Transforming the Economy Sustainably

If we add $1 trillion to existing government spending, and allocate the existing spending in a way that stimulates, how much will the economy grow over time, and how sustainably?

While that is the question of the hour, all the kings horses and all the kings men have no answer.

That is tragic because the answer is blowin' in the wind.

Using complexity and actuarial science tools to supplement existing models, alternative ways of stimulating the economy could be tested before implementation. The ones most likely to succeed could be implemented and monitored and adjusted over time as needed.

That way, tables could be developed showing multiples of alternative allocations. One allocation might double GNP growth over five years while another might produce a 500% increase over three years.

Wouldn't it be refreshing to hear, "We have decided to add $1 trillion to existing spending for the purpose of transforming our tired economy. We have tested alternative approaches and decided on one which has a 95% chance of doubling GNP within three years. We will monitor the money and if it is not having the desired effect, will make adjustments.

We are confident this stimulus will transform our economy because we have tested it from the macro to the micro level. The money is targeted to industries and companies most likely to provide sustainable, transformative growth.

Our models are actuarially sound, demographically robust, temporally adjusted, interactively designed, and probability oriented. The money flow will be transparent and accounted for professionally."

Yes we can.

Harmonious Bibliography

Any book owes a large debt to all books which preceded it.

In my case, Harmonious Universe emerged from my immersion in:

Affluent Society by Galbraith
Silent Spring by Carson
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Pirsig
Lila by Pirsig

The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant
The Dancing Wu-Li Masters by Zukav
The Tao of Physics by Capra
The Art of Mathematics by King

Chaos by Gleick
Complexity by Waldrop
Fire in the Mind by Johnson
Quantum Self by Zohar

Superforce by Davis
The Elegant Universe by Greene
How to Know God by Chopra
Shakespeare and the Common Understanding by Rabkin

Quantum Theory by Bohm
A Mathematical Bridge by Hewson
Tao of Chaos by Walter
Consilience by Wilson

Art & Physics by Shlain
Hyperspace by Kaku
The Self-Aware Universe by Goswami
The Philosophy of Physics by Torretti

The Quark and the Jaguar by Gell-Mann
At Home in the Universe by Kaufmann
Would be Worlds by Casti
Universals by Armstrong

The Theatre of the Absurd by Esslin
Free to Choose by Friedman
The Prophet by Gibran
Synchronicity by Peat

Complementarity by Plotnitsky
Metapatterns by Volk
Microfoundations by Weintraub
A First Course in String Theory by Zwiebach

Among others

Lee

Dimensions of Science

This is my science blog, and it is a good time to put out some ideas which can be explored more deeply in the future.


In Fire in the Mind, George Johnson explores the search for order as reflected in scientific and religious speculation. He compares and contrasts views of the scientific and spiritual communities, particularly in the area around Santa Fe, New Mexico.


The way we carve up the world determines how we perceive it. Physicists see quarks, electons, waves, fields, symmetries and fractals as part of the scaffolding on which our experienes are based. The more we try to contain reality within our perceptual structures however, the more it resists.


Like the scientists who labor in the New Mexico laboratories and look for clues about the existence of everything, so the Tewa labor and wonder. The Tewa "...have woven a tight web of concepts..." into a worldview as well.


We are all trying to make sense of a world which began in mystery and which is connected in ways we cannot yet grasp.


What the scientists in New Mexico and other places have found is that there are patterns which are common to simple and complex systems as well. This gives credence to the notion that there is an overall web of harmony in which all reality is embedded.

Since mathematics is the best tool we have for discerning these patterns, and since mathematics, even aided by advanced computer science, is very crude way of uncovering patterns of systems more complex than the atom, there has been uneven progress in the quest for an overall understanding of reality.

Can Schrodinger Waves be extended to apply to superatomic phenomena?

Can Heisenberg Matrices make the output of experiments on complex systems meaningful?

Can the universality buried in fractal structures explain social phenomena?

Is there a Dirac Sea from which social and economic phenomena emerge?

Certainly worthy questions at least.

In The Quark and the Jaguar, Nobel Prize winning scientist Murray Gell-Mann, gives us a glimpse of his ideas which build from subatomic structures like quarks to complex systems like jaguars.

Gell-Mann is the man who made sense of the "particle zoo" which had been vexing particle physicists in the mid twentieth century. He was also one of the founders of the complexity science movement in the 1980's.

Complexity science is a term which has come to be associated with a movement which brought together thinkers from all areas of thought to probe deep questions. In the process they found commonalities among what were thought to be distinct disciplines.

Economics had uncovered patterns which were also apparant in physics. Biology overlapped with chemistry and physics. Sociological patterns bore resemblance to physical patterns. Patterns of aesthetics often mirrored those of nature.

If we can build a metaphysics which can encompass all phenomena, not just physical phenomena, we will be on the path to a level of understanding which could lead to world harmony.

The tools are emerging.

We are ready to interpret their findings

Lee