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Re33: Outsiders, Power and Waste
Retraice^1
What outsiders and power have to do with each other.
Air date: Friday, 28th Oct. 2022, 11:00 PM Eastern/US.
Like talking to the TV
These are just preliminary remarks on power. We don't have a model yet. But we're operating on the assumption that the vast majority of us are in the 80% outsider (without-power) group, with respect to humanity as a whole. We therefore pay much attention (via mass media) to a world we can't affect, like we're watching a video on a screen. Asking `What's going on out there?', then, is like talking to the TV.
Power: definitions and evidence
Authors are primates, but primates are not necessarily authors. Very few of those primates with power are bothering to write about it.
Russell gives us a definition of power, and Wrong adapts his definition for his focus on social relationships:
"Power may be defined as the production of intended effects. It is thus a quantitative concept: given two men with similar desires, if one achieves all the desires that the other achieves, and also others, he has more power than the other. But there is no exact means of comparing the power of two men of whom one can achieve one group of desires, and another another.... Nevertheless, it is easy to say, roughly, that A has more power than B, if A achieves many intended effects and B only a few."^2
"Power is the capacity of some persons to produce intended and foreseen effects on others.... When attempts to exercise power over others are unsuccessful, when the intended effects of the aspiring power-wielder are not in fact produced, we are confronted with an absence or a failure of power."^3
Waste of resources with respect to power
Outsiders (with respect to a specific group) are mostly just disadvantaged. The romantic idea of the heroic outsider is almost entirely nonsense: they are out in the cold, and that's bad.
Therefore and obviously, no matter how much power you do or don't have, waste of resources is bad. If you're an outsider, you have fewer resources to lose, and so waste is even more bad for you.
A note on resources: What is a resource depends on available technology,^4 and perhaps other things.
Perception, power and deception
Do you care what others think about you? Or just how much control you have on earth? Not caring about what others think of your power is a strange mentality to contemplate. It's something like a hydroelectric dam, or a crocodile, and the kind of power such entities have. These things do not care what humans think about their power. What would a human with such a disposition be like?
The historian Carroll Quigley says an elite secret society, formed in 1891 by Cecil Rhodes, William T. Stead and Reginald Baliol Brett, persisted at least into the mid-20th-century on the basis of power without publicity:
"This organization has been able to conceal its existence quite successfully, and many of its most influential members, satisfied to possess the reality rather than the appearance of power, are unknown even to close students of British history. This is the more surprising when we learn that one of the chief methods by which this Group works has been through propaganda."^5
Not caring what others think or feel (a lose definition of psychopathy^6) might be as common as one in one hundred (1%) people, but the rate might be many times higher amongst those with power.^7 Note: Quigley does not ascribe bad motives or psychopathy to this Rhodes-Milner group--quite the contrary, actually.^8
If you want power and attention
* positive deception about your power (making others think you have more power than you do) is wasteful with respect to power goals, unless those others can really help you; * negative deception about others' power (making others think that those others have less power than they do) is wasteful with respect to power goals, unless doing so can really help you.
The upshot is that seeking attention is wasteful unless that attention increases one's power more than any alternative uses of those resources would do.
As for deception: positive and negative deception about others and about oneself must pass the test of being the best use of resources, or else it is wasteful.
If you want only power
* negative deception about your power (making others think you have less than you do) is fruitful, e.g. by lowering others' guards; * positive deception about others' power (making others think others have more power than they do) is fruitful, e.g. by focusing others' efforts on those others.
The upshot is that, for the power-only type, there's no competing goal, no temptation to allocate resources to actions not increasing actual power. The power-only creature is more focused than the power-attention creature.
Some guy told me once
To be taken with a grain of salt, the following story from a stranger, in context: * A solar-panel salesman (25 years old?) came to my door; * somehow we had a long conversation about the world, spanning multiple hours over two days (he probably thought he was going to sell me solar panels); * late in the conversation, he claimed he was `comfortable' financially, and later elaborated that he came from sixth-generation wealth in Europe (Spain or Portugal) and that he was selling solar panels on the basis of conscience; I found this claim to be credible, based on what I'd seen and heard of him, but of course it sounds very unlikely on its face; * at some point during the conversation he said "I think, like, twelve people rule the world"; I'd heard such things before, and failed to ask him which twelve.
Is the cabal plausible?
Is it possible that there's a group of dam-crocodiles, humans who are "satisfied to possess the reality rather than the appearance of power", not caring what others think or feel, and cooperating? Of course it's possible. Is it plausible?
Claims about cabals are not new. If such a group emerged and persisted, the advantages they would accrue over time would be something like the technological advantages accrued by humanity over animals, i.e. substantial. Think: chimps, Neanderthals, and even large meteors no longer threaten humanity the way they once did, thanks to our accumulated powers of technology.
If the power-only focus were to combine, in a single person, with a very high IQ, the result would be a formidable creature, and one who would have at least one lifetime during which to do his work. And with so many billions of humans, perhaps the combination might happen more than once. What if it happened in 1100 AD? What if it happened in 1100 BC?
Being convinced that his has actually happened, given the evidence available to outsiders, is as ridiculous as being convinced that it hasn't happened because `it can't' for some a priori reason. Both positions are unreasonable.
Convincing outsiders that they're insiders
An outsider is someone not in a cooperative coalition,^9 i.e. without power (compared to the coalition). It is a relative term.
Convincing outsiders that they're insiders neutralizes them, because they don't then feel the need to acquire real power. (And therefore, with respect to power, whatever they do, they're wasting resources.)
`An area that you can do absolutely nothing about'
Consider the purported remarks (impossible to independently verify^10) by Dr. Eric A. Walker, engineer, professor and (so it is claimed) U.S. government insider during the Cold War, to William S. Steinman, a UFO book author (little else about him is easily found):
Walker: Yes, I know of MJ-12. I have known of them for 40 years. I believe that you're chasing after and fighting with windmills!!
Steinman: Why do you say that?
Walker: You are delving into an area that you can do absolutely nothing about. So, why get involved with it or all concerned about it? Why don't you just leave it alone and drop it? Forget about it!!^11
Good actions implied by our models
Our models imply actions. What actions? We'll come back to this.
_
References
Cameron, G., & Crain Jr., T. S. (2020). UFOs, Area 51, and Government Informants: A Report on Government Involvement in UFO Crash Retrievals. Independently published, Kindle, revised ed. ISBN: 9798556079717. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=9798556079717 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+9798556079717
Dolan, R. M. (2014). UFOs for the 21st Century Mind: A Fresh Guide to an Ancient Mystery. Richard Dolan Press. ISBN: 978-1495291609. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=9781495291609 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+9781495291609
Ferguson, N. (2017). The Square and the Tower: Networks and Power, from the Freemasons to Facebook. Penguin. ISBN: 978-0735222915. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=978-0735222915 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+978-0735222915 https://lccn.loc.gov/2018418429
Quigley, C. (1966). Tragedy & Hope: A History of the World in Our Time. GSG and Associates, reprint 2004 ed. ISBN: 094500110X. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=094500110X https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+094500110X https://lccn.loc.gov/65013589
Quigley, C. (1981). The Anglo-American Establishment. GSG and Associates. ISBN: 0945001010. Publisher's note in Books in Focus 1981 edition (PDF, below) says the manuscript was completed in 1949 but Quigley couldn't find a publisher. This edition 1981, with different publisher's note that doesn't mention 1949, though Quigley's preface is dated 1949. http://www.carrollquigley.net/pdf/The_Anglo-American_Establishment.pdf Retrieved 1st Nov. 2022. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=0945001010 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+0945001010 https://lccn.loc.gov/80070620
Retraice (2022/03/07). Re17: Hypotheses to Eleven. retraice.com. https://www.retraice.com/segments/re17 Retrieved 17th Mar. 2022.
Russell, B. (1938). Power: A New Social Analysis. Routledge. ISBN: 0415094569. First published in 1938. This ed. 1993. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=0415094569 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+0415094569 https://lccn.loc.gov/38027828
Salter, A. (2003). Predators. Basic Books. ISBN: 978-0465071732. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=978-0465071739 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+978-0465071739 https://lccn.loc.gov/2002015846
Simler, K., & Hanson, R. (2018). The Elephant in the Brain: Hidden Motives in Everyday Life. Oxford University Press. ISBN: 9780190495992. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=9780190495992 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+9780190495992 https://lccn.loc.gov/2017004296
Wrong, D. H. (1988). Power: Its Forms, Bases, and Uses. Univ of Chicago Press. ISBN: 0226910679. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=0226910679 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+0226910679 https://lccn.loc.gov/88021594
Zubrin, R. (2019). The Case for Space: How the Revolution in Spaceflight Opens Up a Future of Limitless Possibility. Prometheus Books. ISBN: 978-1633885349. Searches: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=978-1633885349 https://www.google.com/search?q=isbn+978-1633885349 https://lccn.loc.gov/2018061068
Footnotes
^1 https://www.retraice.com/retraice
^2 Russell (1938) p. 25.
^3 Wrong (1988) pp. 2, 5.
^4 Zubrin (2019) p. 303; see also Retraice (2022/03/07).
^5 Quigley (1981) pp. 3-5; Ferguson (2017) p. 157.
^6 Salter (2003) pp. 124, 131.
^7 Psychopathy, wikipedia.org; 1 in 5 business leaders are psychopaths-here's why., cnbc.com. During the livestream, we mistakenly said off-hand that the general rate was one in twenty-five, which is false. That might be the rate amongst CEOs though.
^8 Quigley (1981) p. xi; Quigley (1966) p. 954.
^9 Simler & Hanson (2018) pp. 35-37. Their theory of power is, more or less, chpt. 2, `Competition'.
^10 "According to Steinman's handwritten notes, the following telephone interview took place on Aug 30, 1987, between Steinman and Dr. Walker." Cameron & Crain Jr. (2020) p. 29.
^11 Cameron & Crain Jr. (2020) p. 30. See also Dolan (2014) pp. 185-186.
