It looks like seasteading is finally trying to address its audience problem…
Ever since Joe Quirk became the Seasteading Institute‘s unofficial spokesperson, after he wrote that really shitty book, he’s tanked its potential audience by emphasising the endeavour’s potential usefulness for the establishment of a kind of Oceanic Neorandianism.
I think seasteading is a really interesting idea, in and of itself, and a lot of the Seasteading Institute’s materials show that they have been involved in some genuinely interesting research. Unfortunately, that’s largely overshadowed by Quirk’s deficient persona as he tries to be some sort of garden-variety alt-right firebrand. (I wrote about all this previously here.)
So it’s interesting to see this push back (even though it still ends with a plug of Quirk’s book), and a broader look at the SI’s website seems to show they’re pushing for this bipartisan angle more generally too.
Is it even salvageable at this point? Who knows…
It’s worth noting, however, because there has obviously been a lot of patchwork chat orbiting issues of climate change recently and, if that’s your bag, seasteading might be a worthwhile thing to look into. It holds those issues of environmental sustainability and innovation at its heart. Maybe it needs more people who are really invested in that side of things and less Quirks…
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