What Then Must We Do, again?

Don't ask AI. Listen to the attached conversation link below.

Early in the conversation between Nils Gilman and Stuart Russell, (see link below) SR referenced the algebra/calculus (quantum machine learning) used to wrangle-in and test probability, boosting the progression of AI. Near the end of their conversation, Mr. Russell, speaking on the topic of preparedness (or if preparedness is possible), the two delved into the purpose of education & what I interpreted as - implied recognition of anthropocene, and/or existential hazards. They speculated on what people could do in a world dominated by AI & its epistemic impact to create meaning for their lives & the same for communities.

In this section they noted the documented - fast corrosive effect on individual and cohort cognitive sovereignty resulting from even brief reliance on AI for help / research in establishing initial paths of inquiry. They noted that for a lot of people, it’s hard to think in the manner necessary to start productive consideration about it. Our collective cognitive sovereignty, intellectual habits, and epistemic foundations have been significantly degraded by the prevalence of algorithmic manipulation throughout mainstream media, social media, and just the process of using the internet. In my view, our consciousness has been colonized and commodified for the use of increasingly hegemonic owner/operators of data, power (both compute and governance), and resources.

The comments section of this Futurology post are valuable. One commentor references Blake & Gilman’s Children Of A Modest Star - Planetary Thinking For An Age of Crises; a crucial book (IMO) that highlights subsidiarity as a major basis for civic & governance organization. I agree with her. In my logic it leads to foundational small groups organized around the geography of drainage basins focusing on care for nature & each other to achieve maximum practical mutual benefit, with earth as equal partner.

By necessity it would start on relative microscale basis, scaling up to neighborhood, town/city, state, & region. Reality of good governance & economics in this framework depends on ditching extractivive capitalism & developing new paradigms based on regenerative & recipricol systems (1); how nature self-organizes for balance & sustainability, ie the Planetarity element of the concept.

Governance based on natural rights & self-reliance in the context of social responsibility scales up parallel to stewardship of the commons. (For reference see William James clarification of RW Emerson self-reliance as self-reliance in the context of social responsibility) (2) Progressive scaling up essentially recreates indigenous pre-industialization & pre-colonization micro-scale and meta-scale governance frameworks that existed in the Western hemisphere for about 10,000 years. For reference see how the document, Jesuit Relations. derived from French Jesuit missionaries in Arcadia discussions with indigenous intellectual’s critique of European extractive feudal hegemony, +/- 1611 to 1635) helped shape Enlightenment thought & subsequent Massachusetts colony assetion of natural rights in the Crown’s court in Boston in 1761: James Otis presenting “Against Writs of Assistance” ~ leading to 1776 US Declaration on Independance. (3)

All of this is my attempt to capture something vaguely implied near the end of the conversation; speculating on what then must we do? The following is in relation a commentor’s observation / question on the absurdity of some kind of competent & benevolent form of governance magically precipitating out of Chernoble-like, or more existential AI megalomania induced crisis. In my view, enough sober-minded people of good will and influence are engaged in current events to head off magical thinking. We can collectively evaluate the reality of our governance and culture to appropriately fix our operating paradigms. It takes a lot more grassroots education and motivation to achieve more than critical mass level to succeed. AI will be needed to weave the duality of complexity & simplicity into maximum practical mutually beneficial systems - based on regenerative, equitable, resilient & sustainable frameworks for both people & earth. We need to cool and quiet down the scene to keep our heads straight enough to stick to the task.

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Waiting for the AI Chernobyl

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If you’re reading my Substack for the first time, I primarily write about frameworks for working toward environmental & social justice with regenerative, resilient, and sustainable frameworks, organized around the geography of drainage basins. A lot of the recent stuff, (couple links below) stays focused on this but sarcsasm is an inherited trait…. I struggle to reform my ways.

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Annotated Appendix

(1a) Regeneration and Systems Change - John Elkington Triple Bottom Line; “Green Swans”; Volans regeneration agenda; recent essays on the failure of incrementalism. Relevance: Provides the conceptual bridge from sustainability to regeneration.

(1b) Fikret Berkes and Carl Folke - Work on social‑ecological systems and resilience. Relevance: Supports drainage‑basin‑based governance and community‑rooted ethics.

(1c) Glenn Albrecht - Earth Emotions; essays on solastalgia; originator of the Symbiocene concept. Relevance: Frames the transition from extractive Anthropocene systems to regenerative Symbiocene systems.

(2) https://www.innermosthousefoundation.org/jameswritings

(3a) The Jesuit Relations (1632 to 1673), Indigenous ecological governance and its influence on Enlightenment thought.

(3b) Natives and Newcomers: Canada’s “Heroic Age” Reconsidered by Bruce Trigger. McGill - Queen’s University Press, 1985: Indigenous political thought, recorded in the early Jesuit Relations, fed into European Enlightenment debates and later into Anglo‑American natural‑rights discourse.

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(4b)