Scarcity - A New Theory of Everything

In laymens' terms, a real is the result of zero devided by zero? So am I wrong to assume the cardinality of reals occures when you extract zero from that which makes all integers quantifiable?

Oh a question...I apologize by posting sloppy and incoherent $hit in this high-profile discussion, but never mind, so your universal set Omega is a after all dedekind-set? I'm simply a little desperate here to contribute to anything...

reply to post by Xtraeme

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Great Post. Scarcity rules our lives. This is crazy when we consider how much adundance we can create. One quick example is that we pay farmers not to grow food because they've gotten so good at it that to produce as much as they can produce would put them out of business. Therefore scarcity is artificially maintained in order to continue a hierarchical, force labor economy. The official name for artificially created scarcity is subsidy.

That's noramally when it happens, after you realise you have been immobile for an unknown timespan, you can evolve greatly through those loopholes, I've overcome great enough enemies to stay clear.



Originally 'one who doesnot relate to gnosis, knowledge.' but later one who doesnot relate to state religion in ancient Greece. Rød. Remark.



Like science fiction cultism's view on teleportation in a way, only it would involve quantum leaps in technology just to accept the initial message. In short, AnY sthing is possible.



We're already there my friend, our old energy can govern any planet, these powers and forces are primordeal. -- We'll exist in the end too. Only thing is our secrecy in relation to what technology we have and have develloped to the max, at lives' cost.

something got stuck at M$, frekkin smegma.... oh it's the free version, peace dudes!
1.sdsd can travel

reply to post by Xtraeme

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Awesome thread mate. It really made me think... and think... and think. I think I'm caught in some kind of logic loop!

IRM

reply to post by Xtraeme

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Thanks for the heads up about the thread. I'm afraid I shall disappoint, firstly because online time is a scarcity for me these days, but also because I don't fully go along with the argument. I can't articulate this to myself at the moment but it just doesn't quite sit right with me. I have as yet no cogent argument and I may not develop one fully, but I just don't like the idea that scarcity inevitably causes a class system. I can see that our current societal reality-tunnel makes the two highly interlinked, but I believe that rewriting our society's reality-tunnel would break the connection.

The long view you've espoused (in which we eventually become godlike) is well-known but I'm not sure that it has any meaning for me. It's fine as an SF novel timeline but I'm not convinced it has any real-world validity.

I'm going to have to leave it there, but I'll be musing on this and may return to this thread at a later date.

But great thread and thinking and discussion, whether I wind up agreeing with you or not.

beautiful thread man, i really appreciate you taking the time to share this.

i am going to need to take some time to review the philiosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre's view of scarcity before I can comment further but as it stands I am deeply moved by what I have read and seen in your thread.

something about it 'feels' right to me.

again, cheers for sharing such a though provoking topic.

I, too, was mortified at the thought that a class system is "by design." However once I reviewed the notion looking at every system man has ever created, it seems like greed (psychological scarcity) coupled with physical scarcity (natural lack of resources) ultimately forces a scenario where one person necessarily has more than another.

As for your point,



Consider if the 2nd law of thermodynamics holds to the end of time-space and we can't overcome this fundamental law of nature then the universe is ultimately a zero sum game (see 2nd image, Fig. 3, scientism universe). If that's the case how can a man-made system, like capitalism, which is based on the idea that two people can win equally (a non-zero sum game) be possible?

Sadly it can't, since nature has the final say, meaning inherently someone is gaining more than another (it's the recognition of this that causes boom / bust cycles).

This is why it may fundamentally require a rewriting of our human psychology to deal with a world where necessarily someone has to lose.

What's somewhat comforting is that in understanding this it gives us an idea how to min-max such a design because, in grasping this concept, it demonstrates the obscene power vested in economics in that it literally sets the imperative of an entire society even more so than politics, philosophy, & morality. Which suggests that if we're to be fair to all peoples we must admit to ourselves that someone in society ultimately get the shaft. Thus we should design our cultural-value system based on the majority position on how to allocate money on the macro-scale.

For example, imagine a system where people not only vote for their representatives, but they also vote on their funding priorities rather than having to lobby (more complete thoughts on this here). This would allow the proletariat to reinvent their society without having to engage in physically violent revolution.

Technology has always been the great mover of new prosperity. Frustratingly we're getting to the point where we're not only having to contend with issues like peak oil, but peak every other natural resource on the planet. In dealing with a physically scarce world where we don't even have the base resources necessary to sustain each human, morality is inherently subjective and ultimately meaningless. If I had to will something to be a universal law (where people are considered an "end" and not a "means") the only thing that could be said to be "a sin" in this scenario is taking more than a person needs preventing someone else from having food, water and shelter.

Thus a maxim of defining "too much by what's too little" is one possible interpretation of point (d) on Fig. 1, in that it has the potential to provide a rationale for reaching exigency of 0.

I realize you're short for time, but if you can articulate your thoughts as to what specifically you disagree with or what bugs you, please, I'd love to hear it. The more critical analysis I can get the better!

[edit on 24-11-2009 by Xtraeme]

While this sounds quite rustic and I agree there are a number of human activities that are tantamont to taking the paper-work from the in-pile, transferring it to the out-pile and then recycling it back to the in-pile. There's still much that we've gained by ruthlessly pursuing efficiency, not just scientifically & technologically, but in the arts.

Just because I can see the virtues of a particular mode of living doesn't mean that I want to force my views on to to others who have an alternate take on the best course for mankind. This is why I think it's important that there be a healthy balance between all manner of political / economic systems rather than picking one over the other due purely to ideology.

The question is, "Is this possible?"

To try and answer this objectively I considered the difference between a debt-based society (fractional reserve) and a 100% reserve-based system.

"The 100-percenters say that in a free society, force is outlawed, a statement both sides can endorse. Next, since fraud is a form of (implicit) force, it too must be banned. Since a fractional reserve system promises to pay specie in amounts greater than what actually exists, that promise is a fraud. Therefore, the 100-percenters contend, a fractional reserve banking system has no place in a free society.

The fractional reserve advocates, who disagree with the 100-percenters, also base their arguments on free market principles. In a free market, they say, anyone can do what he wants as long as he doesn’t use force against others. This includes banks. If a bank issues notes that aren’t 100 per cent backed by specie, by what right do we stop them? They aren’t forcing people to accept the notes." (1)

Understanding these two mutually philosophies it's easy to see why we don't have 100% reserve banking mixed with a fractional reserve system because as Gresham's Law states, "Bad money drives out good under legal tender laws." The opposite is true when there aren't such legal instruments in affect.

Therefore if we were to provide mixed financial services distinguishing between fractional / 100% backed holdings, then where legal tender laws do exist money would inflate and the 100% backed currency would decrease in value as artificially created "bad money" is put in to circulation. So 100% backed currency in a predominantly fractional-reserve system would protect what's in the vaults but wouldn't protect value relative to total supply.

In a system where legal instruments do not exist then necessarily all fractional-reserve money is seen as a promissory note and therefore people would expect some form of interest to compensate for the degree of risk involved taking a financial instrument for the face-value of the note.

These two concepts reflect two modes of operation: deflationary versus inflationary practices. In an inflationary system those who have access to money first receive greater value for the worth of the currency; and because a fractional reserve system promises to pay specie in amounts greater than what actually exists, the value as written on the face of this fiat currency is a fraud.

In a deflationary system those who hold money retain greater value as currency is split. However this limits the freedom of banking organizations to loan out currency and ultimately slows growth because those who have money retain that money. Making it very hard for new people entering the system to compete.

What this shows is these two concepts are orthogonal to each other. Viewed under this light it seems certain systems cannot under any circumstance happily coexist together.

Or can they?

To make them work together is so extremely difficult because their point of intersection is tangential. To marry these two notions would require some form of euclidean metric where the horizontalness and verticalosity are not independent, but are intertwined such that they're inseparable. Meaning for this to happen we need a system where this formula is true:

A = 100% reserve banking
B = fractional reserve banking
Sqrt[ (A)^2 + (B)^2 ]

The question is how to implement this (security (A) / growth (B))? I can only guess but that's the solution.

Getting back to my main point. This shows there is a way for all systems to work together even if they only have a single point of intersection. In trying to solve that formula the best I've been able to come up with is this:

1. 1/3rd competition / free market capitalism (fractional)
   
2. 1/3rd projects voted on by the group (100% reserve / fractional)
   
3. 1/3rd social minimum to ensure all people have a basic standard of living (100% backed, separate currency)

If you think about it what this is really saying is: 1/3rd competition & efficiency (B), 1/3rd combination competition / all people ( Sqrt[ (A)^2 + (B)^2 ] ), 1/3rd of the pie shared equally by all people (A). So really this seems to show a sort of balanced equation where these things function together in a non-degenerative manner.

Focusing on A (a purely safe economy with stagnation) or B (pure capitalism with high-risk as the norm) means we eventually hit a point where the triangle collapses to a line and we have a degenerative case that causes social / economic hysteresis.

Should these legs of the triangle always be at 1/3rd or 60 degrees to each other? I would say the proportions should be primarily a function of (A) or bullet-point 3. So long as (A) is satisfied then (B) or bullet-point 1 can be maximized.

However, it's worth noting, whichever leg is the longest (the hypotenuse) will necessarily reflect which direction the system is going to converge. So if we put more money in to (A - 100% reserve banking) we'll end up with a first-come, first-serve entitlement system where those who hold their money the longest control the cash supply. If we maximize (B - Fractional reserve banking) we'll end up with pure capitalism where ultimately bankers / corporate fat-cats end up with all the money.

What isn't in affect with our current system is the notion of the public having a direct say on the (sqrt(a^2 + b^2)) component (the leg that pushes the two apart or viewed another way the leg that represents the intersection between the two). The only solution is to have the public directly have a vote on how taxes are used which can be seen as the hypotenuse (or the sqrt(a^2 + b^2) segment). This is why I so strongly advocate for this type of change to our our representative process.

[edit on 25-11-2009 by Xtraeme]

I have to chime in every so often. Quick question...


What happens when you learn to assemble matter? There goes scarcity in your life...



This theory caters to a single state of being. We're only caged by limited knowledge.

[edit on 25-11-2009 by Americanist]

reply to post by Xtraeme

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I think I finally figured out a decent question to contribute to this thread, most likely I'm wrong here!

Wouldn't this imply that this 'nature of reality' is explicitly for the purpose of life alone? I think this line of reasoning would be about as empty as asking what is the purpose of life. If sentience or life is the nature of reality, then shouldn't this be fundamentally true for all things existent in reality with all things possessing life of it's own accord?

Like I said in the U2U awhile back ago, I'm having trouble grasping this concept, and it's equally true even now.

Sorry I'm not getting back to people quicker. Have a lot going on.




Converting energy to matter and energy back to matter perfectly recycling all transitions is point (a) in the first image of Fig. 1. At that point the only thing that will be scarce are psychological conceptions.

For instance as I mentioned previously here ...



As for limited knowledge I spent a little time toying with the idea of what happens in Q1 (life as Aesthetic) after we pass (A) -- the point when humans attain omnipotence. I asked myself, "Shouldn't omniscience, omnipresence, & omni-benevolence also require many quarters to master?"

The answer is yes, they should. Ultimately if all of these things are linear and one step progresses to the next then the progression at least in the universe we live in is very likely:

Omnipotence, Omnipresence, Omniscience, & finally Omni-benevolence

Below is how I rationalized coming to this conclusion:



Basically there are a total of 24 possible permutations of how this could occur if they occur in a linear order. Should they occur simultaneously all bets are off.

[edit on 26-11-2009 by Xtraeme]

I just re-read some of this from more of the economic viewpoint and I just don't see the connection that you make with that point. You made it clear with math with the perspective that you intend, yet that intention doesn't seem to fit so easily into the economic viewpoint as you put it. Maybe I need to re-read the whole thread, yet I think it is simply we just don't agree on our viewpoints for some reason or another that probably boils down to logic existentialism.



To me there is only 1, and that is the scarcity of entropy. I say it specifically like this instead of more general relations, as you have done, because the progressive realization of the infinite create an inverse probability of entropy that approaches 0. Entropy exists, so it never does equal 0.

It can be infinitely closer and closer to 0, and this is the logic existentialism that disagrees with your more general terms. (We can say 0 is God, yet here by logic existentialism we could say God is this infinitely closer and closer value -- hence, they disagree.)

I actually wonder if special relativity was made because of this probability. I imagine Einstein may have jotted something down in his unpublished notes. In general relativity, There is a constant in E=mcc. In special relativity, it is not so constant:

Splitting Time from Space—New Quantum Theory Topples Einstein's Spacetime

As you can see, it is easy to agree in math, yet beyond that it is not easy to agree in logic existentialism.

[edit on 25-11-2009 by dzonatas]

That is a good question. Though I think this strongly hinges on what we use as a definition for life. For the purpose of this conversation I'll use the biological definition implying homeostasis, organization, metabolism, growth, adaptation, response to stimuli, & reproduction. Loosening these restrictions moves virii from the realm of replicators to actual lifeforms.

With that established this idea does bear some similarity to the anthropic principle. For those unaware of what this is:


However if all possibilities are occurring then we can consider our universe to simply be one universe where the parameters for life were sufficient to create us and all the other species on our planet (odds of this happening are 1 : 10^10^120 — note: if there aren't other universes the anthropic principle is definitively accurate based on the law of probabilities). I won't bother going in to the chances of life existing elsewhere in the universe (it's already been done to death), but I will say much like the heliocentric principle devastated the geocentric model it's somewhat silly to think we're the only self-aware creatures in our universe / all of reality. So while there might be an infinitesimally small chance that this is the case it's also highly unlikely.

Whether a person wants to attribute the notion of randomness or design is a personal one. Einstein, for instance, had the happy expression,


But you're right the model does suggest, even if we came from nothingness, that any system where there's life will beget more life. Plants absorb non-organic materials like nitrogen and light to produce energy. Humans eat plants as one means of sustaining our biology. The conversion of one form of energy to another or the chemical break down of matter to energy is a standard metabolic process. So if we don't kill ourselves future humans will either expand at a rate to ultimately consume everything the universe has created (potentially causing all things to become biological) or the universe will consume us at which point we have to consider "is that it?" or through random iterations of all possibilities won't more creatures have opportunities to go through the same process of potentially overcoming all things? If that's the case the cycle in the graph is eventually realized.

One interesting thing about this idea that's broader than the anthropic principle is that it's basically stating that through the lack of something all things eventually come in to beingness. Viewed under this lense "life" is simply one possibility / probability. However it appears once life has bootstrapped the universe with its own will at that point the only way nothingness / non-biological life comes back in to beingness is through choice.

[edit on 26-11-2009 by Xtraeme]

Re. Scarcity.

I don't think scarcity is a flushed out enough theory to be applicable, or that it is altogether true.

Simple observation: put two little kids in a room with several of the same toy. Kid A will want the one kid B has, even if there are ten more just like it sitting all around him. Call this what you will, but it tells us quite a bit about our nature as animals.

Similarly, it is often those with the most money who are the greediest for more. They do not come to this by scarcity, but by expectation and exercise of privilege. Unfortunately, social status is indeed a finite resource.

And there are many other examples of why there will always be an uneven distribution of resources. For example, we can't all have beachfront property, can't all marry the most attractive spouses (this one has caused MANY a conflict), can't all have talents that make us popular or respected, etc. And this is to say nothing of the fact that we will never become masters of nature. I know it's possible to FEEL that way sometimes, but one good drought, volcano, asteroid, virus, or what have you, and we will be rapidly reminded of our small and ephemeral status in this vast universe.

I used to be a behavioral therapist (applied behavioral analysis), and although I don't hold a degree in behaviorism, I've been exposed to a good bit of its principles, and 'scarcity' is not a word I ever see in the literature. Which is to say, this is an idea that is mainly popular with those who do NOT scientifically analyze human/animal behavior. Those who do, have observed that the drive for attention is a far greater motivator, and that, we can not produce in abundance.

Anyhow. I do hope we continue to get better and better at providing for all of our kind; I've long been active in my community trying to help people in different kinds of ways. But I also see the limits of who and what we are, and understand that we are much more complicated animals than can be reduced to a 'unified theory' of behavior.

It's an understandable desire, but does not seem to fit well with my experience of the world or its inhabitants.

Who knows? I'd be happy for the future to prove me wrong.


(happy thanksgiving !)