Notably this also applies to the social epistemics, knowledge, and sense-making available to billionaires and people in other positions of power. Having more real power at a social level makes you less knowledgable about the world because of the way it necessarily deforms your social relationships.
There's a point, well below a billion dollars, where the amount of money you have lets you rid yourself of anyone who can be a check on your worst impulses, and replace them with people who tell you those worst impulses are somehow valorous. Rare is the billionaire with someone to tell them "no."
So much of what we know, the facts, constructs, mental models that are available to us, come from an ongoing interaction with the people in our social networks and information universes. Being surrounded by yes-men and groupthink collaborators is like being in an inverted conspiracy cult of one.
A world where everyone around you conspires together to misinform you because that’s the only way for them to socially navigate the power differential.
I love the folktale of the emperor’s new clothes because it so perfectly encapsulates this problem. It’s so important that we’ve been teaching the lesson to children for at least the last 200 years. But somehow, weirdly, people in power in our society don’t want to hear it.
Feb 3, 2026 22:01
