re-enchanted decision-making

For Altman, the skill of pattern recognition she developed through astrology is the same skill she uses when analyzing a candlestick chart in technical analysis.

“Both technical analysis and astrology use the same mechanism where you’re looking at past cycles to predict the future,” Altman says. “One simply has a lot of pop culture with magic around... See more

The vibes are off, but they’re off fundamentally because they focus only on feelings and emotional connections that have already existed. They don’t provide or imagine pathways to new futures; they allow only for an understanding of what feels good or bad based on experiences that have already happened, things that have already been seen.

In other... See more

“When we emphasize the artificially quantized, we lose access to the glorious in-between where we all actually live. [...] We lose access to the squishy, indeterminate, and speculative. [...] We are flying with instruments alone.” - Douglas Rushkoff

In other words, “vibes” are similar to the approximations that machine learning systems use, and the two feed off of each other synergistically. The situation is precisely encapsulated by Goodhart’s Law: “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.”