The Rich Tech "Genius" Problem, Explained | Mountainhead, OceanGate, & More - video Dailymotion

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00:00Money has long equaled power, but does it also equal intelligence? Many people seem to think so,

00:06regardless of any evidence to the contrary. Both in movies and TV and in real life,

00:11we've seen a number of recent examples of the problems big and small that can arise when

00:16immense wealth comes to dominate views of what it means to be smart, productive and capable.

00:22We literally have the resources, the mental capacity. It would be ludicrous to say to

00:27take over the world, but in layman's terms, to take over the world.

00:32So what's really behind this trend? And how does it harm all of us? Let's take a closer look.

00:38The idea that the ultra-wealthy deserve to have more money and resources is certainly not new,

00:45though in our modern era it has evolved from the older ideas around it being some sort of divine

00:49right for some over others, into the belief that it's all from the result of hard work and thus

00:56earned. As tech has come to dominate our world, those who create it, or fund the creation of it

01:01by others, have become a major symbol for this mindset. These people often are, or at some point

01:08were, very competent, and usually ahead of the curve in some particular aspect, say coding,

01:15and were able to spin that skill set into immense wealth. Because they excel to such a great degree in

01:20this one arena, it can then in turn be assumed that they must be good at everything. They have all of

01:27this money, so they must know what they're doing. Right?

01:31He had said it was loud, but he had said that's what we expected.

01:34That's the carbon fiber seasoning. I've never heard of seasoning a whole.

01:40This dovetails with the other side of that same coin. People who were born incredibly rich,

01:45and assume this automatically endows them with more know-how and capability than those who were not.

01:51In both cases, these people fully buy into the idea that their money is indeed proof,

01:57that they both know everything, and deserve to remake the world however they want.

02:03I'm the eldest boy! I am the eldest boy!

02:08But even when it's born out of some initial spark of knowledge, the truth is that the one

02:13real skill that underlies immense wealth is actually just the ability to convince

02:18other rich people to give you their money.

02:21The only thing to say is, do we think the western hemisphere is a little meager? Kind of used up?

02:29As technology writer Ed Zitron put it in his newsletter,

02:32we live in the era of the symbolic executive. When being good at stuff matters far less than

02:38the appearance of doing stuff. Where what's useful is dictated not by outputs or metrics that one can

02:44measure, but rather the vibes passed between managers and executives that have worked their

02:50entire careers to escape the world of work. Our economy is run by people that don't participate in

02:56it, and our tech companies are directed by people that don't experience the problems they

03:00allege to solve for their customers. As the modern executive is no longer a person with demands or

03:06responsibilities beyond their allegiance to shareholder value.

03:10We're persuading more and more shareholders every day that we offer them just a slightly

03:15better chance for them to make a little bit more money on their dollar.

03:20Being the best at separating bigger fools from more money isn't the kind of smarts these people

03:25want to be known for, however. They often have a desperate need to be seen as hyper-intelligent.

03:31Being richer than everyone else isn't enough. They want to be constantly reassured that they're

03:36smarter than everyone else too.

03:37The antidote to bad tech is good tech.

03:41The, well, they must be doing something right mindset, combined with a hope that latching onto

03:46and upholding these figures will lead to one's own payday, creates a landscape where they are upheld

03:52as geniuses who are saving the world, even when all signs point to the opposite.

03:58That's why we work so hard. Because this machine, and all of us, are going to change the world.

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05:42Even when these people continually fail to meet set goals or to actually prove their own capabilities

05:48in any capacity, as long as they can keep the money coming in, they'll continue to be hailed as

05:53geniuses. Any failure is either hand waved away or reframed as actually being a win.

05:59While Stockton Rush's choices at Oceangate were long decried as incredibly unsafe and irresponsible

06:06by people with actual experience, because he was protected by the bubble of his own riches,

06:11and was able to continue getting other rich people to pay him for dives, nothing ever really stood in

06:16his way. Stockton told me it would be nothing for him to spend $50,000 to ruin somebody's life.

06:23He was able to skirt regulations and safety protocols because he framed it as innovation.

06:29All of those people voicing concerns were just afraid of progress.

06:33In the end they discounted the one system that was going to be vital to their operations.

06:37It is really, in my mind, like the smoking gun of what eventually caused this.

06:41This is a refrain that is often used now to ignore any pushback against these alleged geniuses.

06:47Anyone with a problem is just too stupid to really understand their grand intelligent vision.

06:53People who are afraid of being left behind, and missing the boat on their own riches,

06:58double down in their own support to show that they do get it. And so, the ladder of supposed intelligence

07:04that is really based solely on money climbs ever higher, regardless of the damage done.

07:10It's a great turning of the wheel. I think that's why I'm so excited about these atrocities.

07:15The near-complete immunity from consequences is in direct contrast to how things work for

07:20everyone else, where we're often punished for even minor slip-ups, or even things that we had

07:26zero control over. Jesse Armstrong thoroughly explored the idea of the corruption of the soul

07:31required to endlessly grasp for more and more money, even at great cost to those closest to you,

07:37yourself, and the world at large, with his hit show Succession.

07:41There's a line.

07:42Nothing is a line. Everything, everywhere, is always moving. Forever.

07:48He touched on the concept of the asshole tech bro with Lucas Mattson in that show,

07:52and recently dug in deeper with his new film Mountainhead.

07:56Which follows four ultra-wealthy friends. Already shielded from much of reality by their wealth,

08:02here they're also literally separated from the world, high up in the mountains and totally

08:06divorced from the HAVOC their choices are wreaking on the world.

08:10Ven's social media platform has begun spreading AI disinformation en masse, but instead of just

08:15offlining the feature and fixing the issue, he instead seeks to buy his way out of the problem,

08:21so that he doesn't ever have to admit fault.

08:23I just want to say this is not on you, Venice.

08:27Obviously this is not on me, why would you even say that?

08:29But it's not just Ven. All of these characters are solely focused on themselves,

08:34and how they can use their wealth to wield power over each other,

08:37and shape the world around their own vision.

08:40You coo out Western Hemisphere, you hopscotch.

08:43Maghreb. Saudi. Iran. Asia.

08:47Their entire sense of identity and self is wrapped up in their net worth.

08:52Not just how much money they have, but also if they have more than everyone else.

08:57And because of this, they're willing to do terrible things to society to make more money.

09:02But also are even willing to do bad things to their so-called friends to make sure that they have

09:07the most money. Generative AI is becoming a very useful tool in these geniuses' efforts to paint

09:14themselves as the stewards of the future, and to rewrite the present and past to more closely

09:19align with how they think things should be. A recent study by Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon

09:24University found that, while Gen AI can improve worker efficiency, it can inhibit critical

09:30engagement with work and can potentially lead to long-term over-reliance on the tool

09:35and diminished skill for independent problem solving. Higher confidence in Gen AI's ability to

09:41perform a task is related to less critical thinking effort. If people stop even being

09:46able to question these so-called geniuses altogether, then there will really be nothing

09:51standing between them and their desire to consume everything. This effort to constantly be hurtling

09:58forward comes out of a desire to not leave time for anyone to question or push back against these

10:05geniuses' decisions. They feel that if they can just move fast enough, they can force the world to mold itself

10:10into their image, and then it'll be too late for anyone to do anything about it. Focus isn't on

10:16creating useful products, or helping people, or even creating genuinely successful businesses,

10:21but instead just making sure to keep the money flowing while keeping up the facade of hyperintelligence.

10:28He was a humble human being, but he was an arrogant scientist for sure. Like, he knew he was smart,

10:33there was no doubt about it. He knew he was a genius even.

10:38In his piece, Citron continues,

10:40When the leader of a company doesn't participate in or respect the production of the goods that

10:44enriches them, creates a culture that enables similarly vacuous leaders on all levels. Decades

10:50of direct erosion of the very concept of leadership means that the people running companies have been

10:58selected not based on their actual efficacy, especially as the position became defined by its

11:04lack of actual production, but on whether they resemble what a manager or executive is meant to look

11:10like based on the work that somebody else did. The goal is no longer to actually be a tech genius,

11:17but just to appear to be one and reap the benefits. This belief that their immense wealth

11:22is proof that they know more than everyone else, and that whatever avenue they want to go down is the

11:27correct one, and the refusal to hear the word no, leads to dangerous consequences in both the micro

11:33and mana crow.

11:41Stockton Rush's Titan Submersible did eventually implode, just as people had warned it would.

11:47But Rush wasn't the only one who paid the price. Four other people also lost their lives in the

11:52incident. But more often, these kinds of rich geniuses don't ever seem to face any real consequences at all.

11:59Or if they do, it's only seen as a momentary blip in their upward trajectory.

12:04Mountain Head, like Succession, ends on an unfortunately quite honest note. While these

12:09people might be making themselves miserable with their poor choices and empty souls,

12:13at the end of the day, they're still going to be very wealthy and very powerful.

12:19I can come inside. But I'll come for you in the end, you know that.

12:23That's what's exciting.

12:24Losing, for them, is just essentially the idea that they didn't get everything they wanted,

12:30not any form of real tangible consequence.

12:33Here's the thing about being rich. It's f***ing great. You get to do what you want,

12:38the authorities can't really touch you, you get to wear a costume.

12:41All of the harm these giants dole out to others in seeking their own goals is just framed as a

12:46necessary part of progress. Gen AI in particular has been a huge driver of this in recent years.

12:52Take, for example, the AI data center built near Memphis.

12:56It was framed as something that would help pull the community into the future,

12:59but instead has only caused problems.

13:03According to the Southern Environmental Law Center,

13:05outed as the world's largest supercomputer,

13:08the facility powers Grok, the company's AI chatbot, and requires massive amounts of power.

13:14To meet the data center's incredible energy demands,

13:18XAI set up, and is still running, more than 30 unpermitted methane gas turbines.

13:24In other words, XAI essentially set up a power plant without any permits,

13:29without any oversight, and without any formal input from nearby communities.

13:33Local resident Sarah Gladney told CNN,

13:36Our health was never considered, the safety of our communities was never ever considered.

13:41In all of these pushes towards the future by the rich geniuses,

13:45there's always the refrain that it'll all be worth it in the end.

13:48But worth it for who?

13:50It's so much better to do one big upgrade on the whole world than walking around with

13:55fucking patches solving malaria.

13:57Yeah.

13:57This all, in many ways, feels like an impossible Goliath to defeat.

14:02This is a terrifying experience, and I don't know that I'll ever recover.

14:06But we're not without hope.

14:08There has once again been major pushback against the idea that we should all be willing to risk

14:12or even ruin our own lives in order to continually enrich the already wealthy even further,

14:18combined with calls for real regulation and transparency.

14:22Because the rich geniuses have so easily been able to purchase many of the levers of power,

14:27more and more people are beginning to focus on local elections and community building,

14:31as ways to begin re-leveling the playing field.

14:34And above all else, people are finally shaking themselves out of the mindset that having vast

14:39amounts of money in a world where others must go without is, on its own, an indicator of anything

14:45other than greed.

14:46Instead of upholding these fake geniuses, we can instead begin focusing on all of the true

14:52brilliance around us that can actually help us build a better future.

14:56The truth is way more depressing.

15:00They're not even smart enough to be as evil as you're giving them credit for.

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