The sequel to The Value Crisis (titled Our Second Chance) ended up being a lot more optimistic than it started out to be. The original working title was "Trumping Our Survival", and although it was referring to how number-based values trump natural values, the reference to the chaos in American politics was implicit. Perhaps that harsher message still needs to be disseminated. I will be more explicit:
We are all Donald Trump.
What do I mean by that? I don't mean that we are individually like Trump. I refer instead to humanity collectively. Here are some statements that few (objectively rational?) people would argue with:
Donald Trump started off with some powerful advantages over other people and now believes himself superior to them. He also believes that the rules that govern other people do not apply to him, so he is above society's laws. He declares himself wealthy, but, in reality, Trump has a habit of not paying his debts to other people and society, and what he has is less valuable than he thinks. He will say and do anything to increase his wealth and power because, to him, More is Always Better. By declaring himself superior to other people, Trump ignores the reality of his situation and his dependence on them for his survival. Even though support for his behaviours is massive, enlightened observers can see that, from his position of power, Trump inflicts catastrophic damage on society.
Now read what happens when we simply replace "Trump" with "humans", "society" with "nature", and "people" with "species":
Humans started off with some powerful advantages over other species and now believe ourselves superior to them. We also believe that the rules that govern other species do not apply to us, so we are above natural laws. We declare ourselves wealthy, but, in reality, humans have a habit of not paying our debts to other species and nature, and what we have is less valuable than we think. We will say and do anything to increase our wealth and power because, to us, More is Always Better. By declaring ourselves superior to other species, humans ignore the reality of our situation and our dependence on them for our survival. Even though support for our behaviours is massive, enlightened observers can see that, from our position of power, humans inflict catastrophic damage on nature.
To be kind, Donald Trump is not intentionally evil. He is simply a lethal combination of financial power placed in the hands of someone who suffers from psychopathic narcissism. To be equally generous to humans, the same might be said of humanity - a lethal combination of evolutionary power placed in the hands of a species whose collective self-aggrandizement now blinds us to the needs and value of everything around us.
What natural laws do I accuse humans of breaking - and can I prove it?
The Core of Natural Values
Philosophers have debated for centuries what constitute natural values. I am going to audaciously propose a core principle of natural values - made all the more tricky by the fact that it incorporates a negative:
There is no value in nature where More is ALWAYS Better.
By "value", I refer to any intrinsically desirable quality - demonstrated either by an operational attribute or choices made (excluding number-based values which exist only in recent human cognition). By "nature", I refer to the physical universe, including all forms of life. By "always", I mean in every situation, regardless of circumstances. By "better", I mean: that results in a higher measure of value (i.e. more desirable state) for whatever natural value you are exploring.
While it is impossible to prove a negative, we can make this principle a good working proposition by examining its derivatives. For example, consider food, shelter, territory, and energy – there are plenty of instances in the natural world where more is better, but it is never always better. To absolutely everything, there is a beneficial sufficiency – a peak value, after which more is no longer a good thing, and often becomes a bad thing. More is not always better.
It is only when value is measured exclusive by number (for example, monetary value) that more is always worth more, by definition. With virtual wealth, More is Always Better.
Furthermore, material resources - things that we need to survive - are subject to long-accepted rules like the Laws of Thermodynamics. Neither matter nor energy (nor real value) can be created from nothing, and every transaction is subject to the value-decrementing principle of entropy. Virtual wealth, on the other hand, is not subject to those laws. We create value from nothing all the time – well over 90% of the planet’s monetary wealth exists only as debt. Meanwhile, if you spend $100 on food, the food degrades over time, but the $100 will always be $100 - entropy does not apply to numbers.
Guilty As Charged
So, when our society adopts number-based values like monetary wealth and economic growth as the values that will trump all others, we adopt a More is Always Better approach to managing our lives and our limited resources on this planet. We think nature's laws don't apply to us and that we are superior to everything in the environment that we live in. Our decisions become entirely incompatible with the reality of the physical world around us, and, slowly but surely, we bring an extraordinary range of disasters down upon ourselves.
How do we fix this?
I propose some tantalizing options in other posts, but the key thing to challenge is the More-is-Always-Better philosophy. Individually, we can do this by introducing concepts of sufficiency into our lives. For example, instead of letting your income determine your standard of living, try selecting the minimal standard of living that you are comfortable with, and then figuring out what income that requires. Instead of wealth maximization, focus on joy maximization. A colleague puts it very nicely: "More Fun, Less Stuff".
No doubt, Donald Trump/humanity is insufficiently aware of these flaws. That may only change when society/nature punches back with sufficient force. The question is whether or not that reality is going to assert itself before all is lost...
