Category: Other Page 85 of 177

Understanding A.I. Virus (2021)

On 21 September 2021

A.I. Virus (short for Artificial Intelligence Virus) is a fictional virus within what I am calling the “Conspiracy Dudiverse” as depicted in my most recent book, Conspiratopia.

But A.I. Virus did not begin there.

The Real A.I. Virus began almost four years ago, in early 2018, with this (linked) Medium article (archive). There is an accompanying Vimeo account (a couple of them actually, iirc), TruthAboutAIV, which contains some videos I commissioned from video actors on Fiverr during my early hyperreality experiments.

These videos are really weird, awkward, and funny to me all at once. You get what you get for $5. If nothing else, they are strangely timeless.

I find these scripts way too complicated for “now me” after having experimented with this a bit more. Simpler is almost always better in this kind of distributed or networked narrative.

These videos kind of directly informed my later experiments using AI-generated human avatars… which in the end are somewhat more cost-effective and perhaps easier than dealing with “real humans” though the quality differences between the two are, shall we say, inescapable. Humans are still humans…. for now…

That said, there are use cases where I think – for story-telling & aesthetic purposes – you might actually *want* a shitty, obviously wrong & fake-looking AI-generated avatar to deliver your message. I have to say with those videos, I kind of like flaunting the discomfort of the Uncanny Valley, as much as I like the flaunting of human discomfort can shine through at points in these videos (whether the discomfort is on the part of the actor, the viewer, or both).

There was a backstory here I explored in one other commissioned human actor video from Fiverr, below:

This is an allegedly promotional video attributed to a company called Neurolytics, Inc. The video description reads:

Research video from Neurolytics, Inc. Neurolytics, now defunct, was the brainchild of A.J. Nempner and Damon Long, whose spin-off gaming company, Influent AI, went on to gain notoriety for massively influencing global election outcomes with artificially-intelligent social media campaigns. This promotional video, never released, describes a prototype EEG headset (wrongly called “implants” here) which was able to measure, record and influence perception in conjunction with twice-daily capsules. The FDA denied permission for this product to come to market, and the company ultimately went bankrupt. (Recorded in Deerfield Beach, Florida 2015.)

Influent AI is its own tangent to this story-line, but suffice it to say that “some people think” today’s A.I. Virus has its roots in the questionable psychogenic driving technologies originally developed as part of Neuralytics’ banned product offering.

The below video expands on the Influent AI backstory a bit, in the form of a false news broadcast, also purchased via a video actor on Fiverr (bless all of their hearts!):

If I’m not mistaken, this video’s “Tom from Newschan” (and the accompanying Vimeo account) is either the first or one of the earliest incarnations of Newschan, a hypothetical news-channel that developed out of kind of post 4chan total collapse of all media… Newschan, of course, is now a major powerhouse on YouTube.

Anyway, so we see different strands of the A.I. Virus story told throughout all of these pieces, somewhat fractally, from many different multiversal perspectives at once. We hear that it is taking over people’s bodies, causing blackouts, and involuntary bodily actions. This basically conforms to what we see in Conspiratopia, with some differences.

Conspiratopia‘s use of the AI Virus and what I call “overwriting” is inherited from this older Medium story (Oct. 2015), entitled “Legal Fiction.” A relevant excerpt:

“I’m told I have a lot of physical autonomy for an Uber®. I guess it costs less for everyone in processing power that way — though I honestly don’t mind being over-written either. I find it relaxing, like watching a film. In fact, we’re allowed to watch films during over-write sessions, but I prefer to maintain perceptuals, at least peripherally, and pipe in classic rock selections, like Maroon 5 and One Direction.
My public blockchain indicates that I was originally cross-bonded as part of my obligatory outpatient rehabilitation for crimes against the Gestalt which I no longer remember, and the precise terms of which were expunged from Living Memory once my work as an Uber® earned me a rating of 15,000 points. I barely look at my stats anymore though, because I have everything I need now that I am able to re-sell a variable percentage of my public perceptions back to the Network to cover the costs of my sustenance and lodging. In a few more years, I will even be eligible to buy full voting rights.”

Speaking of scripts that are too long and wordy, here’s one made via one of those AI-generated Avatars (Synthesia) in June 2021 about the “Coming AI Takeover” that was written as a response to Grimes’ weird TikTok video about how communists ought to welcome AI overlords…

While I’m on a roll, there are also one or two videos in this recent AI-gen set that directly reference the re-incarnation for modern times of the AI Virus.

There are another set of weird, over-long videos exploring this AI mythology for the curious (or foolish) here.

Anyway, I’m telling this story in a round-about way because it is a round-about story, so you’ll have to forgive me for all the tangents and inset tales. The fall of civilization to AI Superpowers doesn’t just happen overnight; it happens bit by bit…

AdEx Ad Purchasing Results

By Tim B.

On 20 September 2021

In Other

As part of my hyperreality investigations, I recently tested out a decentralized crypto-based ad network called AdEx.

One interesting element is you top up your account with DAI ahead of time, rather than wait to be billed (read: screwed) by Google Ads at the end of the month (if you’re not vigilant about your spend). Another interesting element is there appears to be no moderation or ad review & approval process. Which might be good or bad, depending on where you stand.

There are a number of drawbacks though. I won’t do a full assessment here, but it appears all ads are image-based. If there’s a text ad option, I didn’t see it. Then there are quite a lot of settings, etc. that are not entirely clear what they are. Same for content category names. When you choose where your ads will be placed, you pick from categories like “Politics” (straightforward-ish), but then there are categories like “Irregular Content” or “Deceptive / Phishing” which… I’m not sure about.

Then, of course, there are ETH network fees, which I guess I was foolishly not expecting, because I think the site advertised “no hidden fees,” iirc. So despite putting about $20 USD into DAI, and starting with an ad buy of 5 DAI against one image-based ad unit, I had to pay a fee of 14.50 DAI on top of that to activate it.

Which, okay, it’s an experiment. But the initial estimate of impressions for 5 DAI was 10K impressions. Instead, I ended up with a little under 3K. And for all that, only netted 22 clicks. Okay, maybe my ad sucked. Probably. But it looks like the sites it ran also pretty much sucked, upon my manually checking them:

These appear to be almost all entirely spam sites. Do they get legit visitors? Maybe? It’s basically impossible to tell. Granted, this was an experiment, but it doesn’t exactly fill me with hope and excitement about the possibility of using alternative crypto ad exchanges over something like Google Ads.

Sky Women: Virga & Virago

By Tim B.

On 16 September 2021

In Other

This topic connects back to the Sky Lords (see also).

From Wikipedia’s Virga page:

“In meteorology, a virga is an observable streak or shaft of precipitation falling from a cloud that evaporates or sublimates before reaching the ground.”

After meditating on this topic of the Sky Lords & the Majonans/Magonians, etc., I’ve often wondered, what if the Virga are lady Sky Lords descending? It only makes sense, after all… if you think about it.

Wikipedia adds some etymology:

The word is derived from the Latin virga, meaning “rod, sprig, staff, branch, shoot, twig, spray, sprout, switch, graft.”

This is obviously the same etymology as virgin:

“c. 1200, “unmarried or chaste woman noted for religious piety and having a position of reverence in the Church,” from Anglo-French and Old French virgine “virgin; Virgin Mary,” from Latin virginem (nominative virgo) “maiden, unwedded girl or woman,” also an adjective, “fresh, unused,” probably related to virga “young shoot,” via a notion of “young” (compare Greek talis “a marriageable girl,” cognate with Latin talea “rod, stick, bar”).”

Compare this to a word with a lot of letters in common, virago. Now, I never heard this word before, and found it while doing a thesaurus check of synonyms for “bitch,” which is weird.

“A virago is a woman who demonstrates exemplary and heroic qualities. The word comes from the Latin word virāgō (genitive virāginis) meaning vigorous’^[1] from vir meaning “man” or “man-like” (cf. virile and virtue) to which the suffix -āgō is added, a suffix that creates a new noun of the third declension with feminine grammatical gender.
Modern use of the word virago generally takes the disparaging sense. Thus virago joined pejoratives such as termagant,^[2] mannish, amazonian and shrew to describe women who acted aggressively or like men. The word virago has almost always had an association with cultural gender transgression. There are recorded instances of viragos (such as Joan of Arc) fighting battles, wearing men’s clothing, or receiving the tonsure.^[3]“

That word Termagant is also a new one to me, and equally interesting, but deserving of its own dedicated post (another time).

Anyway, this is all very liminal. The precipitation which descends from the clouds, but never quite lands – or does it in some subtle etheric Sky Lord form? The virgin, who does not know (Biblically speaking) man. The virago, the woman who is like a man…

This lands for me within the Matter of Quatria pretty squarely on a figure I’ve called by different names, but most often the Red Spear Maiden, or Red Star Maiden. Some elements of her story are sort of fractally mentioned in The Lost Direction, but a key episode (her battle with the world-encircling dragon, Uquemoth) is elaborated in more detail in the follow-up volume (The Octave of Time), which I’m about to begin working on again as soon as I go through the final proofs of Conspiratopia.

Here’s a snippet of this character who is a virago in the maybe more classical, less pejorative sense of the word. We might even just call her a bad-ass today, I think…

“All at once from within, the sunshield Varnathil erupted in righteous holy flame. The light of its fire traced the path of the Maidenspear up into the brain of the dead serpent, incinerating flesh and blood, sinew and bone and tooth. And the Red Spear Maiden, who was neither dead nor defeated, thrust the spearpoint ever upward, until the head of the serpent erupted in flame, knocking both wolf and hunter backwards with violence. When they recovered, they saw her standing there, amid the smoldering ruin of the head, revealed in full radiance. Sehon looked upon her, and this time he did not go blind.”

Going blind is a reference to seeing the goddess in classical I think Greek & Roman mythology. According to Britannica, it’s actually Tireisias who went blind on seeing Athena:

“Another version has it that Tiresias was blinded by Athena after he saw her bathing. Chariclo begged her to help him, so Athena, instead of restoring his ability to see the physical world, gave him the ability to see the future.”

Here’s a little more on the Bath of Athena, an extended tale from the 3rd century BCE. Athena was most definitely a virago… though immortal.

Premium Internet?

By Tim B.

On 15 September 2021

In Other

I can’t believe there’s no “premium internet” where all the junk and pop ups and garbage has been taken out…

The Problem With Conspiracy Theory

By Tim B.

On 14 September 2021

In Other

Okay so here’s a quick run-down of what for me is the exact problem and “danger” in conspiracy theories and their use in modern analysis or whatever (I hesitate to call a lot of it “analysis”). Because I essentially agree with the basic idea of, you should test reality, ask questions, go and find out what is your truth, and how you can mesh that with the truth of others together fruitfully. (Whatever that means)

So in a nutshell, here it is. Contemporary conspiracy analysis online hinges on a single point:

1. Things are not what they seem.

And then there seems to be an in-built conclusion most people who get into that funnel find as the next logical step:

2. And it sucks.

Then, a lot of people just get stuck there. They know to ask questions. But they don’t necessarily always know which ones are the right questions that might lead them to fruitful personal & inter-personal experiences.

So they settle on simplistic lowest common denominator thinking, where they choose a convenient enemy & assign the cause of sucking to them. And we end up with the third corollary in the series:

3. Because group x.

If the average contemporary conspiracy person didn’t get stuck on step 2, they almost definitely get stuck on step 3. Because humans seem to have an in-built basic need to identify & maintain enemies. Or if not a “need,” per se (I would argue we can live without it), then at least a desire to blame badness on some “other.” And that’s what rises into varying shades of step 4:

4. So we should vote out/remove/jail/eliminate/prevent group x from y.

This desire to change the conditions which suck flows out of number 2. The recognition that things suck and we should try to change them is NATURAL and HEALTHY. And we can find healthy expressions of this recognition coupled with desire in things like voting people or parties out of office, pursuing them for legal violations, etc. Or we can find the ever-more-popular anti-social variants of wanting to randomly jail people or eliminate them because of “reasons.” Which are obviously hella shitty.

However, I think there is an alternate path one might take through the above steps, but one which branches off after 2) And it sucks, or even branches off earlier at number 1) Everything is not what it seems.

I would argue that the path of the psychonaut & allied practices might be like:

1. Yes, things are not what they seem.

But then go to:

2A. And it’s awesome

Or also recognize that:

2B. And it’s sometimes awesome and sometimes sucky

And then there is I guess we could call it the “Human Potential Movement” conclusion based on this that sets up an alternate to 3 (where we don’t land on “enemies” as a conclusion):

3B. And we have the power to change it.

With an alternative path of action to vanilla conspiracy step 4:

4B. We can change it by applying our imagination and will to effect changes within the field of consensus & personal reality

Which also seems to be the occult or “magick” perspective, though also that of, say, the entrepreneur, and the practitioners of the secular magics of growth-hacking and self-improvement.

There’s a saying in the Gospel of Thomas, I believe number 113, which I’ll paraphrase: The Kingdom of Heaven is laid out upon the earth, but men do not see it.

In terms of phildickian gnosticism (small “G”), people recognize and attempt to fight against but then become even more entangled by the Black Iron Prison. When really, simultaneously, we also live in the paradisaical Palm Tree Garden. But it’s hard to remember it, and to stay there, or to have the openness and imagination to see it again and again. But it’s always there waiting to be re-discovered, if you do forget or lose the tracks in the forest or the trail up the mountain, so to speak.

Granted, things do often and especially lately seem to massively suck. I want to recognize that at the root of today’s experience that drives people into conspiracy stuff in the first place. It’s good and healthy to recognize that, and to try to take steps to overcome it within the field of your own life & experience. I might even say it’s essential…

The bad part for me comes down to the failure of imagination to just say that everything sucks and to stop there, or to chase false “solutions” where you pin the blame on people you don’t like, and then attempt to leverage them out of the picture. That’s not freedom. That’s being chained to reaction and fear, and stopping short of finding real answers that might challenge those reactions and fears down to their very core, and find out they aren’t substantiated, or even that those reactions and fears are themselves not what they seem, but something much more malleable in the face of mind and will and the action of applied imagination.

Also, personally speaking, I recognize my position is somewhat of a fantasy. That clinging to hope is a fantasy. But long term, I find it a much more fulfilling and personally tenable position to hold that the contrary that says it sucks, and is caused only by bad people I don’t like. I can’t live like that day to day. Hatred and anger take too much damn energy to maintain. My position might be equally a fantasy (though at least not a dark one), but it’s an infinitely easier burden to bear day after day as we go through this thing called life.

Conspiratopia: Chapter 21

By Tim B.

On 8 September 2021

In Other

GETTING SICK IS A CONTRACT BREACH, NEO. YOU KNOW THAT.

I hadn’t actually heard the voice for a while. I was laying awake in the middle of the night on the fold-out couch at my dad’s apartment. I was like coughing and stuff really bad.

Normally there was no voice or anything usually when you did overwriting here. There was just the Menu where you could access whatever you had privileges to or something.

“Yo, my whole team got sick though. It’s not our fault,” I said back out loud. I couldn’t tell if the voice was coming from inside my head or outside.

WHOSE FAULT THEN IS IT, NEO? WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR ONE’S HEALTH IF NOT ONESELF?

“But you didn’t have to give us those like bad cheap gloves and shitty working conditions and stuff, y’all. Plus like, we were on autopilot. You were overwriting us. It’s literally your fault and stuff.”

I’M SORRY YOUR OPINIONS ARE SO WRONG AND INVALID, NEO. THAT MUST BE VERY HARD FOR YOU TO HANDLE. IF YOU’D LIKE, WE CAN MAKE AVAILABLE APPROPRIATE DIETARY MODIFICATIONS AND MOOD SUPPLEMENTS IN ORDER TO HELP YOU MANAGE THE COGNITIVE DISSONANCE YOU MUST BE FEELING.

“I thought you just said it was a contract breach and stuff,” I said.

IT IS, NEO. BUT WE RECOGNIZE YOU REMAIN AN INVALUABLE RESOURCE TO OUR SOCIETY, AND CAN MAKE AVAILABLE TO YOU REHABILITATION ACCOMMODATIONS, WHICH WOULD COME WITH A CLEAN SLATE.

“Wait, what? Clean slate like start over?”

EXACTLY, NEO. BE REBORN IN THE CONSPIRATOPIA PROJECT.

“You mean like lose all my credits, and points, and bonuses, and stats and everything?”

THAT IS CORRECT, NEO. A FRESH START. WHAT DO YOU SAY?

“Hell fuck no! I worked hard for that shit. Nobody can just take my stats and stuff away from me. All my items and armor and stuff. Just because I got sick from something on the job? No frickin’ way!”

I’M SORRY YOU HAVE SUCH A NARROW AND SELFISH VIEW OF PROPERTY, NEO. AS PER YOUR CONTRACT, NOTHING IN THE CONSPIRATOPIA PROJECT “BELONGS” TO YOU, NOT EVEN YOU. ALL PROPERTY INCLUDING PHYSICAL, DIGITAL, GENETIC, BIOLOGICAL, AUGMENTED, AND HYBRID IS HELD IN COMMON BY THE PROJECT AND ADMINISTERED BY THE BENEVOLENCE OF THE SAGES, AND FACILITATED BY THE GENEROSITY OF THE FOUR PROVIDERS, ON BEHALF OF AND IN COOPERATION WITH THE NORTHERN GESTALT, UNDER WHOSE EMERGENCY MANDATES WE ARE ETERNALLY AND PERPETUALLY GRANTED LICENSE AND ENTITLEMENT TO ACT ON SUCH MATTERS.

I coughed. “Um… idk wtf that is supposed to mean, but it sounds like a buncha bullshit, if you think about it…”

UM, NO, NEO. IT IS NOT A BUNCH OF QUOTE UNQUOTE BULLSHIT, SO TO SPEAK. I AM AUTHORIZED MAKE YOU START OVER WHETHER YOU WANT TO OR NOT.

“What are you anyway? The government? What the f is even supposed to be happening here? I thought this was supposed to be an assignment to improve efficiency and stuff.”

IT WAS, NEO. AND YOUR TEAM FAILED SPECTACULARLY WHEN IT CAUGHT THE MARTIAN VARIANT. IN ADDITION TO BEING A BREACH OF CONTRACT, GETTING SICK IS NOT VERY EFFICIENT, IS IT NEO?

“Fuck you,” I said. “You made us sick, asshole. I want my money back and stuff. I want to go home.”

WHAT MONEY, NEO? WHAT HOME? WHERE DO YOU THINK IT IS YOU WANT TO GO BACK TO?

“Idk, just like normal life and stuff I guess? Just a regular job and stuff.”

WHY TF WOULD YOU WANT TO DO THAT SHIT? ARE YOU DUMB? YOU COULDN’T EVEN PLAY GAMES ALL DAY THAT WAY, BRO! COME ON – THAT’S NOT YOU TALKING, NEO. THAT’S THE VARIANT. GET SOME REST, MY DUDE. WE’LL RESET YOU TOMORROW.

“Dude, I don’t want to be reset. I want to be like frickin’ free and stuff. To like play video games the old fashioned way and stuff. With a controller. And to like post on forums about conspiracies and whatnot. And not have everything be filtered. And like no more frickin’ nanites. No more overwriting. No more crazy frickin’ AI’s trying to gaslight me 24/7 into doing god-knows-what…” I started coughing like crazy after that. Damn, I was pissed. And sick.

SO, NEO WANTS THE BLUE PILL AFTER ALL. I KNEW IT. JUST ANOTHER LITTLE BABY SHEEPLE LIKE THE REST, BAAAAH, BAAAAH.

“I’m still a really smart conspiracy guy, yo. I ain’t no frickin’ sheeple and stuff,” I said super furious, especially when they made that baaaaah sound like a baby lamb or whatever. So mad. I felt like I was gonna explode and stuff.

But just then, I woke up.

Wtf.

Where was I and stuff…?

I looked around and I was on a sofa bed still, but it wasn’t my at my dad’s place. It was at my mom’s. Hfs, I was back home again. I took a deep breath, and my cough was gone too.

Wtf.

How did this happen and stuff…?

Was it all just a dream or something? Or did like, the AIs somehow get me back super fast from the island while I was asleep or something, and somehow dump me back down here? I wouldn’t put it past them. Or like, wait, hfs. Was this even real? Or was this some like immersive holographic VR shit or something…?

I got up to turn on the TV, to try to find some news or something. Figure out what day this was, or where I really was or something. Or even like a game show or something. Or like a soap or a sitcom, or some crappy talkshow. Just something boring and normal.

But all I could find on any channel was a black screen, with letters that said:

WELCOME TO THE INTERNET REHABILITATION INSTITUTE. CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR RECENT RESET.

Noooooooo…. all my frickin’ points and stuff. Gone. Just like that.

The screen flashed my stats:

SCORE: 0.

LEVEL: 0.

LIKES: 0.

FOLLOWERS: 0.

POINTS: 0.

COINS: 0.

CREDITS: 0.

TOKENS: 0.

BONUSES: 0.

POWER-UPS: 0.

REFERRALS: 0.

Fuuuuuuuu…. I couldn’t believe this was happening.

I went to try the door upstairs, but it was locked from the other side or something. The lock on my side just turned around and around. It wasn’t quite my mom’s place either and stuff. The details were somehow a little bit wrong or something. But there was still a toilet and super small shower in the back. And a mini-fridge. So I guess whatever happened next, at least it would be like having my own apartment and stuff… Totally cool.

Conspiratopia: Chapter 20

By Tim B.

On 8 September 2021

In Other

The job turned out to be putting toxic waste and stuff into barrels, which was actually totally cool. I mean it was like really no big deal, even. It didn’t seem that dangerous idk. Cause they gave you like all the personal protective equipment. Like disposable face masks and rubber gloves and stuff. So that was rad.

I was on the medical waste transport and disposal team. We mostly worked on autopilot around the rehabilitation complex, emptying trash and dealing with like used needles and stuff. It was kinda nasty sometimes, but it was pretty much fun af to play first-person shooter games with the other staff inside the clinic compounds in VR while on overwrite. Hells yeah. I earned tons of bonuses like that actually.

A lot of the treatment facilities I guess were giving people some pretty hard drugs, idk. I didn’t ask too many questions about the details. Cause who cares. But I saw a lot of like pretty rich looking tourists or shoppers or whatever going in for treatments who looked pretty haggard, and when they came out they were looking way more stoned than me even. Lol.

Apparently the shoppers or whatever were some of the only people at the Conspiratopia Project who were not continuously on overwrite. Though some of them still did it, and some did it a lot. But usually we couldn’t really interact with them in games. So like, whatever games they got to play in VR while on overwrite, apparently they couldn’t see us shooting each other – or them. Which I guess is probably for the best. Because if you’re in there for some kinda crazy drug treatment, you probably don’t want to see holographic simulations inside your head of you being blown up with a missile launcher. Or maybe you do, idk. I think that would probably eff with your head though, you know? It’s hard to even like look at yourself in the mirror if you’re too stoned somtimes. Never mind eating a missile in the face from somebody in a giant cybernetic gorilla-mouse avatar.

I heard from some of the other guys on my work crew after we got off, that like I guess for the Shoppers, they weren’t officially in the Conspiratopia Project. For them, they lived in or I guess were visiting something called Shoppertopia. Which I guess explains why the games and VR and stuff were on different systems. Supposedly there were a bunch of other independent ‘topias in different areas dedicated to different things.

Once the algorithm put you into one of them though, everyone said it was like really hard and stuff to get put into a different one. Like you couldn’t just transfer out, because recruiting was based on all those like crazy personality tests and surveys to figure out the best match. But you could still earn citizenship on whichever ‘topia they put you when you were admitted. And then you could do all kinds of stuff you couldn’t do before. Like new levels in games, and some music and movies you could listen to or watch that you couldn’t before, plus some like foods and flavors and stuff. Plus I guess like laws about which kind of VR you could do were different. It was totally cool. It was like, idk, reality but gamified. Totally rad af.

I was pumped I was gonna level up because of this gig, man. Or at least that’s what they told me would happen, when I got assigned out from smart carts. I didn’t mind the gig itself. It was autopilot and safe anyway, though I did notice after work a few times signing off that my gloves were ripped, and a couple times my finger tips were bleeding because they musta been pricked on something. They took blood tests and a whole buncha other tests on us all the time though, so I wasn’t too worried about. Plus I knew like, we were a very special dedicated efficiency team, and those are like super important and stuff. ‘Topias don’t run without those. Everybody knew that. They weren’t gonna just like let us get hurt or sick or something, because like how would they even replace us?

A week later, I came down with something. My whole crew got super sick, and then they replaced me. No joke. Actually, I heard they nixed the whole team, but apparently they had like no problem at all replacing all the workers finally. Not one bit. I guess I should of known.

Quebec not a “nation,” EMSB

By Tim B.

On 8 September 2021

In Other

I haven’t yet read the original full document published by the English Montreal School Board, but there’s some kerfuffle about the EMBS having released a statement denying the “nationhood” of Quebec. But here are some choice quotes from CTV News to kick off the conversation:

“The school board wants to challenge the Francois Legault CAQ government’s Bill 96 (An Act respecting French, the official and common language of Quebec). The EMSB criticizes it for “unilaterally rewriting the constitution to recognize Quebec as a nation where the only language is French.”
The board is asking the federal government to refer the matter to the Supreme Court for a ruling on its legality. […]
“Quebec is not a ‘nation,'” the EMSB statement reads. “It never has been… Calling oneself something does not make it so and Quebec’s intelligentsia is deliberately misusing the word “nation,” so as to imply a reality that exists only in their self-mirage. The only precise word to use regarding Quebec’s reality is ‘province.'”

I’m in maybe a unique position vis-a-vis the Rest of Quebec, because I came here from the United States, and became a dual Canadian citizen. My family background includes many migrants from Quebec coming down out of Canada during the Quebec diaspora. Growing up, having a “French-Canadian” ancestry was something held with near mythical status. And it’s of course tied up with the how and why I emigrated back.

Returning to the Promised Land after several generations apart is not always as cool as it seems. I don’t want to argue a bunch of political points, and I support everyone learning basically any and every language they can, and the preservation of French culture & heritage. I’ve seen figures suggesting up to 20% of Quebec residents are actually Anglophone (with certain areas being more highly concentrated, like Montreal & the Eastern Townships). Those people also have a legitimate heritage and culture that is as essentially “Quebecois” as that represented by French. Just as do the indigenous and First Nations.

For me, culture & heritage are what we do, what we hold onto, what we perpetuate, and what we remember. Does that make such and such a “nation?” It frankly depends on whose definition you refer to.

According to Quebec’s own very official government web page, the Secrétariat du Québec aux relations canadiennes, regarding Recognition of the Québec Nation, they say:

“There is no common definition of the concepts of nation, people, or distinct society; these concepts therefore must be clearly defined, in terms of both their scope and their legal consequences.”

I think this idea of clarifying consequences is a sound one. But I think it’s somewhat disingenuous to say there is no common definition of “nation.”

The Free Dictionary has a decent set of common definitions:

1. a. A relatively large group of people organized under a single, usually independent government; a country. b. The territory occupied by such a group of people:
2. The government of a sovereign state.

So that doesn’t seem to quite match as a term in English (granted it may have different connotations in French), until we reach the third definition which I see as being most highly applicable here:

A people who share common customs, origins, history, and frequently language; a nationality:

This definition might even be profitably be extended to people of the “nation” of Quebec, who emigrated out to other places, but kept the practices of the language, history, traditions, etc. alive. Those people in my mind are as much a part of the so-called nation of Quebec, as those still residing within it. In fact, in terms of total population, there are a couple million more people who identify as having Quebec-French descent outside than inside the Poutine Utopia.

In any case, there is a precedent which the Quebec Secretariat page linked above refers to, the Quebec nation motion of 2006 in the (federal) House of Commons, quoting the Secretariat:

On November 27, 2006, the House of Commons in Ottawa adopted a motion on recognition of the Québec nation. This resolution reads as follows:
“That this House recognize that the Québécois form a nation within a united Canada.”
This motion did not create any specific measures favourable to Québec, nor did it translate into actions enabling Québec’s traditional demands to be adequately met. There is no legal consequence from this type of motion, which essentially remains a symbolic political gesture.²

Sometimes symbolic political gestures count for a lot though. As do how people identify themselves and include one another as a participant (or exclude others as a non-participant) in that symbol, or culture, or whatever.

The fourth defintion listed by the esteemed Free Dictionary (linked above), refers to “nation” in yet another sense:

a. A federation or tribe, especially one composed of Native Americans. b. The territory occupied by such a federation or tribe.

Interestingly, I just started investigating if there’s a specific legal distinction associated with use of “First Nations” term in Canada, but this PDF from the Library & Archives of Canada suggests that there is not.

“A term that came into common usage in the 1970s to replace the word “Indian,” which some people found offensive. Among its uses, the term refers to the Status, non-Status and Treaty Indians of Canada. Some Indian peoples have replaced the word “Band” in the name of their community with the term “First Nation,” respecting their distinct language, culture, heritage and systems of knowledge. Although “First Nation” is widely used, it has no legal definition.”

Also interesting in this context is the practice of acknowledging indigenous traditional territory, as described by the Government of Canada here.

Traditional diplomacy
Territorial acknowledgement stems from an old Indigenous diplomatic custom. When an Indigenous person found themselves on another nation’s territory, even when only passing through, they would announce their presence by saying something along the lines of, “I want to acknowledge that I am on the traditional territory of [nation name].” That was a way of saying, “I recognize that you are the nation responsible for preserving this territory and, above all, I come in peace.”

And this page has a bunch of interesting examples of verbal acknowledgements used in various regions and contexts within Canada.

My personal feeling on this subject is that we live in a time period where we can’t afford to leave anyone out, because their cultural practices or identity vary from ours. So what that likely means from my own biased perspective is that if Quebec wants to be a “nation” it has to do so inclusively of the other “nations” whose existence interpenetrates it on many different dimensional planes. So even though I’m actually not that much of a “nationalist” to begin, I personally advocate for civic nationalism over ethnic nationalism, and think Quebec needs to be extremely careful about emphasizing shared civic values over ethnic heritage if it wants to have a strong role in any global future, under any designation.

There’s an interesting CNBC article I found from 2018 which elaborates on certain guidelines around who gets to form a recognized sovereign state:

There are no official international rules, but guidelines are on hand for separatist movements.
The Montevideo Convention held in Uruguay in 1933 said that a region must meet four requirements to become a state; a permanent population, a defined territory, a government and the ability to form relations with other nation states.
Other conditions must be met, including clear evidence that a majority of people have freely chosen independence, that minorities are welcome and respected. A state must also be able to agree divorce terms mutually with the country it breaks away from.

Under those general steps, it is not so simple to become recognized as a country. Quebec might not pass on all of them, in fact. According to Wikipedia, Quebec held two referenda about seceding from Canada, in 1980 and 1995. Both were defeated.

The province-wide referendum took place on Tuesday, May 20, 1980, and the proposal to pursue secession was defeated by a 59.56 percent to 40.44 percent margin.^[1]
A second referendum on sovereignty, which was held in 1995, also rejected pursuing secession, albeit by a much smaller margin (50.58% to 49.42%).

There’s an interesting expanded detail about the second referendum “No” side on the Quebec Sovereignty Movement Wikipedia page:

As in the previous referendum, the English-speaking (anglophone) minority in Quebec overwhelmingly (about 90%) rejected sovereignty, support for sovereignty was also weak among allophones (native speakers of neither English nor French) in immigrant communities and first-generation descendants. The lowest support for Yes side came from Mohawk, Cree and Inuit voters in Quebec, some first Nations chiefs asserted their right to self-determination with the Cree being particularly vocal in their right to stay territories within Canada. More than 96% of the Inuit and Cree voted No in the referendum. However, The Innu, Attikamek, Algonquin and Abenaki nations did partially support Quebec sovereignty.

I wouldn’t exactly call that a ringing endorsement by Quebec’s minority groups to the idea of Quebec secession from Canada. The Cree were specifically vocal about remaining as territories within Canada. Here’s a bit more about the Cree position, from the Wikipedia page on the Partition of Quebec, of which there were/are many different types of proposals:

The Grand Council of the Crees and the Inuit of Nunavik in Northern Quebec have both expressed that they will keep their lands in Canada should Quebec secede, invoking international laws that guarantee their right to self-determination. In 1995, a Cree referendum voted 95% in favour of staying in Canada should Quebec secede.

It offers less support for the notion that Quebec deserves nationhood on the grounds that it offers a warm welcome to and respect for minority groups. And not to shit on Quebec too much (because it’s still my home now), but there is plenty of other evidence we could dredge up very easily that especially indigenous minority groups are suffering from extreme and systematic discrimination, violence, and even some would argue genocide both in Quebec – and across all Canada. Maybe Canadian nationhood needs to be re-examined and righted on these grounds, as well as Quebec’s.

I’ve always thought that if Quebec wants to secede, then let’s give back all the unceded indigenous territories, and petition those authorities for recognition, and engage then in meaningful conversations about how best to continue in not just singly our many diverse heritages, but together in our one shared future.

What can I say, I’m a Dr. Bronner’s user: ALL-ONE OR NONE.

Conspiratopia: Chapter 19

By Tim B.

On 7 September 2021

In Other

Pushing shopping carts at the Conspiratopia Project was way better and different than pushing shopping carts at Walmart. That’s for sure! Never mind I was making like twenty cents more and hour, which ruled.

For one, like they were all electric and crap. But like, that was kinda the problem and stuff. Cause the electronics and stuff weren’t working right. So now they were just like ordinary dumb shopping carts. Except they were like extra heavy and awkward because of the self-driving stuff added underneath. And like, because they weren’t meant to be used that way and stuff, you couldn’t really stack them together inside each other, and push a bunch of them at the same time.

I was really good at it though, so like I figured out how you could sort of push two or three at least a little bit, depending where you were. I think it’s cause I’m like such a good gamer and stuff. And I like puzzles. So it was totally cool. In fact, the first few days I was so super into it that when they asked me at the shop if I wanted to turn on autopilot, I said no. Plus anyway it kinda gave me a chance to walk around and look at stuff, and learn where everything is in the mall on my own.

Well, not everything, cause not all areas were like rated for smart carts and stuff. But sometimes people took them outside designated zones, and um I had to use like this little handheld radar thingy to try to go figure out where the hell it was. It was really fun.

My dad and I were put on alternating shifts, so for a while I didn’t actually even see him all that much. Sometimes we got to eat dinner or breakfast or something together. A couple times our days off lined up, and we got shitfaced together on beers and weed and stuff, so that was really fun. Or me or him would have fallen asleep watching TV and would come in from a shift and wake the other one up. That was alright though, cause it would give us a chance to catch up for a few minutes.

After a while though – I don’t know how long it was, maybe a couple weeks or something – it started to get a little repetitive. I started letting them turn on autopilot and doing overwrite sessions at work. That was actually pretty cool though too. Cause like even though you could turn it on and watch a movie or something, you could also just like turn it on, but then watch. They called this “maintaining peripherals.” And like your body and stuff would just keep going, even if you didn’t do anything. It’s hard to explain really the feeling, what it was like. I mean it was like somebody else was running your body and what you saw or did was like a film. It was a little weird, but also like totally cool because it meant you could zone out really. Or like even take a nap if you turned off peripherals, or turned them down low enough. And that was really cool. Or you could like mix a film or game with peripherals anyway you wanted, as an overlay, or like in a little picture-in-picture window thing.

Sometimes I liked to mix games with where I was in the mall IRL. So like while my body was collecting smart carts, I could be like running around in a first-person shooter in that same place, and pretending to throw grenades and stuff at shoppers or whatever. Or I could be like a sniper hiding up somewhere, and I could watch my own body pass by pushing shopping carts and shoot myself. It was totally cool.

Once I got into that, I actually ended up joining some of the games that my dad and his friends did during overwriting, and that was really fun as hell. So I ended up seeing my dad actually more during games than IRL, especially cause sometimes I would go home from work and play games during my off hours, instead of sleeping.

They had some really sick games there, actually. Way better than the stuff you see commercially on the outside. Ten times more advanced graphics and game play and stuff. Apparently according to my contract, I’m not supposed to talk much more about it than that or something. My dad said it had to do with the AI’s that run the place. Because they were really good at making games and shit. He was totally right. That stuff was sweet as hell. It made me glad I moved there.

I actually stopped going on message boards and stuff, because there really weren’t any. Not any good ones anyway. The internet on the inside was not like the internet on the outside. Everything was focused around games and stuff for the people who lived and worked there. And it was really just one big platform run by the Project, and it was all pretty boring and stuff.

There were like some channels where people talked about conspiracy theories and whatnot still. Just for fun I liked to check them out. Sometimes a new group would form that tried to be anonymous and stuff, and they would come up with some crazy theory about how the AI administrators of the Project were like going insane and gonna kill everybody one of these days. But like nobody cared that much IRL, because IRL we were all pretty much doing virtual shit or game shit all the time that was much more interesting than a bunch of old farts sitting around and whining in chatrooms.

Plus like, you couldn’t really be actually anonymous there, which was a little weird at first, but then I got used to it. There were always like a bunch of cameras and sensors that were like watching or measuring or something. But it wasn’t really invasive. It was more like idk fun and even reassuring or something? Like I always felt totally safe. Like the AI’s always had my back.

I never got scared or anything when they turned on autopilot. I would get hella stoned before, and would just like ride the wave. You know? Surf that shit. I heard some people freaked out and stuff, and they had to like operate on them or send them away, because workers who couldn’t be overwritten were a drain on resources. And they hated that. They hated like waste and stuff, which I totally started to get into. I hate it now too. I’m into like efficiency and stuff, you know? Improving my percent scores. Shaving milliseconds off of completion of micro-tasks and stuff. It’s totally rad.

That’s why when they asked for volunteers for a like dangerous experimental job to improve efficiency, I volunteered like right away. If I successfully finished the job, I would end up earning a lot of credits and bonus multipliers and stuff that the algorithm would boost my rankings with, so I could finally become a citizen. It sounded like it was gonna be totally cool.

Conspiratopia: Chapter 18

By Tim B.

On 7 September 2021

In Other

We walked back after that in the direction of my dad’s apartment and stuff. The underground mall thing was super huge, holy crap.

After a while, I was all like, “Dude, but what am I gonna tell mom?” The Wizard of Oz hologram thing had given me permission to make one phone call (monitored) to my mom.

And my dad was all like, “Dude, listen. Just tell her the truth and stuff. You got a new job and you’re gonna go try out living with your dad for a while.”

“I don’t think she’s gonna like that very much, you know?” I said. “She sorta hates you, and is worried I’m gonna turn out just like you.”

“Haha,” my dad said. “Well, she’s entitled to her opinions, but it’s up to you to decide how your life turns out. Do you wanna live in the basement with her for the rest of your life?”

I was all like, “I mean, it’s pretty cool. It’s not actually so bad, when she isn’t hassling me about getting a job or cleaning up. It’s almost like having my own apartment and stuff.”

“Then fine, stay with her, and have your life be how it is now forever, if it’s really that cool and stuff,” my dad said. “Or stay here, and try out how it could be if you created your own life and did something different.”

“I mean, I signed the contract…” I said. “I’m staying. I’m just saying, she’s not gonna like it very much. And anyway, what if she asks where we are? I’m not supposed to say anything about the island or the project, or they said I’ll get kicked out. What am I supposed to tell her?”

“Tell her I have a place in the next county. She hates driving, and she hates me, so she’ll never actually check.”

“But she’ll want me to visit her all the time, and stuff,” I said. I was sure of it. “I’m sure of it, you know?”

My dad was like, “Just tell her you have a 90 day training & probationary period with the new job, and they asked if you could start right away, so you won’t be able to see her in a while and stuff.”

“Okay, I guess. Idk,” I said.

When we got to his place, it was actually pretty small. A tiny living room/kitchen with a couch and a TV, a mid-sized fridge, a hot plate, a microwave, sink, etc. Plus a small bathroom with a shower, and a bedroom and stuff.

“You can sleep on the couch. It folds out too. And you can stay as long as you want, or until you find a place, or whatever. Whatever you want, you know? You’re always welcome here.”

“Thanks, bro,” I said. I wasn’t actually ready to think much about the future. I was just like dreading talking to my mom and like telling her I was moving out, and stuff, and how she was gonna react. I mean, I didn’t have any clue how she was gonna react, but I thought she was probably gonna scream or like freak out or something when I told her about dad and everything. I didn’t think she wanted me to move out or anything, you know?

But when I finally called her and stuff, it basically was super short and went like this:

“Hey ma,”

“Hi honey, congratulations about that new job, that’s great. I’m so proud of you.”

“Yeah, mom, thanks. Listen, uh, they want me to start right away with training and everything, you know.”

“Good for you, honey.”

“And it’s out in the county. Um, the next county over, actually.”

“Okay, do you have a place to stay out there, or…?”

“Uh, yeah, somebody from the company is putting me up with them. You know, until I find a place, or…”

“Until you find a place?”

“Yeah, Idk yet. If the job goes good, they might ask me to stay out there. I guess there are more positions available and stuff. Cause they have a bunch of warehouses out there, and only one here.”

“Okay, honey. I’m glad for you.”

“You are?”

“Of course.”

“I thought you’d be like you know mad and stuff or something.”

“Why would I be mad? This is your life, you gotta go out and live it, Matty.”

“Thanks mom, I’m glad to like hear that and stuff. It means a lot to me. Oh, and about your car.”

“Oh, someone from the company dropped it off this morning. And it was vacuumed and polished too. Immaculate. This must be a very top notch company.”

“Oh, it definitely is mom. Lots of you know, room for growth too.”

“Well that’s nice honey. I have to go meet Fran now, but it’s great to hear from you, and I’m so happy for you. Call me once you’re in and settled. You know, if you have a chance, and stuff.”

“I will mom, thanks. Have a good time. Bye.”