“Alice laughed. ‘There’s no use trying,’ she said. ‘One can’t believe impossible things.’
I daresay you haven’t had much practice,’ said the Queen. ‘When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” – Through the looking-glass, Lewis Carrol
To stay sane, we have to accept that our climate is going completely haywire, but that it is ok to mostly ignore that since saving ourselves is apparently not cost-effective.
In a time of energy shortage and, as noted, climate challenges, we have to accept that the world is going ALL IN on massive AI data centers that slurp up our water and emit vast amounts of CO₂ and gigawatts of heat. Apparently THIS is a priority!
Meanwhile, a total lunatic is in charge of the US nuclear arsenal, and he starts random wars with no plan, and there is zero indication that the military or courts or congress are inclined to stop him in any way. We have to pretend this is all fine to get through the day.
And at the same time, Israel is eradicating a whole population, killing people by the tens of thousands. Yet, somehow, we can still trade with them as if nothing is happening. And we have to fit into our understanding of the world that it is ok if Israel does it. Even writing this sentence is extremely controversial somehow. Here, have some emoji 🇵🇸🍉. Oh, and when this all happens in Sudan we Officially Do Not Care.
AI
The advent of AI is ruining hiring and education. The advantages are nebulous (although there are some good bits), but for some reason everyone in charge (CEOs, ministers) is convinced this is the future. That most people hate it does not appear to matter, and we just have to accept this. Because AI is going to get stuffed into everything we do.
It is simply unbearable to see AI-enthusiasts now emit gigantic amounts of computer code that is not understood, and taking it into production, while claiming that normal programmers need to get on board with this idiocy. “Because otherwise you might be left behind”. It is not idiocy to think that spewing the output of unproven large language models into services we all rely on is madness. And yet.
Clouds
Many governments and countries around the world have configured their societies to fully depend on US clouds, meaning we are utterly dependent on the goodwill of the US to function. And not only that, we have to accept that the US (with their laws) not only can stop our societies, they can also look into our every communication. Many governments in Europe are now literally unable to communicate with themselves without the US getting a look-in. And they LOVE that stuff in the US.
This dependency and “transparency” is intolerable, yet if we complain, we’re told nothing can be done. Even though individuals have been able to extract themselves from these American-operated platforms, our governments and companies and healthcare apparently can’t do it.
Lack of government expertise
Western governments have collectively decided they have no need for government experts. Politicians are generalists, selected for their media presence, ability to win votes and their capabilities to “work the system”. And not for having knowledge or experience in the things they have to govern. Instead, the idea is that the market, the very market the government has to regulate, will provide expertise where needed. This is of course ridiculous, but again, apparently we should just accept that governments come up with plans that every expert has already said won’t work. This happens because if you don’t have your own expertise, you get your advice from lobbyists instead. Because you can’t tell who the good experts are.
While everyone now knows nuclear power is incredibly expensive and comes with enormous cleanup costs in the future (which we conveniently ignore), governments are going all in. Even though everyone also knows that no new nuclear power plant in recent history has been delivered no less than a decade late and often dozens of billions over budget. It is common to pledge 50 billion government euros to nuclear projects.
Interestingly, there are technologies available that with a single 50 billion investment can completely remove the need for nuclear power forever (do click on this link if you care about nuclear power). Yet, multiple governments are now pledging such amounts to (possibly) get only a few nuclear power plants! Such stupidity is intolerable.
Our governments are failing to govern. Both the US and Europe have lost the ability to manufacture vital medicines at even small scales. Market powers have responded to price differences of a few cents by moving most production to India and China. For literally cents per pill we’d be able to manufacture our own antibiotics or even paracetamol/tylenol/acetaminophen (“PAP”). But no, we’ve decided it is fine to live with endless medicine shortages. All to save a few cents. This is apparently how serious people in government make decisions, and we just have to live with that.
Rule of law breaking down
The US Supreme Court is no longer a legitimate court. Do not count on them to uphold the rule of law. This is so hard to accept that even many professionals have a hard time letting go. In the Netherlands, one of our four high courts and all relevant regulators have ruled against the police, who persist in retaining decades old non-suspect data “just in case”. They are willingly breaking the law on police data. They are refusing to honor the high court’s opinions. This is the exact definition of the breakdown of the rule of law. And this apparently is normal and something we should not fret about too much. What has the rule of law ever done for us?
Meanwhile, voters keep electing the most horrible politicians. It is not easy to figure out why they do that. This in itself is a problem. Our media meanwhile persist in platforming the most terrible people, and don’t feel responsible for that. Right wing parties get almost free rein on TV. In addition, lots of people now get their “news” from social media platforms dead set on ruining our democracies, with full US government support.
Everyone knows this. And despite some attempts by the EU, we are just letting this happen. We’ve all accepted that there is a non-stop trade in our data & behavior, and that such data is used to manipulate whole populations. Politicians continue to almost exclusively communicate on the most hateful platforms, and are not inclined to leave. But apparently this is something we have accepted and should not worry about.
These social media and big tech companies are led by a bunch of deca- and centi-billionaires, something that just can’t be right. But somehow we can tax poor people, but have to let these folks alone.
And finally, somehow all the problems in the world (see above) are apparently caused by foreigners and refugees. Fired up by the aforementioned social media, these issues now mostly determine how people vote. And this leaves no room for solving all the other problems.
So..
So if you feel like you’ve had to believe six impossible things before breakfast, you’d be completely right. This is all nonsense and our brains aren’t wired to deal with so much idiocy. It is not your fault.
One day I hope things will get better. And in the meantime, it is them that are wrong, and not you.
Finally, if you want to help make things better, I wrote a long screed called ‘On being useful’, which might be of some use.
By the way, I know there is more idiocy in the world, more than fits on this page. But I hope you get the picture with my limited exposition.
PS: An open question is, if the majority of people don’t want any of the above, why is it still happening?
“If you’ve done six impossible things this morning, why not round it off with breakfast at Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.” - The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams