What is the history of ‘Vox populi, vox Dei’? (2013) | Hacker News Reader

What is the history of ‘Vox populi, vox Dei’? (2013)

historynet.com

39 pointssaikatsg79 comments

Context, for those that don't know (including me):

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1594131768298315777

I doubt trump ever returns to twitter anyway. Hardly matters.

Per Truth Social's S-4 filing with the SEC (p. 110):

> As further described in the section titled, “Information about TMTG,” President Trump is generally obligated to make any social media post on TruthSocial and may not make the same post on another social media site for 6 hours. Thereafter, he is free to post on any site to which he has access. Thus, TMTG has limited time to benefit from his posts and followers may not find it compelling to use TruthSocial to read his posts that quickly. In addition, he may make a post from a personal account related to political messaging, political fundraising or get-out-the-vote efforts on any social media site at any time.

* https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1849635/000119312522...

* Via: https://time.com/6226423/trump-twitter-return-musk/

That last sentence sounds like a giant loophole.

Yeah. "Political messaging" could be interpreted to be just about anything.

This is the person who took classified documents including nuclear material home. Nothing happened to him, as usual.

What effect is some rule on a shitty social media site going to have on him?

> This is the person who took classified documents including nuclear material home. Nothing happened to him, as usual.

Nothing happened to him yet. The justice system is slow.

He is 76. He has had more than 3,000 lawsuits against him. He has been breaking the law for decades. Still nothing. There is a reason why he is called “The Teflon Don”

In that context, it should really be "Vox automatos vox Dei".

When Alcuin writes “Nec audiendi qui solent dicere” ‘And those people should not be listened to who keep saying’, he implies “sunt qui solent dicere” ‘there are those who keep saying’ and that the affirmative use of the proverb is older than his criticism. His letter, alas, seems to be the oldest still existing source of this formulation. Similar thoughts expressed earlier are quoted by Büchmann ²⁰1900 p. 353:

- Hesiod ‘Works and Days’ v. 763–764: “Φήμη δʼ οὔτις πάμπαν ἀπόλλυται, ἥντινα πολλοὶ | Λαοὶ φημίζουσι. θεός νύ τίς ἐστι καὶ αὐτή.” ‘No rumour will perish completely which is rumoured by so many people. A kind of god indeed is also this [= the rumour].’

- Seneca (the older) ‘Controversies’ I.1.10: “Crede mihi, sacra populi lingua est.” ‘Believe me, sacred is the language [≈ speech?] of the people.’

If even one fanboy learns latin because of Musk trying to seem literate and edgy I'll take it as a win.

That's a very strange win to take considering the damage Trump did with his Twitter account and could do again if he gets back to it.

To stay on brand and topic: Armor fati.

Lorem ipsum.

Am I doing this right?

*Amor Fati

(Unless I'm missing a joke)

[sic]

Caveat Emptor.

Ridentem dicere verum, quid vetat?

It has been very interesting watching people laughing at me for investing in "An Internet guy" trying to build cars in 2014.

To now calling me a "Elon Fanboy" and saying that "the car guy doesn't understand internet companies".

Yes, I'm a fan of the guy that helped me make millions of dollars, and who is forcing other car companies to electric.

What do you expect my response to be? "I hate that all these gas cars are going away and I wish I had lost all my money"

> What do you expect my response to be? "I hate that all these gas cars are going away and I wish I had lost all my money"

Let me whip up some copy for you:

“I was a fan of his, but his childish behavior as of late has been disappointing.”

"as of late"

During the Paypal days he slept in the office, expected everyone to work long hours, and got into arguments and was an asshole at times. This has been well known for over a decade.

Why didn't the media run articles talking about how hard he was to work for during the past 10 years? Why just now? And, why is the NYT writing puff pieces about SBF? Do you ever think that maybe you are parroting what the media wants you to think?

I’ve read about his work ethics for ages, which means the media did report on it.

Do you maybe think you’re parroting what groups of sycophants say to each other to rationalize their idols?

Given that my opinion hasn't changed much for 8 years, I suspect, I wasn't parroting the 'fanboy' rhetoric from 2022 back in 2015.

2015 isn’t that long ago when it comes to Elon fandom though.

2015 is firmly in the period when he was amassing his fandom with the work at Tesla. The S was 2012 and the X was 2015. Both were huge things for his legacy that captured many minds, especially the X with its bold door design.

So I’m not sure what your point could even be given that you sound like a long term Elon fan.

Generally your talking points are straight out of every populist fan base.

In 2015 the "populist" opinion was that Tesla wouldn't beat Toyota/Ford/GM/VW at making Electric Vehicles. I'm not sure where you are getting the idea that it was popular to think Tesla was going to beat GM at making EVs in 2015.

Populist != popular

In fact, populist is often not popular till it hits a runaway inflection point. As a case point: Trump was a populist leader but was not a popular leader NOR *the* popular leader.

Besides, this is not about the view of Tesla but the view of Elon.

So when did it become populist to hate Elon Musk?

Again, popular != populist.

It is not populist to dislike Elon, however dislike of Elon is currently popular.

Right, that was my point in the original post. It used to be popular to laugh at Tesla and say they would never beat Toyota/GM. Now it is popular to dislike Elon Musk, even though he has revolutionized the auto sector. Ironically the same people who dislike Musk today were the same people a few years ago that were all upset about oil drilling. They are anti-electric cars AND anti gas cars.

Both your original comment and this one make zero sense because you seem to fundamentally misunderstand the dislike for Elon, and you seem to be projecting it onto Tesla and then extrapolating it to EVs in general.

People can dislike Elon without disliking Tesla.

People can dislike Tesla without disliking EVs.

Again, your argument is illogical as presented, and I suspect is borne out of an emotional reaction to the aforementioned wealth growth that you spoke of.

I'm afraid you've been breaking the site guidelines repeatedly in this thread—such as by crossing into personal attack, as here.

Can you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting? Your substantive points will do just fine without name-calling or swipes. In fact, they'll do better as they will be more persuasive that way.

Edit: perhaps specifics will be helpful. These comments seem fine:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33682623

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33682193

But these are not:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33682662

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33681903

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33681574

If you'd generally just avoid personal pejorative language, this would solve most of the problem. I add this because I've noticed it in at least one other thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33615209. If you know more than someone else, that's great—by all means please share some of what you know, so the rest of us can learn. Just please do it without putting down the other person (such as by describing them as ignorant or "emotional").

Noted and I’ll keep that in mind.

I wasn’t trying to insult the user so much as point out that their argument is emotionally clouded due to their relationship to the subject and their wealth gain. But I’ll try and do better at not using language that is accusatory.

Regarding the GPS thread, I was responding to their dismissal of someone else explaining the problem. While I agree I could have responded more thoughtfully, the subject had already been covered elsewhere. However I agree that the reply could have been better and I’ll try and do so in the future.

Thank you for the suggestions.

It seems illogical to like a company and to dislike the person who was in charge for the last 15 years. It is like someone eating a McDonald's hamburger talking about how much they hate factory farming. It is possible to like McDonalds and also dislike factory meat farming, but kind of strange, because McDonalds only exists because they have cheap food. And they only have cheap food because of factory meat farming.

Tesla only exists because of the way it was managed over the past 15 years. It would be cool if there was a successful EV company run by someone that was super nice to everyone all the time and let employees work whatever hours they want, but in the real world that doesn't exist. So in the real world we have to make trade-offs. Do we want to transition to electric vehicles? If so what is the best way to actually do that?

It’s completely congruent to appreciate the results of something without liking the CEO or the means to achieve it.

I like Disney products, but Walt Disney wasn’t a likeable person. I like soccer leagues but think FIFA are deplorable. I love Pixar films but dislike John Lasseter.

Regardless, I’d bring back the point that nobody is attacking electric cars. Tesla can exist independently, and perhaps should, of Elon.

I like being thin and healthy and I also like Pizza and Beer. If would be great if I could have both things, but in the real world actions have consequences and eating pizza and beer all day will make me fat and unhealthy.

I'm not saying Elon is a perfect CEO and that is impossible for someone to do a better job at Tesla. But in the real world actions have consequences and the current state of Tesla is due to the previous actions of Elon.

For example, he fired a long time assistant after she demanded 4 million dollars in compensation. You can feel sorry for the assistant, for getting fired after doing a great job, but that is 4 million dollars that was then able to be invested into the rest of the business. You can't have it both ways. You can't fire Elon and expect that magically another CEO that you like much better as a person will also produce the same results.

and I'm sure you know he was forced out as CEO by the board even though he had the most equity, mostly because he was pushing terrible branding (X instead of PayPal), product and engineering decisions (Windows instead of Linux,...) and getting into arguments with the folks who'd made PayPal working.

Really makes you think 'ride or die' management style doesn't work with boring products like money wiring or social meds

Sure, I'm not a FinTech COO/CEO expert, so it is entirely possible that the optimal management style for PayPal is Dan Schulman's style.

Yes, you're right -- it's likely he's always been a childish ass. My impression of him before this was neutral to positive, probably because he hasn't been drawing as much attention to himself. Your defense I guess is that he's always been a narcissistic sociopathic inept moron, and since you have supported him then you are unable to back out now?

> Do you ever think that maybe you are parroting what the media wants you to think?

Back to the same arguments people make about Trump, that a liberal media is somehow making it impossible to accurately gauge this childish narcissistic psychopath's behavior. I can see his tweets. I can read the things he says directly. I can see his behavior. I won't be easily swayed by someone trying to put a layer of spin on top in either direction.

> And, why is the NYT writing puff pieces about SBF?

I don't care? It's irrelevant to this? It's a bizarre thing to bring up?

It's increasingly apparent that the attacks of "media made you think" are outward projections from people who incapable of processing basic information on their own; they seem to assume everyone else is equally incapable.

The fact that you admit to being a bad judge of character in the past should give you pause to reflect on the possibility that you are still a bad judge of character today.

Why did you have a "neutral to positive" impression of a "childish ass and a narcissistic sociopathic inept moron"? Is it possible that you are just repeating whatever you hear from the media? And now they have decided that he should be hated?

Also, interesting that you mention Donald Trump because my opinion of Donald Trump has not changed over the past 15 years. I always thought he was a selfish conman. So is my judgment better than NBC who paid him millions and is it also better than the Clintons who went to his wedding?

I did not admit to being a bad judge of character, I simply paid him little attention.

This is a bizarre reframing of the conversation. Mixing or changing of context, trimming statements for the bits you want. Not at all meaningful.

Your argument is a strawman.

1. Nobody is saying the results of his previous work should be negated.

2. Nobody is arguing has cars vs EV here.

3. You can totally dislike what someone has become or revealed themselves to be without that diminishing who they were prior.

4. You can also change your opinion on someone after learning more about them.

Your arguments seem emotional rather than rational.

The reality is that Elon hasn't changed much over the past 20 years. I was never under the impression that he was an easy person to work for.

What has changed is that in 2016 the NYT wrote articles comparing him to Iron Man[1], and in 2022 they are saying he is incompetent[2].

1. Elon Musk served as a real-life role model for Tony Stark, the superhero in the “Iron Man” movies. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/07/25/business/elon... 2. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/10/opinion/elon-musk-twitter...

Elon may have not changed significantly, but his power has. With that power has come a change in how much influence he has , and what he can do with his power.

Also the world has progressed. Social norms have changed, what is acceptable has changed.

this also ignores accumulation of events. Him doing one crappy thing is maybe not newsworthy. Him doing ten of them suddenly adds up.

That is a fair assessment of the situation.

More on Alcuin of York, to whom the quotation is attributed:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcuin

Also:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vox_populi#Vox_populi,_vox_Dei

Wait, so is this an argument against elections too?

Or maybe an argument for electoral votes and against popular votes?

Not necessarily. You can have proportional votes for representatives and then let those representatives make decisions that don’t reflect majority opinions when e.g. those decisions protect minorities.

To me, it sounds more like an argument against listening to the loudest voices. So our (UK-perspective) elections go some of the way to achieving a well-functioning democracy, since the literal act of voting is egalitarian. The issues surrounding how those votes are influenced by the loudest voices, however, still have to be resolved.

> To me, it sounds more like an argument against listening to the loudest voices.

But it's a vote to reinstate one of them?

‘Vox Populi Vox Dei’ was used by Musk as a 'justification' to reinstate such a voice. The article, pointing out that the phrase originally had a different context, isn't making that argument.

So is the point then of posting the article here on HN just to show the irony of Musk’s tweet?

I’d choose “idiocy,” but yes.

I guess the lack of context around why this link was posted is causing some confusion.

To me, the fact that the quote was taken from a time when democracy was not popular makes this whole HN posting sound like an argument against it (democracy).

Disclaimer: I am for democracy.

Quite a lot of the classics were written by hereditary dictators and aristocrats, members of tiny elites so the anti-democracy angle is incredibly common.

Indeed. Which led me to ask the question because there wasn’t much context provided on why it was posted on HN in the first place.

This is so incomplete I kept looking for a "subscribe to read full article" link. Why not explain how it came to mean the exact opposite of what the (alleged) first known usage meant?

and Vox Botuli?

“And those people should not be listened to who keep saying the voice of the people is the voice of God, since the riotousness of the crowd is always close to insanity.”

I think Musk probably doesn’t believe Vox Populi, Vox Dei either but when it suits his extremely right wing agenda it’s a useful meme to wind everyone up on the left.

> extremely right wing agenda

How is he "extremely right wing"? and what does that make the guys with tiki torches and guns? super extremely right wing?

If he was extremely right wing he'd unban that Alex Jones nutjob too but he's already said no to that.[1]

Elon is a crazy dumb moron but I wouldn't call him extremely right wing

[1] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1593681389937102851

I'd say he's more opportunistically right wing. Not that I can read his mind, but his actions seem to suggest he would un-ban Trump to increase 'engagement'. He won't un-ban Jones because that guy is stacking up some big losses in court and Elon doesn't want anywhere near a chance at getting pulled in to that. Ideologically Elon is a classic narcissist and will move left to right and all points in between depending on how advantageous it is to him to do so.

Alex Jones is so far off in unexplored territory that I don't think he can be defined in terms of political alignment. I doubt even the tiki torch people want anything to do with him.

He’s weird but he self-describes as a conservative and his major actions have been in line with increasingly mainstream Republican positions (e.g. attacking the credibility of Sandy Hook parents to limit their attempts to get gun control legislation, attacks on LGBTQ people).

If anyone leading that party wanted to distance themselves from him, they could easily do so but they don’t because he’s useful for keeping a certain group of people riled up.

Right wing is a wide set, with anarchist capitalists and stateist capitalists all sitting somewhere on it. He's right wing, just not the most visible type.

I agree that he's right wing, but extreme?

He is okay siding with the Republican party, which is extreme right wing. US politics has a right wing party (the Democrat) and an extreme right wing party (the Republicans). Both of them incorporate a version of (neo)liberalism; they differ mostly on their social policies.

Regardless of his political affiliations, the guy's fortune is built on family wealth from south African emerald mines, and he's a billionaire. It's about as far from the left as you can go, which places him in the extreme right.

I did write a message giving examples but it's pointless you've already made up your mind.

Simple. If you stay on the same position, and the party you're talking to moves far to the left, you automatically become far right without doing anything.

The tiki torch guys, well, they're the original far-right guys, and are still far right because they were already past the threshold since the beginning.

The president of the United States and leader of the right wing party attempted a months-long coordinated multi-level effort to overthrow the election, and he’s still the de facto leader of that party. It is utter nonsense to suggest that party hasn’t gotten more radical.

> If you stay on the same position, and the party you're talking to moves far to the left, you automatically become far right without doing anything.

That’s not how that works in general any more than Hawaii getting hotter means Alaska gets colder, and it’s not an accurate description of what’s happened in the GOP ideological purges since the turn of the century. In the 90s, Republican leaders were vocally against torture, in favor of immigration, supportive of gun control, and when David Duke tried to run for Senate he was condemned and prominent Republicans steered votes to the Democratic candidate rather than risk a white supremacist getting elected. Those fringe right groups showed no signs of believing that the Republican establishment welcomed them, unlike now.

That’s not to say that there weren’t problems but after watching moderate, and especially small-d democratic, voices be purged from the party for being insufficiently right-wing it’s really hard to support the claim that the GOP hasn’t moved much further to the right.

> extremely right wing agenda

Matt Binder had a simpler explanation for why Elon Musk bought Twitter (thread):

> Musk is in a right wing filter bubble. he bought Twitter believing their problems were real & that others felt the same

> this is what happens when you have a lot of money & live in fantasy land

* https://twitter.com/MattBinder/status/1593474503996280833

Alternate theory- he bought Twitter because his life’s goal is to get humanity to populate other planets, and Twitter makes this planet look like a dumpster fire by comparison.

3D chess, indeed.

Alternate alternate hypothesis:

> Dude LOVES Twitter. As a narcissist, he can't get enough of the adulation of the right-wing mouth-breathers. But Twitter keeps banning the people he loves, so he becomes convinced that Twitter is a liberal SJW organization.

> He decides to teach them a lesson, and make an offer to buy the company. Absolutely convinced that it is a left-wing political site, he's sure they'll refuse his offer, even a ridiculously good offer. Then he can say "aha! they're so woke!" and his fans will cheer. 3/

> But Twitter is actually governed by businesspeople who see his offer as absurdly high, and they jump at it. Musk freaks out, tries to get out of the deal, but he's already locked in solidly. 4/

> Now his Dunning-Kruger kicks in to protect him from his panic, and he says, "heck, it's not that hard to run this site; I'll turn it around right quick!" He's not completely stupid, so he cons investors into going in with him. 5/

[…]

* https://twitter.com/drskyskull/status/1593465921498144769

To be clear, I think your theory is more directionally accurate than mine. I forgot to add a sarcasm tag to mine.

Vox bot, vox dei.

For additional context the villan in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, Ellsworth Toohey, uses the phrase 'Vox Populi, Voa Dei' at the the peak of his character arc.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com