My only quibble is that the scientific establishment needs as much a trim as the political establishment. Like you, I spent a lifetime in the lab. Did some good things.
I think that the scientific establishment as a whole needs to stop doing "new" research and go back and do a whole shitload of "reproducing published results". The overproduction of erstwhile "scientists" needing to put out publications will call for a serious retrenchment and a time of double checking and debunking.
It is what I said: the scientific establishment badly needs "Dogeing" -- but at the same time we can't risk losing more than a century of previous work.
Sounds like we are talking in parallel then. Agreement abounds. I think that maybe the publications themselves need to be made "safe" and available. I am not at all certain how this will be done. Maybe something like the "internet archive" for all of the studies made and published so that they can't be disappeared.
I will ponder this. Maybe those stacks of "nature" and PNAS will be useful in the future.
Maybe it is time to start re-thinking about what we have been doing to public libraries.
Yes, baring maybe a few historical exceptions, only when the elites are divided (that is when there are elites and counter-elites) a revolution can succeed.
But as long as the elites manage to stay united, popular revolts are usually crushed.
Actually, I found Peter Turchin's works very convincing on the matter.
Especially the idea that when the economic system is undergoing a contraction, the upper part of the commoners try as hard as they can to become part of the elites (or at least their children) through education (while, of course, the lower part of the elite do all they can not to become commoners)
The result is an over-production of the elites due to a far greater number of graduates than society needs.
For as long as possible, the state administrations does what they can to absorb as many graduates as possible, aggravating their already difficult financial situation*.
And it's often these educated but disillusioned students and graduates who tend to form counter-elites and then associate themselves with a faction of the impoverished population.
At this point, violence is just one step away.
--
(*) Actually, the various DEI programs that were so fashionable in the US not so long ago can very much be seen as a part of this process as the aim (or result) was for the administrations to hire people from the middle/upper class who, as a matter of fact, had only graduated in DEI management.
Of course, some elite over-production happens in other countries. Graduates unemployment is (once again in its very long history) becoming a very serious problem in China even if it might be addressed quite differently.
True. At present, though, there are two different elites in the US: one is the old elite, still based on fossil power. The other, is based on internet, web control, AI, and the like. The second will probably crush the first. But, as usual, the people will be crushed, too!
Somehow, both elites depends on fossil fuel, directly or indirectly. Beside, Trump announced quite often that he was in favor of a more intensive exploitation of oil fields ("Drill, baby, drill") so I don't know if the oil industry really supported Biden/Harris.
It's more like the old elite depends on importation of goods as cheap as possible and of international royalties on trade marks. So they are quite afraid of any questioning of the free trade dogma and any public relation issues.
While somehow, the news elites, who depends mostly on IT, whose products dominate the market and cannot be taxed the same way, saw an opening with Trump.
Yes, it is more complicated than that. The old and the new elite are somewhat compenetrated; but I think the fossil one will be unceremoniously dumped if the Revolution succeeds. Just like the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks. They were allied during the revolution, then the Bolsheviks got rid of the Mensheviks.
Here is something I read this morning about the mapping of the vast Federal payment software systems by Musk's Forensic Accounting AI. Finally something useful.
This is like Germany's motorized armor overrunning France, if I may make that analogy, which I think is appropriate.
Also, a new social contract by rising populist elites is typically designed to be better for working people, as their alliance is needed by the rising elites. FDR did this.
Good post. You say “The risk is that the reform of the scientific research system will not be just a reform but a wholesale takedown obtained by defunding (it is already happening).” We have to see what “reform” means; so far the attack is on government and academic research. Will this “revolution” take down the research establishments of the pharmaceutical industry and military-industrial complex? What about AI research? Maybe I missed something, but there is plenty of research being protected and incentivized — but to what purposes?
I see a parallel, here, with Germany and the Nazi government. They never stopped funding research, but they directed all efforts toward what they thought were needed to win the war: military research at the level of nuts and bolts. They got rid of everything they thought was useless academic fun. Among other things, they chased out their specialists in semiconductors who would then develop radars in the US and tilt the technological balance against Germany. To say nothing about nuclear scientists, who went on to develop nuclear weapons in the US. Had the war lasted one year more, Germany would have been thoroughly nuked as a result of the work their own physicists had done. I think something similar will happen in the US. They'll jettison climate science, then they will be completely undefended against climate change. They will concentrate on such things as using AIs to maximize oil extraction, which I think won't do them any good.
Did you read anything by prof. Bas van Bavel? He is a historian at University of Utrecht, and his book about the rise and fall of market economies is very good.
He says that the end-point is a monopoly/oligopoly with ten families that own everything, and that it can be stable over centuries, before the next revolution topples them with the credo "cancel the debts, redistribute the land".
He also shows good examples how rural people near metropolitan areas suffer most when the centralization is at the peak, since that is how far police can reach. During those times, it is better to be at the periphery.
What about EU and Europe states then? Their peak fossil was like in 2008 or so, the EU elites have not yet collapsed, how to explain it in comparison to what you described for US?
As long as the EU elites received some dole from the US, they had no interest in rocking the boat. Now, the EU seems to be collapsing faster than the US. We'll have to see who will be the first to hit the dust.
I appreciate your even handed approach to this, Ugo. It's difficult in a polarized society, perhaps easier outside the US.
I ave followed The Limits To Growth since 1974, and see it tracking pretty well. It seems that we just passed several peaks, which looked like COVID lockdowns, for some reason.
There is the Strauss & Howe "Seasons/Turnings" 4 generational model of political-economic cycles of growth, corruption, collapse and rebuilding, similar to Kondratiev-Waves. Looking at resources improves those models, and it looks like we have tapped most of the easy, high-concentration stuff now.
The elite corruption being turned up by the massive DOGE AI, set to Forensic Accounting, is very impressive. Musk was not just working on the most advanced AI in an abstract sense, as it turns out.
This looks at another aspect of elites. Systemic change, according to Samo Burja, whose analysis is clear and cogent, is driven by Rising Elites:
This looks at qualities of elites. Established elites are running a system which is both creative and extractive/parasitic, and at the point that it decays, there is impetus for potential replacement elites to reform it to a more efficient system.
To overcome the established elites in a declining system is no small feat. It takes a better plan, and typically takes the involvement of the common working people, "Populism". This means the system has to improve enough to give workers and the new elites a better deal. That is hard to do unless there is some really-great new technology or process, something like oil, to replace coal, for instance.
The rising US elites shared the stage at the Trump Inauguration, sitting ahead of political elites, in a break of protocol. The technocratic billionaires are rapidly rising and talented technocrats, managing flows of information, money and work in a very competitive environment, which has just entered the halls of power like a massive commando raid.
It has already discovered that balancing the federal Budget b y just cutting out all of the overt graft may actually be feasible.
Even my mind is a bit boggled by how crude and extensive the graft is. US "healthcare costs 3X as much for 1/2 the service?
Uh, I never thought it would be as simple as this...
Indeed, it will still crash the current US economy to cut out all the massive graft, but it will provide the resources to create a more productive and egalitarian economy, as was the case after WW-2
A lot of "assets" are rent-drawing to established financial "owners", but are heavily parasitic to real-economy, and will necessarily be renegotiated in the coming financial collapse, coming because real economy in decline, has diverged so vastly from the virtual economy of growing financial claims and assets.
but can we still avoid collapse and how many time have we to avoid it earth4all authors like sandrine dixson decleve and gaya herrington still believe it is the decisive decade ?
Ask yourself the question the other way, Aaron. Where is the evidence that we will avoid the catastrophe of mass starvation caused by an ever-warming planet that decimates agriculture? Peter Carter's recent summary is worth understanding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uk9vulmEbqc
Ugo: An excellent piece. Thank you.
My only quibble is that the scientific establishment needs as much a trim as the political establishment. Like you, I spent a lifetime in the lab. Did some good things.
I think that the scientific establishment as a whole needs to stop doing "new" research and go back and do a whole shitload of "reproducing published results". The overproduction of erstwhile "scientists" needing to put out publications will call for a serious retrenchment and a time of double checking and debunking.
It is what I said: the scientific establishment badly needs "Dogeing" -- but at the same time we can't risk losing more than a century of previous work.
Sounds like we are talking in parallel then. Agreement abounds. I think that maybe the publications themselves need to be made "safe" and available. I am not at all certain how this will be done. Maybe something like the "internet archive" for all of the studies made and published so that they can't be disappeared.
I will ponder this. Maybe those stacks of "nature" and PNAS will be useful in the future.
Maybe it is time to start re-thinking about what we have been doing to public libraries.
Yes, baring maybe a few historical exceptions, only when the elites are divided (that is when there are elites and counter-elites) a revolution can succeed.
But as long as the elites manage to stay united, popular revolts are usually crushed.
Actually, I found Peter Turchin's works very convincing on the matter.
Especially the idea that when the economic system is undergoing a contraction, the upper part of the commoners try as hard as they can to become part of the elites (or at least their children) through education (while, of course, the lower part of the elite do all they can not to become commoners)
The result is an over-production of the elites due to a far greater number of graduates than society needs.
For as long as possible, the state administrations does what they can to absorb as many graduates as possible, aggravating their already difficult financial situation*.
And it's often these educated but disillusioned students and graduates who tend to form counter-elites and then associate themselves with a faction of the impoverished population.
At this point, violence is just one step away.
--
(*) Actually, the various DEI programs that were so fashionable in the US not so long ago can very much be seen as a part of this process as the aim (or result) was for the administrations to hire people from the middle/upper class who, as a matter of fact, had only graduated in DEI management.
Of course, some elite over-production happens in other countries. Graduates unemployment is (once again in its very long history) becoming a very serious problem in China even if it might be addressed quite differently.
True. At present, though, there are two different elites in the US: one is the old elite, still based on fossil power. The other, is based on internet, web control, AI, and the like. The second will probably crush the first. But, as usual, the people will be crushed, too!
I'm not so sure it's about really fossil fuel.
Somehow, both elites depends on fossil fuel, directly or indirectly. Beside, Trump announced quite often that he was in favor of a more intensive exploitation of oil fields ("Drill, baby, drill") so I don't know if the oil industry really supported Biden/Harris.
It's more like the old elite depends on importation of goods as cheap as possible and of international royalties on trade marks. So they are quite afraid of any questioning of the free trade dogma and any public relation issues.
While somehow, the news elites, who depends mostly on IT, whose products dominate the market and cannot be taxed the same way, saw an opening with Trump.
Yes, it is more complicated than that. The old and the new elite are somewhat compenetrated; but I think the fossil one will be unceremoniously dumped if the Revolution succeeds. Just like the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks. They were allied during the revolution, then the Bolsheviks got rid of the Mensheviks.
Here is something I read this morning about the mapping of the vast Federal payment software systems by Musk's Forensic Accounting AI. Finally something useful.
This is like Germany's motorized armor overrunning France, if I may make that analogy, which I think is appropriate.
What next? Good guys or bad guys in 3 years? https://eko.substack.com/p/override
Also, a new social contract by rising populist elites is typically designed to be better for working people, as their alliance is needed by the rising elites. FDR did this.
Good post. You say “The risk is that the reform of the scientific research system will not be just a reform but a wholesale takedown obtained by defunding (it is already happening).” We have to see what “reform” means; so far the attack is on government and academic research. Will this “revolution” take down the research establishments of the pharmaceutical industry and military-industrial complex? What about AI research? Maybe I missed something, but there is plenty of research being protected and incentivized — but to what purposes?
I see a parallel, here, with Germany and the Nazi government. They never stopped funding research, but they directed all efforts toward what they thought were needed to win the war: military research at the level of nuts and bolts. They got rid of everything they thought was useless academic fun. Among other things, they chased out their specialists in semiconductors who would then develop radars in the US and tilt the technological balance against Germany. To say nothing about nuclear scientists, who went on to develop nuclear weapons in the US. Had the war lasted one year more, Germany would have been thoroughly nuked as a result of the work their own physicists had done. I think something similar will happen in the US. They'll jettison climate science, then they will be completely undefended against climate change. They will concentrate on such things as using AIs to maximize oil extraction, which I think won't do them any good.
so is it time to arange our funeral ?
Hello Ugo,
Very good overview of "popular" revolutions.
Did you read anything by prof. Bas van Bavel? He is a historian at University of Utrecht, and his book about the rise and fall of market economies is very good.
He says that the end-point is a monopoly/oligopoly with ten families that own everything, and that it can be stable over centuries, before the next revolution topples them with the credo "cancel the debts, redistribute the land".
He also shows good examples how rural people near metropolitan areas suffer most when the centralization is at the peak, since that is how far police can reach. During those times, it is better to be at the periphery.
Peace,
GÖran
What about EU and Europe states then? Their peak fossil was like in 2008 or so, the EU elites have not yet collapsed, how to explain it in comparison to what you described for US?
As long as the EU elites received some dole from the US, they had no interest in rocking the boat. Now, the EU seems to be collapsing faster than the US. We'll have to see who will be the first to hit the dust.
I appreciate your even handed approach to this, Ugo. It's difficult in a polarized society, perhaps easier outside the US.
I ave followed The Limits To Growth since 1974, and see it tracking pretty well. It seems that we just passed several peaks, which looked like COVID lockdowns, for some reason.
There is the Strauss & Howe "Seasons/Turnings" 4 generational model of political-economic cycles of growth, corruption, collapse and rebuilding, similar to Kondratiev-Waves. Looking at resources improves those models, and it looks like we have tapped most of the easy, high-concentration stuff now.
The elite corruption being turned up by the massive DOGE AI, set to Forensic Accounting, is very impressive. Musk was not just working on the most advanced AI in an abstract sense, as it turns out.
This looks at another aspect of elites. Systemic change, according to Samo Burja, whose analysis is clear and cogent, is driven by Rising Elites:
"Reform Is Driven by Rising Elites" https://www.palladiummag.com/2020/08/19/reform-is-driven-by-rising-elites/
This looks at qualities of elites. Established elites are running a system which is both creative and extractive/parasitic, and at the point that it decays, there is impetus for potential replacement elites to reform it to a more efficient system.
To overcome the established elites in a declining system is no small feat. It takes a better plan, and typically takes the involvement of the common working people, "Populism". This means the system has to improve enough to give workers and the new elites a better deal. That is hard to do unless there is some really-great new technology or process, something like oil, to replace coal, for instance.
The rising US elites shared the stage at the Trump Inauguration, sitting ahead of political elites, in a break of protocol. The technocratic billionaires are rapidly rising and talented technocrats, managing flows of information, money and work in a very competitive environment, which has just entered the halls of power like a massive commando raid.
It has already discovered that balancing the federal Budget b y just cutting out all of the overt graft may actually be feasible.
Even my mind is a bit boggled by how crude and extensive the graft is. US "healthcare costs 3X as much for 1/2 the service?
Uh, I never thought it would be as simple as this...
Indeed, it will still crash the current US economy to cut out all the massive graft, but it will provide the resources to create a more productive and egalitarian economy, as was the case after WW-2
A lot of "assets" are rent-drawing to established financial "owners", but are heavily parasitic to real-economy, and will necessarily be renegotiated in the coming financial collapse, coming because real economy in decline, has diverged so vastly from the virtual economy of growing financial claims and assets.
but can we still avoid collapse and how many time have we to avoid it earth4all authors like sandrine dixson decleve and gaya herrington still believe it is the decisive decade ?
Ask yourself the question the other way, Aaron. Where is the evidence that we will avoid the catastrophe of mass starvation caused by an ever-warming planet that decimates agriculture? Peter Carter's recent summary is worth understanding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uk9vulmEbqc