Essay: When Algorithmic Optimization Treats Humanity as Systemic Waste
round · x · 2026-09-09
Do Not Research's long essay "Mediocrity as a Technological Imperative" builds on Tiqqun's Cybernetic Hypothesis to argue that radical optimization of algorithmically mediated reality is inverting the human-machine relationship.
- Consumption has expanded from discrete goods (cars, chocolate, appliances) to reality itself: feeds, messages, news, experiences and even thoughts are now configured as products or ad placements
- The threat is not sci-fi machine extinction but a simpler algorithmic logic where humans stop being the center of systemic efficiency and become its primary obstacle
- Drawing on the cybernetic hypothesis of the hollowed-out subject, the authors argue that turning ourselves into products and conductors of social communication is a way of reducing ourselves to nothing
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