Energy Accounting

[Sentinel]

Initially, I'd like to point out that this thread is primarily meant for discussing energy accounting, not technocracy as whole (there are already at least two threads on it).

I've got familiar with their movement quite recently and dare yet not make up my mind on them.

But so far I've noticed that they seem to have some very radical and modern methods to bury capitalism for good.

The opinions about technocracy on this board are mixed, ranging from "sounds really good so far", "sounds good but is not possible (at least in a long time)" to "they want to put an elite of scientists in power and are reactionary".

Whoever is right about that, I think their methods are worth an unbiased analysis to show if some or maybe all of them could be adopted by the revolutionary proletariat.

Without a second thought, the most interesting theory they have to offer is that of
"Energy Accounting".

To me it seems as a modern and extremely clever method for abolition of money and with it obviously capitalism, and optimizing the production in the society.

What is your opinion, comrades? Could a socialist state striving to build communism
use this method? And as a final solution or as a phase? If not, why?

Read the American technocrat message board's definition of Energy Accounting:


Originally posted by tehnocracy.ca
The Scientific Answer

Technocracy's Energy Certificate is the only instrument of distribution which can be used in this Continent's emerging era of abundance--the progress of which is being speeded up by automation. This Energy Certificate provides the accounting means whereby each individual North American can express his individual preference as to what he wants of the products North America is capable of producing. That is its function--to record the demand for goods and services and, thereby, to determine the amount to be produced. By applying one specific technological measuring device, production and consumption can be balanced and the first specification for social harmony is immediately achievable.

Vote With Meaning

The only real vote is purchasing power. What we buy we vote for. With an abundance of purchasing power we can vote as often as we like, every day of the year, and always win our vote.

The Energy Certificate eliminates both the basis and the need of all social work and charity. It would reduce crime to but a small fraction of what exists today.

If you don't like the war, the poverty, the misery, the waste, the crime, the disease, and the corruption which the Price System spawns, why do you stick with it?

The entire article:

http://www.technocracy.ca/modules.php?op=m...&artid=6&page=1 (http://www.technocracy.ca/modules.php?op=modload&name=Sections&file=index&req=viewarticle&artid=6&page=1)

I hope you find this worthy a discussion! :)

[Shredder]

Technocracy is along the same vein of thought that got me interested in communism in the first place - namely, the realization that a planned economy will always outperform a private capitalist economy. But from that point, they have made startlingly little progress in terms of solid criticisms of capitalism or detailed projections of a successful replacement.

But seriously, guys, stop bolding things at random. It's obnoxious when Redstar does it, and it's obnoxious when you do it. Stop.

[Sentinel]

the realization that a planned economy will always outperform a private capitalist economy.

But they go beyond planned economy, by abolishing money completely.


But from that point, they have made startlingly little progress in terms of solid criticisms of capitalism or detailed projections of a successful replacement.

What amazes me is rather that the left in general hasn't adopted their methods in their theories for moving towards communism. They've been around for a while after all..

Why are they not noticed more widely? It seems suspicious. Is energy accounting
too radical or something to actually work? Or is the left too dogmatic?


But seriously, guys, stop bolding things at random. It's obnoxious when Redstar does it, and it's obnoxious when you do it. Stop.

I think it makes reading posts much more enjoyable. Do you think it's cool or mature in some way to write in a boring fashion? This is a matter of taste though, I guess.
I think the topic of this thread is important. Let's not make this a discussion on typing ethics, please. ;)

:rolleyes:

[JKP]

Lower stage communism with labour time vouchers make technocracy superfluous.

[Sentinel]

Lower stage communism with labour time vouchers make technocracy superfluous.

How is that? Could you explain more in detail?

[Cult of Reason]

Why are they not noticed more widely? It seems suspicious. Is energy accounting too radical or something to actually work? Or is the left too dogmatic?


Well, for the last few decades they have been pretty much unheard of, declining as the economy improved after WW2. There are, of course, conspiracy theories related to true events. A few years ago, a very (very) old Technocrat did get some documents from the FBI (personally signed by J. Edgar Hoover, no less), but I do not know what is in them,

They were suppressed a little in WW2, with the Canadian government seizing some property and money (none of which returned). The real suppression was probably through the Capitalist press, however. At the point at which Technocracy was "released into the wild", there was much press attention. Then, when they started to actually read about it, the press attacked it, and then ignored it. This would have increased the effect of the improving economy.

Is the left too dogmatic? Having not encountered many Left people, really, I cannot say. However, some Marxists do seem to regard everything about Marx to be sacred and not to be questioned.


Lower stage communism with labour time vouchers make technocracy superfluous.

How can that be if human labour plays so insignificant a role in real production? Also, if there is more than enough for everybody (abundance), then how long you work would be irrelevant anyway, so the only purpose of the distribution system is to monitor consumption and maintain a balance. How would labour time measurement help with this? If there was an increase in demand, how would a labout time system increase production? Increase working hours? Also, how does it take into account the fact that in most production it is possible to have things produced with almost no human involvement?

[Sentinel]

As I see it, LTV could perhaps be used in a transition period before energy accounting is applied. It will propably take a while before the society can be automated to the degree necessary.

But this is of course the case, should the proletarian revolution occur in a very near future.

I myself am rather convinced that it will be the other way around, and automation of society and the means of production, along with technological development in general will bring on the revolution.

Of course together with other details of capitalism's approaching suicide.

I'd also "predict" a rapidly growing global resistance to imperialism in this century.

We will become one with the technology in the future, it shall serve us in every aspect of our lives. And the ones controlling the technology will initially be the capitalists, but that control will be twisted off their hands by the awakening proletariat. :)

I'd hope all of our comrades recognised the importance of technological progress in modern human society, and revolutionary struggle.

[Ol' Dirty]

Technocracy is a rather enlightened thought on economics and social advancement. It would be excellent if we could use our technology for something more useful than oppresing the lower classes, such as maximizing the efficiency of work to better the quality of life for all people (I enjoy bolding statements as well :) .)

Energy economy is the best alternative to currency in the future that I can see. It has the potential of replacing human labor with labor generally done by machines. Theoretically, humankind would eventually stop worrying about producing recources, and start fulfilling our own needs.

[encephalon]

the biggest problem I have with tochnocracy as an independent ideology is that its constituents generally regard the world's current economy as one of economic abundance. I find this rather flabbergasting. Scarcity still plays a huge role in many, many commodities--including energy itself.

As for energy accounting, I think it's a half-step in the right direction, at least as far as economic planning is concerned. The problem, however, is that it measures things still in the same manner as capitalism: an almost ethereal and ambiguous concept to which it's difficult to attach a real material value. One could, granted, measure it in amperes or something of the like; but then you have the problem of measuring the energy it takes to create that energy. Are you going to measure the human labor involved with energy creation (at least energy made for human consumption) with voltage and amps?

It's as superfluous to say that energy is the fundamental unit of all human consumption as much as it is to say that money is the fundamental unit. Money doesn't produce (save for the production of capital), and energy-for-consumption doesn't produce, at least in the sense that it produces alone. It does produce in tandem with human labor, but human labor is what creates human value. Human labor, when it boils down to it, is what creates the form of energy used for human consumption. Human labor harnesses energy.

Which brings me to this: energy is a commodity, and transferable as a money value today. I would go so far to say, in fact, that energy is in fact what the value of currency is now based upon, rather than gold or silver as it has been in the past.

As such, it is no different in a functional sense than money itself--and can also be used in the accumulation and creation of capital just as we experience today. Which means that energy accounting does nothing to solve the problem of classes, which is the prime reason (among others) we're against capitalism in the first place. Class systems are based upon exploitation and oppression, and I see nothing in energy accounting that transforms this basic injustice into something more acceptable. It merely changes the form of money--like cash into credit--and we're still left with the exact same problems and a new name for money: energy.

[Cult of Reason]

the biggest problem I have with tochnocracy as an independent ideology is that its constituents generally regard the world's current economy as one of economic abundance. I find this rather flabbergasting. Scarcity still plays a huge role in many, many commodities--including energy itself.

A small clarification: The Technocratic movement has never had as its stated aim to put the whole world under its system. Disregarding the very recent European organisation, Technocracy Inc. in North America designed its system for North America only because, at the time they were designing it, North America was the only continent with the capability to produce an abundance of goods and services. In fact they say that North America has had that capability since around 1910.

For Technocracy, it is usually better to talk in terms of continents or not-quite-continents (eg. Europe), as a world technate is too far in the future to really consider (it would probably only happen if there was a continental technate first, but that is a different discussion).


almost ethereal and ambiguous concept to which it's difficult to attach a real material value.

I do not understand you. How can the measurement of energy be anything other than the measurement of something fundamental to all objects? Everything produced has an energy cost, and that cost is most easily measured with mechanised production: a form a production that has all but replaced human production in North America at least, and many parts of Europe also.


One could, granted, measure it in amperes or something of the like; but then you have the problem of measuring the energy it takes to create that energy.

Energy would probably be measured in Joules, not Amperes (since Amperes would be incomplete, you would need to know the time and voltage too, and that is very messy, and unnecessary).

Also, the system is designed to measure all energy used, including transportation, factory production, lighting in the factory, other energy uses in the factory (divided into each product), transportation of raw materials from mine (say), energy costs of mining, energy costs of producing the electricity needed for that, and power plant maintenance. It also takes account of all inefficiency, adding it into the cost. If it were not so, if would be compromised as a device for the measurement of energy demand.


Are you going to measure the human labor involved with energy creation (at least energy made for human consumption) with voltage and amps?

Again, we would just use Joules.

Also, human labour plays such a small part in current production in terms of energy (and probably even less in the future, practically none in a Technocratic future) that it is pointless (and probably too invasive) to measure the energy output of human labourers. Today, in North America at least, less than 2% of the energy in all physical production of goods combined comes from human labour, and it is technically possible to get that at or near 0%.


It's as superfluous to say that energy is the fundamental unit of all human consumption as much as it is to say that money is the fundamental unit. Money doesn't produce (save for the production of capital), and energy-for-consumption doesn't produce, at least in the sense that it produces alone

Energy is fundamental: all life systems on this planet (and many other systems) are just a decay of energy states, the transfer of energy is all that really matters.

Energy does produce, it is possble to absolutely replace human labour (and even now it is almost irrelevant). Yes, materials are important (an abundance of them is also needed for a technate to be possible in any particular area, and recycling them is very important to maintain that abundance), but, assuming that all the necessary materials could be mined or recycled or grown etc. (like now in North America), their use can still be measured fundamentally in terms of the energy used to process them and transform them into useful goods.

If you imagine a simple closed system involving the production of tin cans (assuming them to be made only of iron, for simplicity). You would have a power station of some type to transfer energy to the other facilities. You would have an iron mine, a smelter, an iron recycling center and a tin can factory. You would also have a distribution network of some sort (which we will assume needs no maintenance whatsover) which uses energy to transport the goods. Then we have the people who consume the tin cans (we are ignoring the food within, too). With an efficient recycling system, there would be no significant iron wasteage, so that the iron is a closed system. That means that there is only one thing not in a closed system: the energy used in all of this, so therefore it must be measured to track demand so that there is a balance.

The only real difference between a tin can and a lump of haematite (say) is energy expenditure.


It does produce in tandem with human labor, but human labor is what creates human value. Human labor, when it boils down to it, is what creates the form of energy used for human consumption. Human labor harnesses energy.

Human value? What is that? It is a physical value? If not, then what does it have to do with physical production?

Form of energy? There is kinetic energy and there is potential energy (of various types). What form of energy are you referring to?

Also, it does not create energy, nothing does, it just transfers it, and its rate of transfer only accounts for 2% of production now, and less in the future, so I cannot see the relevance.

Harnessing of energy is not dependent on human labour. There are few, if any, limits to possible automation of the most important productions of goods. A technical problem only.


Which brings me to this: energy is a commodity, and transferable as a money value today. I would go so far to say, in fact, that energy is in fact what the value of currency is now based upon, rather than gold or silver as it has been in the past.

The energy credit, which is the measurement of energy used, is non-transferable. after all, if it was it would not really benefit those to which it was transferred, as the energy it had measured is now locked up in atoms, or was heat in the product that has since dispersed into the environment and is effectively unreclaimable. While energy is conserved, energy in a state where it can do work is not conserved (2nd Law of Thermodynamics). In that way energy is effectively non-renewable and can be used once. We do not notice this in our daily lives since the amount of energy transferred to Earth by the sun changes too slowly for us to notice. However, the energy that you use is "new" energy, you have not used it before, and the stuff you have used before is gone, radiated into space or locked into molecules.

I would disagree with the assertion that money is based on energy: it seems to me to be based on debt only. I have never seen energy inflate before, nor have I received interest on it.

If, however, you mean that money is based on oil: maybe, but that does nt have that much relation to energy as the price fluctuates. Also, if the price of oil fluctuates in terms of money, then money is obviously based on something else, otherwise it would merely be the value of money that changes with that of oil, not the value of oil in terms of money. Money is obviously based on something quite arbitrary. Confidence? Debt? Speculation?


As such, it is no different in a functional sense than money itself--and can also be used in the accumulation and creation of capital just as we experience today. Which means that energy accounting does nothing to solve the problem of classes, which is the prime reason (among others) we're against capitalism in the first place. Class systems are based upon exploitation and oppression, and I see nothing in energy accounting that transforms this basic injustice into something more acceptable. It merely changes the form of money--like cash into credit--and we're still left with the exact same problems and a new name for money: energy.

Energy credits are non-transferable, and so cannot be hoarded (as they are cancelled after a certain period of time in order to simplify accounting, there is no "saving"). In that way it is fundamentally different to money, as it is not a debt token. As the total energy production is split equally to begin with, there is no inequality.

Also, you must take into account the existance of abundance in the proposed system. There is the capability to produce more than anyone could reasonably want or need, so that you can order pretty much anything in pretty much any amount (disregarding orders for 100,000 garden gnomes, assuming people are that stupid). The result is that it is physically impossible to be able to consume more than anyone else unless you have more extravagant tastes, something which is independent of wealth (which would not exist anyway).

[redstar2000]

I think there may be a "nugget" of insight somewhere in all this.

Some time ago in a thread on the labor theory of value, I suggested that we should actually consider a directed energy theory of value...whether human, animal, natural, or mechanical.

A horse-drawn plow adds value to a crop...if only by making it possible to plant and harvest more with only a slight increase in human labor power involved.

A windmill or waterwheel adds value to primitive manufacture...with an actual decrease in human labor power.

A modern semi-automated industrial plant creates products of enormous value with only the human labor power necessary to oversee and, as necessary, to repair the complex machinery.

For Marx, all forms of machinery were simply the stored-up labor power of the workers who built the machine...and could only transfer that value in tiny increments to the commodity made by that machine.

But I don't think that can possibly be right. A properly maintained machine can last for decades and produce commodities that enormously exceed the exchange-value of the machine itself.

And what about that windmill or water-wheel? After they are built and assuming they are properly maintained, they draw on energy sources that are free...that have no value at all until they are directed to some productive purpose.

Once that happens, they must "add value".

The technocratic method involves accurately measuring the amount of energy required to produce each commodity...and, in my opinion, that would probably prove to be an intractable problem.

When you start trying to figure out all the sources of a modern product, all the human workers who contributed something necessary to make it happen, and all the other forms of energy involved, and all the human workers involved in harnessing those various sources of energy...well it's like an infinite regress. All you'd ever get would be a crude approximation at best.

And to what purpose?

What we really want is a "big box store" where we go and get whatever we need. Card-swipe technology is sufficiently advanced to give immediate "feed-back" to all productive collectives on people's preferences. Goodies that are in short supply will be rationed; goodies that are abundant will just "be there" until people take them home as needed.

In a communist society, the concept of "exchange value" is superfluous...and doesn't really need to be measured. All we really need to know is how many of these widgets did people actually use? And then we know whether to make more or make fewer of them.

The technocracy people formulated their ideas in an era when every economic transaction had to have some symbolic record...something "on paper" to represent the exchange of commodities.

That's obsolete now.

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[Cult of Reason]

When you start trying to figure out all the sources of a modern product, all the human workers who contributed something necessary to make it happen, and all the other forms of energy involved, and all the human workers involved in harnessing those various sources of energy...well it's like an infinite regress. All you'd ever get would be a crude approximation at best.

One of the applications of the knowledge of energy use is to plan for how much electrical (and other) energy is to be produced, in which case human energy is irrelevant. Combine that with the fact the human involvement is tiny, it is not really necessary to consider human input at all.


And to what purpose?

Well, efficiency and reduction of waste is one. Technocracy's aims can be condensed into: "To give the highest possible standard of living for the longest possible time", which entails having as efficient a system as possible (this is also related to Technocratic predictions of the death of Capitalism). If it is known how much energy is being used, then it should be possible to match the supply of energy to that, so preserving unused energy etc..


What we really want is a "big box store" where we go and get whatever we need. Card-swipe technology is sufficiently advanced to give immediate "feed-back" to all productive collectives on people's preferences. Goodies that are in short supply will be rationed; goodies that are abundant will just "be there" until people take them home as needed.

This card swipe technology however would give little indication as to how much energy is needed to produce more of the item, and so confusion can result if, say, less electrical energy is being supplied than is needed to produce a certain amount of a certain good.

Also, in Technocratic theory, scarcity of supply would be detrimental, as that would make trading viable, and hence increase of wealth over others. One of the Technocratic fundamentals is that if uninhibited abundance exists, Capitalism and the Price System becomes impossible: a favourite example being that noone tries to sell you normal air (yet... damn pollution) as there is more of it than you could ever need. In the opposite case, however, if there was scarcity of supply, then someone who managed to get that good could then exploit those who needed it before allowing them access.

Also, would not enforced rationing of scarce goods restrict people's freedom of action?


In a communist society, the concept of "exchange value" is superfluous

This is not exchange value, as nothing is exchanged. The energy credits are not given to any individual when used, they are cancelled out, they disappear after use.


The technocracy people formulated their ideas in an era when every economic transaction had to have some symbolic record...something "on paper" to represent the exchange of commodities.

Records in this case have practical reasons for existing, to optimise future production. After all, purchasing power is the greatest vote you can have, so it might as well have an effect.

[encephalon]

Haraldur: while I don't have the time to reply to your whole post right now, I would like to clarify my position on labor vs. energy.

Yes, energy is expended in a forms of production. However, energy is entirely useless to us until that energy is harnessed; in turn, that energy cannot be harnessed until human labor harnesses it.

Not all energy is equally valuable to us as a society. The energy in a piece of wood is useless to us until we labor upon it to extract that energy to suit our needs, in this case in the form of heat. This is what I mean by "energy for human consumption." Energy cannot be used by us until we endeavor to harness it through our own labor.

Value is created by labor, in the sense that an item is not valued in society until we transform it into something usable with our own labor. In the stone age, a piece of flint was virtually useless to a tribe until labor was expended to make it an arrow, ax-head, etc (although those resources very obviously have a value by vert the potential for its transformation).

And I think that energy is getting pretty close to a kind of "base commodity." This does not change the fact, however, the labor is used to extract this energy in a usable form from the abundant energy sources around us. Human labor is the value-giver--while there are obvious flaws in this metaphor, one could say that everything it touches turns to gold. Energy, on the other hand, does nothing for us until we harness it. There's a ton of energy in each and every lightning bolt that falls from the sky, but unless we labor over capturing that bolt and feeding the energy into our electric grid, it's useless to us.

I'm well aware of the argument that machines will do the majority of work involved, and less human labor needs to be used as time passes. And I agree. Yet, this does not mean that, because human labor has created so much that the measure of it seems to dwindle exponentionally, that it should be excluded. The fact is, those machines don't exist nor ever will exist without human labor, even if the process becomes entirely automated itself. Human labor is the source.

In a way, it's comparable to a coal fire. We can measure the luminosity, heat, etc. of the flames, but the true source of that energy lies within the coal that made the fire possible. It's ridiculous to claim that the coal itself is superfluous. In such intense heat, it may seem that the fire itself has in fact taken on a life of its own, but the emergence is entirely illusory. Take away the coal, and the fire quickly dissapates. In the same sense, if you take labor expended out of the equation and only deal with its result--production, including usable energy--then so too does production quickly dwindle.

The fire does not feed itself. Labor is the essence of all production, including the production of energy fit for human consumption. Energy Accounting, as it's been proposed here, differs little than money systems of today in that sense: it attempts to viel the source of society's wealth, and instead places on its altar a result of the production process.

[Cult of Reason]

Why can the energy not be harnessed by machine labour?

Energy accounting takes account only energy actually used.

Today it seems that this "value" you speak of is increasingly created from machine labour.

Could not the energy be extracted using machine labour?


Human labor is the source.

What does that have to do with measuring consumption and changing production to fit consumption?

Are you assuming that energy credits are something that are earned in a similar way to money? If so, then it is quite different. You are given an equal share of all energy (potentially, that is. Of course, as there is an abundance, you will never reach a limit), just because you live within the technate, regardless of what you do. If my clarification was unnecessary, I apologise.

In all, I do not see what you are getting at. Are assuming a system of scarcity or abundance? The latter is the situation energy accounting was designed for.

Have I fundamentally missed something?

[Sentinel]

Originally posted by encephalon+--> (encephalon) Value is created by labor, in the sense that an item is not valued in society until we transform it into something usable with our own labor. In the stone age, a piece of flint was virtually useless to a tribe until labor was expended to make it an arrow, ax-head, etc (although those resources very obviously have a value by vert the potential for its transformation). [/b]

I don't understand how value would still be created by labor? :o

Even though human labor might still exist to some marginal degree, it would be so little that it could be done by either volunteers or maybe everyone had a society service obligation of one hours work per day or something, am I correct, Haraldur?

So as I see it, the age of human labor as we know it would be gone. ;)


Haraldur
Are you assuming that energy credits are something that are earned in a similar way to money?

I think the comrade is assuming so.. Or?

[Ol' Dirty]

Energy economy is not so much currency-based as recourse-based. All people would be rewarded with an equal amount of energy, which would be the only thing necassery to keep a steady economy, as all lobor would be done by machines. In time, people would not have to work, but would work for what they wanty to do to better themselves

[Sentinel]

Originally posted by FluxOne13+--> (FluxOne13) In time, people would not have to work, but would work for what they wanty to do to better themselves [/b]

That's what is so communist about it! :) In this thread (http://www.technocracy.ca/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=1345&sid=be0f92e6fd9add9ee7e62d3e4ffc9c09)
in the lounge of the Technocracy.ca forums, the user Jdlech describes very "indepth" how this is going to work, and refutes the traditional cappie argument of human "laziness" and "need to be rewarded" we all are used to hear. :D


Jdlech
Money is like a drug, and we're all forced to behave like junkies because of our addiction. Once the drug is eliminated, most of us will recover our humanity.


..You, like the rest of us, would probably like to be somebody, would like to contribute, would like to take some pride in yourself and your accomplishments. Money overshadows all that; but this does not mean this desire does not exist.

I could not have put it better myself! His calculation in that thread, how there would not be less, but five times more doctors in the technate than in present day America was a delightful read indeed.

[red team]

Human labor is the source.


What you are assuming is that menial labour or the type that most workers experience now could not be made into a repetitive, but flexible procedure. The kind of stupid work that people endure now can broken down into discrete exact steps that could be mapped onto a flowchart of a computer program. However, events may not go according to plan exactly everytime and also certain jobs may require some flexibility to accomplish tasks that are inherently vague and not exactly discrete. This problem can also be solved by embedding pattern recognition and fuzzy logic systems into the automated devices so a system will actually "learn" by recognizing patterns and hence actions that are "correct" to compensate for the vagueness of a task. I think you are being too shortsighted. In the future all menial work can be reduced to software instructions. I know exactly what I'm talking about too as I was trained in the software field.

[encephalon]

Why can the energy not be harnessed by machine labour?



But who builds the machines? Who upkeeps the machines? Until our machines become wholly independent creatures, able to modify, update, fix and manage themselves, we will be their using our labor.

And if our machines do ever reach the state of being wholly autonomous, when do we start considering these machines living beings rather than components of production? In every relationship we've held with other beings doing our labor, we provide something in return--even if it is little more than food and upkeep. Is it justifiable to use an autonomous system without providing something in return? (note this isn't an argument for or against, just a curiosity of possible developments in the future)



Energy accounting takes account only energy actually used.

Today it seems that this "value" you speak of is increasingly created from machine labour.


But once again, it is humanity that creates these machines. You also forget that a very large part of commodities that we use are produced by fourteen year old girls in military run assembly lines in china. You say that the world is not yet eligible to be a technate, but you forget that the world is so integrated today that there's no possible way we could use our own resources (in the US) to provide the same level of output we get from a global system. How is it a prospective technate would pay for such integral parts of our economy to non-technate states?



Could not the energy be extracted using machine labour?


Yes, but under our current material conditions only in tandem with human labor. Even if the machines wholly extract energy on their own, you still have the people that make and maintain those machines. And if you don't have people caring for those machines, if the machines are entirely autonomous, then are they mere machines any longer?



What does that have to do with measuring consumption and changing production to fit consumption?


Because it is human labor that changes production to fit human consumption, not machines. We create, control and operate those machines.


Are you assuming that energy credits are something that are earned in a similar way to money? If so, then it is quite different. You are given an equal share of all energy (potentially, that is. Of course, as there is an abundance, you will never reach a limit), just because you live within the technate, regardless of what you do. If my clarification was unnecessary, I apologise.


No, I'm aware that each gets an equal share--I've read a bit on technocracy before.

Here's a question: what about hording? What if a person uses that energy to create more energy for himself, enabling him to get a much larger share of society's resources? And then how is that different than capital? (this does not assume abundance, which I address below)


In all, I do not see what you are getting at. Are assuming a system of scarcity or abundance? The latter is the situation energy accounting was designed for.

Have I fundamentally missed something?


I also know that technocracy assumes abundance, which I think is severely flawed. We simply do not operate in a world of abundance currently, at least at the level in which energy accounting might seem half plausible. First, we'd need an infinite source of energy--so we'll use solar energy. No problems, right? Wrong, because the production of solar cells require materials that are not abundant, and attempt at recycling them have thus far been unsuccessful. Which would be okay, except that solar cells currently only last a few years before dying (which is why we keep having to rocket up more solar cells to satellites, or new satellites altogether).

No matter what you do, you will always find scarcity. To assume an abundance so great that there are no worries and no need to allocate resources is not only myopic, it's entirely foolish. I can assume I have an abundance of money, but no matter how much I believe it I'll still sit here eating ramen noodles day in and day out.

Now if you're talking about a future that isn't immediate or anywhere close to the present, that's another matter. Sure, we could in fact one day have an infinite number of resources. We could also one day travel to alpha centauri. But if you're saying that the world is one of absolute abundance now (which is what I've read), then I wholeheartedly disagree. I find very few things further from the truth, in a material sense.



I don't understand how value would still be created by labor? ohmy.gif

Even though human labor might still exist to some marginal degree, it would be so little that it could be done by either volunteers or maybe everyone had a society service obligation of one hours work per day or something, am I correct, Haraldur?

So as I see it, the age of human labor as we know it would be gone.


Because we build, operate and maintain those machines. Even with the help of machines, labor is still labor.

As for your "it would be so little.." factor: is this not the argument used for abundance? That is, there will be (or is) so much energy that there's practically no value of a single unit of it? In fact, I think you have this backwards; the fact that so little labor would produce so much is evidence that the value of labor has increased exponentially, not decreased.

If one person can produce 5,000 spoons in an hour whereas before he could only produce 5, the productive value of his labor has increased.



What you are assuming is that menial labour or the type that most workers experience now could not be made into a repetitive, but flexible procedure. The kind of stupid work that people endure now can broken down into discrete exact steps that could be mapped onto a flowchart of a computer program. However, events may not go according to plan exactly everytime and also certain jobs may require some flexibility to accomplish tasks that are inherently vague and not exactly discrete. This problem can also be solved by embedding pattern recognition and fuzzy logic systems into the automated devices so a system will actually "learn" by recognizing patterns and hence actions that are "correct" to compensate for the vagueness of a task. I think you are being too shortsighted. In the future all menial work can be reduced to software instructions. I know exactly what I'm talking about too as I was trained in the software field.


But we are not talking about a mystical future in which machines wholly operate independent of human interaction (and thus labor), we are talking about now and the near future if I'm not mistaken. And even if we were discussing such a utopian future, who feeds the flowchart into the machines? Who builds the one machine that builds all other machines? I'm a programmer myself, and I'm quite knowledgeable of the potential uses of technology: evolutionary algorithms, artificial life, expert systems, etc. As the theory has been stated, however, energy accounting is not reflective of our material conditions. And if it isn't reflective our our material conditions or forseeable potential (which I've already stated I think is utopian--we've a long road ahead of us to wholly autonomous machines and the moral implications thereof), then what use is it?

Fourier once stated that in post-socialist society, oceans would be desalinated and turned into lemonade. But I'm not going to take that the least bit seriously unless he shows exactly how that's going to happen within our forseeable means (and then, I still won't take him seriously :lol:)

[red team]

But who builds the machines?


Make software to build machines once then manually make the machines that build machines once and install the software which has an instruction to do a cascading installation once.

For energy the machines will go to their re-charging stations which is also built once with the same technique as above.


Who upkeeps the machines?


See above, but replace build with maintain.


Until our machines become wholly independent creatures, able to modify, update, fix and manage themselves, we will be their using our labor.


In diminishing required amount of time as updates are incrementally made. Initially when the automated systems are being built then a full 8 hour day then 6, then 4, then 2... with the rest of the time you get to spend with your harem of 20 synthetic whores each looking like a swimsuit model :D until you get bored of doing that so for fun you make a patch to robot operating system 10.0.1 and it becomes robot operating system 10.0.2 :D


And if our machines do ever reach the state of being wholly autonomous, when do we start considering these machines living beings rather than components of production? In every relationship we've held with other beings doing our labor, we provide something in return--even if it is little more than food and upkeep. Is it justifiable to use an autonomous system without providing something in return? (note this isn't an argument for or against, just a curiosity of possible developments in the future)


Machines need not be anymore intelligent than required to solve the problem required by the specific task. Garbage recycler required? Alright, download garbage recycler program. Waiter required? Alright, erase hard drive then download waiter program. Ask the machine to respond to requests beyond it's specific task and the machine ignores you because it's not it's job therefore it's incapable of fulfilling your request. Do you use a word processor to browse the internet? :rolleyes:


But once again, it is humanity that creates these machines. You also forget that a very large part of commodities that we use are produced by fourteen year old girls in military run assembly lines in china. You say that the world is not yet eligible to be a technate, but you forget that the world is so integrated today that there's no possible way we could use our own resources (in the US) to provide the same level of output we get from a global system. How is it a prospective technate would pay for such integral parts of our economy to non-technate states?


Our landfills are unused mines. A recycler-bot can "mine" landfills for resources 24 hours a day without getting sick or getting mentally depressed at working in dirty conditions. Having a human worker do the same job is inhuman :lol:


if the machines are entirely autonomous, then are they mere machines any longer?


Ants are highly organized and "autonomous" in their actions. We're just leveraging computer technology to build programmed ants which are simply nonsentient bio-machines, but we are making the metallic equivalent.


Because it is human labor that changes production to fit human consumption, not machines. We create, control and operate those machines.


How hard is a few keystrokes? Or better yet with voice-recognition software saying "I want..."


Here's a question: what about hording? What if a person uses that energy to create more energy for himself, enabling him to get a much larger share of society's resources? And then how is that different than capital? (this does not assume abundance, which I address below)


Everybody gets an allotment written onto a smart card. Nobody can create more since everybody is a consumer not a producer of energy. Ownership becomes an obsolete concept. Coercion to re-instate the concept of ownership is futile as organized coercion itself requires coercion to start it off. With the economic compulsion trap destroyed along with Capitalism everybody is too concerned with their own interests so nobody can convince them to join organized coercion in the first place.


But we are not talking about a mystical future in which machines wholly operate independent of human interaction (and thus labor), we are talking about now and the near future if I'm not mistaken. And even if we were discussing such a utopian future, who feeds the flowchart into the machines? Who builds the one machine that builds all other machines? I'm a programmer myself, and I'm quite knowledgeable of the potential uses of technology: evolutionary algorithms, artificial life, expert systems, etc. As the theory has been stated, however, energy accounting is not reflective of our material conditions. And if it isn't reflective our our material conditions or forseeable potential (which I've already stated I think is utopian--we've a long road ahead of us to wholly autonomous machines and the moral implications thereof), then what use is it?

Fourier once stated that in post-socialist society, oceans would be desalinated and turned into lemonade. But I'm not going to take that the least bit seriously unless he shows exactly how that's going to happen within our forseeable means (and then, I still won't take him seriously laugh.gif)

If you are aware of the potential of computer technology then you should also be aware that software and other intellectual work has a property that sets it apart from physical work which makes it dramatically increase the potential to achieve the kind of society that is described by Technocracy. Namely that as long as intellectual work is stored in a medium like a book or CD then once intellectual work is completed it does not need to be done again. Once scientists discover a law or theorem succeeding scientists do not need to rediscover it all over again (with the minor exception of religious fanatics burning down libraries). What the truly powerful potential of software is that when combined with physical hardware designed for work like arms, legs, wheels, treads, etc... then you have the potential to replicate workers simply by copying software from one machine to another.

[Dimentio]

The only thing I could answer in this thread, is that technocracy does not need to "be another kind of communism" in order to work, and does not need to copy marxist theories about class warfare, since technocracy exists in order to streamline the production and allow for an abundance to be distributed to all citizens. Technocratic theories could co-exist with marxism, but does not need to do that.

To say that technocracy competes with marxism is like saying that physics are competing with biology. It does not work.

That technocracy would automatically be a planned economy, I do not agree though. Planned economies tends to have an inflexible system of handling supply and demand, which could be very effective if we are talking about large-scale infrastructural projects. But when we are talking about the daily consumption of consumers, markets has historically proved to be more efficient to allocate resources.

One potentially more efficient system would be an interactive economy, where consumers could order, design and specify their demand directly to the nodes in the technate involved in production, instead of relying on market incentives, like money or energy accounting.

If you are interested in the development of the technocratic movement, then you should take a look on NET;s forum, where the most interesting things are happening right now.

http://spazz.mine.nu/forum3

[red team]

The only thing I could answer in this thread, is that technocracy does not need to "be another kind of communism" in order to work, and does not need to copy marxist theories about class warfare, since technocracy exists in order to streamline the production and allow for an abundance to be distributed to all citizens. Technocratic theories could co-exist with marxism, but does not need to do that.


Being that Technocracy is more of a resource distribution methodology rather than a study on social relations which comprises an important part of Marxism, Technocracy is very good in explaining the unavoidable flaws of a price system which includes resource hoarding, price negotiation and arbitrary valuation of goods and services without regards to the actual amount of effort, energy and resources allocated for the production of said goods and services. It also presents an excellent alternative to determining the cost of a product by using universal physical properties such as the energy required to be used in the production of a good or service, rather than the arbitrary and subjective evaluation of desirability by pricing.

But where it fails is in human social relations in that it doesn't take into account the motivation for the greatest beneficiaries of the price system for maintaining it even at the expense of those who realize little benefit from it and are viewed as little more than profit making machines by those who rule over the system. It's extremely unlikely that the aristocratic rulers of a price system which has ownership claims over virtually every part of the distribution channel for goods and services from the logistics and manufacturing to distribution segments would ever want to voluntarily give up control over these critical life support systems without a challenge from those who want to replace the price system.

Furthermore, at present the production of goods and services in society is geared toward a manual labour system with the corresponding infrastructure accompanying it. If an overthrow of the price system indeed occured then the entire infrastructure that was previously geared toward a manual labour intensive economy would need to be radically modified to support a high-tech, automated economy and this requires an unavoidable transition period.


To say that technocracy competes with marxism is like saying that physics are competing with biology. It does not work.


Marxism is best for analyzing the motivation and flaws of a price system more specifically, but because it was developed as a political-economic theory in the 19th century, it failed to foresee that simply replacing a decentralized price system in which commodity prices were determined by the market by a centralized price system in which commodity prices were arbitrarily determined by government decree only centralizes the problem instead of solving it. Instead of financiers and banks driving many independent competing corporations to maximize profit for those who have an interest in hoarding it, you have a centralized government bureaucracy whose officials also have a monopoly of control over all parts of the resource distribution channel. No doubt there are "good" and dedicated government officials as well as "good" and dedicated financiers, but that's not the point. It is that there lies the potential for abuse of power and corruption for those willing to take advantage of the system's flaws. And this can be a slow process as well as a quick one in which a few corners are cut and a few short cuts are made for expediency which then proceeds gradually until the entire organization is rotten with bribery and corruption. Also, as witness in western democracies, it doesn't matter if the officials are elected or appointed. If the underlying economic system becomes corrupted to the point where wealth is more easily gained from hoarding, bribery and price manipulation than from engaging in productive activities then electoral politics becomes a sham. It's a theatrical puppet show put up by those who actually hold the economic power behind the scenes.

However, I agree that Technocracy doesn't compete with Marxism. Marxism analyzes the cause of failure of a specific price system Capitalism, but failed to present a viable alternative which works and does away with price manipulation and hoarding forever. Technocracy gets right down to the root cause of this failure by discovering the flaws of a system based on the exchange of unquantifiable debt tokens for quantifiable energy produced goods and presents an alternative method of cost evaluation through energy accounting, but doesn't go into the details of social relationships and motivations.


That technocracy would automatically be a planned economy, I do not agree though. Planned economies tends to have an inflexible system of handling supply and demand, which could be very effective if we are talking about large-scale infrastructural projects. But when we are talking about the daily consumption of consumers, markets has historically proved to be more efficient to allocate resources.


I agree with this statement, but only up to a point. The distribution system for consumer luxury goods needs to be flexible enough to respond quickly to changing consumer tastes and the varied interests and preferences of many different individuals, but there are goods and services that all consumers need that are quite stable and unchanging and which are unsuitable to be placed in a dynamic demand driven environment. Things like: power distribution, plumbing, communications, public transportation, health services, education, staple food products and many other goods and services are pretty much standard and unchanging. What is most important in these sectors are a constant and consistent supply and not variability subjected to changing individual preferences.

Furthermore, even if independent production units are allowed outside of centralized control to introduce more flexibility in responding to market demand, incentives should remain purely emotional in that production is encouraged only for a sense of prestige and accomplishment and not material rewards. Assuming we are starting from an environment of abundance in which all basic necessities and even some luxuries are available to everyone at very low cost due to automated production of these items and services, having a emotional reward system is entirely feasable as luxury and extraneous consumer items and services could be produced by fewer individuals who are fully dedicated to their production out of emotional interest and not material incentives. Introducing material incentives in an abundance based system like Technocracy is never a good idea as it will quickly lead to inequality, artificial scarcity, corruption and the eventual undermining of the energy accounting system itself.


One potentially more efficient system would be an interactive economy, where consumers could order, design and specify their demand directly to the nodes in the technate involved in production, instead of relying on market incentives, like money or energy accounting.


Energy accounting will always be necessary even in a fully automated society where all goods and services are produced by machines. Even in this ultimate techno-utopia the machines will still need to be fed fuel and energy to perform useful work and then you'll be up against the ultimate physical cost law of the universe in which there can be absolutely no cheating. Conservation of energy and thermodynamics.

An interactive economy would be a nice idea to replace the crude mechanism of a market for responding to consumer demand, but the problem with this idea at least with present and near future technologies is that production machinery is specifically designed for making only one type of item or in some cases only one unique item with limited or no variability in making something different from the original design specifications. The production machines would need to be retooled everytime a different order comes in which is probably less efficient than simply relying on market mechanisms for luxury consumer goods and centralization of production for staple consumer goods.