Curt Doolittle

Theme: Measurement

  • (NOTES TO SELF) RELEVANT DEFINITIONS (I don’t want to really work in this part o

    (NOTES TO SELF) RELEVANT DEFINITIONS

    (I don’t want to really work in this part of philosophy because it brushes up with metaphysics, and I stick to ethics and institutions. But since our movement’s fearless leader has advised me to try to use existing language more often, I’m collecting some common language definitions that constrain to the propertarian methodology.)

    1: PHILOSOPHY

    PHILOSOPHICAL REALISM is the view that our reality, or some aspect of it, is ontologically independent of our conceptual schemes, linguistic practices, beliefs, etc., such that truth consists in the mind’s correspondence to reality; and whatever we believe at any moment is only an approximation of reality and that every new observation brings us closer to understanding reality.

    SCIENTIFIC REALISM is the view that the world described by science and the scientific method is the real world, as it is, independent of what we might take it to be, and that we can make valid claims about unobservables, and those claims have the same ontological status as observables.

    INSTRUMENTALISM is the view that a scientific theory is a useful instrument in understanding the world. A concept or theory should be evaluated by how effectively it explains and predicts phenomena, as opposed to how accurately it describes objective reality, but that some experience, understanding, or knowledge cannot fully be captured by science.

    ANALYTICAL PHILOSOPHY: A philosophical methodology that attempts to adopt the methods and findings of the physical sciences, and as such is characterized by an emphasis on:

    a) CLARITY: constructing clear arguments, objectively stated, often with the help of formal logic and analysis of language, expressed if possible in ordinary language ;

    b) SCIENCE: a respect for the superiority of the methods and findings of natural sciences over that of the senses (See Scientific Realism);

    c) TRUTH: the principle that there are not any specifically philosophical truths;

    d) THOUGHT: and that the object of philosophy is the logical clarification, and reduction of error, in thought.

    and

    e) ACTIONS: Tangentially, that all arguments (a) are constructed as human actions in Operational Language (See Operational Language).

    In practice, Analytical Philosophy is a rejection of broad philosophical systems in favor of attention to detail, precise, testable statements, expressed in ordinary language. This atomic approach allows analytical philosophers to bring the discipline of philosophy closer to the discipline of the physical sciences because it has the advantage of being able to solve problems incrementally by the same evolutionary process as does science using the scientific method – rather than requiring that all statements fit within a predefined system of thought.

    OPERATIONAL DEFINITIONS: (Operationalism) Operational definitions are definitions of theoretical constructs that are stated in terms of concrete, observable procedures (Actions). Operational definitions solve the problem of what is not directly observable by connecting unobservable traits or experiences to things that can be observed. Operational definitions make the unobservable observable. ( the concepts or terms used in nonanalytic scientific statements must be definable in terms of identifiable and repeatable operations.)

    PRAXEOLOGY: is the application of Operationalism to human behavior: it suggests that all statements must be expressed as human actions, just as all scientific actions must use observable procedures, all scientific statements about man must expressed as individual human actions. Praxeology therefore, is a methodology for testing incentives by analyzing every action in a chain of actions to see if each is a rational action for the actor. In theory praxeolgical reasoning is a rational, non empirical test of any statement about human activity. But given the similarity of human beings, it can be used by human beings to test statements about other human beings, assuming one possesses enough information about the individual’s circumstance to sympathize with it. (I don’t argue that it’s a science. I argue that it is a logical test, and a valid logical test, because humans are more capable of empathic considerations of observables, than they are any other system of measurement.) This definition of praxeology contrasts with it’s authors as a science that purports to permit us to deduce human actions, rather than a method of testing a set of human actions as believable sequences of rational incentives. Praxeology has largely be subsumed by Incentives Theory. But Incentives theory as currently structured seems to rely on positivism rather than testing. And incentives theory seems to have largely been subsumed by Experimental Psychology, which has produced most of the valuable information about human cognitive biases and limits.

    2: SCIENCE

    SCIENTIFIC METHOD is a body of procedures for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, and correcting or integrating previous knowledge, consisting of:

    a) the identification of question or problem,

    b) systematic observation, measurement, and experiment,

    c) the formulation, testing, falsification, and modification of hypotheses.

    (There are multiple ways of expressing this.)

    THE FIVE COMPENSATIONS of Science: The scientific method can help us compensate for:

    i) Biological Limits to Observation: sense, perception, relation, and calculation.

    ii) Cognitive Biases which distort our senses, perceptions, relations, valuations and calculations: the operative consideration bing ‘valuation’ or ‘weights’.

    iii) Experiential Biases which distort the same, such as emotional loading, mysticism, traditions, myths, norms and assumptions.

    iv) Performative Errors which are due to the imperfection of our actions in any endeavor.

    v) Deceptive Loadings such as lies, propaganda, deceptions or manipulations.

    (The compensations are the part I care about.)

    THE FOUR CANONS OF SCIENCE In order to understand the scientific approach to experimental psychology as well as other areas of scientific research, it is useful to know the four fundamental principles that appear to be accepted by almost all scientists.

    i) DETERMINISM : One of the first canons of science is the assumption of determinism. This canon assumes that all events have meaningful, systematic causes. The principle of determinism has a close corollary, that is, that the idea that science is about theories. Scientists accept this canon largely on faith and also to the fact that theories wouldn’t be very useful in the absence of determinism, because in the absence of determinism, orderly, systematic causes wouldn’t exist.

    ii) EMPIRICISM: The canon of empiricism simply means to make observations. This is the best method of figuring out orderly principles. This is a favorite tool among scientist and psychologists because they assume that the best way to find out about the world is to make observations.

    iii) PARSIMONY: The third basic assumption of most scientific schools of thought is parsimony. The canon of parsimony says that we should be extremely frugal in developing or choosing between theories by steering away from unnecessary concepts. Almost all scientist agree that if we are faced with two competing theories, that both do a great job at handling a set of empirical observations, we should prefer the simpler, or more parsimonious of the two. The central idea behind parsimony is that as long as we intend to keep simplifying and organizing, we should continue until we have made things as simple as possible. One of the strongest arguments made for parsimony was by the medieval English philosopher William of Occam. For this reason, the principle of parsimony is often referred to as Occam’s razor.

    iv)TESTABILITY: The final and most important canon of science is the assumption that scientific theories should be testable using currently available research techniques. This canon is closely related to empiricism because the techniques that scientists typically use to test their theories are empirical techniques. In addition to being closely related to empiricism, the concept of testability is even more closely associated falsifiability. The idea of falsifiability is that scientists go an extra step by actively seeking out tests that could prove their theory wrong.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-15 11:57:00 UTC

  • (A collection of thoughts about this problem, not an argument.) 1) SYMBOLS ARE A

    (A collection of thoughts about this problem, not an argument.)

    1) SYMBOLS ARE ANALOGIES

    It is possible to speak universal statements.

    It is possible to record universal statements as symbols.

    It is possible to manipulate relations between symbols while retaining ratios.

    We can use numbers to represent quantities, but numbers are not limited in use to quantities, just as sets of objects are not limited to the property of their count alone.

    We can use symbols to describe categories arbitrarily and at whim – they are categories: analogies.

    We can describe possibilities in time and therefore constrain those analogies by temporal dimension.

    We can count things that exist in reality and are constrained by measurement, and we can perform actions in reality constrained by practical effort. But actions exist, and symbols are just imprecise analogies to existence.

    It is not possible to perform universal actions.

    When we use the terms ‘universal’ and ‘infinite’ we refer to two possible meanings: a) the set of all X, the quantity of which we do not know, and b) an infinite quantity of X’s, the quantity of which we cannot know and cannot count.

    ‘Universal’ can refer to an unknown quantity. But it cannot refer to an infinite quantity. Because infinite quantities cannot exist in reality, only symbolically. We can error in our definition and create the error of infinite objects, but that is all.

    “Infinite anything” is an error. It is the quantitative opposite of ‘division by zero’. We can write division by zero. We can write infinite quantities, but we cannot perform division by zero and infinite quantities cannot either exist or be made to exist in reality despite that we can express them symbolically. We can’t even ‘have’ zero anything except by analogy, because to ‘have’ something means having at least ‘one’.

    We use infinite sets in mathematics as a shortcut for our ignorance – because they can exist symbolically even if they cannot exist quantitatively.

    Making universal statements and using universal symbols is an acknowledgement of our performative ignorance.

    It is a logical error to confuse performative ignorance with possibility. To confuse logical, symbolic allegorical possibility with quantitative or performative possibility.

    Universal and infinite statements are analogies, not facts.

    2) PERFORMATIVE TRUTH

    If we agree on the definition of the room, people, and brown hair, it is possible to know both how many people ARE in the room, and how many people CAN be in the room. Any possibility of error is either an error in the definition of the room, or an error in the definition of ‘people’, or an error in our measurements. This is not a question of externalities for the purpose of action. And the problem with scientific theories is the problem of externalities (what we dont know), what we have selected, and omitted from selection, and our performative errors.

    Information loss exists only because we articulate a theory. Not because the performative actions in the real world would lose such information. OUr actions in reality retain the relations to all other physical properties and entities in the universe. Our ‘rules’ or statements do not.

    Ludic fallacies for example, argue that probabilities we can measure can produce risks measurements, but very few real world phenomenon are sufficiently closed domains.

    3) RECIPES VS THEORIES

    There is a very great difference between the errors that it is possible to create with symbols because they are ANALOGIES, and the performance of actions themselves. The question comes down to whether, when we say we have a theory, we are describing actions (a recipe) which produce specifically desired ends, or general statements (descriptive rules) that purport to describe as yet unknown circumstances.

    Science progresses by producing recipes, and people improve those recipes. Theories are inductive tests that produce new recipes. But theories are just analogies, and recipes are prescriptions for performative action. I think it is a mistake to confuse the difference between symbols which are analogies, and actions which are recipes.

    Rules are general and open to symbolic error. Recipes are functional and open to perforative error. But recipes make no broader claim than that they should produce desired ends if you make no performative error.

    When we talk about the physical sciences we are discussing a vastly unknown territory where we do not understand the basic mechanics well enough to relate our different sets of symbolic tools and rules to each other. But at some point it is both possible and likely we will discover how to do this – because the universe does it so to speak. We simply lack the tools to observe it.

    The failure to demarcate between actions, recipes, rules and symbols is just another kind of platonism in the benign sense, or mysticism in dangerous sense.

    4) WORLDS AND THEORIES AS PLATONIC OR MAGIC

    “We can never know. We can just keep trying.” We must keep pace with the Red Queen. But it turns out that trying produces recipes that work, and that we can indeed make general statements about recipes in order to help us understand how to make new and improved recipes.

    The discussion of theories is a little too close to platonic or magian error, for adult conversation.

    The practical difference is that if we must err on one side or the other: between closed mind and open mind, that the theoretical approach functions as a positive bias in favor of experimentation in the human mind, and the skeptical approach functions as a negative bias in favor of conservation.

    And I am not sure that, like many things we create elaborate artifices to justify, much of symbolic reasoning is anything other than an attempt to alter our innate cognitive bias.

    That’s a laudable objective, but not if we create a new form of mysticism while we’re at it. 🙂

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-15 03:49:00 UTC

  • On Realism

    [W]hat is the relationship between:

      and the combination of:

        when given

          In purest terms, of course, there are limits because of necessary information loss from the process of categorization. And it certainly appears that we can use science (categories and measurements and narratives that express causal relations that are allegories to experience) to understand almost everything we desire to = eventually. But despite apparent successes, the question is whether those limits are meaningful in the context of being a human: converting extra sensual perceptions to sense perceptions. Those limits can be meaningful in at least three dimensions: a) the scope of the patterns that we can identify (which I suspect we can use machines for), b) the period of those patterns, given that causality depends on arbitrary selection of periods of regularity, c) the number of axis of causal relations that we can understand. But since our problem is knowledge for the purpose of action in real time, not ‘knowledge’ as a static absolute, and it is our actions that are limited by our ignorance, and we would not be ‘human’ without those limits, the question always seems irrational. If we understand that all thought is time-contingent based upon the knowledge at our disposal, then it’s simply illogical to even try to represent knowledge as static ‘truths’. The question itself is irrational. If the standard is ‘enough perception that we can act to achieve our ends despite the limits of our minds’ that is very different from ‘we can understand the full set of causal relations by a process of representing measures of categories, and reducing them to expressions that are possible to articulate as a narrative.’ Since, we can test our theories, and science demands that we can both test (reproduce)( and determine the boundary conditions (falsify) our theories, using science and language to extend our sense perceptions, then we can test the correspondence of our understanding of the real world. It certainly appears that we can be successful in reducing the unobservable complexity of the real world into symbolic and linguistic representations that are sufficient allegories to experience, that we can understand and at at any scale in which we an define a scheme of measurement (sensing). And there is no reason at present to believe that there is some limit to this, other than our ability to marshall the physical resources to perform tests, or because performing those tests would violate the terms of cooperation with other humans (morality). And so, as Steven says above, theories are descriptive within the state of knowledge of the moment, if they correctly express the measurements and narratives of causal relations as we understand them at the moment, because they cannot exist without the context of the forms of measurement that we used to formulate them. Those statements in fact, correspond with reality at some level of precision. So the realist expectation is that we increasingly understand the complexity of reality, but may never fully achieve it. Although that imperfection may be meaningless for the purposes of action, as long as the allegory to experience is sufficient to produce the actions in question. The generational problem affecting the discipline of philosophy is that the metaphysical assumption that we can introspectively solve these problems without the help of science is as absurd as thinking that we can solve these problems without language. The discipline of Philosophy can help us construct analogies to experience so that we may consume those analogies and ‘understand’ them. But we cannot introspectively sense, perceive, and understand much outside of human scale, without the discipline of science. Hence not only is CR a form of Realism, but it is an improvement on Realism because it does not assume that representations are static.

        • On Realism

          [W]hat is the relationship between:

            and the combination of:

              when given

                In purest terms, of course, there are limits because of necessary information loss from the process of categorization. And it certainly appears that we can use science (categories and measurements and narratives that express causal relations that are allegories to experience) to understand almost everything we desire to = eventually. But despite apparent successes, the question is whether those limits are meaningful in the context of being a human: converting extra sensual perceptions to sense perceptions. Those limits can be meaningful in at least three dimensions: a) the scope of the patterns that we can identify (which I suspect we can use machines for), b) the period of those patterns, given that causality depends on arbitrary selection of periods of regularity, c) the number of axis of causal relations that we can understand. But since our problem is knowledge for the purpose of action in real time, not ‘knowledge’ as a static absolute, and it is our actions that are limited by our ignorance, and we would not be ‘human’ without those limits, the question always seems irrational. If we understand that all thought is time-contingent based upon the knowledge at our disposal, then it’s simply illogical to even try to represent knowledge as static ‘truths’. The question itself is irrational. If the standard is ‘enough perception that we can act to achieve our ends despite the limits of our minds’ that is very different from ‘we can understand the full set of causal relations by a process of representing measures of categories, and reducing them to expressions that are possible to articulate as a narrative.’ Since, we can test our theories, and science demands that we can both test (reproduce)( and determine the boundary conditions (falsify) our theories, using science and language to extend our sense perceptions, then we can test the correspondence of our understanding of the real world. It certainly appears that we can be successful in reducing the unobservable complexity of the real world into symbolic and linguistic representations that are sufficient allegories to experience, that we can understand and at at any scale in which we an define a scheme of measurement (sensing). And there is no reason at present to believe that there is some limit to this, other than our ability to marshall the physical resources to perform tests, or because performing those tests would violate the terms of cooperation with other humans (morality). And so, as Steven says above, theories are descriptive within the state of knowledge of the moment, if they correctly express the measurements and narratives of causal relations as we understand them at the moment, because they cannot exist without the context of the forms of measurement that we used to formulate them. Those statements in fact, correspond with reality at some level of precision. So the realist expectation is that we increasingly understand the complexity of reality, but may never fully achieve it. Although that imperfection may be meaningless for the purposes of action, as long as the allegory to experience is sufficient to produce the actions in question. The generational problem affecting the discipline of philosophy is that the metaphysical assumption that we can introspectively solve these problems without the help of science is as absurd as thinking that we can solve these problems without language. The discipline of Philosophy can help us construct analogies to experience so that we may consume those analogies and ‘understand’ them. But we cannot introspectively sense, perceive, and understand much outside of human scale, without the discipline of science. Hence not only is CR a form of Realism, but it is an improvement on Realism because it does not assume that representations are static.

              • (PERSONAL NOTE) First sketch: Contra Quine. The Physical Universe Observation (m

                (PERSONAL NOTE)

                First sketch:

                Contra Quine.

                The Physical Universe

                Observation (memory)

                Descriptive language

                The Scientific Method

                Measurement

                Mathematics

                Logic.

                Each of these is related to the one before it.

                Each loses information over the one before it.

                Rather than this hierarchy, they can be arranged on multiple axis describing various relations between them.

                But in every set of relations, information loss remains.

                Calculation in the broadest sense is impossible without information loss.

                The reason Popper’s CR is attractive is that it is a theory of action.

                It compensates for a cognitive bias all humans possess, which is that sense, perception, memory, and ‘calculation’ theorizing and planning are of necessity inductive processes, because we are always working against a kaleidic future whose state we can only approximate.

                Humans evolved to act with little information.

                When we extended our sense perception (observability) first with language and the narrative, we developed argument in the loosest terms. Second with quantitative measurements, we developed mathematics to work with objects whose scale was beyond our perception. Third we developed what we now call pure or symbolic logic to work with sets instead of quantities.

                But each of these systems launders information.

                Furthermore, we are confused by physics and fortunately countered by economics, because while the categories that we measure in the physical universe equilibrate, and we believed economies equilibrated because of prices. But it turns out, that because of flocking and schooling by induction-driven humans, that economies actually drive to disequilibrium, where they crash and people reorganize. Many small reorganizations are easy to absorb, and very large are not. ( Housing, Plague, trade routes, war. )

                There is a vast difference between symbolic logic and the logic of action for similar reasons of information loss.

                And this is the problem with both how popper argued in favor of CR in his era, and how Quine et all’s criticism is false.

                It is that the physical sciences snd the symbolic languages of logic and mathematics refer to constant categories that mirror the properties of the physical universe because ratios equilibrate in a manner identical to the physical universe wherever that universe exists independent of human action.

                But since humans act with limited information, their actions are fraught with error. In their inductions, in their, theories, in their actions and in their observations.

                The difference between poppers CR and Quine’s formal logic is that popper is inarticulately trying to give us direction given that we have made many errors of inclusion, exclusion and calculation in articulating a theory whatever its form, but our error is an error in the selection of information not an error in reasoning.

                Quines errors are many but I think they can be summed up as confusing an error in reasoning with errors of measurement, by confusing the content of statements with the categories that they are symbols of, because the simplistic set theory he is working with correlates highly with the physical universe because that universe equilibrates to a natural state, while the human race faces the unique challenge of creating disequilibria in the physical universe so that we can capture the energy available in the difference.

                I have always viewed formal logic as a tautological victorian parlor game.

                Someone smarter than i am will have to take on the burden of creating a smbolic logic of action in disequilibrium. But i suspect that we already have it, in the scientific method and that the attempts to conjoin formal logic of certainty and the critical rationalism in science are operationally distinct fields.

                Source date (UTC): 2013-07-14 08:12:00 UTC

              • “fluid tests are more reflective of cognitive processes while crystallized tests

                “fluid tests are more reflective of cognitive processes while crystallized tests are more reflective of acquired skills and knowledge. “

                Source date (UTC): 2013-07-11 20:44:00 UTC

              • THE PURPOSE OF PHILOSOPHY (Draft One) 1) All language is allegory to experience.

                THE PURPOSE OF PHILOSOPHY

                (Draft One)

                1) All language is allegory to experience. The most complex terms are simply increasingly loaded combinations of basic experiences.

                2) Our experiences are limited. We can only sense so much on our own, with the physical bodies that we have to work with.

                3) Language allows us to collect a greater range of experiences than we can on our own. Even experiences separated by time and space.

                4) Our ‘calculative’ (not computational) ability is limited. We can only ‘figure out’ so much on our own.

                5) Language allows others to help us calculate what we could not calculate on our own.

                6) Systems of measurement allow us to ‘sense’ what we cannot sense with our senses alone.

                7) Systems of calculation and computation let us compare and contrast what we cannot figure out on our own.

                8) Language, Measurement, and Calculation and Reason allow us to extend our perceptions, and to create symbols that we can manipulate with the limited abilities that we do possess.

                9) The purpose of philosophy is to test, integrate, reconstruct, rearrange, evaluate, prioritize and articulate our body of knowledge to our advantage given the new information available to our senses by way of our tools, measurements, communications, and calculations, so that we can make best use of the information at our disposal.

                The assumption in this line of reasoning, this set of priorities, is that with more knowledge we have more choices to determine how to make ourselves most happy through the accumulation of experiences.

                The other line of reasoning, is that human beings are able at present to be happy if they seek to obtain

                The problem is that humans demonstrate a preference for the consumption provided by the first, and demonstrate a preference to expend the intellectual and physical labor of the second. More accurately: they want others to expend the effort on the first, and to reserve for themselves the experiences of the second.

                We call conflict of ambitions a desire for ‘free riding’. In fact, we can argue that more human calculation is performed for the purpose of pursuing free riding than any other end except sex.

                Curt Doolittle.

                Kiev, Ukraine.

                (NOTE 1: “Calculation, in its broadest sense, refers to any comparison that permits a judgement. So while numeric computation is included in the definition of calculation, but so is ‘Where can I get a peanut butter sandwich?’ and ‘Do I like chocolate or vanilla ice cream more today?’. We use ‘calculation’ to distinguish simplistic processes from reasoning, which has a higher standard of demands – namely substitution and transformation.)

                (NOTE 2: This approach abandons the metaphysical program.)

                Source date (UTC): 2013-07-01 10:22:00 UTC

              • REDUCTION IN GUN HOMICIDES SINCE 1993. Why does the public think they’re increas

                http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_GUN_VIOLENCE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-05-07-19-27-18DRAMATIC REDUCTION IN GUN HOMICIDES SINCE 1993.

                Why does the public think they’re increasing when we’ve seen such a rapid decline?

                Source date (UTC): 2013-05-08 10:45:00 UTC

              • WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF ALL MONEY SUDDENLY DISAPPEARED? by Curt Doolittle, The Prop

                WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF ALL MONEY SUDDENLY DISAPPEARED?

                by Curt Doolittle, The Propertarian Institute

                (Reposted from Quora)

                Believe it or not, this subject has been given quite a bit of treatment in the literature – mostly during the early part of the last century in response to the communist, socialist and fascist movements.

                REALITY:

                Almost everyone, on the planet, except for perhaps ~500M subsistence farmers would die in the first 30-90 days. Yes. Really. Seriously.

                MONEY

                Money makes planning of complex things possible.

                Humans literally cannot ‘think’ as we understand the term, without numbers, money, property, contracts, credit and interest. Just as drawings and written words help us remember things, numbers help us remember things we could not remember, think about, or compare without them. Money makes numbers possible to apply to things that are DIFFERENT. Whereas numbers without money can only be used for things that are the SAME. As such, we say that money makes it possible to compare objects that are otherwise incommensurable. Money renders the world commensurable: open to planning and the use of mathematics (measurement and forecasting).

                In practical terms, money and prices form an information system that tells us all what to do in real time in response to what others want and need. It is how we tell each other how to cooperate. It is the human social system. And the use of that social system, plus the capture of fossile fuel, has taken us out of ignorance and poverty.

                CONVERSELY

                What money and credit have also done is make it possible to breed again up to new malthusian levels. While Malthus was only half right, he was half right. Group selection accomplishes what malthus did not account for. THe general belief of ‘progressives’ is that technology will ‘save us again’ just like agrarianism, and then pastoralism saved us in the past. But the truth is we just breed up to these levels again, and reduce ourselves back to poverty.

                The problem then is that we must control our breeding. And that has been, except for a brief period in china, or the middle ages in England under Manorialism impossible to achieve. Partly because it is so profitable to sell things to people who bear children, and those children as they too mature.

                EXAMPLES

                THe US economy is primarily driven by housing, and the high rate of return on lending for housing, and the large supply of labor jobs for the production of housing. From this perspective, the exceptional nature of the american economy is not the product of ‘democracy’ or innovation, but the product of selling off a continent to waves of immigrants and their offspring, and using the profits from the sale of the (conquered) continent to invest in increasingly complex technologies.

                THe Chinese for example have figured this out and are doing the same thing but moving people from the ‘poor’ village farm to cities where they *hope* the population will be more productive than they were at subsistence farming. China can do this bcause it adopted consumer capitalism (money, prices and interest) and abandoned communism (no money, no prices, and no interest).

                The problem other countries face (India and say, Ukraine) is india is so pervasively corrupt that it’s not possible to create infrastructure without privatization of the investment through corruption, and the population is still expanding unsustainably in a dirty and hot environment. THe problem Ukraine faces, is that it cannot play ‘china’ because the lower levels of government are so corrupt and the country sees no demand for its currency, so the government cannot issue credit, and therefore the people remain poor.

                IN CLOSING

                When you say ‘money went away’ what you must also understand is that with money and prices will go the ability to communicate, and think. Literally. Humans would not be able to cooperate, communicate, plan and think without money. Worse, they would have no incentive to do so, because to have an incentive one must be able to think of something to do. And you couldn’t think of anything to do that you couldn’t do with your own two hands.

                THere is about 4 days worth of energy, and 14 days worth of food in the pipeline. If you made money vanish, you would need to make 6B people vanish along with it.

                You may find a more thorough, or a more simplistic answer elsewhere. But this is the answer, and there isnt any alternative.

                Source date (UTC): 2013-05-01 06:37:00 UTC

              • What Would Happen If There Were No Money On Earth?

                Believe it or not, this subject has been given quite a bit of treatment in the literature – mostly during the early part of the last century in response to the communist, socialist and fascist movements.

                REALITY:
                Almost everyone, on the planet,  except for perhaps ~500M subsistence farmers would die in the first 30-90 days.  Yes.  Really.  Seriously.

                MONEY
                Money makes planning of complex things possible.
                Humans literally cannot ‘think’ as we understand the term, without numbers, money, property, contracts, credit and interest. Just as drawings and written words help us remember things, numbers help us remember things we could not remember, think about, or compare without them.  Money makes numbers possible to apply to things that are DIFFERENT.  Whereas numbers without  money can only be used for things that are the SAME. As such, we say that money makes it possible to compare objects that are otherwise incommensurable.  Money renders the world commensurable: open to planning and the use of mathematics (measurement and forecasting).

                In practical terms, money and prices form an information system that tells us all what to do in real time in response to what others want and need. It is how we tell each other how to cooperate.  It is the human social system. And the use of that social system, plus the capture of fossile fuel, has taken us out of ignorance and poverty.

                CONVERSELY
                What money and credit have also done is make it possible to breed again up to new malthusian levels. While Malthus was only half right, he was half right. Group selection accomplishes what malthus did not account for.  THe general belief of ‘progressives’ is that technology will ‘save us again’ just like agrarianism, and then pastoralism saved us in the past.  But the truth is we just breed up to these levels again, and reduce ourselves back to poverty.

                The problem then is that we must control our breeding.  And that has been, except for a brief period in china, or the middle ages in England under Manorialism impossible to achieve. Partly because it is so profitable to sell things to people who bear children, and those children as they too mature.

                EXAMPLES
                THe US economy is primarily driven by housing, and the high rate of return on lending for housing, and the large supply of labor jobs for the production of housing. From this perspective, the exceptional nature of the american economy is not the product of ‘democracy’ or innovation, but the product of selling off a continent to waves of immigrants and their offspring, and using the profits from the sale of the (conquered) continent to invest in increasingly complex technologies.

                THe Chinese for example have figured this out and are doing the same thing but moving people from the ‘poor’ village farm to cities where they *hope* the population will be more productive than they were at subsistence farming. China can do this bcause it adopted consumer capitalism (money, prices and interest) and abandoned communism (no money, no prices, and no interest). 

                The problem other countries face (India and say, Ukraine) is india is so pervasively corrupt that it’s not possible to create infrastructure without privatization of the investment through corruption, and the population is still expanding unsustainably in a dirty and hot environment.  THe problem Ukraine faces, is that it cannot play ‘china’ because the lower levels of government are so corrupt and the country sees no demand for its currency, so the government cannot issue credit, and therefore the people remain poor.

                IN CLOSING
                When you say ‘money went away’ what you must also understand is that with money and prices will go the ability to communicate, and think. Literally.  Humans would not be able to cooperate, communicate, plan and think without money. Worse, they would have no incentive to do so, because to have an incentive one must be able to think of something to do.  And you couldn’t think of anything to do that you couldn’t do with your own two hands.

                THere is about 4 days worth of energy, and 14 days worth of food in the pipeline. If you made money vanish, you would need to make 6B people vanish along with it.

                You may find a more thorough, or a more simplistic answer elsewhere. But this is the answer, and there isnt any alternative.

                https://www.quora.com/What-would-happen-if-there-were-no-money-on-earth