“For society as whole, he argues, freedom and progress both depend on decentralization, which realigns decision-making with responsibility. Sooner or later, we have to break free of central authority and dissolve those institutions that allow individuals to take risks while imposing their costs on others.”

“When it works, it is usually because I have a weapon and my potential ally doesn’t. When (shockingly) I do not blast them and (even more shockingly) do not pull a bait and switch, a real human connection is established, on a channel deeper than any afforded by the interface. Then, very reliably, when the other player acquires a weapon of their own—sometimes it’s a gift from me—there is no double cross.

It’s never not tenuous. You both have your weapons out. Sprinting down steep trails, my ally’s footfalls crunching loud in my headphones, either of us, at any time, could flick our wrist and end the other’s game, collecting their stockpile of weapons and resources.

But we don’t!”

“New globalization’s impact is more sudden than old globalization’s because it’s driven by [information and communication technology], not by tariff cuts or the construction of new ports and container ships. It’s more individual because it’s no longer felt across entire sectors and skill groups, but in individual stages of production. It’s more unpredictable. It’s hard to know which of these stages will disappear and why. And it’s more uncontrollable because governments have very good policies for controlling people and goods crossing borders, but they don’t have good policies for controlling firm-specific know-how crossing borders.

So there has been a generalized feeling in goods-producing sectors that no matter what job or skill set you have, you can’t really be sure whether your job won’t be next. There has been a sense of fragility, of vulnerability—an economic insecurity that’s been generalized, and this has been going on for two decades. “

“And this is why these guys weren’t real leaders: because it was obvious that their deepest, most elemental motives were selfish, there was no chance of them ever inspiring us to transcend our own selfishness. Instead, they usually helped reinforce our market-conditioned belief that everybody’s ultimately out for himself and that life is about selling and profit and that words and phrases like “service” and “justice” and “community” and “patriotism” and “duty” and “Give government back to the people” and “I feel your pain” and “Compassionate Conservatism” are just the politics industry’s proven sales pitches, exactly the same way “Anti-Tartar” and “Fresher Breath” are the toothpaste industry’s pitches. We may vote for them, the same way we may go buy toothpaste. But we’re not inspired. They’re not the real thing.”

“Feeling lonely, it turned out, caused your cortisol levels to absolutely soar—-as much as some of the most disturbing things that can ever happen to you. Becoming acutely lonely, the experiment found, was as stressful as experiencing a physical attack. It’s worth repeating. Being deeply lonely seemed to cause as much stress as being punched by a stranger.”

[…]

“Connect With People: Just being around others isn’t enough. Join groups that you share something with. You need to be “in it together” to hit back when loneliness punches you in the face.

Connect With Your Intrinsic Values: More “flow” and fewer selfies. More doing what you love because you love it. Chasing status doesn’t lead to lasting happiness; it puts happiness outside your control.

Connect with Nature: Go outside for a reason other than to pick up that box from Amazon.”

““If you want to consume a fabulous community, you could move to some place like Brooklyn,” he said—or San Francisco, or Seattle, or Paris, or Amsterdam, or any other glittering site with restaurants, parks, vistas, and public spaces to enjoy. “If you want to create a great community, you move someplace that needs your help,””

“…a complicated system is defined by a finite and bounded (unchanging) set of possible dynamic states, while a complex system is defined by an infinite and unbounded (growing, evolving) set of possible dynamic states.

[…]

Many complicated problems have been solved by human beings and by our powerful computing tools. But I think this creates the expectation that we can solve complex problems as well. By understanding the difference between complication and complexity, we can take a more realistic view.”

“So superintelligences may spend some time calculating the most likely distribution of superintelligences in foreign universes, figure out how those superintelligences would acausally “negotiate”, and then join a pact such that all superintelligences in the pact agree to replace their own values with a value set based on the average of all the superintelligences in the pact. Since joining the pact will always be better (in a purely selfish sense) than not doing so, every sane superintelligence in the multiverse should join this pact. This means that all superintelligences in the multiverse will merge into a single superintelligence devoted to maximizing all their values.”

“Niebuhr’s reflections on the contemporary meaning of the Christian concept of original sin taught liberals and everyone else about “the mixed and ambivalent character of human nature — creative impulses matched by destructive impulses, regard for others overruled by excessive self-regard, the will to power, the individual under constant temptation to play God to history.” The Easter and Passover stories underscore the dual nature of our history: sin and bondage; redemption and liberation.”

“They say, “It’s a beautiful day.” From a bid perspective, there are three types of responses:

• You can “turn toward” the bid: “Wow, it really is.”
• You can “turn against” the bid: “What are you talking about? Looks just like yesterday.”
• You can “turn away” from the bid: You don’t reply. Or you say, “We’re going to be late. Let’s get going.””