Night isn't just a time of day, it's a state of mind. It's the moment when the masks of the day slip away and what's hidden in the shadows comes to light. The night doesn't lie, it reveals, and if you dare to embrace it, you just might see the world for what it truly is. Welcome to Knox, the podcast that dives into the shadows to reveal the truths daylight tries to hide.
Welcome to the intellectual Thunderdome where we shatter myths, challenge sacred cows and rip off the rose-colored glasses society has glued to our faces. Inspired by Alexander Nezorov's mind-bending opus, The Origins of Genius and Fascism, we're here to excavate the uncomfortable truths buried beneath centuries of comforting lies. Those of you who've been with us through the first two episodes already have a sense of the uncharted territory we're navigating. But if you're just joining us, buckle up, because this isn't just another podcast.
It's a confrontation with the myths we live by and the questions we're often too afraid to ask. A quick reminder, Knox drops every Wednesday on all your favorite podcast platforms. Apple, Spotify, Google, you name it. And don't forget to follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and all our other social media accounts.
And of course, subscribe to our YouTube channel Mindset Maverick where the conversation goes even deeper. All the links you need are right in the description of this episode, so don't miss out. Now get comfortable or uncomfortable, depending on how much you love your illusions. This is chapter three.
The second ass. The first anatomists didn't call the brain hemisphere's hemispheres at all. As has been the custom from the 17th century to the present day, that is not hemispheres at all. Galen, Hierophilus and Erasistratus called them Clibus, that is buttocks.
The exposed brain reminded the ancient vivisectionists of an old wrinkled ass. Probably the association arose due to the straight cut that divides this venerable organ into two halves. One way or another, the very first impression turned out to be the most accurate. It turned out to be the most accurate.
Only by having an ass two in the head could one acquire such an unappetizing history and obtain such pitiful results of species development at the moment. Well, dear listeners, how about that for a perspective? It's hard to argue with the ancients on this one. After all, if we peel back the glossy veneer of civilization and look at the long messy story of humanity, from tribal wars to TikTok.
Doesn't it seem like most of our decisions come from those proverbial buttocks? Galen and his contemporaries might have been onto something. It's a humbling thought. The very organ we idolize as the source of our enlightenment and ingenuity also resembles the thing we often sit on.
Poetic justice, perhaps. And yet, what we look at what we call progress, the picture doesn't get much prettier. The Mars Rover and the Large Hadron Collider are, of course, cute little things. But are they the face of human civilization?
Certainly not. They are just cherries on a large cake made of Auschwitz and TV series. We can put our Mars Rover cherries on its stupid icing, or we can take them off. The cake won't even notice.
But man himself is in complete delight with his own achievements. They seem grandiose to him. And just so you know, whenever I say homo, I'm using Nezorov's term for our species, homo sapiens. It's his way of keeping things sharp, and I'll stick with it as we move forward.
It fits the tone perfectly. Homo admires his brain and is proud of mummies, rockets, and soda. He is confident in the presence of an inner cosmos, soul, and uniqueness of each person. Of course, he is masterfully deceived, and this is not surprising.
About 5,200 years ago in Mesopotamia, the chronology of civilization was launched. Simultaneously, the generator of the myth about the mystery of man was turned on. This generator rattles to this day, continuously updating the golem of Sumerian graphomaniacs. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, humanity's very first opus, demons ruled.
Of course, rulers ruled, but the higher purpose of homo was also felt. Where did this primary Sumero-Akkadian nonsense come from? Let me explain. Amazements appeared long before the cuneiform of Mesopotamia, in forests, savannas, and caves.
Everywhere the primary human packs prowled. Earthquakes, mudflows, echoes, landslides, geysers, ordinary ball lightning, sudden luck, and tragic accidents were quite difficult to ignore. They puzzled even homo. He still couldn't be very surprised, but some perplexities still arose.
They had to be satisfied somehow. The brain, of course, could not offer their correct explanation, and as usual, it produced outrageous chimeras. These accumulated and itched in primitive skulls. Questions and answers of such quality probably arise even in hippopotamuses.
But they don't have the opportunity to discuss these questions and pass their understandings to children. And homo already could. As soon as speech became fixed in everyday life, it was immediately put to the most perverted use. The natural feeble-mindedness of people of that time could not but give birth to gods, as well as those sets of absurd ideas that always come with gods as a package.
There would be nothing terrible about this, but alas, there is a law of occupied space, where the first to arrive remains the eternal master. This is exactly what happened with gods, slaves, and temples. So there's nothing surprising in the fact that 99.9% of the time allotted to it, homo spent not on development, but on endless wanderings from one god to another, on mass murders and cult practices. This happened precisely because the Sumerians inherited purely cave-like ideas about reality.
From these ideas, they molded the first image of the world and by scratching sticks on clay, unfortunately found a way to record it. I remind you, this was before any science. Therefore, the image turned out to be a concentrate of amazing idiocy. But having no competitors, it took root and became the basis of universal human values.
Over the next 5,000 years, hordes of humanity in togas, frocks, and baseball caps brought the cuneiform nonsense to perfection. Thousands of novels, poems, and TV series appeared, sarcophagi were carved, paintings were drawn, statues were sculpted, and gods were crucified. The mastery of gilding primitive stupidity reached perfection. Adorned with rhymes and gems, stupidity began to be called culture and acquired the status of an incredibly important phenomenon.
Culture by and large retained the features of Sumerian gibberish, but increased its narcotic effect regularly. For what sweetly clouded minds in the 12th century works poorly in the 21st century. And there it is, folks, the ultimate narcotic. A couple of doses of Shakespeare, Michelangelo, or maybe a splash of Spielberg, and voila.
Homo sapiens suddenly believes they're a unique cosmic being. Culture doesn't just flatter, it intoxicates. It whispers sweet lies about souls and inner universes, wrapping us in the comforting delusion that we're somehow more than the sum of our evolutionary accidents. But let's be honest.
Isn't this just the prettiest of all delusions? The truth, my friends, is that culture is a hallucinogen. A beautiful gilded mask over the wrinkled buttocks of our shared reality. And like any good drug, it keeps us coming back for more.
What is culture? Undoubtedly, simply by virtue of its origin, it is a lie, both about man and about the world. It's an excellent way to achieve an easy but piercing altered state of consciousness. The principle of culture's action remains unchanged, but the packaging and concentration can vary.
Even a single dose of this hallucinogen, made from the history of religion and art, allows any homo to feel their personal significance, as well as the illusion that their brain contains an inner cosmos, soul, and other mysterious accessories. Culture flatters. It paints man as a complex being with an irrational and somewhat supernatural origin, possessing a certain personality and absolute individuality. Unfortunately, none of this is true.
Yes, fortunately, there is also a sobering up station, as the efforts of 125 bores have not been in vain. Where knowledge about the brain begins, the power of art, religion, and history ends. The culture's imposed self-conceit crumbles, revealing the true origins of the human race, as well as the absence of both mystery and exclusivity, and the gilding of gods and heroes. Ah, the cold clarity of science.
It's like a splash of ice water to the drunken euphoria of culture. You see, science doesn't stroke our egos or wrap us in cozy myths. It rips off the mask and says, here, look at what you really are. And honestly, it's no surprise we prefer the sweet narcotic fog of culture to the brutal clarity of a microscope.
Sobriety is uncomfortable, even unbearable for some. But without it, we're doomed to live forever in that glittering hallucination, stumbling blindly through history with our second ass leading the way. Sobering, isn't it? And that wraps up chapter three.
A journey through the wrinkled buttocks of thought, the gilded hallucination of culture, and the cold splash of science. Don't go anywhere, squad. You won't even notice how the next few minutes fly by before we dive into the next chapter. Night isn't just a time of day.
It's a state of mind. And if you think daylight reveals the truth, wait until you step into the shadows. Let's imagine something unsettling to begin this journey. Chapter four, Children of Horror, Grandchildren of Nightmare.
Let's imagine a viverium, where in the labyrinths of cages, terrariums, and aquariums, languish all species of animals on Earth, from shrews to blue whales. Suppose they are all unhappy and all doomed to slaughter. All wimper, howl, and pitifully puff. All of them asked to be held.
You have the right to save only one creature, becoming its guardian forever. A choice must be made, it's not easy. Now, let's pause here. Imagine yourself standing in this viverium.
What would you choose? Nezorov doesn't mince words, he's saying humans are the worst option. And honestly, considering our track record, can you really disagree? Of course, a cobra, crocodile or tiger will not be the most convenient pets, that's indisputable.
All creatures of the Earth are dangerous to some degree, but still, the worst choice will be homo. So, brave children, pass by the cage with the human, not even turning your heads in his direction and not reacting to the pitiful cries. Yes, a cobra and a crocodile can kill and devour their benefactor, but so can a human. However, a cobra won't write a denunciation against its savior, and a crocodile won't inscribe its name in a will.
It should be understood that 99.8% of real human history fell during the so-called Pleistocene epic, which began two and a half million years ago and ended quite recently. It was the Pleistocene that raised homo. It also endowed him with basic qualities, that is, deceitfulness, conflict-proneness, hysteria, and thievishness. Over a couple of million years, this set of properties was brought to complete perfection.
Ah, the Pleistocene. Two million years of evolution sharpening our species into masters of deception and hysteria. Imagine the world back then. A bloody snarling battlefield where survival wasn't about strength, but cunning.
And we mastered it so well, evolution gave us a little surplus of meanness. Five times more to be precise. Just in case, you know. There is no animal on the planet that would surpass humans in even one of these qualities.
But nothing else could have ensured human survival then. Compared to other creatures of the epoch, humans were dramatically weak, and the best compensator for weakness is meanness. Evolution sighed sadly and equipped them with it, measuring out five times more than necessary just in case. If homo had been formed in a rosy space where creatures strum harps and blow air kisses to each other, they would, of course, be completely different beings.
However, a vicious and cruel world that was constantly devouring and humiliating others at all levels of the biocenosis created them. The Sumerian era received an already fully finished product, and it was too late to change anything in it. Is it possible to calculate the image of that true human who became the creator of civilization? It's extremely easy.
But for this, it's necessary to turn off the cultural-logical pathos, demolish all the myths of anthropologists, and calmly consider our pack scavenger as just an ordinary animal. But let's approach the question in a somewhat unexpected way so everything will be clearer. To begin with, we'll need a piece of the Kalahari desert, a pack of spotted hyenas, and an observer who can whistle. Spotted hyenas as role models for understanding humans?
Oh, it makes sense. Both are scavengers, both are driven by hunger, lust, and conflict, and both have a flair for drama. Except, of course, hyenas are refreshingly honest about it. No art, no religion, just raw, unapologetic survival.
The language of communication for hyenas consists of sounds resembling the laughter of an eccentric schizophrenic, as well as grins and postures. However, laughter and facial expressions convey only the crudest meanings, while nuances are transmitted through aromas. Near the anus, hyenas have glands that create a very informative stench. Simply by raising its tail a little and straining slightly, a hyena recites a poem about its passions and sorrows through a set of smells.
Stench, by the way, is an excellent communicator. Now let's rewind time a couple of million years back. We are in the same place. But before us are not hyenas, but early homo, our ancestors.
At that time, they were at the bottom of the animal world. Homo were also scavengers, fierce, gluttonous, and lustful. Everything said about hyenas applies to them to a high degree. Here's where it gets grotesque, folks.
Imagine. Homo was the bottom feeder of the savanna, waiting for someone stronger to rip open the carcass. No bravery, no glory, just patience, stink, and the ability to gnaw at leftovers. And yet, somehow, this is the ancestor of the crown of creation.
Makes you wonder about the true cost of our so-called progress. Homo knew their place well and gratefully gorged themselves on any rotten meat. Having waited for their turn, they put stones and teeth to use, gradually burrowing into the flesh, making their way into the abdominal cavity and the spaces under the ribs that formed due to the postmortem collapse of the lungs. Rotten meat, scavenged intestines, survival at all costs.
That's the real story of humanity's origins. Forget the romanticized tales of fire and art. Our ancestors thrived on what others discarded. And now here we are, boasting about civilizations built on the bones of our scavenger forebears.
Rotten meat, borrowed tools, and scavenge success. This is the blueprint of humanity. Evolution didn't give us greatness. It gave us desperation, and somehow we turned it into a civilization.
Is it brilliant or is it tragic? Maybe it's both. And that wraps up chapters three and four of The Origins of Genius and Fascism. Two chapters that reminded us how deeply human nature is shaped by absurdity, conflict, and survival.
From the anatomical poetry of the brain's second ass to the grim truths of our scavenger ancestry, Nezorov leaves us no room for romantic illusions about humanity's so-called greatness. It's raw, it's unfiltered, and it's what we're here for. If this journey through the shadows resonates with you, don't forget to subscribe and follow us. You can listen to Knox on all your favorite platforms.
Apple Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, Amazon, and more. Wherever it's most convenient for you. And check out the links in the pinned comment or episode description for more ways to connect. New episodes drop every Wednesday at midnight.
So mark your calendars and don't miss a single step into the darkness with us. Your feedback matters. Leave us a comment, a review, or share this podcast with someone who's ready to confront the illusions of the daylight. Thank you for joining me tonight, seekers and skeptics.
Until next time, humans. And remember, in night we trust.