Zeitgeist: Moving Forward

[InfinityCurve]

Didn't see a thread on this. Thought this was a thought provoking movie. I found the parts about human psychology especially interesting.

Long film, over 2.5 hours, free on YouTube : YouTube - ZEITGEIST: MOVING FORWARD | OFFICIAL RELEASE | 2011

Thoughts?

[Ender22]

Thoughts?

Most important documentary of our time.
The only movie I've seen that examines the one root cause of everything and a possible solution.
Must see for everyone.
Thanks for sharing.

[marinik]

Just like the first part mind blowing! It makes me feel we should "delete" everything and start all over again!

[Alessandro]

I have seen this movie and the theme of the movie is absolutely provoking.The characters of the movie are performance wise perfect.

[Brutha]

I watched the video. When one speeds it up with 1.4x it's at least watchable without boring me to death.

A computer that manages the world isn't neutral.

Say I to want to have a table with 7 legs because I like the number 7. In the world that's controlled by this resource maximizing computer wouldn't allow me my table with 7 legs because it doesn't follow the design of the perfect table that the computer thought out.

That's a huge loss of personal freedom. You might say that the 7 legged table isn't essential to my life and that I should accept to live without a 7-legged table. In the case of the table that's okay.
Imaging however that I have an idea about a new way to cure an illness.

Some people have mercury poisoning and I want to do something about it. I have an idea:
I give mercury to pigs and let the pigs build antibodies against the mercury. Then I extract those antibodies and inject them into the humans that I want to cure.
Should I be allowed to run my experiment and get the resources in mercury and pigs that I need?

How does our present system allocate resources in that case? I can buy the mercury and the pigs with my own money and take the risk that my experiment will fail. If it succeeds I will profit because I know that I helped people and because I feel good about helping those people with mercury poisoning.

That's however not how it works with your resource managing computer. The computer has to make a decision.
It could ask me whether I believe that my invention will work. I will tell the computer that it works. I might however be wrong. There are also not enough resources to give everyone everything they might need for their experiment.

The central computer program could also ask other experts in the field of mercury poisoning. Those experts however might really believe in their approaches and believe that my antibody idea is crap.
If you would run the central computer program that way outside ideas wouldn't enter the problem of treating mercury poisoning.

If I have to bet my own resources on my idea than I can make better decision than the central computer program.
I make my decision decentrally. Decentral decision making simply works better than central decision making.

Any decent reading of modern systems theory tells you that decentral decision making outperforms.
It's easy to tell laypeople that there science and that you will use the system theory that scientists create to centrally manage the world economy. It's however a misinterpretation of systems theory.

The central computer program would push projects like the "Three Gorges Dam". The project however has cost more than was planned, produces less energy and produces more environmental damage.
That the nature of big centrally planed projects.

That said there a good chance that the Chinese government will turn into such a central computer program. The Chinese will probably still allow some free enterprise the way they do at the moment but the government is likely to turn into such a system.

Bruce Sterling* describes such a China a bit in his latest novel "The Caryatids".
Bruce Sterling is one of the best futurists and well worth reading.

Why China? China's government is run by engineers because the liberal arts people often make ideological decisions that go against the party line and as a result they don't go as high in the party hierarchy.

China is already doing public policy via scientific experiments where they try different policies in different parts of their country.

As shown by their one-child policy the Chinese also don't have a problem with the infringement of personal liberty that comes for central decision making.

*: In 2000 Bruce Sterling wrote a book where Osama Bin Ladin once on the side. Sterling really understands what developments are important and sees a lot of stuff a lot sooner than the mainstream.
It isn't easy to understand Sterling but if you are smart and well educated he's worth reading.