250. Tackling ‘Big History’ feat. Ian Morris<br /> unSILOed Podcast with Greg LaBlanc

• Most of human history and evolution is about energy capture.
• Investing 80x energy into land to get 4x output from it has been transformational for modern farmers. (Turning oil into bread.)
• Marshall Sahlins - synopsis: agriculture is a really bad idea.
• Morris Theorem: human history is driven by lazy, greedy people.
• "Fossil fuel values" (00:39:00)
• fairness is a fundamental human value; justice is dramatically different across time and space (00:45:08)
• Morris' "5 Horsemen of the Apocalypse" (the five problems humans encounter when they reach the limits of energy extraction): massive movements of people (mobility); epidemics; climate change; war; governmental collapses;
• The price of overhunting for one person versus the price for the collective. How do we solve these collective problems (particularly for lazy, greedy humans)? (00:52:35)
• Regional failures were the general pattern before; now failures are a global scale problem.
• Morris' explanation of Brexit based on his Big History thesis as one of how Britain maintains power with respect to both China and Europe. (01:05:40)

• for: nature has no values, human values, purpose, purposelessness,
• key insight
  • evolution doesn't care
  • humans care, humans construct value and want to save ourselves. Evolution doesn't care if entire species live or die.
• comment
  • I've thought the same thing. It differentiates human beings from nature
  • Another way to say this is that humans have purpose, nature does not

We can't define ethics and human values in objective terms.

We do better with algorithms where the utility function can be expressed mathematically. When we try to design for utility/goals that include human values, it's much more difficult.