Constructive Uses of Energy
I've been thinking a lot about energy lately. Not just consumed energy like food calories, fossil fuels, or electricity, but also raw human energy. It occurs to me that there are two distinct paradigms that are constantly locked in battle.
The first is the modern economic rendition of savage monkey competition. People work and compete with each other for better jobs, more money, and more privilages. The attitude in this paradigm is that the individual is responsible for their own welfare, and need not care about the fortunes of their fellow human beings.
The second is a more communal approach in which society tries to be collectively prosperous. Everyone is entitled to certain things and try to work together to accomplish them. Its interesting to note that the fruits of these efforts almost always benefit those who aren't involved in the effort.
Take clean air, for example. The competitive approach is to not care, as a wealthy individual can buy air filters or even bottled air to breathe. The pollution may stem from production of things that they sell, and hence preventing pollution may threaten their profit margin or entire business process. The communal approach is that everyone breathes, so everyone should have access to clean air. This includes the people who pollute or just don't give a shit. With this in mind, people work to protect the communal air supply and ensure that it is all safe to breathe.
As more things shift from public to private domain, the society becomes less communal and more competitive. The very concept of private ownership of things follows the competitive blueprint, as one person has access and power over something while others do not. Many people hail this as a civilized rendition of our basic natures. However, this model is not sustainable in the long term. As the individual seeks greater and greater levels of prosperity, their resource consumption climbs to ridiculous heights. This means that additional resources must come from somewhere, and in some way this always translates into a number of other people getting far less than their fair share.
In some ways, this problem becomes much bigger when applied to conceptual property. Imagine that someone owns a patent on a technology for emission-free engines. This person could license the technology to others for a price, or keep it to themselves (meaning that only one type of car contains these revolutionary engines), or bury the technology in a cabinet so no one can ever use it. Why would they do this third option? Imagine that you can make a certain amount of money off of using this new engine. Many people will be excited and buy it. But then another businessman shows up and offers you ten times as much money to bury the patent. His business will suffer if people start using this new engine. Thus less money for him and less personal prosperity. By agreeing to his terms, you can make far more money. So you bury the patent, and no one can ever use it. Even if someone comes up with a similar design ON THEIR OWN, you can sue them and keep them from ever using the technology.
Final equation: Two businessmen profit. Associated employees for one of them may also profit and maintain higher job security, though the amount is completely at the discretion of their business leaders (Point of interest: in modern business-speak, they often refer to additional profits as "New Jobs". The two terms are interchangeable, meaning that creating jobs can actually just be greater profits for executives, or losing jobs means they can't buy a third yacht this month). But the rest of the world suffers, as they cannot use this great new tech to help keep the air clean. At this point it becomes really complex, as the costs of the pollution become widely distributed and associated with partial causation. For example, high rates of asthma and challenged immune systems often stem from air contamination. This in turn adds to health care costs, lost work days, etc, etc. It is very hard to quantify the final cost. But qualitatively, this small group of people (maybe even as small as 2) has profitted at the expense of everyone else.
Obviously, this model isn't sustainable, as it clearly leads to a parasitic upper class that benefits exponentially from losses to everyone else. So the big question is, how do you overcome this problem? Classic communism doesn't work, and competition is an important incentive for human beings to do all sorts of things. What we need is a competitive environment for communal achievement. And perhaps it doesn't need to be any more complicated than that. Imagine if competitive activites were focused on creating something to benefit everyone.
Which leads to my latest crazy idea. Let's make an International Infrastructure Competition League. Imagine teams from all over the world competing to build bridges, roads, houses, walls, etc. Sure, they have competitions of this sort, but I'm talking about making something as mainstream as the NBA. With a little marketing magic and the right approach (ie, making the format of the task conducive to good team work and fast-paced action), you could create massive amounts of infrastructure while keeping people entertained. A panel of judges could inspect the works for quality to ensure that no badly rushed jobs can win. Sure, you might call this sort of thing crazy. But is it really crazier than spending millions of dollars a year watching tall spindly guys toss a orange ball through a hoop? Is it crazier than being glued to your TV while watching people bathe themselves in vats of live spiders or eat dog testicles? I think that with significant backing to give it momentum, this sort of thing could really take off. In about five years time, you would have teams specializing in laying asphalt and erecting dry-walls in record time. A few years after that, all the highways in America would be smooth and gleaming. Money spent on hosting the competition would be recouperated through ticket sales and merchandizing, creating a nearly zero-cost infrastructure support system. You'd have teams like the Michigan Masons or Chicago Carpenters. All that competitive energy would be channeled into fixing everything that is broken. The key to making a good game out of it would be to pre-process the materials and make a task that is easy to learn, but hard to master. Imagine little Timmy wanting to grow up and be just like his idol Rich "Concrete God" Armstrong. But instead of hitting baseballs through the neighbor's window, he builds a gleaming new doghouse for Fluffy.
Mad, am I? Oh yes, I am. But in case you haven't noticed, sane people never end up ruling the world.
The first is the modern economic rendition of savage monkey competition. People work and compete with each other for better jobs, more money, and more privilages. The attitude in this paradigm is that the individual is responsible for their own welfare, and need not care about the fortunes of their fellow human beings.
The second is a more communal approach in which society tries to be collectively prosperous. Everyone is entitled to certain things and try to work together to accomplish them. Its interesting to note that the fruits of these efforts almost always benefit those who aren't involved in the effort.
Take clean air, for example. The competitive approach is to not care, as a wealthy individual can buy air filters or even bottled air to breathe. The pollution may stem from production of things that they sell, and hence preventing pollution may threaten their profit margin or entire business process. The communal approach is that everyone breathes, so everyone should have access to clean air. This includes the people who pollute or just don't give a shit. With this in mind, people work to protect the communal air supply and ensure that it is all safe to breathe.
As more things shift from public to private domain, the society becomes less communal and more competitive. The very concept of private ownership of things follows the competitive blueprint, as one person has access and power over something while others do not. Many people hail this as a civilized rendition of our basic natures. However, this model is not sustainable in the long term. As the individual seeks greater and greater levels of prosperity, their resource consumption climbs to ridiculous heights. This means that additional resources must come from somewhere, and in some way this always translates into a number of other people getting far less than their fair share.
In some ways, this problem becomes much bigger when applied to conceptual property. Imagine that someone owns a patent on a technology for emission-free engines. This person could license the technology to others for a price, or keep it to themselves (meaning that only one type of car contains these revolutionary engines), or bury the technology in a cabinet so no one can ever use it. Why would they do this third option? Imagine that you can make a certain amount of money off of using this new engine. Many people will be excited and buy it. But then another businessman shows up and offers you ten times as much money to bury the patent. His business will suffer if people start using this new engine. Thus less money for him and less personal prosperity. By agreeing to his terms, you can make far more money. So you bury the patent, and no one can ever use it. Even if someone comes up with a similar design ON THEIR OWN, you can sue them and keep them from ever using the technology.
Final equation: Two businessmen profit. Associated employees for one of them may also profit and maintain higher job security, though the amount is completely at the discretion of their business leaders (Point of interest: in modern business-speak, they often refer to additional profits as "New Jobs". The two terms are interchangeable, meaning that creating jobs can actually just be greater profits for executives, or losing jobs means they can't buy a third yacht this month). But the rest of the world suffers, as they cannot use this great new tech to help keep the air clean. At this point it becomes really complex, as the costs of the pollution become widely distributed and associated with partial causation. For example, high rates of asthma and challenged immune systems often stem from air contamination. This in turn adds to health care costs, lost work days, etc, etc. It is very hard to quantify the final cost. But qualitatively, this small group of people (maybe even as small as 2) has profitted at the expense of everyone else.
Obviously, this model isn't sustainable, as it clearly leads to a parasitic upper class that benefits exponentially from losses to everyone else. So the big question is, how do you overcome this problem? Classic communism doesn't work, and competition is an important incentive for human beings to do all sorts of things. What we need is a competitive environment for communal achievement. And perhaps it doesn't need to be any more complicated than that. Imagine if competitive activites were focused on creating something to benefit everyone.
Which leads to my latest crazy idea. Let's make an International Infrastructure Competition League. Imagine teams from all over the world competing to build bridges, roads, houses, walls, etc. Sure, they have competitions of this sort, but I'm talking about making something as mainstream as the NBA. With a little marketing magic and the right approach (ie, making the format of the task conducive to good team work and fast-paced action), you could create massive amounts of infrastructure while keeping people entertained. A panel of judges could inspect the works for quality to ensure that no badly rushed jobs can win. Sure, you might call this sort of thing crazy. But is it really crazier than spending millions of dollars a year watching tall spindly guys toss a orange ball through a hoop? Is it crazier than being glued to your TV while watching people bathe themselves in vats of live spiders or eat dog testicles? I think that with significant backing to give it momentum, this sort of thing could really take off. In about five years time, you would have teams specializing in laying asphalt and erecting dry-walls in record time. A few years after that, all the highways in America would be smooth and gleaming. Money spent on hosting the competition would be recouperated through ticket sales and merchandizing, creating a nearly zero-cost infrastructure support system. You'd have teams like the Michigan Masons or Chicago Carpenters. All that competitive energy would be channeled into fixing everything that is broken. The key to making a good game out of it would be to pre-process the materials and make a task that is easy to learn, but hard to master. Imagine little Timmy wanting to grow up and be just like his idol Rich "Concrete God" Armstrong. But instead of hitting baseballs through the neighbor's window, he builds a gleaming new doghouse for Fluffy.
Mad, am I? Oh yes, I am. But in case you haven't noticed, sane people never end up ruling the world.