I liked the “it’s time to build” pmarca essay when it came out, in a very different era, but now I think the underlying idea is incoherent.

Builder, unlike destroyer, is an aptitude, not a role anyone can play. And since building is a “creative destructive” process that you might naively assume can be unbundled into pure “creation” and pure “destruction” what general calls for a society-wide period of building do in the best case is try to elevate builders in status, but in the worst case simply unleash a wave of pure destruction much larger than any wave of building. And the building itself ends up being mostly naive “pure creation.” Ie doomed first-principles Xanadu projects.

What’s the alternative? Recognize that “building” is just one aptitude and personality among many. The real challenge is recognizing that a finite game is ending and figuring out how to continue the infinite game by improvising a new finite game. And that comes from play-testing, not slogan-led missions.

Delver at contraptions.venkateshrao.com, running summerofprotocols.com, host of /gloom ☀️

Vishnu is better understood as a restorer rather than preserver

The trinity don’t normally act. Brahma only created once. Shiva does creative destruction during deeper renewals. Epochal innovator. Vishnu restores dharma periodically after it erodes. A sort of scheduled maintenance/10k miles checkup guy. 

The steady state gods are the minor ones. Eg Ganesha is the remover of everyday obstacles, hanuman is the courage and devotion guy. Lakshmi is the new year accounting book goddess, saraswati is the back to school goddess. 

Daily-use gods rather than history wrangling gods.

How does the preserver / Vishnu archetype fit into this?

Can one ever say “it’s time to preserve”? I suppose when structures are just and maximally efficient