Daddy Bezos and Uncle Elon say high. Another good opinion has been voiced by Randal Monroe of XKCD fame. "I don't worry about when AI becomes smart enough to rule us. I worry about the time between now and then where "AI is smart enough to allow a handful of wealthy people to control a massive army of drone kill bots".

He pictured what AI would do under capitalism. But it is better to see it as "Automation", it has been happening. The better the technology the less labour power averaged people had and the more easily rich people would make profit and exploit people.

@@theelectricprince8231 I'd be careful about making such precise statements. Herbert's politics were broadly small-c conservative and he was a critic of socialism as well. I'd say Herbert was more generally skeptical/fearful of any societal lever that allowed a small group so much control with so little consent. Just as he was skeptical/fearful of charismatic leaders.

@@Bustermachine I don't think he critised socialism but I feel like he was an Anarchist.

@@theelectricprince8231 He was a critic of the Soviet Union (which yes, I know wasn't socialist) but I think he was generally skeptical of any type of mass movement or consolidation of power. Even distributed power. Anarchist might be the correct description but I've heard of his politics being described as conservative as well and I think a lot of his beliefs don't really line up with modern western anarchist thought (such as it is). I suppose it would depend on examining him in a historical context. Easy to forget, but Herbert was born literally a hundred years ago and even Dune itself is now over fifty years old. So there's certainly much that is dated despite rather timeless qualities. Edit : For instance, there's another hoopla right now over people discussing if Dune is a 'White Savior' narrative. I'd urge people not to get angry at this and big brain how the media just doesn't understand dune. Dune is a warning against Messiah but that doesn't mean it isn't stepped in orientalism. It was a product of its time and herbert would have been immersed in those ideas all of his formative years.

Well, isnt the Diktatel Letos private Blog?

As you leave a comment on social media.

Social media is barely any technological innovation

Private blog??? You mean a journal? 😂

@@grahamstephens1117A private blog can basically be used as a journal…I’ve used one that way before.

Leto was the most human of all.

@@dorbie Indeed. Leto would probably view the Ixian disposition towards cybernetics as incidental to their 'machine mindset' and it is not the US of the machines itself that is a danger but only introduces the possibility of danger.

Fuck that big bug

Who remembered thousands of lifetimes living as human. Serious sacrifice giving that up.

Mitwit take, but kinda funny.

This can't be overlooked. The scarcity of spice wasn't only a means of control. It was a method of making humanity chafe in their confinement. It had to be as absolute as possible. He knew given the chance the Guild would fashion an illicit revenue stream in contravention of Leto's travel restrictions. So he ensured a bottleneck of the number of Navigators they could create and maintain. So both the Ixians and Bene Tleilax found their own unique methods around it. Thus creating a situation where spice, and by extension the Guild, could never again be a limiting factor in human movement.

And the same goes with any dependency whether it'll be automation, AI, or even bio-engineered tools (i.e. Clones, Gholas).

Undoing the dependence on engineered humans (Guild Navigators, Mentats) was a side effect of the Golden Path as stated with "breaking humanity of all addictions". The No-ships were probably one of the technologies he pushed for to prevent Atreides descendants or other prescient beings from seeing a great many humans by the time of the Scattering. Those ships could space-fold using "mathematical compiler" computing systems, but did such systems represented progress away from the proscriptions of the Butlerian Jihad?

Well said.

Sadly, it is not within human nature for people to think for themselves, thus Leto's Golden Path was always doomed from the start. It would have been better had he harnessed the power of his empire to plan and guide humanity himself. If someone is in charge, it might as well have been him, who was able to see down into the future, was immortal, and had the moral fortitude to not be corrupted, even after thousands of years of rule. Instead, he had some stupid pipe dream where people would all become ubermensch, if only they just realized their own potential, and didn't let tyrants arise.

@@taliesin7913 i dont think you really understood the books. Scattering caused by Leto II meant that humanity expanded so far and wide that no one could find and rule all of it. Humanity was bound to develop into manny different species. Trough this Leto made sure no power could either exterminate or subdue humanity. Some parts perhaps but never all of humanity.

@TryllaTröllMaistre Fictitious Fables of Europa which planets language is that?

@TryllaTröllMaistre Fictitious Fables of Europa You most be the fabled Unamusing Troll,

Yes, exactly, you beat me to it by 5 months.

All Leto really needed from them was the no-ship technology. That plus the prophecy-blocking Siona genotype was all that was needed to make the Scattering possible.

@@hoi-polloi1863 True, but I think there is also the idea that he was culturally instilling certain concepts and ideas that led to the Scattering. He saw that a people that could be ruled by one institution, could be destroyed at once by an enemy. That people drifted into a false since of security, only to have their descendants succumb to invasions and disaster. In the Golden Path, he rejects the primal inclination for a tribal society with set roles and a guaranteed existence, and sees a humanity that is cautious toward its own nature.

….LAST time? (laughs in sci fi future fashioned after feudal past, laughs in confusion)

*no doubt his view of social media as it has become would be seen as a self inflicted cancer a sweet poison that many chose not to live without*

I don't know if I necessarily agree if 'thinking' machines are what lead to the numbing of thought. In my experience, 'dumb' machines (such as on a production line) or even unmechanised menial tasks, contribute just as much to the need to 'tune out' so as to not go mad. It's just not the same as handcrafting something, which is a meditive, healing process. I suppose you could respond 'well he means that if we don't need to do mental work to perform the basic administrative tasks of life then we'll lose touch with the world and our place in it' or something, but that's also not really true. In a sanely run economy, automation would be a fantastic boon for everyone, as scientists thought it would be in the 1950s. They argued that by eliminating even many of the more complex tasks of general life, production, and maintenance, we'd all have more time to learn instruments, languages, sports, to raise children, to grow gardens, to meditate, to pray, to sleep. Now, of course, that didn't come true, because our economic system demands that those who work less should have less, incentivising everyone to work, thus producing an awful number of jobs that ultimately contribute nothing (and thereby ensuring that, since 1971, productivity has continued to rise every year, but wages have stayed the same). The only two ways of solving this contradiction, in my view, are to renounce all machines and return to some 'natural state' in which we will perhaps find a mystical/spiritual fulfilment that we once had (probably the more likely scenario if current trends continue, although I doubt that natural state will prove utopian), or to restructure the way we distribute the products of our labour so that either wages rise back up to meet productivity levels or we find we have no more need for the wage system. This is the less likely scenario currently, and with each passing minute our chances of achieving it drop a little further.

​@@scottmantooth8785 TBF he'd hardly be alone in that opinion. I say as I agree while addressing a stranger in a comment thread in a video served up to me by the all mighty algorithm . . . Something something, one cannot participate in society without being complicity in it, something something. Anyways. One must imagine Herbert's views evolved with the progression of technology as well. Much as Asimov failed to glean just what computers would actually be capable of, Herbert didn't really understand the shape of the emerging technology either, although I think he did understand its sociological danger. I think Herbert for instance, would have heartily approved of many of the ways we use computers for scientific and engineering endeavors. Just like he would probably approve of SOME of the ways we CAN use computers to communicate. That's because these uses complement human agency and perform tasks for us that never really involved 'thought' in the first place. Adding two plus two to get four, for instance, is not thought. Understanding why two plus two equals four and the underlying principals of mathematics, is thought. A mathematician, or someone in a more tangible field such as climatology, must understand mathematics in order to construct their models. But the raw number crunching itself is a needless burden to task them with, even for the sake of error checking which adequate knowledge to create a model will readily reveal in aberrant behavior of that model under computational simulation.

what about the media in general? people would not be convinced of many things if the media did not fabricate lies and drill them into the minds of the masses

@@smallhatshatethetruth7933 This has the taste of bait to it, but sure I'll bite. I want to make clear. None of this absolved individual morale failings. At the same time, there are media sources that have operated with integrity, but almost none of them have acted with integrity every time because, as it turns out, humans are rarely their best selves every time they are called on to be so. First, is it useful to say 'the media in general' when the media is a nebulous body with no gate keeping functionality over itself? I think this is personally silly and makes the question a moving target. Everything from the Enquirer to the Watergate Expose could be counted as 'the media'. Second, is the media solely an inviolate body pumping information into society fomr outtside, or is it responding to the punishments and rewards inflicted on it by the society it exists in? I think the truth is both at once. Some media is incentivized to report favorably on one position above all others. This isn't necessarily horrible, advocacy is not bad so long as the bias is honestly presented. Some media is outright propaganda that does seek to manipulate with straight up falsehoods. And some is greatly beholden to market force and what their viewers wish to hear. What I'm trying to say is that you're not wrong, but just blaiming 'the media' offers no solution.

Dune is not just sci-fi; it's also a great self-help philosophy!

@@mbaxter22 I, too, strive to turn myself into a worm to solve my problems and fix the world. 🥰

@@General12th There's close on 8 billion humans, 99.999% (at least) of whom are fucked up. Mending one is a trial and a triumph. 8 billion ? I shudder to think.

There's technological slavery. There's socio-political slavery. There's ideological slavery. There's economic slavery. And of course there's physical slavery. However, the most dangerous, most pernicious form of slavery is self-imposed ego-slavery. The bible calls it satan. The Buddha said the greatest warrior is the one that can conquer one's passions. If we can see from whence our motivations truly spring and hold dominion over them only then are we free. Free to to do nothing other than follow the moral imperatives of wisdom and compassion. So we are either slaves to the winds of chaos or slaves to avoiding all harm. To harm others is to harm ourselves since wisdom brings empathy. Thus it is that freedom is at best illusory and at worse an illusion.

lol. Seeing that my first thought was "Amazon warehouse."

I disagree. Wouldn’t you rather have robots rather than humans in the high stress environment of a Amazon warehouse

@@PulsefiredGaming If it wasn't for the millions who need jobs and could stand the horrible working conditions, I agree. ✌️

Bezos will learn to fear the Jihad

Too late, already have robots helping with distribution in an Amazon wharehouse. Also delivering packages in the UK (could be other places too).

​@Isolated Pixels it's true

This is why I don’t support firing/cancellation of researchers for ideological or unproven accusation reasons. Let the criminal justice system handle actual crimes, but otherwise let them keep up their societally beneficial work - modify their staffing rules if needed at most.

Since he commissioned the first no-ship, we can assume he intended them to play a significant role in the golden path.

Indeed that technology was crucial both to engineering his final downfall to start the Scattering and to ensure the role of prescience could be reduced to protect humans from his Great Enemy.

Honestly, I'd say we're living in the prologue of how Herbert would have written in it. As opposed to the Penny Dreadful Terminator Rip off his son and KJA gave us. The intense fetishization of technology, technological power, and automation. In particular the way that corporate consumerism has urged us to reorder our societies to make the adoption of automation easier. A dirty little secret of computer science. None of these 'Deep Learning' or 'Big Data' algorithms are cutting edge. Their principles were worked out immediately following WW2. They were simple immensely computationally inefficient and there was no way to funnel them enough data. Well, the internet and the smart phone solve those problems allowing massive amounts of data aggregation to take place. This produces only the illusion of intelligence, but it's good enough and can be implemented in such immense fashion while being controlled by only a very few.

Obviously. Fanfiction that missed the point.

@@Fridaey13txhOktober his son is nowhere near as worldly or knowldgable as Frank Herbert was

Now I have to admit I don't remember what version was written by. But the machines aborting babies to control the population sounds a lot like planned parenthood

@@Bustermachine We could look at it from the other side. It's possible that all "real" intelligence actually _is_ just an illusion of intelligence. Our brains are just the most sophisticated users of "deep learning" and "big data" around. The difference between us and our computers is one of scale, but not really one of kind. Maybe.

Leto is the Gandalf of Dune now

@@Akoom he is the White Wizard and the Balrog all wrapped in one.

Plans within plans...

Nice

*Bilbo; but it is Gandalf who says the line though.

I hope that it comes soon

Came here to say the same thing

As long as it is "eventually." I am happy to wait years

I figure he is editing this video to perfection for us fans. I will be worth the wait. He has the best dune videos hands down

Ditto 😎

YES! YES!

Better than those on Richess.

Never i would say

My interpretation when I first read the series was that it was leading to a survival of the fittest between the next stage of humans. Telax genetic engineering, ix cyber punk, humans 2.0 the sisters. However the face dancers, the American gothic couple, were basically an aberration to the timeline and shouldn’t have been created. That’s why they were basically hidden and stopped the path from progressing. I read the series way back in HS and realize later books basically rewrote the couple, but there were a few good years before the Brian Herbert books came out and the internet was young enough you could join a niche online group and throw out ideas.

@@alexalexander1772 Yeah, I completely agree with you. The Golden Path was about to be completed, but stopped at the last moment by the advanced face dancers who had a prescience beyond prescience that could see no-ships and the prescience of people with prescience. So while at the end of Chapterhouse humanity is still kind of fine, it all gets ensnared in the net making the golden path useless. However, Duncan and his crew do escape. I believe the golden path was intended to save at least a few billion, but it failed due to Advanced face dancers who just caught them all in a net. But, at least one crew did survive which is more than 0.

For real. As a history buff I knew of the movement but not that it had a magazine. Gotta look for some volumes. Also what remains of that movement isn’t much, best I know of is the Venus Project and resource based economy movement from Jacque Fresco.

Technocracy members were the Greyshirts

Check out a channel called transhumania, he talks about that and a bunch of others

Singapore. Technocracy + Capitalism.

It's definitely relevant considering Frank Herbert basically grew up in the context of that word used within that time period. Is understanding of technocracy would have to be derived from that

I've come around to this view after 15 years. Messiah has remained my least favorite.

@@duncanidaho6600 I don't think there's a weak book in the Saga, in my opinion. However, I would have to agree that Messiah is probably going to rank the lowest for me too.

It took me a 2nd read through of God Emperor to really appreciate it and love it even more. First time for me was a lot to take in, like for instance Leto’s observations on civilisations, rebellions, governments etc. Then I found it a lot more easier to absorb when you realise that this is a human (kinda lol) who has available to him all the experiences/knowledge of humankind’s relative past through his inner lives and so his wisdom is genuine.

Totally agree. The first Dune and God-Emperor are the only ones I've re-read more than once. Masterpieces.

Funny how I think Messiah to be outstanding. I admit, after the grand adventure of Dune it almost seems depressing...but Dune: Messiah perfectly shows the downfall of the "Hero" in ways that really got to me. The betrayal, the morals of Idaho fighting the Tleilaxu tempering, the forces slowly plotting against Paul...the older I get the more I love Dune: Messiah... Of course God Emperor of Dune is the real masterpiece because it dwells in philosophy, politics, religion, moral values and has with Leto II maybe the most alien but also human character in scifi history...and Duncan Idaho is the perfect sceptic mixed with a distrust all of us would share of being cloned into a world beyond his understanding. I probably read Dune about 200 times...but god Emperor I didn't just read over and over...it changed my outlook on a couple of things...a book that changes you is " more worth than a ten legions of the emperor's sardaukar terrortroops"😆

On Ix, maybe. Many machines on Ix.

@@dorseyblack9833 New machines... better than those on Richese. But no, the problem with the Ixians wasn't that they created tech that came about as close to violating the strictures of the Butlerian Jihad, it was the mentality that made them only care about the letter of the law, not the spirit of it. it's knowledge without wisdom. The Great Enemy that the Golden Path predicted, and which Leto II's efforts were meant to thwart were those within the Imperium that had that mentality, no matter which sector they came from. In truth, despite the fact that the Ixians were seen as the ones most likely to give birth to such an enemy given their research and technological progress, which Herbert's son seemed to favor with how he interpreted who the two mysterious figures were; the truth is that the Tleilaxu were just as likely to spawn such an enemy, with their over-reliance on organic based technology; creating such things as Futars and Super-Face Dancers.

I'd love to see Quinn dive into known space, there's so much to talk about!

Also the separatist in the Star Wars..

Ix is underground because the machines couldn't reach them there

in the past great war against the thinking machines

That's what we are meant to understand when reading about how people felt about the god-emperor. He even talks about it himself!

I DID 20 YEARS ON SALUSA SECUNDUS

almost like it's on purpose...

It's said in the books that it's name is actually a number from a dead language

And that the people of Ix long ago forgot that fact. As well as the rest of humanity having long ago forgotten their home planet..