HAT Manifesto Part 1/3 - Rubric Cube - 240804 revision

 

From The Birth of Plenty. William Bernstein. 2010. Kindle online sample. Section 1.

From book sample:

Captain George Proctor of the HMS Centurion had every reason to thank watchmaker

JOHN HARRISON, WHO HAD ACCOMPANIED HIS H-1 MARINE CHRONOMETER—A LARGE AND EXTREMELY ACCURATE CLOCK USED TO COMPUTE LONGITUDE—on its first sea trials in the late spring of 1737.

As the faint line of the English coast rose above the horizon, Centurion’s navigator, relying on traditional dead reckoning, calculated that the ship was sailing in safe waters south of Dartmouth.

Harrison disagreed.

His clock placed them about eighty miles from Dartmouth, in hazardous waters just off the Lizard, a peninsula at the far southwestern tip of England.

Taking no chances, the captain turned east and confirmed a few hours later that Harrison’s computation had been dead on.

…

Proctor’s caution would have been readily understandable to any seafaring contemporary.

Thirty years earlier, Admiral Sir Clowdesley Shovell, making the same navigational error, had driven his fleet onto the Scilly Isles, drowning more than two thousand men.

That catastrophe riveted British public attention on the need for improved navigational techniques.

Aside from possibly owing his life to Harrison, PROCTOR HAD ALSO UNKNOWINGLY WITNESSED ONE OF HISTORY’S GREAT TURNING POINTS, ranking with the invention of the steam engine, the development of representative democracy, and the battle of Waterloo.

…

THE ADVENT OF A RELIABLE MARINE CHRONOMETER HELPED TRANSFORM MARITIME TRADE FROM AN UNCERTAIN AND OFTEN DEADLY VENTURE INTO A RELIABLE WEALTH MACHINE.

Two and a half centuries later, Harrison’s clock, on display at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich and still keeping accurate time to within a fraction of a second per day, remains a marvel.

But it was, in fact, the least conspicuous of the technologic advances of the remarkable era that ran from 1730 to 1850.

…

Few ordinary citizens ever saw a marine chronometer, whereas the other great advances of that period—the modern canal system, the steam engine, and the telegraph—were readily visible to everyone.

Since the dawn of the modern era, it has been the conceit the technologic advances of the day are unique and revolutionary—certainly, the thinking in our time is no exception.

This is, however, an illusion.

To see the full effect of scientific progress on human affairs, we need look no further than THE TECHNOLOGIC EXPLOSION THAT OCCURRED IN THOSE 120 YEARS AND TRANSFORMED LIFE FROM THE TOP TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SOCIAL FABRIC.

At a stroke, the speed of transportation increased tenfold, and communication became almost instantaneous.

As recently as the turn of the nineteenth century, it took Thomas Jefferson ten days to travel from Monticello to Philadelphia, with considerable attendant expense, physical pain, and peril.

By 1850, the steam locomotive made the same journey possible in one day, and at a tiny fraction of its former price in money, discomfort, and risk.

…

As put by historian Stephen Ambrose: A critical fact in the world of 1801 was that nothing moved faster than the speed of a horse.

Nothing had moved any faster, and, as far as Jefferson’s contemporaries were able to tell, nothing ever would.

WITH THE INVENTION OF THE TELEGRAPH BY WILLIAM FOTHERGILL COOKE AND CHARLES WHEATSTONE IN ENGLAND IN 1837, INSTANTANEOUS COMMUNICATION ABRUPTLY, INCREDIBLY, ALTERED THE WORLD, of economic, military, and political affairs in ways that dwarf the changes wrought in this century by the airplane and the computer.

Before the telegraph, the primitive state of communication routinely led to tragedy, both great and small.

Andrew Jackson’s bloody victory over the British at New Orleans in 1815, for example, occurred two weeks after the signing of a peace treaty at Ghent.

…

SINCE 1850, THE PACE OF TECHNOLOGICAL PROGRESS HAS SLOWED SLIGHTLY, NOT ACCELERATED.

The average inhabitant of the Western world who was alive in 1950 would have no trouble grasping the technology of the year 2000.

On the other hand, everyday life in the year 1850 would have dumbfounded the average citizen of fifty years earlier.

…

The economic turmoil that began in 2007 has yielded much blather about a “new normal” of lower growth.

Healthy capital markets are indeed an essential ingredient of economic progress, and yet the world economy has rebounded from financial crises far worse than the recent one.

The reason for this resilience is simple: CAPITAL MARKET BOOM AND BUST TURBULENCE DOES NOT FUNDAMENTALLY ALTER THE ULTIMATE SOURCE OF ECONOMIC GROWTH—THE RELATIVELY STEADY FLOW OF SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCE.

…

The qualitative examination of history and culture teaches us only so much.

In the end, the ultimate measure of progress is statistical.

What measurable improvements have been made in a nation’s literacy, longevity, and wealth?

WHEN WE LOOK AT THE NUMBERS, IT BECOMES CRYSTAL CLEAR SOMETHING HAPPENED AT SOME POINT IN THE EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY.

Before that time, the rate of improvement in the lot of mankind was small and stuttering, and after it, the rate was substantial and steady.

…

This does not devalue the intellectual and scientific advances during the three centuries after the Renaissance.

But the bald fact is, THE RENAISSANCE [1300s~1600s] AND THE ENLIGHTENMENT [1685~1815] ONLY MINIMALLY IMPROVED THE LOT OF THE AVERAGE PERSON.

How do we know this? From the study of economic history.

The best way to measure the impact of intellectual and scientific progress is to examine its footprint at ground level.

Just how much did the per capita economic output of Italy, France, Holland, and Great Britain grow over the centuries?

What happened to life expectancies? Educational levels?

…

Thanks to the efforts of economic historians over the past several decades, this quantitative portrait of mankind’s progress has slowly come into focus.

The numbers tell a striking story.

UNTIL APPROXIMATELY 1820, PER CAPITA WORLD ECONOMIC GROWTH REGISTERED NEAR ZERO.

…

In the centuries after the Fall of Rome, Europe’s wealth actually declined, as NUMEROUS CRITICAL TECHNOLOGIES SIMPLY DISAPPEARED.

The most important of these was cement, which would not be rediscovered for thirteen centuries.

The great tragedy of the premodern era was large bodies of knowledge were lost for millennia.

…

Before Gutenberg and Bacon, INVENTORS LACKED TWO CRITICAL ADVANTAGES WE TAKE FOR GRANTED TODAY: ROBUST INFORMATION STORAGE AND A FIRM FOUNDATION OF SCIENTIFIC THEORY.

The lack of a scientific method meant technological advances relied purely on trial and error and were thus few and far between.

Furthermore, absent the printing press, inventors and manufacturers could record their work in only a few places.

Consequently, inventions were frequently “lost,” and the technological and economic condition of the ancients retrogressed almost as often as it advanced.

…

True, beginning about A.D. 1000, there had been improvement in human well-being, but it was so slow and unreliable that it was not noticeable during the average person’s twenty-five-year life span.

Then, SOON AFTER 1820, PROSPERITY BEGAN FLOWING IN AN EVER-INCREASING TORRENT.

With each successive generation, the life of the son became observably more comfortable, informed, and predictable than that of the father.

…

This book will examine the nature, causes, and consequences of this transformation.

The first section will unfold the compelling narrative told by these new data.

I will identify the points in both time and space where economic growth sprang to life after millennia of slumber.

I will also describe and examine the history of THE FOUR FACTORS THAT ARE THE ESSENTIAL ingredients for igniting and sustaining economic growth and human progress:

-PROPERTY RIGHTS

-SCIENTIFIC RATIONALISM

-CAPITAL MARKETS

-IMPROVEMENTS IN TRANSPORT AND COMMUNICATION

…

The second section tells the story of when and how these factors came into play: first in Holland, then in England and its cultural offspring, followed, in turn, by the rest of Europe, Japan, and, finally, the remainder of East Asia.

In each case, I will dissect the takeoff in growth and find NOT UNTIL ALL FOUR OF THE FACTORS JUST MENTIONED ARE IN PLACE CAN A NATION PROSPER.

…

Although I try to maintain a global perspective throughout this book, many readers will find its focus overly Eurocentric.

WERE NOT THE CHINESE—THE INVENTORS OF PAPER, THE PRINTING PRESS, AND GUNPOWDER—THE GREAT INNOVATIVE ENGINEERS OF THE PREMODERN WORLD?

Were not the early Arab empires oases of learning and culture during a time when Europe was mired in the Dark Ages?

Did not mathematicians in India devise a numerical system, incorporating the concept of zero, far more advanced than the Greco-Roman letter-based system?

To all these questions, the answer is a resounding yes.

…

YET NOT ONE OF THESE SOCIETIES WAS ABLE TO TURN THE MODERN WESTERN TRICK OF CONTINUOUSLY AND PERMANENTLY RAISING ITS CITIZENS’ STANDARD OF LIVING.

Furthermore, the four factors responsible for modern wealth—property rights, borne on the common law, scientific rationalism, advanced capital markets, and the great advances in transportation and communication—were largely European in origin.

Although prosperity has become a global phenomenon, there is no escaping the fact its nursery lay in the area between Glasgow and Genoa.

…

Finally, the book’s third section will plumb the sociological, political, economic, and military consequences of the great disparities in personal and national wealth that have arisen from this birth of plenty, and what the consequences of growth have in store for the future.

Recent advances in the social sciences provide us with a fascinating window on the complex interaction of societal values, wealth, and politics.

First, the bad news: IN A WORLD GROWING MORE AND MORE PROSPEROUS, PEOPLE ARE NOT NECESSARILY BECOMING HAPPIER, PARTICULARLY IN THE WEST.

But the good news is substantial improvements in individual well-being are occurring in developing nations.

As nations advance from the third world to the first, their citizens do indeed become more satisfied.

…

We’ll find ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT FACILITATES DEMOCRACY, BUT DEMOCRACY DOES NOT FACILITATE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT.

Too much democracy may actually be bad for economic growth.

The rule of law is the essential bulwark of a robust system of property rights.

Property rights, in turn, are essential to prosperity, which itself is the essential fertile soil in which democracy flourishes.

…

In the book’s original 2004 printing, I opined optimism about democratic development in a nation whose traditional cultural values are antithetical to the rule of law—such as Iraq or Afghanistan—was likely to prove costly and dangerous, DEMOCRACY CAN RESULT IN ANARCHY.

The past few years have, unfortunately, borne out this prediction.

…

I will argue THE DESTINIES OF NATIONS ARE DETERMINED FAR MORE BY THEIR ECONOMIC DYNAMISM THAN BY THE VAGARIES OF WAR, CULTURE, AND POLITICS.

The current world hegemony underwritten by American military might is no accident.

History teaches the fate of all great world powers is decay and downfall, but this will not occur to the United States until other nations both surpass America in economic productivity and take an interest in projecting power.

…

Despite the economic turmoil that began in 2007, the United States solidly controls the world’s major sea lanes and maritime choke points, and can still project power across the globe in a way that no other nation can.

This will not likely change any time soon.

More important, FOR THE FORESEEABLE FUTURE NO NATION CAN EXISTENTIALLY THREATEN THE AMERICAN HOMELAND WITHOUT INCURRING ITS OWN CERTAIN ANNIHILATION.

By examining how our world prospered when and where it did, we just may be able to better divine where it is we are going.

(end of section 1)

… …

(own comment)

“Economic development facilitates democracy but democracy does not facilitate economic development.”

More wealth solves social problems, more politics creates social problems.

Democrats get into government because zei love to, Republicans because they have to.