This week, I wanted to walk through an idea that I’ve mentioned in previous videos but never fully unpacked - a Mordor economy. In the default scenario, I see us heading towards a system where higher energy/extraction costs and complexity require us to devote more and more energy to providing the same amount of energy we’ve had historically. We will increasingly conflate ‘gross energy’ (what GDP measures) and ‘net energy’ the benefits to the rest of society. Additionally, as ecological limits are met - and surpassed, we’ll have to devote more energy/materials to environmental remediation (graphically indicated by the flying CO2 scrubbers around Mt. Doom in the image above) - therefore leaving even less energy/resources for eg hospitals, schools, shopping centers and eg X-boxes. This explanation is rather dense and involved topics like energy quality, debt and credit, and thinking about what areas in the margin of society will no longer have the energy available to be supported**. Is it a binary path? Either a ‘Mordor Economy’ or a ‘Great Simplification’ or is there some middle path?
The Mordor Economy | Frankly #23
The Mordor Economy | Frankly #23
The Mordor Economy | Frankly #23
This week, I wanted to walk through an idea that I’ve mentioned in previous videos but never fully unpacked - a Mordor economy. In the default scenario, I see us heading towards a system where higher energy/extraction costs and complexity require us to devote more and more energy to providing the same amount of energy we’ve had historically. We will increasingly conflate ‘gross energy’ (what GDP measures) and ‘net energy’ the benefits to the rest of society. Additionally, as ecological limits are met - and surpassed, we’ll have to devote more energy/materials to environmental remediation (graphically indicated by the flying CO2 scrubbers around Mt. Doom in the image above) - therefore leaving even less energy/resources for eg hospitals, schools, shopping centers and eg X-boxes. This explanation is rather dense and involved topics like energy quality, debt and credit, and thinking about what areas in the margin of society will no longer have the energy available to be supported**. Is it a binary path? Either a ‘Mordor Economy’ or a ‘Great Simplification’ or is there some middle path?