In football we used to say that you know an offensive lineman is doing his job if you never hear his name called. The offensive line is an intricate system whose purpose is to protect the quarterback and open up rushing lanes, and when a system is functioning properly, we hardly even notice it’s there. We are all embedded in, and dependent upon, systems that are largely invisible to us until they break down.
Today, systems seem to be breaking down all around us, or transforming at a pace with which it’s almost impossible to keep up. International institutions are being deconstructed, the nation state is being hollowed out, and things that used to just be taken for granted as part of life - jobs, family, community, etc - are now “problems” for which we’re all seeking solutions.
There’s no one I’d rather talk to about this than John Robb. Some of you old schoolers may remember the interview I did with him a few years ago. John is the author of Brave New War, a seminal book on War on Terror, and the changing face of warfare with the advent of technologies that allow small groups, even individuals, to disrupt the operations of states and corporations. John is a tech founder who was on the team that created RSS (so if you’re listening to this as a podcast, you can thank him for it), and was a special operator in the US Air Force. In 2017, at my urging, he started the Global Guerillas newsletter, where he discusses current events in a comprehensive, multidisciplinary way that focuses on systems, rather than simply reacting to the daily news cycle. In this interview, we discuss everything mentioned above, and we spend a long time on the implications of artificial intelligence, a subject of which John is uniquely knowledgeable. Enjoy!
Enemy, episode 2 update: I’m done with my reading. Now I’m organizing all my material and beginning to write it out. Won’t be too long now, I promise.
