[WIP]

I attended a fascinating discussion hosted by Pace Capital that compared Francis Fukuyama's "end of history" thesis with Leopold Aschenbrenner's Situational Awareness.

It is this premise which attracts those with a certain philosophical optimism, seeking the potential of what is undefined (and not guaranteed). The fall of the Soviet Union drew hordes of thinkers to Fukuyama's vision. The promise was (somewhat) true – liberal democracy seemed to triumph as the final form of human government. Political systems and market economies thus expanded across the globe to meet the needs of this new world order.

This undeniably raw hope defines Fukuyama's thesis. It's the origin of a unipolar world – the possibility of ideological convergence. And while the dream has forever been tied to the immense value of democratic ideals, what little remains unchallenged is not enough to justify a modern renaissance. We thus began engineering ourselves the frameworks through which new values might be realized... Aschenbrenner's work attracted a new population of digital philosophers who realized this potential by building models of existential risk and technological growth.

The geopolitical landscape today presents us with new material, again of our own creation – artificial intelligence, machine as arbiter. This technical shift is our modern ideological battleground. Fukuyama's linear progression meets Aschenbrenner's multidimensional awareness, a clash of visions as profound as any in intellectual history.

I've pondered the importance of historical narratives and belief in a higher geopolitical order before. In a world where these traditional formats of political expression are shattering, it seems there is a case to be made for faith in situational awareness rather than a predetermined end state. I don't necessarily believe in a world that develops in one direction or the other, but I have to acknowledge the perhaps inevitable synthesis of these viewpoints.

I imagine a next era of geopolitical theory where this pattern of transnational influence only grows, perhaps with AI-enhanced situational awareness at the helm over individual human foresight. When this experience is universal, does it accelerate a culturally / intellectually unifying movement toward a new understanding of history and risk (at least in terms of policy guidance) opposed to disaggregated belief systems with varying ideological figures?

This depiction of geopolitical thought is intensely idealized, though perhaps that reveals my current sentiment. In most academic circles, playing the game according to established paradigms is rewarded, and the rules are already defined. What the intersection of Fukuyama and Aschenbrenner rewards is the creation of new systems of understanding entirely. I think a new era of geopolitical theory has begun, and we are attempting to define an alternate framework for historical progression and with that, reclamation of the intellectual paradise which we have always imagined will exist... "You don't have to be constrained by linear historical thinking anymore. You're in the age of situational awareness now."