mega-niches
How can we, and I mean the royal We of All Humanity, push innovation while retaining justice and humanity?
You may think “That’s crap, we’re doing it now.” Well, I disagree with you. I think that modernity is faltering, and that scares me. It scares me becuase i’m a _HUGE_ fan of modernity. One of the reason I think it’s faltering is that the proliferation of choice and plenty is causing huge ammounts of ennui and people are reaching back to a romantized past of simple times. This is not new, ven Martin Buber in “I and Thou” noted that
Those who tell of two ways and praise one are recognized as prophets and great teachers. They save men from confusion and hard choices. They offer a single choice that is easy to make because those who do not take the path that commended to them live a wretched life
And he wrote that in 1923. Way, Way before economists started noticing the paradox of choice. Ok, so the problem is choice, then we eliminate that.
That’s no good either. Central planning is a failure; markets work. Without choice people are not free, and without freedom we are not completely human. So what do we do?
What? you didn’t think I knew did you? My arrogance only goes so far, it seems.
