The Subtle Art of Mind-Control (Part II)

the Lonely Brain Problem

What is the Lonely Brain Problem?

To explain, let's focus in on the squishy thing between your eyes sitting inside that bony prison you like to call 'your head.' 

Your skull. Your noggin. Your cranium. 

If you find this in someone’s basement, get out of there now.

Regardless of what you like to call it, it is really just a container for the brain. And simplistically, no matter how sophisticated your container gets, conceptually you are just a brain in a vat. 

Your vat just so happens to be connected to four long spindly appendages that divides further into five shorter, more stubby appendages. These appendages can bend and twist and wrap itself around things and through good old fashioned training, we develop the ability to interact and manipulate the various objects around us. 

Your vat also has many holes. 

Some holes are great to put things in and some are great for having things come out. You never really want to confuse these functions, but for some people, these holes are indeed multifunctional if you catch my drift. 

These holes are vital, because as a brain in a vat, you are needy and high maintenance. You can’t just be content with simply being. You need stuff! You need a lot of stuff and you need them all the damn time! 

Energy, oxygen, water, nutrients! 

You use your spindly appendages to navigate the world finding and putting variations of these things into your main hole, allowing them to make their way to you through a complicated system of tubes and chutes. Because you are a high-maintenance brain-in-a-vat, you then make a mess of all the nice clean things that are given to you and you turn it all into a stinky, filthy, awful brown goo that you then have to get rid of. 

Luckily, there’s a hole for that too. 

Becky looks down in horror and in amazement at what she just produced. She could tell it was big when it was coming out, but now that she was staring at it, she couldn't imagine just how big. Oddly enough, there is a small sense of pride. She calls her husband over to come look. "We'll have to name him Bearsly," she coos. Becky and her husband hold each other as they bathe in the sunlight of parenthood.

You do this day-in and day-out without stop. Your existence depends on it. 

Unfortunately, due to the nature of the environment you live in, this is not a one man job. Your ability to procure these resources and and satisfy your neediness requires the cooperation and help of other brain-in-a-vats. 

Since the beginning of time, as a a brain-in-a-vat, the fundamental question has always been that of control - control of resources and influence of others in procuring those resources. 

Many call it teamwork. Some call it "working together to enhance survival." But at the end of the day, what most interactions boil down to is about getting other brain-in-a-vats to do something that benefits your brain-in-a-vat. 

The most efficient and obvious way to do so, as we have discussed, would simply be mind control. It is the ultimate and most fundamental superpower. If you could use all other brain-in-a-vats as simple extensions and figurative appendages of yourself, life would be immensely easier.

One pale brain-in-a-vat admires the many darker appendaged brain-in-vats working to provide his a-hole, with sustenance. 

But you don’t have that power. None of us do, at least not in its imagined, supreme, unadulterated form. Control exists on a spectrum and within that spectrum, the best most people can do under equal circumstances is to influence and to persuade. We convince others that doing the thing you want is beneficial for themselves too. A simple trade. A simple compromise. 

Now here-in lies the problem.