A Couple More Tweaks to My Newsletter

I originally imagined that my newsletter would correct the false narratives of both the Left and the Right and that I would leave it at that. However, I am discovering that it is really too narrowly focused to function properly.  In reality I cannot divorce my efforts to solidify a community identity for the intellectually sophisticated from my efforts to promulgate an objectively supportable world view from my desire to correct 'misinformation' that is presented through the Legacy Media (formerly the Mainstream Media).

So, I will broaden my scope. I am 'in process' on four books.  They are :

• The Polymathican Subculture: Values, Education, Careers, Research, Lifestyles and Community
  Its purpose is to help solidify a community identity for intellectually sophisticated people and to present a preliminary roadmap to manifestation.
• A New Enlightenment: Crafting an Information Age Political Philosophy
  The Political Philosophy that was developed during the Age of Enlightenment was marginally sufficient to sustain liberal principles during the Industrial Age.  However, it was not a complete philosophy and the cracks, as the Information Age emerges, are beginning to show. So, here, I will make an attempt at updating the liberal paradigm.
• The Death of Capitalism: The Economics of the Information Age
  The 20th Century was dominated by a political argument between the principles of Adam Smith and Karl Marx.  As we enter the Information Age, they both are becoming progressively more irrelevant.  Rather than an upper class of 'owners', a middle class of 'manufacturers' and a lower class of 'service workers', we are headed toward an extremely affluent society comprised of an upper class of 'creators, owners and deciders' and a lower class of 'dignified service providers'.  So, everything changes.
• The Rise of the Microstate: Intentional Cultural Diversity
  When the principles of representative democracy and the Westphalian nation state collide with Information Age realities, we see a rising sense of alienation among cultural and ideological minorities and a rising clamor for divorce from the traditional nation state within which they find themselves.  While this is touched upon lightly in A New Enlightenment, it is really so profound that it deserves a deeper and in many ways more pragmatic consideration. 
  

While these four books will clarify much of what I mean by an objectively supportable world view, they are in the future and my article writing via this newsletter is in the present.  So, I cannot simply say, 'Wait for the book' when I make assertions.  I do need to deal with these ideas in the interim, while leaving the ultimate argumentation to such time as the books are published. That is in the near future.

Also, there are other topics that will not be considered in my upcoming books, but are still central to creating an objectively supportable world view.  Among these are:

• The Legacy Media reports on the basis of an alarmist, rather than balanced, view of climate change.  Even at my very accelerated rate of learning, I have had to dedicate thousands of hours to becoming expert in this arena and I don't expect a similar effort from my readers.  However, I cannot ignore climate change in my ongoing effort to help Polymathicans (people who subscribe to the polymathic subculture) in their quest for an objectively supportable world view.  The climate alarmist have made it too central to the world view for which they argue.  On the other hand, the Rightside media's take that there is 'nothing to see here', isn't right, either.
• The New Enlightenment must, necessarily, consider the diversity of social structure and the forces, both exogenous and endogenous, that drive that diversity.  While they all will manifest in the fullness of time, the breakdown of marriage and family is current and very poorly understood.  Women are quickly truncating the population of men that are allowed to procreate.  An increasing percentage of men are becoming both career and family discouraged.  In addition to increasing drug related deaths, violent deaths and suicide, this also contributes to male antisocial behavior.  There will not be a single resolution but rather a multifurcation of social solutions, many of which are mutually incompatible.
  
• The energy picture just could not be more screwed up.  We are being treated to a vision of a world of electric cars fueled by clean energy that just can't happen, at least not in the near term.  The 'powers that be' are killing fossil fuels faster than replacements are being implemented.  Some real straight talk is needed based upon 'what is', 'what is hoped for'.  As I discuss in an upcoming article, the objective is not to get you into an electric car running on clean electricity, but rather to push you out of the suburbs (if you are currently there) and into public mass transit.
  
• The socioeconomic classes are not going away.  Equality of opportunity can be constructively pursued, but equity of outcome is a fantasy.  Social class, rather than being determined by the social class of one's parents or by one's 'identity', is very quickly becoming determined by educational attainment, which is primarily determined by IQ which is primarily determine by parental genetic and environmental contributions.  The Simonton-Hollingworth Interval and Denissen Mutual Understanding Range (citations in The Inappropriately Excluded article) define socioeconomic classes.  Even if there are no structural impediments to class mobility, 1/6 will fall one socioeconomic class below that of their parents, 1/6 will rise one class above and 2/3 will find themselves in their parent's class.  No 'privilege' required.  That is just how IQ distributes.
  
• We hear a whole lot about falling life expectancy and it is real.  However, it is mostly caused by falling life expectancy in the lower half of the socioeconomic ranks.  The upper 20%-30% have been experiencing a 2.4 year per decade increase in life expectancy while the lower quintile, primarily because of lifestyle issues, have been falling by a bit more than that.  While upper classes are experiencing impressive gains in life expectancy, the 'radical life extension' movement, though inspiring, is not the most likely scenario.  Rather the evidence suggests that life expectancy, at least for the upper 50% of the population will increase to a mean of about 100 and then will likely stall.  Still, that, compared to the historical 80 years or so, will have profound effects on society.
  
  
  

Lastly, and I would say most importantly, as the microstates arise, one of them will need to be Polymathica. However, prior to the physical manifestation of Subcultural microstates, ministates and city states, virtual, subculturally defined communities are forming.  The Rightside 'parallel economy' is certainly the most developed example, though 'green', Christian, polyamorous, et alia certainly are coalescing.  The Right doesn't tweet.  They use Gettr.  They don't watch Youtube;  they watch Rumble.  They have their own fintech, web hosting, cell phone services, etc.  We Polymathicans need to do the same, not because we are suffering active hostility, but because our idea of a preferred lifestyle is so different from the rest of society that the mainstream social media is not user friendly.

I have named our parallel economy, Polymathica Central.  Of course, those Polymathicans who actually build it may choose a different name.  Whatever its name, it will accumulate Polymathicans and make them available to each other.  That may be for social media or it may be to find investors, donors, customers, audience, etc.  It needs to have available educational resources from K-12, continuing education, professional certification as well as access to an online library to assist in lifelong, autodidactic learning.  It should also kick off a process of creating 'bricks and mortar' polymathic communities.

To facilitate that, premium membership to my newsletter will be entitled, Polymathica Central Founders and will be used as a way to accumulate 100 highly motivated people to undertake projects that will make it all happen.  I will post an article on just that.  However, to clarify, it is a working group.  If you join, you will be expected to create something.

If you become a Founder, first, I will be publishing important information that will be circulated only to Founders.  It will be a kind of manifesto which I expect will be heavily modified as the 100 Founders weigh in.  However, we will also have regular Zoom meetings.  I will be creating some of these and they will be topic specific and primarily oriented toward creating meaningful and effective work groups.  Of course, other Founders may schedule Zoom calls, as well, an I expect that the work groups will.

Founders Group membership is most certainly not just about talk.  Our purpose is to effectuate a Polymathica Central Internet presence that will begin the process of creating the Polymathic subculture.  Polymathica Central as it matures will facilitate discussion, create polymathic online communities and provide many, many polymathic career possibilities.  Basically, we all can talk about being polymathic and/or Polymaths or we can make it mean something real.  I understand that most people will talk.  But, if I can get 100 Founders who will undertake the tasks of making Polymathica Central a reality, that will be enough.

While not necessary, I assume that most of the Founders will aspire to Polymath certification.  Creating a certification process is essential to making 'Polymath' a designation that is something more than self-assigned aggrandizement.  Anyone can call themselves Polymath, (are you equating yourself to Leonardo da Vinci?) but Certified Polymath means that other Polymaths agree.  Circular, I know but there is no other way to start it.

The Founders Group, upon success, will have not just contributed to the formation of an Information Age, virtual nation, but will also have a properly remunerated place within the community.  That means, in addition to all the intangible rewards, incomes can be expected in the six and seven figure range.  That is a typical Information Age lifestyle.

I do not want to be overly involved in the creation, growth and operation of Polymathic Central.  I learn, I think and I write.  Nowhere do I say that I am an entrepreneur and I am not.  However, early on in the process, I imagined that I would form a Cooperative of Polymaths called The Polymathic Roundtable.  That will enable the writing part.  We will write articles, but I imagine that we will also have actual roundtable discussions, likely via Zoom and published on a video platform. 

The going rate for a subscription on substack is $60 per year, though I have seen as low as $50 and as high as $100.  In truth, few can write enough articles to actually justify that as fair value.  Yet, in order to promote one's Newsletter, that level of revenue per subscriber is required.  Essentially, there is an inherent cost to acquiring a paid subscriber and the cost increases as the subscription price increases.  Many worthy newsletters just can't find a break even point.

Hence, The Polymathic Roundtable.  The Roundtable will be comprised of the 12 most capable Polymaths out there.  (Wouldn't it be a kick if I wasn't one of them? The market will decide)  For $60 per year, you will be able to subscribe to the newsletters of five of them.  You also will be subscribed to The Polymath, which will, monthly, publish the very best articles of all 12.  However, perhaps the biggest benefit is that you will have real time access to the Roundtable Discussions, themselves, and have access to the superchats where subscribers can discuss the topics themselves.

Of course, other Polymathicans will write articles, vlog, write books, publish podcasts (supported by Substack), etc.  And they will have an easy route to success because Polymathica Central will give them an easily accessible audience.  I will publish more about this in future articles in an effort to attract Founders'.  However, the point here is that my Newsletter will be advocating for Polymathica Central and recruiting a Founders Group.

I will also continue to expand and elaborate on the tab function that Substack provides.  My tabs include Nomadic Polymath because that is quite different than my other articles and you may or may not be interested.  By unsubscribing you will not receive Nomadic Polymath email notifications, but will continue to receive notifications for my main articles.  You can still go to MichaelWFerguson.substack.com and read Nomadic Polymath whenever you want.

I will be publishing articles that will be available to free subscribers.  However, over time, an increasing amount of content, once other Roundtable members join, will be for paid subscribers, only.  It is only fair that people who create valuable content be remunerated for it.  However, I do not want to dismiss the patronage impulse, either.  In other words, when Patreon started it was primarily a way for people to support people who were doing things that the supporters wanted to continue.  It was only over time that it morphed into a 'fee for service' platform.  I do encourage the patronage impulse.  I am advocating for Polymathicans or intellectually sophisticated people with the intent to improve their life choices.  If you want that to continue, supporting it primarily as a patron is also much appreciated.

Lastly, I do want MichaelWFerguson.Substack.com, as it evolves into Polymathica Central to be a community and for the comment function to be widely used.  If you are a paid subscriber, you can do that now and I encourage you to do so.