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On one hand, OpenAI is not a cult. On the other hand, everybody who works there must believe in a millenarian doctrine that says the god-machine is coming and it's their duty to bring it into existence and make the messianic vision of AGI finally come to fruition

— The Mechanic and the Luddite by Jathan Sadowski (65%)

I call this the Tinkerbell Effect: speculative technologies only exist when we believe hard enough and clap loud enough. If we stop believing and clapping, then they can start fading away, becoming more immaterial by the moment until they disappear. Even investing billions of dollars may not guarantee the realization of a dream if people stop feeding it with their psychic energy. Metaverse? A distant memory. Web3? Sorry, wrong number. Google Glass? Never heard of it.

— The Mechanic and the Luddite by Jathan Sadowski (63%)

The mechanic knows how a machine operates, how it is put together, and how it can be repaired or reengineered. The Luddite knows why the machine was built, whose pur poses it serves, and when it should be disassembled or des troyed. By becoming mechanics and Luddites, we get to the heart of how these systems work, who they work for, and what we can do to change them. Together these models provide us with the tools necessary for rejecting the systems thrust on us by others and, in their place, making our own future.

— The Mechanic and the Luddite by Jathan Sadowski (15%)

I want us all to be mechanics because none of us should be shut out from the workings of technology and capital; instead we should all be empowered to get under the hood and tinker with the machines, as well as take apart and (re) build the machines for our own purposes.

— The Mechanic and the Luddite by Jathan Sadowski (12%)

Beerbohm argues that one cannot insulate oneself from shared responsibility for government injustice by not voting-or, in our terms, by being politically apathetic. This because of the institutional ties binding citizens together. If our democratic state is unjust, and we do nothing about it, we are like someone who knows that a friend plans to rob a bank and prepares him breakfast that morning or puts gas in his getaway car. We provide support, to one degree or another, to the overall enterprise and knowingly do nothing to blunt its evil intent. This makes us accessory to the injustice.

— Democracy for Busy People by Kevin J. Elliott (Page 39)