34 votes

Marc Andreessen is a philosophical zombie

20 comments

  1. [13]
    Narry
    Link
    Don't introspect about yourself? Okay. Next they'll be telling me to beware the sin of empathy.

    Don't introspect about yourself? Okay. Next they'll be telling me to beware the sin of empathy.

    25 votes
    1. [9]
      TheD00d
      Link Parent
      Boy, do I have news for you.
      14 votes
      1. [4]
        papasquat
        Link Parent
        I don't know how we got to a place where billionaires go on podcasts to say stuff that sounds like in-universe Warhammer 40k propaganda.

        I don't know how we got to a place where billionaires go on podcasts to say stuff that sounds like in-universe Warhammer 40k propaganda.

        24 votes
        1. DefinitelyNotAFae
          Link Parent
          If only it was like, they're painting it red to go faster or that if we collectively believe in something we can achieve it, rather than "HERESY"...

          If only it was like, they're painting it red to go faster or that if we collectively believe in something we can achieve it, rather than "HERESY"...

          9 votes
        2. TheD00d
          Link Parent
          I could do this all day lmao His other kids have names that look like regex. We live in weird times.

          I could do this all day lmao

          His other kids have names that look like regex. We live in weird times.

          8 votes
        3. hobbes64
          Link Parent
          These tech dudes probably believe this stuff, but they are also saying stupid shit for engagement because that's the ridiculous world we live in now. Just yesterday The Atlantic posted My New Life...

          These tech dudes probably believe this stuff, but they are also saying stupid shit for engagement because that's the ridiculous world we live in now.

          Just yesterday The Atlantic posted My New Life With the Palantir Chore Coat which has a few sociopathic tech bro billionaire quotes:

          The Palantir chore coat is made by the same Palantir named in homage to Lord of the Rings, the same Palantir that has developed a reputation as ruthlessly committed to any number of national-security imperatives, and, yes, the same Palantir that builds AI tools for the military and tracks migrants for ICE. The mysterious tech giant now also wants to sell you outerwear. Only a tiny Palantir logo is embroidered into the coat’s left breast pocket, but flip the coat inside out and you’ll find a message from Palantir’s CTO, Shyam Sankar, sewn into the lining.

          ASK YOURSELF CONSTANTLY, AM I WINNING? IF THE ANSWER IS YES, NOTHING ELSE MATTERS. CHAOS IS TOLERABLE; PAIN IS TOLERABLE. THE ONLY THING THAT MATTERS IS TO WIN.

          ...

          Mine arrived two weeks later in a giant box labeled SOFT WEAR COLLECTION. The package included a placard signed by Sankar, a SOFTWARE DOMINATION sticker, a postcard urging me to CHEW THE GLASS

          The end of the article sums up this stuff pretty nicely.

          In that sense, the jacket is perfect. No other product better encapsulates how exhausting and predictable it is to be online right now. The merch-industrial complex has come so far from KFC-branded clogs and Panera’s baguette purse that even a company like Palantir is hawking swag for the likes and lolz. Next month, Palantir plans to release a tennis skirt and, to celebrate America’s 250th birthday, boxing gloves. One day, Younes said, he wants to drop a Palantir espresso machine. Sure, why not? It’s more than a bit sad. But so is the alternative, in which Palantir disappears entirely into the shadows. At least online, Palantir is just like everyone else.

          5 votes
      2. [4]
        Narry
        Link Parent
        Which one called empathy a sin? Or was that SecDef Hegseth?

        Which one called empathy a sin? Or was that SecDef Hegseth?

        3 votes
        1. [3]
          DefinitelyNotAFae
          (edited )
          Link Parent
          It's a book and a concerningly popular right wing POV, Hegseth is a member of the denomination of the guy who wrote The Sin of Empathy. Vance has also tried to use a theological concept to limit...

          It's a book and a concerningly popular right wing POV, Hegseth is a member of the denomination of the guy who wrote The Sin of Empathy.

          Vance has also tried to use a theological concept to limit the idea of empathy for people outside your family in a very folkish way.

          Similar opinion from the same person includes

          "[Bishop] Budde's attempt to 'speak truth to power' is a reminder that feminism is a cancer that enables the politics of empathetic manipulation," Rigney wrote for the evangelical World magazine.

          12 votes
          1. [2]
            Narry
            Link Parent
            I had seen it thrown around a few times from various sources earlier this year and maybe some of last year, but I didn’t really understand the source because nobody seemed to be talking about...

            I had seen it thrown around a few times from various sources earlier this year and maybe some of last year, but I didn’t really understand the source because nobody seemed to be talking about where it comes from. So it’s another version of pretend masculinity dressed up as piety. How charming.

            Thank you for explaining the source of this to me, you’ve done more good for my understanding of this than anybody else so far.

            7 votes
            1. DefinitelyNotAFae
              Link Parent
              Glad to, well, disregarding the whole "the fact this theology exists is awful and somewhat horrifying" part.

              Glad to, well, disregarding the whole "the fact this theology exists is awful and somewhat horrifying" part.

              6 votes
    2. [3]
      wervenyt
      Link Parent
      His logic is even more specious when you get into what he's pseudoregurgitating: the idea that "the modern subject" is contingent upon the immediate precarity of owing your 'betters' for living,...

      His logic is even more specious when you get into what he's pseudoregurgitating: the idea that "the modern subject" is contingent upon the immediate precarity of owing your 'betters' for living, and similar socioeconomic arrangements. None of which concerns itself with introspective faculties, at most the modality of how that introspection is conceived.

      The way these billionaires style themselves ubermensch and fall into a methhead's performance art cult in one move is deeply entertaining, at least.

      6 votes
      1. [2]
        Narry
        Link Parent
        When you consider that the Tech Bros have been trying to tell us that we are in a new era for the last 30 or 40 years, and that all of the old ways of doing things have been wiped away by...

        When you consider that the Tech Bros have been trying to tell us that we are in a new era for the last 30 or 40 years, and that all of the old ways of doing things have been wiped away by computers and that “men” like them are the new dominate class, it starts to make a little bit more sense.

        It really is just a bunch of nerds with an axe to grind against perceived oppressors. And not even fun nerds who know science stuff. This is just a bunch of finance and tech meat heads. Absolutely nothing to them beyond the surface level. Instead of liking sports, they like numbers. Trite. Tiresome. Shallow.

        7 votes
        1. wervenyt
          Link Parent
          100%. Said cult was made to appeal to them, it's just mindnumbingly stupid to watch.

          100%. Said cult was made to appeal to them, it's just mindnumbingly stupid to watch.

          5 votes
  2. NaraVara
    Link
    The part where she jokes that we might have a methodology to create p-zombies at will gives me an idea for a sci-fi horror movie. Imagine taking an otherwise dull man and unknowingly placing him...

    The part where she jokes that we might have a methodology to create p-zombies at will gives me an idea for a sci-fi horror movie. Imagine taking an otherwise dull man and unknowingly placing him in a “Truman Show” type situation surrounded by sycophantic cyborgs until he loses all sense of qualia.

    The movie would just close with him releasing himself into an empty world and immediately losing his mind when he sees a butterfly and can’t will it to land in front of him so he can get a better look at the pattern on its wings. Nature gives no shits about him and he’s forced to ask “WHO AM I!?” for the first time before a bear mauls him.

    Or maybe he sees a pretty berry and eats it before we close with him shitting himself to death. Being as how taking a dump is when one is most private and free to introspect there’s some poetic symmetry there.

    5 votes
  3. thearctic
    Link
    I think something can be said, for some people in some instances, about not ruminating too much. But, the notion that there's nothing to be found from introspection because the "self" only exists...

    I think something can be said, for some people in some instances, about not ruminating too much. But, the notion that there's nothing to be found from introspection because the "self" only exists insofar as it's an internally maintained "tradition" or "narrative" implies that...there is no biological basis for personality and that...there is perfect free will. Ignoring the utility of introspection even in this case (uncovering contradictions in mental frameworks, revisiting relevant pieces of information based on your stated values and priorities, etc), these are two radical implicit assertions for a supposed rationalist.

    5 votes
  4. [3]
    chundissimo
    (edited )
    Link

    archive link removed, use gift link in other comment

    3 votes
    1. [2]
      LukeZaz
      Link Parent
      Reminder to keep uBlock Origin active when visiting archive.is or any of its mirror domains (most any archive.[whatever] site except archive.org), since they've been found to abuse their position...

      Reminder to keep uBlock Origin active when visiting archive.is or any of its mirror domains (most any archive.[whatever] site except archive.org), since they've been found to abuse their position to DDoS people they don't like, as well as altering the snapshots of pages that they store as a means of harassment.

      19 votes
      1. chundissimo
        Link Parent
        Woof, I didn’t know this. I’m gonna remove my link especially now that there is a gift link

        Woof, I didn’t know this. I’m gonna remove my link especially now that there is a gift link

        9 votes
  5. crulife
    Link
    I thought this would've been a continuation of a long line of dumb anti-billionaire articles, but apparently Andreessen is proudly exactly what the title says. Huh. Well. He might be a good...

    I thought this would've been a continuation of a long line of dumb anti-billionaire articles, but apparently Andreessen is proudly exactly what the title says.

    Andreessen cheerfully says he has “zero” levels of introspection — “as little as possible.” This is a positive for entrepreneurs, we are told. “And you know, if you go back 400 years ago, it never would have occurred to anybody to be introspective,”

    Huh. Well. He might be a good entrepreneur still, though. Just that we have no reason to take into account anything he says beyond that.

    3 votes