Americans are afraid, very afraid.

 https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/these-are-americans-biggest-fears-in-2024-as-the-country-is-becoming-more-afraid-180985339/

Fear is playing a bigger role in American life than at any time in recent history, according to the results of a new survey from Chapman University. Americans are afraid of more things, and they’re more afraid of those things than they have been in the past, the researchers suggest.

At the top of the list of fears in 2024? Corrupt government officials, cyberterrorism and loved ones becoming seriously ill or dying. Other fears include world powers deploying nuclear weapons, terrorist attacks, biological warfare and not having enough money for the future.

(Corrupt government? EGADS, it is gonna get a hell of a lot worse in 2025 in that case)

“This year, all of our top [ten] fears were expressed by more than half of Americans, and many were high throughout the rest of the survey,” says Christopher Bader, a Chapman University sociologist who worked on the survey, in a statement. “This tells me Americans are becoming more afraid in general, about everything.”

What does Snowflake think? He is afraid that the above survey might be right on the money and that Americans might be turning into a nation of ............Snowflakes! 

Book review: Shock Doctrine

The 2007 book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, by Naomi Klein describes sobering visions somewhat like what is happening today. 

The Shock Doctrine focuses on the concept of economic shock therapy (EST), a strategy where neoliberal economic policies are implemented during times of crisis or disaster. At times like that, populations are most vulnerable and least able to resist. EST involves rapid deregulation, privatization, and severe cuts in government spending to impose free-market policies quickly. This method is theorized to teach the public a harsh lesson about economic realities, making them more compliant with drastic changes. 

EST envisions a blend of authoritarianism and deregulated capitalism. It involves authoritarian methods to enforce rapid economic liberalization, often during times when democratic processes are weakened or suspended. The policies themselves are rooted in neoliberalism, promoting deregulation and privatization, which are hallmarks of deregulated capitalism. Implementation of these policies in a manner that bypasses democratic consent and often leads to social suffering and increased inequality. That can be seen as authoritarian in practice. Thus, while EST aims to establish a deregulated capitalist system, its methods and consequences often align with authoritarian governance.

Some critics argue that Klein oversimplifies complex political phenomena, but others praise her work for exposing the harsh realities of neoliberal policies. John Willman of the Financial Times described the book as "a deeply flawed work that blends together disparate phenomena to create a beguiling – but ultimately dishonest – argument." Well, coming from the Financial Times, a leading capitalist publication, maybe there's a wee bit of hostile bias in that account. Or maybe not.

Shock Doctrine has influenced public discourse on economic policy, disaster response, and the ethics of capitalism (now an oxymoron). It was a bestseller and won the Warwick Prize for Writing.

Demagoguery and the illusion of the will of the people

As DJT continues to quickly move the US from a democracy to some form of kleptocratic authoritarian state, three very debatable assertions are being commonly used to justify, deny, distort, self-delude and/or soften the harsh reality and cognitive dissonance of DJT's and MAGA's destructiveness to democracy and its rule of law. I refer to those assertions as (i) the will of the people illusion, (ii) the democratic governance illusion, and (iii) the déjà vu illusion. In my firm opinion, all three assertions are more false than true, and thus illusions. The three assertions are devastatingly wrong. In my opinion, they are obviously more false than true. This post is about what the will of the people means and how it can be manipulated.

The will of the people illusion

Context: For millennia, the phenomenon of talented demagogues, tyrants, liars, crackpots and irrational emotional manipulators to create self-serving false realities and beliefs has been known. The issue was debated over 2,000 years ago by some of the greatest human minds. Almost equally well-known is the fact, not opinion, that deceived people sometimes act in accord with their genuinely held but objectively false reality perceptions or beliefs. A modern day example is empirical data that some people who believe lies that vaccines are bad or ineffective, do not get vaccinated, then get infected, and then either they, or someone else they infect dies.[1] The "will of the people" is not rocket science, it's human condition science.

The illusion: Few people appear to be aware of any possibility or assertion that demagoguery threw the 2024 elections to DJT. A few MSM reports raised the possibility, e.g., here, here and here. I believe that demagoguery and false beliefs threw the election to DJT. Some may be aware of the demagoguery idea, but, humans being human, most of them probably don't believe it. In my firm opinion, the illusion is that the 2024 election reflected the will of the people. It didn't. I reject that as a seriously flawed perception of reality. Yes, people consciously voted as they did. But what was the basis that DJT voters voted on? In my opinion, mostly illusions. 

For example, some poll data evidence indicated that about one-third of Trump supporters viewed democracy was the most crucial factor in their voting choice, but 80% of them feared that electing Harris would lead to radical left authoritarianism.[2] There was a perception that Trump would protect democracy from what they saw as threats from the left. Two big illusions there, one about DJT and one about Harris.

Exactly what is the will of the people? As I see it in politics in a democracy, it is people freely choosing and acting in accord with actual facts, truths and reasonably sound reasoning. What is a vote for DJT cast mostly on the basis of one or more false beliefs? Is acting on a false belief(s) the will of the voter? Or is it the will of the demagogue who implanted the false belief? Also, we can now consider mind control tactics that go farther than merely disinforming people. Demagogues and all other kinds of mind manipulators are learning how to supplant a person's will with the manipulator's will.

My logic/reasoning: Demagoguery and the false beliefs it created sabotaged enough minds to throw the election to DJT. As far as In know, I am the only source arguing that. Because I am probably in a small minority, that does not make me wrong. Evidence or data and logic or sound reasoning can make me wrong.

What I have seen of DJT's governing style so far is mostly radical right, kleptocratic authoritarianism, not mostly democracy. For example, illegally firing inspectors general is clearly both kleptocratic (pro-corruption) and authoritarian (illegal). He breaks laws and leaves it to others to file lawsuits. He governs in accord with the kleptocratic authoritarian manifesto, Project 2025. All of that is anti-democratic authoritarianism. 

My personal estimate is that (1) about 65% of Trump voters' beliefs, facts, and votes could be attributed to demagoguery, lies, and misinformation. Important mental influences such as Trump's identity fusion (people who have fused their identity with Trump and are thus more susceptible to DJT's demagoguery and lies), his perceived authenticity despite lying, and media narratives that reinforce these beliefs, and thus (2), about 35% of Trump voters' beliefs, facts, and votes were mostly grounded in things like facts, truths, more rational reasoning, and self-interest. Obviously, putting numbers on estimates of mental influence is not a precise science. But, if one engages in the exercise in good faith, being as neutral and fair as possible, the estimates arguably have non-trivial value.

I asked this question to Perplexity twice, once yesterday and once today: For Trump voters, estimate the rationality basis of their their important beliefs, facts and votes, e.g., is it about 65% a product of demagoguery, lies and crackpottery, and ~35% a product of truth and sound reasoning?

Yesterday it said 50-60% truth and sound reasoning and 40-50% demagoguery, lies and crackpottery. Today, it said 35% truth and sound reasoning and 65% demagoguery, lies and crackpottery. That shows the inherent noise in estimating mental influence of demagoguery, lies and crackpottery on voters' votes. But because the system is noisy, and there is little data and effort to research this topic, one has to expect uncertainty. As far as I know, there is no polling directed squarely at the issue of dissecting true belief from false in driving voter behavior in the 2024 elections.

However, the point here is not the exact numbers. The point is existence of the reality that significant numbers of DJT voters voted for him mostly on the basis of demagoguery, lies and/or crackpottery. If one accepts that as true, one can rationally argue that there very likely were enough deceived voters to put DJT back in power.  

Q: Do you believe that even though a voter is seriously disinformed and votes on the basis of false facts and beliefs, that the voter nonetheless voted in the voter's personal free will? If so, how do you account for the fact that a person's freedom to think, believe and act has been subverted by dishonest speech or demagoguery by others, usually for their own or their group's self-interest, usually at the expense of the public interest, which includes support for democracy?

Q: How likely do you think that demagoguery, lies, slanders and crackpottery or flawed reasoning was a necessary factor in DJT being reelected? 

Footnotes:

1. Data about belief in lethal lies: Evidence indicating that unvaccinated individuals are more likely to experience severe illness and death from COVID-19 compared to vaccinated individuals is robust. A meta-analysis involving over 21 million COVID-19 patients found that unvaccinated patients were 2.46 times more likely to die from the disease compared to vaccinated patients. Surveys have shown an increase in the number of Americans who believe in vaccine misinformation, with 28% mistakenly believing that COVID-19 vaccines have caused thousands of deaths, and 22% thinking it's less risky to get infected than to get vaccinated. Misinformation about vaccine safety and efficacy has been shown to increase vaccine hesitancy, with some studies suggesting that up to 30% of unvaccinated individuals might be influenced by such misinformation.

2. Regarding the alleged authoritarianism of Harris: 

Q: Many Trump voters, about one third, feared that election of Harris would lead to authoritarianism. How much truth in that is there based on Harris' rhetoric, leadership style and any other relevant indicators?

A: Conclusion: Based on her rhetoric, leadership style, and policy positions, there is little evidence to support the claim that Kamala Harris would lead to authoritarianism if elected. Her approach, while progressive on many issues, remains within the democratic framework, emphasizing consensus, legal norms, and gradual reform. The fear among some Trump voters appears to be more a reflection of political rhetoric and polarization rather than a factual assessment of Harris's potential governance style.

The intention economy: Subtly, quietly replacing your motives with their motives

I originally posted this on 1/5/25 as the 2nd of a two-part post. This topic is so important that it needs a dedicated post. I cannot emphasize too much how important this new AI-powered front in propaganda war is. This is a lightly edited version of the original.

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There is a new front in the war on human minds by unscrupulous marketers, ideologues, plutocrats, theocrats, politicians and other morally debased opportunists! On Dec. 30, 2024, the HSDR (Harvard Data Science Review) posted an article about this nascent new war. Viewed from my cognitive biology and social behavior point of view, this constitutes an entirely new political, religious and economic gold rush. The HSDR calls it the intention economy. The HSDR sees this new mind war about the same way I see it, scary or worse. 

Long story short: Artificial intelligence gives the opportunists a way to discover and manipulate your intentions and motives to do or not do something, e.g., to buy or not buy a product or to vote for or against a political candidate. This new mind war is truly scary:

ABSTRACT

The rapid proliferation of large language models (LLMs) invites the possibility of a new marketplace for behavioral and psychological data that signals intent. This brief article [it's not brief, it's well over 4,500 words] introduces some initial features of that emerging marketplace. We survey recent efforts by tech executives to position the capture, manipulation, and commodification of human intentionality as a lucrative parallel to—and viable extension of—the now-dominant attention economy, which has bent consumer, civic, and media norms around users’ finite attention spans since the 1990s. We call this follow-on the intention economy. We characterize it in two ways. First, as a competition, initially, between established tech players armed with the infrastructural and data capacities needed to vie for first-mover advantage on a new frontier of persuasive technologies. Second, as a commodification of hitherto unreachable levels of explicit and implicit data that signal intent, namely those signals borne of combining (a) hyper-personalized manipulation via LLM-based sycophancy, ingratiation, and emotional infiltration and (b) increasingly detailed categorization of online activity elicited through natural language.

This new dimension of automated persuasion draws on the unique capabilities of LLMs and generative AI more broadly, which intervene not only on what users want, but also, to cite Williams, “what they want to want” (Williams, 2018, p. 122). We demonstrate through a close reading of recent technical and critical literature (including unpublished papers from ArXiv) that such tools are already being explored to elicit, infer, collect, record, understand, forecast, and ultimately manipulate, modulate, and commodify human plans and purposes, both mundane (e.g., selecting a hotel) and profound (e.g., selecting a political candidate).

CONCLUSION

The possibility for harm made feasible by a large-scale, multiparty intention economy merits sustained scholarly, civic, and regulatory scrutiny. In whatever way these data partnerships turn out in practice, the ambition of making conversational interfaces and generative AI systems unavoidable mediators of human–computer interaction signals a turn from the attention economy, whereby access to the limited resource of human attention is traded through advertising exchanges, to the intention economy, whereby commercial and political actors bid on signals that forecast human intent. This transition would empower diverse actors to intervene in new ways on shaping human actions. This ambition must be considered in light of the likely impact such a marketplace would have on other human aspirations, including free and fair elections, a free press, fair market competition, and other aspects of democratic life.

All of that is going on right now. As far as I can tell, the mainstream media has not picked up on this yet. It constitutes a vast new playing field for bad people and interests to (i) manipulate minds and beliefs, (ii) create false realities, and scarier yet, (iii) implant desires and motivations in a person's mind.  

Q: How well known is the concept of the intention economy, as exemplified in this article: https://hdsr.mitpress.mit.edu/pub/ujvharkk/release/1 ?

A: The concept of the intention economy is gaining traction in academic and tech circles but remains relatively niche in broader public discourse.

Attention vs. Intention: There's a distinction between the attention economy, which focuses on capturing user engagement, and the intention economy, which aims to predict and influence user decisions. Some discussions mistakenly conflate the two, but the intention economy goes beyond mere attention to actively shape consumer behavior.

Ethical Concerns: The intention economy raises significant ethical questions about privacy, autonomy, and manipulation. Researchers warn that without proper regulation, this economy could undermine fundamental societal values, including free and fair elections, a free press, and fair market competition.

Marketplace for Intentions: The intention economy envisions a marketplace where AI systems not only capture attention but also anticipate and influence user intentions. This could lead to a scenario where our decisions are influenced before we consciously make them, creating a new commercial frontier.

Hm, Perplexity sees it about the same way that HSDR and I see it. Well brain war fans, there we have it. A whole new front against us and our democracy has opened up and we are clueless.

Of course, this could also be used for good. But think about our current political, social, commercial, financial and religious situation. Where does the balance of power lie, with super wealthy, self-serving special interests and ideologies or public interest-serving ones? 

Q1: What array of forces and finances is most likely to more aggressively and more deeply apply this new kind of mental manipulation, (1) morally bankrupt for profit commercial interests and various kinds of authoritarians seeking power and wealth, or (2) nice people wanting to do good things for people and society?

Q2: Which political party is most likely going to oppose regulating the intention economy for concentration wealth and power, the Repubs, the Dems, or both about equally?

Q3: Can you see the potential for a further shift in the balance of power from the seriously weakened public interest to the already more powerful special interests?