Palantir, Trump, and Inverted Signals

Actionable Information:

Palantir

Palantir, for better or worse, continues to accumulate investment capital. Up nearly 140% from its IPO price, it remains to be in an ideal strategic position. At the center of government contracts, with the expansion of the surveillance state, and against the backdrop of the pandemic, it’s hard to identify a company better positioned to capitalize on ‘The Great Reset’. I do not bring this up as investment advice, but rather to indicate the tangible effect that public markets have on the world that we live in. Palantir’s market cap has more than doubled since its IPO, which means that they have dramatically increased their access to capital, and with that comes an increased economic, political, and social footprint. Stock prices aren't just numbers on screens. As we shove capital into these profit yielding incentive structures, what do we expect to come out the other end? When people ask ‘how did we get here?’, this may be an example that we see play out in real time.

Narrative Reconstruction:

Trump

It has been.. quite something.. to see The Party ‘play Trump out’, as Eric Weinstein so eloquently put it. Don't be misguided, the legal battles will continue for weeks. But it is important to understand that we are at a point where courts rule mostly along partisan lines. Not only has this election brought to light that the integrity of the vote has been compromised, but also the integrity of the courts. My more judicially fluent readers probably already know this, but it will be fascinating to see it enter the public consciousness soon. There is absolutely no doubt that there is enough evidence to warrant audits in most, if not all, of the swing states; however, it seems that the Trump administration was simply unprepared for this level of politik from the opposition.
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Inverted Signals

Last week I wrote about Inverted Signals, where I attempted to explain why institutions often perform the inverse of their originally intended function. In short, my view is that this phenomena occurs because institutions naturally require local accountability, but when this is foregone to access the incentive structure of the global market, their purpose is turned inside out as they become victimized by statistical optimization; whether it be for individual KPI’s, financial returns, or even well-intentioned objectives.

I wanted to include some thoughtful comments on this topic from Forfare Davis, @Pseudoplotinus. You can find some of his published articles on the National Review here.

"Nice observation, J. My take, the only thing that's inverted is the relationship of signifier to signified. Modes of signifying markets, actual satisfaction and actual knowledge have become decoupled from the reality they were intended to represent. The effect is the over pursuit of fiat signifiers that, having no relationship to reality, are experiencing hyper inflation."

In the Theatre of Envy, could it be any other way?

Regards,
J.