Social Equity and Civilization Collapse

A research team at Princeton has statistically verified something we already knew intuitively: that American politics today is controlled by elites and business interests, and average citizens have little or no say in the outcome. There are two names for the type of political system we appear to have -- the broader term "oligarchy" (rule by elites) and the narrower and more controversial term "fascism" (as defined by Mussolini: rule by corporations, or by corporate interest groups.) In the way it actually functions, our political system is not a "democracy" (rule by average citizens, or by public interest groups.)

Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens

I suspect we've all already seen the graphs which depict the rapidly increasing social inequity that has gone hand-in-hand with this shift from democratic rule to oligarchy. Another recent study describes a model of human population dynamics, and attempts to tease apart the factors which determine the outcome of civilizations. Many different factors have been invoked to explain specific examples of civilization collapse, but in studying the historic record the research team identified two factors -- resource depletion and social inequity -- that have been prominent across many different civilizations just prior to collapse. Their model incorporates these factors into a simulation of predator-prey dynamics in an attempt to define the "carrying capacity" of a civilization and predict when collapse will occur. In the simulation results (and also in the historical record) either resource depletion or social inequity can independently lead to collapse: both must be addressed in order to create a sustainable society.

Human and Nature Dynamics (HANDY): Modeling Inequality and Use of Resources in the Collapse or Sustainability of Societies

Social equity has been part of the sustainability picture all along, but I had always imagined this to be primarily an ethical stance. If we take this study seriously, the obvious conclusion is that it's also a basic requirement for survival. (In the context of predator-prey dynamics, "collapse" means "population collapse".) Which means that it's just as crucial to address our political imbalance of power as it is to address our resource usage, if we want our civilization to survive.

There are at least two obvious explanations for why social inequity might be destabilizing. One is that the elites lose touch with the reality "on the ground" and fail to notice and take action on resource depletion (or other impending crises) until it's too late. That's a relatively benign interpretation of the problem. However, having recently watched the first episode of that Dangerously Alarmist Documentary with this question in mind, I suspect there's another, more dangerous, explanation. When elites lose touch with the circumstances the masses are living under, it creates tensions that destabilize society. Once that happens, even a moderate crisis (which would be easily weathered by a more equitable society) can become a flash point for social unrest and violence. Social equity determines whether people come together in a crisis, or fall apart.

We're currently facing a whole string of global crises, from climate change to peak oil to overpopulation at a level which strains our global food supply. Those crises will inevitably bring loss and hardship in their wake. We can choose to create a society which is resilient -- one whose members take care of each other -- or one which is poised to self-destruct when hard times come.

Can Science and Technology Save Us?

This is the title of a salon I've been asked to help facilitate next month. My designated position on the panel is that of middle ground, between the optimist (yes it can) and the pessimist (we need to reclaim the commons, is how I think his position was described to me.) I was surprised to be invited; I had no idea I was perceived as any kind of authority on this topic. Perhaps there's some value to being outspoken after all; often I feel as if it just gets me mired in controversy.

But how do I actually feel about it? I'm not sure if middle of the road is the right place for me or not. I strongly suspect we're doomed, and that the effect our technology is having right now is to dig a deeper hole to bury ourselves in. To quote Einstein, "You can't solve a problem on the same level you created it." We need to move to a higher level of thinking to find a solution to our problem (if in fact a solution exists.)

One thing I know to be true: if you devote resources to solving a problem, you make progress toward a solution. If you devote a lot of resources, you make rapid progress. That is why we have a telephone system, an interstate system, an internet. It's why we have the most advanced military in the world.

It's also the case that a failure to devote *enough* resources can doom us to failure, and can be used as a strategy to destroy an otherwise promising option. If a project is funded on a shoestring long enough, its opponents can use the lack of progress to justify shutting it down entirely. Wind and solar and the electric car have all been adversely affected by this type of funding strategy. It's also a common strategy for holding women back in traditionally male careers (I used to have a research reference for this, back when I was still at MIT, but it would take some serious digging to find it any more.) One might think of it as a variation on "damning with faint praise."

But even more true is the fact that we are facing what reporters are beginning to refer to as a "perfect storm" of crises, and the one of the things we know to be true is that we can't fund every kind of research at once. In the Limits to Growth studies, the cause of collapse was never an unsolvable crisis -- it was too many crises happening all that the same time. So if we want to survive this "perfect storm" we have to be extremely careful about where we put our limited resources.

One of the problems with our current business-as-usual approach is that all the most promising possibilities are competing for a small and relatively fixed-size pool of research dollars. To pursue more options in parallel, we need to free up resources from other, wasteful enterprises to increase the size of the funding pool. But a lot of that wasteful spending is happening in the private sector, under corporate control -- whether it's advertising, marketing, media propaganda, packaging, political campaigns, global shipping, lights burning in empty buildings, or further enriching the uber-rich. Some of it is in government, mostly in the form of extravagant military spending, but even the government is increasingly falling under corporate control. Most of that spending is simply making our problems worse, so if we redirected it toward solving global problems, it would certainly make a difference.

But to get all our resources on board we will have to refocus our economy, instead of letting it run without a head, churning out short-term amusements and trash at the expense of our long-term viability as a species. And even if we did refocus we would have to think very carefully about where to place our bets. Because gambling is what it comes down to. High stakes gambling, with the world in the balance. If we back the wrong horse, we may not get another chance. And the likelihood that we're going to have the opportunity to place a bet at all is growing slimmer with each passing year.

Kant and and the Rise of Amorality

Okay, I'll be the first to say I'm not the expert here, but in reading over the Wikipedia entries on Immanuel Kant and his writings and ideas, I find that I am feeling extremely irritated with him. I'm going to give a short synopsis of his contributions to philosophy, and then I'm going on a little rant.

Immanuel Kant -- 1724-1804 -- According to Wikipedia, Kant believed one ought to think autonomously, free of the dictates of outside authorities. If we live that way, then our beliefs, conclusions, and the moral code we live by are personal and internally generated, rather than being dictated by society or the church. Off the bat I have to say that I'm inclined to approve of this idea, but  I fear it may, in combination with his other ideas, have had a detrimental impact on Western civilization.

On Pure Reason

Kant's work in Epistemology reconciles and integrates the Empiricist and Rationalist schools of thought, and thereby unifies the experimental and theoretical sciences. Empiricism is characterized by the scientific method. One of its core beliefs is that knowledge can be derived only through the evidence of our senses, using a process of forming and testing hypotheses against the world, and rejecting those which prove contradictory to our experience.  In Empiricism, absolute knowledge of reality is impossible, and truth is inherently uncertain and limited by our experience. In Rationalism -- characterized by the development of mathematics -- reason, not experience, is used to distinguish truth from falsehood. The evidence of our senses is considered unreliable at best, and it's the inner world of our mind which is seen as the ultimate source of knowledge. These two schools of thought developed in parallel in the century prior to Kant's arrival on the scene.

Pure reason refers to the mental process by which we perceive and understand reality. Kant put forward the idea that our experiences are structured by essential mental constructs -- in particular, the concepts of space and time, and cause and effect -- which make it possible for us to process and understand our sensory experience. These concepts cannot be experimentally verified, but without them we cannot make sense of the phenomena of our senses. So we must rely on reason to understand our experience, and reason in turn must be grounded in experience to avoid spinning off into theoretical illusions. In his view, all our knowledge of reality comes through our senses, and the process of converting raw sensory phenomena into a mental model of reality is inherently shaped and limited by the internal structure of our minds. We cannot directly perceive reality: our knowledge is limited both by what we are capable of sensing, and by our mental capacity for understanding. If a reality exists outside of space and time, or beyond the limits of our senses, we'll never know, because we would be unable to perceive it. This is the essence of his most famous work, the Critique of Pure Reason.

On Practical Reason

Practical reason, as distinct from pure reason, refers to the mental processes by which we decide how to act. According to Kant, there are two reasonable motivations for choosing how to behave: we may act out of self-interest to bring about a desired end, which is inherently subjective and relative to our individual situation, or we may act according to a universal moral law (which, to be valid, must be objective and independent of the empirical world.) The second choice he refers to as pure practical reason. According to Kant's view, there is only one valid universal moral law, which he refers to as the categorical imperative. This law is to act according to those maxims which we can, at the same time, will that they should be universally applied. (You could think of this as a generalization of "do unto others...") He believed that all other moral laws which can be formulated fail the test of universality by making reference to desired ends in the empirical world. 

So far so good, but brace yourselves: here comes the "proof of God" part. At the end of Kant's first book, one might have concluded that God is ultimately unknowable -- and from the standpoint of pure reason that is the case. Kant, however, was unwilling to leave things in that state. He did believe it was impossible to prove God's existence through empirical means, due to the limitations of our minds and senses (and we mustn't forget the lack of empirical evidence.) However, for the same reason, it is also impossible to *disprove* the existence of God.

You might think he would end up an agnostic after that statement, but no.

Kant believed that moral law is superior to self-interest as a motivation, and so there must be a valid reason for choosing it. He also believed that, in order to be superior to self-interest, such a law must provide for the highest good. In his view, that is the only reasonable justification for choosing pure practical reason over one's own self-interest. But this statement gives rise to a contradiction. A reality in which morality prevails *and* people are happy is better than a reality in which morality prevails and happiness is not achieved (or not reliably achieved.) So the highest good must include both the highest virtue *and* the greatest happiness. However, we can readily observe in the empirical world that virtue does not necessarily lead to happiness, and that we ourselves have not achieved the highest virtue (and are not likely to achieve it any time soon.)

So Kant concludes that we must be immortal, so that we can have a *really* *long* time to overcome our human self-interestedness and achieve the highest virtue, and there must be an afterlife outside the empirical world in which we can achieve whatever measure of happiness we deserve which does not come to us in this life, and there must be an omniscient God to make it so.

Say what?

So the promise of a reward in heaven is the only reasonable justification for moral behavior? And we ought to believe in God because we can't get a reward in heaven unless God exists to give it to us? Holy limburger, Batman! This argument is so full of holes I could strain spaghetti with it!

Kant was one of the greatest thinkers in Western history -- the man who finally reconciled the philosophical divide between the theoretical and experimental sciences -- and this is the best justification he could come up with for morality?! No wonder Karl Marx came out so vehemently in opposition to religion, just fifty years later!

I wonder if Kant realized how easily his argument could be used to support the opposite conclusion. The juxtaposition of: we cannot prove God exists, with: God is the only justification for morality, leads directly to a highly undesirable conclusion: namely, that a belief system in which God does not exist, and morality is irrelevant, is equally valid. At which point the obvious thing to do is to use other people's belief in God as a tool to manipulate their behavior, and get the goodies in this life instead of waiting for the next. Sure, there's some risk involved -- there might be a hell, after all -- but Christianity quite handily filled that gap with an insurance policy that says Faith is all that's needed to avoid that fate, and Good Works are unnecessary. And, to clinch the deal, you have until you're on your deathbed to attain your Faith. I wonder who originated *that* idea?

It seems clear to me that the empirical world does not function according to Kant's views on morality. There are a great many non-theists who follow a moral code, and (unfortunately) a great many theists who act primarily in their own self-interest. So I think the compelling scientific conclusion is that either Kant is wrong, or the world is full of fools. I find myself wondering who it was that substituted the concept of "Greater Good" for "Highest Good" in this argument, and when that substitution was made, since it seems to me that's one of its fundamental flaws. Does that count as a cliff-hanger? ... read on, my dear, read on ...