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When we think about our collective economic future, is it dismal or dazzling? Or a bit of both? Chris Kutarna and Ian Goldin argue that we stand on the precipice of transformational change, the likes of which we have not seen since the Renaissance and the Age of Discovery, so once in every 500 years. We discussed this and all the paradigm-breaking implications for politics, technology, and the human experience.
Chris Kutarna is a Fellow at the Oxford Martin School. He earned a doctorate in politics from the University of Oxford. One time a consultant with BCG, he is a two-time Governor General’s Medallist, a Sauvé Fellow and Commonwealth Scholar. His new book isAge of Discovery, written with Ian Goldin, who is the Oxford University Professor of Globalisation and Development and a Senior Fellow at the Oxford Martin School, and a Professorial Fellow at Oxford’s Balliol College.
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Just don’t buy all of it.
For instance, when talking about computers pushing on the hard questions in science. Computers have to use models. Models have to be right. When they aren’t, you’re just talking about polling. Rubbish.
As for the idea of job displacement, I have no doubt that automation will cause this. But the idea of just handing out income is a really bad, bad idea. People need the psychic value of having earned money. Why do people not understand something so simple and basic? The policy makers, because they are lazy, want simple answer such as just hand out money. The trick will be to keep the economic activity in the location where the jobs were dislocated and then build new links to employ people. Something the people who did NAFTA and WTO and all the rest of the stupid trade agreements never learned. But then economists are idiots.
Brutal central planning by high exalted government experts circa 1929 U.S.S.R. just updated with a dash of scientism for leaven.
This belief isn’t based on the Renaissance but NEP.
I try to keep such questions about technological changes and the possibilities they offer in a simple framework . First off I’ll state that I believe “The Enlightenment” is very much a constant now ,that it never really ended and this fact seems obvious enough to me . Here begins my framework, yes we can probably do most of these things mentioned in the podcasts but just because we can doesn’t necessarily mean we should . I’m not a fan of technology removing the individual’s right to be incorrect ! Humans become something less when elites decide for the individual .