[09] Cancer

Title Card

YouTube Link

Status

Editing

Transcription

Air Date

Nov 7, 2023

Target: 30-45 minutes

Script

Intro

<<dual screen, background visible>> Shift+1

ZFi: GM and welcome to Moloch Traps, our new podcast here at From Aa to Zzz. I’m ZFi, this Zombie Shepherd, and we’re excited to be bringing you this new show in collaboration with BanklessDAO and its Audio/Visual team. To be clear, opinions in this series expressed by either of us are our own opinions and do not reflect the opinions of BanklessDAO at large.

This week, we will continue to study and discuss excerpts from the "Meditations on Moloch" essay, written by Scott Alexander. The essay provides examples of multi-polar traps and delves into various instances from history, biology, and economics to illustrate how competition often results in collective harm.

In today’s episode we’ll discuss Cancer and the behaviors of such cells. Let’s start with Alexander’s words on this example.

Segment 2 — Cancer

ZFi:

(reading from Meditations)

9. Cancer. The human body is supposed to be made up of cells living harmoniously and pooling their resources for the greater good of the organism. If a cell defects from this equilibrium by investing its resources into copying itself, it and its descendants will flourish, eventually outcompeting all the other cells and taking over the body – at which point it dies. Or the situation may repeat, with certain cancer cells defecting against the rest of the tumor, thus slowing down its growth and causing the tumor to stagnate.

From a god’s-eye-view, the best solution is all cells cooperating so that they don’t all die. From within the system, cancerous cells will proliferate and outcompete the other – so that only the existence of the immune system keeps the natural incentive to turn cancerous in check.

Segment 3 —  Open Discussion

<<dual screen, full frame>> Shift+2

Zombie Shepherd notes:
unchecked growth and consumption

Cancer as self defection

Toxoplasma - changes in behavior especially an increase in dangerous behavior

Addiction - unchecked consumption to the point that it becomes detrimental to your health or lifestyle and yet you won’t stop.

Cancer as planned obsolescence via medical and food industry 

Pooled capital as cancer for society

ZFi notes:

cancerous growth is akin to the malthusian trap in reference to population growth with the “food source” being other healthy human cells.

one boom bust cycle, that takes the host organism with it when it busts

cancer optimizes for “MORE CELLS” without a reason or a goal or cooperation between cells

cells go rogue and start their own individual fish farming story, consuming at max capacity, to the unfortunate disadvantage of the properly-behaving cells nearby

as is true with moloch traps, no individual cell can choose to revert back to normal behavior, typically

Conclusion

<<dual screen with background visible>> Shift+1

Zombie Shepherd: (start and then hand off as appropriate)

Summary

What would YOU do? @listener?

Outro

Zombie Shepherd: 

Thanks for watching today’s episode of Moloch Traps. We hope you enjoy this series. As always, none of what we say is legal or financial advice, and we encourage listeners to do their own research in these areas before making any related decisions.

If you find our content informational, educational, or entertaining, and would like to support us, please collect these episodes on Hey (formerly known as Lens). 18% of proceeds go back to BanklessDAO, 2% supports Tape (formerly knows as Lenstube) for hosting our videos, and the rest helps to make From Aa to Zzz productions possible.

To stay on top of our weekly series, subscribe to us on the BanklessDAO YouTube. Don’t forget to like and comment while you’re there!

We’ll see you next time, friends!

Clickbait Titles and Descriptions

[09] Cancer

Title Card

YouTube Link

Status

Editing

Transcription

Air Date

Nov 7, 2023

Target: 30-45 minutes

Script

Intro

<<dual screen, background visible>> Shift+1

ZFi: GM and welcome to Moloch Traps, our new podcast here at From Aa to Zzz. I’m ZFi, this Zombie Shepherd, and we’re excited to be bringing you this new show in collaboration with BanklessDAO and its Audio/Visual team. To be clear, opinions in this series expressed by either of us are our own opinions and do not reflect the opinions of BanklessDAO at large.

This week, we will continue to study and discuss excerpts from the "Meditations on Moloch" essay, written by Scott Alexander. The essay provides examples of multi-polar traps and delves into various instances from history, biology, and economics to illustrate how competition often results in collective harm.

In today’s episode we’ll discuss Cancer and the behaviors of such cells. Let’s start with Alexander’s words on this example.

Segment 2 — Cancer

ZFi:

(reading from Meditations)

9. Cancer. The human body is supposed to be made up of cells living harmoniously and pooling their resources for the greater good of the organism. If a cell defects from this equilibrium by investing its resources into copying itself, it and its descendants will flourish, eventually outcompeting all the other cells and taking over the body – at which point it dies. Or the situation may repeat, with certain cancer cells defecting against the rest of the tumor, thus slowing down its growth and causing the tumor to stagnate.

From a god’s-eye-view, the best solution is all cells cooperating so that they don’t all die. From within the system, cancerous cells will proliferate and outcompete the other – so that only the existence of the immune system keeps the natural incentive to turn cancerous in check.

Segment 3 —  Open Discussion

<<dual screen, full frame>> Shift+2

Zombie Shepherd notes:
unchecked growth and consumption

Cancer as self defection

Toxoplasma - changes in behavior especially an increase in dangerous behavior

Addiction - unchecked consumption to the point that it becomes detrimental to your health or lifestyle and yet you won’t stop.

Cancer as planned obsolescence via medical and food industry 

Pooled capital as cancer for society

ZFi notes:

cancerous growth is akin to the malthusian trap in reference to population growth with the “food source” being other healthy human cells.

one boom bust cycle, that takes the host organism with it when it busts

cancer optimizes for “MORE CELLS” without a reason or a goal or cooperation between cells

cells go rogue and start their own individual fish farming story, consuming at max capacity, to the unfortunate disadvantage of the properly-behaving cells nearby

as is true with moloch traps, no individual cell can choose to revert back to normal behavior, typically

Conclusion

<<dual screen with background visible>> Shift+1

Zombie Shepherd: (start and then hand off as appropriate)

Summary

What would YOU do? @listener?

Outro

Zombie Shepherd: 

Thanks for watching today’s episode of Moloch Traps. We hope you enjoy this series. As always, none of what we say is legal or financial advice, and we encourage listeners to do their own research in these areas before making any related decisions.

If you find our content informational, educational, or entertaining, and would like to support us, please collect these episodes on Hey (formerly known as Lens). 18% of proceeds go back to BanklessDAO, 2% supports Tape (formerly knows as Lenstube) for hosting our videos, and the rest helps to make From Aa to Zzz productions possible.

To stay on top of our weekly series, subscribe to us on the BanklessDAO YouTube. Don’t forget to like and comment while you’re there!

We’ll see you next time, friends!

Clickbait Titles and Descriptions