The current status of Western civilisation is that we have absolutely no idea what we’re doing, but we’re certain that we must do more of it, and faster. You almost get the impression that the lust for speed is there to prevent a moment of reflection occurring in which the question “why?” was answered by nothing more than silence.
In any case, the reign of quantity is held together by at least three intertwining dogmas:-
1. The dogma of progress
2. The dogma of science
3. The dogma of money
The dogma of progress can be summarised by the belief that anything new must be better than anything old. This ensures that any new idea will be received with, if not enthusiasm, then at least the passive acceptance that the experts have done it again.
A rather amusing example of this hit the internet this week when said experts rolled out the idea of “liquid trees”. Why on earth would anybody want these things? Well, apparently they are a solution to urban air pollution. It surely never occurred to the designers that there’s such a thing as eye pollution. Anyway, according to the dogma of progress, liquid trees are better than normal trees. There’s an excel spreadsheet to prove it.
As we can see, the dogma of progress is tightly related to the dogma of science. Anybody can plant a tree, but it takes a scientist to design a “liquid tree” and then to do the necessary calculations about how much pollution it can absorb. The new things embraced by the dogma of progress are always those designed by some expert or other, and so it’s tempting to think that the dogma of progress is identical to the dogma of science.
I think they are best kept separate, however, and one reason is because the dogma of science is often wheeled out to justify some of the “failures” of the dogma of progress. We saw a classic example of that during the corona debacle. The mRNA vaccines were “new”, and, in accordance with the dogma of progress, that makes them not just good, but better than anything that’s come before. Thus, we had world leaders tripping over themselves to proclaim that the new medical intervention would stop the “pandemic”. I recall the then German chancellor Merkel saying with a straight face that every person in the world would have to take the new vaccine. That’s the dogma of progress in its purest form as blind faith in new technology.
Of course, it became instantly clear that these wild claims for the efficacy of the new treatment were not valid, and that’s where the dogma of science was wheeled out to explain the situation. Science is about adapting to new information, we were told. It was not a failure to accept that the vaccine was not as effective as first believed; it was “science”. This appeal to the dogma of science gave people permission not to notice that the promises of the dogma of progress had been clearly and obviously wrong. A neat trick.
If progress is synonymous with “science”, then it is also true in the post-war years that science is always institutional science. This brings us to the third dogma of money. Gone are the days of the scientist as a gentleman of leisure or an enthusiastic amateur. In the old world, Darwin could arrange for the publication of the Origin of Species to occur after his death so that he didn’t have to be troubled with the controversy that he knew would ensue. Such a thing would be unthinkable nowadays. Science is funded by money and money always needs to generate more money.
Thus, the new things that are created by progress and science are always those that can be monetised in one way or another. In particular, speculative capital is always looking for ideas that might pay off big if they come to fruition. Note, that speculative ideas are, by definition, new. Therefore, the dogma of money tightly aligns with the dogma of progress. Since any new breakthrough must come with the prestige of science and engineering behind it, the dogma of science is included by default.
If the dogma of progress is the engine and the dogma of science is the wheels, the dogma of money is the fuel which makes it all go. Where is this metaphorical vehicle going? Well, that’s the thing; nobody knows. We don’t even try to understand it in a qualitative sense, only in a quantitative one.
Money is both the fuel which drives the engine and also the metric by which we measure its performance. Every year, the RPM of the engine goes higher. We call that GDP. But, as Frederic Bastiat pointed out about 150 years ago, measuring the economy in this quantitative fashion tells us nothing about the quality of the output. It’s entirely possible to continue to make GDP go up while having an economy that produces no value or even negative value. The car’s engine may be going faster, but the car itself may be headed straight over a cliff.
The fact that economics takes a purely quantitative approach to the matter is quite in keeping with the dogma of science. Although there is no inherent reason why science can’t concern itself with quality, it is simply the case that it has always struggled to even define quality, let alone measure it. This is true even in the hard sciences.
The result has been to focus almost entirely on quantitative methods. Corona provides yet another useful example because, in recent decades, virology has come to rely on mathematical analysis of genetic codes to define “new” viruses. The determination of what is a “new” virus is now quantitative in nature, just like the determination of whether a new product is successful is also quantitative, even if the success only comes because governments agree to purchase the product en masse (hello, mRNA vaccines).
The dogma of progress says that anything new is “better”. The word “better” normally entails a qualitative judgement, but because of our obsession with quantity, we have set up systems that equate “better” with “more”. We have reduced questions of quality to ones of quantity.
The theory of capitalism states that quality is inherent in the purchases made by individuals because individuals will only pay for that which they value. That’s true enough as far as it goes, and, as long as the post-war economic gains were shared with the general public, it worked tolerably well. However, the neoliberal reforms of the 1990s have shifted the balance away from the general public and towards the corporations, investment funds, billionaires, and governments. The result is a closed loop where winners are picked in advance according to ideological parameters, not according to quality and value.
Whenever the public happens to notice that these new developments don’t represent a qualitative improvement on what came before, some propaganda will be wheeled out to correct the perception. That propaganda inevitably bases itself upon the three dogmas of progress, science, and money.
It’s ironic that, for a society that is supposed to be secular, non-religious, and “scientific”, we have ended up becoming more doctrinaire than the average religious observer. Moreover, as we saw during the corona debacle, the exponents of the three dogmas are just as fanatical as any true believer.
Hi, there, Simon. I am writing to you from Belgrade, just after having gone to see the “Liquid Tree” you mentioned in your post. The beauty of the story is that I am in Belgrade for different reasons and, a few hours ago, I read your post and I discovered that the “thing” was just a few hundred meters from my hotel. So, I went to see it. I think you are being a little harsh with it. It is, actually, a very good idea not so much to replace trees — of course — but to do the job of trees in places where trees can’t stay. Indoors, for instance. So, I wrote to the inventor, Prof. Spasojevic, and we’ll be meeting tomorrow for a chat! Strange world… On this matter, you may be interest in my recent paper: https://www.qeios.com/read/IKNUZU
Ugo – it’s a small world!
I still argue that, whatever the utilitarian benefits of the liquid tree, it would be almost impossible to make it aesthetically pleasing. We instinctively know that there’s something wrong with a standing body of water filled with algae. It’s out of balance. All other life has been killed off. By contrast, a tree is always a participant in a web of life. That’s why we have the “tree of life” but not the “algae of life” 🙂
I saw the inventor, he told me a lot of details about his idea. Of course, the idea of “liquid trees” is a little deceptive. Natural trees are much less expensive and also more beautiful. But there are places where you can’t plant trees. Think of your living room! So, I think there are many good reasons to diffuse this idea to improve indoor conditions. More oxygen, less CO2 and other pollutants. The best would have been not to spread CO2 all over, but by now it is too late to go back
Ugo – I think the professor needs to consult a good marketer. The comparison with trees is not in his favour because everybody loves trees but nobody loves algae 😛
Hi Simon,
Fixing a problem caused by energy and technology, by using even more energy and technology, is a story which makes little sense to me. Far cheaper to simply go and plant some trees, then look after them.
From the photo, it’s hard to tell for sure what the algae machines are made of, but glass, aluminium, concrete, steel – and who knows what pumps and electrical circuits are hidden within the bowels – all take a fair bit of energy to manufacture, assemble and then ship to that location.
When I was younger I used to have an aquarium, and it was most certainly not a set and forget proposition. Far from it actually. In some ways, I’m seeing the same sort of metaphor could be applied to where I reside. Hmm.
I’m of the belief that the future will involve using less of everything. Did you note that there is now some loose talk of a second desalination plant? Possibly due to the increased population and the many applications for water hungry data centres, but that’s pure speculation on my part. Oh well.
Cheers
Chris
Chris – it’s funny cos the fact that I had no idea what I was doing when I planted the trees in my own garden meant that only what was suited to survive in this environment actually did survive. Therefore, the trees that remain are those that need almost no work on my part. Sometimes ignorance has its benefits!
I think that’s an excellent point about solving tech problems with more tech. Wasn’t it Einstein who said that you can’t solve a problem with the same thinking that caused it?
Simon,
This seems to have started by the west doing away with personal experience with the real world in favor of models, theories and management. In the past, most engineers had technical background before university, for example electrical engineers often did tech school and were trained electricians before entering academia. Therefore, they knew the difference between something that works in theory, and something that will only work after a lot of tinkering if at all.
The old system was based on getting an initiation with an elder, as an apprentice, which lead to wisdom and intuition, which allows for judgement over quality. This is largely gone, and arguably for good since we have done away with elders. In the absence of empirical knowledge, quality is meaningless, much like trying to explain what is orange to someone blind from birth. Lacking concrete knowledge, all you are left with is quantity.
Algae are very good to eat, Simon! Have you ever been to Japan?
BTW. Algae photosynthesis is 10-100 times faster than that of trees. We get most of our oxygen from algae, not from trees. That makes them interesting. But the question of whether you can make a practical CO2 removing system using algae is all to be experimented.
Bakbook – I would also add that most people used to have some experience of life before entering any education at all. It was the case in northern Europe, for example, that a young man (it was always men back then) who went to university was the eldest son of a farmer and had been raised in the real world before entering the world of books and theories. We seem to have reached a complete inversion of that now where people will accept any theory, even one that obviously contradicts reality.
Ugo – now we’re getting somewhere! Instead of “liquid trees”, they should be called “seaweed cafes”. You can have an al fresco dining area set up and you get to watch the chef harvest your dinner from the tank.