> … this is clearly one of those risks (much like a pandemic) for which we cannot ever be adequately prepared
I disagree with that statement in the article. Adequate preparation is possible. Just do it.
I disagree with that statement in the article. Adequate preparation is possible. Just do it.
You'll need a bigger gun to threaten the species though.
Civilization is fragile, life is resilient
A lot of people’s thinking about these issues essentially starts with “assume a benevolent dictator.” That’s a big assumption!
Fewer gripes about capitalism; more grooming of the global bug tree.
Money sucks but it is an effective way to trick our self-interested brains into creating value for society. It leverages our own greed to make us hard-workers. It is a way better lever than fear or compassion.
The only reason why I'm not creating more value for society (I have some social side-projects that never get my entire attention) is money. My NGO self-funded projects cannot compete with my salary working for a shit startup producing no value for society whatsoever but burning through VC money.
For one thing, if you try to get rid of money, you'll quickly end up inventing it again just to manage complicated distributions of resources. You might not call it money, but it will acquire all the same connotations.
For another: Consider what happens if you try to get rid of money, then run a major grid-hardening project. Who builds/works in the factories you need? Why do they do that instead of writing poetry or going fishing? How do they eat? Someone has to grow the food, right? Apply the same questions recursively.
We've had one big shot at trying to solve those problems without a market. It was called Communism. Didn't work so well. And they still had money.
That wasn't communism, they they tried to call it that. That was "authoritarian socialism", an authoritarian single-party system with central planning. It had money just like any other economy; the big difference is that central government planners decided how the market would run, what would be made by factories, etc. It failed largely because central planning doesn't work very well. In theory, maybe if some smart AI were doing the central planning with plenty of feedback, it could work really well, but the way the Soviets tried it, it was a big failure.
Still, your point stands: the system still needs money. As long as individuals can make their own individual choices about things, they need money as an exchange of value and way to limit resource consumption. Otherwise, what's to stop a few mentally ill people from grabbing everything off the store shelves for themselves? Or to keep a large fraction of people from taking too much. leaving nothing for everyone else?