Economics of Human Energy

Thoughts about how money and human energy relate

A PM I once worked with was struggling to persuade somebody of something. I told him to ask them the question, “What data would I have to show you to get you to change your mind?” If they didn’t have a clear answer, then he would know this was an idea they held on faith, a bit like a religious belief. No amount of data can sway a person from their... See more

Deb Liu • Changing Your Mind

Faith requires less energy than change

The biggest factor that slows down a company is how much time and energy it takes to communicate goals and expectations.

Rebranding to Engineering Generosity

High-quality access to information : social technologies that help people form high-quality opinions about important topics in an adversarial environment. I personally am bullish on prediction markets and Community Notes; you may have a different take on the solutions, but the point is that this topic is important.

Vitalik Buterin • Against Choosing Your Political Allegiances Based on Who Is "Pro-Crypto"

We need ways to filter, validate, and value large amounts of information. Traditionally, this has been limited to the wealthy in the form of “experts”

At present most work is useless or worse and we should simply get rid of it.

Bob Black • The Abolition of Work

Paladin saves the world? Degrowth story.

Barbarian masculine energy saves the world? Degrowth story.

Enlightened sexless bureaucracy saves the world? Degrowth story.

Nurturing feminine energy saves the world? Degrowth story.

Unbridled technological acceleration saves the world? Degrowth story.

Unbridled GDP growth saves the world? Degrowth story.

Saintly

every story is a degrowth story

These I agree are degrowth stories.

I think the connection he’s making is to the book, so that the loss of complexity in society leaves people feeling lost and unvalued, and that leads to societal collapse.

What if we don’t tie society to complexity?

This is the paradox of our time: the very tools designed to free us from labor are trapping us in an endless cycle of escalating work.

Tina He • Jevons Paradox: A personal perspective

Yes.

In the US, this began with the launch of TikTok.

Jonah Peretti • The Anti-SNARF Manifesto

this began well before TikTok.

It was always there from the time we networked the first computers together, because it’s the flaw with the economy first and foremost.

However, if we truly aim at discussing the economy at a level where we can start to grasp it in its broadest sense we need to add the “invisible” economy, or what is more often called the non-monetary economy. This is a system of economies typically embedded in a monetary economy yet it undertakes tasks that benefit society by means that the... See more

Jenny Grettve • economicspaces

Money is a captured subset of human value created. For people with plenty, it’s the default, because it’s easy to use. But for people without, that value is captured in ways like status, privileges, perks, etc.

H]uman beings need all the relatives they can get–as possible donors or receivers not necessarily of love, but of common decency.

. . .

When we were children in Indianapolis, Indiana, it appeared that we would always have an extended family of genuine relatives there. Our parents and grandparents, after all, had grown up there with shoals of siblings

Austin Kleon • KURT VONNEGUT ON THE NEED FOR BUILDING EXTENDED FAMILIES

Extended Family is important. Why not choose the extended family we bring in?