Rising Complexity

The phrase 'rising complexity' is not a very common idea discussed or explored in most fields of studies, and, perhaps, there is only one field of study that allows us to see the amazing story behind the rising complexity: The Big History.

The Big History was introduced by David Christian. It starts from the big bang theory and investigates the first atoms, the formation of stars and the first life on earth. It culminates in the formation of human civilization. This study spans all forms of study; from astronomy to biology to humanity. The whole story surrounds and depends on one phrase, “rising complexity”. This resounding phrase refers to how multiple simple elements, or something similar, have worked together to form more complex effects which in turn create far more complexities. Since not everyone is not on the same term with most of the facts in Big History, I will focus only on the advancements of civilization to explain the ideas behind “rising complexity” in more detail.

After the agricultural revolution, we experienced the first population boom, and that means more people working with each other. There was much more diversity since everyone focused on different functions. Complexities within and among humanity had risen constantly after that, but the industrial revolution had more of an astounding impact. After the invention of the railroads and steam power, the world became smaller than most people originally thought. Travelling and transferring goods became efficient and convenient; people communicated at much faster speed. Then the invention of fertilizer came about during the industrial revolution, which brought us the second population boom, and thus pushed complexity into a new threshold: modernization.

Humanity was advancing because of the rising complexity brought upon by development. In other words, in order to ensure long-term survival, we need to keep pace with this complexity rising. People who cannot keep up with these complexities are seen to be slowing down the ever rising complexity are, therefore, not contributing to society.

There are three ways to look at how we can bring this complexity to the next stage: through politics, social dependence and interactions and economic situations.

Politics, determined by international borders and customs control, prevents easy communication between people in the world. All leaders of nations tend to focus their attention on their own respective countries rather than the global good. They hoard and accumulate all resources to themselves and very rarely share them. If the relationship between countries worsen, ideas and resources are prevented from being exchanged. 

Some people argue that competition between countries, for instance the ‘Space Race’, results in better innovation when countries work separately than together as competition accelerates ingenuity. This argument is contradictory as in Nature, working with each other usually provides a higher chance of survival than competing against one another. Homo sapiens are social animals who are dependent on each other to survive, because our gene dictates that we do not harm our own species, like many other primates. Yet, our society and education brought us up this way, to compete with other people and 'survive' in this society.

In social terms, Ken Robinson reports that our education system is killing creativity. I totally agree with him, because we value Math and Science more than Speech and Drama. He believes this happened because of industrialism that gives people an illusion that Math and Science are more important than many other subjects. If this issue is seen from the point of view of rising complexity, it makes more sense. Some people have potential in other fields of studies, like the Arts or in Music, but our education system often marginalizes these people. Parents need to pay money and take extra time for their child to go to tuition centres or academies to learn these skills. It halts diversity and ignores, sometimes discriminates, people who think differently.

Racism also plays a big role in slowing down complexity. Just like national borders, racism forces people to limit their connections and cooperation with others. I noticed that each race holds a slightly different genetic code that brings different potential to each race. Thanks to capitalism, some races are not receiving the equal chance to maximize their own potential. If all races learn to work with each other, we will have more diversity, as each race sees things differently, and, therefore, further boosts rising complexity.

In terms of economy however, capitalism plays a huge role in slowing down rising complexity, because it emphasizes more on competition than on teamwork. In capitalism, whoever has the most money is the most powerful. People who are successful economically will be more superior to people who are good at other things, like artistic expressions. Not many people want to donate their money to those who need it more and also the governments would rather invest money in things that can bring them more money instead of other things which will be more beneficial to the people.

In our current situation, I think the best way to keep this complexity rising is to dispel poverty in third-world countries. According to research, around 0.1% of the human population considered to be 'genius' or 'gifted', and this has not included those immensely talented in athletics. If this is the case, there should be 7 million geniuses around the world, and why is this fact not so? This is because most geniuses, from birth, do not receive proper education and miss the chance to be one of the most influential people in history.

Rising complexity is just one of the ways to see how our society can improve in leaps and bounds in the right direction. We really should learn to evaluate the things that we do in our everyday lives. Our goal to live is not for our own survival only, but for the survival of the species. I hope this article allows you to look at our world in a different perspective and realize how corrupted humanity really is.

Money is the root of all evil

1 Timothy 6:10: "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil...” I'm almost certain that Paul did not mean this literally because it is not the root of all evil, but one of the many causes of evil. Due to this, I do not agree with the following statement 'money is the root of all evil'. However, if I tweak it a little, by changing it to 'money will be the root of all evil', I would argue that that is a true prediction. Please take note that for a monetary system to work, greed for money must exist, therefore money and the greed for money are fundamentally the same thing. One day, money will be the source of all evils, and we will no longer be able to rely on it, despite its efficiPncy.

Before I explain the disadvantages of money, we need to first understand the current trend of our economy, and how the role of money is changing within the last few decades. The trends of the economic systems of many nations are quite obvious: it is moving towards socialism. The rapid growth of China proves that a mix of both capitalism and communism is able to thrive economically. It also proves that a communist state is not always a failure and that it can co-exist with capitalism. The high levels of happiness and literacy rates of the Scandinavian nations are also worth a mention. Many of these nations adopted many socialistic policies and were able to achieve economic equality, yet strive economically in the world. It is very important to understand that many capitalist models that we adopt nowadays are getting less efficient and a solution is required. Within a short-term period, we will have to reform our system to provide greater flexibility and complexity for our society.

The role of money changes as well in recent times. As time passes by, the 'value of money' itself is increasing and the power of money is growing stronger. One of the most obvious changes is the ability to acquire happiness with money. As of now, money can gain you some degree of happiness, like buying your favourite album or visiting your dream nation. In the past, most people couldn’t do either because there was limited use for money. Still, as of now, money can't buy you pure happiness. You can't really earn real friends or a sincere lover with money because money can't buy you pure happiness. However, this may change in the future as it is very likely that the 'value of money' will increase to a point where you will be able to 'buy' relationships. There is no guarantee that money will not be able to buy pure happiness in the future, but if it actually happens, happiness will become worthless and purposeless.

The two points mentioned above are actually related. Happiness is becoming worthless because of capitalism which makes consumers money-orientated and self-interested. In this sense, assuming we are not moving towards socialism, someday in the future, everything that we do will be driven by the increased greed for money. Someday, all the evils and sins that we do will be caused by the greed of money, instead of the greed of satisfaction, honour, pride or fame. Even if we move towards socialism, the problem will be delayed, but it will still be there, because of, well, many reasons that I will explain further.

Money's role is as a medium of exchange, but most people nowadays treat it like a necessity of life, like water. This is very dangerous because money is not a biological need, it is not necessary, but it has been treated as if it is necessary. A person's greed for money is nearly infinite while greed for biological needs is finite, you can't eat an infinite amount of food. It is because of this reason we have 'infinite' amounts of luxurious goods to spend money on. To produce these goods, we need resources, and since our greed of luxury is unlimited, these resources will deplete very quickly. This phenomenon is very obvious as basic needs like water, and sooner air, are depleting quickly. What happen if we live in a socialistic society, will it solve the problem? No, because the society's greed for luxury is still there and still infinite, it would be easier to control and provide greater flexibility to delay the problem.

Since money is a medium of exchange, let's think of it as an exchange. People spend energy and time to earn money, and then they use the money to acquire luxuries and basic needs that other people spend time and energy to produce. In this exchange, there are three things that are involved: energy, time and money. Amongst all three, money is the most valuable, because it can be stored while spending time and energy will give you some payback in the form of experience or relationship (making it less valuable). You are more likely to spend a day's worth of time and energy than a day's worth of salary to help someone. Therefore, it makes sense to say that people are more likely to help one another in the form of time and energy than in the form of money. However, we are living in a world where money dominates everything. It will only make people more self-interested and less likely to help one another when helping one another is the most effective way to solve most of the world's greatest issues.

Before the agricultural revolution, people used the barter system to trade with each other. When currency and money were introduced, trade became more complex than ever, benefitting all parties. However, the barter system had a great advantage that is easily neglected: tribes that use barter system tended to rely on 'gift economy' more than tribes that use monetary system and this promotes selflessness. Gift economy is a mode of exchange where valuables are not traded or sold, but rather given without an explicit agreement for immediate or future rewards. This method is increasingly crucial to long-term human survival because people who rely on the gift economy are more selfless than those who don't. For example, poverty is an urging issue that we have to tackle, gift economy is the best way to deal with it, but its effectiveness is hindered by our monetary system. At some point in the future, both capitalistic and socialistic societies will face an issue where the monetary system is hindering advancement and reducing complexity because monetary system is the reason why people's skills and talents are not at their full potential. It is also the reason why people are selfish, therefore we can blame selfishness (thus all evil) on the monetary system.

I agree with most people that money is one of the most influential innovations of human civilization, so is feudalism and slavery, but that does not mean it will always be the most efficient invention. One day, it will fail us. People may ask,"how can we run our economy without money?", and my answer is this: I'm not sure. There is a utopian model that might work, but it is too far out and seemingly impossible. I can identify the problem, but I do not have a substitution or a solution, so I'm asking you to help me out. You must realize and recognize the problem, and try to solve it, no matter how hard it may seem. 

Human Advancement: the Why of Human History

We humans are special. Technically, we are animals, and we are one of the few species that managed to evolve the brain significantly.  This allows us to be curious and acquire the skill of collective learning which is what sets us apart, making us different. For thousands of years dominating the Earth, we have advanced rapidly, from the Palaeolithic Age to the Modern Age. However, have we been advancing as we should, progressively? Or have we been advancing into extinction?

I can split our advancement into two types, the physical advancement and the mental advancement. These two types of advancement are strongly connected and ignoring either one of them may result in a major society breaking-up. Physical advancement refers to the advancement achieved through technology. Mental advancement leans towards our mental behaviour and how we treat each other, as well as towards the environment.

The history of physical advancement is what we studied from our textbooks, from the prehistoric periods to the dawn of civilisations, to golden age of the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, the Dark Ages, the Renaissance and Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, and last but not least the Modern Era. I don't need to elaborate more on these textbook materials.

As for mental advancement, we don't really study it even though we already know  about it. During the prehistoric times, humans killed  each other for they didn't know what care and love were. Around the time when language was developed, humans learnt to communicate and express feelings with each. They cared for each other and unity was developed. After that, they  relied on feudalism, which was another weakness that they did not notice. Now, we understand that democracy is more efficient than feudalism as it keeps our society in harmony and peace, so we replaced  feudalism with democracy. In short, the more mentally advanced we are, the less selfish and more mature we will be. 

Therefore, we are advancing mentally too, but what exactly connects these two advancements?
I have tried to study history's pattern and I discovered three crucial rules of it:

1. Our physical advancement, also known as technological  advancement, can surpass our mentality's maturity.
2. Yet, there is a certain 'limit' for physical advancement. The ‘limit’ increases when we advance mentally. It is a limit that can't be calculated but can be pictured. When we reach this ‘limit’, major society breakup will occur.
3. It is impossible for our mentality to advance further than technology. It is because our technology will definitely progress when our mentality steps forward. Again, it can't be calculated and can only be pictured.

Before and during world wars, humans used technology and weapons to fight against each other, and thus, physical advancement was misused. Some of us even used our power to conquer other countries. For example, the British used their industrial advantage and weaponry to strike fear among our ancestors, the Malaysians, and I'm very sure that my country is not the only one who suffered from that. During World War II, Japan and Germany definitely used weapons in their attempt to conquer the world. After World War II, we managed to achieve peace, which means our mentality improved. When the United Nations was formed, ever since then, we were gradually adapting to the changes in the structure of the society.

These points show that when peace is achieved, we can actually advance further physically. Unfortunately, there is a limit to it. As we hit the mark, society will eventually start to break up because our mental state cannot accommodate the physical state. In this day and age, we are reaching the limit due to the rapid advancement of technology. I'm afraid that the society will crumble if we continue to be adamant and refuse to control ourselves.

I've found proof from the past 50 years that point towards our downfall in the near future that we will fall apart sooner or later. Firstly, we are using technology to hurt Mother Nature. Secondly, most people nowadays talk to each other virtually instead of talking face to face. Thirdly, humans are more dependent on technology. If we allow this to go on, one of the possible consequences of our society in the future is that technology will somehow outsmart us and develop self-awareness. When this happens, the downfall of mankind will soon follow.

Mental advancement is a very interesting and important topic, yet most people do not know  about its importance. Perhaps it might be hard for us to change the current generation, but don't forget that we can still educate the next generation and will, hopefully, be able to advance into a better world and brighter future.