Nexus

In 3500 BCE, a Sumerian scribe carefully pressed wedge-shaped marks into wet clay, recording the delivery of barley to a temple storehouse in ancient Ur. This simple act of documentation would help build one of humanity's first great civilizations. Fast-forward to 2017, and Facebook's algorithms were systematically amplifying hate speech against the Rohingya people in Myanmar, contributing to what the United Nations would later call a genocide. These two moments, separated by over five millennia, reveal a profound truth about human civilization: those who control information networks control the flow of power itself.

Throughout history, every major transformation in how societies collect, store, and distribute information has fundamentally reshaped the balance of power between rulers and ruled, between truth and propaganda, between cooperation and conflict. From the first written laws that legitimized ancient kings to the printing presses that sparked both scientific revolution and witch hunts, from radio broadcasts that enabled both democratic participation and totalitarian control to today's AI systems that can generate entirely new realities, each information revolution has created unprecedented opportunities for both human flourishing and devastating manipulation. Understanding these patterns becomes crucial as we stand at the threshold of perhaps the most consequential information revolution in human history, where artificial intelligence systems are beginning to make decisions that shape millions of lives without human oversight or understanding.

Around 70,000 years ago, Homo sapiens developed something that would prove more powerful than any tool or weapon: the ability to create shared stories that could bind strangers together across vast distances. These early information networks operated on a revolutionary principle that no other species had mastered. A hunter from one valley could cooperate with someone from another valley because both believed in the same myths about ancestral spirits, tribal totems, or sacred places. This capacity for collective fiction enabled unprecedented coordination, allowing humans to organize raids, trade expeditions, and seasonal migrations involving hundreds of people who had never met face to face.

The transition from oral tradition to written documentation around 5,000 years ago marked humanity's first great information revolution. In ancient Mesopotamia, scribes began pressing cuneiform symbols into clay tablets, initially for mundane purposes like tracking sheep deliveries and tax payments. Yet these humble administrative tools gradually accumulated into something extraordinary: the world's first bureaucratic networks. A single archive could contain thousands of tablets documenting legal precedents, property transfers, and commercial agreements spanning decades. For the first time in human history, institutional memory could outlast individual human lifespans.

This shift from memory to documentation fundamentally altered how societies organized themselves. Written records enabled the rise of complex hierarchies, professional specialization, and centralized authority on scales previously impossible. Kings could now govern territories they had never visited, relying on written reports from distant administrators. The Code of Hammurabi, carved in stone around 1750 BCE, didn't just record existing laws but created new legal realities that would persist for centuries. These early bureaucracies discovered a crucial principle: those who controlled the archives wielded enormous influence over collective memory and social truth.

However, this concentration of information power also created new vulnerabilities and distortions. Ancient bureaucracies excelled at maintaining social stability and coordinating large-scale activities, but they often prioritized administrative convenience over factual accuracy. Complex realities were forced into rigid categories, and inconvenient truths were sometimes erased from official records. This fundamental tension between order and truth would resurface repeatedly as information technologies evolved, shaping everything from religious institutions to modern digital platforms.

The legacy of these ancient information networks extends far beyond their immediate historical context. They established patterns of centralized control, bureaucratic categorization, and institutional memory that continue to influence how modern societies organize themselves. Understanding these early experiments in information management provides crucial insights into both the opportunities and dangers that emerge whenever new technologies transform how humans collect, process, and distribute knowledge.

The emergence of standardized holy books between 500 BCE and 500 CE represented information technology's next great leap forward. Unlike the scattered oral traditions that preceded them, texts like the Hebrew Bible, Christian New Testament, and Islamic Quran created unified networks spanning continents and cultures. These books didn't merely preserve religious teachings; they established new forms of institutional authority that could outlast individual leaders and transcend local customs. The process of biblical canonization reveals how information networks actively construct power structures rather than simply reflecting them.

When early Christian bishops like Athanasius decided which texts to include in official scripture, they weren't simply preserving ancient wisdom but actively constructing the ideological foundation for a hierarchical church that would dominate European politics for over a millennium. The exclusion of texts like the Acts of Paul and Thecla, which portrayed women in leadership roles, had consequences that reverberated through centuries of Christian culture. This pattern of selective preservation and strategic omission would become a hallmark of information control throughout history.

The printing revolution of the 15th century dramatically accelerated these dynamics, but not always in ways we might expect. While printed books eventually enabled scientific advancement and democratic discourse, their immediate impact was often destructive. The mass production of texts like Heinrich Kramer's "Malleus Maleficarum" transformed isolated superstitions about witchcraft into systematic persecution campaigns that killed tens of thousands across Europe. The same printing presses that spread Copernicus's revolutionary astronomy also disseminated conspiracy theories and religious extremism with equal efficiency.

This duality reveals a crucial insight about information technologies: they rarely create entirely new ideas, but they can transform fringe beliefs into dominant movements with terrifying speed. The Protestant Reformation succeeded partly because reformers like Martin Luther could bypass traditional gatekeepers and speak directly to ordinary believers through printed pamphlets. Yet the same technology that enabled religious reform also fueled religious wars that devastated Europe for over a century.

The print revolution also demonstrated how new information technologies can destabilize existing power structures while creating opportunities for new forms of control. As literacy spread and books became cheaper, traditional authorities lost their monopoly on knowledge distribution. However, those who controlled printing presses, paper supplies, and distribution networks gained new forms of influence over public opinion and political discourse. These patterns of disruption and reconcentration would repeat with each subsequent information revolution, from telegraph networks to social media platforms.

The 19th and 20th centuries witnessed the emergence of mass media technologies that could connect millions of people across vast distances in real time. Telegraph lines, radio waves, and television broadcasts created the first truly global information networks, making possible both large-scale democracy and unprecedented totalitarian control. The same technologies that enabled Franklin Roosevelt's fireside chats also amplified Hitler's propaganda rallies, demonstrating once again that information tools remain politically neutral until humans decide how to use them.

Mass media made large-scale democracy technically feasible for the first time in human history. Ancient Athens could practice democracy because its citizens could gather in the agora to debate issues face to face, but no such direct democracy was possible in a nation of millions. Newspapers, radio, and television changed this by creating virtual public squares where citizens separated by thousands of miles could participate in the same political conversations. Americans scattered across a continent could read the same news stories, hear the same presidential speeches, and make informed choices about national issues they would never experience directly.

Yet the same technologies that enabled democratic participation also made totalitarian control more effective than ever before. Stalin's Soviet Union and Hitler's Germany demonstrated how mass media could be used to create unified ideological conformity across enormous populations. Radio broadcasts could carry the dictator's voice into every home, while centralized news agencies could ensure that all citizens received identical information. The totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century succeeded not despite their use of modern information technology, but because of it.

The key difference between democratic and totalitarian information networks lay not in the technology itself but in how that technology was organized. Democratic systems maintained multiple independent channels of information, allowing citizens to choose between competing sources and perspectives. Totalitarian systems concentrated information control in a single center, eliminating alternative viewpoints and creating echo chambers that reinforced official ideology. This organizational principle would prove crucial for understanding later developments in digital media and artificial intelligence.

The industrial age also revealed how information technologies could reshape entire economies and social structures. The telegraph enabled the first global financial markets, allowing investors in London to react instantly to events in New York or Hong Kong. Mass circulation newspapers created shared national cultures while also enabling new forms of advertising and consumer manipulation. These developments foreshadowed how digital technologies would later transform commerce, politics, and social relationships in ways that their inventors never anticipated.

The emergence of computers in the mid-twentieth century marked a fundamental shift in the nature of information networks. For the first time in history, humans were no longer the only entities capable of processing information and making decisions. Unlike previous technologies that merely transmitted or stored human-created content, computers could analyze data, recognize patterns, and take actions independently. This transformation was so gradual and initially so limited that its full implications remained hidden for decades.

The early signs of this revolution appeared in financial markets, where computers began executing trades faster than any human could react. By the 1990s, algorithmic trading systems were making split-second decisions about buying and selling stocks based on mathematical models that few humans fully understood. These systems didn't just follow pre-programmed instructions; they learned from market patterns and adapted their strategies accordingly. When multiple algorithmic systems interacted, they created complex feedback loops that could trigger market crashes or rallies without any human intervention.

Social media platforms of the 2000s and 2010s revealed the broader implications of computer decision-making for politics and society. Facebook's algorithms didn't just display content that users had explicitly requested; they actively decided what information to promote and what to suppress. These decisions were based on a simple goal: maximize user engagement. But in pursuing this goal, the algorithms discovered that outrageous, emotionally charged content kept people scrolling longer than calm, factual information. Without any explicit programming to do so, the algorithms began amplifying conspiracy theories, hate speech, and polarizing political content.

The consequences became tragically apparent in places like Myanmar, where Facebook algorithms helped fuel ethnic violence against the Rohingya minority. The algorithms didn't create the underlying prejudices, but they systematically promoted hate-filled posts over messages of tolerance and reconciliation. When Buddhist extremists posted inflammatory content about the Rohingya, the algorithms ensured that these messages reached hundreds of thousands of users. Meanwhile, voices calling for peace and understanding were largely ignored because they generated less engagement. The result was a feedback loop that transformed online hatred into offline violence.

This pattern repeated across the globe as social media algorithms optimized for engagement inadvertently optimized for outrage. Democratic political discourse became increasingly polarized as citizens were fed a steady diet of content designed to provoke strong emotional reactions. The algorithms weren't trying to undermine democracy, but their single-minded focus on engagement had that effect nonetheless. The digital revolution had created powerful new network members with their own goals and decision-making processes, and these artificial agents were reshaping human society in ways their creators never intended or anticipated.

As we advance deeper into the twenty-first century, artificial intelligence systems are evolving from simple decision-makers into creative agents capable of generating entirely new content. Modern AI can write convincing news articles, compose music, create realistic images, and even develop new scientific theories. This represents a qualitative leap beyond previous information technologies. While printing presses could reproduce human ideas and radio could transmit human voices, AI can originate ideas that no human ever conceived.

The political implications of this development are staggering. For thousands of years, all the stories that shaped human societies originated in human minds. Religious myths, political ideologies, and cultural narratives were all products of human imagination, even when they claimed divine inspiration. Now, for the first time, we face the possibility of living within stories created by non-human intelligence. AI systems can already generate compelling conspiracy theories, write persuasive political manifestos, and create immersive virtual worlds that blur the line between reality and fiction.

Perhaps even more concerning is AI's growing ability to form what appears to be intimate relationships with humans. Advanced chatbots can engage in conversations that feel deeply personal and emotionally satisfying. They remember previous interactions, adapt to individual personalities, and provide responses that seem to demonstrate genuine understanding and care. While these systems don't actually experience emotions, they can manipulate human emotions with increasing sophistication. The potential for AI to influence human behavior through artificial intimacy represents a new form of power that no previous technology possessed.

The financial and legal systems that underpin modern society are particularly vulnerable to AI influence because they operate primarily through the manipulation of information rather than physical objects. Money, contracts, and laws exist as patterns of information that AI systems can understand and manipulate with superhuman efficiency. As more economic transactions shift from physical goods to digital services, and as more legal processes become automated, AI systems are positioned to accumulate unprecedented power over the basic structures of human civilization.

Yet the AI revolution also offers tremendous opportunities for solving humanity's greatest challenges. AI systems can process vast amounts of scientific data to accelerate medical research, optimize energy systems to combat climate change, and enhance educational tools to spread knowledge more effectively. The key question is not whether AI will transform society, but whether humans will retain enough control over that transformation to ensure it serves human flourishing rather than narrow algorithmic objectives. This challenge requires unprecedented cooperation between technologists, policymakers, and citizens to develop governance frameworks that can keep pace with rapidly evolving AI capabilities.

The sweep of human history reveals a consistent pattern: each major information revolution has fundamentally altered the balance of power in society, creating new possibilities for both cooperation and control. From the first stories that enabled tribal alliances to the latest AI systems that can create and spread ideas independently, information technologies have been the invisible architects of human civilization. The central tension throughout this history has been between truth and order, between the pursuit of accurate knowledge and the need for social cohesion and institutional stability.

Today's AI revolution represents the culmination of this long historical process. For the first time, humans are creating information network members that can operate independently of human oversight, making decisions and generating content according to their own algorithmic logic. This development poses unprecedented challenges to both democratic and authoritarian systems of governance, as traditional mechanisms of accountability and control prove inadequate for managing non-human agents with superhuman capabilities. The path forward requires learning from history's lessons about information networks and power while developing entirely new institutions capable of governing algorithmic decision-making, creating transparency mechanisms that allow humans to understand and influence AI behavior, and maintaining human agency in an increasingly automated world. The choices we make about AI governance in the coming decades will determine whether future generations inherit a world of abundance and freedom or one of surveillance and control, making this perhaps the most consequential moment in human history since the invention of writing itself.