Thinking- In the Age of Complexity
Adam Smith – The Invisible Hand
In economics, the invisible hand of the market is a metaphor used by Adam Smith to describe the self-regulating behaviour of the marketplace. Individuals can make profit, and maximize it without the need for government intervention. The exact phrase is used just three times in Smith's writings, but has come to capture his important claim that individuals' efforts to maximize their own gains in a free market may benefit society, even if the ambitious have no benevolent intentions. Smith came up with the two meanings of the phrase from Richard Cantillon who developed both economic applications in his model of the isolated estate.
He first introduced the concept in The Theory of Moral Sentiments, written in 1759. In this work, however, the idea of the market is not discussed, and the word "capitalism" is never used. By the time he wrote The Wealth of Nations in 1776, Smith had studied the economic models of the French Physiocrats for many years, and in this work the invisible hand is more directly linked to the concept of the market: specifically that it is competition between buyers and sellers that channels the profit motive of individuals on both sides of the transaction such that improved products are produced and at lower costs. This process whereby competition channels ambition toward socially desirable ends comes out most clearly in The Wealth of Nations, Book I,
The idea of markets automatically channelling self-interest toward socially desirable ends is a central justification for the laissez-faire economic philosophy, which lies behind neoclassical economics. In this sense, the central disagreement between economic ideologies can be viewed as a disagreement about how powerful the "invisible hand" is. In alternative models, forces which were nascent during Smith's life, such as large-scale industry, finance, and advertising, reduce its effectiveness. From Wikipedia
Nascent: in the process of emerging, being born, or starting to develop
“John…. you are so complex” is the most common comment I hear about who I am and what I do. I have always looked at relationships and the between-ness of the relationships. Which means I’m always looking at what caused the way something happens. Today, I’m sure with 100% confidence that the planet is in the age of Complexity for all HUBEINGS. Like it or not….
In other words, every man, woman and their children (HUBEINGS) are linked by relationships and now Omni-inter-relationships or the between-ness of everything. We now live on a planet that has so much pollution that every being (HUBEING, Animal, Mineral, Plant) on this planet is being affected by invisible forces created by decisions that are made by a small few HUBEINGS!-!
As people occupying this planet, we can all apprehend that there is something big brewing, yet we just can’t get to a moment of comprehension and then finally repeatable knowledge.
I believe that the few could be of a belief that what they do is for the common good of this Planet. Yet we are driven as HUBEINGS by thinking and decisions that are not Aware or Present. A lot of decisions are created by mathematic formula that are the invisible hand forces of today.
In 1759, Adam Smith recognized the concept of the invisible hand. Now more than ever, there is an invisible hand. I believe that what makes the visibility difficult is the speed, width, and depth of the information each HUBEING has to deal with on a daily basis.
In 1843, Ada Lovelace wrote a scientific paper describing a machine that Charles Babbage proposed. Although his Analytical Engine was never built, Ada Lovelace’s description covered four main concepts that are embodied in modern-day computers although they were not invented until a century after her notes were written. She described a multi-purpose machine that could process and act upon anything that could be expressed in symbols. This machine could be given instructions on what to do by way of a sequence of operations. She also made clear that the machine would never be able to think on its own. It Hollerith created tabulator machines that made use of electrical circuits to process information. He went on to establish the company now known as International Business Machines Corporation (IBM).From Summaries, Instaread (2014-11-08). The Innovators by Walter Isaacson – A 30-minute Summary: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution (Kindle Locations 38-43). Instaread Summaries. Kindle Edition.
The real point of this is that in 1843, Ada Lovelace realized that the computers would be tools for decision making, not the decision makers.
International Conference of Weights and Measures in 1967 to declare that it was time to reinvent time. In the new era, the master time for the planet would be measured in atomic seconds: “the duration of 9,192,631,770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the caesium 133 atom.” A day was no longer the time it took the earth to complete one rotation. A day became 86,400 atomic seconds, ticked off on 270 synchronized atomic clocks around the world. From Johnson, Steven (2014-09-30). How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World (p. 187). Penguin Group US. Kindle Edition.
1967 was the acceleration of complexity. We could now do business and transfer information in less than a tick and a toc…HUBEINGS have the capacity now to work in the vibration of caesium 133 atom. HUBEINGS are now getting into the rhythms and beats of the Biosphere.
1969 First nodes of ARPANET installed. 1969 The ARPANET ended up representing an interesting conjunction of military and academic interests. It was funded by the Defence Department, which tended to want hierarchal command systems with centralized controls. From Isaacson, Walter (2014-10-07). The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution (Kindle Locations 4356-4357). Simon & Schuster. Kindle Edition.
The internet was the beginning of the acceleration of complexities of inter-relationships for OMNI-Beings.
Now everything is being prodded and measured to see the movement across time and then to see how it relates to Omni-Omni Macro of realities. Macro-thinking/Micro-Action is the new thinking of complexities.
Just to make the complexities more interesting, Richard Nixon took the US economy off the gold standard.
The Nixon Shock was a series of economic measures undertaken by United States President Richard Nixon in 1971, the most significant of which was the unilateral cancellation of the direct convertibility of the United States dollar to gold.
While Nixon's actions did not formally abolish the existing Bretton Woods system of international financial exchange, the suspension of one of its key components effectively rendered the Bretton Woods system inoperable. While Nixon publicly stated his intention to resume direct convertibility of the dollar after reforms to the Bretton Woods system had been implemented, all attempts at reform proved unsuccessful. By 1973, the Bretton Woods system was replaced de facto by a regime based on freely floating fiat currencies that remains in place to the present day.
Speaking on television on August 15, the Sunday before the markets opened, Nixon said the following:
The third indispensable element in building the new prosperity is closely related to creating new jobs and halting inflation. We must protect the position of the American dollar as a pillar of monetary stability around the world.
In the past 7 years, there has been an average of one international monetary crisis every year…
I have directed Secretary Connally to suspend temporarily the convertibility of the dollar into gold or other reserve assets, except in amounts and conditions determined to be in the interest of monetary stability and in the best interests of the United States.
Now, what is this action — which is very technical — what does it mean for you?
Let me lay to rest the bugaboo of what is called devaluation.
If you want to buy a foreign car or take a trip abroad, market conditions may cause your dollar to buy slightly less. But if you are among the overwhelming majority of Americans who buy American-made products in America, your dollar will be worth just as much tomorrow as it is today.
The effect of this action, in other words, will be to stabilize the dollar. From Wikipedia
The whole Biosphere is now being affected by the complexities of relationships and inter-relationships. It will be a rollercoaster ride of complexities until we as HUBEINGS come to term with the idea that risk will always be part of what we do and machines are tools, not the decision makers and that the fear of the machine is just errant nonsense. All HUBEINGS are blessed with a brain and a Mind. It is time to take responsibility and be accountable to our birth right and think for ourselves……
Complexity is not going away in a big hurry. Strap in for the ride. It is only going to get faster before it slows down.
JDS OUT!_!
