The Great Simplification with Nate Hagens - The Fellowship of the Ring - 'Bend Not Break' Version | Frankly 58

Episode Date: March 29, 2024

In this Frankly, Nate recasts his favorite book series, the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien, with some speculative "archetypes" of our human world grouped by various timelines. The eventual reduction in energy and material accessibility will likely alter the archetypes that we're familiar with today - perhaps to become something not helpful to larger society. What categories of human archetypes in the future will have the potential to best influence their communities and the Earth? What will the most powerful among us choose when it comes to protecting their (monetary, temporary) wealth vs using it towards prosocial collective responses? Finally, and most importantly what archetypes will form a new Fellowship of humans to 'bring the ring to Mordor' during humanity's 'Bend not Break' moment? Which archetype do you resonate with? Are there others?   Watch on Youtube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oh-zdo-l8I   For Show Notes and More: https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/frankly-original/58-the-fellowship-of-the-ring-bend-not-break-version  

Greetings. I'd first like to apologize for last weeks, frankly. Not really an apology, but an explanation. Those beeps were a last-minute addition to kind of call up a metacognition from the viewers on what could I have said there that would have been triggering. But I didn't think that many of you've listened to this on iTunes and Spotify in different countries and might have wondered what the heck was going on. So not an apology, but a promise that I won't do that again. But I'm going to try different creative things. I'm trying to do one of these Franklies every week and lots of other things to work on.

And they have to be playful and creative for me. Otherwise, I won't do them. So please stay tuned. Today I'm going in a totally different direction. Like many of you in your 50s, well, or 40s or 60s, J.R. Tolkien's books and subsequent movies based on the books had a big impact on your fantasy worldview of how that book kind of was an analogy for our modern society. I read those four books, The Hobbit and the Three Toms of the Fellowship of the Ring, the Two Towers and the Return

of the King when I was 13. I read them again when I was 20, and I read them again in my 40s. I think each of those nine characters in the fellowship represented a certain archetype. Legolas was the warrior. Gimli was represented the industry and Aragorn was the hero or Frodo. And what I'd like to do today is talk about the archetypes in our modern society, where they're headed, and what sort of a fellowship of the ring, metacrisis version, do we need in coming decades. So first of all, our modern archetypes. There's lots of them, but let's just look at some main ones. There's the banker or investor that uses optimal foraging theory dynamic as a biological organism,

coupled with a culture with lots of energy surplus. It is a respected profession. Finance is overlaid on top of energy, materials, technology, and ecology. is the worker around the world. There are billions of nine to five workers that combine with machines and energy to create products. They don't make a lot of money. In fact, the correlation between money supply and income is incredibly correlated to the top 1%. And the bottom half have basically been flatline the last few decades. I digress.

The third category of archetype is the technologist. Better and better chips and innovation and efficiency and inventions have continued widening the straw and propelling growth forward in a naive progress sort of way. Technologist is an archetype. Next, we have the barker in a society full of energy surplus near the last stage before the energy surplus gets dissipated or consumed in society is the salesman. And the salesman add on 10 or 15%, which keeps them employed. So we have salesmen or barkers as a archetype riding the carbon pulse. Next is the scholar, and we have academics, scientists, university professors around the world. Next would be the warrior.

We have military people in the United States, especially in the United States, and around the world, young men and women that work for the Air Force, the Army, the reserves, the Marines, and other foreign militaries. We have the preacher, which is not a salesperson. person per se, but someone who evangelizes ideas, often connected to religion, but not necessarily. We have the consumer, which is those people, especially in the global north that on the backs of energy surplus have created houses full of 60 or 70 items that need to plug in and have access to electricity, short-term stimulation, technology, iPhones, Disneyland trips, sporting events, vacations, et cetera. And the last archetype of modern society is the elite, the 1% of people that are living high

on the carbon surplus and their roles in modern society, irrespective of what they do, a lot of people still aspire to this archetype of being elite. except these nine archetypes are what has worked in the past, what our culture has aspired to and accepted and culturally advocated in the past 50, 70 years. We are now approaching either a Mordor economy where AI and the productivity straw widens our sucking up of ecosystem services, planetary health, or we reach limits of productivity, and as our energy declines, we're going to have the name of this podcast, a great simplification, which is a reduction in energy and material benefits to most people. So where do these archetypes, these current archetypes morph to, lead to under a likely scenario in coming decades? It's while the banker may morph to a hoarder where loss aversion keeps those people from being prosocial and part of their community and tries to hold on to what they've, the excess claims

on reality that they've accumulated. The worker in a place where AI is getting more prevalent, energy surplus goes away, and wealth inequality increases, the worker can become the indentured or even the slave in many places. Patrick Nodle on recent podcast told me that, you know, depending on the definition, we have more slaves today than any time in human history on the planet. The Barker, who lives on the energy surplus that powers salespeople going forward may morph into the grifter, someone that doesn't have the ease of having a job as they did in the past and turns to whatever method they can to make ends meet. The scholar could morph into the farmer as we need a lot more people working

on the land and generating real surplus as opposed to a deputy dean for student affairs or some esoteric PhD that's not really contributing to what the future will need. The warrior, will all these military people instead of fighting other countries be need as an enforcer to keep civilians and the peace? We recall the George Floyd situation. Is that going to repeat and escalate? The preacher, well, the preacher will always exist as an archetype in human cultures, maybe with a lowercase P and a smaller megaphone. because they won't have access to their own AM radio station with the way the internet works today.

The consumer may morph to the addict where we still have access to goods and services and stability, but a lot of the things that gave us our short-term dopamine hits are no longer available and that could be fine, but for the average person that might have some many withdrawal symptoms. And lastly, the elite. This morphs into a wild card. It could go two different ways. I almost thought of saying the loci, which was the Star Trek episode with the half black face and half white face with two different personalities. The elite could go the way of the hoarder and just try and build bunkers around the world and live off. their historically stored surplus or the elite could play a huge role in a collective

response to the Great Simplification. So these are the archetypes just hypothetically how I see them potentially unfolding in coming in decades. But what are the archetypes that we need? What are the archetypes knowing what we do about the system science of our world? What would be the nine archetypes that our future needs. First, the ecologist, someone who understands the interrelationship of things, the interrelationship of humans to nature, to soil, to the biosphere, the inner relationship of academic topics and how they explain reality from a fundamental level. The engineer, someone that has the scientific knowledge of building,

and blueprints and scaffolding and electronics and how to actually look at a system from an engineering perspective in case hard decisions need to be made in that realm. The ancestor, we're all here as products of our successful ancestors, but what's happened now is all of our ancestors lived on an ecologically empty planet. We don't. And we are ancestors to what comes after,

not only our species but other species as well, complex life. We are the ancestors of complex life in coming centuries and millennium. And so almost this replaces the preacher in a way. It's someone that has sapience, has wisdom in in addition to cleverness and looks at our impact of being good ancestors to the future. The craftsman, I thought about saying the MacGyver, but some younger people might not know what that is, but someone who can build things with their hand using a variety of materials, perhaps not with the global supply chains and Home Depot and Walmart access that we have today, but a craftsman.

The healer, right now we have doctors and nurses. I think in the future, the healer is going to be an important archetype. We're going to have to get 80% of the health benefits using 20% of the plastics and overnight resources that we have today. That's going to require more of a generalist sense in medicine, but also a lot more mental, physical, psychological, resilience and well-being before people are sick, including potentially new food systems. The stalwart. Sam Gamji was such in the Lord of the Rings. There are people who are, and Carl Jung had one of his

12 archetypes, if I recall, was the regular person. We're going to need an anchor or a ballast or someone that just acts as a rock in the room to support others. That, that is strong and is just kind of an even keel temperament. The warden or the earth warden, this is going to be someone who understands ecology, but stands in defense of the natural world and the other critters we share the planet with, and that this is someone who lives in our communities as an archetype that actually prioritizes the health and protection of other species and our local. ecosystems and watersheds and prioritizes that over monetary profits. The Merry Maker also could

be jester or artisan or musician or something, but we need someone in our society that lifts us into joy with poetry and art and music and dance. And right now we've got super normal stimuli sort of access, but the merrymaker isn't of the human quality and the way it was in the past. And finally, the matriarch or the mother or even, yeah, some the governess maybe. Let me start that over. And finally, the matriarch. some bastion of feminine wisdom that's more longer looking, more right brain-centered than our current society.

We need an archetype for the future that is akin to that. So these archetypes of the future are not the fellowship I had in mind because there are three timelines of the future. There's right now our current business as usual, which is unsustainable and has a road close sign in the future. There is the distant future 20, 30, 40 years from now after we've navigated the bringing the ring to Mordor situation, which I'm going to talk about in a second. That's where these nine archetypes reside is in the future. And we need those people today as well, but this is not what's going to get us through the

bender break moment in coming years and decade. So there is a third timeframe, which is the next decade or so, what are the archetypes that we're going to need in our society to meet this incredibly difficult challenge of respecting our biosphere and having the human economy thrive? but not eat our home. So here in no particular order are some archetypes for the bend or break moment. The silver tongue. We have a tribal temperament and we have social media has polarized and splintered

all the various demographics in our society. We have so many single issues siloed analyses. And we're going to need an archetype to translate and act as a diplomat between these various factions. Otherwise, we have no hope. This is one of the dearly needed archetypes and at high levels in your community, but also at the UN and in Washington and abroad. The alchemist, the alchemist historically combines different counties. into potions and formulas.

The alchemist during the bender break moment understands our biophysical balance sheet and knows that we use money and technology as society markers for energy materials and ecosystem impact. And we're going to have a shrinkage on the former versus the latter. And the alchemist is to be fluent in this

and to prepare benign pathways for how that shrinkage occurs. occurs. The disarmor. I think that I like that word anyways because we should disarm people with the truth and move to a different Overton window sort of conversation, but that's not what I had in mind. We have over 12,000 nuclear warheads. Hardly anyone is focused on what's going on in Russia and Ukraine and Israel and Gaza other than the horrible loss of life. But this undergirds a huge instability in the way the world is in coming decades. And unless we're able to take the non-military path, I don't see how this all doesn't end up

in a conflagration. We need serious disarmament techniques. So an archetype there is a peace activist, if there's such a thing, or something more Machiavellian to reduce the risk of bright flashes. The muse, we need someone without a specific goal that acts as an inspiration as some little turbo boost to other people with warmth and love and music. and kindness and that this is infectious and spreads that dynamic around more people in a time of increasing chaos and despair, the muse is going to be an important archetype. The Barber. We are in a biophysical way playing a giant planet-sized game of musical chairs, and there are going to be haircuts. There's going to be triage needed, and we're going to need people,

that at local levels, at all levels, that prioritize what we spend resources on. And some things are going to be dead ends. And some of our financial chits that represent reality in our minds may not actually ever be called into being spent on reality. And there's a difference between nominal and real reality as far as inflation. So I think there are haircuts on the way, especially in the global north, and to have an expert archetype, understanding that and prioritizing it is something important. The governess could be governor. I chose governess.

Our ways of making decisions right now are not suited for what's ahead. and we need different forms of making good decisions. And I'm not an expert on that, but that archetype is deeply needed, the governess. The wellspring for this fellowship that I'm describing here, there could be one who acts as just a central node of power and energy and enthusiasm and support that when the other get beaten down or discouraged or slip up, there's always this pushing, this thread, this unity.

Gandalf was kind of this in the Lord of the Rings, but it doesn't have to be a powerful, charismatic person other than a really strong, deep-running ethic of a human being. And you know those people in your own community. We need more of them. Last but not least, we need an archetype of the catalyst. If we recall in the Lord of the Rings, Frodo was the hero, but even he was unable to take the ring to Mordor. It required Sam and Ghalm, who was kind of a tragic monster. They were catalysts that changed the result of the story. And I think many of you may think what role can I play in what's coming? You can be a catalyst. You do your job, live with your family, enjoy your life, learn and pay attention to what's going on. And you never know when your actions

could shift the larger story. The most important part of this little, frankly, reflection, I've outlined some, you know, playfully, some categories of archetypes. When I read the Lord of the Rings, I loved the magic swords and the dragons and the different species other than humans. But the really great feeling I had when I was reading it for three hours a night and didn't want to put it down, It was the feeling of camaraderie and fellowship. These nine archetypes I just outlined have to work together and not, we can't solve what's coming, just solo. There's got to be little groups, little fellowships all around the world. And this is one of human superpowers.

It's forming small groups of diverse skills and temperaments and attitudes and bells and bells and whistles. collaborating towards a greater goal. The greater goal is how do we navigate the great simplification without a collapse, without a nuclear war, and without collapsing the biosphere. This is the largest David and Goliath or forgot the Bard's name versus smog in Lord of the in the Hobbit. But we have to create these fellowships metaphorically on a societal level and perhaps not so metaphorically in your own community and watershed. I hope this made sense and we'll talk to you next week. Thank you.