In the works for years, "The Post-Individual" is here...

A new way of seeing who we are

This essay and concept is something that's been rattling around in my head since before the time of the original Dark Forest essay in 2019. I had this image of my self as this fractal, with each slice a different version of myself that was alive online, and was in fact independent of one another.

How it started

Research for my book had taken me into Charles Taylor, Michael Walzer, and Elizabeth Anderson, who all shared distinct visions of how one could delineate between precise dimensions of self and values of self. Further curiosity led me to Joseph Henrich the "The WEIRDest People in the Room" and Larry Sidentop's "Inventing the Individual," which tracked anthropologically and sociologically how the Western notion of individualism had come about.

During this time I was also interviewing various figures about this topic. There were conversations with Adam Curtis, Priya Parker, Kate Raworth, Heather McGhee, Marianna Mazucatto, Pia Mancini, and John Higgs, among others. They offered other dimensions and ways of thinking about the evolution of the self. The writings of David Graeber offered a wonderful counterweight.

There was also material from the actual geography of the piece: the internet. Writings by the great K-Hole, Ben Thompson, and Viskath V made it into the essay, and ideas by Katherine Dee, Paul Ford, Robin Sloan, and Aaron Lewis were latent.

The end result is a piece that looks at Western individualism as an invention of Christianity that's fundamentally changed because of the internet. Because the internet re-individualizes us, we are born again as new dimensions of self that we are free to live and act as according to our imaginations and willingness to play a part. On the other side of it is a new definition of what an individual even is.

This First Edition

I've worked on this piece for many years. It became a bit of an obsession. Because of this, I've decided to treat this release with a level of intentionality. Here I've crafted what I see as the ideal expression of this work. It includes:

• A PDF of the work
• A video of me talking about the essay
• An audio recording of me reading it
• Slides from a talk I gave where I presented this
• Early notes and sketches

Together these files are collected into an Open Edition that's a record of where this came from and who made it. I've made this available for anyone to download and collect at any price (including free). All funds will be given to the Dark Forest Collective treasury to support other works exploring these topics.

Provenance

The Post-Individual First Edition By Yancey Strickler PDF generated from author's original Scrivener file 4,162 words .MOV and .MP3 files recorded in author's home Scrivener file dump Illustrations by Ilya Yudanov and Laurel Schwulst Citations of: Joseph Henrich, Larry Sidentop, Sherry Turckle, K-Hole, Ben Thompson, Priya Parker, and Adam Curtis Written: 2019-2023 Locations: Los Angeles, Vancouver, London, New York