Freedom Beside the Waves 📙
Selections | “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea” X “The Sovereign Individual”
Welcome to Selections. Where we slide a book off the shelf or a record from the stack, and talk about it. I’ve got something just for you.
I’m sure we all can point to a movie or two that shaped us from the moment we saw them as children. This small collection of films usually seems quite odd to anyone else, and we may even have difficulty explaining why exactly they so altered our outlook. Probably a combination of time and place, our own personality responding to the way a collection of images moved us in the moment. Today in Selections we will attempt the ambitious task of examining the interplay between two very different books, both written at times of scientific progress and attendant cultural upheaval. What else connects them? In my mind, a 1954 Disney classic starring James Mason, Kirk Douglas and Peter Lorre. Because since I beheld the plush steampunk interior of the Nautilus, splashed with glorious Technicolor in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, a small part of myself knew that true freedom was a lonely voyage into the depths, complete with a sumptuous library and a pipe organ.
The works we are comparing share many similarities. Both analyze the moral and societal implications of a destabilizing technological revolution cresting the immediate horizon. Jules Verne, famous for his science fiction adventures containing eerily accurate scientific predictions, argues that the turn of the upcoming century would bring an onrushing force of technology that will allow individuals to become their own masters, judges and dictators. Davidson and Rees-Mogg attempt to do exactly the same thing, only their century in question is the twenty-first rather than the twentieth. Both works meander through the fascinations of their authors (oceanic natural history and presumed mass societal breakdown, if you’re interested). But hidden within are vital thought technologies that must be brought up from the depths. The times just before and after centuries turn are often moments of confusion and exploration, as we evaluate a shifting world and try to claim our place in it. Learning from past mistakes is always preferable.
Ah! sir, live—live in the bosom of the waters! There only is independence! There I recognize no masters! There I am free!
~ Jules Verne, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the SeaIn the Information Society, no one who is truly able will be detained by the ill-formed opinions of others. It will not matter what most of the people on earth might think of your race, your looks, your age, your sexual proclivities, or the way you wear your hair. In the cybereconomy, they will never see you. The ugly, the fat, the old, the disabled will vie with the young and beautiful on equal terms in utterly color-blind anonymity on the new frontiers of cyberspace.
~ Davidson and Rees-Mogg, The Sovereign Individual
The concept of the Sovereign Individual might be as old as the first downtrodden peasant shaking his fist at the walls of a palace and muttering “Some day….” It is one of the most alluring dreams of modern society, the escape beyond borders and laws to a place where one is truly the master of their own fate. Every “off the grid” and “digital nomad” daydream is the descendant of this age-old consolation, the hope that it is possible to escape the pains and indignities of the rest of mankind. Captain Nemo is in many ways a precursor to the hopeful picture of a Sovereign Individual, a self-sufficient techno-feudal lord who governs a stateless mobile domain beyond the reach of humanity. He is free to go where he wills, snugly ensconced in an ark of wealth and leisure. All that remains is for him to enjoy the pursuits of a gentleman, rational scientific study and appreciation of what cultural artifacts he chooses to grace his surroundings. Feeling himself wronged by mankind, he now possesses the asymmetric power of a mysterious dynamo at the heart of his vessel, and can ignore or punish his fellow men as he sees fit. Like the faceless and anonymous cybernaut, Nemo is a man intentionally divorced from human contact, isolated by choice.
I am not what you call a civilized man! I have done with society entirely, for reasons which I alone have the right of appreciating. I do not, therefore, obey its laws, and I desire you never to allude to them before me again!
~ Jules Verne, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the SeaWhen technology is mobile, and transactions occur in cyberspace, as they increasingly will do, governments will no longer be able to charge more for their services than they are worth to the people who pay for them.
~ Davidson and Rees-Mogg, The Sovereign Individual
The authors of The Sovereign Individual foresaw a similar opportunity approaching at the close of the 1990s. The computational revolution was soon to exponentially warp the ways human beings dealt with each other and existed as individuals. All predictive works are easily critiqued by archly mocking their failures at anticipation, but this seems to miss the point a bit. Like Verne, Davidson and Rees-Mogg correctly identified that technology would enable the defiance of human government, as well as increasingly rendering it meaningless. We currently live in a chaotic ocean created by the web2 and web3 networks, in many ways more connected to a disparate cloud of humanity across the globe than our own geographic and national neighbors. However, a crucial point that Verne depicts is the inevitable failure of the impulse to flee beneath the waves. Nemo’s descent into megalomaniacal vengeance is intended as a warning against our hubris. No anonymous shell or mobile home can rid us of the destructive nature we bring along. For all their Nietzschean predictions that only those brave enough to forge their own destiny will survive, the authors of The Sovereign Individual do little to explain what our moral ties should be to those unable to foresee the danger. At the very least, consider with me whether your plan to become crypto wealthy and disappear beyond the reach of society includes a strong commitment to love and bless other people? And if not, how exactly are you planning to escape yourself?
We are now quarter into the century Davidson and Rees-Mogg prophesied would bring economic and viral upheaval (correct to put it mildly), as well as total failure of political entities to collect rents from their citizens (jury’s still out). But it seems quite clear that the advent of a new technological revolution hasn’t altered humanity all that much. We still use our tools to harm and defraud each other. We still manufacture elaborate environments to indulge our most heinous desires. Given the chance, we prefer selfish isolation over sacrificial sociableness with its attendant awkward uncertainties. But just because each technological advance enables us to more efficiently pursue our faults doesn’t mean that we should, or must. In fact, I think a this is the primary failure point of a futurism without moral foundation: it has no ability to speak other than in terms of historical and economic inevitabilities. It cannot reckon with our ability, I would exhort in fact our definite obligation, to live well within and despite our storm-tossed times. I have to say that in many ways the vision of The Sovereign Individual is deeply morally tempting to me personally. But I was also convinced as an adolescent that my best possible future life would be captaining a luxury submarine, on an eternal cruise below the surface of the world’s oceans. I’ve since fallen in love, fathered children, made and lost friends. I know better now.
The next time you are at the beach, enjoy the thrilling depth beneath you. Venture out to where the power of the waves humbles you and dip beneath the water to enjoy its breathtaking beauties. Hold your breath as long as you can. But inevitably the moment will come when you paddle back, walk out of the surf. Hear the happy shrieks of people you love. Feel the oven-heat of the nearest star on your face. Taste a cold drink, sit for hours watching immense power splashing harmlessly at your feet. Be as God made you. The seas aren’t going anywhere, and you can sail them whenever you wish. But live here, at the shore.
We may brave human laws, but we cannot resist natural ones.
~ Jules Verne, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
I enjoyed this overlap between past and future very much, between fiction and fact, and ending with the same reminders and warning about navigating a reality that is still governed by the same human truths. We can explore as far and as deep as we want but we can't escape ourselves.
"Be as God made you. The seas aren’t going anywhere, and you can sail them whenever you wish. But live here, at the shore." I love that! Everything I've read from you resonate with the life of mine. Trying to escape the pain life has in store for me was a reason why I chose to dive into the ocean where I could be free - but I wasn't free. I was safe but I had nothing there for me, nothing good. Looking forward to reading more of your work!