One symptom of a civilization in decline is that the inhabitants become jaded and cynical. Nobody can be believed, the news is dull and depressing no matter how you look at it, and everything seems to have turned to shit. Yet we live in the most prosperous era humanity has ever experienced, with entire nations rising out of poverty and oppression; so why — if this is the apotheosis of the human race — does everyone seem to be so unhappy? While there are plenty of legitimately unhappy folk, I think much of it is performative. The megaphone of social media means everyone has a soapbox to mount and practice their angry face. Confected outrage has always been popular, and it works so well to feed “the algorhythm” that it’s become the sine qua non of social media drivers. A bona-fide pathway to success in 2026 is to adopt the persona of the provocateur — especially effective if you’re a rage-bating troll with high phenotypical attractiveness and perky sulcus intermammarius!
Mmmm, love the sulcus.
But you don’t need to be a catastrophizing “Professor” Jiang-style conspiracy theorist to sense that maybe the people in the cranky corner are feeding off SOMETHING that’s real and tangible and awful with the world. For all the boon and benefice that technology has wrought upon humanity, it has also cursed us with idle thoughts and idle hands. Artificial intelligence made exactly seven people happy since it was invented, and now six of them are running for the hills. Part of the disconnect is the feeling we’ve been left behind by a future that’s accelerating out of sight and out of control, that we’re a nanosecond away from redundancy, and that we’ve been robbed of agency in everything except the dull shit that doesn’t matter.
I mean who would have believed that in the early years of the 21st century our world would be watched by an intelligence greater than our own?
Take the US-Iran War. You don’t need to be an military-industrial complex insider to know that the only people benefiting from this pointless excursion are those within the military-industrial complex. Just follow the money/share prices. Chief Warmonger ‘Pistol Pete’ Hegseth says the spend so far is ballpark $35B, but the Pentagon’s quote comes in at $90B. That’s almost $3B per day going where, exactly? How much of it ends in your pocket? The big question (“how long will this bullshit continue?”) has a very unsatisfying answer: absent better information, the odds are even that a phenomenon will endure at least as long as it already has. So another five months (at least) of this shit with no promise of an end let alone a happy ending.
Yippee. Thanks Pete.
Let’s imagine the US send ground troops to occupy Abu Musa, Greater Tunb, or some other strategic dot in the Strait of Hormuz. The oil starts flowing for a week or two until Iran’s version of Pearl Harbor sinks the US Fifth Fleet and shuts Hormuz, potentially for good. Bibi fulfils Nostradamus’s prophecy by gleefully detonating a “tactical nuke” over Tehran, but instead of ending the conflict it triggers a forever war that plunges not just the combatant states but the rest of the world into a new Dark Age. Do you think this would lift the mood?
So why does that prophecy seem infinitely more likely than a scenario where Donny, Bibi and the Supreme Leader sitting down for coffee and do a deal? Is it just that we’re jaded and cynical, or is there actually something real, tangible and awful at work in the world that we’re powerless to prevent?
I don’t want to end on a depressing note.
I hinted in my opening paragraph that I believe a lot of people just like to whinge. Discretionary spending rose in Australia last month, and is 7% higher than last year. Cost of living crisis? My ass. Everyone I know is buying electric cars, installing solar, travelling overseas (despite The War), yet if you ask them they bemoan the price of their morning latte, and it’s all our Prime Minister’s fault. We are a nation of whingers who suffer excruciatingly from downward-envy and have enjoyed such a cossetted existence that nothing except the good life is tolerable. Well kids, the party’s over and the numbers are looking grim. But maybe AI has the answer? When I asked, it hedged: “The most effective way to improve life on Earth is to build societies that are competent enough to solve collective problems, accountable enough not to abuse that power, and wise enough to use it for broad human and ecological wellbeing.” Thanks for nothing, robot.
It might be time to start hoarding beans, and sharpening a stick at both ends.