The Shadows on Our Walls: An Allegory of Fear and Curiosity

Last week, on December 8, Romania was scheduled to hold presidential elections, but they were unexpectedly canceled. In the last week of the campaign, one of the candidates rose from under the radar of all major polling organizations — aka obscurity — to garner 2.5 million votes within a week, primarily through a TikTok-driven campaign. This phenomenon captured international attention, highlighting an intense battle between opposing forces, each claiming to represent good while portraying the other as evil. The battle was not new: globalist vs. suveranist, with a local touch.

To make sense of this complexity, I turn to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. In this allegory, prisoners, born in darkness, perceive shadows cast on a wall as the entirety of their reality. The shadows were mere reflections of actions occurring outside the cave, unseen by the prisoners.

In our world, the allegory diverges in three significant ways:

• Individual Walls: Unlike Plato’s singular canvas, in our world, each person stares at their own wall of shadows.
• Infinite Layers: These walls are not singular; they consist of infinite layers, each reflecting different aspects of reality.
• Same Play: We are part of others’ canvases, as our characters have reflections on their walls.

The outermost layers are formed by visible actions — faces, spoken words, and events we witness. Deeper layers represent thoughts: what people think and why. Those who introspect can descend even further, questioning the roots of these thoughts. Since the advent of psychology and psychoanalysis in the 20th century, humanity has made strides in understanding these deeper layers. Our actions, shaped by thoughts, project new images onto the walls of others, perpetuating a cycle of perception and reaction.

From Psychology to Mass Manipulation

By the mid-20th century, insights into individual psychology evolved into tools for mass control. Governments and powers harnessed media — radio, television, and propaganda — to manipulate the collective psyche. This mastery of mass psychology, from World War II through the Cold War, allowed those in power to shape narratives and behaviors.

The rise of the internet and machine learning (ML) took this to unprecedented depths. Algorithms began deciphering behavioral patterns, mapping psychological responses to stimuli, both physical and digital. Social media platforms, initially limited to personal circles (e.g., Facebook, Instagram, Twitter), refined these techniques, enabling precision targeting for both products and ideas.

The TikTok Revolution: Global Manipulation

TikTok introduced a paradigm shift. Its algorithms broke down traditional social circles, creating a global stage where anyone could influence everyone. With behavioral maps generated by ML, coupled with the financial resources to harness TikTok’s algorithms, individuals or groups can deliver messages with pinpoint accuracy. For more sophisticated clients, TikTok algorithms can be further manipulated using bot farms to simulate organic interest, tricking the system into amplifying specific content. While this undermines TikTok’s credibility, such strategies remain difficult to detect.

The Deeper Question: Primordial Bias?

Returning to the metaphor of layers: how deeply can we introspect, either scientifically or algorithmically? At some point, this introspection reaches the cellular level, where the foundations of our existence were first laid. At the core of human perception lies a primordial conflict: how does me vs. you evolve in us? This struggle is not just a social construct but a deeply rooted evolutionary mechanism, echoing billions of years of cellular history.

Consider the evolution of cells. In the earliest stages, life consisted of simple prokaryotic cells. A milestone occurred when two of these simple cells merged to form a eukaryotic cell — a more complex entity capable of advanced functions. Later, during the Cambrian explosion, another leap was made as complex cells began cooperating, giving rise to multicellular organisms. These evolutionary steps were fraught with negotiation: an ongoing tension between individuality and collective existence. The me vs. you dynamic had to be reconciled repeatedly for life to evolve.

This ancient cellular memory still influences us today. Deep within, I believe we carry the echoes of this conflict, refracted through countless layers of experience and perception. It manifests first as raw emotions — fear or excitement — and then surfaces as rational thoughts and actions. When viewed from the outside, each of us becomes a kaleidoscope of biases, all rooted in this primordial duality.

Modern technology and scientific exploration have begun to decode these biases, revealing the intricate patterns that shape our actions. Yet understanding alone cannot resolve this conflict. The challenge is not merely to observe but to confront and reconcile this fundamental duality, building bridges between the “me” and the “us” — and, by extension, between opposing ideologies in our increasingly interconnected world.

What can we do about it, beyond continuing to decode each individual’s unique map — a mission that, incidentally, lies at the heart of the work we do at adiem.com?

The most abstract ideologies today, which appear to be choking, are globalist vs. sovereignists. There are many views supporting globalism, so I will only give an example of a contemporary thinker about why we have to find ways to reconcile the unilateral views. It is Peter Thiel, in a recent interview here about Antichrist.

I also want to propose a practical way to force this bridge. Democracy, as it is now, is unable to find a way because it promotes the same pattern of power/opposition, even in turns.

A Proposal for Post-Democracy: The 50/50 Model

Now here is an idea I want to share and comment on regarding a post-democracy structure.

What if we decide someday on a political and administrative structure in which all opposing ideas have, by constitution, 50% representation in two political parties — Black and White or Yin and Yang? There is no power or opposition. It is also not a dictatorship. It is the percentage everybody hates, even in business, because it can block decisions: 50/50.

The parties start writing their political platforms bottom-up, taking each opposed bias and building upon it, transforming it into real-life views about the world. Each side can be organized as a party, but you know from the start that there are only two opposing parties, and each has the same 50/50 distribution.

From time to time, there are elections — let’s say every four years. People can select which side they vote for, and they can only choose one side. They vote for the best people they imagine, knowing that these people not only have to be competent but should also be able to negotiate every aspect with the other side, equally clever. It is similar to deciding who runs for Democrats or Republicans as president, only in this case, more people would be involved, not just one person.

We would vote, for example, for 50 or 100 people per side to represent that side for the next four years. It is like voting for seats in parliament, but the structure of the parliament is 50/50 by default. This 50/50 Parliament votes for the President and the executives.

This structure forces competence but also communication and negotiation skills because every decision must reach common ground. The structure and the current institutions would mostly remain in place, with only the upper structure being changed.

Bridging Divides

Our world is a kaleidoscope of perceptions, shaped by layers of fear and curiosity. To navigate this complexity, we need structures that force collaboration and introspection. Whether through technology, psychology, or political reform, the goal remains the same: to transcend the me vs. you dichotomy into us and build a world where shadows and people are one.