but actually; is it? it's certainly got elements of emergent agenthood: a dense core network of ideological generators (sensemakers), a fanatic cult of maximalists who allow the meme to subsume their identity, a self-sustaining metabolism (economy), an immune system (consensus)
---
RT @pee_zombie
"Is Bitcoin An Egregore" - the greatest thread in the history of postrat Twitter, keyword muted by ingroup after 12,239 QTs of heated debate,
twitter.com/pee_zombie/status/

but Bitcoin does not really seem to be a proper organism, lacking certain qualities such as a homeostasis-maintaining regulatory system, some means of reproduction, altho various forms of these seem to be emerging; see the BIPs, taproot activation, etc

---
RT @pee_zombie
homeostasis is the pursuit of biological ergodicity by living beings, an attempt to perpetually stave off the cessation of optionality, the halting state; in this way,…
twitter.com/pee_zombie/status/

Follow

do we have a coherent enough theory of egregores to reliably identify extant ones by evaluating the characteristics of various hyperobjects? there are well known hallmarks, but I'm not sure how to reliably identify one such; but I know it when I see it

---
RT @pee_zombie
when the system is a hyperobject, this entails a sort of agentic recursion; the overlay system emerges from the substrate's collective behavior, but to protect itself …
twitter.com/pee_zombie/status/

perhaps we need to consider the developmental stages of these systems, the phases traversed as they bootstrap into agency, from a viral fitness-increasing meme like money-worship, to a hyperobject like technocapital, all the way up to the very concept of God

what do they share?

how would we tell, for sure, if Bitcoin, or some other cryptosystem-community complex, has matured enough to truly qualify for the label? how many of these already exist, hidden in plain sight? and, should they exist, what, exactly, distinguishes them from AI?

Sign in to participate in the conversation
Mastodon

a Schelling point for those who seek one