There is a sort of fork in my philosophy, at first visible (or, perhaps, at first impossible to ignore) in the single sentence of Blood in the Snow that introduces the image of the bird's nest —and then at much greater length in the two hour lecture on Iran that explains this allegory of the bird's nest as the bridge between generations at greater length, and in dramatic fashion.
Although in some ways this is just a return to the concerns stated in the old manifesto video in Season One (i.e., long before No More Manifestos) I've made a subtle shift from a two-category to a three-category system of thinking about the lives and immediate futures of myself, my colleagues and contemporaries. The first two categories, perhaps excessively familiar to the few who will read this note, contrast (i) the life of the mind to (ii) the pursuit of short-term self-indulgence, a false model of happiness. We now have a third category of (iii) building the bird's nest, the bridge between generations. Although I was many years younger when the old manifesto video was recorded, you might recall the greater emphasis on retirement homes (and medical care for the elderly, etc.) at that time.
Empirically, I think the third category is fictional, or at least much more fictional than the first two: some people passionately, directly desire to live the life of the mind, and directly experience some kind of joy from living it. I doubt anyone would be able to muster up much skepticism if I were to say something parallel about the pseudo-hedonism of the second category. These two categories exist: that people desire them, perceive them, and experience suffering and sorrow as a result, sometimes misperceiving misery as happiness, sometimes experiencing true elation, joy and happiness. What I doubt is that the bird's nest (and the bridge to the next generation) is real for anyone in this same way: all I ever hear is women who were brainwashed into maternity by one oppressive religion or another regretting that they'd ever agreed to raise kids at all, looking back at their prior lives as a succession of submissive mistakes. Atheism neither liberates us from the chains of sexual desire nor sexual morality; it does, apparently, liberate us from having any interest whatsoever in sexual reproduction.
You will think that I am joking because I am joking, but my point is sincere: the human species seems to truly lack instincts or interests related to building this nest. I've had a few encounters lately with women who suddenly decide that they want to become mothers, but their passion for this is not even enough to compel them to quit smoking, quit drinking, or quit uploading hardcore pornography videos of themselves to Onlyfans. When the simplest of questions are asked about the most immediately obvious prerequisites (i.e., nest building activities) they stare blankly into a future they have no practice imagining. I do not think these women are exceptional, and I do not think the men are better than them (i.e., I would tend to assume most men are even worse).
All three categories involve vanity. All three categories involve egoism and self-serving delusion. However, the first two categories have some power to tempt people, whereas the third does not: there is a temptation to live, broadly, then a temptation to live a meaningful life, much more narrowly, in part arising from the experience of the meaninglessness of the pursuit of many different kinds of happiness. In this sense, nobody really needs to advocate for the life of the mind: it is seductive in its own way, whereas cocaine and prostitution are rebarbative in their own way as well. The lack of human interest in that third category is remarkable, however: we have no instinct to build this bridge between the generations, and so —it seems— all our bridges to the future may soon be burned.
The enjoyment of life and the meaning of life are two different things. However, if you are at a high enough level of intellectual sophistication, raising children is both enjoyable and meaningful —whereas going to Coachella is neither one nor the other —whereas watching televised ice hockey is neither one nor the other, and so on. I suspect we are members of a species that has just enough "low cunning" to become entirely consumed with short-term self-indulgence (video game addiction and drug addiction included) without reaching that level of intellectual sophistication that would make the miseries of raising children enjoyable to endure.
