We held two 0xSalon conversations under Chatham House Rule on 'Prophet Motives'. This is an audio conversation recollecting and extending those discussions. With Wassim Alsindi, Martina Cavalot, Jasmine Erkan, Ellie Hain, Kei Kreutler, Alessandro Longo & Karin Valis.
Topic page: https://0xsalon.pubpub.org/pub/oczjk65o/release/2?readingCollection=17bb1dac
Arena Channel: www.are.na/0x-salon/prophet-motives
Image generated with Craiyon and Stable Diffusion, 2022.
Prophet Motives explores imbrications of capital, technology, and divinity, with attention paid to the reshaping of the world map by would-be empires and their messianic figureheads. For as long as there has been financial capital, risk and speculation have orbited, manipulated and harvested from it. As narrative feedback machines, simultaneously reading and rewriting realities, markets exist as a distributed conversation amongst speculators driven by profit motives and an appetite for divination and prophecy. Despite the ostensible ‘neutrality’ afforded by technology advances, recognisable human characteristics and archetypes appear again and again.
Today, new strains of techno-colonialism are emerging, which are the latest of a series of echoes throughout Western history. An ascendant cabal of technology elites are attempting to reshape the world in their favour, whilst hiding in plain sight behind the faceless technologies that have enriched them. Theirs is a Promethean zealotry without faith: affecting an aura of ‘divine sanction’ for the purposes of elevating the ego, enriching the ‘chosen ones’, and creating empires of varying stripes. Was it not always so? History is littered with examples of the unintended consequences that are risked when the self-righteous set the agenda. Can foreknowledge of a prophet’s motives help us prepare for and be organised against the ‘captains of industry’ and their masculine (demi)urges?
SalonCast005: Prophet Motives