The Ministry for Everyone
December 18, 2021 10:01 AM Subscribe
Interested in climate disaster? Human nature? Freedoms in the future? Let me recommend two books, which appear to be written as point and counterpoint. These authors are in each others' heads, and they are both at the top of their game. Kim Stanley Robinson vs. Dave Eggers.
In The Every Eggers is focused on the horrifying downside of removing freedoms in order to save the planet. In The Ministry for the Future Robinson is focused on the horrors of not doing exactly that.
There is a lot of symmetry. Both books are more sketches of the future than plot driven. Both consider the pros and cons before taking a stand. Here's a take-home question: should we have credit scores, and should we create a carbon score to go with it? Discuss.
Here's a little preview, where I've mashed up some key quotes. It is tough to discern where one book stops and the next starts---even if you have already read one or the other!
"'Revolutions do not come on schedule, but they come if you’re listening.'
...her plan actually would reduce waste. Would create order. Would drastically limit the unnecessary exploitation of land, energy, animals. But it would also give...historically unprecedented power. It would make the Dutch East India Company look like a lemonade stand. What she had just described would surely mean the end of much of what makes a human free. It would be a doorway to far tighter restrictions on movement and choice. But it did have perhaps the best chance to slow the catastrophic warming of the planet. It would usher in a new, ever-more obedient era in the human procession, but our reckless freedoms and thoughtless whims were precisely what brought the planet to the brink.
... Social engineering through network shame...It works the same for neighborhoods, cities, countries. For years we’ve measured the so-called happiness of each nation, but this will be far more accurate. This is, like, an all-encompassing virtue rating.
...The global situation was to be judged actor by actor. Rated, scored, judged; and if judged malingering, then penalized. Time was passing, patience was running out. The sheriff would have to be formed by a concoction of every sanction and penalty they had at hand. The general intellect. The world in their time. ...The hidden sheriff; she was ready for that now, that and the hidden prison. The guillotine for that matter. The gun in the night, the drone from nowhere. Whatever it took. Lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, fuck it—win.
...She would outline SumNum and the Consensual Economic Order, the seamless way they would work together, and the world’s last bits of chaos and uncertainty would evaporate like dew in sunlight. Where there had been din and disorder there would be the quiet hum of a machine that saw all, knew all, and knew best—that was committed to the perfection of people and salvation of the planet...What the success of the carbon coin meant was a huge amount of money was now going to landscape restoration, regenerative ag, reforestation, biochar and kelp beds, direct air capture and storage, and all the rest of the efforts described elsewhere in the hall. A banner over one of the rooms put it this way: 'Revolution comes; not the expected one, but another, always another.' ”
Previously: KSR
Here's a little preview, where I've mashed up some key quotes. It is tough to discern where one book stops and the next starts---even if you have already read one or the other!
"'Revolutions do not come on schedule, but they come if you’re listening.'
...her plan actually would reduce waste. Would create order. Would drastically limit the unnecessary exploitation of land, energy, animals. But it would also give...historically unprecedented power. It would make the Dutch East India Company look like a lemonade stand. What she had just described would surely mean the end of much of what makes a human free. It would be a doorway to far tighter restrictions on movement and choice. But it did have perhaps the best chance to slow the catastrophic warming of the planet. It would usher in a new, ever-more obedient era in the human procession, but our reckless freedoms and thoughtless whims were precisely what brought the planet to the brink.
... Social engineering through network shame...It works the same for neighborhoods, cities, countries. For years we’ve measured the so-called happiness of each nation, but this will be far more accurate. This is, like, an all-encompassing virtue rating.
...The global situation was to be judged actor by actor. Rated, scored, judged; and if judged malingering, then penalized. Time was passing, patience was running out. The sheriff would have to be formed by a concoction of every sanction and penalty they had at hand. The general intellect. The world in their time. ...The hidden sheriff; she was ready for that now, that and the hidden prison. The guillotine for that matter. The gun in the night, the drone from nowhere. Whatever it took. Lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, fuck it—win.
...She would outline SumNum and the Consensual Economic Order, the seamless way they would work together, and the world’s last bits of chaos and uncertainty would evaporate like dew in sunlight. Where there had been din and disorder there would be the quiet hum of a machine that saw all, knew all, and knew best—that was committed to the perfection of people and salvation of the planet...What the success of the carbon coin meant was a huge amount of money was now going to landscape restoration, regenerative ag, reforestation, biochar and kelp beds, direct air capture and storage, and all the rest of the efforts described elsewhere in the hall. A banner over one of the rooms put it this way: 'Revolution comes; not the expected one, but another, always another.' ”
Previously: KSR
Chiming in to say I really recommend Ministry for the Future, which is ultimately more hopeful than it sounds in synopsis. I can't convince any of my already-anxious friends to read it, though, which is fair.
I find Eggers to be really inconsistent as an author, but I usually end up reading all of his books just in case. Didn't know about this one, so thanks for the recommendation, TreeRooster!
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 10:15 AM on December 18, 2021 [6 favorites]
I find Eggers to be really inconsistent as an author, but I usually end up reading all of his books just in case. Didn't know about this one, so thanks for the recommendation, TreeRooster!
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 10:15 AM on December 18, 2021 [6 favorites]
We need a carbon score for companies; I'm not at all keen on individual scores (even having a monetary credit score feels somehow unclean).
KSR's writing is mostly uplifting and optimistic though I've been putting off reading Ministry for the Future on worries it would be depressingly too like current events on a bigger scale. No comment on Dave Eggers yet, having not read any.
posted by anadem at 10:36 AM on December 18, 2021 [6 favorites]
KSR's writing is mostly uplifting and optimistic though I've been putting off reading Ministry for the Future on worries it would be depressingly too like current events on a bigger scale. No comment on Dave Eggers yet, having not read any.
posted by anadem at 10:36 AM on December 18, 2021 [6 favorites]
Here's Ministry for the Future on fanfare. A lot of the fanfare discussion is on terrorism elements, which honestly I thought was there for primarily narrative reasons. Not because it was being endorsed.
It's an attempt to make saving the Earth sound plausible in a novel, the same way he made terraforming Mars sound plausible. Connoisseurs of the genre know humanity saving itself is always way harder to imagine than anything else, even stories that imagine brand new physics. I didn't like it much as fiction, personally; the non fiction value was limited since I already have opinions about a lot of this stuff.
A comment on freedom: I find the idea of capability theory appealing on these issues, or at least my simplistic understanding of it. Which is probably wrong. But as I understand it, the argument is the amount of freedom we have is the connected to the number of things you are realistically capable of doing. Andin this case: Not doing extreme things on climate change limits everyone's freedom in a big way.
posted by mark k at 10:47 AM on December 18, 2021 [5 favorites]
It's an attempt to make saving the Earth sound plausible in a novel, the same way he made terraforming Mars sound plausible. Connoisseurs of the genre know humanity saving itself is always way harder to imagine than anything else, even stories that imagine brand new physics. I didn't like it much as fiction, personally; the non fiction value was limited since I already have opinions about a lot of this stuff.
A comment on freedom: I find the idea of capability theory appealing on these issues, or at least my simplistic understanding of it. Which is probably wrong. But as I understand it, the argument is the amount of freedom we have is the connected to the number of things you are realistically capable of doing. Andin this case: Not doing extreme things on climate change limits everyone's freedom in a big way.
posted by mark k at 10:47 AM on December 18, 2021 [5 favorites]
I have tried and tried to read Eggers, but I just can’t seem to latch onto anything that might keep me going. I dunno. It all seems to read as a whole lot of words that say not much. YMMV, of course.
KSR, otoh, is always a good read.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:50 AM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
KSR, otoh, is always a good read.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:50 AM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
Here's CBC Ideas this week: "Kim Stanley Robinson: The Best-Case Scenario You Can Still Believe In."
posted by PhineasGage at 11:01 AM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by PhineasGage at 11:01 AM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
A lot of the fanfare discussion is on terrorism elements, which honestly I thought was there for primarily narrative reasons. Not because it was being endorsed.
I think that's a big largely-invisible split there. Of people who're prone to pointing to it, everyone goes "That first chapter is horrifying", and then it splits off to
"I'm endorsing it because it provides the most optimistic-plausible view of getting to the other side of this crisis, shame about the cloak & dagger stuff in there"
and
"I'm endorsing it because what is to be done will need to look something like the deniable-ops portions of this book (in addition to the rest), but also talking about it openly is unwise/not generally welcomed by platforms"
Can't say I have an answer there, though I do think KSR's struck on an interesting thing providing one text that people can point to that's simultaneously benevolent & deniable. Maybe it'll mean something over time.
posted by CrystalDave at 11:57 AM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
I think that's a big largely-invisible split there. Of people who're prone to pointing to it, everyone goes "That first chapter is horrifying", and then it splits off to
"I'm endorsing it because it provides the most optimistic-plausible view of getting to the other side of this crisis, shame about the cloak & dagger stuff in there"
and
"I'm endorsing it because what is to be done will need to look something like the deniable-ops portions of this book (in addition to the rest), but also talking about it openly is unwise/not generally welcomed by platforms"
Can't say I have an answer there, though I do think KSR's struck on an interesting thing providing one text that people can point to that's simultaneously benevolent & deniable. Maybe it'll mean something over time.
posted by CrystalDave at 11:57 AM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
BuddhaInABucket, which Eggers novels should I not miss out on? The only one I've read is The Circle, which I hated, but if he's just uneven, I'm open to trying another.
posted by aws17576 at 12:12 PM on December 18, 2021
posted by aws17576 at 12:12 PM on December 18, 2021
How to Blow up a Pipeline (of which posting probably just put me on some government list), but is a nonfiction exploration of violence against carbon gas infrastructure and how to make greenhouse gas emissions risky enough (as an investment) to make it so that businesses cannot sustain that infrastructure, or will be unwilling to. These ideas are being explored in nonfiction writing, and among activist circles. The climate movement has largely been aligned with nonviolence broadly; this will change at a point. Maybe not for everyone in the movement, but a whole lot of the movement is going to be at least accepting of this violence, especially if it is only against property.
I think KSR's assessment that we'll see more of this after just a few mass casualty climate events is pretty legitimate. If you follow the path that radicalization often takes, and apply that to the climate scenario we have ourselves in, this doesn't seem outlandish at all.
Asymmetric warfare has proven incredibly efficient against large, hardened armies. Carbon infrastructure is not hardened against sabotage and targeted violence. People will likely get much more creative than KSR in their attacks of it.
posted by furnace.heart at 12:15 PM on December 18, 2021 [6 favorites]
I think KSR's assessment that we'll see more of this after just a few mass casualty climate events is pretty legitimate. If you follow the path that radicalization often takes, and apply that to the climate scenario we have ourselves in, this doesn't seem outlandish at all.
Asymmetric warfare has proven incredibly efficient against large, hardened armies. Carbon infrastructure is not hardened against sabotage and targeted violence. People will likely get much more creative than KSR in their attacks of it.
posted by furnace.heart at 12:15 PM on December 18, 2021 [6 favorites]
I didn’t like Ministry for the Future at all. I found the idea of a UN ministry (headed by an Irish stereotype) saving the world risible. And generally the fact that she more or less leads a lifestyle most high income liberals I know aspire to didn’t inspire me.
posted by Wood at 12:31 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
posted by Wood at 12:31 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
I loved the Red Mars series. It was incredibly refreshing, way back when, to have an optimistic vision of the future for a change.
But when the most optimistic of our science fiction visionaries starts to believe that terrorism is the only way we have left out of the climate crisis... well, fuck.
Because terrorism doesn't work.
posted by MrVisible at 12:49 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
But when the most optimistic of our science fiction visionaries starts to believe that terrorism is the only way we have left out of the climate crisis... well, fuck.
Because terrorism doesn't work.
posted by MrVisible at 12:49 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
> We need a carbon score for companies; I'm not at all keen on individual scores (even having a monetary credit score feels somehow unclean).
talking about carbon scores seems fairly meaningless without also articulating the design of some mechanism where carbon scores translate into changes of behaviour by groups of people or individuals -- especially in the important case where the groups of people or individuals may prefer to opt out and keep doing what they've been doing already, thank you very much.
do carbon scores somehow get priced into prices paid by individual consumers, so each individual selfishly making the choices that are best for themselves or their family are forced to pay for some of the negative externalities their decisions cause for other people?
posted by are-coral-made at 1:04 PM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
talking about carbon scores seems fairly meaningless without also articulating the design of some mechanism where carbon scores translate into changes of behaviour by groups of people or individuals -- especially in the important case where the groups of people or individuals may prefer to opt out and keep doing what they've been doing already, thank you very much.
do carbon scores somehow get priced into prices paid by individual consumers, so each individual selfishly making the choices that are best for themselves or their family are forced to pay for some of the negative externalities their decisions cause for other people?
posted by are-coral-made at 1:04 PM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
Because terrorism doesn't work.
The white paper you've linked states in the summary that "Groups whose attacks on civilian targets outnumbered attacks on military targets systematically failed to achieve their policy objectives, regardless of their nature." Malm specifically is suggesting something very different from that, more infrastructure sabotage actions. KSR's fiction often highlights attacks on individuals and flagrant emitters.
We already have real world examples of how attacks on infrastructure play out in real life. The Colonial pipepline ransomeware attack earlier this year is a great example. Those individuals were motivated by profit, and basically halted gas movement on accident because of their ransomeware attack. What if their goal was to keep the pipeline shut, or cause massive disruptions in the reliability of the pipeline system? What if they employed the exact same tools but did not take payment to free up those systems? What if the attacks were staggered for maximum shut down? What if their goal was to increase the price of gas so much that people used less of it?
Especially what Malm is suggesting is not terrorism in the classic sense; he very much draws a line between attacking people and attacking infrastructure. I agree with him that crime against property is moral; especially considering the ramifications of letting that property continue to emit greenhouse gasses. I'm not saying that it will work great, and that public opinion will largely be on the side of individuals who take this track but it very well could make certain types of carbon infrastructure so expensive to maintain, that they are not maintained. This could increasingly be done by fewer and fewer actors, and those systems are rarely hardened as well as they ought to be.
posted by furnace.heart at 1:36 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
The white paper you've linked states in the summary that "Groups whose attacks on civilian targets outnumbered attacks on military targets systematically failed to achieve their policy objectives, regardless of their nature." Malm specifically is suggesting something very different from that, more infrastructure sabotage actions. KSR's fiction often highlights attacks on individuals and flagrant emitters.
We already have real world examples of how attacks on infrastructure play out in real life. The Colonial pipepline ransomeware attack earlier this year is a great example. Those individuals were motivated by profit, and basically halted gas movement on accident because of their ransomeware attack. What if their goal was to keep the pipeline shut, or cause massive disruptions in the reliability of the pipeline system? What if they employed the exact same tools but did not take payment to free up those systems? What if the attacks were staggered for maximum shut down? What if their goal was to increase the price of gas so much that people used less of it?
Especially what Malm is suggesting is not terrorism in the classic sense; he very much draws a line between attacking people and attacking infrastructure. I agree with him that crime against property is moral; especially considering the ramifications of letting that property continue to emit greenhouse gasses. I'm not saying that it will work great, and that public opinion will largely be on the side of individuals who take this track but it very well could make certain types of carbon infrastructure so expensive to maintain, that they are not maintained. This could increasingly be done by fewer and fewer actors, and those systems are rarely hardened as well as they ought to be.
posted by furnace.heart at 1:36 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
So his hope for the future is that he's developed a new, more humane, more controllable form of terrorism that will actually work?
The problem with violence is that it's inherently difficult to control. It's nearly impossible to predict the impact of a violent act, either psychologically or socially. Promulgating the idea that terrorism (seriously, terrorism) can be both controllable and beneficial, and can avoid unintended collateral damage, is astonishingly irresponsible. Not to mention delusional.
If this set of concepts was being floated to solve any other problem, it would be considered horrific. The fact that we're considering things like this (seriously, terrorism) indicates just how desperate this crisis is becoming.
posted by MrVisible at 1:53 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
The problem with violence is that it's inherently difficult to control. It's nearly impossible to predict the impact of a violent act, either psychologically or socially. Promulgating the idea that terrorism (seriously, terrorism) can be both controllable and beneficial, and can avoid unintended collateral damage, is astonishingly irresponsible. Not to mention delusional.
If this set of concepts was being floated to solve any other problem, it would be considered horrific. The fact that we're considering things like this (seriously, terrorism) indicates just how desperate this crisis is becoming.
posted by MrVisible at 1:53 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
I know Ministry for the Future is generally lauded and held in high regard here on the Internets but I found it profoundly disappointing. The future KSR posits is so entirely implausible that for me the book had the exactly the opposite impact intended -- if that's the future where Mankind doesn't destroy the Earth then we're screwed because that future is never going to happen. The central banks of the world get together to fight climate change at the expense of the 1%? I mean, c'mon. You don't have to be some kind of peak capitalism zealot to understand that is just never going to happen.
(On another level, KSR's writing is equally disappointing. It's all oddly distant and never focusing on any character or topic for long enough to be more than minimally engaging. It reads like Cliff Notes summary of itself, if that makes any sense.)
posted by srt19170 at 1:56 PM on December 18, 2021 [10 favorites]
(On another level, KSR's writing is equally disappointing. It's all oddly distant and never focusing on any character or topic for long enough to be more than minimally engaging. It reads like Cliff Notes summary of itself, if that makes any sense.)
posted by srt19170 at 1:56 PM on December 18, 2021 [10 favorites]
Because terrorism doesn't work.
OK, that's wrong, and it's wrong because of their own case studies. I've beaten this drum before:
posted by Mayor West at 2:09 PM on December 18, 2021 [34 favorites]
OK, that's wrong, and it's wrong because of their own case studies. I've beaten this drum before:
9/11 was the single most effective military operation ever conducted in the history of the world. It was a major covert operation, planned over the course of several years by a few dozen confederates and possibly with some state backing, which was then executed flawlessly, in the bright light of day, right under the nose of the largest and most powerful military history has ever known. It completely altered the balance of world politics, threw the world's only superpower on the defensive, and legitimized Islamic radicalism literally overnight. It siphoned tens of trillions of dollars out of the world's largest economy, leaving it in staggering debt to foreign creditors who will never be repaid. If events continue apace, it will bring about the end of the petro-dollar, the isolation of the US from its longtime NATO allies, the end of the American century, and the rise of a global far-right movement the likes of which hasn't been seen since the Nazis were goose-stepping past the Fuhrer.I don't know what definition of "work" we're using here, but by any metric I can invent, asymmetrical actions by small groups against major state actors are (by several orders of magnitude) the biggest bang for your buck. We can argue about the morality of using terror attacks to achieve your goals, but the efficacy doesn't seem to be much in question.
posted by Mayor West at 2:09 PM on December 18, 2021 [34 favorites]
My definition of 'work' is the same as the paper I cited; whether the terrorist groups achieved their policy objectives. Let's see what the stated goals of Osama bin Laden were on 9/11:
Ending or severely curtailing American support for Israel.
Ending American immorality, including " fornication, homosexuality, intoxicants, gambling, and trading with interest."
Lifting sanctions against Iraq
Ending American military presence in Saudi Arabia
Ending "support of the Indians in Kashmir, the Russians against the Chechens and to also cease supporting the Manila Government against the Muslims in Southern Philippines."
Did the 9/11 attacks achieve those specific goals?
I'm not saying terrorism isn't a good way to change the world. I'm saying that it's a really, really sucky way to achieve specific policy goals.
Committing an act of terror is an exercise in chaos. More chaos isn't going to help.
Now, here's my question. What would your specific policy goals be if you committed an act of Robinsonian ecoterror? How would an act of terror achieve those goals?
Or are we just talking about blowing things up because we have a problem we can't solve and it makes us angry?
Allow me to quote the inestimable Jason Mendoza here:
“I'm telling you, Molotov cocktails work. Any time I had a problem, and I threw a Molotov cocktail, boom! Right away, I had a different problem. ”
posted by MrVisible at 2:35 PM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
Did the 9/11 attacks achieve those specific goals?
I'm not saying terrorism isn't a good way to change the world. I'm saying that it's a really, really sucky way to achieve specific policy goals.
Committing an act of terror is an exercise in chaos. More chaos isn't going to help.
Now, here's my question. What would your specific policy goals be if you committed an act of Robinsonian ecoterror? How would an act of terror achieve those goals?
Or are we just talking about blowing things up because we have a problem we can't solve and it makes us angry?
Allow me to quote the inestimable Jason Mendoza here:
“I'm telling you, Molotov cocktails work. Any time I had a problem, and I threw a Molotov cocktail, boom! Right away, I had a different problem. ”
posted by MrVisible at 2:35 PM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
> when the most optimistic of our science fiction visionaries starts to believe that terrorism is the only way we have left out of the climate crisis [...] Because terrorism doesn't work.
Some of the, er, less optimistic visionaries write novels involving methods that less resemble terrorism and more resemble Australia's management of feral rabbit populations through biocontrol, aka intentional introduction of viruses.
posted by are-coral-made at 3:20 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
Some of the, er, less optimistic visionaries write novels involving methods that less resemble terrorism and more resemble Australia's management of feral rabbit populations through biocontrol, aka intentional introduction of viruses.
posted by are-coral-made at 3:20 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
I'm not saying terrorism isn't a good way to change the world. I'm saying that it's a really, really sucky way to achieve specific policy goals.
The argument is that activist's generally anti-violence stance will not continue to be the case as the climate crisis worsens and the movement gains momentum. And as more individuals are impacted by climate change directly, those actions will at least be met with ambivalence, and possibly/probably support from many individuals regardless if one individual or group 'likes it' or if it 'works' or not.
My example of the Colonial pipline was only to illustrate that this could be done with minimal human labor, no casualties and extreme disruption. If the goal was disruption of that pipeline, it could have been more severe. That was a huge disruption on the fuel supply in the area was a byproduct of another goal entirely. These kinds of interruptions, if effort were put into them, would increase the cost of these infrastructures operating budgets. The most compelling part of both KSR and Malm's 'terrorism' is that the goal is entirely to make it prohibitively expensive to do the stuff. If attacks and sabotage are common to routine on carbon infrastructure, that makes renewables an even better investment for capital.
It might not be something that you want, or something that will 'work' especially well, but the more damage we allow the climate to inflict on people the likelihood of them becoming radicalized against emitters increases.
posted by furnace.heart at 3:31 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
The argument is that activist's generally anti-violence stance will not continue to be the case as the climate crisis worsens and the movement gains momentum. And as more individuals are impacted by climate change directly, those actions will at least be met with ambivalence, and possibly/probably support from many individuals regardless if one individual or group 'likes it' or if it 'works' or not.
My example of the Colonial pipline was only to illustrate that this could be done with minimal human labor, no casualties and extreme disruption. If the goal was disruption of that pipeline, it could have been more severe. That was a huge disruption on the fuel supply in the area was a byproduct of another goal entirely. These kinds of interruptions, if effort were put into them, would increase the cost of these infrastructures operating budgets. The most compelling part of both KSR and Malm's 'terrorism' is that the goal is entirely to make it prohibitively expensive to do the stuff. If attacks and sabotage are common to routine on carbon infrastructure, that makes renewables an even better investment for capital.
It might not be something that you want, or something that will 'work' especially well, but the more damage we allow the climate to inflict on people the likelihood of them becoming radicalized against emitters increases.
posted by furnace.heart at 3:31 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
To misquote Michio Kushi as I have on numerous occasions:
"Civilization is the disease. Global climate change is the cure."
posted by tspae at 3:45 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
"Civilization is the disease. Global climate change is the cure."
posted by tspae at 3:45 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
The most compelling part of both KSR and Malm's 'terrorism' is that the goal is entirely to make it prohibitively expensive to do the stuff. If attacks and sabotage are common to routine on carbon infrastructure, that makes renewables an even better investment for capital.
Doesn't the development of renewals require fossil fuels to be available for the first stages of the rollout? Aren't fossil fuels essential to creating the renewable energy infrastructure we need? Doesn't every plan to implement renewables globally involve a carefully controlled stepdown of the fossil fuel infrastructure? Aren't fossil fuels currently keeping billions of people who don't currently have access to renewable energy alive?
The impacts of the ransomware attacks on the Colonial pipeline shutdown were negligible for the oil industry; they lost a bit of profit as the airlines juggled schedules a bit. But the unintended and unpredictable result was that peoples' lives were disrupted throughout a number of southern states, with fuel shortages rampant and gas prices rising. How would you prevent the effects of terrorist actions from having massive negative impacts on the general population, when the psychological effect of terrorist actions is unpredictable at best?
Isn't encouraging terrorism irresponsible?
And yeah, are-coral-made, it's hard to imagine a world where a widespread campaign of ecoterror to shut down the carbon economy doesn't encourage governments to unleash all those nifty biological weapons they've developed.
That being said, yeah, as the planet becomes less capable of supporting seven billion human beings some wackjobs are going to go around blowing shit up. I just think that the idea that terrorism will make things better is astonishingly stupid.
posted by MrVisible at 3:48 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
Doesn't the development of renewals require fossil fuels to be available for the first stages of the rollout? Aren't fossil fuels essential to creating the renewable energy infrastructure we need? Doesn't every plan to implement renewables globally involve a carefully controlled stepdown of the fossil fuel infrastructure? Aren't fossil fuels currently keeping billions of people who don't currently have access to renewable energy alive?
The impacts of the ransomware attacks on the Colonial pipeline shutdown were negligible for the oil industry; they lost a bit of profit as the airlines juggled schedules a bit. But the unintended and unpredictable result was that peoples' lives were disrupted throughout a number of southern states, with fuel shortages rampant and gas prices rising. How would you prevent the effects of terrorist actions from having massive negative impacts on the general population, when the psychological effect of terrorist actions is unpredictable at best?
Isn't encouraging terrorism irresponsible?
And yeah, are-coral-made, it's hard to imagine a world where a widespread campaign of ecoterror to shut down the carbon economy doesn't encourage governments to unleash all those nifty biological weapons they've developed.
That being said, yeah, as the planet becomes less capable of supporting seven billion human beings some wackjobs are going to go around blowing shit up. I just think that the idea that terrorism will make things better is astonishingly stupid.
posted by MrVisible at 3:48 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
"Civilization is the disease. Global climate change is the cure."
If you can't find anything worth preserving in humanity, that says a lot more about your state of mind than it does about humanity.
posted by MrVisible at 3:50 PM on December 18, 2021 [11 favorites]
If you can't find anything worth preserving in humanity, that says a lot more about your state of mind than it does about humanity.
posted by MrVisible at 3:50 PM on December 18, 2021 [11 favorites]
Is The Every worth reading? Because I pretty much hated everything about The Circle, but haven't read any of Eggars other work.
posted by Faintdreams at 3:58 PM on December 18, 2021
posted by Faintdreams at 3:58 PM on December 18, 2021
I like and respect KSR but had the same reaction as srt19170 to Ministry and to the CBC program with him that I linked to. He seems naive about the ugly realities of the selfish and/or deluded politics that drive a substantial portion of the citizenry in most countries. If he is imagining the best case scenario there is no hope.
posted by PhineasGage at 4:19 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
posted by PhineasGage at 4:19 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
For those wondering (Faintdreams, aws17576), The Every is subjectively an improvement over The Circle. Although there are characters who return, the books are quite independent plot-wise, so you can read The Every first: much like one would watch the Star Wars trilogy first, before the prequels. In fact, The Circle serves the same purpose in many ways---a villain origin story, for one.
Neither book is my all-time favorite novel, not even my favorite Dave Eggers work. (What is the What is much better.) However, The Every does provoke some thought. Much of that thought might be familiar (smart speakers are always listening and recording---how long until they are used to prevent abuse in the home?) but Eggers does connect some new dots. How about when spontaneity gives you a low virtue score, simply due to the fact that reducing carbon requires predictability? Buying the same type and amount of breakfast cereal for the rest of your life would mean that manufactures can plan production and shipment with minimal waste, minimal carbon burn.
posted by TreeRooster at 4:19 PM on December 18, 2021
Neither book is my all-time favorite novel, not even my favorite Dave Eggers work. (What is the What is much better.) However, The Every does provoke some thought. Much of that thought might be familiar (smart speakers are always listening and recording---how long until they are used to prevent abuse in the home?) but Eggers does connect some new dots. How about when spontaneity gives you a low virtue score, simply due to the fact that reducing carbon requires predictability? Buying the same type and amount of breakfast cereal for the rest of your life would mean that manufactures can plan production and shipment with minimal waste, minimal carbon burn.
posted by TreeRooster at 4:19 PM on December 18, 2021
The central banks of the world get together to fight climate change at the expense of the 1%? I mean, c'mon. You don't have to be some kind of peak capitalism zealot to understand that is just never going to happen.
Eh, I thought there was more going on in the book than just "central banks save the day". Because we're talking about the entire globe over a period of many decades, so unless KSR started an entire book series he can't fit everything in one book. For instance, there's parts of the book talking about environmental rebellion/terrorism that folks this topic are talking about and there's also all the stuff about glaciers and geoengineering. But there's also brief snippets about the popular revolution in India or countries turning towards socialism or democratic socialism in all but name. The other thing is most of the book is written from the perspective of someone working at the Ministry, so I feel there's definitely things that are missed because we only see things happening from the Ministry's perspective.
I think the general idea I got from the book is humanity will probably stumble through and live to fight another day. And it's better to try a bunch of different solutions than to think one thing will save us, because I feel the book is also meant to counter the sci-fi clichés of a magic energy source solving the world's problems or every country becoming ruled by a single world government and against solving everything.
posted by FJT at 4:39 PM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
Eh, I thought there was more going on in the book than just "central banks save the day". Because we're talking about the entire globe over a period of many decades, so unless KSR started an entire book series he can't fit everything in one book. For instance, there's parts of the book talking about environmental rebellion/terrorism that folks this topic are talking about and there's also all the stuff about glaciers and geoengineering. But there's also brief snippets about the popular revolution in India or countries turning towards socialism or democratic socialism in all but name. The other thing is most of the book is written from the perspective of someone working at the Ministry, so I feel there's definitely things that are missed because we only see things happening from the Ministry's perspective.
I think the general idea I got from the book is humanity will probably stumble through and live to fight another day. And it's better to try a bunch of different solutions than to think one thing will save us, because I feel the book is also meant to counter the sci-fi clichés of a magic energy source solving the world's problems or every country becoming ruled by a single world government and against solving everything.
posted by FJT at 4:39 PM on December 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
I think it's fair to say KSR threw a bunch of different tactics into the soup of The Ministry of the Future. Which ones you might grab onto as either possible/hopeful, unlikely/hopeless, or just plain evil probably depends on your own experiences and stance in the world. But I took his larger point to be somewhere between a hopeful "to make things better lots of people are going to have to try lots of stuff that seems unimaginable now" and a darker, dire warning version of that same statement.
I found the debt cancellation stuff intriguing (as I did in his NY book), the big bank collusion partially plausible (if out of self-interest only), the blockchain stuff laughable, and the rogue geo-engineering stuff compelling, if scary.
As prediction, the latter stands out. Some smaller country with skin in the game saying "fuck it" and doing some aerosol injection... like, that's just gonna happen.
The person-oriented terrorism piece felt both alarming and too hopeful: in any world I can think of where assassinations become "a thing" again, they would be happening for so many different reasons, many of them very bad, that any intent would be swamped in the general chaos. Infrastructure-oriented terrorism is already happening for other reasons, as pointed out earlier. The problem is the same: green infra is no less an attractive target. "Nice wind farm you got there, shame if ..."
Overall I think it's one of his less effective novels and more effective treatises.
posted by feckless at 5:09 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
I found the debt cancellation stuff intriguing (as I did in his NY book), the big bank collusion partially plausible (if out of self-interest only), the blockchain stuff laughable, and the rogue geo-engineering stuff compelling, if scary.
As prediction, the latter stands out. Some smaller country with skin in the game saying "fuck it" and doing some aerosol injection... like, that's just gonna happen.
The person-oriented terrorism piece felt both alarming and too hopeful: in any world I can think of where assassinations become "a thing" again, they would be happening for so many different reasons, many of them very bad, that any intent would be swamped in the general chaos. Infrastructure-oriented terrorism is already happening for other reasons, as pointed out earlier. The problem is the same: green infra is no less an attractive target. "Nice wind farm you got there, shame if ..."
Overall I think it's one of his less effective novels and more effective treatises.
posted by feckless at 5:09 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
Anyone read Termination Shock? Any good?
posted by gwint at 5:53 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by gwint at 5:53 PM on December 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
There's an excerpt for The Every on Wired. I looked at it. It's absolutely dreadful, which is not to say it's not not bad (or good) writing, but it's like a perfect distillation of the nightmare of modern social-media algorithm-driven always-on-their-phone FaceGooAppleZon bullshit that I find so incredibly offputting about the current reality and where it's going. Nothing against Eggers, but I'd rather read a dictionary than whatever that was.
posted by glonous keming at 7:16 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
posted by glonous keming at 7:16 PM on December 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
gwint, I read "Termination Shock" and mostly enjoyed it, but I'm not sure if it's fair to describe anything in it as particularly plausible. I'm not sure that Stephenson was really trying to do more than suggest that we're probably going to have to do unexpected things, and that those things might have to be done outside of traditional authority structures (governments and conventional NGO).
posted by wintermind at 8:02 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by wintermind at 8:02 PM on December 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
I wasn't too surprised KSR went (partly) the terrorist route, the reality will be much messier, as the book ignores all the other actions which must be taking place. Sadly XR etc will soon look tame.
feckless is right on about KSR's soup approach, Robinson seems terribly discursive but I think the extra words are there to give pause and help the real content soak in.
mark k I feel strongly terror appears as content, not necessarily endorsed, but a tool in the box - some of the countries we are writing from would not exist (in their supposed superior state) without violent uprisings.
An alternative to terrorism might be anonymous, crowd-funded market manipulation - am surprised it's not happened yet. Demonstration is increasingly verboten (Russia, UK is imminent, Australia wants to) - and it's high-resource with uncertain return, which tends to leave only terror in many people's minds, but other options will exist.
posted by unearthed at 1:00 AM on December 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
feckless is right on about KSR's soup approach, Robinson seems terribly discursive but I think the extra words are there to give pause and help the real content soak in.
mark k I feel strongly terror appears as content, not necessarily endorsed, but a tool in the box - some of the countries we are writing from would not exist (in their supposed superior state) without violent uprisings.
An alternative to terrorism might be anonymous, crowd-funded market manipulation - am surprised it's not happened yet. Demonstration is increasingly verboten (Russia, UK is imminent, Australia wants to) - and it's high-resource with uncertain return, which tends to leave only terror in many people's minds, but other options will exist.
posted by unearthed at 1:00 AM on December 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Ministry for the future should have just been 100 articles like this, about wind energy, stapled together
posted by lalochezia at 7:38 AM on December 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by lalochezia at 7:38 AM on December 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Boris Johnson, a child’s crayon drawing given life to reassure old British people
from moorooka's link above
posted by glonous keming at 5:43 PM on December 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
from moorooka's link above
posted by glonous keming at 5:43 PM on December 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
We need a carbon score for companies ...
Companies already neatly sidestep and manipulate this by buying 'carbon credits' (or, more often, by getting their customers to do so at the point of purchase). The only way this could have any meaning at all is to dispose of the whole 'carbon credits' idea. However, cost just end up being passed on and the end result of this is that people struggling to survive have to go without something (or yet another something), while the rich don't even notice the difference.
If there were actual consequences for companies not achieving a score of x, then maybe scores would have some impact. The consequences of making this happen are politically infeasible because everyone in power is owned in one way or another by the companies at the top of the pyramid in terms of both corporate power and harm to the environment. It's hard to see those same politicians agreeing to hand over power to some hand-wavy UN body that they can't control.
The Ministry for the Future looks like an interesting book and I look forward to reading it.
posted by dg at 6:44 PM on December 19, 2021
Companies already neatly sidestep and manipulate this by buying 'carbon credits' (or, more often, by getting their customers to do so at the point of purchase). The only way this could have any meaning at all is to dispose of the whole 'carbon credits' idea. However, cost just end up being passed on and the end result of this is that people struggling to survive have to go without something (or yet another something), while the rich don't even notice the difference.
If there were actual consequences for companies not achieving a score of x, then maybe scores would have some impact. The consequences of making this happen are politically infeasible because everyone in power is owned in one way or another by the companies at the top of the pyramid in terms of both corporate power and harm to the environment. It's hard to see those same politicians agreeing to hand over power to some hand-wavy UN body that they can't control.
The Ministry for the Future looks like an interesting book and I look forward to reading it.
posted by dg at 6:44 PM on December 19, 2021
Ministry is very much a KSR book. Take the good ideas, the flashes, the inspiration and forget that the whole doesn't fully work, and the story is meandering. This is not an author you read for the plot, but for the ideas. Some of them are not close to being realistic, but at least he's throwing things out there and makes you think.
posted by WaterAndPixels at 9:06 PM on December 19, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by WaterAndPixels at 9:06 PM on December 19, 2021 [3 favorites]
But when the most optimistic of our science fiction visionaries starts to believe that terrorism is the only way we have left
I don't think he was saying that any more than he was saying factional infighting and assassinating a rival is necessary to terraform Mars.
The central banks of the world get together to fight climate change at the expense of the 1%? I mean, c'mon. You don't have to be some kind of peak capitalism zealot to understand that is just never going to happen.
I'll defend this. Central banks are political institutions. The staff at them are trained in economics, but are technocrats at heart, not plutocrats. Longtime staff specifically chose this less lucrative career path. There are all sorts of reasons policies often align with capital, but they are not themselves the one percent, and often not even aspirationally.
In a world where there has been a big shift to a consensus about climate change being a crisis you'll absolutely get intelligent people at banks coming up with novel ideas. A lot of the accounting tricks he talked about, or the "sue on behalf of future generations" are in fact being proposed by the same sorts of people who'd staff the banks.
KSR is a socialist but not an anarchist. He's not naive about the way capitalism interferes with progress. But he thinks institutions will be the means to implement policy.
posted by mark k at 1:15 PM on December 20, 2021
I don't think he was saying that any more than he was saying factional infighting and assassinating a rival is necessary to terraform Mars.
The central banks of the world get together to fight climate change at the expense of the 1%? I mean, c'mon. You don't have to be some kind of peak capitalism zealot to understand that is just never going to happen.
I'll defend this. Central banks are political institutions. The staff at them are trained in economics, but are technocrats at heart, not plutocrats. Longtime staff specifically chose this less lucrative career path. There are all sorts of reasons policies often align with capital, but they are not themselves the one percent, and often not even aspirationally.
In a world where there has been a big shift to a consensus about climate change being a crisis you'll absolutely get intelligent people at banks coming up with novel ideas. A lot of the accounting tricks he talked about, or the "sue on behalf of future generations" are in fact being proposed by the same sorts of people who'd staff the banks.
KSR is a socialist but not an anarchist. He's not naive about the way capitalism interferes with progress. But he thinks institutions will be the means to implement policy.
posted by mark k at 1:15 PM on December 20, 2021
Y'all. In the US, the pipeline companies are the ones blowing up the pipelines already. When the pipeline explodes, pipeline executives make lots and lots of money.
Neglect and bankruptcy and climate change mean that pipelines are less and less functional all the time.
It s likely different in France, but in the US, we should try regulating the pipelines first....
posted by eustatic at 12:06 PM on December 22, 2021 [2 favorites]
Neglect and bankruptcy and climate change mean that pipelines are less and less functional all the time.
It s likely different in France, but in the US, we should try regulating the pipelines first....
posted by eustatic at 12:06 PM on December 22, 2021 [2 favorites]
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