Bostrom, the Economy, Apocalypse, and You (Part II)

Part II: White Shadows

"When I was a young boy I tried to listen,
Don't you wanna feel like that?
You're part of the human race
All of the stars and the outer space
Part of a system, a plan."
~Coldplay, "White Shadows"

If it is true that we are living in a computer simulation headed towards its demise, then this fact has some strong implications on how we should behave economically. If the story of the planet is scripted that the sky is to fall in the near future, then in effect the markets are being rigged not by bankers, financiers, or politicians on the planet Earth, but by an architect or architects somewhere else. If it is true that this universe is being run from some guy's couch in another dimension, then our freedom in economic affairs is only as expansive as the designer allows. If our universe is indeed a computer simulation, then like clouds over a city, our economic weather is overshadowed by higher forces.

Does this mean that we should change our economic outlooks and economic behavior? Should we give up on this world financially if all is rigged and our fates are sealed? Not necessarily. Even if we are living in a computer simulation, this sphere remains reality for us and the rest of the world. Nothing's changed save for our perspective. The idea of our universe being some sort of cosmic boardgame does not take away the fact that this is the only reality we know. Where our financial actions might change is when the prospect of the apocalypse becomes a reality. Simulated reality or no simulated reality, our worldwide financial predicament remains our current reality to be dealt with. And cosmic designer or not, life goes on.

Were a man on a street to inform me that we are all living in a computer simulation and gave me incontrovertible proof of this, I would most likely attribute the proof to a cheap magic trick, deem him mentally disturbed, and go on with my day. I would ask, "So what?" I am not too sure that the revelation would change my financial intentions. Nevertheless, were it made clear with sound evidence that we are living in a simulated reality and that the designer intended to cause a financial apocalypse, it would only make rational business sense as a trader to short everything in existence.

I previously wrote that "things have gotten bad on a global scale, and there is no sign of things getting better soon. In the future, water and food shortages could give way to world conflicts of the kind that humanity has never seen." Climate problems, financial problems, natural disasters, and overpopulation are all contributing to the specter of Armageddon imminently facing us. The fact that the current financial crisis is global and that the entire world is being affected says something significant about our quagmire. Things have never been like this before; we are in uncharted territory. And not only this, but there appears to be nowhere to run. We are trapped like ants in an ant farm. We have no choice but to keep on playing the game. The crux comes when the depth and nature of our financial/global predicament choke off any hope for a functional solution or escape -- thereby severely compromising our ethical and economic alternatives. Like mice in an experiment run by scientists, we are being driven to the test by force, not will.

Unlike the wars and tribulations of ages past where one could simply hop on a boat or a horse and move to a foreign & undiscovered land, there is nowhere for us to go. This is a global crisis. I cannot understate the significance of this in our common plight. For all intents and purposes, we are trapped on this round, little planet, and the globe is getting smaller by the day. If there is going to be global financial tribulation in the near future, then it will be one such that the world has never seen before nor may ever see again. Such a possible tribulation would truly be a climax for the history of this planet. And as a writer of fiction knows, it is at the climactic point in the story that the hero is either made or destroyed. The hero either arrives and the world is saved, he doesn't arrive and all is lost, or the hero suffers from a fatal flaw and the result is tragedy.

In this light, doomsday may be upon us, and this tells us something about the nature of humanity. According to "Essential Economics" written by Matthew Bishop, economics is "the study of how society uses its scarce resources". Scarcity is really the crux of our economic system, scarcity is what has brought us to this point, and from the heavens to the Earth it appears impossible to escape the basic market mechanics of supply & demand. Scarcity is what drives the drama.

To an outsider, the goal of capitalism may appear to be the transaction of procuring goods & services necessary to survive. I propose an alternate viewpoint, and that is that the ultimate goal of capitalism is not merely to gain goods and resources necessary for survival, but rather to achieve a functional sense of divinity or godhood. Such a goal, though it may only be possible far into the future, is a mere dream for us today. Survival alone appears to be a functional end in doing business (and let's face it, people work to put food on the table), but the long-term goal of economic behavior for humanity is to achieve a state of existence where resources are not needed at all and where one is free to act as he or she will: godhood. The rational economic actor procures goods & services not merely to ensure short-term survival, but also long-term survival -- all the way to eternity. Survival, and not the mere use or management of scarce resources, is really the name of our economic game. Of course, much of this may sound like science fiction, but we have to remember that at one point in the not-so-distant past airplanes, spaceships, and submarines were science fiction, too.

Perhaps our way of living is an infantile version of "divinity" in comparison with a being that would be capable of sustaining an entire simulated, created universe, but the principle stands nevertheless. To a person on an isolated island who has never seen a plane, a car, a mobile phone, or a computer, our way of life may appear to them to be "divine", e.g. cargo cults. However, whether we live in a hovel or a castle, the shadows of natural selection & survival in nature do not move. In viewing the nature of humanity in this light, one can see that the "real economy" is not about trading paper, pieces of metal, or certificates, but the procurement of necessary resources for survival. The struggle for survival is the gist of this "real economy"; we might call it (the economic equivalent to Realpolitik or) "Realoekonomie". Our notions of law and business assist human civilization in procuring necessary resources for survival without the use of brute force. However, were law & order not in place, the Realoekonomie would most likely be managed by the sheer use of brute force.

The importance of Realoekonomie in light of the simulation hypothesis is that life on Earth seems to exist on an evolutionary, biological arrow that results in rational intelligence. I cannot downplay this concept. Were simulators to create millions of planets with millions of homo sapiens in environments similar to ours, it is plausible that these humans would live, play, and work in manners very similar to ours. They would most likely use money, have occupations similar to ours, live in huts or houses, eat, marry, and have children just like us. Humans on other planets would laugh, create stories, develop technology, and make music just like us. All this would remain with the process of natural selection. This process of natural selection and the struggle for survival is the Realokonomie by which humans toil, grow, adapt, and survive. As such, the fruit of this biological arrow appears to lead rational intelligent beings toward a state of "godhood" in the sense that one day humans would grow technologically to the point of creating universes. Even so, we reach this destination by the brutish, crude process of natural selection, i.e. the struggle for survival.

We should not be ashamed of this idea; this is our planet. It is the way things work here, and it gives us the power to weigh the possible fates of human political economy. Humanity may one day go extinct, but it could also possibly evolve into something greater than what it is today. It is hard to conceive of a post-human planet Earth, especially nowadays when the planet is spinning so fast, but one day this will all be in the long-distant past. The economic things that bother us today may not be issues in the future. I know not what the Dow Jones Industrial Average will be in two or three years, but I can tell you that when all is said and done, its final value will be zero. Nevertheless, if humanity is permitted to continue, evolve, and grow without going extinct by nature or by its own hand, then some sense of divinity may be in humanity's future.

If it makes sense that one day humanity (or any intelligent civilization in the past or future) will be able to simulate a universe (arguably, this is already taking place) and that an intelligent civilization would run billions of simulations such as ours, then we have to weigh whether we are the one civilization to achieve such a state or whether we are merely one of the billions of simulations being run. If we consider ourselves most likely only one of the billions of simulations to be run, then we have to accept the implications. If it makes sense that the creators of a computer simulation would intervene in a computer simulation as designed for a specific script or drama, then apocalypse may be on the horizon.

As William Shakespeare once wrote, "All the world's a stage." If this planet is a literal stage, then not only are we the audience, but we are also participants in the drama. Just because we may be living in a computer simulation does not mean that the designers have scripted an apocalyptic demise. It is thus a leap to suggest that because we are living in a simulation that we must necessarily prepare for the end. This could all be some experiment or some sandbox video game without a foreseeable end.

Nevertheless, when we reflect upon our understanding of the universe, the world's history, and how mankind has developed in the past 2000 years (let alone 200,000 years), we have to ask ourselves what the point of all this is. Of the 13.7 billion years that the universe has existed, why is it that we are so privileged to be living in this time period when we are on average granted a mere 70 to 80 years on this planet? What really are the odds that we are alone in our development, as opposed to being on the opposite side of that technological growth?

Given that we can see tumultuous times ahead globally and economically, it would appear to be a strange coincidence that all these apocalyptic shadows are converging upon us at the same time. The question is really whether our current global quagmire is an ultimate climax in the story of the world; it appears that the answer to that question is yes. This makes for a convenient epic per some cosmic design. With this, the odds of our existing at such a time period is quite coincidental and somewhat suspicious as to the nature of this economic game -- especially if we take an honest look at the past 6,000 to 10,000 years on this planet. When we look at the past 6,000 years, we see a somewhat interesting, entertaining, interconnected, and epic storyline that may tell us something about our creator or creators. Ours is a storyline that unites the globe and brings the past, the present, and the future together for a worldwide climactic point. It all appears to be coming together and converging at some point in the near future.

Thus, if humans are able to simulate realities in our common dimension in the near future, then we can retain some hope that there is a mystery to the madness. Even in the midst of the apocalypse, we can retain hope that we are all part of some plan and that this is all part of some cosmic design.