Trump. Paris. Moscow.

Tags

coal, gas, green, oil, Paris, Putin, Trump

I am sure a lot of people wrote something recently about the biggest idiot of a president of the United States history in relation to his (confused) backing out of Paris treaty. I didn’t expect anything else from advocate of fake news – he will be convincing you that global warming does not exist and best for you for breakfast is a bit of coal garnished with oil. Well, if you believe him, you deserve it.

I looked at those news from another angle, namely through the Russian involvement in election affair. It may be far-fetched, but maybe it is not: Russian economy survives practically only because of oil and gas reserves, not mentioning vast amounts of coal. On top of that Russia is way behind in new technologies, it would need a lot of catching up which would mean investment. Now imagine that demand for oil goes down because bunch of countries (including biggest pollutants) are now going green. Russia has a problem. No money for new technologies… and no money from oil to fill budget coffers.

And here is the catch: Trump gave Russia fantastic way out of it. Russia can now count on demand staying at least steady for a while when at the same time it can support Paris agreement. Trump is bad boy. Not so long ago Putin told the world that a group of patriotic Russian hackers may have attacked US election. Patriotic? Is this not a definition of defending interests of own country?

Strange world we live in.

12 Questions About Future

Tags

12 questions about future, article, BBC, future, future of mankind, Magazine

BBC online version has interesting article here: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170328-12-questions-we-need-to-prioritise-in-2017, and below is my summary 🙂

1. HOW CAN WE AVOID RESISTANCE TO ANTIBIOTICS?
2. WHAT CAN WE DO TO CONSERVE WATER — ESPECIALLY IN THE FACE OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND URBANISATION?
3. HOW DO WE FIGHT ‘FAKE NEWS’?

This is truly a very interesting question (not that the first two are not important). How do we tell the difference between real reality and the one made for us? Where there is a line between what we believe to be true because of whatever, and what is really true? Populism uses many tools today to make fake news and people believe in them…

4. IN AN INTERCONNECTED WORLD, HOW DO WE FIGHT GLOBAL DISEASE?

5. HOW WILL WE DEAL WITH OVERPOPULATION?

6. HOW WILL THE ERA OF BIG DATA AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE SHAPE OUR HEALTH?

7. HOW CAN WE SAFELY USE GENE EDITING TECHNOLOGY IN HUMANS?

8. HOW DO WE MAKE CITIES MORE SUSTAINABLE AND PLEASANT FOR THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE THERE ?

9. HOW CAN WE KEEP EXTENDING OUR LIFE EXPECTANCIES?

This one stands out too, especially now. Living longer is one thing, living productively and purposefully is another. I will get back to it below.

10. HOW CAN RAPIDLY DEVELOPING REGIONS GROW EFFECTIVELY?

11. HOW CAN WE BETTER INFORM PEOPLE ABOUT NATURAL DISASTERS?

12. CAR OWNERSHIP CONTINUES TO RISE WORLDWIDE — HOW WILL WE ACCOMMODATE THIS?

And that is the whole list. I am somewhat disappointed that one question is missing:

HOW DO WE GUARANTEE JOBS TO PEOPLE IN AGE OF AUTOMATION?

It ties in with getting older and somewhat touches on car ownership, as this is the first area with such a visible impact where automation is likely to displace millions of jobs within next 20 years or so. Truck drivers, taxis, post office vehicles all have humans behind a wheel. Soon not to be so. Of course many other jobs are in danger, jobs which do not require university diplomas to be executed. What are going to do with those people? Who will keep paying to support ageing population? This for me is one of the most pressing questions where time runs out for an answer… and it did not show up in BBC article.

Popular Demand

Tags

AI, decisions, future, jobs, laws, populism, technology

Today world is full of populist pseudo-leaders using rhetoric people like to hear but offering no real solutions to problems. It is so easy to promise to build a wall, so easy to close borders. It is more difficult to fix the underlying causes of immigration. Politics became a game of thrones – who will get the seat to gain power, wealth, name in history. Reality though does not care, wheel of time moves unaffected by all this noise. There are issues out there not one of the leaders is even mentally ready to fix. World today changes because of technology and capitalism. Income gap is a reality pushing people for change, without really knowing what change they really want. They want different reality. But hey, it will not come by itself.

What needs to be done is not easy, involves tough choices and consequence. A lot of thinking and preparation. Technology threatens to remove a lot of jobs: driver-less cars will kill Uber, taxis, truck drivers and with it all mail or milk or post deliveries. This in itself represents great number of people. Robots replace manual labour. AI removes secretaries or assistants. Capitalism means producing goods cheaper and cheaper to beat competition, but that in assumption that someone is still out there to be able to buy those goods. If technology will remove jobs, who will buy those goods produced at near zero costs? Many of us will get by, but will have not enough to retire in comfort. We are, as humanity, getting older. Who will support us?

This is not to say that capitalism is bad. It drives a lot of inventions, if not all. But we need to come up with an idea how to share that additional value made without being communist about it. We need to divide income in a better way, without giving it away. We need to tackle those issues first. World is so interconnected today, that it moves like water. Rich economies attract poorer ones, as in nature trying to reach balance. We can either leave it to chaos, or try to control it using some measures. It is clear that some will gain without giving, but many more will gain and give, loosing at the same time reasons to emigrate. I don’t know what will work, simple giving money away may not be a solution. But this is what leaders should think about. The rest is just a circus and sometimes we laugh until we cry.

Hopes of Change

Tags

change, economy, election, politics, populism, president, promises, Trump

I just came back from a trip to South Africa and there too new American president, Mr. Trump, is being discussed widely and often. Some people have really high hopes for the new president and this looks to me like a confirmation of what I wrote before about populist choices. Your heart wants things to happen. But… logically Mr. Trump as any other president needs to follow (or observe) some rules which are beyond his control.

For example: he wants to build a wall and let us say that he does. Someone needs to pay for it, regardless of the cost. If he will pay for it from taxes, there will be nothing left for anything else. If he will print money, the country will end up in a downward inflation spiral.

I have no idea how he wants to “convince” private companies to manufacture in the US… nationalize them? This also will send a wrong signal, which may result in companies moving their offices abroad. Massively. If he does convince them to produce in the US, the prices will probably get higher. Both results are bad for the consumers.

Immigration: if he will start deporting people, he has to have agreements with other countries to take those people in. Takes time and result is very questionable. If he here pays them (with some sort of trade or debt incentives) US will lose and the result may be more national debt, less money for other projects (such as infrastructure revamp) or again, inflation. If he will just dump people at the border somewhere, this may result in unrest and riots. Not pretty prospect either.

I could go on and on, and I didn’t even mention global political issues where Mr. Trump has no training and no experience. If in terms of business acumen he may be able to use his knowledge, in area of global politics he will need to rely on advisors and those people will follow old way of doing things – at best result will be more of same old stuff.

At best, choosing Mr. Trump will not change much and result in big disappointment. At worst, he will drag the country into even bigger debt and loose global leadership position to China and/or Russia, which will take years to change.

There is one area though where he could do something: change the tax laws and simplify them. Through that, he may achieve at least economic change. But here he will need to fight establishment currently taking profits from existing situation. I personally doubt if he will manage to do that… but good luck American people. You have chosen. Live with it.

 

People are bunch of liars

Tags

Clinton, election, forecast, Nate Silver, people, politics, populist, president, Trump, USA

Have a look at this picture (it comes from Nate Silver website here):

This image was on his web site on the 8th of November, meaning that his forecast was wrong right up to the last minutes of the election. Why? I can only speculate, but I base this speculation on election results in Poland and in Hungary and on recent successes of all populist parties in Europe. My speculation is this: all polls check what people say, not what people feel or really think. We live in times where all issues where politics have failed us (income inequality, immigrants, refugees, unemployment, lack of future) have become playing field for all kinds of populists. They know how people feel and use it to gain power – but have no real solutions to those problems. Look at Brexit. It was easy to play on people’s feelings, but after it was done, masters behind that referendum disappeared, leaving a big mess behind (here too, all sorts of forecasts showed Britain staying in the EU). I am sorry to say to all Americans, Trump will not leave. You are stuck with him for at least 4 years – unless you will impeach him for something. Which is not that unlikely.

Similarly I guess all the recent elections were lost to populists, and there is plenty to come, next one being Germany. Those parties promise money, or building walls, or whatever – and sometimes really keep their promises by paying for them with taxpayers money – and even though your reason tells you that they are not the best solution, your heart wins, because you feel in your heart that this is what you would like to happen, even if it logically cannot as there are no easy solutions to all current problems. And you vote for them. Lying at the same time to all polls you came across, so you don’t look stupid.

My advice to Nat Silver and all other guys (including the one from Stanford who ate a bug on national TV) is to add “feeling factor” to their algorithms. The more all issues are hot in terms of beliefs and feelings, the bigger impact that factor should have over cold data based on interviews. Eventually you will be able to adjust over people’s lies.