It’s Better Than It Looks

It’s Better Than It Looks: Reasons for Optimism in an Age of Fear  by Gregg Easterbrook

From the title, I expected this book to be much like those by Steven Pinker, showing how human life has steadily improved from generation to generation, about how we’ve reduced things like hunger, disease, poverty, crime, and war by implementing the ideas of the Enlightenment. There is some of that in these pages, but Easterbrook isn’t really looking at the broad scope of history here. He is more focused on today, or at least on the last century. His main point is that things today (in general) are far better than politicians, social media, and most news reports might suggest.

Humans, he states, are predisposed by their evolution to suspect threats and be wary of the unknown. Even though most shadows are harmless, treating all as if they are bears hiding in the bushes has survival value because, every once in a while, there really is a bear. Politicians and the media exploit our inherent fears (sometimes intentionally) for their own benefit. His take on how current politicians have done so abound.

This isn’t an objective or scholarly work. There is little statistical data, no graphs, no detailed analysis, and the author freely shares his personal opinions and value judgments (such that Western ideals are moral and that a well regulated market economy is the economic ideal). Despite these differences, he comes to much the same conclusions as Pinker does in The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined and in Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress. Things aren’t only not bad; they are better than they ever have been. That doesn’t mean we don’t have serious problems. Disease, crime, poverty, and hunger have been reduced, but they haven’t been eliminated. Challenges such as climate change and wealth disparity certainly need to addressed, but history shows that humans are quite good at overcoming challenges. There is every reason to expect that we’ll meet those of today as least as well as we have met those of the past.

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Glass House

Glass House: The 1% Economy and the Shattering of the All-American Town by Brian Alexander

The business of business is to make money. That’s the basic premise of an economic theory advocated by the late Milton Friedman and embraced by politicians from Reagan to Trump. Investors entrust companies and corporations with money with the expectation of receiving even more money. Investor value is therefor the primary concern of businesses. It’s not about producing goods and services, at least not primarily. Those are simply a means for making money. It’s certainly not about creating good-paying jobs. Employees are human resources to be used as needed and discarded when not, just like any other resource. An efficient business creates as much product as it can sell while employing as few people as possible, paying them only what it must. Anything beyond that cuts into profits that could otherwise be returned to investors. Generating more money at less cost makes a business efficient. It makes it successful. It increases its value and attractiveness for even more investment. It raises the price investors can get when they want to sell their shares. It’s a fairly simple idea. Investors provide capital to fund businesses in which workers create wealth, and then the investors extract the wealth beyond that necessary to maintain the business. It’s a great mechanism for making money, and somehow, through the magic of the invisible hand of free market capitalism, it brings prosperity to all. Or so the theory goes.

Glass House provides a case study of how the theory has worked for Lancaster, Ohio. It’s a compelling account of the Anchor-Hocking glass company, once a major U.S. producer of glassware and the lifeblood of this small city. The company has generated a lot of wealth for investors over the last half century, but there has been a cost. This is the story of those who paid it.

Homo Deus

Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari

Advances in human knowledge and technology are rapidly changing our society. What we value and what we believe are all in transition. That’s nothing new, of course. Our concept of the universe and of our place in it has changed throughout time—from trembling in awe at the power of thunder gods to challenging the heavens in rocket ships. In the near future, however, we may not only change how we see ourselves; we may change what we are.

This, I think, is the point Yuval Noah Harari, a lecturer in history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is trying to make in this book (which, by the way, is beautifully produced, with thick, glossy pages and color pictures). By speeding through history, he attempts to show that people have often shifted their beliefs, priorities, and goals, which he attributes to changes in ‘religion,’ a term that I think he uses far too generically. (He did the same in his previous book, Sapiens). For Harari, ‘religion’ refers to not only theistic religions, but to things that I would call ideology, philosophy, paradigm, or theory. Nazism, fascism, communism, capitalism, humanism…pretty much any overarching idea that provides a template for human understanding is a religion. I think his historical analysis suffers by conflating them. There are important differences, not least of which is how susceptible they are to revision in the minds of their subscribers. Some of these can change far more easily and quickly than can others. It is not until page 182 that he provides his definition: “Religion is any all-encompassing story that confers superhuman legitimacy on human laws, norms and values.” Personally, I think he should have used a different word.

He also applies seemingly broad definitions for words such as ‘worship’, ‘spiritual’, ‘dogma’, and ‘divinity’. Whether he uses religious terminology to annoy traditional theists or simply for the shock value, I’m not sure, but it may be a bit of both. What his ultimate (and laudable) goal seems to be is to get readers to question their assumptions.

He eventually describes a new, rising ‘religion’ that he calls Dataism. This one manifests itself as a ‘worship’ of data. We create it, share it, and depend upon it. Under this ‘religion’, the value of data supersedes previous values of privacy and free will. Well, perhaps.

As an analysis of history or as a futurist prediction of things to come, I found this book just so-so. But then I tend to read a fair amount in both subjects, so there wasn’t much new here for me. Harari does close with three questions, though, that I think are worth pondering:

1. Are organisms really just algorithms, and is life really just data processing?
2. What’s more valuable – intelligence or consciousness?
3. What will happen to society, politics and daily life when non-sentient conscious but highly intelligent algorithms know us better than we know ourselves?

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My Review of Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1252063767

Millennium

Millennium: From Religion to Revolution: How Civilization Has Changed Over a Thousand Years by Ian Mortimer

The last thousand years of human history is a story of advances and declines, challenges, failures, and successes. There is no consistent plot, no preordained or inevitable conclusion, but there is always change. In this book, Medieval scholar Ian Mortimer summarizes those changes, devoting a chapter to each of the last ten centuries, highlighting the major changes, and identifying the one person who was, in his opinion, the greatest agent of change. I can’t say I necessarily agree with all of his choices, but he’s the historian. I’m just a guy who writes science fiction stories. His opinion is undoubtedly far better informed than my own, however I find his conclusion about where humanity is headed in the future a bit pessimistic. My objections involve likely advances in technology, and a disagreement that standard of living is measurable in terms of income and consumption. Like him, I expect humanity to muddle through, but I don’t agree that human societies will become “more hierarchical and less liberal.” (Pg. 329) I’ll refrain from writing a lengthy exposition because it’s not really relevant for a book review and because I have other things to do today.

Colonies In Space

There is a bittersweet quality to this book. It’s nonfiction, so it has no engaging characters, no suspenseful plot, but it does tell a story. It’s more of a snapshot, really, of a hopeful era in which humanity seemed on the verge of venturing out into space, building colonies, and expanding its reach throughout the galaxy. It seemed inevitable, a near certainty, almost right around the temporal corner. The first step would happen soon. Large colonies would be built in space. Initially, these would produce and maintain solar power stations, which would beam their energy back to Earth via microwave transmission. This would make the space colonies economically self-sustaining, possibly even highly profitable.

Published in 1978 (copyright 1977), the author’s predictions about what would happen over the next forty years are often incorrect. He did not foresee, for example, the stunning advances that have been achieved in solar voltaic cells, artificial intelligence, 3D printing, or the possibility of cultured meat (his colonies would raise chickens and goats). He was extrapolating from the proven technology of the time, and all of these areas were still quite speculative.

He was also extrapolating from current culture and politics, prior to Reaganomics or the collapse of the Soviet Union. I found the following rather poignant:

Barring a catastrophic epidemic of human stupidity, the decades ahead are likely to see the foundations solidly laid for a world without large-scale poverty or hopelessness, a world of opportunity, rising living standards and widely shared middle-class levels of affluence. Such a world will endure into the indefinite future. (pages 250-251 of the 1st edition Warner mass market paperback)

Obviously, the world he envisioned didn’t come about. One can argue whether this is good or bad, but the political motivation and the governmental financial capacity to fund large-scale space development no longer exists. We didn’t build space colonies. Perhaps, some day, we will. If humanity is to survive into the distant future, I believe we must.

The Money Makers

The Money Makers: How Roosevelt and Keynes Ended the Depression, Defeated Fascism, and Secured a Prosperous Peace by Eric Rauchway

It is said that history repeats itself. That’s not quite true, but it does often rhyme. When FDR took office in in 1933, the United States was in much worse shape than it is today. The Great Depression had destroyed businesses and jobs. Discontent was raging, and there was a real threat of populist movements that regarded democratic capitalism as a failure and were willing to consider fascism, communism, or some kind of totalitarian system to replace it, as long as it provided a promise of security and a sense of hope for the future.

People today are feeling much the same, but for reasons far less dire. Still, with wages stagnant and with the promise of upward mobility lost, there is again this urge to find an alternative. In 1933, Roosevelt understood where the real problem lie, and he drew on the insights of British economist John Maynard Keynes to help him to not only restore the economy but to make America greater than it had ever been. The history related in this book is especially important for our time. As the author says, “So we face a choice. We can return to the lately prevailing orthodoxy that discounted Roosevelt and Keynes, and which led to our current discontents: or we can heed the lessons of their success.” (pg. 245)

The Time Traveler’s Guide to Elizabethan England

The Time Traveler’s Guide to Elizabethan England by Ian Mortimer

I read this book directly after reading Mortimer’s previous Time Traveler’s Guide to Medieval England. That one covered the 14^th century. This one “represent(s) England as it existed between Elizabeth’s accession on November 17, 1558 and her death on March 24, 1603.” Two centuries separate the times they describe, and although there have been changes, the culture and the lives of most people seem remarkably (almost disturbingly) similar. It remains a period of superstition, oppression, injustice, poverty, violence, and disease. That’s in comparison to our point in space-time, of course. Two hundred years from now, people reading about our times may regard them much the same way. We may not draw and quarter criminals the way Elizabethans did, but many nations still execute them. Bearbaiting and cockfighting are no longer popular forms of entertainment, but our movies often portray fictionalized acts of violence that are no less brutal. Maybe we haven’t progressed as far as we might wish to believe.

But I digress. This book attempts to provide the reader with a feeling of what it might be like to visit Elizabethan England, and to the extent possible, I think it largely succeeds. Unlike the previous book, this one has no color plates or pictures or any kind. These would have been helpful, especially to illustrate the clothing of the well off, which sounds incredibly impractical, uncomfortable, and outrageously expensive. The primary function seems to be as displays of social status, but I suppose people still do that in our time with designer handbags and whatnot.

I’m tempted to go on about how histories like this demonstrate the foibles our species, and that we and our ancestors are much the same, subject to the same types of irrational beliefs and behaviors. But I won’t. I’m only writing a short book review, after all, and I have other things to do today. Still, I can recommend this book, not just for the history it provides about a specific time and place but also as a means for encouraging a higher perspective about the human species and its cultural evolution.