Deep, Dark Thoughts

All moral instruction is contrary to nature. It has to be, or there would be no point. We don’t need to be told to do what we would do naturally.

But anything contrary to nature is contrary to the wisdom evolution has beaten into us. Why would we go against that wisdom? Because sometimes it’s wrong?

If it’s sometimes wrong, then the opposite is only sometimes right. Why not go with what is usually right?

Here’s the truth: we evolved for a hunter gatherer existence that is remote from the highly structured society we are raised in. We live in a world that is contrary to our nature.

Civilization is unnatural. It is artificial, fragile, in need of constant maintenance. Deontic conditioning is part of that maintenance. The savage must be tamed.

Obey the rules for the sake of the system. The only time to buck the rules is when the system is failing anyway. Which, by the way, happens a lot.

So keep in touch with your inner hunter gatherer. Most of the time he’s trouble, but every once in a while he’s your salvation. He knows what to do when everything’s falling apart around you.

Your natural instincts are safe mode. Boot up into safe mode when you must.

There are certain people who will shriek for you to follow the rules even as things are going to pieces. Do not heed them. They are not thinking clearly. They are in a panic. They cannot think beyond the system, and cannot accept that the system is beyond rescue.

Their inner savage is atrophied. They are weak, and dependent on the system for life support. Nothing can be done by them, or for them. Try never to become that weak. Never completely buy into the code. Eumeswil will fall. Don’t fall with it.

Only those who survive the collapse of the system will be around to build a new system. So understand the system. Understand how and why it once worked, and how and why it is now failing. See deontology from the outside and discover virtue ethics. Solve for pattern to inherit the earth.

Savages invented civilization. Not ordinary savages, but savages. Sufficiently clever savages can rebuild it from scratch if need be. But the overly civilized will not be around. Mindless slaves of their programming, they will go down with the old system.

Know where deontologies come from, to know where they’re headed. We see them changing over time, and think they are evolving. They’re not evolving. They’re degenerating. The old moral codes come from enlightened savages – inspired, perhaps by God – to engineer a program for lesser savages to become civilized.

“We should return to the original Law!” We can’t. We don’t even know what it was. The code has been lost to entropy.

“We have the Torah!” We don’t understand the Torah. We’ve lost the context in which it was written.

Also, civilization has changed the world. When civilization falls, it will leave a mess behind. It will not recreate the exact conditions pre-civilization. That world is gone for good.

In particular, there will be remnants of technology that thalamic savages cannot handle responsibly.

We need to start from scratch. And by we, I mean superior post-civilized minds.

Here’s a starting point: Peer morality will give us a future. – Deep, Dark Thoughts

But that’s only a starting point. Peer morality will need to be adjusted, so non-peers can follow some version of it. Dumbed down and spelled out for minds who can’t handle abstractions and can’t reason from first principles. That is, most people.