On Feb 15, 6:11=A0pm, d...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
(David DeLaney) wrote:
> David Friedman <d...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> > Willie.Moo...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:
> >> I was reflecting on what Skinner said about society being like a big
> >> Skinner machine you cannot escape. The whole of society becomes a
> >> large reinforcement schedule that promises rich rewards throughout
but
> >> in reality, takes everything from you that you've got and play ends
> >> when you are broke.
>
> >> The more efficient we become along this path, the bleaker things will
> >> be - and in the end, large populations of lucky and unlucky folk
alike
> >> will have become desensitized to the messages used to fleece them -
by
> >> and large those messages are the fabric that holds society together.
> >> At that point all hell will break loose.
>
> >How, on this theory, do you explain that by any objective measure--life
> >expectancy, real income, calorie consumption, health--things have been
> >getting generally better in most of the world for the past several
> >centuries? Murder rates have gone up and down, and historical data on
> >crime rates isn't all that good, but it seems clear that murder is much
> >less common than it was five or six hundred years ago.
>
> Semi-relevant URL (20 minutes long, safe for work in general):
>
> http://roslingsblogger.blogspot.com/2007/06/debunking-myths-about-wor...
>
> Dave
> --
> \/David DeLaney posting from d...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
"It's not the pot that
=A0grows =
the flower
> It's not the clock that slows the hour =A0The definition's plain for
anyon=
e to see
> Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE =A0 =A0 =A0
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PYNET VRbeable<BLINK>http://www.vic.com/~dbd/-
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UV you in all CAPS! --K.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Since the beginning of the industrial age until the mid 1960s the cost
of energy decreased steadily at an average rate of 4.9% per annum.
Noting this trend experts in the 1950s predicted that somewhere
between 1970 and 1990 energy would be too cheap to meter. As
standards of living rose dramatically, the wealth spread more evenly,
and a great middle class formed in America and that middile class
improved.
The United States entered secondary production of oil in 1970. Since
1970 the cost of energy increased steadily at an average rate of 9%
per year (oil sold for $2 per barrel in 1963)
Despite automation and a number of other improvements that came to
pass since 1963 that dramatically increased the productivity of labor,
increasing amounts of wealth went into rising energy costs and capital
to reduce the use of energy. This capital in a world of declining
energy prices, would have gone into increased labor rates and
increased capital formation - accelerating the trends pre 1963.
This did not happen, in the 1970s the United States went off the gold
standard and its currency inflated in value. Other currencies became
relatively more important and challenge the dollar's dominance. In
the 1980s the United States moved from being the geatest creditor in
the world to being the world's largest debtor. In 2000 its stock
market tanked, and continuing problems with increasing levels of debt
both public and private have given impetus to other stock markets
around the world and other money centers.
The trends toward greater liberality and greater wealth for the middle
class have largely reversed and there is a greater disparity of wealth
today than there was in 1963 - despite higher income. Disparity
breeds discontent, especially when it occurs in a melieu where there
is an expectation of rapid and sustained growth.
Today, we do not hear pundits speak of too cheap to meter - instead we
hear pundits say this is the first generation of Americans that will
not live better than their parents.
.
The world is entering a period where global output of primary energy
will enter secondary production and these trends will be
exacerbated, We may hear pundits in the future remark, that the
industrial revolution failed.
Had the hopes people had in commercial nuclear power been realized, we
would have had a hydrogen economy in the 1970s - powered by direct
thermolysis occuring in specially built nuclear reactors built at low
cost. - 43.7 kg of hydrogen (equivalent to a barrel) would likely have
been made for pennies from 383.9 liters of seawater. This according
to magazine articles of the day. A continued decline in energy prices
would make a barrel of oil today worth $0.20 -and a gallon of gas
equivalent - a half cent. There would be no oil kingdoms and all the
money that had been spent on inflated oil prices would have gone into
wage rates and capital to make those wages efficient. Average income
would be $250,000 - 1963 dollars - which would be $2,000,000 current
dollars per year - and life would be radically different today than
mid 20th century. One of these possiblities at these price points for
energy - a VTOL jet in every garage.
Consider the difference between an age of horse drawn carriages, steam
engines on rails and boats and gas lights - in the 1880s - and an age
of electricity, automobiles and aircraft of the 1930s.
That 50 year span had dramatic changes - inspiring changes - hopeful
changes and improvements in living conditions. Yet McCormick's reaper
did away with labor on the farm, and created surplus populations that
Ford's mass production technique gave jobs to and created markets
for.
The world of 1930 was better in most ways than the world of 1880 - yet
industrialization and mechanization brought with it the
industrialization and mechanization of warfare. The first megadeaths
were recorded by 1920 - and by 1940s - we could create them with a
single device - in an instant the atomic bomb.
The propensity toward violence is not just about disparity of income
and lack of real substantial growth. Its about a sense of community
and belonging and commitment - which doesn't exist in mass culture.
We are given the icons to acquire to do to be - like the wheels of a
pokie machine - and we pay to spin the wheels - and when we are broke,
we are often broken - with no recourse - and if we lack the social
net, the direction and the internal resources to pick ourselves up and
carry on usefully - its easy to project onto others the cause of our
unhappiness - and take it out on them.
We also glorify violence. Often violence is a substitute for dramatic
tension - a car chase substitutes for compelling and convincing
writing skill - so we glorify violence. We also glorify these acts.
We are a news story away from learning that what we say and how its
said - can unleash a blood bath of me-too type killings - among those
who are disenfranchised and have little to lose.
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