My prediction is that IS will go pretty much the same route as the ideologically and structurally very similar Mahdist State in South Egypt / Sudan in the late 19th century. Meaning I expect it to have more success, maybe sustained over a couple of years, due to their ability to wage war at comparatively little cost, then fall apart due to factional infighting when a new leader needs to take over.
That’s because succession crises tend to be worse when the old leader’s legitimacy depends on something any new leader cannot easily obtain. Abu Bakr, like Muhammad Ahmad before him, is holding together a large group of very angry people only due to the great respect he gets from them for the very successful campaign that put his organisation on the landscape. This campaign took years of clandestine preparation and would be very hard to copy for a now super visible group like IS.
Finally, that campaign was less than a year ago. Their infrastructure hasn’t had time to crumble, they haven’t run out of stolen bullets, their lieutenants haven’t had time to develop grudges against each other. Give it time.
I find your scenario of a death of rationality ridiculous—even if IS could nuke the Bay Area, even that wouldn’t do it. Rationality doesn’t need anybody’s approval. And from a monotheistic perspective, autonomous machines, let alone intelligent ones, seem so blatantly Demonic that I honestly cannot imagine any true believer attempting to build a godly one.
My prediction is that IS will go pretty much the same route as the ideologically and structurally very similar Mahdist State in South Egypt / Sudan in the late 19th century. Meaning I expect it to have more success, maybe sustained over a couple of years, due to their ability to wage war at comparatively little cost, then fall apart due to factional infighting when a new leader needs to take over.
That’s because succession crises tend to be worse when the old leader’s legitimacy depends on something any new leader cannot easily obtain. Abu Bakr, like Muhammad Ahmad before him, is holding together a large group of very angry people only due to the great respect he gets from them for the very successful campaign that put his organisation on the landscape. This campaign took years of clandestine preparation and would be very hard to copy for a now super visible group like IS.
Finally, that campaign was less than a year ago. Their infrastructure hasn’t had time to crumble, they haven’t run out of stolen bullets, their lieutenants haven’t had time to develop grudges against each other. Give it time.
I find your scenario of a death of rationality ridiculous—even if IS could nuke the Bay Area, even that wouldn’t do it. Rationality doesn’t need anybody’s approval. And from a monotheistic perspective, autonomous machines, let alone intelligent ones, seem so blatantly Demonic that I honestly cannot imagine any true believer attempting to build a godly one.