The Main Character of Westworld Season 3 That You Didn’t Discuss

Published May 9, 2020 · Updated July 6, 2022

Hi all,

I’ve followed all your podcasts this season and enjoy your intelligent and in depth analysis. The amount of time and effort that you put in shows how much you genuinely care about this very special show. What I didn’t hear you discuss so far is what I think was the main character of the season and what this character portends for our own civilization. This character is Big Data. The real reason Westworld was built, the real reason InCyte was almost successful in controlling the trajectory of human civilization was because of their harvesting of detailed human biometric and behavioral data.

This is no longer science fiction in our world. The US is beginning to resist this harvesting to some extent but in China, in particular, this genie is already out of the bottle. Chinese people who have escaped the firewall have documented how every detail of their lives is captured by CCP officials who use it to determine who gets housing, where they can live and travel, what jobs they can have, what level of education they can achieve, and a host of other outcomes that determine their lot in life. They use a social scoring app to communicate to their people how every act, contact, financial action, or support for community events affects their future choices. There is a Rohoboam in China but it is a human machine, the Chinese Communist Party. If Westworld Season 3 has a larger message for the world it is the sounding of the alarm regarding the tyranny that is possible when there is central control of Big Data.

Until next season,
Dave Wright

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