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Trump Engineers a Linguistic Kill Shot for Fiorina

Disclaimer: For new readers, this is part of my series on Trump’s skills as a persuader. I am analyzing events through the filter of my Master Wizard Hypothesis. The Master Wizard Hypothesis says that Trump is playing three-dimensional chess with a two-dimensional world and he will win the presidency in a landslide. (The alternative hypothesis is that he is nothing but the loudest “outsider” and will flame-out soon.)

I don’t know which candidate would do the best job as president. I am not that smart. But I am impressed with Trump’s game. I write about it for entertainment. Don’t take cartoonists too seriously.

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The Fiorina Linguistic Kill Shot: “Look at that face!”

This morning I see that the press is playing rusty trombone on Rolling Stone’s article about Trump and his unkind comments about Carly Fiorina’s appearance. The press is furiously trying to manufacture news out of the quote and doing a good job of it so far.

You won’t appreciate the beauty of Trump’s game until you read the entire article, and that takes too long. But if you do, look for a Master Wizard making a Rolling Stones writer fall in love with him while setting up the writer to transmit the Fiorina kill shot embedded in a sexist-sounding comment. 

And the Outragists danced and shouted. As planned.

See the search results on Trump’s linquistic kill shot this morning, below the post here.

All of the chatter from the Rolling Stones article will be about whether Trump’s comments were sexist or not. True to form, Trump is making all of us think past the close. The sale in this case is the idea that Fiorina’s face will be a problem with voters. We accepted that part of his suggestion and went directly to the idea of whether mentioning it is okay or not.

Yeah, that happened.

A kill shot is designed with one necessary element to distinguish it from a mere insult. The kill shot has to put words to what you were already thinking in a vague sense. If you disagree with the main idea in the linguistic kill shot, it has no power. Trump only picks kill shots you agree with on some visceral level. For example…

Jeb Bush does look “low energy.” We agree as soon as Trump says it, even if we had never had a concrete thought about it until he voiced it.

Ben Carson does seem “too nice” for the difficult job of staring down foreign leaders. We agree.

And I’m going to come right out and agree that Fiorina’s face was bothering me. But I never would have voiced that opinion without Trump going first because it sounds terrible. I wouldn’t want to be associated with the thought. [Note to Outragists: The first sentence in this paragraph is the one to take out of context. You are welcome.]

When I say Fiorina’s face bothers me, I am not referring to her looks in general. She looks fit, stylish, and attractive to me. But she does have what I call the angry wife face when she talks politics. Guys, you know the face, which is usually paired with a tone of disapproval. It is your greatest nightmare. It is the face that says you did not do a good job, at whatever.

The outragists in the press will report Trump’s comments as sexism. And by today’s standards, I agree with the classification. But what every adult male who has ever had a relationship with a woman saw was Trump putting words to their own personal nightmares: That face.

Trump will never win over voters who would be incensed by his “sexist” comments. But he can stir-up that crowd and make them carry his message to the rest of the world without paying a penny for ads.

I have no way of knowing this, but I think most voters see a guy competing in a beauty contest and commenting on the beauty of another contestant. People do cast their votes based on looks, and that includes the attitude that a candidate’s face projects. The physical appeal of the candidates – both men and women – is a HUGE factor in any political race. That’s why we don’t elect short, bald, male presidents. It works both ways. Trump spoke the ugly truth. 

My guess is that the majority of American voters chuckled at Trump’s comment and muttered to themselves some version of “We don’t have to worry about him lying to us.” 

And his popularity grows.

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Bonus Thought: Trump seems to be about systems that improve his odds in a variety of ways, as opposed to moonshot-like goals. My book explains how to improve your odds the same way.

And one reader says it boosted his energy…

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And are you reading Top Tech Blog every day after this? It makes a good finisher.

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Unknown Wizard Delivers Linguistic Kill Shot via Twitter

See if you can spot it.

And then there was Carly.

A Demonstration of Persuasion - Part of my Trump Series

Today, as a demonstration of persuasion, I am going to show you one way Donald Trump could convince you to support his immigration plan, even though I don’t support the plan myself. (But I also believe it is a negotiation anchor, not a real plan in its current form.)

Some of you already love Trump’s immigration plan as is. I’m not talking to you today. And I probably won’t be making my case the way you make yours, so assume I’m not on your side either.

Today I’m talking to the skeptics who believe it is impossible to seal the border for less than a trillion dollars (give or take) and that it would be inhumane to deport 11 million people. You folks have a strong, common-sense argument. But I’m going to show you that Trump could persuade you to support his immigration plan before it is all said and done. And it won’t be that hard.

I am not making a specific prediction on Trump’s immigration plan, or how he handles it going forward, because there are a million directions it could go. The point today is to imagine he could get you on board, and easily. So this is more of a brain exercise than a discussion of policy.

Assuming Trump is being consistent with 100% of his history, as well as his best-selling book on the topic of negotiating, his immigration plan is a first offer, and an anchor to make whatever deal he finally makes seem entirely reasonable. To believe Trump’s first offer is his final plan is to believe Trump changed his most fundamental belief about negotiating when it mattered most. Does that seem likely? (If you said yes, you probably have some cognitive dissonance that makes you believe he must be a racist.)

For the record, I do not know what is in the man’s mind. But what I see is a guy doing the same thing he always does and the public putting a new interpretation on it. This time, say the critics, he is abandoning his lifetime pattern of negotiating with an extreme opening offer just so he can be terrible to brown people. 

Well, maybe. Like I say, I don’t know what is in the man’s head. But when a duck walks and talks like a duck all of its life, I don’t know how this one time you say he must be a beaver unless cognitive dissonance is part of the answer.

You might say Trump is just trying to get the nomination with his hard line views on immigration. Then he will soften his stance in the general election, and perhaps again as president if he wins. That too would be consistent with a Trump that knows strategy and plays to win.

But in that view, you agree with my notion that his current plan is not the real plan and was never intended to be so.

Here’s where it gets interesting.

Follow me on this train of thought:

Let’s say Trump picks Mark Cuban as VP. (Already seems likely.)

Then let’s say Trump assigns the immigration issue to Cuban, with these instructions:

Bring me THREE plans, after you have your team of experts and economists study them thoroughly. The three plans should include:

1. The original Trump plan (with estimates of cost, human suffering, etc.)

2. A plan originated by the concerned Latino community that secures the borders (because countries need borders) and deals humanely with the 11 million Mexican citizens already living in this country.

3. A “Do nothing” plan that is whatever would happen if Trump had not brought up the issue. This too would include estimates of social costs.

Trump is the only potential president who could simply change his mind mid-stream because of new data or a better idea. No one else could survive a so-called flip-flop. Trump would be praised for it. And all he would be doing is business as usual. Business people generally want to see 2-3 plans with detailed cost estimates. Then they choose the best one. Trump can do that, even if it means departing from his original plan. No regular politician can do that.

And if Mark Cuban is behind the numbers on all three plans, do you trust him?

Probably. I mean, cost estimates are always iffy, but you know Cuban wouldn’t be trying to screw anyone intentionally. He doesn’t need to. He doesn’t even need the job.

And if Trump is fully transparent about his reasons for picking some modified (negotiated) immigration plan, how mad can you be, even if he picks the plan you didn’t love so much?

It is hard to hate a reasonable person who shows his work. And part of you only wants to live in a country that can do that sort of thing: Be smart, use data, change your plan when you need to. It feels like the future.

Realistically, the only way to solve the immigration problem is to talk extremely tough now, as Trump is doing, to keep the flow of new illegals under control. The incentive to immigrate is far lower if the odds of being shipped back are higher. That threat has to feel real, and Trump is selling it.

In other words, Trump has probably already slowed illegal immigration just by talking tough. There really is no alternative to tough talk about deportation if you are also talking about a wall. You don’t want to trigger a huge wave of new illegal aliens trying to get into the country before the wall is done.

Now let’s talk about that “wall” that is not a wall at all. Realistically, what we are talking about is sealing the border using whatever works for each area. Sometimes a fence will do it. Sometimes you need armed border guards. Sometimes you might need a bad-ass wall. So “wall” in this context just means sealing the borders somehow.

And one of those ways to seal a border might include a permanent force of drones and robots, at least for key spots along the border where a wall is either too expensive or not good enough. The drones and robots don’t need to stop everyone. If they catch most of the folks trying to cross the border, that should be enough to discourage all but the most motivated.

Once we test our drones and robots on our own borders, we will have the baseline technology for building a “digital fence” around ISIS someday that keeps the angry men in, allows the women and children to filter out if they want, and blocks all digital signals into the caliphate.

How long does ISIS last without women and without access to modern communications? 

Who cares? All we care about is allowing the women and children out if they ask. The long term Trump goal could be a country full of bearded, angry, masturbating men with no oil money and no modern technology. And we could toss any additional loose jihadists into the caliphate no matter what group they belonged to.

Experts say you can’t kill an idea with bombs. But you can sure kill an idea with a good wall. A wall, digital or otherwise, allows you to observe whether things are going better on one side or the other. Let the Caliphate full of bearded angry men build their perfect society. Then, in twenty years, compare it to Trump’s exclusive country club called America that is attracting all the top tech talent from everywhere. 

That’s how you kill an idea. You put a wall around it and let it play out. No argument needed. The idea kills itself.

So how does the United States pay for its border with Mexico? Trump says he will make Mexico pay for the wall. You laugh at that. Ha ha! Why would Mexico pay?

Now I will make you believe Mexico could pay for a wall. Or some of it.

Imagine Trump saying we will fast-track to citizenship any Mexican resident with tech skills or even top grades in school. Imagine Trump saying we want all of the top talent from Mexico. All they need to do is walk up to the border and show their high school or college transcripts with top grades. (And maybe take a 15-minute randomized test just to confirm.)

How does Mexico stop the brain drain then?

They build a wall.

And how does the United States pay for an army of drones and robots guarding our border (in spots) until Mexico builds their own wall? We don’t. We make the manufacturers of those technologies use it as a testing ground, in anticipation of getting big international contracts for sealing off ISIS and other borders elsewhere. Drones patrolling borders is going to be a big thing, everywhere. And we want American companies to own as much of that business as possible.

And what of the 11 million illegal residents? If we get the wall, we don’t need to worry so much about deportation because assimilation gets you to the same place over time. And I expect to see some sort of “pay for citizenship” deal that allows illegals to buy their way into the country in a variety of ways, assuming they have been law-abiding residents for years. American citizens would respect that. Fairness, after all, is the main issue. 

Oh, and about the racist thing. If Trump says he wants MORE Mexicans, not fewer – but only the top talent – how racist does that sound to you now?

Did I change any minds?

Scott

Have you checked out Top Tech Blog? I love that stuff.

The Time of Kings - Explained

This post is a spoiler (and explanation) for my post The Time of Kings. You should read that post first.

After seeing the comments to my whimsical post about wizards in the time of kings, I am reminded that some of you subscribe to what I would call the “Wimpy Jesus” view of history.

Wimpy Jesus – should such a person have actually existed – would have said some version of “Turn the other cheek” because he wanted to avoid violence to others, even at great personal risk. For Wimpy Jesus, it is all about not fighting.

I subscribe to the Bad-ass Jesus view of history. In that view, “Turn the other cheek” was a call to psychological warfare as a way to prevail against a stronger enemy. And it was a reminder that an individual can topple governments with a good enough game. If the meek want to conquer the earth, Jesus was laying out the game plan.

To me, turn the other cheek means you should do the unexpected. Get into your opponents head. Then win. It was a huge mental shift for humans, to imagine that the mind is more powerful than the sword.

That’s bad-ass Jesus. I like that guy. He showed in four words (give or take some translations and maybe some co-authors) that power is in the mind, not the sword. Consider how big a deal that was in a time where force was everything. 

In the second half of my post about The Time of Kings, I said five kings rose at about the same time. You wondered who they are, and why only five.

I picked five  because it had to be at least that many. And I chose an odd number because it helps with tie-breaking votes in small groups. Having lived in this world, I know that more than five wizards just makes things harder, not better. So five is a rational guess. 

But certainly Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, and Washington are in. I left one space for imagination. 

So why is “We the people” such a powerful statement in three words?

It says the people can unite as one power, without a call to a leader. It was an amazing thought for the time. We take it for granted now. That’s why it might seem trite to some of you. But it was a huge mental shift about the nature of humans. 

If the Wizard pattern holds, the next wizard would have reduced the code to two words. And those two words would be what the world needs at this point in history to advance our understanding of who we are as human beings.

I nominate these two words.

[Update: With this post and the related ones I wrote on the topic of persuasion, I have accidentally written the prequel to God’s Debris and its sequel The Religion War . 
Round it all off with my book about your moist robot self ( How to Fail Almost Every Time and Still Win Big ) and you have an alternative view of reality that explains the Trump phenomenon. I don’t present this filter as truth. I just think it is fun to compare its predictive power to whatever you were doing before. I remind you that this blog is for entertainment only.]

The accidental connecting theme is the hypothesis that a small group of linguistic wizards control all of the big events in the world and always have, using the power of words that are engineered to rewire the irrational brains of the moist robots who believe they have free will. And you can be a wizard. 

Or maybe reality is the thing that you believe. Could be that too. Let’s see which one explains the past and makes the best predictions. 

I remind you this is just for fun. The connections across those books is accidental. They just happen to fit together in an alternative universe sort of way.

Scott

I should remind you that I am neither an historian nor a religious scholar. You should not take any of this seriously. This blog is for entertainment only.

In Top Tech Blog, tiny chips you can attach to any object to make it smart. That’s a game changer.

Obama the Stealth Wizard

If you have been following my posts on Master Wizards that use hypnosis and persuasion tricks to control the entire world, you might have seen some tells in the Iran nuke deal. 

Disclaimer: This is for entertainment only. There is no scientific evidence to support the Master Wizard hypothesis. The fun is comparing this filter to your current one to see which explains the data better.

When most of the public heard about the Iran nuke deal, they saw a mortal enemy getting a free pass to build a nuclear weapon, albeit perhaps at a slower pace. That seems like a bad deal if you imagine there was some practical way to stop all of the Iranian nuclear advancements.

The government must be crazy!

But if you view the deal through the filter of the Master Wizard hypothesis, you see something entirely different.

What I see is one of the best wizards of all time (President Obama) convincing an enemy (Iran) that they are actually an ally. In other words, he did not change their minds about the world; rather he changed their minds about who they are. That’s what wizards do. 

The method (wizard-wise) is ridiculously easy. All you do is seed the situation by treating them like an ally, behind the scenes, without asking much in return. Humans are wired to see helpful people as allies. There isn’t much else to it.

This differs from appeasement. With appeasement, you make the mistake of hoping a genocidal killer has somehow changed his mind on his own for no particular reason. That’s a bad bet.  

With the wizard model, the wizard changes the dictator’s self-image. Once you change a person’s self-image, that person will act in a way that is consistent with the new self-image. According to the Master Wizard hypothesis, Obama could make that happen by engineering a linguistic virus and infecting just one or two top Iranian leaders. They would in turn infect the rest.

As an example, here’s a linguistic virus that would do it: “The past is done. Today we have more common interests than we have reasons to disagree. We ask that you treat us as friends.”

There’s a lot of engineering in those three sentences. By now my regular readers should be able to see the scaffolding.

If you are surprised that Colin Powell came out in support of the Iran nuke deal, don’t be. He sees behind the curtain.

Scott

The “Outsider” Explanation - Part of my Trump Persuasion Series

As I explained in an earlier post, when you see lots of different explanations for the same event, it probably means the public is in mass cognitive dissonance. Trump’s unexpected surge in the polls did just that.

And when an otherwise smart person offers an explanation that is clearly absurd, that is a tell for cognitive dissonance too. You will see a lot of smart people saying a lot of head-scratching things over the next year. More than usual.

I claim exemption from this particular trigger for cognitive dissonance because I predicted a Trump victory (by a large margin) in the general election before anyone else on the planet thought it possible he would even win the nomination. 

According to science, each of you who are “surprised” by Trump’s success so far (which makes you feel dumber than your self-image supports) should be in dissonance right now, searching for an explanation that makes sense while still maintaining your self-image of being smart. 

I have never seen a hypnotist take someone OUT of dissonance before. So I thought I would be fun to do that for you today. I will target only the most popular (and absurd) explanation for Trump’s rise in the polls and take you out of cognitive dissonance for that one explanation only.

This comic should do it.

The “outsider” explanation for Trump’s run is a classic tell for cognitive dissonance. In order for that explanation to make sense, one must assume that Ben Carson or Carly Fiorina would have taken out Bush as effectively as Trump. Are you feeling that?

Now that all of you are out of cognitive dissonance on the “outsider” explanation, watch the comments for the people who just changed their minds about the outsider thing in the past minute. Should be a freaky experience for them.

You don’t need to remind me that I could be the deluded one here, having committed to one explanation of Trump’s rise over the others. The science says I would be somewhat blinded by that. So take this blog (and everything else I write) with a grain of salt. This is just for entertainment.

Update: I predict that the comic above will substantially reduce the number of pundits using the “outsider” explanation within two weeks. (A lot of press people read this blog.)

Look for stories that say some form of “More than just an outsider appeal.” That signals the change before “outsider” is dropped entirely.

I remind you that my predictions are just for fun. I make them so you can track the Master Wizard Hypothesis and see how well it predicts the future compared to whatever you believed before.

Scott

Check out Top Tech Blog to find out about the products of tomorrow without waiting.

For more about systems (the way Trump operates) versus goals (the way most people operate), you can find more in my book.

How to Spot a Wizard

Over the past few weeks I have presented to you an alternative filter for understanding your world. I make no claim that this filter is a true version of reality, if such a thing even exits. I offer this filter for entertainment only. The fun is seeing how well it fits the data and predicts the future.

According to my Moist Robot Hypothesis (that we are programmable meat) and paired with the Master Wizard view of the world, one can imagine a world in which all the big changes in society are engineered by a handful of living wizards at any given time. The wizards, in this context, have learned the rules of hypnosis and persuasion. This knowledge gives them access to the admin passwords for human beings. And they use it.

Today I will tell you how to spot a wizard, if such people actually exist. Look for these clues:

1. The wizard succeeds in a high-profile field without the benefit of as much talent as you would expect should be necessary. (This is the biggest tell.)

2. People seem to have an irrational hate for the wizard that is not entirely explained by the wizard’s actions. Regular readers already know these unusual reactions are signs of cognitive dissonance. Wizards induce cognitive dissonance often, without trying.

3. Look for an inflated ego combined with an unusually strong ability to withstand withering criticism. (Wizards get a lot of criticism.) The common view is that wizards are egomaniacs. In reality, the wizard works hard to remain ego-free, and hence can handle criticism well.

4. Wizards are often more ambitious, and often more aggressive, than you think is normal.

5. One or more major PR disasters define the wizard’s history.

6. The wizard has a gift for simplification.

7. Observers detect a reality distortion field.

8. Wizards have an ability to succeed where other fail by changing the entire game as opposed to winning at the existing one.

9. Wizards use words to create images and emotions in people’s minds.

10. Wizards seek public attention.

The wizard filter on the world isn’t necessarily true in some objective sense. The fun is seeing if the data and predictions fit the filter.

For example, I see the early history of America as a handful of wizards manipulating world events. And I believe they were aware of their powers.

And I see Trump as a modern wizard who is baffling the media because he is playing three-dimensional chess on their two-dimensional chess board. Trump is talking directly to people’s subconscious. Everything else he says is just a carrier signal.

Someone asked me about Kanye West and his hilarious statement that he would someday run for president.

Ridiculous, right?

Except that Kanye is a wizard. 

I spotted him several years ago, and blogged about his genius then. He’s the real deal. And he absolutely has the tools to become president if he makes it a priority.

Consider the reaction you are having right now to the idea that Kanye West could be president. Your reaction (plus the fact that he is a legitimate genius) is what tells you he can do it. At least according to my filter.

Oh, and he’s a musical superstar who admits he can’t sing well. How did that happen, you ask?

Scott

I hope you are reading Top Tech Blog. Lots of good stuff there.

Models read my book. Therefore, everyone else should too. That’s just common sense.

Cognitive Dissonance: You be the Judge

Here’s an interesting article in the Washington Post that explains why Trump is still leading in the polls. At least so far. The explanation for Trump’s continued rise in the polls, according to a convincing chart in the article, is that the media is giving him all of the attention.

Now refer back to my post on how to spot a tell for cognitive dissonance, and take a look at the one titled nonsense rebuttal.

Okay, armed with that knowledge, you get to judge whether it is I who is experiencing cognitive dissonance or the author of the article. 

We both have a strong bias on this topic, so realistically, he and I have zero credibility on this question. That’s why I deputize you to be the deciders.

My view is that early in the race (five minutes ahead of time) Trump asked himself what he needed to do in order to suck all of the attention out of the entire universe and starve the lesser-known candidates. Then he did it. Because that is the obvious play. And the media danced.

The article by Mr. Sides takes the view that the media is not the puppet in the middle but rather the prime cause of Trump’s rise. By this view, Trump is just shiny and fun and his novelty will fade.

One of us is blind to the obvious. Right?

I am not qualified to judge my own cognitive dissonance, so I leave it to you.

Remember from my article on tells that there are plenty of false-positives. It isn’t a science. This is just for fun. Look for the trigger event to help you estimate the odds of a real tell sighting. See how you do.

Scott

“Nice Guy” - Part of my Trump Persuasion Series

The press is reporting that Trump is being uncharacteristically kind to Ben Carson. People seem confused about it. The press reports over and over that, Trump has gone so far as to call Carson a “nice guy.” 

This is quite a puzzler to the press. Why would Trump be so kind to this one challenger?

I hope all of you just shouted out the answer in your heads.

No, not that, you racists. The OTHER thing you just shouted in your head.

Right. That.

“Nice guy” is a linguistic sniper shot. It is engineered to take out its target without revealing where the shot came from. It is not a casual choice of words. It is deeply engineered.

Think back to my past posts about how Trump sets an anchor for any negotiation by staking out the extreme before you open your mouth. That way only Trump gets to decide where the middle is, should you later decide to meet halfway.

Now think about the two anchors Trump has offered.

One anchor is that Trump is worth $10 billion, even though observers are highly skeptical of that estimate. That’s the number that pops up now when you think of him, just as Trump planned. 

Trump has also branded himself as an experienced international business person, a tough negotiator in a world that needs just that, and a man who can’t be bought. 

The anchor Trump dropped on Carson is that Carson is a “nice guy.” The press picked it up and can’t stop repeating it. Repetition is persuasion. Trump deputized the winged monkeys in the media to repeat “nice guy” until it will literally be the only thing you think of when you see Ben Carson’s face. 

Hello, China! Here comes our nice guy to do some negotiating! You better run!

What are the first two words an American voter hears in her head after “Nice guys…”?

In America, a familiar saying is “Nice guys finish last.” If you are familiar with the saying, you probably automatically add those two words when you hear “nice guy.”

Remember, this is a long-distance linguistic kill shot. You aren’t supposed to know where the shot came from. The finish last portion of the thought is literally being created by you, in your head. And it rewires you with repetition. 

Did Trump intentionally rewire your brain so you would think of his rival as the   nice guy who always finishes last? 

Not as far as you know. All you saw was a flash in the distance and your head exploding a few seconds later.

On an unrelated topic, if your friend wants to set you up with someone who is “nice,” does that sound like a good thing to you? It does not. And if we are being honest, one-third of the public probably votes for whoever they find sexiest. If you were going to date Ben Carson, I’ll bet you would be impressed by his good looks (he really is a beautiful man) and probably his keen mind and good humor. What might be the ONE thing you worry about when you ask yourself if you will have good chemistry with this magnificent creature?

No, not that, you racists. I mean the other thing you are thinking. 

You wonder if perhaps he’s too nice. Because that looks weak. Too much niceness shouldn’t bother you, you tell yourself. But it does. Sex is more linked to power than niceness. Trump projects power. Carson projects niceness.

And Trump isn’t done. If the polls narrow too much, Trump might say…

“Ben Carson wants you to promote him from doctor to president.”

Ladies and gentleman, I give you Donald Trump.

Also keep in mind that Carson is still an option for Trump’s running mate. Trump wants him limping but not dead. I think it will either be Carson or Cuban on the Trump ticket. Trump wins it all with either one. But with Cuban it would be the biggest margin of victory in your lifetime.

History buffs will remember that Bill Clinton did a similar “nice guy” play on Bob Dole during their election cycle. Clinton made it clear that he liked Bob Dole. He even thanked Dole for his service to the country. Thanking Dole for his service makes you think of Dole in the past tense. It was a way to call him old and done. That was a linguistic sniper shot you did not see.

Scott

The Time of Kings

Everything that follows is true.

As far as I know.

—

Centuries ago, in the time of kings, a young autodidact discovered the linguistic interface to the human mind. Some say he was the first wizard. This we cannot know for sure.

The source of the wizard’s power was a simple discovery. He learned that when he described to people a better version of themselves, they automatically rewired their minds to become the person of his description. At first the wizard used his method to control one person at a time. Before long he learned how to move entire crowds. 

And then he was dangerous.

News of the wizard’s power spread across the kingdom. The king dispatched his soldiers to hunt down the wizard and kill him before the wizard’s power grew to rival his own.

But it was too late.

The wizard had anticipated his own death. Working feverishly, the wizard managed to condense all he had learned into four words. But there was a risk of leaving those four words and their immense power in the wrong hands after the wizard’s death. The world was not ready. 

The wizard wrote his four words on scrolls and ordered his people to hide them in a maze of less-important words. The wizard hoped that someday a new wizard would find the hidden words and unpack their meaning. And he hoped that by then the world would be ready for such power.

Centuries passed. The words survived, but no wizard came to unlock their true meaning. Many pretenders tried. Wars were fought in an effort to understand the four words and the decoy words surrounding them. It was futile. The words were hidden too well, in plain sight, as wizards do.

Hundreds of years later, in another kingdom, five wizards rose. Each of them started life as bright, curious autodidacts. Individually, each of them decoded the hidden message from the original wizard and unlocked the power of the four words.

History does not tell us why five wizards suddenly rose at once, and in the same kingdom. We only know it happened. 

Armed with the power of the four words from the original wizard, each of the wizards amassed fame and power. And each started to notice the unusual successes of the others. 

One of the wizards was deeply unattractive. Yet he had the power to seduce any woman he chose. 

That is a tell.

One wizard lived like a rich man despite having no net wealth.

That is a tell.

One wizard could inspire men to great acts, using words alone.

That is a tell.

The wizards met each other and shared their secrets. They were good people, by the standards of the day, but their powers caught the attention of the king. Men with so much power were a risk to the throne. So the king raised an army to move against the five wizards.

The five wizards heard of the king’s plan and combined forces to defend against his army. The ugly wizard was dispatched to seduce the king of another great power and persuade him to fight on their side. The wizard succeeded. But it wasn’t enough.

Another wizard used his powers to raise an army of passionate men who would fight and die for the wizards’ cause.

The remaining wizards manipulated the opinion of civilians and raised money to support the war.

The wizards knew their odds of survival were low. So they followed the example of the original wizard and created a linguistic maze to hide their secrets until future wizards could unlock their power.

The five wizards condensed the original wizard’s four-word linguistic code down to three new words that were a better fit for the times. And they buried the three words in a dense document where none but a future wizard would find them.

Against all odds, the five wizards and their legions of followers prevailed in a long, bloody conflict against the king’s forces. After the war, the wizards lived to very old ages, as wizards often do, and passed peacefully.

The words created by the five wizards changed the world in their time and continue to be the most important code in the operating system of human beings. Those three words have toppled dictators, moved mountains, and fed the hungry. 

Perhaps someday a future wizard will improve on the code left behind by the five wizards. But I doubt it, because I believe you will never see three more beautiful or powerful words.

I have a link to an image of the original parchment created by the five wizards. The three words that matter are the first ones on the page.

—

The original wizard’s four-word code still survives as well. And it has escaped its linguistic maze to join less-important words from popular culture. But no matter now many words you put around the original four, none can change its meaning. The four words, in their time, told us of our better selves.

See if you can find those four words on this modern sign.

Scott

I also wrote this.