[extropy-chat] Interview with a Luddite - Kevin Kelly's US$1, 000 Bet

[natashavita at earthlink.net]

While doing a little luddite-mining today, I came upon Kevin Kelly's
"Interview with a Luddite" in the Jun3 1995 "Wired" Issue 3.06.

"Kirkpatrick Sale is a leader of the Neo-Luddites. Wired's Kevin Kelly
wrote the book on neo-biological technology. Food fight, anyone?"

By Kevin Kelly 

...
Kelly: You get very specific in the closing pages of your book, where you
say that if industrial civilization does not crumble because of the
resistance from, say, Neo-Luddites or others, then it will crumble of its
own accumulative excesses, specifically "within not more than a few
decades." Now, if somebody two decades hence wanted to decide inarguably if
you were right or wrong about that forecast, what would be the evidence of
that? How would someone know whether you were right? 

Sale: I would say that you can measure it in three ways. The first would be
an economic collapse. The dollar would be worthless, the yen would be
worthless, the mark would be worthless - the dislocation we saw in the
Depression of 1930, magnified many times over. A second would be the
distention within various societies of the rich and the poor, in which the
poor, who comprise, let's say, a fifth of society, are no longer content to
be bought off with alcohol and television and drugs, and rises up in
rebellion. And at the same time, there would be the same kind of distention
within nations, in which the poor nations are no longer content to take the
crumbs from our table, and rise up in either a military or some other form
against the richer societies. And then the third is accumulating
environmental problems, such that Australia, for example, becomes unlivable
because of the ozone hole there, and Africa, from the Sahara to South
Africa, becomes unlivable because of new diseases that have been uncovered
through deforestation. At any rate, environmental catastrophes on a
significant scale. 


Kelly: So you have multinational global currency collapse, social friction
and warfare both between the rich and the poor and within nations, and you
have continentwide environmental disasters causing death and great
migrations of people. All by the year 2020, yes? How certain are you about
all this, what you call your optimism? 

Sale: Well, I have spent the last 20 years looking into these problems, and
I have suggested to my daughters, who are in their 20s, that it would be a
mistake to have children. 


Kelly: Would you be willing to bet on your view? 

Sale: Sure. 


Kelly: OK. [Pulls out a check.] Here's a check for a thousand dollars, made
out to Bill Patrick, our mutual book editor. I bet you US$1,000 that in the
year 2020, we're not even close to the kind of disaster you describe - a
convergence of three disasters: global currency collapse, significant
warfare between rich and poor, and environmental disasters of some
significant size. We won't even be close. I'll bet on my optimism. 

Sale: [Pauses. Then smiles.] OK. 

[Sales reaches over to checkbook on his desk and writes out a check. They
shake hands.] 

Kelly: Oh, boy, this is easy money! But you know, besides the money, I
really hope I am right. 

Sale: I hope you are right, too. 

______________

Natasha


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