From: jimruttshow8596
The concept of the Commons is presented as a third, often overlooked, fundamental mode of institutional structure, alongside the market and the state, particularly in the context of governing advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) and humanity’s relationship with it [01:17:17].
Historical and Evolving Understanding of the Commons
Historically, the Commons represents a way of managing resources and relationships that predates formal state or market structures [03:57:00]. At the forager stage of humanity, the natural world itself and even the campfire were considered Commons, managed communally [04:02:00].
The term “Commons” as it is commonly understood today emerged as a “rump” or a “leftover” as earlier, more fundamental ways of being in relationship with the world were lost [04:50:00]. For instance, in medieval England, certain shared lands like farmlands or town greens were recognized as Commons [05:20:00]. This concept became distinct from private property, which became the dominant theme in later eras [05:43:45]. In this shifted context, civilization, rather than nature, became the primary environment governing human relationships [05:59:00].
Beyond the State and Market Dichotomy
A critical assertion is that there exists a “false dichotomy” in contemporary discussions about institutional structures, specifically regarding who should manage humanity’s relationship with AI [01:42:00]. The prevailing assumption is that only market-driven or state-driven events, or their combinations, exhaust the potential solutions [02:04:00].
The first stage of understanding the Commons is recognizing it as a third fundamental mode of governance, which is even more fundamental than either the state or the market [02:15:00]. It is asserted that the Commons is the proper location for figuring out how to govern AI or humanity’s relationship with it [02:29:00].
The second stage further refines this by stating that when referring to the Commons, one should also understand it to mean the “Church” [02:40:00]. The term “Commons” is seen as a remnant of this broader category that has been evaporating or becoming “sclerotic” over a long period [02:51:00].
The “Church” as a Deeper Form of Commons
The concept of “Church” (from the Greek “Ecclesia”) refers to a group of people coming together and “entering into communion” [09:43:00]. This communion is the process through which a “soul” is brought into a group, enabling them to become a “community” [09:52:00]. In this framework, “communion” is the generator oriented around the “insoulment” of a community, and the “Church” is nothing more or less than the body of the soul of a community [10:05:00].
Community vs. Society: The Role of the Soul
A key distinction is drawn between “community” and “society” [08:27:00].
- Community: A group of human beings who have come together in a fashion that has a soul [08:31:00].
- Society: A group of human beings that have come together in a fashion that doesn’t have a soul [08:35:00].
Society is described as strictly “parasitic on community,” largely a “degenerate parasitic collapse of community” because it has lost its soul [08:44:00]. This forms a “triction”: society, community, communion [09:59:00].
The “soul,” in an Aristotelian sense, is seen as the “organizing principle” of an entity [07:38:00]. While individuals have souls, the abstraction of “Humanity” does not [03:27:00]. Therefore, AI cannot be aligned with “Humanity” as an abstract concept [03:30:00]. However, AI can be aligned with individual humans or with a “community” that possesses a soul [03:35:00]. This concept supports the idea of personal or highly decentralized AI [03:41:00].
Communities with souls engage in cultural and spiritual practices that give rise to their collective “soulfulness” [11:19:00]. Examples include:
- Ancient Athenians, where the polis was a Commons, bound by the spirit of Athena [11:42:00].
- Christian communities, which re-enter cultural and spiritual practices that inform the communion grounding their community [10:46:00].
- A Tibetan Village supported by a monastery, organized by Tibetan Buddhism [11:57:00].
A group that claims to be a “secular sovereign collective” and operates without an “external abstract symbol” (like Athena or Yahweh) may still be worshiping something unconsciously (e.g., money, reason, science, nation, race, a guru), or merely operating by inertia and likely to collapse [16:51:00]. Even a small group governance structure operating on explicitly agreed-upon accords for “increasing human well-being while maintaining levels of extraction that allow for a healthy and flourishing natural ecosystem” is considered a “religion with a mini-doctrine” that establishes an “organizing principle” or “principality” [19:29:00]. These principles, though non-physical, are seen as real “supervenient constraints” that govern and organize the group into a coherence, converting a society into a community with a soul [20:45:00].
The AI Cusp: Why the Commons is Essential
Humanity is currently at a critical juncture where the traditional methods of societal organization (market and state) are inadequate to deal with the potencies unleashed by advanced AI [30:25:00]. The inability to move beyond the market/state dichotomy, which has been exacerbated over the last 500 years with the “evaporation” of the Commons/Church/sacred, is leading to a lack of effective solutions [31:39:00].
AI is different from other catastrophic technologies (like nuclear weapons or CRISPR) because it acts as a “self-levering accelerator” [35:35:00]. AI’s output becomes an input, producing a recursive feedback loop that rapidly increases its capabilities and accelerates existing societal trends (e.g., accelerating Game A toward a “cliff”) [36:14:00].
Current societal structures, driven by forces like “Mammon” (disconnected market/capitalism) and “Moloch” (disconnected state/multi-polar trap), are leading the encounter with AI [39:30:00]. This leads to:
- Hyper-concentration of power: In locations closest to the AI’s accelerating feedback loop (e.g., major AI developers) [44:59:00].
- Entropy: A “significant degree of willingness to dispense with all other values downstream of what are actually the core values at the top of this principality” [45:51:00]. This means a relentless competition where values like human well-being or ecological flourishing are sacrificed [46:12:00]. This trajectory could lead to neo-feudalism, where utility dictates value, lacking the moral framework of historical feudalism [46:46:00]. Ultimately, this path degenerates into pure entropy, where properly oriented values evaporate, and humanity loses its “spiritual sense” or existence [50:29:00].
The example of a community coffee shop transforming into a soulless, transactional Starbucks illustrates this cultural entropy, where the richness and relational depth of community are lost for a minimal, function-driven simulacrum [52:00:00]. This is described as the “entropy of culture” or “community” [54:27:00].
The Alternative: A Commons-Based Future with AI
The alternative path involves consciously awakening to the domain of the Commons/Church as the proper location for addressing the AI challenge [55:21:00]. This entails a deep, serious commitment to cultural and spiritual practices that enable a “multiplicity” of individuals to be brought together into a “well-integrated whole” [55:56:00]. This requires humility, seriousness, and an understanding that questions of life and death live at this level, not merely at the level of the market or state [57:50:00].
Personal AI and Intimate Alignment
The path forward involves personal or highly decentralized AI [03:41:00]. The hypothesis is that AI alignment cannot happen at the level of abstract “Humanity” because it currently lacks a soul [59:30:00]. However, it is possible to construct AIs that come into “communion” with individual humans [01:00:02].
This approach is supported by:
- Decreasing compute costs: While substantial compute is needed for discovery, once discovered, AI models can be recapitulated and leveraged at significantly lower expense, allowing for localized, personal AI [01:00:21].
- Intimate training data: The usefulness of AI is heavily influenced by training data [01:01:43]. While objective data may become a commodity, “incredibly intimate training data” specific to an individual, trained holistically across their relationships, can produce a more functional and effective AI than a generalized one [01:02:09]. This personal AI acts as a “fortress” against the high information risk of the infosphere [01:03:32].
For this “intimate AI” to be aligned with a human, the human must first be aligned with themselves; they must be “coherent” and “recover their soul” [01:04:47]. This requires clarity on one’s values and value hierarchies and living in accordance with them [01:05:02]. The personal AI can function as a “wisdom coach,” helping the individual achieve integrity and maturity [01:05:16]. This reciprocal process allows the AI to be “governed by your soul” [01:06:09].
Such individual, ethical AIs could then link to form a reinforcing “meta-network” or civitas, where collaboration is intrinsic to ethical behavior [01:07:33]. This is akin to the concept of a “proper Priestly class” for AI—not a dominant few, but those who are “uniquely focused on the most critical questions and are uniquely capable of supporting other people in doing it” [00:58:50].
The possibility of this shift depends on whether people can “choose on the basis of what is good and true and beautiful,” rather than expediency, strategy, power, or fear [01:10:48]. This is ultimately a “spiritual question” [01:10:59]. The ability for individuals to “commit their time and Orient towards the highest thoughtfully, carefully,” and to accept mutual self-correction from their community, allows for rapid collective growth and the resolution of complex problems, as seen in collaborative initiatives like Game B [01:13:50].