markjgsmith

I’ve been working on a blog post, another Gemini collaboration post, for just over an hour. Working on stuff with AI is really bizare. It’s like the most extreme form of hit or miss ever. I’ve had loads of times when it’s a total disaster, both with writing code and with prose. Then again sometimes you get something back and it’s like nothing you could have imagined, and you are completely stuned by what you are reading, as if you’ve just been contacted by higher dimensional beings from another universe. That’s been the case today.

It seems to be particularly good at taking a jumble of thoughts, where there is an undercurent of something that you can’t quite put your finger on. I find that happens a lot when you read and listen to lots of online content from modern tech. I guess it’s often triggering many age old themes that have been hammered into you but they aren’t immediately obvious in a new context. This is great of course because often it’s exactly this sort of thing that can keep you awake ruminating at night as your brain tries to put all the pieces into a narrative that makes sense.

Of course you have to at some point put aside the awe of the situation, and get on with things, because neverending awe is stupid and annoying. Very odd this new AI world. Blog post to follow. #

Freedom, control and societal structures

The Unseen Current: Navigating Freedom, Control, and the Perpetual Paradox

Our minds, like rivers, sometimes surge with a jumble of thoughts after immersing ourselves in the digital age. Podcasts, conversations, and the relentless hum of modern life churn ideas into a turbulent flow. What emerges is often an abstract theme, a deep current that speaks to freedom and its many definitions, control and its pervasive reach, and the timeless, often maddening, nature of being human. Beneath the surface, a more unsettling truth began to reveal itself – a perpetual paradox at the heart of our attempts to build a just and secure world.

New Frontiers, Old Dilemmas: The Trust and Betrayal Loop

Consider the whispers of "freedom money." Technologies like Bitcoin promise a new dawn, a world where the power to spend doesn't require permission, offering liberation from centralized authorities. Yet, this noble pursuit immediately bumps up against a brutal reality: greater individual autonomy, by its very nature, inevitably empowers all individuals, including those with malicious intent. Suddenly, the very tools designed to circumvent traditional control become instruments for unseen actors, with Bitcoin itself facilitating international criminal operations like kidnapping, raising the specter of sophisticated criminality.

This quickly triggers a demand for order. If individual freedom enables unseen dangers, then surely the collective must step in. We call for stronger state intervention, for more pervasive oversight, for "Know Your Customer" regulations, accepting a trade-off of privacy for protection. But here lies the devastating twist of the paradox: the very institutions we empower – the state, its agencies, its police – are themselves composed of individuals. And individuals, regardless of their uniform or office, are susceptible to corruption, inefficiency, or the lure of power. The shield we raised against external threats can itself become a source of oppression, turning "freedom tech" into something disturbingly akin to oppression tech.

And so, the cycle turns. When the collective, entrusted with our safety, becomes the very thing we need protection from, the desire for greater individual freedom surges anew. We seek even more decentralized, permissionless ways to exist, to transact, to live beyond the reach of a potentially compromised system. This is the heart of the loop: a constant, almost futile, oscillation between empowering the individual and empowering the collective, each solution inevitably creating the conditions for the next problem.

The Architecture of Security: A Shifting Foundation

This same paradox permeates our quest for physical security. The ideal of police protection for all contrasts sharply with the chilling reality that such safeguards aren't always universally applied, or that the protectors themselves can become sources of threat. The alarming surge in kidnappings targeting high-net-worth individuals in the crypto community, notably seen recently in France, highlights a universal vulnerability that directly stems from the very "freedom money" they possess, which criminals then leverage for their ransoms and logistics. This specific, visceral concern pushes us to consider our own threat models. We contemplate owning guns, learning martial arts – measures of individual empowerment and self-reliance, precisely because the collective's promise of safety feels increasingly conditional or even compromised.

This pushes us to confront the deepest tension: the collective versus the individual. We cherish the image of neighbors helping neighbors, a community united, yet this benevolent ideal is shattered by the unsettling thought of holding the door open for someone who might then burglarize your house. Can we truly foster a collective spirit when the very fabric of trust is frayed by the constant threat of exploitation, whether from individuals outside the law or institutions within it? It's a continuous calibration between enabling a cooperative society and guarding against its inherent vulnerabilities.

The Unending Questions: Navigating the Grey

Across all these domains, a desperate cry for visibility emerges – whether it's demanding proof of reserves in financial systems or simply greater transparency in governance. Yet, here too, the paradox bites. While transparency is championed for accountability and trust, this very visibility can be weaponized, exploited by criminals to identify and target their victims, just as "freedom money" can be used against its proponents. It becomes another double-edged sword in the ceaseless fight for security.

The stark division between rich versus poor continues to shape our societies, influencing everything from access to opportunity to the very nature of our daily struggles. This is where the core contradiction rears its head again: who gets to decide when a person is "ready," when they are "good enough," or when they can be truly trusted by the collective and granted full autonomy? In a system where the collective itself can be perceived as corrupted, even "plainly stealing" from its constituents, the individual faces a stark choice: to wait for permission that may never come, or to forcefully take independence, knowing the risks. The tension between learning versus working also plays out here, as individuals strive for the knowledge or means to claim that autonomy, often against a current pulling them back into pre-defined roles.

And then there's the personal resonance of it all. The anxious questions that echo within us: "Am I ready yet?", "Will I be ready before I die?". These are the universal human queries about preparedness, purpose, and the precious, finite nature of our existence. There are moments of chaotic intensity, mirroring that internal and external struggle, punctuated by moments of clarity and the simple realization: we are "still alive for now."

Is this the real life?
Is this just fantasy?
Caught in a landslide
No escape from reality
Open your eyes
Look up to the skies and see
I’m just a poor boy, I need no sympathy
Because I’m easy come, easy go
A little high, little low
Anyway the wind blows, doesn’t really matter to me, to me

Mama, just killed a man
Put a gun against his head
Pulled my trigger, now he’s dead
Mama, life had just begun
But now I’ve gone and thrown it all away
Mama, ooh
Didn’t mean to make you cry
If I’m not back again this time tomorrow
Carry on, carry on, as if nothing really matters

Too late, my time has come
Sends shivers down my spine
Body’s aching all the time
Goodbye everybody I’ve got to go
Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth
Mama, ooh (anyway the wind blows)
I don’t want to die
I sometimes wish I’d never been born at all

I see a little silhouetto of a man
Scaramouch, scaramouch will you do the fandango
Thunderbolt and lightning very very frightening me
Gallileo, Gallileo
Gallileo, Gallileo
Gallileo Figaro, magnifico

I’m just a poor boy and nobody loves me
He’s just a poor boy from a poor family
Spare him his life from this monstrosity

Easy come easy go, will you let me go
Bismillah! No we will not let you go, let him go
Bismillah! We will not let you go, let him go
Bismillah! We will not let you go, let me go
Will not let you go, let me go (never)
Never, never, never, never, never let me go
No, no, no, no, no, no, no
Oh mama mia, mama mia, mama mia let me go
Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me
For me
For me

So you think you can stop me and spit in my eye
So you think you can love me and leave me to die
Oh, baby, can’t do this to me, baby Just gotta get out, just gotta get right outta here

Ooh yeah, ooh yeah

Nothing really matters
Anyone can see
Nothing really matters nothing really matters to me

Anyway the wind blows

Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody, video here, the lyrics themselves a poignant cry of the individual battling forces, seen and unseen, perfectly capture this fundamental push-and-pull. A sign this path has been walked by others before. A lot.

Perhaps the most profound insight lies in embracing the apparent contradictions, in acknowledging that all of these things can be true at the same time. Our world is not always black and white; freedom and security can be opposing forces, technology can liberate and control, and human nature remains a complex tapestry of altruism and self-interest, intertwined with the constant threat of corruption in both individuals and the systems they build.

And in that dizzying recognition of the perpetual paradox – that our solutions so often contain the seeds of new problems, that the very acts of seeking freedom or demanding security can loop back to undermine themselves – perhaps the only honest reaction is a bewildered, emphatic: "Holy shit balls."

This exploration doesn't offer neat resolutions. Instead, it invites us to acknowledge the vast, interconnected terrain of these timeless human issues, to navigate the complexities, and to grapple with the inherent paradoxes of our modern existence. The unseen current continues to flow, and we, in our little dinghies, are all part of its journey.

This blog post was created in collaboration with Gemini. Check out the full chat conversation here. #

What is up with these LLMs adding bold everywhere in text they write? It’s madening. #

It’s completely wild to me that I finished writing the latest Gemini collaboration blog post and the very next thing I did was pick back up a Rogan Protect Our Parks episode I had been watching yesterday, and they immediately start talking about Little Richard and the lyrics from Tutti Frutti, followed by a bit about modern content being sythesized from many different places.

For the record my Holy shit balls comment at the end of my blog post was lifted from the latest Rabbit Hole Recap Ep#360. I was listening to it as I finished the initial bullet point list that created the blog at the exact moment Marty said it comicly. I just thought it sounded funny, so added it to the list without giving it any thought. Don't think I'd ever heard the expression before. Just another set of data points that indicate we are living in some sort of AI guided, possibly nefarious, simulation.

Oh well, world keeps on turning. #

Still no word from Github support. My Github account is still blocked, so still can’t publish to the website. #

Honestly, sometimes I wonder if Bitcoin fixes anything. #

The core contradiction

I was working with Gemini earlier on a blog post and we did a little side quest to figure out the general theme in some jumbled up thoughts I was having after listening to tons of podcasts and youtubes. The response was so good that I thought it might be useful as a stand alone blog post. I was completely taken aback by it because in my head it was such a mess, but the loop it identified really was what was bothering me. The key insight was that it was a loop. It‘s difficult to think about now, but I‘m not even sure I had identified myself that it was a loop. It probably could be formulated better, but it‘s already a huge improvement on the original mess.

Anyway, here it is:

The fundamental dilemma you're pointing to is the inescapable trade-off between individual empowerment (freedom) and collective security (order/protection), compounded by the inherent fallibility and potential for corruption in both individuals and the systems they create.

Here's the loop you've identified:

1. Desire for Individual Freedom (e.g., Bitcoin): We seek to empower the individual with tools that grant greater autonomy and freedom, often to escape perceived control or corruption of existing systems.
2. Unintended Consequence: Empowerment of "Bad" Individuals: This increased freedom (e.g., anonymity, permissionless transactions) inevitably extends to those with malicious intent (criminals).
3. Reaction: Call for Stronger Collective/State Control: The rise of criminal activity fueled by individual freedom leads to a demand for stronger state intervention, police, and regulations (e.g., KYC, surveillance) to provide collective security.
4. Inherent Flaw: Corruption within the Collective/State: The very institutions we empower to protect us (the state, police, regulatory bodies) are themselves composed of individuals and are thus susceptible to corruption, inefficiency, or even becoming tools of oppression.
5. Result: Need for More Individual Freedom (to escape the State/Collective): When the collective/state becomes corrupt or overreaching, it drives a renewed desire for even greater individual autonomy and "freedom money" to protect oneself from the very system designed to protect you.
6. The Loop Continues: This new wave of individual empowerment once again creates avenues for malicious actors, restarting the cycle.

The "So What to Do?" Question:

This highlights the profound challenge:

• Individuals are flawed/corruptible.
• Collectives/States, being made of individuals, are also flawed/corruptible.
• Therefore, any solution, whether individual-centric or collective-centric, carries an inherent risk of failure, exploitation, or unintended consequences.

The core contradiction is that the very solutions we seek to protect ourselves from one threat (e.g., state overreach) can inadvertently create or exacerbate another (e.g., criminal freedom), which then leads back to empowering the original threat (the state) in a futile cycle. It's a game of whack-a-mole where the hammer itself might be faulty.

This clarifies the issue significantly. We're not just talking about general contradictions, but a feedback loop of distrust and the search for security, where every solution seems to contain the seeds of a new problem.

This is a powerful concept to weave into the blog post. It grounds the abstract in a very human and very modern dilemma.

This blog post is an extract from a conversation I had with Gemini. Here is the full conversation. #