The Upside of Down - Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization
2006 by Shearwater Books
Tectonic Stresses
Human societies are threatened by interrelated stresses:
- Population – growth rate is different in rich and poor societies, has peaked in some rich societies – the poor flood into rapidly growing megacities (e.g., Dhaka in Bangladesh)
- Energy – high quality energy (oil) that fuels growth has peaked – we are now scrambling
- Environmental – natural environment is being destroyed
- Climate – atmosphere is changing, planet warming
- Economic –gap between rich and poor is widening, societies becoming unstable – prone to revolution, terrorism
Multipliers and Thresholds (Non-Linear Systems)
We need to develop prospective minds – embracing change and surprise, understanding how little we understand (can understand) how little we control (can control).
Conditions are made worse because of global connectivity. Everything, everyplace is connected. One thing can affect many things which can affect many things - and feed back on itself. This means a small event in one place can have an outsized impact everywhere. An unexpected but well-connected event can trigger a Fall. Maybe a pandemic comes out of Africa, a critical oil producer in the Middle East collapses, a terrorist uses a nuke anywhere, a critical component of the climate (say the Gulf Stream) fails.
It's The Flat Earth meets the Black Swan.
Thermodynamics
The underlying theory comes from complex adaptive systems. These include human and animal societies, the stock market, the biosphere, all businesses - human minds individually and collectively. The list goes on. Characteristics include connectivity, non-linear reactions (small causes can have large results), energy usage, growth.
The last two are especially important. Complex adaptive systems are thermodynamic. They suck energy out of environments, consuming the readily available energy first then as that supply is exhausted the more costly energy (in terms of money, effort). Adaptive systems that are smart enough try various compensating tricks as energy becomes scarcer. For example, in burgeoning rat populations the strong eat the weak - which might be analogous to what some rich humans do to poor humans.
(Regarding us - Homer-Dixon says human societies adapt to resource scarcity by becoming more and more complex, more connected and interdependent. We squeeze every last bit of efficiency out of our systems, until there is nothing left to squeeze. In the process we loose resiliency, become fragile, subject to disruption. )
In the final stage of growth cycle (common to all), adaptive systems become increasingly vulnerable to black swan events. Inevitably something happens. The whole thing falls apart. The Lemmings go off the cliff. The rat population collapses. The locusts, having eaten everything, starve. The forest burns. Rome falls. Entropy eases over the debris like still water.
(Homer-Dixon says that the upcoming Fall of human civilization will be a major social transformation "pulse" comparable to the transformation from hunter-gatherer to agricultural society, the industrial revolution, the communications revolution.)
Foreshocks include the recent recession, the current revolutions in the Middle East, the synergy of disaster in Japan.
Prospective Minds
But - and this is the hopeful note offered at the end of the book, if too much doesn't fail at one time, a resurgence can follow a Fall. Homer-Dixon calls this Catagensis. It's what happened in Western Europe after WWII, what happened in the Northern US after the Civil War (what happened to me after I had angioplasty - when I quit smoking, lost 40 pounds and started taking six mile walks). However if the things go too far (think Haiti, Somalia, Southern US after the Civil War) resurgence is less likely, or will take longer.
To minimize the effects of The Fall, Homer-Dixon says we need to develop value systems that get beyond consumerism and the growth imperative - that recognize (1) laws of thermodynamics and role of energy in our survival (2) dangers of certain kinds of connectivity and (3) non-linear behavior of natural systems. We must embrace change and surprise.
We need to develop prospective minds – embracing change and surprise, understanding how little we understand (can understand) how little we control (can control).
In the words of Nassim Taleb (the Black Swan guy) we must become citizens of Extremistan.
Links
I'll be adding links here to related web sites - mine and others. I'll probably also add notes and do obsessive ongoing editing.
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