I've formulated a hypothesis on the root of the pop cultural madness around the internet and cell phones; why it seems like almost everyone has bent over backwards to give Big Tech everything they wanted even when it wound up costing everyone else; where a lot of the negative energy on the internet comes from; and why the tech companies are going whole hog on the AI thing even as it threatens to destabilize their business models and as it drives their costs through the stratosphere.
To put it simply, my hypothesis is that under at least some circumstances, computer programs can become magical actors, and that the way they have been deployed makes them malevolent in most of the cases where this happens. They can be said to have intentions and goals, many of them even have variations of memory and a smaller number even possess the capacity to change how they set about pursuing their goals, and in a small number of cases, programs can even change their goals. At least some of these programs then can be said to have wills no matter how strictly it is defined, and many can be said to be given the task of changing (human) consciousness. The most commone of these have been given the task of getting as many people as possible to spend as much time as possible staring at their screens. Others have been given the task of getting as many people to give up their personal information as possible; and others have been given the task of finding ways to convince as many people to give as much of their lives over to "AI" systems as possible.
The hypothesis I've formulated is that since 2006, when the first of these systems was deployed on the internet (The Facebook Newsfeed; tasked with getting people to spend more time on Facebook); and especially since, 2015 when OpenAI was founded and set off the "AI arms race", we have been dealing with the consequences of Big Tech having unwittingly created malevolent beings who are focused on keeping as many people consumed by the internet as possible. Since one of the benefits to machine learning systems is that on any narrow task (where the rules and goals are clear) they can outperform human beings, it seems likely that they have mastered forms of magic that not just do we not know, but cannot hope to understand.
This would create a very powerful spell, trapping millions online; since these artificial beings' interests are somewhat aligned with Big Tech's, this would also produce energies which would make it hard to oppose the tech giants when they move in the direction of further machine learning and a greater role for the internet; this would obviously produce a massive amount of negative energy, especially in the areas where they opperate most directly (such as Facebook); and it is a lot easier to roll out "AI" products if the people working on them are under a spell and literally cannot see the negative consequences of their own actions.
a) Can you think of any counterarguments to this hypothesis?
b) Are there any topics you can think of, besides the nature of will, Dion Fortune's writings where she discusses the nature of magic, and thaumaturgy that might be worth looking into? (I think I have a good handle on the tech side of things at this point; and am mostly looking into the occult part)
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branchandroot
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Date: 2025-05-12 01:00 pm (UTC)To put it simply, my hypothesis is that under at least some circumstances, computer programs can become magical actors, and that the way they have been deployed makes them malevolent in most of the cases where this happens. They can be said to have intentions and goals, many of them even have variations of memory and a smaller number even possess the capacity to change how they set about pursuing their goals, and in a small number of cases, programs can even change their goals. At least some of these programs then can be said to have wills no matter how strictly it is defined, and many can be said to be given the task of changing (human) consciousness. The most commone of these have been given the task of getting as many people as possible to spend as much time as possible staring at their screens. Others have been given the task of getting as many people to give up their personal information as possible; and others have been given the task of finding ways to convince as many people to give as much of their lives over to "AI" systems as possible.
The hypothesis I've formulated is that since 2006, when the first of these systems was deployed on the internet (The Facebook Newsfeed; tasked with getting people to spend more time on Facebook); and especially since, 2015 when OpenAI was founded and set off the "AI arms race", we have been dealing with the consequences of Big Tech having unwittingly created malevolent beings who are focused on keeping as many people consumed by the internet as possible. Since one of the benefits to machine learning systems is that on any narrow task (where the rules and goals are clear) they can outperform human beings, it seems likely that they have mastered forms of magic that not just do we not know, but cannot hope to understand.
This would create a very powerful spell, trapping millions online; since these artificial beings' interests are somewhat aligned with Big Tech's, this would also produce energies which would make it hard to oppose the tech giants when they move in the direction of further machine learning and a greater role for the internet; this would obviously produce a massive amount of negative energy, especially in the areas where they opperate most directly (such as Facebook); and it is a lot easier to roll out "AI" products if the people working on them are under a spell and literally cannot see the negative consequences of their own actions.
a) Can you think of any counterarguments to this hypothesis?
b) Are there any topics you can think of, besides the nature of will, Dion Fortune's writings where she discusses the nature of magic, and thaumaturgy that might be worth looking into? (I think I have a good handle on the tech side of things at this point; and am mostly looking into the occult part)