselves as evil, so they will have some sort of justification. Plus we tend to be biased when it benefits us, so people are more likely to find arguments credible when they allow them to continue making money.) I suspect there's more going on than simple greed.

More than just human bias, too. After all, some of those corporations clearly did have proof that they were trying to cover up. 

When I try to imagine what would lead me to make such morally bankrupt decisions, I think back to the times when I really, really, didn't want to believe something.

Like realizing I was the one who made a mistake. I think most people, like me, feel an instinctive fear when that happens. Sort of an 'oh shit, I screwed up... This could get me fired' fear. It doesn't even have to be a direct threat from your boss, most people think that if they screw up badly enough they will lose their job. (There was a thread on Twitter once where tech people talked about their biggest, most disastrous mistakes... And it's kind of reassuring to realize so many people - people who mostly seem competent and good - have stories like that. Helps dispel the myth that we all have to be perfect).

It's hard to set aside the ego, to not get defensive and immediately try to shuffle the blame or hide what you did and hope nobody figures it out.

Those are the moments that can define a person, a corporation, a country...

And when we talk about character, we're talking about people who demonstrate it even when your self interest is telling you to hide and cover up whatever it is.

I don't know that that makes any difference - we still have short sighted fools preventing us from addressing problems because it's not in their interest.

It's just their possible motivations change. 

Dungeon Crawler Carl

The newest Dungeon Crawler Carl book came out, and of course I had to reread all the other books so that I didn't spend the first few chapters trying to remember the details of who is who, or what happened if they reference earlier events.

I am in awe of the storytelling, even more so after this book. I'm not sure how to explain it, I don't think I'd enjoy a similar book with less talentee writing (it doesn't shy from the grotesque and disturbing, imho. It's hard to imagine how a TV or movie could hold true to the story without either sanitizing it or having quite a lot of gore and violence) but I don't really think it's grimdark, despite my initial impressions.

There's hope, especially as he starts making allies and coordinating his fellow crawlers.

It's more like we have this absolutely terrible system, but you see how many people are caught up in it. They're not necessarily evil.

It also has some excellent moments showing the cognitive dissonance that lets a system like this exist.

He and his cat are popular enough that they're sometimes pulled from the show for interviews and such (kind of like in Hunger Games - if you're popular you're more likely to have a sponsor giving you loot that can really help you survive), and during one such show a side character was killed. All the other people on the show were expressing their shock and horror, and he's like 'it's terrible when they die, but you're all okay with us dying?'

Or when he learns that the AIs life is protected... But not the crawlers.

There's so many layers to the story - about terrible systems, community action, power dynamics (the AI is obsessed with his feet, which makes things - strange. Like we talk about sexual harassment and power dynamics in the real world, and an artificial intelligence that can make lots of monsters attack you is one hell of a power imbalance), there's his relationship with Donut (the cat, who was given a pet treat that made her intelligent and thus a crawler in her own right), and there's Carl's own backstory, which was slowly played out.

Really, I could write pages about these books.

But I think what I've been dwelling on the most is how part of his path to success is reminding the public that they are people.

Dehumanizing the 'other' has all too often allowed people to tolerate the intolerable. Allows them to brush it aside, or ignore it.

Like the rich people who cared more about Epstein's arrest than the damage he was doing to all those girls.

Same for job losses, healthcare disasters, and all the other things far too many people struggle with.

We may not have an obviously evil Dungeon Crawl, but there are systemic problems that people with power have learned to look away from.

Maybe they tell themselves it's because normal people are lazy, or entitled, or whatever excuse they can come up with to justify blocking any attempt at change... I don't really know what goes through their heads.

I just think any explanation that dehumanizes the vast majority of people (and calling them 'lazy' as a way of dismissing them is one such) is a good indicator that you're not thinking too clearly.

Thought Exercise Commentary

In case it wasn't obvious, yesterday's post was revisualizing the debate between being a big fish in a small pond vs a not-so-big fish in the ocean (though there were flaws with it).

Or rather it's about fear and control.

After all, a billionaire has more money than a millionaire and an entire nation would naturally have more options than a small city. Why wouldn't you choose it?

The millionaire isn't objectively as well off, their only real advantage in that scenario is that they're probably the most powerful person in their area.

(The analogy also shows how wealth is comparative rather than a specific number, but I'd rather keep the focus on fear and control. After all, paying attention to when your decisions are influenced by a desire for control or fear about one possible future can help steer you away from some pretty terrible choices).

Thought Exercise

Would you rather be a millionaire in a small city where you are wealthier than the next five people put together?

Or a billionaire in a nation where you aren't the wealthiest, but you're definitely in the top 1%?

Innovation

I thought I had said enough about the Titan submersible and hubris, and while technically this is a bit of a different topic, I guess I'm not done yet.

The New Yorker just published this article giving some background on the Titan, and I wanted to focus on some of the quotes.

Rush replied four days later, saying that he had “grown tired of industry players who try to use a safety argument to stop innovation and new entrants from entering their small existing market.” He understood that his approach “flies in the face of the submersible orthodoxy, but that is the nature of innovation,”

“If you’re not breaking things, you’re not innovating,” Rush said, at the GeekWire Summit last fall. “If you’re operating within a known environment, as most submersible manufacturers do—they don’t break things. To me, the more stuff you’ve broken, the more innovative you’ve been.”

 

in 2021, Stockton Rush told an interviewer that he would “like to be remembered as an innovator. I think it was General MacArthur who said, ‘You’re remembered for the rules you break.’ And I’ve broken some rules to make this.”

All of these quotes seem like something you'd hear from a 'tech bro'.

And here's the thing. The tech bro attitude (move fast and break things) came Silicon Valley and tech where lives are not at risk.

If your code doesn't work and the program crashes, you just lose time. Well, and depending on if you've pushed to production you might lose some customers and some money. 

It's not like civil engineering, where if your bridge is poorly designed it'll fall apart and people will die.

Maybe there's more serious consequences when we start talking about Industrial Control Systems and medical implants, but most of the time tech failures mean the loss of convenience, not life.

Furthermore, this guy seemed to have only superficial knowledge of the challenges involved.

It reminds me of what a character said, trying to teach etiquette and proper behavior to an unwilling student - 'if you're going to break the rules, you should at least understand which rules you're breaking.'

This guy seems to think simply breaking rules proves he's innovating, rather than knowing which rules his innovations allow him to break.

Overall he comes across as a boy pretending he's a man, which I suppose is part of the whole tech bro think. (That's why they're 'bros')

Finally, he reminds me of a terrible commander I worked under as a young lieutenant. The kind that has learned to basically pressure their underlings to get results...

And doesn't care about what sorts of shortcuts or illegal behavior their subordinates do to meet their goals.

Like... Some pressure is fine? But you don't want to create a team that goes too far, and how do you know when it's too far?

People perform at their peak when they're challenged, but if the challenge is too much (or impossible) it does more harm 5yan good. That's why there are so many studies on how to coach athletes to their peak potential.

You don't make someone start long distance running with a marathon, you build up to it.

These guys only seem to know half of the puzzle.

It's a shame their attitude is so pernicious. 

Current Events

I've thought about writing a bit... And wind up thinking 'why bother? '

I don't want to admit that, or give in to defeatism and cynicism, but it's hard to feel like anything I say will affect the people who I think need to hear it. 

Why would they care about my opinion anyway? 

Besides, I've written plenty on groupthink, decision making, etc.

I try not to assume the worst of the powers that be, but it does seem like too many of them are like that Titanic submarine guy - so arrogantly certain they know better, and so unwilling to hear anything that doesn't support what they want to hear.

Which, well... At least the submarine guy only hurt himself and the others who chose to join him. Unfortunately, for issues like the environment or economics or the threats to our democracy, we're all stuck dealing with the consequences of their hubris.

It's like we're all on a plane that's about to crash, and the pilots have locked the cabin door and shut out anyone who might be able to pilot the plane into a safe landing.

(Okay, I really hope it's not that bad. And it does seem like some people are still trying to steer us to safety... It's just that there's story after story of people with money who use that money to block any effort at changing course).

Speaking of misusing wealth... How on earth do the Mercers justify bankrolling Alex Jones?

Like, do they not realize funding a guy spreading lies about the death of children makes them... Kind of evil?

Or do they not care about morality?

Or are they so lost to sense and sensibility that they somehow think the ends justify the means? Like... They don't want gun control, but rather than admit they're okay with regular school shootings because they think gun rights are more important, they'd rather support lies that obfuscate the issue?

And it's not just them, either.

So many people with money and influence seem to have a really warped world view that prevents them from making sound decisions.

It's hard to feel like things will get better when there's that level of poor judgement.