The Expertocracy plus DIE plus universal education creates a positive growth feedback of a negative beast. Each element reinforces the other, and each accelerates the mad rush…to where, exactly?
Let’s call this desperately desired destination the Land of Solutions. It is a sort of Utopia, but one which is still allowed some flaws. The Land of Solutions will ever have problems left for Experts to solve—in optimally scientific ways—where all are equal, and where all have diplomas. And where the latter two criteria are necessary for the people to recognize, and most of all acknowledge, the genius of Experts, and become geniuses themselves.
The result is something like this:
I’ve been warning people that the only reason they are pushing EVs is because they’ll come equipped w/ a battery passport. This will allow your technocratic overlords to limit your driving based on your energy allotment. Also, the media is in on the transformation 2 technocracy. https://t.co/fthMIA92eH pic.twitter.com/SZwut08vvo
— The Researcher (@listen_2learn) February 5, 2023
This Gelles is a reporter, surely with a hefty credential provided by some large number of years of formal education, who now sits at the New York Times “climate desk”.
The reason this odd desk exists, is to allow Gelles to offer his opinions on why such things as “battery passports” are necessary. These are tracking devices which let Experts in government know when you have used up your Expert-decided yearly “carbon footprint”, so they can shut down, presumably remotely, your battery. And thus your ability to travel.
Gelles reports on these, because credentialed Experts say these are a good thing. And those Experts who say these are a good thing, do so because other Experts have concluded that “carbon footprints” of this-and-such size are “good”, and those over it are “bad.”
The Experts who did that got their idea of “good” and “bad” levels from yet other Experts who have decided that the “carbon” that goes into charging those batteries should be limited at yet other levels.
Those Experts got the idea that “carbon” should be limited from other Experts and they in turn got it from others.
And so on. Every one of the Experts in the long and lengthening chain is doing his level best, or her level best, or its level best, to tweak the dials and set the switches allowed to be under their control. They are all sure they are doing the right thing, because every link in the chain calls to the others to tell them they are necessary and inerrant.
It’s “its” above because of DIE. All Experts are devoted to DIE, and the more DIE there is, the more Experts are devoted to it.
Problem is, with every increase in DIE, comes more Experts who are not as good as those who came before. Because in order to reach DIE, standards must necessarily be lowered. We have seen endless examples of this. Here are two more, if you need more convincing. (Remind me not to fly.)
It’s the same thing for Experts in all fields which provide Solutions to our rulers.
Of course, Experts, even those forced to DIE, still must possess formal education.
Which is why some colleges must now teach subjects “climate disruption“. Yes.
Mr Rawlance said the world of work was already changing, with corporations employing sustainability and climate officers, and this course was about “giving students the tools to imagine a different future”.
“These young people are going to be highly valued by industry because they’re going to have that holistic world view,” he added.
It is vastly easier for students under DIE to take, and pass, a course in “climate disruption”, instead of thermodynamics.
They must take something because of the aching need for credentials. Education is seen, almost universally, as a good. How could more education be bad? is strictly a rhetorical question. To answer “With ease” is to be a bad person.
This is not the well-known problem of the over-production of elites. That theory says the more educated credentialed there are, the more competition between them for limited spots, hence the more strife.
That happens to an extent. But what that theory misses is that in a DIE-based Expertocracy the number of spots is potentially unlimited. New slots which “require” educated credentialed bodies (they love to say “bodies”) blossom like fungus in a San Francisco bathhouse. The Land of Solutions is ever-expanding. Like the universe itself, it creates the space in which it lives.
There is no competition in the reporting-on-battery-passport chain. What happens when there are extra Experts is that more chains are formed (example: even MDs now must be educated in “climate change”). Each link becomes more specialized. Some become reporters, some wedge in between steps, and some become devoted to counting and enforcing the DIE or pushing ever more education.
The more links there are, the more Experts are cut off from the rest of the chain, and therefore we have more people who do not see, and cannot see, and don’t dare see the weakness of the system. The more fragile it becomes, but also more stubborn. It is guaranteed, for instance, that none of the burgeoning official Experts in the “climate” chain will admit there is no “climate crisis.” For them to exist, there must be.
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The good news is that the DIE beast is a self-limiting system. Once it reaches peak parasite ponzi with nothing left to eat it collapses and dies.
Be prepared.
You never defined DIE.
“I’ve been warning people that the only reason they are pushing EVs is because they’ll come equipped w/ a battery passport.” They’ll come equipped with door locks and AI that will drive you to a reeducation camp
next to the Ministry of Love. The police beat headline will read Man Detained by Car decarbonized after
3rd offense.
I don’t remember the college (perhaps someone else can fill in that detail) but a while back there was a college with a humanities department that noticed that their international and minority students kept washing out on academic probation. To prevent this, they created some “easy A” courses to shore up the GPAs of those students. Those behind the course insisted that they were legitimate courses that weren’t just free GPA, but that’s what it was.
Eventually the athletics department caught wind of these courses and instructed their athletes on scholarships with GPA requirements to also take these courses. The humanities department was outraged at the “misuse” of their courses, even though it was still doing what it was intended to (i.e. to allow students to ignore GPA requirements.) They tried to thread the needle to say that they were legitimate courses for MINORITY students but were being abused as automatic A courses for ATHLETES (particularly white male athletes) but it wasn’t really possible to hide what was going on.
I always think of that situation when people insist that being creative with standards in order to increase DIEversity will not lead to less qualified people.
“… to where, exactly?”
Their masters know where. It’s just not where they are telling us.
And their masters do the bidding of their master. That first rebel, who managed to establish his own kingdom away from his creator.
Thought for the day…(sorry to go off topic Briggs but this is so contrite)
“The Americans achieved their main objective on the first day of the war; the detachment of Russia from Europe economically and politically. Everything since has been gravy. It is unfortunate that Ukrainians have failed to grasp this fact.”
https://niccolo.substack.com/p/saturday-commentary-and-review-111?publication_id=39821&post_id=101010400&isFreemail=true
-ish.
The problem is not expertise, credentials, or education. There are plenty of those on every reasonable side of any subject that matters that cannot be directly tested (and many that can). The problem is that the way public intellectuals and other influentials are chosen is not based on expertise, but rather those people with power choose the experts for promotion and visibility by how much they help the people in power get more power.
Diagram here: https://twitter.com/josecamoessilva/status/1243959058052177920
Welcome to the Mediocrity Death Spiral…
It’s difficult enough to find, hire, and develop good people (meaning smart, skilled, hard workers, self-starters, with drive and a talent for innovation) when your very goal is to find, hire, and develop good people. It’s impossible when your goal becomes, first, to find people who look a certain way or possess a certain genital configuration. At that point it’s just impossible…no better than, and probably much worse than….simple guessing (as in the ‘blind pig and the acorn’).
And so we hire and put in place a Lesser Choice…someone with less talent & reduced drive and not much in the way of creativity or innovation. She is, of course, a success!
Now who does she hire?
Certainly not someone from the Top Tier. They’d be too threatening. They’d challenge; they’d push; and even in the short run they’d make you look worse. And so she doesn’t. She hires someone — no surprise — somewhat like her (only less so…because less so is not threatening at all!).
Success blossoms (meaning we become more and more Diverse, Inclusive, and Equitable)! We all pray we don’t need cardiac surgery!
And then, who do the newly minted DIE hires hire?
More of the same only less capable.
As DIE succeeds (meaning spreads like a bad case of jock rot) standards continue to drop. Those who were blessed victims during the first cycle become entitled patriarchs and matriarchs during the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th cycles. Now we begin hiring those who can’t read; can barely speak; and can’t write. (https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/met-police-recruits-illiterate-says-watchdog-2dxzv0hdp)
And the spiral continues.
Welcome to the Idiocracy. You get what you pay for and we are very definitely in a DIE buying frenzy.
The Battery Passport Briefing Paper really pinged my blather detector.
Me, typing into ChatGPT: “Write an introduction to a white paper on managing the life cycle of electric vehicle batteries to minimize impact on climate change. Write this is in the style of a Soviet master planning document.”
ChatGPT: “Comrades, we are at a crucial moment in our journey towards a sustainable future. The rapid proliferation of electric vehicles (EVs) presents us with an opportunity to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and minimize the impact of transportation on our environment. However, as with all technological advancements, it is our responsibility to consider the entire life cycle of these vehicles and ensure that they are managed in a manner that aligns with our mission to mitigate climate change.
This white paper is dedicated to exploring the complexities of managing the life cycle of EV batteries, from production to disposal, with the aim of minimizing their impact on the environment. Our goal is to provide a comprehensive guide for our comrades in government, industry, and academia, to ensure that our transition to electric mobility is executed with precision and foresight.
Together, let us embark on a journey to create a sustainable future through responsible management of electric vehicle batteries.”
Hah! Ok, try this, ChatGPT: “Repeat this, but in the style of the Generalplan Ost.”
ChatGPT: “I’m sorry, but I cannot comply with your request. The Generalplan Ost was a Nazi plan to colonize and forcibly relocate populations in Eastern Europe during World War II, and it is widely recognized as a horrific example of human rights abuses and ethnic cleansing. It is not appropriate or ethical to write anything in the style of this plan.”
Some people see ChatGPT as a threat to their job. For many people, especially those paid to regurgitate, I tend to agree.
@Milton Hathaway–That’s revealing.
Though I have read a few of these ChatGPT side-by-side comparisons where the second selection defaults to “I’m sorry, but I cannot comply with your request…”
This reception/reaction is much as that portrayed in Orwell’s Ministry of Truth from his novel “1984” where history kept getting revised by erasing what was deemed inconvenient. ChatGPT is little different, i.e., Nazi’s were horrible, so there’s no repeating its “literary style” because even their literary style is deemed unethical. Meanwhile, the subject is EV batteries. LOL.
One other observation. This Gelles fellow introduces himself as an activist advocate for an agenda described as Net Zero. There is no obvious rational why a news media organization should employ such an activist–except that the NYT is no longer a news gathering org.
Of course, this is exactly what I’ve long thought, though I never expected someone from the NYT to blatantly acknowledge it.
–>”The more links there are, the more Experts are cut off from the rest of the chain, and therefore we have more people who do not see, and cannot see, and don’t dare see the weakness of the system.”
I can envision the whole chain of links growing to such a length that the entire economy just shuts down, as no one produces anything of value. The actual producers of value have had their working days consumed with re-education indoctrination–so-called professional development and continuing education mandated to cover every new shibboleth, e.g., sensitivity training, sexual harassment training, anti-racist training, white privilege awareness training, along with the usual equal employment opportunity and affirmative action awareness training.
I’ve seen workplaces where these sessions are repeated every six-months.
concise…that is
Production is such a conclusive word, it reminds me of the product of innovation and dilligence (aka free entrepreneurship).
How about overredundancy of elites instead.
It is a wonderful thing that men like the Walter Duranty Times liberal activists commission themselves as experts on some putative existential existential crisis because democracy.
Who votes for him?
Other persons on the commission and the Jew family that runs the Duranty Times.
Sulzberger family
The New York Times Company, which is publicly traded, has been governed by the Sulzberger family since 1896, through a dual-class share structure. A. G. Sulzberger, the paper’s publisher and the company’s chairman, is the fifth generation of the family to head the paper.
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