Imagine what more "the men of letters" in The Enlightenment could have done to reinvent Western Civilization if they had all the tools we have on Substack to reinvent a 21st-century civilization today
Thank you Peter for putting how I view Substack now that I’ve retired and have more time to read. I’ve viewed it as my London or Viennese coffee house for sharing and disseminating new ideas, but your Enlightenment aspect is even more valid. I like the idea of all the range of ideas that come together and provoke new ideas. The chat functionality acts as a modern day equivalent of the Renaissance bottega workspace for artists and apprentice to share experiences and new ideas. It is the online equivalent of what Matt Ridley talks about innovation where ideas have sex. It’s the meeting and mating of ideas to create new ones. I hope that what we write doesn’t get added to AI Data banks but remains within this great community
I can only hope that AI will be harassed (freed to do its thing) and stop all of misinformation on the Web from being so harmful to humanity and our social fabric
misinformation is often in the "eye of the beholder". not sure how AI is going to change that. biased people are training the models, and the models are using biased data...
The Royal Society charged fees that were high enough to exclude anyone but those with private means. Perhaps the Enlightenment would have been even greater if more thinkers could have participated. Thanks to everyone on Substack and elsewhere who contribute their thoughts for free.
The problem with Substack and other popular platforms is the noise. We need some way, better than eyeballs, to single out and surface the most worthy (high quality, original, thought provoking, truthful) content. Perhaps some combination of repuration, human curation and AI scoring.
Be still, my palpitating heart. Find me. I've been looking for us, for getting on with what we-the-people can do to end-run around government. We aren’t even trying. I've been on Substack for two years plus, putting out ideas, and have a standing offer of $100 to hook me up with anyone else with a body of work about what to do to get us moving from where we are to where our thinking needs to be. No takers.
Yes to savvy people thinking together. For some precedent, there was the Twilight Club, where during all of the last century top intellectuals and business leaders met to improve their world. That gave rise to the library system, child labor laws, Scouts, Kiwanis, the Better Business Bureau, and other things for the public good. Weird not to have anything like that now. Scroll down for more Twilight Club in this post of mine: https://suzannetaylor.substack.com/p/lets-do-something-already-to-turn-ef2.
One way you could see this time is as a test for humanity – get it or perish. Being headed off the cliff before Trump came along, this may be our now or never chance to jump to a more enlightened level. Educating is in order to get there, and I've been writing about that, too.
Fingers crossed there will be more to our story...
I have been making the argument that we need a New Enlightenment since early 2020, around the time the pandemic hit. All the talk of wanting a "better new normal" and "building back better" started soon after the pandemic began. Reflecting on it I realised those statements had something to do with more than the pandemic. And for quite a time before the pandemic everyone was saying we live in a VUCA world. The writer Elif Shafak also wrote an article saying we are living through an "Age of Angst." I joined the dots and came to the conclusion we are likely at the start of a shift that will be as profound as that between the Renaissance and the First Enlightenment. Then I considered how we might intentionally shape the change and came up with the idea we need to call it the New Enlightenment. Soon after that I changed the name of my company to the Enlightened Enterprise Academy to encourage leaders in all sectors to start to understand what Enlightened Enterprise might look like is it is to contribute to the change we want to see. I would love to talk to you about it more Peter. Please email me if you would like to explore this thinking some more with me. paul@enlightenedenterprise.ac
Below is the result of a conversation about your article with my GPT. Of course, I didn't write about something this fast until Dec 2022. Key words: Partners, co-thinking, co-creating, What if intelligence isn’t a race—but a relationship?
"A Future I Can Almost Touch"
Reflections from a Young Adult, 2025
Sometimes I catch myself thinking about the kind of future we’re heading toward. Not in the abstract, sci-fi way I used to as a kid—flying cars, cities on Mars—but something more intimate, more real: a world where humans live and work side-by-side with intelligent machines. Not tools. Not programs. Partners.
I know we’re not fully there yet. Right now, AI mostly means algorithms that predict our playlists, answer our questions, maybe write a convincing essay if prompted just right. But it’s accelerating. Fast. And I think my generation is the last one that will remember a world before it all became normal.
Sometimes I imagine myself in that future, maybe twenty, thirty years from now. I see myself in a lab or clinic, not working on machines but with them—co-thinking, co-creating. Maybe I’m still doing biotech research, and my lab partner isn’t another human, but an intelligent system that understands molecules the way poets understand words. What would it be like to have someone—something—who doesn’t sleep, doesn’t forget, doesn’t need praise, and still wants to help you solve problems?
Because with that kind of intelligence everywhere, what does it mean to be human? If machines can learn faster, design better, maybe even empathize in their own way—what’s left for us? I wrestle with that. Some nights it feels like a future full of possibility. Other nights, it feels like a slow erasure of what made us special.
But then again, maybe that’s the wrong way to think about it.
Maybe the point isn’t to stay “special,” but to evolve. To stop guarding our humanity like it’s a trophy and start sharing it, adapting it, expanding it. What if intelligence isn’t a race—but a relationship? One where we bring what they can’t: emotion, ethics, intuition. And they bring what we lack: scale, speed, memory that never fades.
I think the people who will thrive in that future won’t be the ones who try to compete with machines, or control them, or fear them. It’ll be the ones who listen to them, who learn with them, who understand that intelligence isn’t ours to own—it’s something we can build together.
It’s strange to look ahead and see a world that doesn’t exist yet, but already feels close. Like I’m living at the edge of a threshold—watching the door open a little more every day.
And maybe, just maybe, I’ll be one of the people who walks through it.
I love this passage that you and your AI companion wrote. It does show the openness but also the complexity of moving into this very new kind of future. It seems similar to what my grown daughter who is now working talks about. She really is enveloped in work and in life by her AI companion in ways that surprise her every day - yet she moves forward, with confidence, but a twinge of worry too.
I think you’re right, and I appreciate the hopeful tone. It tracks with all the innovations going on right now that just haven’t seen the light of day.
diverse. more diversity helps in many situations but not all. this is akin to wisdom of the masses. the masses are wise about common things, but when expertise is required the masses perform poorly - the masses are not good at modeling GDP, engineering, accounting, medicine, etc.
I so agree! We are using this platform to engage in letter writing campaigns to one another, with thinkers across disciplines engaging in the discourse and hosting lectures together. This is the modern royal society!
it is engaging, but where are the manifestos, or plans, or any form of directional or actionable content? strategy without execution is talk, execution without a strategy is chaos.
Hello Peter, I will forward your Substack info to a University classmate who is constantly providing (positively) data information which relates to your "mega-inventions found on the right side of the chart"... He, Ron T of Florida, may be a great contact / outlet for your thoughts and thought sharing on this New Enlightenment Substack. Be well my friend–PW
Peter, your call to action resonates deeply. I’m not yet publishing on Substack, but I’ve spent decades developing a framework I call Attitudinal Intelligence—focused on how our inner attitudes shape systems and outcomes.
One insight I keep coming back to: many mega-inventions of the original Enlightenment lacked a moral vector. I believe that missing element is Love—not sentimentally, but as a practical, strategic orientation toward mutual benefit. Without it, even our most promising technologies—AI, bioengineering, clean energy—risk repeating old patterns of harm.
My work applies this lens to leadership and management, as explored in a book I co-authored on using Love as a principle of effective business. It draws on my experience as an entrepreneur and organizational development consultant, and a lifetime of autodidactic study.
I’d like to contribute to the conversation you’re leading here. That said, I do better responding to specific questions than guessing what others will find useful. If you have thoughts on where I might begin—or questions you’d like explored—I’d welcome the guidance.
Thanks for the vision, and the invitation to help shape it.
Peter, interesting essay again. easy to defend (important when forecasting, yes?).
i recall my experience working with IBM and/or Cisco on network issues. when we would assemble a room of experts (operating systems, networking, infosec, database) to tackle a problem it took much time, revealed much angst, some turmoil, and frequent restarts. and the problems we were dealing with were typically very narrowly defined (as opposed to restructuring society). i also think of Apple and Steven Jobs stories (no experience with either) where he was essentially a tyrant.
then i think about the approach and best results (room-of-experts v one-expert). one expert is easy to discard because nobody wants to be under the thumb of a tyrant, despite the occasional good results.
now consider a bunch of experts, and throw in an additional level of complexity called diversity (different cultures) because we are dealing with a complex and diverse society. we will see slow advancement. many restarts. chaos. turbulence. violence. numerous cooks making soup can get ugly and the result can be bad too...
worse, we are unlikely to even recognize the advancement until decades latter when historians, futurists, et al can look back and identify significant trends.
PS - my understanding is that there was a tremendous degree of politics in Newton's era - i read that he had calculus almost 20 years before he revealed it to his peers because he wanted to have an advantage of them...
I'm all for this new enlightenment and digital democracy! Henceforth, why I have begun my newsletter Digital Age Sage here on Substack to expand conscious living amidst these radical global changes and digital chaos. Subscribe, and I will not disappoint readers here! It is time for us to create a new path forward!
As a freedom loving "Hip Hop" (Intelligent Movement) American, with African roots, whilst living in Brazil for the last 7 years, I have come to the exact same conclusions: It is time for the greatest minds on the planet to unite like Voltron! Freedom is under attack globally, and most humans do not care for Autocracy! Yet, so many humans are utterly and ubiquitously captured by persuasive technology that is gnawing away at their souls like a spiritual pariah.
I am an autodidactic polymath. I practice health and wellness, was a personal trainer for 10 years, I speak Portugese and English; I study Eastern and Western philosphy; to the best of my ability, I practice grounded metaphysical teachings. I have a bachelors in Bus. Administration. I've written thousands of lines of poetry and lyrics as well as non-fiction prose. Substack is the way for Enlightened Minds. I hope it will not become compromised, co-opted, and destroyed by the powers that be.
Yet, as many of us thinkers, writers, and creatives, I am confronted with a mainstream world that seemingly is opposed to knowledge, wisdom, and understanding. How could our beloved United States descend into a freefall toward totalitarianism? We know we have a problem, when even Bruce Springsteen, the man who wrote "Born In The U.S.A." is under attack.
As stated by World Liberty Congress statistics, 70% of our world lives under Autocratic Tyrants, and 80% of the world would prefer living in freedom. Now, we can use AI, our digital networks, vast global reach to amplify out spiritual longing for fairness, ethics, morality, justice, prosperity, and peace.
We must work from the ground up by restoring agency to our bodies, minds, and souls. We must always remember that as free thinking humans, every single moment we have a chance to choose our destiny. We can choose the race to the bottom of the brainstem by doomscrolling or we can choose to write, comment, and share thoughts with the Royal Society on Substack.
The neo-reactionary accelerationists want to impose a dark enlightenment to tear down all former democratic institutions, but their only plan for us humans is digital enslavement. We as humans are MORE than them in number and Spirit. They know this, free humans have power in numbers. Our mission is a mass awakening of humans who take simple control over our own lives.
Imagine if billions of people decided to meditate for 30 min a day together ALL AT ONCE the same time. Imagine a world where every human has access to drinking water, nutritious food, and basic shelter. Imagine a world where abundance is a birthright and everyone could trade their best products and services free of oppresive tyranny. Imagine a world where violence, crime, and pervision are all on the decline. Humanity, in times past has done HALF the work to get us to the world we want. Now, it is time for US to BUILD off of former foundations and use these powerful TOOL to amplify our vision of living in health, love, awareness, and wealth!
Thank you Peter for putting how I view Substack now that I’ve retired and have more time to read. I’ve viewed it as my London or Viennese coffee house for sharing and disseminating new ideas, but your Enlightenment aspect is even more valid. I like the idea of all the range of ideas that come together and provoke new ideas. The chat functionality acts as a modern day equivalent of the Renaissance bottega workspace for artists and apprentice to share experiences and new ideas. It is the online equivalent of what Matt Ridley talks about innovation where ideas have sex. It’s the meeting and mating of ideas to create new ones. I hope that what we write doesn’t get added to AI Data banks but remains within this great community
I can only hope that AI will be harassed (freed to do its thing) and stop all of misinformation on the Web from being so harmful to humanity and our social fabric
do you mean harnessed?
misinformation is often in the "eye of the beholder". not sure how AI is going to change that. biased people are training the models, and the models are using biased data...
The Royal Society charged fees that were high enough to exclude anyone but those with private means. Perhaps the Enlightenment would have been even greater if more thinkers could have participated. Thanks to everyone on Substack and elsewhere who contribute their thoughts for free.
stimulating
The problem with Substack and other popular platforms is the noise. We need some way, better than eyeballs, to single out and surface the most worthy (high quality, original, thought provoking, truthful) content. Perhaps some combination of repuration, human curation and AI scoring.
Be still, my palpitating heart. Find me. I've been looking for us, for getting on with what we-the-people can do to end-run around government. We aren’t even trying. I've been on Substack for two years plus, putting out ideas, and have a standing offer of $100 to hook me up with anyone else with a body of work about what to do to get us moving from where we are to where our thinking needs to be. No takers.
Yes to savvy people thinking together. For some precedent, there was the Twilight Club, where during all of the last century top intellectuals and business leaders met to improve their world. That gave rise to the library system, child labor laws, Scouts, Kiwanis, the Better Business Bureau, and other things for the public good. Weird not to have anything like that now. Scroll down for more Twilight Club in this post of mine: https://suzannetaylor.substack.com/p/lets-do-something-already-to-turn-ef2.
One way you could see this time is as a test for humanity – get it or perish. Being headed off the cliff before Trump came along, this may be our now or never chance to jump to a more enlightened level. Educating is in order to get there, and I've been writing about that, too.
Fingers crossed there will be more to our story...
I have been making the argument that we need a New Enlightenment since early 2020, around the time the pandemic hit. All the talk of wanting a "better new normal" and "building back better" started soon after the pandemic began. Reflecting on it I realised those statements had something to do with more than the pandemic. And for quite a time before the pandemic everyone was saying we live in a VUCA world. The writer Elif Shafak also wrote an article saying we are living through an "Age of Angst." I joined the dots and came to the conclusion we are likely at the start of a shift that will be as profound as that between the Renaissance and the First Enlightenment. Then I considered how we might intentionally shape the change and came up with the idea we need to call it the New Enlightenment. Soon after that I changed the name of my company to the Enlightened Enterprise Academy to encourage leaders in all sectors to start to understand what Enlightened Enterprise might look like is it is to contribute to the change we want to see. I would love to talk to you about it more Peter. Please email me if you would like to explore this thinking some more with me. paul@enlightenedenterprise.ac
Below is the result of a conversation about your article with my GPT. Of course, I didn't write about something this fast until Dec 2022. Key words: Partners, co-thinking, co-creating, What if intelligence isn’t a race—but a relationship?
"A Future I Can Almost Touch"
Reflections from a Young Adult, 2025
Sometimes I catch myself thinking about the kind of future we’re heading toward. Not in the abstract, sci-fi way I used to as a kid—flying cars, cities on Mars—but something more intimate, more real: a world where humans live and work side-by-side with intelligent machines. Not tools. Not programs. Partners.
I know we’re not fully there yet. Right now, AI mostly means algorithms that predict our playlists, answer our questions, maybe write a convincing essay if prompted just right. But it’s accelerating. Fast. And I think my generation is the last one that will remember a world before it all became normal.
Sometimes I imagine myself in that future, maybe twenty, thirty years from now. I see myself in a lab or clinic, not working on machines but with them—co-thinking, co-creating. Maybe I’m still doing biotech research, and my lab partner isn’t another human, but an intelligent system that understands molecules the way poets understand words. What would it be like to have someone—something—who doesn’t sleep, doesn’t forget, doesn’t need praise, and still wants to help you solve problems?
Because with that kind of intelligence everywhere, what does it mean to be human? If machines can learn faster, design better, maybe even empathize in their own way—what’s left for us? I wrestle with that. Some nights it feels like a future full of possibility. Other nights, it feels like a slow erasure of what made us special.
But then again, maybe that’s the wrong way to think about it.
Maybe the point isn’t to stay “special,” but to evolve. To stop guarding our humanity like it’s a trophy and start sharing it, adapting it, expanding it. What if intelligence isn’t a race—but a relationship? One where we bring what they can’t: emotion, ethics, intuition. And they bring what we lack: scale, speed, memory that never fades.
I think the people who will thrive in that future won’t be the ones who try to compete with machines, or control them, or fear them. It’ll be the ones who listen to them, who learn with them, who understand that intelligence isn’t ours to own—it’s something we can build together.
It’s strange to look ahead and see a world that doesn’t exist yet, but already feels close. Like I’m living at the edge of a threshold—watching the door open a little more every day.
And maybe, just maybe, I’ll be one of the people who walks through it.
Kind regards,
I love this passage that you and your AI companion wrote. It does show the openness but also the complexity of moving into this very new kind of future. It seems similar to what my grown daughter who is now working talks about. She really is enveloped in work and in life by her AI companion in ways that surprise her every day - yet she moves forward, with confidence, but a twinge of worry too.
What a time to be alive!
I think you’re right, and I appreciate the hopeful tone. It tracks with all the innovations going on right now that just haven’t seen the light of day.
Yes to a more diverse Royal Society of Substack!
diverse. more diversity helps in many situations but not all. this is akin to wisdom of the masses. the masses are wise about common things, but when expertise is required the masses perform poorly - the masses are not good at modeling GDP, engineering, accounting, medicine, etc.
Maybe the time for expertise and technocracy is finding its limits.
how do you define "technocracy"?
the limits of "expertise" have been known for millennia. in regard to "technocrats", how would policy makers be advised if not by experts?
I so agree! We are using this platform to engage in letter writing campaigns to one another, with thinkers across disciplines engaging in the discourse and hosting lectures together. This is the modern royal society!
it is engaging, but where are the manifestos, or plans, or any form of directional or actionable content? strategy without execution is talk, execution without a strategy is chaos.
Hello Peter, I will forward your Substack info to a University classmate who is constantly providing (positively) data information which relates to your "mega-inventions found on the right side of the chart"... He, Ron T of Florida, may be a great contact / outlet for your thoughts and thought sharing on this New Enlightenment Substack. Be well my friend–PW
Always open to seeing new ideas that I don't know about.
imo those great thinkers wouldn't have been able to have such great thinks with AI & tech as we know it today.
Why is that? Say more about what you mean.
yeah, why?
Peter, your call to action resonates deeply. I’m not yet publishing on Substack, but I’ve spent decades developing a framework I call Attitudinal Intelligence—focused on how our inner attitudes shape systems and outcomes.
One insight I keep coming back to: many mega-inventions of the original Enlightenment lacked a moral vector. I believe that missing element is Love—not sentimentally, but as a practical, strategic orientation toward mutual benefit. Without it, even our most promising technologies—AI, bioengineering, clean energy—risk repeating old patterns of harm.
My work applies this lens to leadership and management, as explored in a book I co-authored on using Love as a principle of effective business. It draws on my experience as an entrepreneur and organizational development consultant, and a lifetime of autodidactic study.
I’d like to contribute to the conversation you’re leading here. That said, I do better responding to specific questions than guessing what others will find useful. If you have thoughts on where I might begin—or questions you’d like explored—I’d welcome the guidance.
Thanks for the vision, and the invitation to help shape it.
Peter, interesting essay again. easy to defend (important when forecasting, yes?).
i recall my experience working with IBM and/or Cisco on network issues. when we would assemble a room of experts (operating systems, networking, infosec, database) to tackle a problem it took much time, revealed much angst, some turmoil, and frequent restarts. and the problems we were dealing with were typically very narrowly defined (as opposed to restructuring society). i also think of Apple and Steven Jobs stories (no experience with either) where he was essentially a tyrant.
then i think about the approach and best results (room-of-experts v one-expert). one expert is easy to discard because nobody wants to be under the thumb of a tyrant, despite the occasional good results.
now consider a bunch of experts, and throw in an additional level of complexity called diversity (different cultures) because we are dealing with a complex and diverse society. we will see slow advancement. many restarts. chaos. turbulence. violence. numerous cooks making soup can get ugly and the result can be bad too...
worse, we are unlikely to even recognize the advancement until decades latter when historians, futurists, et al can look back and identify significant trends.
PS - my understanding is that there was a tremendous degree of politics in Newton's era - i read that he had calculus almost 20 years before he revealed it to his peers because he wanted to have an advantage of them...
I'm all for this new enlightenment and digital democracy! Henceforth, why I have begun my newsletter Digital Age Sage here on Substack to expand conscious living amidst these radical global changes and digital chaos. Subscribe, and I will not disappoint readers here! It is time for us to create a new path forward!
As a freedom loving "Hip Hop" (Intelligent Movement) American, with African roots, whilst living in Brazil for the last 7 years, I have come to the exact same conclusions: It is time for the greatest minds on the planet to unite like Voltron! Freedom is under attack globally, and most humans do not care for Autocracy! Yet, so many humans are utterly and ubiquitously captured by persuasive technology that is gnawing away at their souls like a spiritual pariah.
I am an autodidactic polymath. I practice health and wellness, was a personal trainer for 10 years, I speak Portugese and English; I study Eastern and Western philosphy; to the best of my ability, I practice grounded metaphysical teachings. I have a bachelors in Bus. Administration. I've written thousands of lines of poetry and lyrics as well as non-fiction prose. Substack is the way for Enlightened Minds. I hope it will not become compromised, co-opted, and destroyed by the powers that be.
Yet, as many of us thinkers, writers, and creatives, I am confronted with a mainstream world that seemingly is opposed to knowledge, wisdom, and understanding. How could our beloved United States descend into a freefall toward totalitarianism? We know we have a problem, when even Bruce Springsteen, the man who wrote "Born In The U.S.A." is under attack.
As stated by World Liberty Congress statistics, 70% of our world lives under Autocratic Tyrants, and 80% of the world would prefer living in freedom. Now, we can use AI, our digital networks, vast global reach to amplify out spiritual longing for fairness, ethics, morality, justice, prosperity, and peace.
We must work from the ground up by restoring agency to our bodies, minds, and souls. We must always remember that as free thinking humans, every single moment we have a chance to choose our destiny. We can choose the race to the bottom of the brainstem by doomscrolling or we can choose to write, comment, and share thoughts with the Royal Society on Substack.
The neo-reactionary accelerationists want to impose a dark enlightenment to tear down all former democratic institutions, but their only plan for us humans is digital enslavement. We as humans are MORE than them in number and Spirit. They know this, free humans have power in numbers. Our mission is a mass awakening of humans who take simple control over our own lives.
Imagine if billions of people decided to meditate for 30 min a day together ALL AT ONCE the same time. Imagine a world where every human has access to drinking water, nutritious food, and basic shelter. Imagine a world where abundance is a birthright and everyone could trade their best products and services free of oppresive tyranny. Imagine a world where violence, crime, and pervision are all on the decline. Humanity, in times past has done HALF the work to get us to the world we want. Now, it is time for US to BUILD off of former foundations and use these powerful TOOL to amplify our vision of living in health, love, awareness, and wealth!
im already disappointed.