The question opened two chapters ago still hangs open: how many, if any, of the psychological foibles and failings inherent to the individual human persona might be or have been inherited into the functional awareness of the newly awakened Collective Entities? Is it possible for a collective life form to suffer what in an individual would be called a mental illness?
After some serious skull spelunking on the subject my answer is yes.
If I am going to say an element of society can awaken as a Collective Entity within the pixel forest of mankind's digital footprint, a unique and living thing in its' own right, then it would be the ultimate case of wishful thinking to assume, or presume, such entities would of necessity be creatures of God-like perfection. Particularly when I know that both the component cognitive nodes (the individual humans who provide a "time share" brain) and the (social) architecture of said nodes that give shape and structure to a collective entity are ultimately the work of fallible mortal humans. By the definitions involved cause and effect reasoning demands the answer be "yes, such inheritances are, because they must be, a very possible thing."
A very possible thing. Sometimes? Sometimes I do not like working downstream from me. Possible? Chickens are possible. Eggs are possible, even pre-chicken. A lot of things are possible, including circular reasoning accelerating into an ever tightening death spiral of sobriety going down life's drain. And yet, the question had to be asked, and once asked if you try and dodge your own answer it's time to give up on philosophy and take up competition drinking. Whiskey, of course.
Ok, it is what it is, and anyway… does this actually change anything already in play? No, not really. Perhaps the end of an innocence to realize a collective has no more assurance of sanity than an individual, but again… so what? If this be truth then the consequences are already part of observed reality. Perhaps an answer, or a route to an answer, for what is not understood about observed reality, but not something new.
The field of thought itself, on the other hand, must now expand about an order of magnitude to accommodate adding the concepts of mental health having impact in, on, and among the citizens of mankind's third reality, the collective entities. To sort out the possible feedback loops of the collective entities and the individual human nodes cross contaminating each other with mental maladies (in anything resembling real time) opens an entirely new state-space to these deliberations, quite a social wormhole in point of fact.
Since the title of this chapter is "Free and Clear to Navigate" from the Star Trek universe, and since the functionality of transient wormholes apparently just entered the picture, and recalling the unknown fate of the USS Voyager? I feel inclined to avail myself of that empowerment. Let's put a little more room between us and that anomaly. "Helm, three hundred AU immelmann out if you please, put the anomaly between us and the local solar. Lets see what might show up with a bit of a backlight. And ship to combat status, we already know that manipulating complex mental aberration is a prime weapon of the Borg inspired American fauxLiberal. I don't want to be caught with our pants down if any of them notice us noticing."
Temporarily parking the state and fate of the individual human nodes (relatively) safely off to the side the first order of business is to refresh to mind as precise a definition as possible of the situation in play. It will be needed.
A collective entity is a creature whose neurology rides mankind's ever advancing technologies of communication and whose cognitive homeostasis resides on some number of individual human (nodes/hosts) as a portion of their self identity. They who acquire a unique element of -Self- from a specific Collective Entity are in fact existing in a symbiotic relationship with that Entity for neither would be the same creature without the other. The CE provides to the human host a vocabulary of concepts (associated to the central definition of that collective) which are merged and integrated with other such symbol sets to become the vocabulary of self the human uses in the cause of the mandatory self definition required to create an identity robust enough to recognize self from other in any possible third person perspective of intelligent imagination. The human returns the value received in the form of an exclusive loyalty to the exacting and specific definitions which separate the providing CE from any other offering an element of similar nature. The individual human's creative intelligence set in the service of that loyalty, extended proportionate to the degree of definition integrated into the unique definition of self, enacts into the second and common reality the deeds and decisions which become the life supporting sustenance of the Collective Entity's husbandry and harvest.
The basic definition puts no boundaries on what type of element might be traded between a CE and the human. If a sufficient number of individuals internalize a concept per the relationship defined above that concept can be or become the definition of a unique CE engaged in a symbiosis with the humans. It is, therefore, just as possible for a collective entity to be defined by some specific form of mental illness as it would be for a collective entity defined as some, any, other component thought of the human condition to become infected by some form of mental illness presuming some critical number of its' hosts fell prey to that illness from another point of contagion.
The former case, a CE defined by, or within, some form of mental malady is a relatively transparent and harmless thing. The nature of the malady is understood (to some degree or another), the CE resolves as an entity acknowledging the burdens born by those afflicted, there are few if any surprises to be seen between the behavior of the CE and the behavior of the nodes. The consequences fold inwards as it were, little is exported beyond the host base.
The latter case on the other hand, the case of a CE that was not in its' beginnings integrated, initialized, within a host as a malady which is then infected by some mental illness? Such a case as that is anything but transparent and harmless. Quite the opposite, such a case would be all but opaque and a truly sinister danger to all creatures exposed since all consequences are exported beyond the infected element.
Given the subtle interconnections between the contributions of the CE's within any given host humans' psychology the influence of one or more infected CE on any of the several others (sure to be active in the overall personality of said host human) are beyond predicting, ergo, the net impact on that human's executive function (those moral and ethical processes that govern behaviors) is also unpredictable.
Equally to be considered: the older or lower level the infected CE the greater would be its' relative influence on those daughter CE's integrated above it in the structure of the host's personality.
A truly frightening consideration given the state of current events is the very real potential for the nature of the CE/host symbiosis to allow some contagion thought to spread quite unnoticed to many CE's by way of the common host base before suddenly erupting with very little warning as a cascading failure of sanity damaging many lives across a wide swath of society. The words plague, and pandemic, are not inappropriate words within the context. It would be entirely possible for the world to go crazy before the people in that world lost their sanity.
Ok, Pilgrim. Hold it right there. You wrote that, you did, and I'm having trouble taking myself seriously. Does this actually make any sense, or is this what common sense getting sucked down a psycho-babble drain sounds like?
To answer my own challenge? Maybe. But isn't that exactly the subject at hand? And anyway, is anyone offering a viable explanation of why the current state of the world undeniably presents as a case of cascading insanity?
Nothing I've heard offered from on high addresses the issue. I've heard fifty variations on old themes recycled, but nothing attempting any degree of cohesion. In point of fact the old themes seem on parade more as finger pointing divisive distractions than anything else. Why? Why rehash what has already been worked when there is ample evidence to indicate unknown forces in the current mix, forces obviously operating from a common and formally coordinated set of malicious intentions?
So yes, these thoughts do need to be taken seriously. If there be any truth to these ideas then bizarre as the extrapolations might seem they are still causal reasoning riding a stock and standard "if that be true then these be possible" in a place where way, I do mean waaaay to many of the ancient prophesies start making sense.
So with that said, and given the subject matter, I'm not going to worry about publishing this. If insanity this be then I shall indulge it, at least for a little while, just to see what pops up. Might as well since in these wide awake days of social enlightenment any talisman of individual thought or perception not duly certified by an agent of Empire Academia is promptly and permanently labeled as a work of conspiracy theorist insanity anyway so I have nothing to lose.
I therefore assert that I am not a mentally compromised individual, I'm just claiming my innate right to self identify as a humanoid alien visitor to Earth trying to understand why it is that half the human race is systematically and perpetually trying to anthropomorphize the other half.
The likelihood of a self aware CE becoming a contagion vector spreading mental distress among the human hosts as well as its' own kind is actually far higher than the odds of the jabberwocky escaping its' cage in that infamous kink club just off Times Square to roam the city at will, mauling the helplessly sane while stealing anything crafted of pink silicone on its' way back to underland. Well, would be if jabberwocky wasn't just slang for a devotee of non-consensual political sex as a demented form of socially significant performance art.
I am very sure there will be many and a many far better educated than I (who do not believe in jabberwockies at all) who will, with all proper condescending mockery, plop these thoughts in the mad hatter's teapot as they retire to their therapist's lounge to indulge in carnal entertainments captured beneath the kaleidoscope sky seen reflected in the glazed eyes of a beautifully nude young Alice attempting to imbibe the Red Queen's infamous pepper and potato soup… politely… followed of course by coffee and cigars. Their choice, not mine, and so be it.
These thoughts will continue from the shifted perspectives known by humans hosting a troubled CE… (as a best effort expose emulation)… in the forthcoming chapter "Vorpal Blade Gone Galumphing."
...to be continued...
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