Asymmetric Charity

Disruption can work in both positive and negative ways. Indeed, the total effects of disruption can be seen further in the future. In an era of networked protests and open source insurgencies, new methods of construction and social collaboration also unfold. If one man can start protests that topple regimes, why can't another unleash an invention that helps millions?

Bad Ideas

Casebook example of a potential problem. Whether they can fix it by decentralizing it is up in the air.

The Swiss Army Asset

A theory that's gained traction in recent decades is that of the diversified holding of assets. In a purely financial sense, even a balanced portfolio (perhaps including a variety of stocks and bonds) becomes more of a liability. As such, any would be investors or clients may start holding non-conventional assets, such as precious metals and even crypto-currencies. While crypto-currencies may be volatile and metal prices rigged, there is more than simply the financial gain in some cases.

In an unstable economy, the assets which sell are those that can be used to cut costs and allow people to become further self sufficient, or at least find alternative economies. It also brings to mind Gibson's concept that "The street finds its own uses for things." While the price of an individual Bitcoin can vary, the greatest asset for it may in fact be as a transfer system as opposed to a new currency.

Despite a few valiant attempts, the political machinery has largely become an incoherent mess. Can it be repaired, will something better arise, will it fail horribly, or perhaps all three? These answers are sure to be interesting as the robots advance. Perhaps the greatest asset in an unstable economy is a machine that allows one to produce almost all of what they'd need or want at once, including another such machine.

Supervillain Style

Sometimes, supervillains need more style than just financial lawsuits. In the meantime, new materials open possibilities for everything from machinery to buildings to clothes to medicine. Perhaps more importantly, they can be 3D printed.

Otherwise, there's tricks more like cartoon and comic book villains. We're also seeing the beginning of automating security. I wonder what happens when police and soldiers who once enforced the law find themselves employed?

Positive Disruption

What is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil.
Read more at http://quotes.dictionary.com/What_is_done_out_of_love_always_takes#sYyik86eErBgMeYV.99

 "What is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil." -Friedrich Nietzsche

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Sometimes, systems can be disrupted or exploited in ways that may not be apparent at first, but may actually be refinements of its original purposes. Manipulating data mining algorithms may increase traffic to certain sites, or spread news stories that help/hinder business interests and advertising. Other times, a new technology or paradigm may threaten an old and corrupt order. Or perhaps simplest of all, it can be used to find love. Consider this a preemptive Valentine's Day post.

Soviet Daze

The center cannot hold. The United States has made many of the same errors as its Cold War nemesis, the late Soviet Union. From gulags, to invasive border searches, to economic mismanagement, to ignoring corruption, to costly interventions in Afghanistan, to targeted secret assassination, to suppression of whistle-blowers, and failing infrastructure, the similarities start to outweigh the differences.  

One issue is that over two centuries of legislative process, there exist many laws on the books that are contradictory, bizarre, and downright strange. Imagine if for profit prisons, combined with drones and surveillance, begin enforcing them selectively in ways that targets political opponents. Who needs a public secret police force when the whole thing is privatized and for profit? Of course, the system requires taxpayer money to function, so the difference between 'socialism' and 'capitalism' is largely non-existent.

Many of the few productive centers of US business (thus excluding financial speculation, guard labor, patent/copyright trolling, and polluting resource extraction sectors) want out. As empires falter, the richer sectors try to leave, the educated flee for greener pastures, and the poor are thrown to the dogs. The recent debt circus merely postponed the next act until early 2014, by which time many of the larger players' flight from the US dollar may be well underway. So many matches could ignite the oily remains of the petrodollar economy. Who knows which will be the straw that breaks the camel's back? 

Creative Annihilation

Sometimes, a force comes that simply utterly annihilates and obliterates what came before it. More often, it is a slow and gradual process as a status quo adapts and readapts to a new balance of powers. Other times, however, it can be a single, overwhelming force that truly is the stuff of legend and nightmare alike.

Destruction events can provide a clean slate, and not just in human history. Mass extinctions in Earth history usher in new types of dominant life, from dinosaurs and the age of mammals. Native Americans were nearly annihilated by European diseases, while colonists would swoop in to seize the freed real estate.

The destruction occurs when the ability of a system to adjust is overwhelmed by its ability to respond and reform, when the body fails to the pathogen. From barbarian invasions to plague biology, natural selection tends to favor the adaptive. While more specialized animals (the fastest, the smartest, the strongest, etc.) may die off, the common types endure. Compare machinery that can be built in caves to an over-complicated piece of crap. However, once the initial shock is gone, specialization occurs again. Such is a natural process of biology and economics alike. The lesson, however, is to have backups in case the over-specialized and delicate things fail. Because they will.

Feedback Mechanisms

In engineering and systems analysis, negative and positive feedback are essential concepts. Various medical conditions, such as diabetes, are a result of certain metabolic systems lacking the ability to regulate themselves as they typically would. Auto-immune diseases, when the immune system attacks the body's own systems, are likewise signs of something amiss.

Certain machines, by their very natures, require feedback mechanisms. The most advanced aspects of various jet aircraft, for instance, are the controls and avionics. The jet engine moves the plane much faster than humans can possibly hope to react, and thus several control and feedback mechanisms are needed to prevent catastrophic failures.

This is also true in political and economic systems. The theory behinds checks and balances in the Anglo-American tradition were meant to ensure the rule of law was harder to subvert. Likewise, various bills limiting financial speculation and types of banks acted as another firewall. High performance systems with no feedback tend to fail in big ways.

Free speech and rule of law are safeguards against political corruption. These have failed in recent years as politicians continually ignore the wishes of their constituents. Despite the fact that disruptive technologies continue getting smaller and cheaper, they make all the wrong moves. What could possibly go wrong when feedback mechanisms are removed?

Heterotechnology: Alternative Methods and Means

Heterotechnology is a term referring to the use of alternative technologies to reach the same end point. It is a view of technology different other than a utopian vision of progress or wish-fulfillment of a (Kurzweil styled) Singularity. Heterotechnology would be viewing each device or machine from the point of view of a systems engineer, and imagining each step as a "module" that could be replaced or substituted with something else.

Now, certain forms of technologies became popular or widespread due to economic, safety, and social reasons. For example, steam powered automobiles existed since the 1780s, but it was not until the assembly line and widespread use of cheap petroleum that gasoline-fueled cars became popular around the world. However, if there is a dearth of petroleum and other natural resources, the economy may shift towards other forms of transportation (perhaps including chemical battery powered electric cars popular in the early 1900s).

A mainstream subculture reveling in the idea of heterotechnology is steampunk, the application of Victorian (or pseudo-Victorian) machinery and aesthetics to modern technology. A "steampunk" internet, for instance, might be Babbage's engines connected by telegraph line. Since then, related subcultures have spun off (such as dieselpunk and clockpunk, focusing on 1920s/30s and Renaissance/early modern aesthetics, respectively).

A recent literary term, salvagepunk, is very much relevant to heterotechnology. Salvagepunk consists of using trash and wreckage and adapting it for one's own use. Interestingly, "salvagepunk" already resembles conditions of life in several developing countries, with the refuse of the First World recycled and adapted to local conditions.

Heterotechnology has economic and cultural implications as well as purely technological ones. As a dominant type of technology becomes prohibitively expensive, substitution with less practical ones (to an extent) could occur. For example, car culture can decline as fuel prices continue to climb, as well as the suburban commuter lifestyle.

Likewise, the rise of 3D printing, automated milling machines, and other types of "desktop manufacture" mean that the globalized economic system faces competition of a different sort. A makerspace does not have the capacity to churn out comparable amounts of product, but it does have the capacity to produce much of what it needs rapidly at a fraction of the energy and resource cost. It is an economy of scale, the globalized one, against an economy of scope, the relocalized one. The two systems still depend upon each other, as the worldwide economy is much larger than selling luxury goods and real estate to developed worlders.

Heterotechnology may be less practical in terms of money compared to our current consumer economy, but it can be an asset to a community. Imagine a small community-supported business specializing in a particular niche product (as a good portion of the German economy is). It is also interesting culturally, because it favors those who try something different out of curiosity and whim rather than pure profit motive (although that can well be a part of it).

If the slogan of the 20th century was "lowest cost and highest efficiency," the slogan of heterotechnology is "multiple ways to do the same thing." It is not merely turning simple gadgets into Goldberg style machines (although that can a form of it), but developing alternative ways to live and work, fusing the new and old. After all, obscure technologies can be revived as new developments take place. Venice already had a form of assembly line to produce ships in the Arsenal, yet it did catch on for a few centuries. Heterotech diversifies a technology's implementation, from computers to firearms. It is the confluence of the artist and the engineer, and a welcome one. 

The Process of Perversion

Continuing with last week's theme of regulatory capture, I mused on the process itself. A robust institution may maintain several failsafes in case of abuse. In a free society, this often comes in the form of transparency from the public and press. The judicial and legal branches (in theory) act as ways to ensure the social contract. Security forces exist to enforce the laws of the land and protect citizens. These institutions essentially go mad, as catabolism wracks the system. We live in such a time where most of these had failed. The security system has become an end, rather than a means of defense. In an age of enforced frailty, the best defense is resilience, and opting out whenever one can. 

The Spectacle of Violence

While the events involving a stabbing attack on a British soldier in London are still shrouded in uncertainty, possible revenge attacks have also started. The grisly spectacle has quickly devolved into a violence-porn media chasing every possible rumor or story. Whether the attackers had some religious or political motive or merely were apolitical attention seeking sociopaths, I do not know. This does, however, illustrate one of the darker points of the current media cycle.

Compared to the USA, the city of London has become a virtual police state (although the Americans are rapidly changing that). There are CCTV cameras everywhere, privatized police/security, and strict gun (and other weapon) control laws. Despite all of these 'precautions,' a mad slasher with a knife and one unlucky victim managed to provoke such a media reaction (and public backlash). A grim "return on investment" for the price of a cheap blade would be millions of pounds worth of police/security/media coverage of such an event that feeds upon itself as the frenzy builds.

For all the fuss about an inaccurate, exploding 3D printed gun in recent times, the knife attack serves to remind that the equipment for disruptive actions (including violent ones) is rarely far outside one's own kitchen. Even with development of 3D printers, firearms, and ad hoc explosives vanish from the earth, a single edged weapon can still stand as an assassin's weapon, as it has for the sum total of human history. Why should the future be different?

Disruption in Action

In the wake of the tragic Boston bombings, a number of other incidents have occurred. Letters full of ricin were sent to political figures in both parties. In Silicon Valley, a fiber optic cable was cut while some individual or group caused an oil spill near a substation. In addition, the design of the bombs in Boston seems to be a rather common “pressure cooker” design. These incidents may be unrelated, may all be copycats, or may be something else, but the fact remains that for all the police state and surveillance powers assumed after 9/11, the military and police were not able to stop them. Nonetheless, I imagine many of the familiar shills for despotism to start crawling out of the woodwork like they did after 9/11.

In the meantime, some fear-mongering (especially Arab-baiting) continues in earnest. While the week in April has some significance to American domestic extremists, the drone program has increased anti-Americanism abroad (especially under the Obama administration). The incident may also be apolitical, such as a deranged spree killer seeking more attention by using explosives instead of firearms. A sporting event is certain to have lots of cameras rolling, so merely a “smaller” bomb may kill and wound but get far more media attention. (Many rather nasty weapons in history were designed to maim rather than kill, but that is a topic for another day.) The objective may be disruption itself, showing how ineffectual the government is to prevent such carnage. The over-reaction by the government may actually be what the goals were, causing billions in disruption for the price of some cheap bombs. However, I would rather not indulge in more speculation over this sociopath and his/her/their motives. Interestingly, though, the massive deaths in foreign bombings are all but invisible to the US media now.

Future Shocked

Technology advances at a breakneck pace as corrupted institutions metastasize into Orwellian bureaucracies at a close rate. The signs of rule of law are generally thrown in front of a train as organizations prey on their former customers and clients.

To further add to the confusion is the effects of advancing technology. In military science, technology is not only a force multiplier for armed forces, but also enables new venues of attack previous generations would consider impossible. Imagine explaining cyberattacks to a World War II tank commander. Asymmetric warfare favors the small groups and even individuals, and their powers only increase over time. Today’s cutting edge research is tomorrow’s niche hobby.

With resource depletion, climate change, and economic collapse, the ruling elites are trying their hardest to hold onto power of vestigial structures. However, their desire and desperation to hold onto power are often the things that destroy the institutions they depend on. Corruption means that more disaffected individuals will arise, regardless of how many riots or uprisings are put down. Lots of broad bans on technologies and fields of research mean amateurs are less likely to hold things, but only a few professionals (who may or may not game the system for their own benefits). Surveillance and arrest of dissidents (including those practicing “legal” methods of dissent) means that change within institutions becomes much more unlikely. Expansive domains shrink as the costs of maintaining them exceed wealth extracted.

On the positive side, though, technologies exist for eliminating poverty and alleviating resource depletion (albeit treating symptoms rather than causes). From cheap desalinization to renewable energy to 3D printing to impressive medicaltechnology, we will need everything we can. Living under a dystopian police state out of a cyberpunk novel is bad enough, but as technologies get cheaper and more widespread, we may at least get a postcyberpunk future instead.

Mad Science at Home

There is a number of topics I could address this week, such as the food scandal in Europe, the spread of drones in the USA, or the rumblings of a genuine supervillain state in North Korea. However, the creation of mad science innovations at home is only beginning compared to what it may become despite (or perhaps because of) government laws. Death rays may join homemade firearms and explosives as weapons of mad scientists. Perhaps drones may be the new guns, in the sense of a disruptive technology everyone rushes to ban. Given the vulnerabilities of critical infrastructure and possibilities of destructive drone swarms, protection will be extremely difficult, if not impossible. Tomorrow's "terrorists" may lack ideology or cause, save destroying something and seeing what happens. The instability of the current world system becomes even more strained as a result. What could possibly go wrong?

Shadow Banks, Shadow Economies

Like it or not, currency systems have long been part of civilization. The types of currency range from gold and silver coins to fiat paper bills to digital, decentralized algorithms. What a proper currency allows an individual to do is have a common method for acquiring the services of goods and services. Barter systems were out-competed by currency in the richest countries, although barter returns after disasters and in the informal economy.

Even the most basic barter system allows one to engage in economic activity. Thus, price discovery, or the ability to accurately determine the cost of a product or service, is a precondition for a vibrant economy. Instead, high frequency trading, short sales, and interest rate rigging reduce the foundation of capitalism to a rigged carnival game. This process has been ongoing for decades, and is unlikely to change, no matter what legislation gets passed (as loopholes can be added). Legal gray areas are often not a bug, but a feature of new laws.

In thriving economies, ecosystems, political, and agricultural systems, diversity is a sign of life. Thriving economies allow for plenty of competition, coexistence of large and small. Although some entities out-compete others, others can arise to fill the void. Thriving ecosystems, such as a forest or jungle, have more types of species than a lawn or parking lot. Thriving democracies have a variety of parties. While some parties may become the most common mainstream ones, it is not impossible for other groups to get elected. An agricultural situation with several types of crops (and multiple species of each) means that a drought or pest is unlikely to destroy all of them.

Instead, we face monoculture in all areas. Markets are rigged to benefit a few big firms. Ecosystems are disrupted at even the microscopic level. Electoral districts are gerrymandered to benefit parties and incumbents. Factory farming has replaced conventional farming as a source of food production. The problem with monoculture is that catastrophic failures become all the larger, as they are inherently brittle.

As these systems fail, others arise outside of the existing legal and political framework. This "black market," informal economic sector is today called System D, as discussed before. As things are banned by increasingly corrupt governments, System D is poised to grow. Furthermore, System D itself is the future of many "legit" firms. The "shadow banking" system comprises the majority of the world's currency reserves, existing in legal limbo in offshore accounts. Somehow, multiple times the planet's GDP in debt was wasted and frittered into this black hole. As something new arises, Ragnarok style, the darkness will turn into the new system.

The Coming Era of Supervillainy

Multiple converging trends indicate that someday, evil overlords and criminal masterminds straight out of popular culture and into the news. There are multiple types of supervillains we can discuss here, often with significant overlap between the categories. Many are as old as society itself, while others wield abilities undreamt of by previous generations. As long as human society exists, there will be crime and malcontents of some sort. There will always be those who use power for their own ends, ignoring the cost to others. Such an environment is neither conduciveto representative government nor human benefit. 

The supervillainy of the era represents the return of a system that is as old as history. This socio-economic model is neither capitalism nor socialism, but instead something much older: feudalism. Parasitic elites at the top use warlords and peasants to support their lifestyles while peasants and serfs toil beneath them. Those outside of the system are outlaws, having no legal representation to the feudal order. 

The fundamental components are already in place, and the momentum is already leading there. I will discuss three categories of potential supervillain that could thrive in such a system: the Corrupt Elite, the Empowered Individual, and the Underworld Entrepreneur. There is significant overlap between these categories in some cases, but I believe these could be the main archetypes that tomorrow’s supervillains may gravitate towards. These are just my takes on how they may arise, what their strategies may be, and how they may deal with threats. 

--The Corrupt Elite: The robber baron, the corrupt politician, and others who abuse power and wealth for their own benefit are among both the most transparent and easiest to loathe. However, as long as even the elite have “skin in the game,” they realize working with others (the positive sum game) is better than just ignoring them. Power and wealth often go together, and history is full of politicians who help wealthy friends loot others’ wealth (via often taxes on lower classes, no-bid contracts, and bailouts for their associates). The term “kleptocrat” is most apt for these individuals, as their primary goal is to use the state apparatus to encourage rent-seeking. 

When there is less difference, financially and ideologically, between the top and bottom of society, there is a greater chance each member realizes they’re “all in it together.” This is why I believe the health of the middle class and related metrics like “median household income” are better indicators of social and economic health than just GDP. As the middle class collapses, stratification, crime, and instability also increase. The elite become increasingly isolated, building their own infrastructure and segregated enclaves while letting everything elsefall apart. Look at the American infrastructure. 

While barely half a century old, it’s already collapsing to below Victorian levels. Overreliance on cars and suburbs, as opposed to logical urban planning and mass transit (public or private), additionally made the USA extra-vulnerable to oil price shocks. There was actually a conspiracy behind this that makes the tinfoil hat crowd seem sane. Oil, tire, and car companies conspired to replace streetcars with buses. By the time the case had made it to court, the damage had already been done. The fact oil and gas companies have such financial and political power is hardly surprising. 

Many Corrupt Elites do not content themselves with merely minding their own business. Many will crackdown on the “peasants” for espousing views they disagree with, turning police forces into their personal illegal spying agencies, and enforcing their personal whims upon others with a “nanny state” approach. While police forces and crackdowns are their preferred tools for now, advances in drones, automation, and surveillance technology will mean the need for “manpower” for running their regime is greatly reduced. So maybe those police and official pensions are ripe for kleptocrat seizure, once drone and robot technology has become sufficiently advanced. Like Dr. Doom, they are “legitimate” overlords of states and territories with no shortage of robot henchmen.  

--The Empowered Individual: As stated before on the blog, new technologies can empower individuals for good or ill. However, unlike comic books, it is extremely rare for a “lone genius” to produce paradigm-shifting technologies wholly by themselves. However, the production costs and increasing ease of fabrication makes many disruptive technologies more available.

This means that while a single mad scientist is unlikely to destroy the world, the potential for disruption increases. Autonomous, decentralized networks are a far more likely incarnation for the deployment of disruptive technologies and techniques. From non-violent activist groups to armed insurgencies (and everything in between), the successful techniques used by one group are likely to be copied en masse by others. By the time a countermeasure has been found, others will likely have moved on to different tactics. Especially savvy groups might combine tactics for maximum effect, a sort of fourth generation warfare (4GW) analog of combined arms theory. 

Empowered Individuals may be motivated by a number of things, but Corrupt Elites are natural targets for them. Activists may seek the removal of a corrupt official, protest the favors given to a crooked businessperson, or seek redress for government misconduct. Not all EIs may have ideological or "moral" reasons for their activities. As people become desperate, there is always the risk of the depraved spree killer. As stated before, Dr. Brin has a great way to deal with them, denying them the infamy they seek. Like the character "V" in Alan Moore's "V for Vendetta," they cause ideologically disruption against centralized power and infrastructure for good or ill. Or like Batman's eternal nemesis, the Joker, engage in destruction for its own sake.

--The Underworld Entrepreneur: Crime of the regular sort has always been part of the economy.

As such, there have been individuals and organizations that out-competed their rivals to dominate their market. In the underworld, this means the most adept at violence and ruthless behavior can dominate their fellows. Whenever something is banned in the regular economy, black and "gray" markets may emerge to fill the demand. 

The effects of Prohibition and the "War on Drugs" have encouraged organized crime to thrive. Not only are drug-related shootings the dominant type of firearms crime, but prisons have been shoved full of non-violent offenders who have little to lose by going deeper into crime. Many street gangs use drugs to fund their own activities, and battle other gangs for control of turf they can use to sell drugs with. Typically, the police target the largest gang, often the "victor" of the gang war. After the police act, there is typically a power vacuum as other gangs or factions within the gang start the cycle over again. 

No matter which gang dominates the streets, the long term winners are the drug cartels that supplied the drugs in the first place. Some groups, like the Mexican drug cartels, have such wealth and power, they have built their own infrastructure. Not only do they possess significant munitions, logistics networks, tunnels, and other methods to smuggle drugs, some even built their own communicationsinfrastructure and armored vehicles. They maintain international smuggling networks to move their product, and are a force to be reckoned with in their home country (and beyond). 

Even outside of "regular" criminal activities (gun-running, drug smuggling, etc.), there is an entire market ecosystem outside of official channels. This is known as System D. The original term comes from a French word, "débrouillards" (meaning "clever"), but I believe an apt English translation is "Devious." Not all parts of System D involve organized crime of the regular sort. System D is a broad category for all "informal" economic activity, from kids selling lemonade to African marketplaces selling fresh food to even services like trash removal. There's even real estate provided by System D.

System D is the world's fastest growing economy outside the USA (and possibly inside it). As more things are banned, regulated, or restricted by increasingly desperate and cash-strapped states, the black and gray economies can only grow as more and more people turn to alternative economies. As 'legit' economies falter, the laws of supply and demand reach new equilibrium independent of existing policies and laws. Even "legit" companies can inadvertently be drawn into System D by proxies and "technically" legit deals.

As discrete method of payments like encrypted cybercurrencies (such as BitCoin) and unofficial exchange/logistics networks (such as the Islamic world's "hawala" practice) combine, a new type of underworld entrepreneur may emerge. The survival criteria for continuing to operate in System D are being sneaky enough to avoid law enforcement and/or having the wealth/political clout to evade accountability. This not only means it is possible an organization like SPECTRE from James Bond may emerge, but statistically probable. 

A real life Blofeld or Moriarty may lord over a distributed network of crime like a spider in a web. They may supply Empowered Individuals with illicit goods, be targets of them, or may compete with Corrupt Elites (or perhaps even make the transition into "legitimacy"). A UE may likewise benefit from automation, as it removes the need for human operatives in crime networks to a significant degree. (Such an idea is the basis of a new novel a friend and I are working on.)

So there you have some of the archetypes I believe may emerge in the future. Of course, if strange vigilantes arise to match real life supervillains, then things may get very interesting real fast. For the rest of us, however, the quality of life is likely to suffer greatly. There are many reasons why places with roving warbands are not pleasant to live in. At the same time, living on the whims of a neofeudal overlord are little better. That is why I believe in living in a resilient community less dependent on an increasingly unhinged world system.