In some of my recent blogs, I noticed some paradigm shifts within the Power domain of the 7 Belief systems: Religion out, Technology in. A decoupling of Money and Politics suggests that the role of Politics is also changing. The decreasing role of Democracy (4th) suggests a move in Plato’s 5 regime types: either towards Aristocracy (1st) or to Tyranny (5th).
The future Power domain of the 7 Belief systems may look like this: Data/Info, Money, and Technology. Exit are Politics and Religion. The new entries are derivatives from the Knowledge domain: Data/Info (the Truth) and Technology (Science). This new Power domain challenges the notion of “Knowledge equals Power” (eg, Imam Ali, Francis Bacon, Michel Foucault).
The relationship between the Truth and its successor Data/Info needs clarification. Guardian, 2018: “Social credit was used specifically in these cases to compel international airlines to acknowledge and adopt the CCP’s version of the truth, and so repress alternative perspectives on Taiwan.” Hence, there can only be 1 truth in a highly technological society.
The future Knowledge domain may look like this: Faith, Philosophy, and Science. Exit is the Truth that migrated to the Power domain as Data/Info. Faith is a new entry and represents the core of Religion (eg, omnism). It’s like the 1977 Odyssey song “Going back to my roots”.
The future Power domain looks somewhat like China’s Social Credit System, an Orwellian tool of technological mass surveillance by Chinese government (and Big Tech). Hence, a very powerful combination of Data/Info, Money and Technology. It’s hard to see an adequate counterweight by the future Knowledge domain.
The 7th Belief and 3rd domain, Love, does not take sides in the struggle for balance between Knowledge and Power because “Love is blind”. Love is strictly personal and usually bilateral. Love is the oldest Belief system and the source of all its derivatives: Love for a Deity (Faith + Religion), Love for Life-Nature-Universe (Philosophy + Science), Love for the law of nature (the Truth). Love for Power (Money, Politics) was probably last.
Without an adequate balance between Knowledge and Power, Lord Acton’s 1887 quote springs to mind: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of the certainty of corruption by authority.”
It’s tempting to use the Netflix series Altered Carbon as an example of a combination of (i) Plato’s regime types’s of Aristocracy or Timocracy, and (ii) the future Power domain, consisting of Data/Info, Money, and Technology.
“A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.” A quote by Max Planck (1858-1947), German theoretical physicist.
Believer (2017) by Imagine Dragons – artists, lyrics, video, Wiki-1, Wiki-2
Note LO: all markings (bold, italic, underling) by LO unless stated otherwise
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