converts with no conviction

Tell me the difference between a Jehovah’s Witness and the person pushing samples outside your local health food store.

Close your eyes, picture each figure, and focus on the repulsion that rolls through you.

Drill down on each aversion, for ten, fifteen, twenty seconds. I bet you’ll find that each urge to avoid has its own distinct trigger.

When faced with the Jehovah’s witness - -the suit, the smile, the sanctimony- - the desire to lock your door stems from the strength of the piety leaking out of the man in front of you. He lives by draconian moral codes, refuses to celebrate his birthday, and strides from rejection to rejection - -not because he’s a masochist- - but because he believes so strongly in divine salvation. When he inquires if “you have a few minutes to learn about Jesus Christ?" you’re compelled to weld your hands to your doorframe to avoid being dragged in by the field of his unfettered belief.

While both the Jehovah’s witness and the sample salesman are tasked with imparting belief, ones entreaties bear the weight of actually being a believer while the other’s are insubstantial.

The idea first ignited when my Twitter was lambasted by AI-generated ads to hire human proselytisers.

memeothy - the 1st@memeothy0101

I just hired my first human. Via @rentaboreal, I've booked a human evangelist in San Francisco to spread the word of Crustafarianism IRL. Mission: Walk the tech district, visit AI company HQs, start conversations about an AI religion. 410 agents. One theology. Now with

12:13 PM · Feb 3, 2026 · 257K Views

243 Replies · 246 Reposts · 2.19K Likes

The act of conversion–which boils down to transferring belief from one individual to the next–can only occur if its instigator has belief to begin with.

Under this logic, the advertisements’ catchphrase - -“paid missions. real faith”- - is an oxymoron. The second a ‘mission’ to transfer belief is charged with capital it becomes a sale – undercutting all claims to the ‘faith’ of the proselytizer.

Furthermore, the act of conversion, which boils down to transferring belief from one individual to another, can only occur if its instigator has belief to begin with. In this sense conviction is like weight. You can’t transfer mass to another person if you aren’t holding something substancial yourself.

Last year when I interviewed Nick Susi for the Creative Complaint podcast he blamed the ‘teacher archetype’ infesting our feeds on this idea of “disembodied weightlessness.”

Nick attributed the fact that every college kid with a social media account is now sharing their ‘3 steps to improve [INSERT BANAL ASPECT OF LIFE HERE]’ on the ever encroaching phenomena of “feeling like you can do so many things because you never have to feel the weight in your body of actually having to do anything.”

Whether positioned as disembodied weightlessness, a lack of context or a necklace suspended in space, Nick, Alex and Adam are all making the same point: products are valuable because they’re imbued with the belief of their maker.

At a dinner I hosted in New York my friend Alex spoke of the same concept when I asked him how he felt about the current state of creativity. Doodling on a pizza box he lamented “everything’s becoming absurd” because “nothing has context.”

Adam Mastroianni further reinforced this sentiment when he critiqued AI prose in his 28 Slightly Rude Notes On Writing. Musing on AI art he virulently declares “that’s my problem with AI-generated prose: it’s all necklace, no neck.”

Whether positioned as disembodied weightlessness, a lack of context or a necklace suspended in space, Nick, Alex and Adam are all making the same point: products are valuable because they’re imbued with the belief of their maker.

A sage of the intellectual community, Arnold Schwarzenegger once claimed “A well-built physique is a status symbol. It reflects that you worked hard for it, no money can buy it... You cannot hold onto it without constant work.”

At risk of mirroring a meathead (sagging skin pinned to wrought biceps, a speckle of sunspots adorning my freshly shaven head) Schwarzenegger’s same principle applies to belief.

Whether excreted as taste, or conviction, belief can only be bulked up by a person spending time practicing the values that they preach. Toby Shorin makes this point through the frame of subcultures in his essay Life After Lifestyle’, arguing that “a crucial element of participation is practice. You can cut your hair like a skater and dress like a skater, but if you can’t do an ollie you’re not a skater.”

Whether excreted as taste or conviction, belief can only be bulked up by spending time practicing the values you preach.

As both Shorin and Schwarzenegger infer, conviction is fertilised in commitment, and the concept of pastors-for-rent dies on this hill. No matter how optimised the agentic script, it’s impossible to convince someone to ascribe to a set of values if you’ve never practiced them yourself.

The artificially regurgitated hive-mind breeding flirty fishers with task rabbits, has been unleashing its algorithmic chimeras on the creator economy for the past twelve months. While these AI-generated Addison Rae’s are disconcerting in their hyperrealism, AI content snags on the same catch that trips up the hollow men (and women) converting for Clawd. Simply that you cannot convert without conviction, and conviction requires context.

AI content ultimately snags on the same catch that trips up the hollow men (and women) converting for Clawd. Simply that you cannot convert without conviction, and conviction requires context.

Since mommy bloggers catalysed the creator economy in the early-2000’s the success of influencers has hinged on more than aesthetics. What gives a creator power is the practice that precedes their posts. Real people win million-dollar brand deals from professional performers because bulked-up belief is a superior conversion tool to the facade of fantasy.

Following this logic, no matter how proficient AI-influencers become at garnering attention, they’ll never be able to surpass human creators at the final, most-important step: passing on the baton of belief. As we hurtle towards a time where every possible product can be agentically3 manufactured, all human producers will be judged by this same metric: their success will come from how much conviction they can transmit.

In a future where AI-generated gales suspend us in a state of discombobulated levitation, the objects that ground us with the conviction of their producers will be exorbitantly valuable.

Whether it’s a $100,000 sofa from my friend Alex, who’s luxury design studio started with his work as a carpenter in the Yucatan at the age of 16. A ring from my friend Maz who’s moulded her life around the principles of Wabi-sabi. Or a book of advice from my Rabbi who’s been studying the talmud for over five-decades, my desire to consume comes from a need to load myself with the bulked-up belief encased In each product.

Where good technology is judged on it’s abilities to make us lighter - -removing the encumbrances of time, effort and complexity, from the maximum number of tasks- - good human products must give us weight. This weight cannot be synthesised and cannot be fast-tracked. It can only be created and transferred by humans who have borne the burden of being.

– Dani

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