the bandwidth problem

I thought about it, and how we're limited seems to come down to two broader domains. I'll refer to them as the "surface" (limitations we're aware we have) and the "underground" (concepts we don't even know we're missing).

Some well-known surface limitations could be things like:

• Physical limits, like only seeing around 0.003% of the electromagnetic spectrum. Sharks detect electrical fields. Radio waves carry information through your body that you cannot perceive.
• Cognition. We can convince ourselves we can multitask, but ultimately we're bad at focusing on more than 2 or 3 things. Learning quantum physics is fun because it feels like your mind is being blown, but that might just be a symptom of a bigger problem: ultimately, that I'm incapable of intuiting it.
• Conceptual frameworks, such as medieval humans' inability to conceive relativity. Even educated people in the 1800s couldn't conceive of information theory. Rather than a lack of knowledge, it seems as if, at the time, the thoughts themselves were unthinkable.

If we treat reality like a simulation, we know that these concepts are are real properties of reality. Inside the simulation, some other interesting gaps I found could be in quantum mechanics, consciousness (subjectivity's clash with physics), and models for meaning/value. At least we're aware our frameworks explicitly break down.

But what about the underground, i.e. outside the simulation?

Either we're not aware that the problems exist, or we understand the problems through a very limited lens. What if we're perceiving time under a suboptimal bandwidth, so time is not what it actually seems it is? What if our modes of expression (e.g. verbal/body language) are severely limited in communicating certain ideas, and we're actually only receiving a fraction of the information when interacting with someone.

The bug doesn't know it's missing anything because it's just doing bug things.

We're probably doing human things, unaware of what we're missing.

the ugly

I went a step further, and now it's getting real ugly. Let's take climate change as an example.

We see symptoms, like storms and melting ice, similar to how the bug saw my boot (obstacle, threat). We know it involves feedback loops and emergent properties across timescales. Our institutions struggle with the complexity. But it's a wonder if that struggle itself reveals a deeper limitation? What if 'nonlinear feedback loops across timescales' is still us trying to cram something into our current frameworks, when the real pattern operates on principles we haven't discovered yet?

Or maybe climate isn't even the right example. Maybe the real blindspot is elsewhere. Something we're not tracking because it doesn't fit our threat categories at all. Maybe "threat" itself is the wrong framing, and there's some other dimension (opportunity? transformation? reorganization?) we're missing because we're locked into survival-mode thinking.

And yet, I can't tell you what we're actually missing. If I could, we wouldn't be missing it. All I can point to is the pattern, that persistent paradoxes eventually require new frameworks, e.g. Darwinism. We're probably doing this with something right now.

It's concerning because it's unfalsifiable in the moment.

But I don't want this to enter conspiracy territory. The way I'm thinking about it: Pre-Darwin, evolution wasn't wrong; rather, it was unthinkable. Persistent paradoxes -> framework shifts that dissolve them. Ultimately, something practical and concrete needs to emerge.

the uglier

But if we're bandwidth-limited, are we even sure of what we're striving towards? The lines are beginning to blur. Now, you start questioning everything.

What do we actually know is important, good, or bad for us (if that's even the right question to ask)—with absolute certainty? Just that death/bad health is bad for us? Is that our ultimatum?

It seems like very little with certainty:

We prefer some states (health, autonomy) over others (pain). These preferences are pretty consistent across humans. But then, humanity's evaluating from within its own bandwidth. We can't verify these are objectively good vs. just what-feels-good-to-creatures-like-us.

The bug prefers avoiding danger, and that makes sense for bug-survival. But the bug can't evaluate whether bug-survival is "objectively good" or just what bug-nervous-systems want.

Same with us. When we say "climate change is bad," we mean bad-for-human-civilization. But we're judging within our framework of what matters. Maybe there's forces at play that make our framing too narrow?

I'm realizing that it not be as helpful to excessively question our grounds without discipline. Conclusionss drawn by humanity throughout history have demonstrated to have a ton of value. A healthy balance likely prevents stalling progress.

our response

So how much questioning is a "good amount?" I've always followed Peter Thiel's work, and I like his thoughts on favoring careful planning and advancement through technology. But as much as he loves "secrets" hidden in the universe, he also seems to dismiss anything outside immediate comprehension as impossible "mysteries."

I think most valuable work happens by optimizing within frameworks. Startup founders reach their ultimatum if they "strike gold"—aka, find something others missed, like an inefficiency or a new technical possibility, and create real value. Scientists work within the scientific method and make genuine discoveries. This isn't settling because it's how progress actually happens, and you need constraints to do anything.

But I think it's still reasonable to ask whether some people should simultaneously be questioning the frameworks themselves.

For example, It seems like materialism is assumed, and consciousness is unexplored because it's "too hard." I can't say they're wrong, and they're productive simplifications that let us make progress. But unless I'm overly naive, ultimately, they're simplifications.

How would you know if you were in a local maximum? By definition, it looks optimal from within.

In action, I'm not any different (yet), and I'm likely doing the same thing. fiveRoll picks up on patterns others miss in the social fabric. I think that form of horizontal (local) expansion is valuable and necessary, and I love doing it. Within our bandwidth, I'm optimistic that most problems can be solved with the right understanding and creativity, as long as you see patterns from first principles.

Vertically, I'm still optimistic, but it feels like humanity hyperfocuses and rewards horizontal progress, probably because vertical progress is beyond rare.

If humanity falls, I think what would be the most devastating is if it happened because we've accepted our downfall due to lack of our capabilities as of now, without realizing that was a locally determined conclusion all along.

So are we solving the right problems, or just the problems we have the bandwidth to perceive? Are we optimizing for what we can measure while missing forces shaping our trajectory that lie outside our frameworks?

I don't know. I guess that's kind of the point. But unlike the bug, at least we can hold the question.

what can i do?

Yeah, now that we've come this far, life seems pretty dark. But I'm pretty optimistic. I'm certain that we've expanded our bandwidth before, and we can do it again. Not in the sense of transcending our biology, like expanding our view of electromagnetic spectrum, but we've found ways to make more of reality accessible.

Writing let us think with more than we could hold in our heads at once, extending what we could process. New conceptual frameworks like calculus let us conceive of not things unknown to us but those were outside the space of possible thoughts.

I think I should work on important problems using existing frameworks, but I should now stay alert for where the frameworks break. I say this because thinking alone likely won't get me very far.

When a contradiction persistently hits (not ignorance, but a place where the framework gives incoherent answers), that might be where bandwidth expansion is needed.

Or, in an attempt to be more deliberate:

• Pick a hard problem and push existing frameworks as far as they go
• Notice what questions the framework makes unaskable, not just unanswered
• When multiple frameworks give contradictory answers to the same question, that might be a sign
• Build something new. If it works and was previously impossible, I've expanded bandwidth. If it doesn't work = likely just philosophizing

my purpose

If all of this started from the bug, that would be pretty darn sick. But in all honesty, I would say it also started from some observations, over time, of how people around me perceive their lives.

A few thoughts have emerged since:

• a limited bandwidth's implications makes me uncomfortable
• many things now pale in comparison
• but within the current bandwidth, life is still beautiful and worth living. we find content through human flourishing (e.g. love)
• capable people must work on the most important things
• environments with solitude and distance from social performance, like confined military spaces versus college, seem to create better conditions for this kind of thinking because they make you less susceptible to being consumed by low-bandwidth forces
• the universe is vast, and that's fascinating

This leads to a fluid yet conviction-led purpose, in two clauses:

I find sufficient purpose in solving important problems for humanity, using whatever bandwidth we currently have.

My ultimate purpose is to solving problems we can't yet see, which requires expanding our bandwidth to perceive them.

I recognize that the ultimate purpose is much harder to attain, but I'm 21, damn it! I have a good amount of conviction that I'll find my way there. In fact, I'm already on the way to fulfilling the first clause. I'm confident that I'm doing my best work that I can now, while also trying to learn to reach something greater.