What’s the way to progress? Evolution, revolution, or revolution through evolution? [Progress Studies]

I don’t know. But I suspect evolution, if only by default. I think we’re headed toward collapse or revolution, perhaps revolution via evolution (if the latter isn’t merely verbal trickery).

What do those words even mean? A first crack:

• Evolution: The basic structure of the human world is OK and we can achieve progress by tweaking parameters of existing practices and institutions.
• Revolution: The structure of the human revolution is fundamentally flawed and we need to devise new practices and institutions.
• Revolution by evolution: When you tweak enough parameters long enough you end up with fundamental change. By implication, mere revolution implies a quick break (e.g. Russian 1917).

Of course we can look to history to see what has happened in the past and then see which cases best fit the present moment. Of course the present moment isn’t a single monolithic phenomenon, so different cases will fit different phenomena. What of the overall envelope?

Where does the Progress Studies movement stand on this issue? I’d think it varies from person to person, but that it’s mostly up in the air because the question hasn’t been explicitly proposed and thrashed out. It smells to me as though the Progress Studies movement leans toward evolution, if only by default. It’s much easier to think about modifying what we’ve got than creating something new (from the ground up).

How do we increase innovation in scientific research? Do we offer more prizes, award more grants to younger investigators, more long-term grants, reduce the burden of reporting overhead? Those things preserve the current structure, but tweak the parameters. Dismantle the current university research structure and replace it with…whatever…a thousand blooming flowers? That’s rebuilding from the ground up.

Tyler Cowen is a major figure in Progress Studies. The blog he runs with Alex Tabarrok, Marginal Revolution, is subtitled: “Small Steps Toward a Much Better World”. That sounds like parameter tweaking. But how much and for how long (forever)? Is that much better world like the present one, but in color rather than black and white, or is it fundamentally different (3D vs. 2D)? Cowen puts exponential growth at the center of his thinking, as many economists do. And why not? If the pie grows faster than the population, then there’s more for everyone. Back in 1972 the Club of Rome famously proposed that there are limits to growth. Is that a few parameter tweaks away from Cowen’s position or is it a different world?

What about global warming? Collapse of the world order, fundamental change, or can we weather the storm by vigorous parameter tweaking? Kim Stanley Robinson’s New York 2140 is set in a world where the seas have risen 50 feet in two major “pulses” (that have taken place before the story begins). There have been technological advances, but no space travel (none depicted in the book), and no human level artificial intelligence. But the basic political and economic structure of the world appears to be the same as our current world, hence Robinson can tell a story that is a replay of the 2008 financial crisis in a different key, with different instruments, and a different ending – spoiler coming! … [the banks get nationalized]. Can we get there from here by parameter tweaking? Though Robinson doesn’t depict it, there seems to be plenty of room in that world for seasteading and charter cities? Assume there is. Could they give rise to a revolutionary restructuring of the world order?

Consider the first quarter of the 20th century. Everything changed. The arts saw abstraction and surrealism begin to displace figurative painting and drawing. Atonality enters classical music while jazz (swing) revolutionizes popular music. The modern novel is born: Ulysses (1922), The Sun Also Rises (1926), Mrs. Dalloway (1925), The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas (1933), In Search of Lost Time (1871-1922), and so forth. Then we have the Russian Revolution (1917-1923), and World War I (1914-1918), which reworked the map of Europe. The automobile emerged as a major mode of transportation and motion pictures and radio became major forms of popular entertainment (and news). And so forth.

Can we get from the world of 1900 to that of 1930 by nothing more than tweaking parameter of things that existed in 1900? I don’t think so. Is the current world undergoing changes of a similar magnitude?

At this point we’re far afield from the questions of scientific and technological innovation (fueling entrepreneurial activity) that seem to be driving Progress Studies. Those questions are important ones, but they aren’t the only ones. They’re no more than a beginning.