Krish Thakker

Introduction

So, full disclosure: I've never actually written a proper blog post before. I've always been one for making random notes, and logging random voicenotes about what I'm thinking about. Doing my best to articulate how the content I consume and things I do shape my opinions and world-view.

I'm just now realising that's basically just blogging without a publish button, with all my 'posts' just sitting in my drafts pre-composition.

So, I figured I might as well put something out there, and whipped up this website myself with cursor in about an hour. It's nothing fancy, but it's the next logical step. This is me finally trying to take that random soup of ideas and turn it into something someone other than me might actually read.

A topic I've been fascinated by in my recent musings is the "Kali-Yuga", the final stage of the dharmic cycle of existence, the era of spiritual degradation. I can't help but draw parallels between what scriptures like the Mahabharata and the Kalki-Puraan predicted for this age and my own observations of the modern world. This series of blog posts, in part, is my attempt to connect those dots. It's me trying to see if I'm just pattern-matching, or if those writers were really onto something

This first post begins by exploring the idea of the material "self" which is explored in both vices, and what factors influence how our world-view is formed.

If that sounds as interesting to you as it does to me, let’s get into it.

The "Average Self"

A professor I've been watching for some time now, Prof. Xueqin Jiang of Predictive History, argues that we aren't "one" person. We are a collection of identities. We're a student in class, a child at home, an employee at work. We code-switch. We present different facets of ourselves to different people.

A "self", then by virtue, isn't a static set of rules you choose to live your life by, It's the average of who you consciously present yourself as in different scenarios. The aggregation of different performances you choose to act.

Today, this "self" isn't just formed by the (limited, and fast decreasing) in-person interactions we have. It's also profoundly shaped by our digital footprint. The posts we like, the reels we share, the version of ourself we meticulously curate online. These aren't just passive actions; they're performative. We are, in effect, constantly building and broadcasting an identity. This digital life creates a powerful, real-time feedback loop. We post a version of ourselves, the world (or more fittingly the algorithm) reacts, and that reaction tells us who to be next.

Our worldview, then, is this fluid, aggregated "self-perception": a "self" that is seed-authentic, but majorly curated, and constantly in flux. It is the perfect "self" for the Kali Yuga: unmoored from a stable, inner truth and defined instead by the fleeting, external world.

The Programmable Self (The Modern Maya)

If our worldview is this fluid "self-perception," how is that perception formed?

A century ago, a journalist named Walter Lippmann argued in his 1922 book ‘Public Opinion’ that the real world is "too big, too complex, and too fleeting for direct acquaintance." We can't possibly know it all. We’ve never seen 'the government' in its entirety, we've never experienced 'market forces', and we’ve never visited every country we have an opinion on.

So, we create simplified "pictures in our heads.": assumptions at best. We build a "pseudo-environment." We don't respond to the world as it is; we respond to our perception of it, which we’ve established is controlled by an algorithm feeding our self-curated identity.

In Hindu philosophy, this "pseudo-environment" has a name: Maya. It is the veil of illusion, the manufactured reality that we mistake for the real thing.

This is where the idea for this series really began for me. Only very little of what we 'know' is actually based on real world, firsthand experience. Today, because of social media, new generations are experiencing less firsthand reality and more of the "pseudo-environment," a manipulable feed of incoming data shaping their reality. The "pictures in their heads" are no longer a map of the world; for all intents and purposes, they are the world. The Maya has become all-encompassing.

So, if our worldview is our "self-perception" (Section 1), and our self-perception is built from this managed "pseudo-environment," this Maya (Section 2), then our worldview is, by its very nature, programmable.

If you can control the "pictures," you can shape the perception. And if you can shape the perception, you can define, or re-define the "self."

This brings us to the new court which everyone in the world is playing on: the attention economy. This is the engine of the modern Maya. He who controls the "pictures" (the content, the feed, the narrative) controls the "self." And in our world, control of the "pictures" is given to whoever can get the most attention.

Manufacturing the Self

Almost century ago, Edward Bernays (a man I'll be referencing a lot in posts to come) staged the "Torches of Freedom" event. He linked a product (cigarettes) to an unconscious desire (female liberation).

But today's mechanisms are far more direct.

Let's take a modern example: the "Hustler" aesthetic, personified by figures like Andrew Tate, Iman Gadzhi, Ashton Hughes, etc. I know this world. I know this "script" is effective because, for a long time, I bought into it.

This isn't just a "look"; it's a social media-born "script" for an identity. Let's break it down:

Products: Online courses ("Hustler's University," "Agency Accelerator"), paid information, digital communities.
Linked to Unconscious Desire: Masculine power, financial freedom, status, respect, and, most of all, escaping "the matrix": that vague but powerful feeling of powerlessness in the modern world.
Resulting Identity: The "High-Value Male," the "Escapee."

The performance of the hyper-masculine, wealthy lifestyle (the cars, the cigars, the private jets) is the marketing. It’s a "drip-fed" cultural script that channels a widespread, often unconscious, desire for male identity and power into a specific consumerist worldview.

And here's the genius of it: it comes with the sole intention of providing you a solution (the 'red pill' out of the matrix) which only comes at the ($1499) fraction of the potential gain. It teaches you to perform this identity by consuming the correct product. It's Bernays' playbook, supercharged by a direct-to-consumer information algorithm.

This is the "feeling of meaninglessness" that this "Hustler" script preys on. It finds a generation of young men, spiritually confused in their own internal battle, and it offers them a new "script."

The Unconscious Playing Board (The War for Maya)

So, why is this "script" so effective? Why did it work on me? From what I understand, it’s because it operates on an unconscious level.

This is exactly what Edward Bernays called the "conscious and intelligent manipulation of organised habits" in his 1928 book, Propaganda. The "Hustler" script is a perfect modern "unseen mechanism" that organises the habits (what to buy, how to 'grind') and worldviews (how to "escape the matrix") of its mass audience.

Jacques Ellul, another theorist I've been reading, explained how it works. Propaganda, he said, must "constantly short-circuit all thought and decision... operate on the individual at the level of the unconscious."

A young man doesn't decide to adopt a new worldview. He feels powerless or lost. The "Hustler" aesthetic is presented as the pathway to that feeling. It bypasses rational thought. It doesn't feel like propaganda; it feels like a revelation, like "common sense," like you're the one who's finally "woken up." It short-circuits the decision.

This is the "war of perception" that Prof. Jiang was talking about: it is the very essence of the Kali Yuga. It's a war for your self-perception, fought by "reinventing reality in a way that serves power" to those winning in the attention economy.

The Algorithm is the Unseen Mechanism

But here's the final piece that's been clicking into place for me, the part that resolves the "Hustler" script. It feels like a conscious choice, doesn't it? We choose to watch those videos. We want to "escape the matrix."

This, I'm realising, is the most profound illusion.

It's not a choice. It's a positive reinforcement algorithm. The "choice" doesn't begin with us; it's the end result of a process we're not allowed to see.

Think about it. As we’ve defined our "self-perception" through countless likes, shares, and hours of watch time, the algorithm's positive reinforcement loop has been quietly building a "pseudo-environment" just for us. It feeds us the content that aligns with the 'self' we are curating.

You feel powerless or lost. The algorithm, sensing this, presents a higher-dopamine script as the logical next step. It short-circuits thought not by forcing, but by recommending you into a corner. You "choose" the script because it’s the only one being shown to you.

This is where it all connects. The script and the Cambridge Analytica model (political propaganda) aren't different methods. They are the same mechanism pointed at different targets.

Both rely on an algorithm discovering 'the self' you're building, and then feeding that 'self' a personalised reality. This is propaganda not for the 'self' we aspire to be, but for the 'self' the algorithm has calculated us to be.

So, what happens next? What happens when this same 'unseen mechanism' moves from just recommending content to creating it? I’ll save it for the next article when I’ve done some more digging, and had a few more conversations with Gemini.