There’s an almost comical, yet deeply ingrained, tendency within us humans to compare. Be it on a personal level – chasing titles, salaries, or Instagram likes – or on a national stage, where last year's football champions hold fleeting bragging rights. It’s a curious habit, this constant measurement. Yet, there’s one particular metric against which, based on our current understanding, we are destined to perpetually lose: our inherent capabilities versus those of machines.
This isn't a dystopian lament. It's an invitation to a humbling reflection. Because to truly understand our place in this burgeoning mechanical landscape, we first need to strip away some illusions about the very genesis of these incredible creations.
We often think capitalism is solely at fault for creating consumption juggernauts, but we are solely, solely mistaken. It makes no difference whether we are talking about a capitalist or a socialist model; they are all based on this idea of consumption. Consumption makes both those political worlds go round.
The Machine's Genesis: A Triple Blind Spot 💡
1. The Earth's Deep Breath: Machines and Natural Capital 🌳 Let's start at the very beginning: Machines are created through the exploitation of natural capital. No natural capital? No machines. It’s that simple, yet we often overlook it. While there might be some substitution in the materials being used – perhaps a new composite instead of steel, or recycled plastics – this does not escape the fundamental truth that all these materials, in their raw or repurposed form, ultimately originate from nature. Every circuit board, every piece of casing, every atom of rare earth mineral mined for your smartphone or server farm, began as part of the Earth's body. We are, in essence, transforming vast, ancient geological processes into fleeting technological marvels.
2. The Temporal Distortion: Nature on Steroids ⚡ Secondly, we gravely abuse temporality in the creation of machines. We force nature onto a hyper-speed track. Mining processes extract resources in decades that nature took millennia to form. Manufacturing cycles churn out products in minutes that, if left to natural processes, would never materialize in such forms or speeds. It’s nature on steroids, which means we are actively ignoring some basic natural laws of rhythm, regeneration, and slow evolution. We are not inherently "better" as human beings for having this capacity to accelerate. Nor do we truly own the capability or capacity to compete with the long game of natural cycles. This temporal imbalance, I'm convinced, will catch up to us.
3. The Knowledge Blind Spot: Flaws in Our Own Design 🧠 Thirdly, and perhaps most subtly, we should never forget that our creations are based upon the knowledge we possess at the time of creation and do not take into account potential flaws in our thinking that could create an irreparable situation. We build based on our current understanding, on the paradigms dominant today. But history is replete with examples where humanity’s "peak" knowledge of one era led to unforeseen and disastrous consequences in the next. All we need to do is take a stroll down our historical technology pathway – from lead pipes to CFCs, from the unbridled use of fossil fuels to certain pharmaceutical marvels later revealed to have severe side effects – to find such chilling examples. Our inventions are extensions of our current mental models, and our mental models are, by definition, incomplete and imperfect.
The Consumption Conundrum: A Timeless Trap 🍎
Can we say that consumption was triggered by our original parents, Adam and Eve? They had everything they needed. Nothing to consume, neither were they producers. Yet, did they truly understand what they had, or perhaps only after they desired more? Vance Packard, in his 1960s book The Waste Makers, noted: "Our enormously productive economy demands that we make consumption our way of life that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals that we seek our spiritual satisfaction, our ego satisfactions in consumption." This isn't new; the question of our obsession with consumption has been around for a long, long time.
But what if Adam and Eve's motives were the impetus we carry for this clamoring of consumption? The question of "being" is the main driver, but we've unfortunately taken a path that no longer allows us to contemplate who we are or what we do; it all comes down to what we make. That's when the production stick comes into play.
The Mirror of Reflection: Are We Just Roles? 🎭
If you think about it – and as you can probably guess, I do think about these things a lot – this reflection has acted as a mirror. I’ve been able to ascertain how far removed I’ve been, never claiming infallibility, yet still craving that ability to relish in just being ourselves.
Think about daily conversations, especially when meeting new people. In North America, the first response when introducing yourself is often tied to your role or profession – what you do. It has little to nothing to do with where you reside, what inspires you, or your unique identity. We’re either producing so we can consume, and our consumption supports those who are producing. That’s the system.
Within this model, what would be the opposite of this consumption-production conundrum? Idleness, wouldn't it? Not doing anything, neither consuming nor producing. "Idle hands are the devil's playground," the saying goes. Idleness might cause you to do stupid things, think outside the norm, or even lead to contentment – the antithesis of this juggernaut where consumption and production keep the wheels moving. We deem the idle as social parasites. We pay lip service to purpose, vision, and mission, but do we truly own these attributes?
I’ll make the audacious claim that the biggest problem we have, the source of our demise, is tied to the lack of individual purpose. The cumulative sum of individual purposes would be our collective purpose, but it often comes top-down, due to conditioning. What if we turned that on its head and started with the introspection and proclamation of our individual purpose?
I was explaining to a friend recently a concept I call the "obituary party." It might sound morbid, but it’s about pausing your life journey today to consider that inevitable day when we are no longer part of the scene, officially relieved of our duties as consumers and producers. Do we have the ability to influence that narrative today? I'm going out on a limb to claim that yes, indeed, it lies within our power. We don't have to wait until the switch is flipped and the game is truly up.
Internal vs. External: The Manipulation of Desire 🎯
We run ourselves ragged in this consumer-producer race, producing until we have no more energy, then "recharging" (often through more consumption where someone else produces). Just like Adam and Eve, we’re told more is better. Tom Watson's novel quotes a workaholic journalist: "Me, I dread weekends... I wish I didn't have vacation time. I have no idea what to do with it. It's like for a week a reminder of what a loser I am." This speaks to our disconnection from internal motivators.
External motivators – titles, pay raises, prizes – are almost always tied to some other agenda. They are, in essence, a form of manipulation. As Vance Packard noted in the 1960s, "The people of the United States are in a sense becoming a nation on a tiger. They must learn to consume more and more or they are warned, their magnificent economic machine may turn and devour them. They must be induced to step up their individual consumption higher and higher. Whether they have any pressing need for the goods or not." This induced demand, creating value only through consumption, forces individuals into a consumerist looking glass.
Internal motivators, for me, are purpose, autonomy, and mastery. Autonomy means doing things on our own; mastery means the learning curve, picking ourselves up, and constantly getting better. This drive comes from within, allowing us to relish progress and satisfaction, ultimately finding new challenges. None of that is found in external motivators.
And yes, if I'm truly holding up the mirror, if I'm really talking about reflection, I come to the conclusion that for myself too, it's not always easy to throw the plan overboard and just let things be. I admit, my mornings often begin with a grab for the notebook and checking emails, seeing what's in the news, rather than just... being.
The Sociological House of Cards: A Choice to Be Made 🃏
Our current societal model, especially in places like Vienna, often casts citizens as consumers, expecting the government (producers) to deliver. This feeling of entitlement, born of privilege, is a strong external motivator. What if we turn this concept on its head? Eliminate entitlements and differentiate, viewing our community as a collection of unique individuals whose collective internal motivators can make a real difference.
The real problem, I'm afraid, is that if we follow this path, we'll realize that this sociological house of cards we've created – tied to consumption, production, and our identity as one or the other – will fall. The collateral damage would be immense. Perhaps we lack the imagination, the strength, the urgency to take on such a challenge. So we prefer to keep the house of cards upright as long as we can, until that light is turned off for each of us, freeing us from the burden of this construct.
It's a pretty sad state of affairs, but it doesn't have to be this way. Do we have the ability to say, "Today is going to be different"? Today, I don't have to live by yesterday's rules. Nobody's asking me to. And yes, if we make that decision, we will get pushback. Because that means you are not freely playing the roles that are expected of you within this consumer-producer complex. Your refusal to fit the role model paradox could be the biggest threat to those closest to you. That's the challenge.
What is the alternative? To continue following the preordained path simply because it causes the least amount of tension? Because it offers a false sense of security about future events based on predictable roles? We all know this faith in the future has no basis in reality.
Our fears are tied to waking up without a plan, to idleness, to boredom – just another form of missing that consumerist impetus. The fear of an empty calendar, no mail, no likes, no appointments – these are our benchmarks. That's why unemployment is such a problem; we equate employment with value, even when it's based on inexplicable decisions, leaving individuals' value dependent on factors unrelated to them as human beings.
We long for certainty, especially with the elephant in the room of pandemic figures that we pretend aren't there. But perhaps you might want to try this: consciously think about these roles we play as consumers and producers. This doesn't mean throwing everything overboard. Sometimes we don't have a choice; sometimes we do need to play these roles. But it makes a huge difference if we are sleepwalking through the day or if we're very conscious of the roles we're playing. Only through consciousness will we have a choice and perhaps, at some time, make a very conscious decision as to whether that's what we really want or not. And with that, I see a lot of hope, a lot of hope.
