Technology changes everything. I remember intellectual discussions 50 years
ago where people would argue that Communism, specifically Planned Economies,
couldn’t work. Back then it was hard to
argue the point because one realized that there would be too much important
data that one would have to keep straight, and the legitimate concerns of
multitudes of people would inevitably fall through the cracks. But in
the late 1980s when Computers started winning Chess Matches and we were hearing
more about Super Computers, then it became reasonable to argue that Super
Computers could help with all the essential data, but there were still concerns
about what the heck the Super Computers were expected to do with it all. Yes, I knew how Supercomputers were used to
‘Model’ various constructs, but the Models were always so dependent upon just
the right set of assumption algorithms.
A planned economy could still go belly up simply because the programmed
assumptions were off the mark, in the same way that Super Computers programmed
to Model Weather Patterns and Hurricane Tracks were getting it wrong a great
deal of the time. But now we are being
presented with the combination of Super Computers and Artificial Intelligence bolstered
with Machine Learning capabilities.
The Super Computers would handle the Data. You could upload hard data on every recorded
economic exchange, market data, weather data, consumer data, polling data, school
and court records – if it is on a spreadsheet then it can go in as Hard
Data. You could also upload Soft Data
such as Economic Projections from specific pundits, Trade Publications and Scholastic Papers, News
Editorials and Opinions, Social Media chatter,
fashion trends, Hit and Cancelled TV Shows, Movies and Media. Then, with the capabilities of AI and Machine
Learning (where you give an AI System a Goal to achieve and it constructs a
Best Guess Methodology for pursuing that Goal by considering all known
variables, but then, without further programming instruction inputs, it can
refine and adapt its Methodology to achieve its directed Goal in an ever more
efficient and elegant manner), then the System could ‘learn’, or rather, ‘teach itself’ what it all Hard and Soft Date
means and how to apply it to achieve its Set Goals (you can imagine how this
would work – at super high speed the “System” would endlessly create new Comprehensive Models of
Reality using years old sources of Hard and Soft Data and the compare those
Models’ “predictions” to subsequent Events
as they really occurred, rejecting inaccurate models and refining those models
that were most successfully prophetic). Once reliably predictive Models of Reality are
created within the “System” one could have a high degree of trust that the
System would Know What was Going On and know that if such and such an Action
were implemented then there would be a Certain Resultant Effect. Depending on the Set Goals of the System,
providing that the Set Goals are not impossible demands, a Government and
Economy directed by such a “System” would continuously trend in the direction
of perfectly conforming to those Social Political and Economic Set Goals.
Obviously the Set Goals would be very
important. Just the requirement that
they not be impossible would greatly constrict many of the envisioned
possibilities that could be politically imagined. And to be Possible would imply that the Goal
must be Sustainable. Right there we
could eliminate any Set Goal that includes any notion of exponential Growth
because any exponential expression, no matter how seemingly slight the positive
exponent, such as an interest rate or rate of inflation or GDP (Gross Domestic
Product), will eventually veer up in a curve toward Infinity which of course is
impossible to ever reach. We can see
that even now. In order to maintain a
system of Capitalism based on lending money at exponential rates of interest, it
is necessary to continuously increase the Money Supply at roughly the same
exponential rate.
Likewise, Set Goals should optimally be set so that
Conditions do not hit Saturation Levels beyond which one would run into the Law
of Diminishing Returns, in which steering inputs have less and less influence. An example of this could be that as Fossil
Fuels become more and more scarce, that it could possibly take more energy to
extract and process them than they are intended to provide – effectively costing
more than its worth. So just in order for the “System” to maintain
an optimum level of Control, resource demand must be way down from saturation
levels and levels of diminishing returns, that is, the “System” should not just
target Sustainability, but Sustainability within a healthy margin.
Of course we could expect many people to be
disappointed with “Sustainability”. Right
now the World has several millions of people who are extremely wealthy and
therefore control a huge proportion of the Earth’s Resources and we can
understand well enough that they would be very happy with the present
arrangement. But the drawdown they put
on the Earth’s Resources are unsustainable and any “System” that would impose
Sustainability would certainly run afoul of this Most Affluent Economic Class. It is unfortunate that not everybody would be
delighted with a Plan that is ultimately necessary, because Unsustainability
eventually would hit a very hard wall.
We can either turn away from that Wall while we have a chance, or slam
right into it.
But, yes, it would be nice if everybody could be
Happy. One factor I believe could be
very significant in engendering a general ‘happiness’ and that would be in
regards to increasing the Available Resource Per Person, not by trying to
create or procure more Resources, but by allowing for a steady decrease in the
Number of People. For instance, if the
planet had 12 Billion People, then, however resources were allotted, we could
not imagine that a significant percentage of this mass of humanity would have
much to be thankful for. However, if the
Planet’s Population was allowed to contract to about 200 Million, that is about
3% of what it is now, I could more easily imagine that the quotient of Available
Resources Per Person would be high enough where we could all understand it in
terms of being a General Condition of Prosperity, where not only basic needs
would be met but where there would be plenty extra for artistic, creative and
social flourishing. And then with the Human Population cut way
back, there would be not nearly the need to put so much land under the Plow and
the grasslands and forests could be allowed to return, and all that increased
greenery would suck a lot of the carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and
promote more leaf-to-air evaporation which would increase the Cloud Cover which
could reflect some of the Sun’s heat energy back up into space, as well as
providing more rain which would serve as a Positive Feedback for even more
forests, grasslands and greenery. So
less Population would be a Win Win for everybody that would be alive, as those
who are never born really wouldn’t have a say in it. But, yes, I can imagine how most women of
childbearing age would wish to have a baby, or babies all their own. I
suppose the social solution for all these women yearning to be mothers would be
to give up on the Nuclear Family and transition to female centric Communities where
many women could live together and participate in the rearing of a few children. Of course Men could visit, but it would be
best for men to live apart. You see, Men
could be far better Role Models if their visits were kept brief, that is they
could come wearing their best cloths, and dine with the Community and engage in
some hours of Social Activity – Dancing and Music or whatever. They could show themselves to their best
advantage, and then go back to their own Male Oriented Quarters where they
could again pick up on all of their casual nasty habits, and, most importantly,
live well clear of feminine scruples, fussiness, and nagging. And,
of course, in the Women’s Community the few children would be the center of it
all. I suppose there would have to be
studies made on how to prevent all these children from growing up absolutely
spoiled rotten. Or maybe “spoiled rotten” would become the new
Personality Normal. We’ll leave that to
the Future.
Oh, and by now most readers must have reached the
inference that for the “System” to really be viable, it would have to be
Globally implemented. Just One Country could
not solve all the World’s Problems if all other Nation were pulling in the
opposite directions. Of course now it
would be politically impossible to envision a Unified World, but perhaps in a
Generation or two the People of Planet Earth will come to develop a more
Cosmopolitan and less Nationalistic Point of View, and begin to understand that
Economic Competitiveness is just the World Fighting Against Itself, where One
Group succeeds by holding the others down or even by doing deliberate harm to
them. It shouldn’t be long before the
Peoples of the World develop a Vision that embraces the Virtue of Cooperation. Then the “System” could be implemented
Globally.
In a previous blog I had mentioned having a
Meritocracy, that is, a Government composed of People. But what would we even need them for if we
were effectively automating Government with an Automated “System”? Well,
somebody has to interface with the “System” and monitor it if for no other
reason than to assure the People that the “System” does not suddenly go “SkyNet”
on us. And you can imagine that a great
many people’s natural political leanings would have them complaining about how
the “System” was being wasteful and giving everybody else everything but
screwing over their own particular set of self-interests. It
would be the role of People in Government to respond to such criticisms. Indeed,
not just chronic complainers would be asking questions but I would anticipate
that the Universities and the Press would be curious to know why and how the
“System” was making its decisions.
You know, it would probably be no easy task for
People in Government to answer for the Doings of the “System”. You
see, the “System” is in effect Thinking Inductively and making generalizations
using billions of data particulars in its logical-rational-practical process
for decision making. Even if you asked
the “System” to explain itself, could anybody be expected to understand the
Answer?
Well, that is why you need a Meritocracy. You would need really the Best and Brightest
across many Intellectual Disciplines – Economics, Sociology, Education, Psychology,
Criminology, History, Agricultural and Animal Sciences, Medicine, Health Care,
Disease Control, and especially Public Relations. They could be organized into Departments
which could again be subdivided and compartmentalized with Specialized Experts
scattered about with the hope that no matter how obscure some problem, concern,
or enigma, that somebody within the Meritocracy could be expected to get a
handle on it and be able to somehow conceptualize a coherent explanation for
it.
In order to facilitate communication between Men and
Machine, the “System” could be fed a detailed assessment of each Official’s scholastic
background – every book and paper they ever read and everything they ever wrote.
So when the “System” would be asked a
Question, it could be specified that the Answer should be specifically tailored
to the understanding of a Specific Department or Set of Individuals. Of course, I could allow for the “System”
augmenting its Answer with ‘Suggested Reading’ recommendations for certain
individuals whom the “System” believes most capable of understanding its
“Answer” but whom the “System” anticipates could still use a bit more
‘background info’ before heorshe could fully grasp of the concepts being
discussed.
Of course, much of the activity in each Department
would be solely to satisfy their own curiosity, and undertaken for the reason
of conscientiously monitoring the “System” and to forestall being taken by
surprise by It. And frankly I believe
that most of this ‘Specialized Detail’ would bore the General Public. Yes, the Meritocracy should be ‘transparent
and forthcoming’ to the People who have to live with the “System”, and specific
information should be allowed to those who ask for it (particularly those who
are studying for the next cycle of Civil Service Tests which would be the
Gateway into becoming part of the Meritocracy).
But burying the General Public in millions of pages of scientific
gibberish would perhaps obscure more than it could reveal. It puts me in mind of how Lawyers will create
a Contract that is 68 pages of legal gibberish in microscopically fine print simply
so they can hide one predatory clause that is easier to sign up to if it
remains unread. Too much information can
often serve only to cloud what is essential.
Just as the Departments were created as an interface
between the Meritocracy and the “System” so the Meritocracy would have to have
a similar Office for interacting and communicating with the Public. We could call it the Office of Public
Accountability, the OPA. The OPA would
be a Synthesizing Level above the Departments and so it would need liaisons
between the Departments whose jobs would be in trying to discern the Big
Picture Processes that the “System” is implementing. You
see, while the divisions between the Departments make perfect organizational
sense, still, in the Real World there are no hard and fast border lines separating
things – Economics affects Society affects Criminal Behavior affects Media
Trends, etc. So the OPA would have to
review, reflect and determine whether there is anything that we can Humanly Understand
about the “System” Operations that is useful or important and could be of
interest to the General Public. In this sense the role of the OPA is largely
that of Public Relations. The Job
wouldn’t be easy. The OPA would have the
difficult task of distilling all the specialized techno-talk and expert-speak
of the Departments into something that any normally educated member of the General
Public could grasp. Some kind of balance would need to be struck
between the extremes of overwhelming the Public with specialized obscurity, and
offering so little explanation as to appear vague and uncertain.
One concern I have regarding a Computerized AI
Supercomputer System is that its Super Efficiency would come at the price of a
Super Complexity. The World’s Population
would depend upon it for the Distribution of All Necessary Goods and
Services. But what if the lights went
out? What if a very intense Solar Flare
where to have the intensity of a Nuclear Bomb’s Electromagnetic Pulse and fry
all the circuits? Humanity would be
helpless. So this is another reason to
cut way down on Population. Is we
continued then, as now, to concentrate hundreds of millions of people together
in urban concrete jungles hundreds of miles away from cultivatable land and irrigation
water, and the “System” were to shut down, the results would be unthinkably catastrophic. So the
Population must be kept within viable limits calculated to be able to survive a
“System” breakdown, and that Population should
be spread out in areas that could, in the event of an emergency, be quickly converted
to agricultural use. One of the most
important roles of the Meritocracy would have to be in regards to Contingency
Planning and Preparation, that is, if
the “System” goes down there would have to be a “To Do” List for each and every
person, so that actual people could step in and take over in the Distribution
of Necessary Goods and Services.
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