Aarco Kreijenbroek

Writing a book on “whitewashing”: drawing on Popper’s epistemology, evolutionary theory, and Austrian Economics

[Conjecture Institute @ConjectureInst]

Why does it happen?

Why did Volkswagen install cheating software?

Why did Stalin rewrite history?

Why did Paul Ehrlich continue to hold on to his catastrophic theories long after they have been refuted?

And more broadly, why do we take the very thing by which we can solve our problems, our ability to create new explanations, and use it instead to hide those problems?

A tempting answer is to put all the blame on the environment.

It's the culture, the incentives, the system.

They cause us to misuse our creativity.

And this is clearly true to some extent.

If criticizing a communist regime gets you sent to the gulag or executed, we can easily imagine people will be making very different moral calculations compared to when you live in a society that that rewards open criticism.

And yet even in the most closed repressive societies, people still choose to confront problems openly.

Galileo after being forced by the Inquisition to recount his heliocentric explanation continued his scientific work in secret, elevating his curiosity above official doctrine.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn after surviving eight years in the gulag wrote The Gulag Archipelago. Breaking with his own Marxism, he exposed the horrors of the Soviet system knowing full well that it could cost him his freedom.

Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of one of Hamas's founders, despite living in one of the most ideological environments on earth, secretly started working against them, elevating moral truth over his own safety.

In the end, it is not the environment that determines whether the problem of washing grows.

What matters are our moral theories.

Do we elevate the letter above the spirit, the end over the means, the model of reality, certainty over problems, social safety over moral truth?

That is the moment we wash over reality.

~Conjecture Institute Fellow @Aarco_K_ at @conconeurope

[Conjecture Institute @ConjectureInst]

Conjecture Institute is thrilled to welcome our newest Fellow, @Aarco_K_!

Aarco is a documentarian and writer.

He is working on a documentary about “Washing” (derived from whitewashing): the act of covering up errors to meet external norms.

He aims to explain why this happens—whether in markets, politics, scientific institutions, or everyday life—and how it is a problem that causes knowledge to grow sideways rather than through genuine error-correction.

The English version of Aarco's documentary will be a part of Conjecture Studios.

Meanwhile, watch the first two episodes of his documentary (with English subtitles), link below👇

[Neil Hudson @NeilHudsonexp]

Any movement that tries to protect its ideas by controlling who may criticise them is sacrificing the very mechanism that could discover its errors cheaply. Reality will supply criticism eventually - but usually at a much higher price.

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

Perhaps the most famous example of Greenwashing is Dieselgate.

Volkswagen installed defeat devices to hide technical shortcomings and still meet emission standards.

But is that the whole story? Or was Dieselgate merely the symptom of a mistake that has been painted over for years?

Watch the episode and judge for yourself (in Dutch, with English subtitles):

https://t.co/vEWGs06TXv

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

What if the very thing that enables us to make progress — scientifically, technically, economically, or morally — can also hold us back?

That question is at the heart of my new documentary series on whitewashing.

A philosophically optimistic series about the unique human ability to create explanatory knowledge — and why that ability can be both our greatest strength and our greatest vulnerability.

For anyone interested in knowledge, culture, economics, policy, science… and above all, optimism.

The first episode is now available on my YouTube channel (in Dutch, with English subtitles):

https://t.co/lTbDfE44rp

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

@PaulvanEgmond @AndreasKinnegi1 Mijn fout!

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

If you suddenly burst into tears at the end of your talk, it can come across as a bit strange. “Unprofessional,” even. Especially if you then give a half-baked answer as to why. Here’s an explanation, and at the same time, the reason I started dealing with the problem of “washing” (moral pretending) in the first place.
https://t.co/973rea77TZ

[Conjecture Con Europe, Oxford 2026 @conconeurope]

The first 4 talks from Conjecture Con Oxford 2026 are now live on our YouTube channel!

Subscribe to stay up to date on new releases: https://t.co/rxGePDsIWl

[Sam @Sam_kuyp]

The problem of politics isn’t who should rule.

It’s how easily bad rulers can be replaced, and at what cost.

A piece on extending Karl Popper’s criterion beyond politics, to markets and even families 👇

https://t.co/g2TYolxLwz

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

Washing happens when we elevate the first above the second:

Norm over Value
Plan over Execution
Model over Reality
Intention over Consequence
End over Means
Word over Deed
Subjective over Objective
Theory over Reality
Belief over Argument

And it can be recognized and countered by testing the first against the second.

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

@NimeeshPatel Nice! And yes, once theories are no longer recognized as such, contradictions between reality and fantasy stop being noticed, and the latter begins to wash over the former.

I guess we can counter it by explaining why and how compulsion undermines progress

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

In jouw eerste ‘feit’ zit al een verklaring: een verhaal waarmee je uitlegt dat een systeem dat is gegroeid op basis van specifieke waarden, niet goed bestand is tegen mensen met andere culturele waarden.

Overigens is ook deze stelling over jouw verklaring niet een feit, maar een verklaring

[Aarco Kreijenbroek @Aarco_K_]

@NimeeshPatel The pattern is more general: wherever a theory becomes sacred, creativity is used to uphold appearances rather than expose errors.

[Magatte Wade @magattew]

Criticize by creating.