From: jimruttshow8596
The study of societies reveals that none have been immortal. Samo Burja’s work focuses on understanding why societies do not endure indefinitely [01:06:00]. This inquiry often stems from an interest in intellectual progress, which is typically presented in history books as a series of “unmitigated triumphs” [02:25:00], but this view often omits periods of decline and the loss of knowledge.
Historical Accounts and Selection Bias
Historical accounts inherently involve “immense amount of selection bias” [04:39:00]. During periods of intellectual decline, simpler works are more likely to be preserved, with introductory material often surviving while complex scientific or historical texts are lost [05:00:00]. For example, 94% of known ancient Greek authors are only known by name and reference, with their works lost [03:22:00]. Historical books can also be inconvenient and suppressed by new regimes, as seen in the Roman Empire or during the transition from paganism to Christianity [05:48:00].
High-quality historical recording has emerged only a few times:
- Classical Greeks: With figures like Thucydides, who advocated for historians to write about what they personally experienced and were experts in [07:11:00].
- Classical Chinese Civilization: Known for very high-quality historical accounts, with authors willing to sacrifice personal well-being to complete their works, such as the Records of the Grand Historian [08:01:00].
- Early Modern Europe: This period saw the emergence of relatively good history, which some optimistically believe continues to the present day, though others are pessimistic about its recent decades [08:33:00].
The preservation of information in the modern era is challenging, with electronic formats quickly becoming unreadable, akin to encryption [09:16:00]. The true value of information lies in “communities of practice” and embodied knowledge within people, rather than just written records [09:52:00].
Theories of History and Societal Futures
Implicit beliefs about the future influence how the past is rewritten [10:18:00]. Apocalyptic views, for instance, can lead to short-term thinking and consumption of vital resources, like “eating the seed corn” [10:37:00]. Conversely, a perspective like that held by Chinese civilization, viewing itself as “immeasurably old and… immeasurably long future” [11:01:00], encourages long-term decisions and maintenance. The decline of the Library of Alexandria, for example, was less about a fire and more about centuries of dried-up funding and lack of copying [11:24:00].
The Role of Institutions
Institutions are defined as “automated instantiated coordination mechanisms” [12:17:00]. When highly automated, they resemble bureaucracies, which break down tasks into small steps where individual participants don’t need to understand the whole process for a reliable output [12:35:00]. Self-correcting institutions, like organized religions or market mechanisms, are often more dynamic because people deeply believe in their mission or adaptive individuals’ knowledge can be factored into their behavior [12:55:00].
Social Technologies
Social technologies are broad concepts that reshape societies by influencing everyday interactions [14:38:00]. Politeness can be seen as a communication protocol, and bureaucracy as a machine for a specific purpose [14:16:16]. They can be recombined, meaning elements that appear together in one civilization might not need to in another, like Japan adopting capitalism without converting to Protestant Christianity [15:09:00].
Evolution vs. Design in Social Systems
While there is some “evolution” through selection for sustainability, Samo Burja argues that societies often face “massive cliffs” where they are maladapted, and evolutionary processes are not strong enough to rescue them [17:24:00]. This leads to the concept of a “great founder,” a specific person who introduces a fully formed social technology, leading to rapid social transformation [17:41:00]. Examples include the creation of new religions [18:11:00].
Conversely, Jim Rutt offers the example of social media’s development from early online services (The Source, CompuServe) as a more evolutionary process, driven by competition and “specific step-at-a-time improvements” [21:17:00]. However, Burja notes that the variance in creative competition differs across historical periods, with “golden ages” like the Italian Renaissance or classical Greek city-states experiencing more dynamic, competitive evolution [22:23:00].
Societies, especially in non-dynamic periods, might not undergo rapid change because they are “remarkably conformist” and “ignorant of the past,” leading to little variation or mutation in social norms [16:56:00].
Coordination Costs and Social Cohesion
Social technologies primarily serve to lower social coordination costs [27:24:00]. Human behavior and evolution are largely driven by interactions with other humans, requiring complex social and economic arrangements [27:45:00]. These technologies “render each other more intelligible and legible” [29:05:00].
Examples of social technologies lowering coordination costs:
- Market mechanisms: Reveal and profit from information, increasing shared information [28:48:00].
- Imposition of national languages: The French state’s imposition of the French language facilitated trade, bureaucracy, and military scaling by creating a shared information sphere among 60 million people [29:12:00].
- Axial Age religions: These arose to provide universally understood gods and mythologies for large Iron Age empires (Roman, Persian, Indian, Chinese), enabling broader political and trade systems [30:21:00].
These mechanisms can be voluntary or “invasive,” terraforming the “human animal into something different” [31:04:00].
Information Asymmetries and Centralization
The modern online world has created radical information asymmetry, making individuals “radically more transparent to organizations” through extensive data collection, while organizations remain opaque [37:24:00]. Decisions about algorithmic management of public opinion by social media companies are often opaque, with unknown committees and decision-making processes [33:57:00].
There is a concern that without democratic intervention, the opportunity to avoid domination by asymmetric information and opacity could be lost within a few years, as accumulated financial power locks in advantageous situations for incumbents [39:08:00]. This dynamic contributes to what is called a “centralized declining empire,” where a non-dynamic center sustains itself by taxing and “self-cannibalizing” other parts of society, leading to a slow, imperceptible decline [39:49:00]. The late Western Roman Empire is given as an example [40:32:00].
Technology and Society
Technology and society are “completely and utterly mutually co-dependent” [51:53:00]. A material technology cannot be analyzed without understanding its production and the social niche it fits into [51:58:00]. Inventions are often forgotten if they cannot be productively absorbed into a social structure that supports their instantiation and further development [52:13:00].
- Steam Engine Example: The steam engine was invented multiple times in history (e.g., Heron’s engine in Hellenistic Greece) but only “took off” in 18th-century England because the society was able to integrate it into its broader understanding [52:49:00].
- Japan and Firearms: Japan banned firearms after a 16th-century civil war, leading to 300 years of peace but no advancement in gun technology. This lack of integration into societal norms resulted in the country being forced to transform when confronted by Commodore Perry’s advanced weaponry [53:28:00].
This highlights the distinction between invention (the creation of fundamentals) and innovation (the development of supporting structures to make an invention socially important) [54:42:00]. Thomas Edison’s success with the light bulb, unlike other inventors, lay in building the accompanying infrastructure and institutions (like General Electric) necessary for widespread adoption [55:07:07].
The Industrial/Taylorist Era
The 20th century’s industrial societies shared a “six sigma” mindset, aiming to eliminate variance in production lines and measure things with increasing precision [01:06:00]. This “Taylorist mindset” is seen in schooling systems that prioritize competition around standardized metrics like SATs and the breakdown of subjects into discrete disciplines [01:06:50]. While this approach can be effective for financial optimization, it doesn’t guarantee an increase in human well-being and can lead to anomie (meaningless lives) [01:07:52].
Organized bureaucracies tend to “climb the hill and entrench on the hill that they’re in,” failing to consider other potential “hills” or the co-evolutionary nature of fitness landscapes where hills are constantly growing and shrinking [01:08:49].
Purposeful Manipulation of Human Psychology
Modern marketing and advertising, influenced by psychological insights from figures like Edward Bernays (Sigmund Freud’s nephew) and John B. Watson, leverage the “purposeful manipulation of human psychology” [01:12:37]. This involves pairing material goods with desirable social roles, inducing desires, and essentially running mass education programs [01:13:08]. While this can lead to positive outcomes like rapid adoption of new domestic or workplace economies, there’s concern that constantly deploying these tools for “behavior modifying updates to the social code” might be “eroding some deeper cultural reservoirs” [01:14:30].
Functional Institutions: The Exception, Not the Rule
Functional institutions are rare [01:17:47]. The mere appearance of functionality, or “lights on” in an organization, doesn’t guarantee substance; it might just reflect financial or prestige endowments [01:18:06]. A strong indicator of functionality is an institution’s ability to “reorient and adapt to a radical change in circumstances” [01:18:40]. This requires a “self-re-engineering ability” rather than being an inert machine [01:19:16].
Live Players vs. Dead Players
- Live Players: Operate in a “responsive creative way” [01:21:21], actively perceiving and adapting to their environment.
- Dead Players: Execute a pre-existing script or archetype, even if currently successful [01:21:33]. Their success may be due to past circumstances or chance. A radical change in environment quickly reveals who is a live or dead player [01:21:56]. Apple, despite its prestige and value, is questioned as a potential “dead player” due to its aesthetic continuity and lack of fundamental change in style for over a decade [01:22:14].
The Succession Problem
The “succession problem” is crucial for institutional longevity [01:27:52]. Institutions built by one generation must be successfully handed off to the next to remain functional; otherwise, organizational sclerosis or internal conflict may set in [01:28:03].
The succession problem has two components:
- Skill Succession (Knowledge Succession): Understanding the importance of personal collaboration and mentorship [01:28:39].
- Power Succession: The tendency in political thought to disperse power, often leading to unintended consequences like a loss of authority by elected officials to unelected ones [01:28:51].
Historically, the Roman Empire during the “five good emperors” period (Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius) used an “adoptive monarchy” system [01:31:16]. An adult emperor would adopt another adult man, often a capable general or administrator, as his son and successor (Caesar), ensuring both skill and a credible promise of political succession, which helped prevent civil wars [01:31:16]. This contrasts with the later succession of biological sons, which often led to instability [01:32:06].
Another example is the Japanese practice of mukuyoshi, or “son-in-law adoption,” where industrial dynasties (e.g., Suzuki, Kikkoman, Toyota) marry their daughters to men chosen for their business acumen, who then adopt the family name, transferring social capital and ensuring strong leadership [01:34:37].
The rise of “startup culture” in modern American economic contexts, where talented engineers create new companies instead of rising within old ones, could be seen as a “show of weakness” [01:41:43]. It suggests that power succession has become “stuck” within traditional corporate America, forcing innovation to happen outside established structures [01:42:30].
Botswana: A Case Study in Successful Succession and Planning
Botswana is presented as a notable exception to the “resource curse” [01:50:01]. Despite being resource-rich (diamonds) and landlocked, it has maintained political stability and economic growth through a unique succession mechanism: every president has been the vice president of the previous one [01:51:17]. This ensures “learning on the job” [01:52:25], smooth political transitions, and the long-term planning vital for a resource-based economy, unlike Saudi Arabia [01:52:26]. Botswana’s low corruption levels and diversified economy demonstrate that positive outcomes can be achieved through effective, if unusual, governance strategies [01:52:47].